18.05.2014 Bulletin

by Marita
(Montevideo, Uruguay)

Consider:

"There is a line from one of Charles Dickens' novels that goes something like this: Income 21 shillings, outgo 19 shillings equals bliss. Income 21 shillings, outgo 22 shillings equals misery." -- Charley Reese.

Dear Folks

The weather is still excellent! So, while waiting for winter, you can come over to La Papoñita in Montevideo to talk about anything and everything with others enjoying the fact that winter has not yet arrived.

And yes, we will be back at La Papoñita this coming Sunday, so at14:00 (2 pm), so La Papoñita is the place to be.

Other topics that may be of interest include:

1. If an electronics engineer would like skip this coming winter in Uruguay and spend a few months in London working on an interesting project creating cheap electricity to power lights, so that the poor worldwide can stop using the dangerous kerosene, you can still send your CV to GravityLight. And yes, they have developed a light that works with something everyone everywhere has for free--gravity. The deadline was actually May 2nd, but they say you can still apply.

Find out more about GravityLight at:

http://deciwatt.org

and read about the position at:

http://deciwatt.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/2014-04-29-GravityLight-electronics-engineer-volunteer-description.pdf

2. Some Uruguayan History. This time a surprise: There is a holiday coming up on May 18th, Batalla de las Piedras, celebrating the first important victory of Artigas in 1811, and this time, stores and office will NOT be closed. Definitely a first! You can read all about it at

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batalla_de_Las_Piedras_%281811%29

3. It might be a good time to think about cell phone security: A visitor from Brazil had her cell phone stolen while in Uruguay, and had to leave without it, but she had an app through which it could be traced, so that story has a happy ending. There are several apps that make this possible, and others that provide added security. Check out:

http://www.heavy.com/tech/2013/04/apps-to-find-a-lost-or-stolen-iphone/

or

http://techpp.com/2009/09/18/6-ways-to-find-track-lost-stolen-iphone-free/

Other stories have had less happy endings: There is a new trick, in which thieves set up their own "businesses" with numbers that are expensive to call, and then go to another country, where they steal phones and then call their own "business" numbers, leading to cell phone bills of thousands for the owner. The solution to that is to be sure that you set your phone to require the password immediately.

4. There is lots of music to be enjoyed, much of it for free. Our music expert writes:

There's also a Chinese percussion ensemble called Li Biao on May 24, a Portuguese fado singer on June 9, and the Jerusalem Festival Chamber Ensemble on June 25 – all at Solís. Not to mention bunches of dance things and things in Spanish...

There's another free concert at Solís on Sunday June 15:

Soprano: Paula Almerares (Arg)
Tenor: Rubén Martínez (Arg)
Guitarra: Álvaro Córdoba
Flauta: Sonia Callejas
Piano: Carla Ferreira

Programa:

Parte I

W.A. Mozart (1756 - 1791) _ Sonata K.V. 331 en La Mayor
Transcripción para flauta y guitarra del Mtro. Antonio Pereira Arias
Andante grazioso
Variaciones I, II, III, IV, V (Adagio), VI (Allegro)
Menuetto - Trio - Alla Turca (Allegretto)

Parte II

Abraham Jurafsky (1906 - 1993) _ Canciones argentinas
Copla
Vidala
Vidalita

Borges _ Poema de los dones
Arreglo: Andres Risso

Carlos Guastavino (1912 - 2000) _ La rosa y el sauce
Poesía de Francisco Silva

Parte III

Johannes Brahms (1833 - 1897) _ Canciones populares alemanas Wo0 33
Da unten im Tale (En el fondo del valle)
Schwesterlein (Hermanita)
Es steht ein Lind (Un tilo se alza en aquel valle)


Camille Saint Saëns (1835 - 1921) _ Una Flauta invisible
Para canto, flauta y piano

Franz Liszt (1811 -1886) _ Die Loreley

Morgan_Zveignumg - Cecilie

5. Update on FATCA: For those of you that are required to pay taxes in the USA, FATCA, which was delayed but scheduled to begin on July 1, 2014, has now been delayed yet again for some, this time to January 1, 2016. According to Nestmann,

On May 2, it (the IRS) released regulations that give many of the companies and financial institutions affected by FATCA another 18 months – until January 1, 2016 – to become fully compliant. But this extension will apply only if the IRS thinks the particular institution is making a "good-faith effort" to do so. If it's not, withholding begins July 1.

http://www.nestmann.com/will-the-irs-reschedule-the-death-of-the-dollar

Any funds transferred to institutions deemed non-compliant will simply have 30% deducted from the money to be transferred. The US bank will send it to the IRS, so the recipient and the IRS can sort it out later.

You might want to keep this date in mind when you plan to transfer funds from the USA to Uruguay.

Which is quite enough for this week.

Except to remind you that we will meet back at La Papoñita again this Sunday--14:00 (2 pm), to discuss Mujica's trip to Washington, D.C., and other hot topics.