Back in Guarambare! Ahhhh, home sweet home. I spent the last couple days in the Caaguazu region, shadowing PCV Vickie and learning a bit about life in the campo. I met Vickie and her BF Blake at the Asuncion Bus Station Monday morning.Blake lives in a community pretty close to Asuncion that is an afro-paraguayan community, one of the only ones. Interesting little tid bit of Paraguayan history-there are many Paraguayans that believe that there was never slavery in this country because it was more or less erased from the history books a long time ago. I’m not sure of all the details but I know it has a lot to do with the dictatorship and what not, but pretty interesting eh? Anyway, Vickie and Blake and great humans for a bunch of reasons, one of the being they know the value of getting a good meal in Paraguay. For lunch, we went to Asuncion’s China Town and had some lovely chicken and rice-and soy sauce to boot! After some travel, Vickie treated me to “lomitoarabe”, which is what they call doner kebabs here (yes Madrid Kids-they HAVE taken over the world, gracias adios!) which was easily the most delicious thing I had tasted in three weeks. Yes that’s right; I have been here three weeks as of Wednesday! Woa.So we got to her teeny tiny sight that consists of a mile long “main street” with several off shoots that house the majority of the residents. The main street has a smattering of little stores, one of which is a clothing store that is owned by her Argentinian neighbors. We stopped in there to meet the fam, have some terere, discuss local happenings etc. This family was really interesting because instead of moving away from Paraguay to Argentina as so many people do, they decided after nearly twenty years in Buenos Aires to come back to sleepy little Cecilio Baez. Needless to say their teenage daughters are not feeling it, and have been trying to move back since they got here. They were an exceedingly nice family , and there accents were a nice little change up too.
Vickie lives in a cute little green house with her own kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom-perfect size for one person. She doesn’t have a refrigerator which means she has to go grocery shopping A LOT. However, one new thing I learned this week is that eggs don’t actually have to go in the refrigerator right away. Who knew?
I’ve already talked about Paraguayans rain phobia but in this town it seemed a little more valid since nothing was paved and everything got muddy and squishy in a matter of minutes. Unfortunately the massive two day rain storm of yesterday and today inhibited my trip a little bit because there were not too many people around to talk to at the school and the municipality, and Vickie’s girls group cancelled on her which was a bummer but I picked her brain for ideas and things anyway. I got to speak with the director of the school, the mayor, and watch Vickie give several computer classes in the muni as well which was interesting and something I never really considered doing but I surely see the relevance of it now. At night since it was raining so bad I picked Vickie’s brain about various other PC things, and she gave me the latest addition of the Peace Corps Paraguay magazine which is put out every swear in/close of service and is HILARIOUS. It made me really excited to start meeting other PC Paraguayers and to really start getting into the thick of things during service. Also, I realized I totally need to get an external hard drive so I can join the movie and tv show swapping network taking over the nation around here. We watched a couple episodes of How I Met Your Mother and she had a whole bunch of other stuff too. I can definitely see how something like that can maintain your sanity on slow campo nights in the rain.
This morning I jumped on the last bus outta town at 7:15am (the first one leaving at 5am, just to give you a clue as to how isolated this place is) and after a pit stop in a beautiful little city called Oviedo (not quite Vicky Cristina Barcelona but very cute)I hopped on a bus to Asuncion. The rain was SO intense, the most intense it’s been since I’ve been here so thank god Vickie was nice enough to lend me her umbrella or else it could’ve gotten ugly. In Asuncion I took an empanada break and then set out looking for my chariot back to Guarambare. The thing about the Paraguayan bus system is that you’re really never 100% sure you’re on the right bus, going in the right direction, paid the right price etc. There is a fair amount of guess work in all of it which makes it interesting, and in the POURING rain even more interesting. Luckily I picked correctly and made it back to a casi flooded Guarambare just in time for lunch and a siesta! My host aunt or cousin or something, Ali was over for lunch and she is always very warm and funny so I love her company. Some kids in my group are working in her school so she was asking me how they thought the first day went and then I just had a piece of fried chicken and went to off to my glorious nap.Luckily, I woke up just in time to go get ice cream with Ariel, Deide, and Ian’s two host siblings Matias and Velem.Wonderful day, all in all.
Saturday
Yesterday we had a training day at the big center so it was nice to catch up with the health kids and see where and what they’ve been up to the past week or so since we saw them. Most of them went to reallllllly campo places and it was funny to compare experiences. Then we got another really gross and disturbing power point on scabies and worms and bot flies (a fly that bites you and then lays an egg in you and if you don’t get it out the larvae will grow and become a fly IN you!) and other really gross things that may or may not ail you whist in Paraguay. We were all sitting there itching and grossed out the whole time but luckily I got to escape to go get my yellow fever shot and have my interview with Dee, the kind of second in command around here. So I was put out of my misery. After that we all enjoyed a Brahma or two at the little place next to the training center and had a mini celebration for one of the health kid’s birthdays.
Today we had language class early in the morning but it was fun because instead of class we had a little fiesta to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Peace Corps and also El Dia de La MujerParaguaya which was really awesome. We made guacamole with the avocados and limes from the back yard of the school and we bought a cake and made popcorn and invited our families and stuff. A couple people spoke about the history of Peace Corps, the history of the Paraguayan Women’s Day, and also about famous and important women in Peace Corps History. Ian wrote a song in guarani to celebrate the event as well. Then everyone ate and drank and what not and had a great time and we got out of guarani lessons for the day! Hallelujia!
We have the afternoon off so Ellie and I are going to show Luisito a thing or two about making papas fritas and then we’re going to watch the big important soccer game-Cerro vs. Olimpia. The whole country is at odds about this match because its between the two most popular teams in the country so it should be pretty exciting. I’ve become a Cerro fan because I’d probably get the locks changed on me if I wasn’t. So- yay Cerro!! The rest of the weekend I plan on spending verrrrrrrytranquilo and finally finishing my book! We’ve all begun a massive book trade so hopefully I’ll be able to trade mine for something new and interesting. Someone got a huge package yesterday from the Peace Corps office and we were all so jealous but her mom spent like a million dollars getting it here in a week so I’m not sure if it’ll be worth it to send things DHL. The post office ladies are coming this Wednesday so I can finally send out my letters! Apparently there is a post office in Guarambare but in typical Paraguayan fashion no one really seems to know exactly when its open and closed so I figure I’ll just wait until they come to us.
Miss and love you all, look for some letters in the next couple weeks!
Paz,
Himay
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