Three years ago, I began my application for the Peace Corps. It took the better part of a year to finish the application process and be invited to serve in Paraguay. As it turns out, the process for leaving the Peace Corps is, in many ways, equally drawn out. I’ve spent the last month closing [...]
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Last week, the 28 twenty-somethings from G-29 (my training group) congregated in a hotel outside of Asuncion for three days of paperwork, discussions, and thrilling Powerpoints complete with gripping animated slide transitions (and sound-effects!). Our group started with 31 trainees in February ‘09, and losing just three volunteers to ETs over the course of two [...]
Many of us volunteers who keep blogs often forget that people actually read them. I frequently get contacted by future trainees back in the US who have questions, and I though I would address some of their most frequent questions:
Dear future G-35 trainees,
I think it’s customary for most soon-to-be-leaving volunteers who keep blogs to write [...]
Elections were held this week. Being a spectator of the process was as amusing as it was vexing. The political campaign ads in the States that you see on tv, the internet, billboards, bumper stickers, blimps, graffitied on public bathroom stalls, or thrown through your living room window wrapped around a brick are all, compared [...]
Folks here in Paraguay neither trick nor treat this time of year. The general reaction to my explanations of how Halloween works in the States is confusion mixed with sympathy for the frightened children. I tell a story about how my family once sent a five-year-old Power Ranger running out of our haunted house after [...]
I’ve mentioned the idiosyncrasies of Paraguayan plumbing in earlier posts. For those who don’t remember, let me put it this way: The important barrier that normally exists between water and electricity is a bit blurry here. Homes that are fortunate enough to have those two utilities generally don’t use the same technique that you may [...]
I don’t do drugs, but I will be writing this next post really, really high. I just got through painting my concrete cell of an apartment, and that paint was stinky. Now I have nothing to do but sit on the roof waiting for the paint to dry, and convince myself that those flying monsters [...]
As I chatted with an old woman on the second of my day’s three flights, I realized just how long it had been since I was in the States. She and her husband were on the way home from a trip to Peru, where they were doing an amateur archaeology expedition. They told me about [...]
Ever since Peace Corps unexpectedly pulled me out of site like a mean little brother pulling the Band-Aid off the wound of a sleeping sibling, I have wandered Paraguay with little more than a small backpack. My belongings were fetched by a PC driver after my evacuation and placed into storage. My life since that [...]
Phrenology was a science based upon the idea that the shape of the human brain could indicate certain character traits or mental abilities. For example, if you had a large section for music, that meant you were likely to be a good musician. I say this “was” a science because its foundation was debunked long [...]
It wasn’t the Nazis’ faces melting off or that huge Nazi guy that gets chopped up by an airplane’s propeller that made Indiana Jones an inappropriate movie for the 5 year-old version of myself. It was the damn snakes. Fellow volunteers and local Paraguayans are aware of this fear I have and think it’s hilarious. [...]
I apologize for my absence from the world of blogs, (also known as “blahgs” for those from Minnesota). I have been busier than a BP Public Relations employee recently, and have been without my trusty old laptop for a little while as it gets cleaned up. I lived near the beach for a few years [...]
It was either a fellow volunteer or Confucius who once said, “In Paraguay, the days are long but the months are short.” That is to say, one’s life here day to day can feel like its moving slowly, but when you step back and consider it all, everything goes by very quickly. That feels more [...]
Some things are just impossible to get rid of: A box of slightly-used New Kids on the Block cassettes; that fishy smell in your kitchen after seafood night; a head-shrinking gypsy curse; second-hand glitter from your middle school dance partner; and of course, obnoxious South American terrorists.
Remember those guys pretending to be a terrorist group [...]
April means a few things every year. You need to start figuring out a good way to lie to the IRS about how much you made in tips last year. You need to call animal control to come fix that April Fools joke that went awry, (I was sure that prank with the squirrels was [...]
What do you get when you mix America’s big government bureaucracy with Paraguay’s laid-back procrastination? Besides the setting for a potential sitcom pilot on FOX called Arrested International Development, you get a painfully frustrating scheduling challenge.
The first time I met the US Ambassador to Paraguay, I was at the embassy for my training group’s [...]
My repertoire of amusing food stories seems to be constantly growing in this country. There are many meals that end with me thinking to myself “Wow, I didn’t realize people ate that animal part/organ/section of the digestive track.” Of course, some food stories don’t necessarily have to involve strange animal parts. They sometimes are the [...]
Like aging, the process of adapting to life here has been gradual, and its results are nearly indiscernible from day to day. However, if you were to step back and look at a bigger picture of one’s adaptation here, the differences would be much more apparent. Volunteers arrive in groups and we all experience this [...]
In order to explain how many times I have found myself in a situation here in Paraguay where I wished I had my camera with me, I will have to try out my best Carl Sagan impression and simply say: Billions and billions. As the events of last friday night were unfolding, my first reaction [...]
Some things seem to be universal when it comes to conveying our messages non-verbally: A raised-eyebrow when caught off-guard; pinching the top of the nose when tired or frustrated; flying the bird out the window when some dude on a cell phone decides to brazenly break all generally-accepted social mores and risk the personal safety [...]
Summer is now in full swing down here in the southern hemisphere; Things feel a bit like a Bikram Yoga class, except without that silly looking fat guy in front of you trying his best to do the “Backwards Gyrating Lizard at Sunset” move while wearing shorts that are just a little too revealing. The [...]
End of the year holidays and quick review of 09
After a week in Buenos Aires, I bid farewell to Colin and Shawn and caught a flight to Lima, Peru. A quick aside regarding that flight: If you are in South America, and you happen to be looking for a cheap flight around the continent, I would advise you splurge on a slightly more expensive [...]
My trip started in Asuncion right around the time Americans were lining up outside of Wal-Mart and limbering up for some riot-style Christmas present shopping. Rather than drop-kicking the old lady who was about to snag that last 90%-off Tickle-Me Elmo or whatever it is that’s hot on the streets this year (I think I [...]
I just got back from about a month traveling, and I’ll be sharing all of those stories as soon as I can devote some time to telling all the great stories. I just wanted to update the situation here in site since I left. As I mentioned earlier, there was a kidnapping that has spooked [...]
Let’s see: Lance Armstrong has those yellow ones, Breast Cancer has pink, Prostate Cancer royal-blue, AIDS red, Diabetes gray, the Environment went with the easy choice of green, and a veritable war appears to be building between everyone who wants purple. When I started to see white ribbons tied to car antennas, buses, buildings, dog [...]
Since I arrived in Paraguay, I have woken up to some strange sounds. From pigs screaming as they get killed to steam whistles at the sugar factory. Hearing people running around the house screaming like they walked in on a triple homicide crime scene, however, tops the list. One morning last week, I was off [...]
I never really complain about the fact that Paraguay is usually anywhere from five to 20 years behind on most fashion, music and movie trends. I have enjoyed getting to hear the music of my childhood, watching cheesy old action flicks, (they love Rambo for some reason), and of course there is no better way [...]
It was only about a month ago when I was spending every night shivering in my sleeping bag, amazed at the thick fog that rose up from my mouth with every breath. Now I only use my laptop in the evenings or early mornings because it overheats during the scorching-hot days. It has been hovering [...]
Every four months, a new training group swears in, and their arrival spells the departure of the oldest group. G-30 recently swore in, and G-24 swore out. There were two G-24ers in our VAC, and per Peace Corps regulations which require all volunteers to seize upon any opportunity to throw a party and cook asado, [...]
Back when I was still applying for the Peace Corps, one of the biggest fears that I often found floating around my head was that I was going to be stuck eating food that was so unappetizing that I would end up losing half my body weight by the time I came back to the [...]
If you have downloaded Google Earth, Google’s free satellite imaging program, you can now spot my house here in Paraguay. The link below opens up the Google Earth program, so make sure you have it installed.
See my house from space!
Note: If you a dialogue box like the one shown below appears after clicking on the [...]
I recently completed the third part to the video slideshow. This third installment had many many more photos in my original cut, but due to the incredibly slow internet connection here, I have had to trim it down considerably. Also, I have lost my patience with YouTube, so my video updates will be through Vimeo [...]
There is a common joke amongst PC Paraguay: When you come to Paraguay, you speak one language well. When you leave, you speak three languages poorly.
Paraguay is relatively unique in the Peace Corps world, in that it is one of the few countries where the vast majority of the population is bilingual. When people mix [...]
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