"A ver" mujer

Come one, come all. If you are about to turn 98, are pregnant with triplets, are 40 and just got your fifth divorce, are still a toddler (OK, maybe a bit of an exaggeration)... Universidad República is for you.

Oh, wait, you have to be Uruguayan. That probably eliminates the majority of you. No, who am I kidding, that eliminates all of you.

Founded in 1849, La Universidad República is Uruguay’s oldest and largest public university. Education at “República” is free and open to all Uruguayans with a bachillerato (high school diploma). A few decades ago, despite the free tuition, university education tended to be limited to children of middle and upper class families as the lower classes needed to work to support their family. However, recently there has been a surge in night classes, known as “horario nocturno” to enable more full time-workers to also be university students. (This would explain why my classes are from 6-9 pm and why on my original schedule I had a class 9-11 on Friday nights…which took me only one look at my schedule to change).

So, lets move away from the quick history blurb and turn to the make-up of my own classes at La Universidad República.

I counted today (during one of the many times in the course of the three hour class where the professor was talking about something completely off topic) and of the 35 people in my class, I figured that five were under the age of 30. I also figured (this is a complete guess) that at least 20 of the 35 students could care less about their final grade. No one has to pass here, what is the difference between a grade of 1 (fail) of 12 (the highest mark) when you are sixty and taking the class for something to do on Tuesday and Thursday nights?

One woman in my class known by most of my compañeros as the “a ver” mujer is a middle aged women who decided to take an education class because her daughter is a teacher in Miami. I know this because she told me. Well not just me, the whole class….along with every other little fact about her life and opinions of the education system in Uruguay. Staring every phrase with “A ver” or sometimes just sticking her little finger in the air and saying “a ver” to try to get a word in when someone else is speaking, every time her shrill voice is heard half the class cringes and the professor always gets a nice little grin on his face.

Both of my classes are lleno aka full of “a ver” mujeres and other choice personalities…but I can’t complain. I wanted something different, right?

SIDE NOTE: Although this blog is a tad sarcastic and implicative of a somewhat dreadful Latin American University experience I would like to mention that most of the time I enjoy my classes and of the select few younger students in my classes, have met some great new friends. No te preocupes…don’t you worry….