Paving Roads with Good Unintentions

I know the road to hell is paved with good intentions. What road is paved with good UNintentions?

This past weekend I was in Punta del Este, Uruguay, where the people are beautiful and the prices are high. Well, I was there post-high season, so I can only confirm that the prices are high. If you go in January and February, the place is said to be full with of the rich, the powerfull and the beautiful.

While there, I stayed at Hostel 1949. A decent enough place with a bit of a view of the water. Despite rain for 3 of 5 days i was there, it was a good time. I was able to make it through thier casino without gambling.

Yeah me!

As usual, the hostel had backpackers from all over the world, including two co-eds on spring break from NC State. (Is it spring up there? what happened to winter?)

The co-eds left for Montevideo about 4 hours before me because they had to catch a ferry to BA. When I arrived in Montevideo, one of them was in the terminal. She explained that she had left her passport at the hostel and that it was arrving on a bus. she went on to explained that she had now missed the ferry and she would have to fly to BA to catch her flight to the States.

The only problem, aside from missing her ferry and wondering whether her passport would arrive and thinking that the flight from UY to BA might not be in time to catch her flight to the states, was that she had no UY pesos. Her bank card didn`t work and she would have to pay a departure tax since she was flying instead of taking the boat.

She had 100 Arg Pesos. I had about 1,650 UY pesos, so i told her that i would give her 600 UY pesos for the 100 Arg pesos. An even trade for both of us.

After the passport arrived, I went on my way.

The next day, the day i planned to leave Uruguay, I was looking for my 1,000 Peso note. I knew i had it because I had had it for a few days. I saw it again when I was exchaning the 600 Pesos. I needed the 1000 pesos because i was trying to time my money so I would be done with pesos at the border of Argentina.

I looked in all my money-keeping spots but I could not find the bill (about US$45) anywhere. I had to take more money from the bank.

The other day, I received a nice thank you email from North Carolina. ¨Thanks for the help the other day. I had to pay additional tax for....(who knows what)....Thanks again, best of luck traveling, and don't worry, I'll pay it forward.¨

¨Pay it forward¨??????? but we had an even exchange of currency.

Or did we?

Email:

Me: I don´t suppose i gave you a 1,000 peso note in with the 100`s, did I?

Her: Ahhh yes, you gave me the 1000 pesos. I didn't realize it until I got the airport but it was very fortunate because there was no ATM in site and of course I had no money. Honestly I don't think I could have made it home without the 1000.

Me, to myself: ¨can you pay it forward to my bank account?¨

I am sure goodwill will come my way for this untintentional good deed - but I would rather have the cash.

bjm 13 March 2008