Making the garden, start to finish

After three months of struggling to get the materials and some help, I am happy to announce that my garden (huerta) is up and running as of today! I had to wait to plant until I had a fence, otherwise the chickens would destroy it all. It was really a pain to get the materials because most people use bamboo (takuara) to build the fence, but bamboo is not readily available here. First, Fermin (Cristina’s husband) brought a giant pile of very thick bamboo. I was going to use that, but unfortunately my machete skills are not good enough to cut such thick material. So I waited and waited for Fermin to have time to cut it for me. That went on for over a month because he is busy planting in the fields. Eventually, they decided to bring me some pre-cut, sorta rotting bamboo that was at his mother’s house. Back in business! However, the next roadblock was that it is really hard to make the fence with just one person. I invited Dan to come help me and finally got started this past weekend. We used the larger pieces of bamboo as fence posts, dug a trench, and lined up all the smaller pieces of bamboo one by one to form the perimeter. To attach them together, you wrap wire around each piece. Once you get into a flow with one person handling the wire and the other one placing the bamboo in the right spot, it’s not that difficult. Fermin is very quiet and we hardly ever speak more than one word, but he seemed to be interested in the garden and came out to help. After years of practice he is much faster at fence building and using the machete!

Once the fence was chicken proofed, the next step was to prepare the soil. Here they use raised beds called tablones. They do this because sometimes the rains are very intense and this helps to keep the seeds from washing away, and when there are droughts I guess it is easier to maintain moisture. It is also very important here that the crops look neat and organized, and so they love using tablones! After Dan had gone, I assumed that I would be on my own. I was surprised that Fermin wanted to help make the tablones. It can be very awkward here because traditionally women don’t work in the fields, and because of my age and the fact that I am not married, it is not always acceptable to be working alone with a man. Some Paraguayans are very relaxed about this and there are no issues, but some people are very uncomfortable. Fermin is more of the second one.

It was a bit frustrating because I had a whole plan for this garden to also serve as a demonstration plot, and was aware of this goal as I started to make the tablones. In PY they almost always plant in monoculture, so my other goal is to show them more effective methods, such as companion planting. I roughly measured out where I wanted the tablones and made walking space in-between so that I could have easier access. He saw me working and came out to help. However, without any discussion, he changed my measurements and made the tablones how he wanted them. It was very nice of him to help, but at the same time was sort of a reality check for me. I am lucky that my opinion is more valued in the states, and I know that if I was back home someone would consult me before just removing the work I had done. Here, I sometimes forget that women do not hold the same place as men. He knew how the tablones are supposed to be, so he took over to do what he thought was best, but never bothered to find out why I was making them a certain way. I know he was coming from the right place, but it still made me feel emasculated because I knew what I was doing.

So this morning after he had gone to work in the fields, I spent two hours repositioning the tablones back to how I wanted them. Now I have ample room to work without fear of stepping on all my plants, and can easily show people what I’m planting! My garden is a lot bigger than I imagined and it was backbreaking work to transplant all my plants that I had been growing for a few weeks. I also planted all the direct seed plants. I must say, it felt really good to have done all the work myself, and I spent a lot of time admiring it! I am currently growing pepper, carrots, tomatoes, lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, beets, swiss chard, cauliflower, parsley, onions, and maybe some others that I am forgetting. I also have marigolds growing to help deter pests. Next week I plan to buy more seeds for herbs, and other natural pest repellents. I hope the leaf cutter ants don’t eat it all.

A few images from my site, the burres as they´re called plowing the fields, my grandma surrounded by the animals drinking mate, and a pretty moth.

I have begun teaching in the school. I am starting with a program for the 4, 5, and 6th graders to learn about trash classification and management. I am also trying to make my way in with the teachers, but it is hard! They are a bit skeptical of me, and my poor language skills don’t help. But a few of the teachers seem excited. One in particular, Marina, invited me to visit her house and is interested in doing outside projects. Like most of the teachers, she lives in Tabai, which is actually the next compania over, not my actual site. But igual no mas. I have been wanting to visit it for awhile, but wasn’t really sure where it was. This morning, I started my journey without knowing more than the basic direction, but it was surprisingly easy. The nice part about such small towns is that I just asked people along the way for professora marina’s house, and ended up there 40 minutes later. The community is wealthier than Potrero, larger, and feels like a small town. Many people still work in the fields but many others have other professions. Marina, her two sisters and husband are all teachers! I spent some time at her house with her children and parents (who live next door) and then Marina, Roque (her husband), and I were off to see some of the town.

In particular, Marina wanted me to see an area slightly out of the main town where the people are without potable water. They have wells, but they have all but dried up because of changes in the environment such as the cutting down of trees. Roque’s parents still live in this area, and he brings them water for consumption. They still have quite a few trees that they planted, and are able to grow things, but the original garden of Roque’s youth is no longer because there is no water to keep it going. Marina wants to restart the garden. She is looking for my help to get water to this area, and also to help get seeds for people to start their gardens. I am hoping to work something out even though this is out of my area of expertise or mission. We shall see. It is always so nice to meet people that are really happy that you are here to help them. I hope to get to know them and the community better.

On a side note, a few weeks ago our well collapsed. Maybe the ants were tunneling around it, who knows! Not that I ever thought the water we were drinking wasn’t contaminated already, but now it is rust colored. Very unappetizing. Luckily, they don’t want to drink this either. The only way to get water now is to haul water in buckets from the neighbor’s house which is not too fun. Its really a pain when we run out at night and cant get it until the next day. I have never missed running water more!

my new and improoved room and cooking space, the spider ive been seeing lately aka tarantula!

The month of April has been crazy in terms of PC obligations. We had the IST (training), then our PTIP (progress reports with our director), and today I am attending some activities in the city to connect PC with other international volunteer groups (Japan, Korea), as well as a benefit concert for Ahendu (“I hear Paraguay,” a PC group that promotes music). I also visited friends for their birthdays. Needless to say, I haven’t been able to spend that much time in my site. This has been frustrating for me because while most people are settled in their sites after the 4 months, I am just getting to know my community, and it looks bad when I am away a lot. Most people hardly ever travel further than the nearest pueblo (town), so it is strange for them to see me heading off to all different parts of the country on a regular basis.

I am feeling like I am starting to make some progress. I spent last week observing different classes at the school. I am trying to get to know the teachers and become familiar with their teaching methods. It is less interactive than U.S. schools in that most teaching is lecture style and the students copy off the board (there is a lot of memorizing). Peace Corps is known for its interactive and participatory teaching style, so I guess I will have to step up to the plate! I am planning a series of talks discussing trash (one of the biggest environmental issues here), as well as on endangered species. While the teachers don’t really know what to do with me, or how to act, I think that in time we will form good working relationships. Most of the teachers don’t actually live in my town, but the next one over, which makes it harder to spend time with them. However, I was invited to one of the teacher’s houses on the 3rd, and I am looking forward to meeting more people there, and getting to know the area around me better.

A few days ago was Dia del Maestro, aka teachers day. The kids had off from real school, but everyone came in the morning to celebrate. The kids from each grade performed some song or dance, or read letters to the teachers to thank them. Next, each teacher sat in the middle of the “stage” on a chair. All the kids from their class came up and greeted the teacher one by one and gave them a present. It was like the teachers were sitting on a throne being adored by their subjects! Even though I was watching from the back for awhile, the director had me sit up on the stage (not the throne) with the other teachers, and even recognized me at one point. It was very awkward as I haven’t done any classes yet. But it was very nice that they invited me, let alone had me join the other teachers. It must be very weird for them to have some foreigner come in to teach, so I am grateful that I am being included in activities.

My first real nature adventure here in PY was a trip to Salto Cristal. This is a beautiful waterfall located in the forests in Dept. Paraguari. It’s a bit difficult and pricey to get there on your own, so a bunch of us organized the trip with the help of some G-28 volunteers who know the ropes! First we all met up in the city of La Colmena via normal busses. Then we rented a pickup truck, squashed in the back, and drove about 1 hr up to the falls. The road was pretty bumpy, and this truck was known to breakdown easily (we had to push it to get it started), but somehow we made it in one piece. The ride alone was great because we were in an area that actually had some elevation (a rarity here) and were able to get a great view. We also passed the largest organic (so they say!) sugar cane plantation. Once we got to the entrance, we had to pay the owner of the property we crossed a fee. I felt like I was paying to cross a bridge! Then we had a steep hike down to the waterfall. Luckily it wasn’t that long, but it was strenuous. At the bottom we had to trudge up the river, trying not to slip, to reach our destination. But it was worth it! Salto Cristal is a picturesque waterfall with a nice swimming pool right underneath. Since the seasons are changing, the water was really cold. I only managed to go in for a quick dip, but some others were jumping off the rocks and swimming. We spent the day relaxing and having lunch before heading out. It was really nice to finally get to see some of the natural beauty PY has to offer. Mostly we are dealing with degraded ecosystems and pollution. I look forward to going on more nature oriented trips!

Since I’ve been gone I have had a very busy couple of weeks. The most time consuming part was our IST’s (in service training) where the entire G-31 gang reunites to have some language training and get PC updates, etc. This event is also known as our “3 month reconnect,” but actually took place 4 months after we swore in. All that means is that I hadn’t seen the majority of these volunteers in four months. They held the conference back in Guarambare, our training site, and it lasted about 4 days. It was really great to see everyone, but since we started at 730am and finished at 5pm there wasn’t a whole lot of time to hang out. We all wanted to spend some time at night with our host training families. While home-stays are always exhausting, it’s nice to be able to go back to the same one so that you know what to expect and have things to look forward too. I was really happy to see my little host brother, Manu. Although we got some great language help while we were there, I am definitely nowhere near where I would like to be on a language level. I guess I forgot how long it took me to get this far in Spanish (I’m conversationally fluent although still lacking many tenses and vocabulary!). Guarani is a million times harder than learning a romance language. The pronunciation is really difficult, especially the nasally sounds. There are some people who just have a knack for language and are speaking really well. Unfortunately, I am not one of them!

After the training in Guarambare, we had a meeting in Asuncion. Most people were able to stay the night afterwards, and we finally had a bit of time to relax. The next day I headed out to San Lorenzo again to buy the rest of my furniture. I was able to get a ropero (kinda like a free standing closet/dresser that they use here) and a cabinet for my food. I also bought some cheap fabric to cover the shelves in my room and keep the bugs and dust off my things. My room is finally feeling like a place I can call home. I am still cooking on a one burner hotplate which really limits what my meals. But other than that, I am feeling more comfortable at this house. The majority of volunteers here in PY do move to their own houses, but because of lack of availability, it just may never be an option for me. Some of the benefits of this being that I always have people at the house and don’t have to worry about break-in’s when I travel; I have people to share meals with, and 3 cute dogs! However, it can be frustrating never really having any time alone and feeling like you’re on other people’s schedule. Right now things are going well here, and hopefully I will be able to stay here for the rest of my service.

The food i received in one day from neighbors and the dogs!

Yesterday I was able to spend some time with my new contact, Nancy. She lives on the very edge of town with her mother, nephew, and uncle. Nancy is very outing and chatty which makes speaking a foreign language so much easier. We talked on the long walk to her house about her goals in life and all of her responsibilities at home. Later I had terrere and snacks with her and her mother. They were both very interested in learning about the states. They showed me their land, and what they hope to plant in their garden. I am looking forward to spending more time over there. We also walked over to visit some neighbors. They are the caretakers for a farm that grows all sorts or fruits, trees, and vegetables. I was overwhelmed by how many different plants they had. I am planning to go back to spend time with the family and learn more from them because they sure seem to know what they’re doing! As I’ve mentioned before, the people here are very generous and are always giving me treats to take home. However I don’t think that I’ve ever gotten so much as I did yesterday. Nancy and her mother sent me home with a huge bag of bananas, cheese, and vegetables and the neighbors sent me home with tons of fruit. I am always amazed how generous they can be!

On a different note, I am terrified for winter. We have had a bit of a cold front over the last few days, and I am already sleeping with my sleeping bag! It’s going to get a heck of a lot colder, and there isn’t going to be anywhere to go to escape it. I do have one window that is just open and doesn’t have any type of shutter, so I am going to have to get that fixed. That and buy a whole lot of blankets! The two little dogs here, Madonna and Cindy, both have very thin fur and have been shivering. Madonna likes to come visit me in my room and doesn’t give a second thought about jumping in bed with me for a belly rub. I wouldn’t care accept that she does have fleas and I really would rather not have those all over my bed. So yesterday I let her onto my yoga mat and put an old t-shirt over her. She is very cute, and reminds me a bit of my own dog who I miss terribly. I am very lucky to be living at a house where they really like their dogs (they even get to sleep inside). It is really nice to have that companionship again.

The compost pile and my new bed!

Despite coming in with the mindset of jumping right in and getting a bunch of projects going, I am finding myself hard-pressed for people to work with, and unsure of what projects are feasible. Finding “work” is actually a lot harder than one would think. When we arrive in site we have some idea of the projects we would like to accomplish, but are not really sure how to go about it. It is pretty much up to us to find people to work with, motivate people, get materials, do the manual labor, get the project going, follow up, etc, etc. Of course it depends on the country of service, and in some places volunteers are setup with an actual job they go to everyday. Here in PY, lack of work is one of the major complaints of volunteers. How can this be? Here we have flown halfway across the world to offer our expertise and passion, and no one wants to work? It’s true. There are many reasons that volunteers face this problem. For example, there are often cultural barriers that hinder women volunteers from working in the fields with men. There are often social prejudices that make people wary of our motives here. And sometimes people are just not willing, or are not ready, to accept new ways of doing what they’ve been doing for many years. Who can blame them? I sure wouldn’t want some foreigner who couldn’t speak my language trying to advise me of better ways to do things. The fact of the matter is, we can only do so much during our time here. And it just can’t be rushed. When people are ready and willing to make changes, only then will it start to happen. If we try to push our ideas, we will only end up doing the work ourselves, and that is not sustainable.

Therefore, I am spending my time trying to get to know the community and getting them to trust me. That way people will be more willing to work with me and try new things. Especially as a first time volunteer, it is going to be a long process. I come from the mindset of getting things done, but I am trying to accept that my time here is going to be a series of small steps. I am going to start right here where I’m living and then try my luck with other families. But in the need to get something tangible done, this weekend I was thrilled to get my compost pile up and running! Cristina is now saving all kitchen scraps for the compost. I have also transplanted some pepper plants that were growing freely (thanks to the chickens for pooping out the seeds all over) but were too crowded into containers to later plant in the garden. I also started planting flowers which are starting to pop up. Today, I hoed half the area that we are planning for the garden and the bamboo for the fence should be brought over soon. Without the fence, there is no point in gardening because the chickens are relentless! So once my garden gets going I will be on my way!

Preparing the Tatakau, rolling out the the dough

Back to Semana Santa, Thursday and Friday before Easter are considered the main holy days. Due to this, work is supposed to be minimal, and therefore Thursday lunch is supposed to be the last big meal, and Friday there is not supposed to be any cooking. In order to have something to eat, large amounts of chipa are made usually on Wednesday. When Cristina’s mother in law and sister came over to make the chipa yesterday, I had no idea how much work it would be. The only times I’ve seen it made was only small batches, but these women made over 180 chipas! It is quite the process, and you could tell the master teacher (the mother in law) took a lot of pride in her work and shaping the chipas just right.

The day began around 930 am with the gathering of the women and the ingredients (some of which there wasn’t enough of so they sent the little kid to run errands, love that). Then the dough was formed by mixing flour, corn flour, eggs, pig lard, milk, butter, anis, sugar, salt, mandio powder (I think that’s it) in a very large tub. It gets very thick and heavy, and took about 1 hour or so to make. Meanwhile there was chatter (of which my Guarani lacking mind didn’t understand) and terrere breaks. Once the dough was prepared we had to knead it out like bread. This got very tiring! Two of us were kneading the dough then handing it to the mother in law. She then finished kneading it and shaping it into either bagel like forms or more roll looking ones. Finally, Cristina put them on banana leaves and cut them out individually, ready for the oven.

The next biggest challenge is getting the oven ready. In the campo most people have a tatakua, which is a brick oven that resembles and little igloo. It has openings on opposite sides. In order the heat the oven, we had to collect and cut down a lot of dead branches and even a dead tree. Cristina’s husband helped with that part, but in general the women handle the tatakua including lighting it and maintaining the fire. The wood is placed inside and allowed to burn like a campfire that you just keep going. After about an hour it reaches the right temperature and the ashes and remaining wood are pushed back out with a makeshift broom (long stick with leaves tied together on the end) to clear an area for the chipas. Next the chipas are individually placed in the oven on a shovel. The process is reminiscent of cooking brick-oven pizza. The openings are blocked off and the chipas cook from the heat retained in the oven for about 20 minutes after which they are taken out, cooled and eaten! It sounds relatively simple, but with cooking the amount of chipas we did, we had to repeat this process 3 times. With the heat in the 90’s, smoke in your face, and physical work of it all, I was wiped out! The day ended around 630pm with the dividing of the chipas to the 3 families. Although they might not be my favorite, it was a great day of cultural exchange and bonding.

The baking process!

Pictures of the ingredients in chipa, making the batter, me and chipa headed for the oven and Cristina preparing the cheese

The week before Easter is celebrated here as Semana Santa. I still don’t get exactly what’s going on, but what I do know is that millions of Chipas are made and consumed all across the country. Chipa, as I may have mentioned before, is a local specialty. Any bus ride you take the “chipa girls” will come on the crowded bus and push their way up and down the aisles in a short skirt with a huge basket of the stuff balanced with some body part. It’s rather impressive how they can push down the packed aisles handing out the chipa and giving correct change. What is chipa you ask? Well let me start with a quote from an article I read about Paraguayan cuisine which discussed how the origin of the current diet had to do with the Triple Alliance War (a defining point in PY history).

“The war meant food shortages, therefore all Paraguayan cuisine became very abundant in caloric content as well as protein level, given the fact that daily meals were few and had to take all cuts of the animal…The use of almost all parts of the animal is a constant, either for one or another dish”.

That pretty much sums up Paraguayan food! From this history evolved such specialties as chipa, sopa paraguaya, and chipa guasu, which, in actuality, are all based from the same ingredients but are mixed in different forms. They are listed in order of my palatability, meaning that chipa guasu does not go down without a fight with my willpower. Here it is customary to give guests large plates of food which is very generous but often a struggle when you do not want to offend anybody but are consuming something you would rather not. But, for the food’s sake, I will say that I do know volunteers who will purchase the above items on their own and enjoy them! When I pretend it doesn’t have pig fat in it, chipa itself is not bad when it’s hot (kinda like a cheesy bread roll), and sopa is edible when it’s hot. However, they do have this squeaky quality I can’t get past, and eating them cold and a few days later is not for me. (All opinions are a reflection of a delicate vegetarian palate and are in no way meant to be disrespectful!).

Not a big “bang for my buck” so to speak, but at least it’s out of the way. I tried my best to hand out invitations to those I know, those I didn’t, and even posted them in the dispensas. Needless to say, it wasn’t a big turnout. I had a few members of the community in addition to some of the students and teachers. I spent a lot of needless time worrying about the snack I was supposed to provide. I ended up just buying cookies and making juice (which takes a lot of time with a well, let me tell u!). Everyone seemed to enjoy that part at least! But anyway, my boss, the director of the Environmental sector, came out and gave the audience a short talk about the Peace Corps and what I’m doing here. That was pretty much it. Since I am the first PC volunteer at this site, most people have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing, etc. It was nice that at least some people will now have a better understanding. People are very timid but I am hoping that will start to open up me and begin to ask for my help. That is ultimately the goal, that the community will use me as a resource. Also, I didn’t have a contact (someone who is supposed to act as my advisor almost, giving advice or telling me things I wouldn’t otherwise known) beforehand, but someone in the meeting has agreed to take on the role. I didn’t have any luck with that at my old site, but I am optimistic that this time will be different. I haven’t had a chance to really speak with her yet, but she seems outgoing and eager to be involved.

On March 24th I officially reached the 6 month marker of the time I have been living in Paraguay. This is the longest I have ever been away from the United States, and the longest time I have gone without seeing family or friends. Timing here is funny because sometimes I feel like I have been here for years, and other days I feel like I just got off the plane. I still have a long time to go, but it’s good to know that I have made it this far, and am strong enough to finish. Thanks for all the support!

Due to a shift in schedules because of some intense rain, my site presentation has been moved up from the end of April until this Monday. I just found out on Wednesday, so it didn’t give me much time to prepare, but I am getting it done. In fact, it’s better that I am getting it out of the way now so that hopefully people will understand me better, and working will become easier. I went and spoke with the Director of the elementary school to set up the event there during school hours so that more people will be in attendance. I printed up invitations and am in the process of handing them out. I put them up at the dispensas, and did some door-to-door soliciting which I am never a fan of. I walk up to the house, clap (they do not have door bells, so to let someone know you are there and ask to come in you stand outside and clap), and wait for them to say adelante (come in). Then they stare at me for a bit wondering who is this strange rubia (they use it to refer to blondes or just people with whiter skin) at their house. I stumble over my auto-presentation I memorized in Guarani and hope that they understand some of what I am trying to say. The whole thing is very awkward, and I am always relieved to get it done. I have met a few people this way, but it’s always nice to have another Paraguayan with you to take some of the pressure off. Despite only knowing a few people, it looks like everything will come together ok for my event on Monday.

This week I also attended my first two meetings as a community member. Originally I thought that this town was only just looking into getting running water, but in fact, a large amount of townspeople have been hooked up to a water system for about 2 months. A Japanese program was able to come in and set up the infrastructure, and now many people here do have running water. This meeting was to clear up some confusion about monthly rates, usage, and maintenance. The family I’m living with has chosen not to get running water now, but may change their minds in the future. The startup costs are still somewhat high, but monthly are very reasonable. It was interesting to see the cultural differences at the meeting. For one, nothing ever starts on time. Secondly, if people arrive once the meeting has started, they will still say hello loudly to the group while the speaker is talking and everyone will say hello back. Third, people will talk through the meeting. It is definitely less structured than meetings I am used to attending. It was given in Guarani so I didn’t understand all the subtleties, but I was happy that I understood the generally picture.

The next meeting I attended was just this morning at the school. I am in the process of trying to get to know and maybe befriend the teachers and director in order to facilitate working. Therefore, I am trying to stay on top of school events. This was a meeting with the parents to explain the resources (or lack of) that the government was providing to the children. Again, I didn’t understand a lot of it, but people were concerned about the lack of school supplies given to the kids, lack of a school snack, etc. They also voted for new people to run what I think was the school committee. Again, it started at least ½ hour late, people talk out of turn, but the structure seems to work for them. Everything is more relaxed. About 50 people were in attendance. I had asked the Director to mention my open invitation to my site presentation on Monday. I wasn’t expecting him to call me up to the front and say a few words. For someone with a fear of public speaking, I have to say I have come a long way. I spoke in Guarani in front of 50 people without being prepared to talk and I think I did ok! I know I don’t speak it well, and will continue to mess up, but people appreciate the effort. I really want to learn more so that I can actually understand all the jokes that people tell.

While the people are continuing on with their lives at the usual Paraguayan tranquilo pace, I personally seem to be moving along faster. I’ve only been in my site for 2 weeks now, but already I have done way more than in the two months I spent in my old one, and for that I am grateful. Early this week I made my first trip into Asunción to get some veggie seeds for the garden I’m planning. I also went to the University of Asunción to get some tree seeds. It was quite the process involving getting lost, going to four different offices with my papers, and finally getting the seeds about 4 hours later! But, I got them and am looking forward to planting them. Most Paraguayan universities are very small, but this one actually felt like an American university as I trudged 20 minutes across campus. It is very interdisciplinary, including a vet school and agricultural school. It is at the agricultural school that they do a lot of interesting research and also have a program to encourage reforestation, which is why I could go there to request free seeds for my community. Normally, tree seeds can be very expensive.

My other task in Asuncion was to get myself some furniture. I was borrowing a bed from a neighbor, but it was time to get my own as I will have it for the next two years. The town nearest to me was very overpriced, so I needed to get my stuff in the big city. After hours of searching, bargaining, and hassle, I finally got a reasonable bed for a reasonable price. I also decided to invest in a fridge. I struggled with this decision a lot because as a volunteer there is this sense that you need to be a martyr to be in the Peace Corps. Therefore, you shouldn’t buy any modern conveniences and should suffer physically (believe me, I still do that). In many PC countries none are available, but in Paraguay, the majority of local people and almost all volunteers do have fridges. Being a vegetarian without any way to keep produce in a tropical climate isn’t too much fun, and therefore I decided to put my health first and get one. Luckily, they provide a delivery service with such appliances, and I was able to talk my way into getting the fridge people to pick up my bed and take that with us too. Phew. Glad that’s over. I am still without anywhere to put my clothes or someplace to cook, so those will be my next goals.

Pictures of our well and the view from my house

I have been asked to describe what a typical day here is like. Well, I haven’t yet settled on a schedule. Luckily, things have been moving along a little better here than in Apipe in terms of meeting people. However, there is either absolutely nothing going on, or I’m busy the whole day. For example, on Friday I was sick, presumably from the well-water, and I didn’t do one thing all day. Then Saturday, I was asked to visit the house of a professor, Ismael, who both works in the school and is on the agriculture committee. He is interested in starting a demo plot on his property and in composting etc. He seems very nice and enthusiastic about work, so I am hoping that this will turn into a good lead for projects. I do have to keep explaining that I am not an agricultural engineer here to increase crop yields (many people think I am), but rather, an ecologista here to improve the health of the environment and the people. However, I do think that there are many things we can do that will both help the environment and increase crop production. They tend to use monoculture farming here and lots of pesticides and chemical fertilizers because they don’t know any other ways of production. Hopefully, I can assist the farmers to use more natural fertilizers and adopt agroforesty methods…..big goal.

After checking out Ismael’s land, we visited the plots of a few other people and stopped at his Aunt’s house for mid-day terrere and a snack. It’s always nice to get a snack when you go to people’s houses, that day in particular was great because I hadn’t eaten breakfast. She gave us some cocotero, which is a species of coconut. Pretty much, they are just seeds about the size of a chestnut (but round), which are harvested here and sold by individuals to companies for large-scale production. To eat them raw you break open the shell and eat the inside (about the size of a macadamia nut) and it is has this slight coconut flavor. Not bad.

After retuning home, I was greeted at the house by more of Cristina’s family who live in Asuncion. They still own some land here and are actually planting trees on the property because they are worried about all the deforestation! They come visit Potrero on the weekends to get a break from the city. I guess leaving the city for a break in the country really is a universal theme. The husband works for Johnson and Johnson and speaks some English. He also called his daughter and had me talk to her on the phone because she wanted to practice English. In fact, she speaks fluently and I am hoping to get a chance to spend some time with her either here or in Asuncion.

I had finally run out of clean clothes so it was time to do some laundry. I actually don’t mind washing my clothes by hand, but this was my first time having no running water also. Needless to say, it took me about an hr with the hauling up buckets and all. Also, I need to buy my own soap because I’m pretty sure that the one I was using is made from cow fat, and I’m not a fan of that. Finally, the day concluded with my participation in some sort of religious ceremony for the patron saint of the town. Each town honors a saint and they have a special holiday for it. I am still very confused on how this works, and when it happens. Apparently our All Saints day isn’t until May, but for some reason they were doing something last night. It was just a few woman gathered around a picture of a saint and some flowers and candles. They said prayers and then we walked with the picture and they sang as we went to another house. I had absolutely no idea what was going on. That was Saturday.

Sunday morning was a bit of a letdown. My hosts thought it would be a good idea to have a mini site presentation at 9am to talk to some people about what I have to offer. I will be having a formal presentation of my site in April. This consists of my boss coming and explaining Peace Corps (in Guarani since I can’t!) and what we do here. I will be organizing it, providing snacks, and writing more formal invitations. It’s supposed to be kind of a big deal to get the community onboard and also to clear up and confusion about my role in the community. I wasn’t a big fan of the idea of having this mini-meeting because I just wanted to wait until I had the assistance of my boss to explain everything better. I didn’t have any materials with me, and felt ill-prepared. Plus, some people were asking me why they weren’t invited, but since I don’t know everyone and wasn’t the one really inviting people, it got a little weird. The last thing I want is for people to feel left out. Nonetheless, I worried about the meeting all week and did my best to prepare a short talk and a signup sheet for activities, etc. I almost looked forward to it at that point to get a tangible project going. But, no one showed up. Not one person! That just goes to show you the major cultural differences. About 15 people said that they were going to come. However in this culture, it is ok to say yes to things that you don’t intend to do because to say no directly would be rude. Too bad I’m an American and I like it direct and to the point. I am not going to let it discourage me because I know that many of those people really do want to work with me, I just need to win them over a little better and may have to do things on a more individual basis.

Pictures of the front of the house, the patio, my room, and where we cook

I have spent five days in my new site. It is located in the Department of Central. More specifically, I am in another small compania outside the towns of Itaugua and Ypacarai, which I can get to on a campo bus with relative ease. I’m 2 hours by bus to the capital. That is 8 hours closer than before, so I am relieved to be able to leave my site regularly for meetings or just to get a break in the city with other volunteers. No one has been able to tell me how many people actually live here, but I’m guessing between around 200 residents. It’s always hard to get an accurate count anyway because so many people immigrate to other countries to work and then return after a few years. The town has one school for all grades, a church, and a few dispensas that actually have yoghurt, hooray! I’ve been told that most people work in agriculture; however, there are very few fields and very few cows. Besides the few teachers and dispensa owners, I am not really sure what people do for income, and will have to get back to you on that.

I am staying in my own room in the house of a young couple (29 and 30) and their elderly grandmother (80). In fact, the Grandma spent 25 years living and working in Argentina before returning with her husband to build their house here. Because of this, while I am still in the campo, the house is very spacious and has many unused rooms. However, they live very simply and have only the necessary furniture, so most rooms are empty. While they do have a modern stove, it is currently without gas because it’s very expensive to keep up with. Instead, Cristina, my host, cooks on an open fire in separate room behind the house. They gather kindling in the woods, and use dried corn husks to help feed the flame. Although a Japanese organization is working to get the community running water, it hasn’t happened yet, and most people just have a well. Our well is quite deep; I would say about 20ft, and is much more profound than those in Apipe. I have finally mastered the art of bringing up a full bucket of water instead of the drops I was getting in the beginning. It’s all in how you tilt the bucket as it hits the water! But yep, it gets pretty heavy that way and my fingers are already starting to callous. A good surprise was to find out that I don’t have to go back to using a latrine. The house has a newly added outdoor bathroom with a modern toilet (no more squatting for me!). The only difference is that it can’t flush without running water, so you just dump a bucket of water down there. To bathe, you simply haul up a bucket of water and there is space with a drain in the bathroom to bathe. It’s nice to have doored room for that, I never got used to the strong possibility of my host family and neighbors catching me in the nude.

Something new for me to adjust to is that there is no refrigerator. Ice for terrere is purchased and put in a cooler. For breakfast they drink mate (hot terrere), followed by cocido (a tea of yerba mate and burnt sugar, usually with milk) and eat kokitos (hard bread balls). Lunch is the bigger meal that is usually a meat soup, or meat with pasta or rice. For dinner, they have cocido again, or nothing at all. Accustomed to eating a big dinner, I have been heading to the dispensa in the evenings for yoghurt and filling up on snack mix (thanks mom!). The possibility of living in my own house here seems very slim, so if I am going to live here for 2 years, then I will have to buy a fridge and gas for the oven so that I can try to keep a healthier diet. Cristina is complexed by my vegetarianism, and I am looking forward to cooking for myself again. They also have 3 very friendly dogs. Two are obese Chihuahua mixes (Madonna and Cindy, haha), and one mutt that used to live next door but came here when her owner passed away.

A Few Observations:

1) Always check your yoga mat before laying down on it. Very large, possibly poisonous, spiders like to hide there and then crawl on your shoulder while you practice breathing with your eyes closed and scare the crap out of you.

2) Dogs and chickens do not live in PY harmoniously as I previously thought. Dogs do attack and kill chicks, as Cindy the Chihuahua was kind enough to show me during breakfast

Picture yourself being dropped off in an unknown town, asked to live with strangers, not speak the local language, not eat the food, and everything you know seems backwards. This is what Peace Corps volunteers face on a daily basis. Pretty much, you are thrown completely out of your element and are forced to figure it out. Sometimes I wonder how it’s even possible; how am I surviving in this strange place? But the answer is relatively simple. You survive because you have to. There is no other choice. It’s like that sports slogan: “Play hard, or go home”. Except here it’s “Adapt or Go Home,” literally. I’ll admit, sometimes it’s very tempting to catch that first flight to Boston. Thoughts of my clean bed and cuddling my dog are sometimes too hard to take. Yet, something takes hold of you, and you will yourself to stay for just one more day. You think about why you’re here and maybe, just maybe, you will be able to better the quality of life of some people, and in my case, plant some trees. All the little things count. So alas, here I am, adapting.

Thats right people, I am finally going to my new site Friday morning! These are all the facts i know right now: itś close to Asunción, i am 2-4km from the main road where i can catch the bus, its a small compania, there may or may not be running water, i am living with a family, there is a school. Yup, thatś about it. So iḿ sorry I cant provide any more details until after I get there and see what it is like. I am feeling very overwhelmed by everything that has happened (or hasnt happened for that matter) over that last few months. However, I am very happy to be getting to my site, and I have high hopes for the future. I know so much more now than I did when I went to my first site that I think I can get a running start instead of moving at a snails pace. Only time will tell what I can accomplish over the next 2 years.

The last few days I have been in Asunción for meetings and getting myself repacked. I have accumulated a lot of stuff. I have no idea how because I really dont buy anything. I guess its all the books they gave us! Anyway, I got to hit the pool at the embassy yesterday with Lora, which is always nice. I even did 4 laps. haha. I am amazed how out of shape I am. Today, Jess, Jen, and Brenda from my EE group are in the city, and I am psyched I get to spend some time with them before I head to site. Well thatś all for now. I will update as soon as i can about the new site. Also, as you can tell, I spent a lot of time updating my blog. I hope that it is easier to read, and there are now pictures attached to almost every post, so check out my old entries. The link to all my pictures on the bottom left finally works, and the stingless bee video is up!

I have been stuck in Lora’s site for a week now. I shouldn’t say stuck because I am not actually being kept here by rain or some other event that traps people in their sites, but needless to say, I am not in my new site yet. I no longer have a time estimate. I am getting frustrated because I am eager to get to know my new community, to get a place of my own to live, and to get started on projects. It is just about time to get gardens growing here, and I hope to have a very productive one so that I don’t get scurvy! I have been able to accompany Lora to a few project related meetings, some that I may possibly still be able to be involved with if I am close enough. It’s nice to feel like I am doing something. It’s also been great being able to hang out with one of my closest friends for a whole week!

I also took this opportunity to visit the host family that I really connected with during my long field excursion while in training. I only lived with them for about 4 days, but the bond was pretty strong. We have been in touch and they have been asking me when I am coming to visit. Their community, called Ndavaru, is only a short bus ride away from Carapegua. In fact, an agroforestry volunteer from my G currently lives there. It was cool being able to see the family and visit another volunteer at the same time. Upon arrival, I was immediately served some nice, cold terrere. T-ray, as we volunteers shorten it to, is a godsend with the heat. It is essential to keep yourself hydrated. I especially like drinking it there because they always use fresh yuyos. Yuyos are the leaves, roots, flowers, or stems of plants that are used by the people for various purposes in terrere or mate (cold or hot yerbamate). Usually they have medicinal purposes, but in this case, they used mint leaves or lemon shoots which are mostly just very refreshing. That is my favorite way to drink it.

This is the family that makes the beautiful tablecloths. Since the last time I was there, it seems like business is better than ever because there have been some changes to the household. First, they no longer just use the fireplace for cooking, but have a conventional oven. Also, they have hired someone to help do the household chores so that my host Mom can focus on getting her tablecloths done. The Mom even goes to Ciudad del Este once a month to sell her wares. Diego, their youngest son, is still in school to be a nurse and is doing very well. It seems like things are going very well for the family. As always, they were still perplexed by my vegetarianism, and made a point to tell everyone we saw that I didn’t eat meat. However, they didn’t try to make me eat any which I was very grateful for. I think it was really important for me to visit for the night because I am trying to maintain relationships with the people here that are earnestly interested in the work of Peace Corps, and who are supportive of me personally. It can be challenging, and I’m glad I had the time to reconnect.

One unpleasant part of the trip was watching the castration of a pig. I decided to watch only so that I could provide accurate info about how it’s done here if anyone asks me. Warning: graphic content! Pretty much, one person grabs the piglet (he was about 2 months old I’m guessing), flip him on his back and hold his legs. Meanwhile the piglet is screaming bloody murder. Another person takes a knife (no idea if it was sterilized prior to this but I’m guessing not), and slits open the testicular sac. He then rips out the testicles with his bare, unwashed hands, and cuts them from the body: job done. Next, he cuts off the tip of the tail for a reason unknown to me because it wasn’t done short enough to serve any purpose I could come up with. There are no use of analgesics whatsoever, and no sterilization prior to the “surgery”. No pain medications are given for the aftermath. The only thing that is used to stop infection is that he sprayed the “purple stuff” on the wounds. I haven’t gotten my hands on a bottle to see what chemicals are actually in it, but people spray the “purple stuff” on any and every type of wound or ailment that animals have. Yikes. I am glad I am not a pig. The next question here is, why do they castrate pigs that provide livelihood, but refuse to castrate dogs that turn into pests because they say it’s unnatural? Wouldn’t they want more pigs and fewer dogs? I haven’t figured this out yet.

After my meeting in Asuncion, a few of us volunteers decided to head back to Guarambare to visit our training host families. Because I had lived so far away, it was my first time back and I was a little nervous. While I like my family, we were not really close, so I wondered how they would react to my visit. Luckily, I quickly felt at ease and was very happy to see them again. My little brother had his 9th birthday while I was away so I brought him a present. I chatted with my host mom and had terrere. It felt good to be somewhere familiar.

Later that evening, I attended the 9th birthday of Dan’s little cousin, Ruthcenia. She is super cute and sweet, so I was excited to go. Her dress was yellow, pink, and blue, and all the decorations matched! So much work was put into making this party, it’s crazy. I can’t wait to go to my first quinceniera (like sweet 16, but a girl’s 15th birthday that consists of a very over the top party here in PY) because it is going to be insane. Some people can’t afford to have such a nice party, but in general, birthdays are a big deal. It was similar to the states in that guests brought a present, cake was served, and happy birthday was sung. However, the food was all Paraguayan obviously, boys and girls sing happy birthday in separate groups, and cake is of course, made out of dulce de leche. They also fill a giant balloon with candy and the birthday girl pops it, and all the kids scramble for it just like a piñata. It was a fun experience. Wish I was 9.

After another set of meetings in Asuncion, I headed out to the Department of Paraguari, which is sort of in the middle of the country. I went to visit Lora, another Envi Ed volunteer who lives in Carapegua. This is a very different atmosphere than either my previous site, or Dan’s site because it is a city with roughly 15,000 people. While this seems like a small town in the states, here it is one of the bigger volunteer sites and is much more developed. There are no skyscrapers or anything like that, but there are many schools, shops, businesses and medical offices unlike in the campo. The majority of people do not have plots of land to work, and very few have farm animals other than some chickens. Most people’s houses are multi-room, have plaster walls, landscaped yards, bars on windows, etc. Lora will be working more in the school system with teachers than out in the fields.

It is a nice city and it is really great to be able to walk to the market everyday to pick up whatever food you want. The downside of that is that I have been spending tons of money and eating way too much! We have been doing a lot of reading of old volunteer periodicals (that were left to Lora because she is a follow up volunteer at her site) looking for useful articles on technical projects, crafts, and recipes. I will most likely be in this department for my site, so I am trying to learn more about this area. It has a similar topography to Dan’s site, with some hills, and lots of green.

Of course, I have to include some animal stories. While we were taking a walk, a bouncy little white puppy with one straight, and one floppy ear came out to greet us. She had beautiful dark eyes and was very friendly. After petting her for a bit, a woman came out of her house to offer her up. Apparently she is a street pup that no one wants around. I was dying to take her but the logistics right now are rough. I don’t know when I am going to my new site, or if a family would even let me bring a dog. It’s just horrible timing. My heart broke as I walked away from the second puppy I have been offered (the other time was in Pilar). How sad. I hope she finds someone to take her…

The next day, Lora and I were on another walk when we saw a little head poke out of an empty fruit stand. Upon closer examination, we found not one, but 2 young kittens. I estimate that they are about one month, are grey tigers with bellies that look like leopard skin (sorry ARL I never learned my cat colors). After talking with some people across the street, we learned that these too, were unwanted street cats. They didn’t look so hot, and would surely succumb to sickness or live on to produce more feral cats (both are female). After much debate, Lora decided to take them home with her knowing that we could sucker some other Peace Corp Volunteer into taking them. Lora already has taken in one cat, so now she’s up to 3! Luckily, the cats have already been spoken for and will go to good homes later this month. I will miss living with Lora and the kitties.

Next up I plan to visit my host family from my long field visit (when I was a trainee) since I am very close to their town. I will hopefully get to my new site, or at least know when I am going to my new site, this week. I know I keep saying that, but I am on Paraguyan time here, and it is going much slower than anticipated!

One last anecdote about Dan’s site: I love stingless bees and hate wasps. I have struggled with a fear of bees for many years. Well, it’s more like I am utterly confused by bees. An avid lover of all fauna (ok not ticks or mosquitoes, but I do like bugs), I always seem to get stung for absolutely no reason while other people who avidly hate insects and would gladly kill them, don’t. I never could figure it out. This didn’t stop me from working with bees here, and won’t stop me from trying bee keeping at my site, but I still don’t understand my luck. I got stung at the pool in Asuncion bringing my total to 21 stings in my life. At Dan’s house, he is lucky enough to have a hive of stingless bees (yes they do exist and still produce pseudo-edible honey!). They are very tiny, cute, and have cool looking little cave hives. I love watching them fly in and out, protect the nest, and listening to their hum. I took a video to share with you all; I hope it works.

However, Dan also had a hive of some type of wasp in his outdoor shower area. At first they never bothered us, but I went in there with a broom trying to sweep the floor. I should have known better, but as they had barely moved form the side of the hive when I was in there before, it didn’t occur to me that sweeping would cause my 22, 23, and 24th stings. As the broom moved across the wall, all I remember is seeing a blur of black things flying towards me, and feeling sharp, intense pain on the right side of my head. I ran screaming from the shower, threw the broom, and headed up towards the house. I felt my head and realized that there was one caught in my hair and I struggled to pull it out. Dan was across the street and came back to me sobbing, and screaming to pull out the stingers that were still stuck in my head. He did, and it felt a little better, but I was shocked by what happened and how intense the pain was. I have been stung by a wasp before, but not 3 times at once, and never before on my head. It swelled up and gave me a horrible headache and sporadic sharp pains for the next 2 days! Worst stings ever.

It was time to get rid of the nest. I feel bad about killing anything, but after experiencing the pain of those stings, I knew it was unsafe to allow the nest to continue to grow in the shower. Someone else would surely get stung. Of course, the logical solution was a spray, but you can’t by that in town. Dan was advised by the locals to attach some dry newspaper to a long stick and light the suckers on fire. I was sure I was going to have to pull his limp, wasp covered body out of the shower 3 hours later, but amazingly, it worked. He did it at night when they were less active. Because the smoke confused them so much, they didn’t even bother Dan. He did get one sting from one that hitch-hiked back up to the house and was sat on! I feel bad, but I am happy they are gone…

Since the decision was made to change my site, I have been living out of a suitcase. I feel like a gypsy, as I’m travelling around from place to place, never having anywhere to call my own. I am eagerly awaiting the final kinks of my new site to be worked out so that I can get started with my work! However, the benefits of this month long hiatus are that I have had the opportunity to see new parts of Paraguay through staying with other volunteers, and got to reconnect with my training host family. I will try to elaborate without boring you with where I’ve been and what I’ve been doing over the last few weeks.

After meetings in Asunción (which is always great for an air-conditioned break and yummy food), I headed to the department of Guairá which is in the Bosque Atlantico del Alto Paranal (aka the tropical forest which extends into Argentina and Brazil that has been devastated from deforestation). Specifically, I was going to visit my boyfriend Dan, who is also an Environmental Education volunteer. He lives in a small town about 1 hr from the city of Villarica. Upon arrival into this new eco-region, I was immediately surrounded by green vistas and rolling landscapes. While deforestation has taken most of the virgin forests, there are 2nd growth trees in some areas. The town has done a lot of work re-planting trees, and Dan wants to continue this task. The landscape and climate were quite different than what I was “accustomed” to in the marshlands. It was less hot and humid, very green, hilly, had trees, many less mosquitoes, and sand was replaced with red dirt. Needless to say, I was much more comfortable in this climate. The people still work in the fields, but many have other jobs like shop owners, carpenter’s, teachers, haircutters, etc. I could buy yogurt every day at the dispensa (small store) which made me so happy because I couldn’t buy anything in my previous site. I am obsessed with yogurt here; probably because of all the sugar in it and that I can drink it out of the carton.

We spent our time setting up his new house, talking and sharing terrere with neighbors, attempting to replant trees in the yard which unfortunately the cows ate, taking sunset walks (because it’s finally cool then), and the best part, “adopting” a starving dog. The dog, whose original name is Lassie (ugh), does have some semblance of an owner, but they did not care for her properly. In this country the standards for pet care are very different than our own, and often dogs are solely kept for the purpose of protection. When she started visiting Dan’s house, she was very timid, untrusting, and very underweight. We starting feeding her right away, and before we knew it, she was spending 90% of her time at Dan’s house per her own choice. She has come a remarkable way in a short span of time. At first she would tuck her tail and cower if you reached out to pet her, and now she will roll-over for a belly scratch! She also began to accompany Dan and I on walks, chase unwanted animals out of the yard, and spend the night on the porch. Dogs are rarely invited inside so most won’t even try to go in for fear of a walloping, but eventually it would be nice if she would feel comfortable sleeping in the house. But she is fattening up and appears very comfortable and happy now. I absolutely adore her (no one compares to my Finn though), and was sad when I had to say goodbye.

In fact, she made our lives quite difficult when I was attempting to go back to Asuncion. I had a meeting on Monday, and therefore would have to leave a day early on Sunday to make it in on time. However, there are no busses directly from the town on Sundays so we were planning to walk the 3 or so miles to the next town where we could pick up the bus. We left at 5am to beat the heat and make the bus at 715am. We gave the dog (still unnamed because nothing seems to suit her yet) a huge breakfast and some water to hold her over until Dan made it back a few days later. Being a campo dog, she can hold her own for a few days, even though it’s hard for me to leave her without a babysitter like I do for my pup in the states! Anyway, we started on our journey and were surprised to find that she was following us even though she never likes to walk in the direction we were headed. We just assumed she would turn back at some point, but she continued to follow us. At the edge of town I started to get worried, and tried (poorly) to chase her away, but it didn’t work. We were going to miss the bus, so we continued to let her come with us. The problem with this is that there are a lot of territorial dogs out there who will stop at nothing to keep other dogs (or people) out of their property. Being only one skinny dog, we were afraid that once we left she either wouldn’t be able to get back from 3 miles away, or that other dogs would attack her without our protection (throwing rocks). Long saga short, after walking 2 miles with our heavy bags, we turned around and gave up leaving on Sunday and had to change all of our plans to make sure that she stayed in town and was safe. It was worth the trouble in the end because my guilt would have haunted me if Dan returned a few days later and she was nowhere to be found, but it was a pain in the ass. Luckily, she is cute and I could forgive her easily!

I would like to give a quick announcement that my site in Paraguay is going to be changing. As some of you know and others may not, I have been having a difficult time adjusting to the isolation of my site in addition to not having a place to live for the next two years. Due to this, the Peace Corps is considering a site change. At this time, Im visiting a site near Villarica to work and get to know another area. It is very beautiful here. There are many more trees and hilly terrain as opposed to the flat wetlands of Nembucu (which also have their appeal). In the meantime, I am waiting to hear about my new site. Please do not send any more mail to the Pilar address. It will now be going to the old Asuncion address, but you might as well wait until everything is figured out in a few weeks. Thanks to everyone for all the support!

I have been told that my writing tends to run-on and I know I don’t like to make new paragraphs. It’s just a habit I guess. I remember in the 9th grade we had to correct another classmate’s paper. The boy with my paper’s only comment to me was that I had too few paragraphs, and mine was that he had way too many. Go Figure. Nevertheless, I do agree that I can get a little lengthy, especially as I’m usually writing these blogs in a hurry and not much editing occurs. Therefore, I will attempt to make my blabbering easier to read.

Mbaepa la novedad That means, what’s new? You do not need a question mark, because the pa at the end of the word signifies that you are asking a question. Since my days here are remarkably similar, I decided that I should give some highlights.

First, my biggest issue right now is that I cannot find housing. It has been really stressful because instead of focusing on the community and thinking about projects, I spend most of my time preoccupied about not having a place of my own to move into. While there are some vacant houses, so far, no one has wanted to rent to me. Many people leave to work in Buenos Aires for a few years and want to keep their house and all of their things inside. Why they wouldn’t want to make some bucks in the meantime I have no idea. As I mentioned, logic here tends to be a little backwards. It is very important for volunteers to have their own house. While a select few choose to stay with a family the whole 2 years, most choose to get a place of their own. The reason being, it takes a lot of energy to go out and do what we do. Everything is foreign, and when you get back from attempting to speak Guarani for 3 hours and being laughed at, it’s nice to have a quiet place to relax. Additionally, it serves as a visual aid to the people about the work we can do. For example, if they see me out working in a healthy, thriving garden, they will think that I am guapa (hardworking) and be more inclined to heed my advice about agriculture. So it goes both ways. Finding housing in PY compared to Boston for example, is really rather comical. In Boston I had strict criteria of good lighting, washing machine, living room, spacious bedrooms, etc. Here, I’m checking out condemned looking buildings or half finished shacks with animal poop everywhere saying to myself, “Yeah, I could make this work, are there fruit trees”?

Dad, this is especially for you. It is mani (peanut) harvesting time! I love peanut butter like most Americans, but never really thought about how you get peanuts. To be honest, I had no idea they grew underground. Yes, they are a root. So the other day I helped the family I’m closest with, the Zayas’s, in their kokue (field). The plants were already pulled out of the ground, so all I had to do was help collect them. Then, they bring them back to their house and string them up to dry. If the peanuts do not get fully dried out by the sun, they will rot. Everyone is doing this work at the same time, so you walk by all the houses and just see tons of peanut plants strung up to dry. It looks really pretty. Today, once they had dried fully, we began to pick them off the plants. It is a lot of work as they have thousands of peanuts! They do a little bit each day which I think is a good way to go. They always give me food at this house, so I knew I was getting some yummy peanuts to take home. They gave me a small bag full, and it took me an hour to shell them all, but it’s worth it. They eat them in many forms: plain, with honey, make a candy, make a milkshake, and there has to be others I’m forgetting. Peanut butter is not that well known here. I can buy it in some cities, but it is loaded with sugar, and I’m not a big fan. These peanuts are a lot sweeter than the one’s we get in the states, and you eat them with the skin on. I like to eat them with a little honey. I could be a peanut farmer. Hooray for peanuts.

Ovati. That’s corn. It is another HUGE crop here. They make pretty much all of their typical dishes out of it, and the dried corn is used to feed animals. And the husks, well I will let you imagine what they use those for…but it is a very important crop. Yesterday I went out with Carolina and Maximo (I finally learned her husbands name) to harvest some corn. It was all dried at this point so we were just filling up a rice bag full of cobs for the chickens. All you do is take off the husks and pull out the cob. Some of them are hard to get out, others easy, and sometimes there is no cob when you get to the center. While I have no problem with fresh corn, I did not enjoy this task. I guess maybe if it wasn’t 100 degrees and if I didn’t get an allergic reaction to it. Yep, I broke out in the little hives, all over my arms, and then my neck decided it would join in. It was very itchy and dusty. I could not be a corn (dried) farmer. Boo for dried out Corn.

Finally story; I was visiting another house in the midst of my house hunting. I had heard they had native ostriches here in Paraguay. In fact, one had even chased after our car the very first time I came here. But for some reason it didn’t click that they really existed here until I saw it in person. It was being kept as livestock, but still, I was standing 2 feet away from an ostrich. She was scared and put up a defensive posture which consisted of opening up her wings to try to appear as big as possible. She succeeded! I felt bad for scaring her as her life is not that uh, liberated, and I didn’t want to stress her out more. Next, I noticed something even cooler than and adult ostrich in PY; a baby ostrich in PY. I couldn’t believe it. I have never seen a baby ostrich before. The funny thing is, it still stood over a foot tall and would be huge in comparison to other birds, but it’s so small for an ostrich. It walked around the house with the kittens, chicks, and other animals as though it was nothing unusual. But to me it was unusual, and it was so cute it that ugly way. It was tame enough to let me stroke it as it walked past. The feathers were not as I had imagined from handling other birds, but were slightly rough and scratchy.

Ok well, this computer is burning my lap…

I have a friend chicken. Well maybe not a friend chicken, but we have finally come to an understanding. This particular white and tan chicken has woken me up from a nice nap numerous times in the past squawking and such. What is she squawking about? Well, I’ll tell you. Chickens are prey species. They are used to being hunted, and spend most of their time worrying about being eaten. Because of that, they like to have a safe place to lay their eggs. Just like a pregnant cat or a dog will find themselves a quiet, dark place to have their litters, so too, do chickens like to feel secure where they choose to lay their eggs. In the states we give our chickens coops to protect them, and nest boxes to lay eggs in. I can name five chickens in particular (thanks mom and dad for taking such amazing care of our girls) that are living a life of luxury, because they are almost free from the stress of worrying about predators. The chickens here for the most part are always out in the open, and if they are lucky, they have a tree they can climb up in at night to sleep. Yes, chickens sleep in trees. No, they are not very high trees as chickens can’t fly that well, but they can fly.

Anyway, this particular white and tan chicken seems to be more bothered than most about not having a good place to lay her eggs. So, she would squawk outside my window because she knows that inside would be a good place to lay. She would flap up onto my windowsill and squawk. It’s very annoying and loud, so I would chase her off. Also, chickens are not supposed to be in the house (although they are everywhere in the kitchen trying to stay cool), and her being caught inside my room would surely get a flip flop thrown at her from someone (not me, ok I did it once, but I only scared her with it). So, I chased her away. One day, after coming home from somewhere, I found my room disheveled. There is a large shelf in my room attached to the wall that has Carolina’s and my books on the bottom, and some of her clothes covered in plastic on the top. I had a hunch, and sure enough, after feeling around on the top shelf, I found a single, pinkish white egg. The white and tan chicken was gone.

This didn’t happen again for some time, but recently, this particular chicken has been trying to get into my room again. The first time I was in bed and she didn’t see me. When I got up to get her out, she freaked out, and flew around my room squawking at the top of her lungs and knocking things over. Finally, she flew out, but before long, she was peering in though the window again, thinking about that top shelf. I let her come in. She flew up to her favorite spot, and proceeded to lay down. I let her stay there while I went to eat breakfast. I even closed the door so she wouldn’t get caught. When I came back in, sure enough, I found that she had left me one perfect, pinkish white egg. While it’s most likely that the egg is fertilized because we have a rooster, she never tries to lay a full clutch or incubate them. She comes to my window, flies up to the top shelf, and lays her perfect egg. She seems very happy and content up there as it is dark, soft, and high up, i.e. safe. I don’t try to chase her out, and in return, there are no piercing shrieks from her end. She now allows me to stay in the room and do things as long as I’m not too close to her, and in return, I get my fresh egg everyday. So as I said, I have a friend chicken. Well maybe not a friend, but we have come to an understanding.

It’s amazing how different a Peace Corps experience one can have depending on the placement of your site, despite being in the same country. As I mentioned before, I am 45km from the nearest road, in walking distance of nothing, and am not able to work with other volunteers easily, let alone get out of my site. Others are living in small towns and cities, seeing other volunteers on a daily basis, taking day trips to places, have internet in their houses, and can walk up the street for an ice cream when it’s hot. And it’s always hot. Needless to say, this is rough; harder than I thought it would be….I have been asked to describe my site and the people in more detail. Here you go:

My town consists of roughly 20-30 houses. I haven’t counted them yet, so I don’t know. Maybe I’ll do that tomorrow. There are pretty much two types of houses. The more primitive one’s are generally one or two room large “huts” with the walls made out of adobe (which is a mud and water and straw and something else mixture). The floors are usually dirt. The roofs are generally bamboo with straw covering that, maybe tile. There may or may not be a window. Water is from a well and the bathrooms are outdoor latrines. People bathe by filling a bucket of water and splashing it on themselves and dunking their heads in to wash their hair (well at least that’s how I did it!) While everyone here is now connected to electricity, most of these houses do not use conventional ovens, but a few have fridges. Usually they still cook over a fire and also have these brick outdoor oven things. Most families all sleep in one room. Everyone has a t.v. Go figure. The chuchi (rich) houses are the newer ones. They consist of one to four or five rooms. The walls are brick, the floors are cement, and the roofs are tile. These houses usually have a fridge, may or may not have a conventional gas oven, and if lucky, have an indoor bathroom. The water is still from a well, but gets pumped up by some form of engineering I don’t understand. In my house for example, there is a sink with running water and an indoor shower in the bathroom (phew)! But, there is no sink in the kitchen and we fill a bucket to wash dishes outside. Most people have a small area of land and work that for subsistence. Most people either keep chickens, cows, pigs, horses, or all of them. Men head out to work in the chacra (fields) in the early mornings and late afternoons. I do not know what they do out there all day. Women usually get up early to milk the cows if they have them and to begin cleaning and preparing the days meals. I do not live in a conventional household because Carolina works as a teacher, and her husband is a carpenter. Some men have other jobs outside the fields, but I don’t really know what. Most women here work the household. There is a puesta de salud, in which a nurse is there a few days a week. She is responsible for getting kids vaccinated and treating minor illness or injuries. However, in this country you can get drugs (not hardcore but antibiotics and stuff) without a prescription and without really knowing what they are doing: kind of scary. When I was sick they wanted to give me this weird chemical, no thanks. But a lot of people also only believe in home remedies. People are really superstitious. So again, most people just live off the land and do not have salary jobs. Lack of work is a huge problem here, and most young people leave to work and live in Spain or Argentina. There is one road going directly through my town. It is very sandy and motos and cars get stuck a lot. Most of the houses are clumped together, and some are more spread out. It’s probably a mile or so from one end of town to the other. We have one school for the area with about 40 students total from preschool to high school, and four teachers. It is out of session until mid Feb. There is a teeny tiny police station in which I have no idea what they do all day. There is really no crime here because everyone knows everyone else. Most people do not lock doors and most houses do not have any form of security (like bars on the windows). There is a teeny tiny church which I have yet to see open. There are two houses that are dispensas (little stores). You can buy the basics: soap, toilet paper, some hardware stuff, soda, soda, soda, maybe garlic or onions, chicken feed (aka corn), and sometimes the bread balls (think stale, tiny, round white bread croutons, that I have come to enjoy). There are two similar towns about 10-20km away. I have to pass through one to get here and it looks just the same as my town, and the other one is further away from Pilar than me, so I have no desire to go check it out. I think that pretty much sums up the town. Most people spend their days in the field, tending animals, cooking, cleaning, and just sitting around drinking terrere. There is also a volleyball “court” because that is randomly a popular sport here. There is a soccer field, but have yet to see a game, maybe once schools in session. The climate is usually really hot, humid, and the soil is very sandy and dusty. I love when it rains. It finally cools down a bit, and the storms here are awesome with great thunder and lightning. It can be black and raining in one spot and not the other, or suddenly stop raining and be hot and sunny again. I guess it’s kind of like Florida that way. Who would have thought that I would miss predictable Massachusetts weather, but I do! Also, there are amazing sunsets and cloud formations here. If it’s not too buggy, I sit outside and watch the sunset. I go to Pilar once every two weeks or so to buy food.

I hope to take some pictures of the town and get them up, but uploading is really hard to do here, so it might not be until I go to Asuncion next. I am trying to get out every once and a while to see my friends, but I am super far away and it’s hard. My other source of stress is that I have nowhere to live in March. We are supposed to (or are dying to, we can stay with families if we want) move out to our own houses that we rent, but there are not really any options here for renting. I can have a tiny house built, but it is really expensive because it costs a ton to get the materials all the way out here from Pilar, and I am working with a very tight budget. So right now, that is really up in the air and I do not know what I am going to do. I really need my own space to start a garden and demonstrate sustainable gardening techniques, and to have some privacy! But if I can’t get the money loaned to me, I don’t know what other option I have but to stay in this house. I have to figure this out by feb 1st, so we shall see what happens. I wrote this on the 9th but am adding to it now on the 18th. i just spent a few days in pilar and it was great to get a little break from site. I have been trying to meet people in town, but it is very awkward and my guarani skills are terrible. i still just speak spanish. my goals for the upcoming weeks are to try to spend time at someone´s house everyday, even just for a few minutes. i also need to start exercising at night or in the early morning, because i am starting to feel really sluggish and terrible from not getting any exercise and sitting around all day due to the heat. in another week or so, im heading into asuncion for a friends bday, so i am hanging in there and looking forward to that! i have to take it one day at a time here, and see if this is really what i want for the next 2 years!

just a quick note that i posted 2 new entries today:one on the 21 and 28th. thanks

My trip to Pilar and the internet café have obviously been postponed… a few times. Originally I was planning to head out there that Monday, but when Carolina couldn’t come back on time due to the rain, I decided it would be weird if I left right after she got back. So I stayed. Then I thought I would go in right after Christmas, but then I decided to hold out until I ventured back to Asuncion to retrieve some of the huge pile of books and clothes I couldn’t carry out here all at once. So this will eventually get posted.

Like everything else, the Christmas holiday is celebrated differently here than in the U.S. Instead of the main activity taking place on the 25th, the 24th is more important. It is actually celebrated more like New Years Eve than anything else. Pretty much, there is a big asado (barbeque) planned. Cooking begins in the afternoon and traditional foods like chipa and sopa paraguaya (These are palatable for me only directly out of the oven when hot; I wouldn’t choose to eat them, however some volunteers love them) are made, and later meat will be served. There is a “countdown” and at midnight you finally eat dinner and greet each other with cheek kisses for women and handshakes for men (the usual). Depending where you live, there are religious activities (some of my comrades went to church or did vigils, luckily for me, the minister only comes to this town once a month so I was off the hook). That’s pretty much it. There is also a lot of drinking involved with some families (not this one). There is generally a lot of drinking involved on all days off, especially Sunday. I heard that in the cities Santa Claus is known and will leave kids a present, and many people buy American decorations. I was kind of sad that the commercialism has made it all the way out here. It just shows how big an influence western culture has. The question of where to spend Christmas was a bit stressful for me because at that point, I had only spent 2 full days with Carolina, and a lot more with the Zayas family (the original family I stayed with). I decided to spend Christmas Eve with the Zayas family, and Christmas Day with Carolina. I didn’t know at that point that they don’t do anything for Christmas Day. I headed over to the other house around 6. Not knowing or having anything to bring, I picked up a bottle of soda (drunk constantly here) and packed some of the candy canes my Mom had sent me from the states (thanks Mom!) to share. The night passed slowly and painfully, for I had forgotten to put on long pants or apply bug repellant, and I was being eaten alive by mosquitoes. I normally go to sleep at 9 here, so I hadn’t seen how bad the bugs could get at night at a house with a lot of farm animals. They pretty much sit around, and don’t always talk much. Luckily (because I needed to escape the bugs) that family goes to sleep early too, and by 1030pm we were all exhausted and hungry, so we ate early. Then they walked me back to my current house, where I got to meet Carolina’s parents and sister. I stayed up with them until after they had their asado, and finally went to bed around 130am. In the morning, they feasted on the night’s leftovers, including the asado. I however, was thrilled that Carolina’s Mom had brought me some fruit. They left around 11, and I wasn’t sure what to do with myself. I spent the day alone, reading, and talking to my own family at home and missing the cinnamon buns my Mom always makes Christmas morning (delicious if you have never experienced my mom’s cooking!). Later, I took a walk and found a big wetland area, so I am looking forward to exploring that more. I do have a bird identification book for PY, but I couldn’t carry it the first time out. I have already seen many species I don’t know, and am eager to start learning them and the other animals. Another highlight for me is that so far I have encountered 3 different species of frogs and 2 species of toads: all in my house. The frogs come into the shower for water, as it’s very hot and dry here. The toads can be easily heard and often venture inside and near the lights to eat the bugs. I’m planning to keep a few in my house as natural pest control. They are also HUGE. The biggest one I’ve seen was about twice the size of my fist. I have yet to see any local mammals, but hopefully they are not all extinct yet. Other than Christmas time, my schedule has pretty much been the same. I get up sweating. If it is not insanely hot already, I attempt to do some pilates, but usually I’m already too hot. I take my first shower of the day and eat breakfast. Then I read. And read. Terrere. And read. Then I eat lunch. Maybe shower. Then I want to take a nap but it’s too hot, so I read some more, or stare at the chickens. Terrere. Write in my journal. Then I read until dinner time. Sit around. Take a shower and go to bed, sweating. Sometimes I do leave during the day to visit either the Zayas family or the family of Carolina’s husband (still don’t know his name, or the dog’s name for that matter). That takes up some time, but usually I am just thinking, staring, or reading. I will eventually need to force myself to not be shy and meet all the families in town, but I’m not ready to do that just yet. I am still adjusting, and with the heat, it’s really hard to move. I don’t have many of my reference materials with me, but once I do, I need to get back to studying and starting to prepare projects. Everything happens slowly here, and that’s ok, because it wouldn’t be appropriate to start shoving my views down everyone’s throats. I need to first get to know my community, assess their needs, and then can start doing “work”. The thing people at home may not realize is that through our fast paced culture, there is always a pressure to do something, something tangible. A lot of you think I’m already building schools or something like that. That’s not how Peace Corps works. Everything is a process, and you can’t rush it. Simply me being here is “work”. Maybe not tangible, but unless I am comfortable and the people trust me, nothing I do will be sustainable anyway. So I am taking my time. And as a first time volunteer, it is going to take longer than other sites. I am also getting to know Carolina better, and still hope that we will one day be friends. She is very progressive in her thinking compared to many women here, I am looking forward to working with her on projects and connecting her with resources of her own to use in the future. I also learned that there is already an adult education group that meets periodically, so I hope to get involved with that. So yeah, things are going. It is still really challenging, lonely, and frustrating at times, but I’m doing ok. I have made a lot of good friends here, so we all support one another. That’s all I got. Happy birthday Laura!

It’s hard to believe that it is only 4 days away from Christmas. People at home are starting to slack on their work, eagerly anticipating a few days of vacation and frantically trying to catch flights and avoid the traffic. I’m sitting here, in my little room in the middle of nowhere, thinking about you all. It’s strange to think that it’s Christmas time, because it sure doesn’t feel like it here.

I arrived to site after a long and bumpy bus ride on Thursday afternoon. That means I have only been in site for 3 full days, but it seems like a lot longer. As I mentioned, I am living with a woman named Carolina who is 28, and her husband, who is 34. Carolina works as a teacher in my compania (small village), and is one of my “contacts”. That simply means that she is one of the people who agreed to help me early on. It in no way guarantees that I will be working with her in the future, or that she has any responsibility for me. However, due to the housing situation I ran into last time I was here, she has graciously agreed to let me stay in her niece’s room. Luckily for me, school is out for summer, so I have the room to myself until the niece comes back in Feb for school. Privacy is not something that comes easily here, so I really enjoy having a little space to call my own (Even if everyone can see in through my window). Plus, I t have and indoor bathroom and shower! (Until I move out on my own, then it’s most likely back to bucket bathing and the latrine). Carolina is originally from Pilar, and is more of a city girl. She came out here for work, but often goes to Pilar to be with her family, or to attend classes to get her final teaching license. She speaks Spanish to me, which makes things a little easier, except that I am realizing how much knowledge I’m lacking in that language too. Her husband is a carpenter of sorts, speaks mostly Guarani, and I have no idea what his name is after being told multiple times. The first day here I spent my time organizing my room, reading, and trying to make myself socialize. It is a really hard transition. Pretty much everything is awkward and awkward all the time. Imagine going to someone’s house you don’t know and having to ask questions about where to put the dirty toilet paper (it does not go down toilets). Additionally, things that would come as second nature in the U.S., like washing your dishes, become a difficult task. Where is the soap? Do they use soap? Why isn’t the soap near the faucet? Etc. Etc. They must think we are all very dumb, because everything is so backwards that we newbie volunteers fumble around all the time. You almost go back to feeling like a little kid who can’t take care of themselves. Furthermore, I’ve decided that logic goes out the window here. Things that I think would make sense don’t apply here. For example, this house is not fully built. Wouldn’t you want to have doors and windows before you installed your expensive new washing machine (a huge rarity) so that’s protected? Wouldn’t you want to put dirty dishes by the faucet so you could clean them easier than carry a bucket to the other side of the house? No and No. I just try not to question things anymore. Carolina is very nice, but she has made it clear to me that she doesn’t want to be my mother. This is fine because I am really hoping we become friends. There are very few women my age here as many go off to work in Argentina. However, it is a still a little weird staying at someone’s house and being told to do whatever you want. I feel like I am in the way, and I do not want to overstep any boundaries. Carolina and her husband left early sat morning (330am is when the bus comes) to go to Pilar and left me to my own devices. There was a big storm on Sunday afternoon when they were supposed to return, so It’s now Monday afternoon, and I am still alone and waiting for them to come back. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to have time alone, but I just don’t know what to do with myself all day. I am not really ready to venture out to unknown houses and chit-chat. That confidence is going to take me a little while. So pretty much, I have spent the days sitting around, watching the chickens, reading, watching the clouds, eating, watching the chickens, petting the dog…. Not a whole lot. I have become attached to two young chickens who keep by me in the hopes I give them something yummy to eat (as I often do). They sleep next to my chair in the kitchen sometimes. I have a few pictures I took so far of my house, which I hope to get up for you all. There is a strange head of some tiny opossum like animal in the fridge that I have had to look at for the last few days. I sure hope they get rid of that. I have tried my hand at cooking, but my skills are severely lacking, and I don’t have many ingredients. Yesterday I went over to the other host families house (the one’s I stayed at on my site visit). They were very nice to me and fed me lunch and gave me some food to take home with me. It’s amazing how people with so little can be so generous. While I am happy I don’t have to stay in their house (think 1 room adobe hut), and I am no longer afraid to go over there and spend some time. Hopefully, I will start to feel close to them. Well I feel that I have rambled on long enough, so I’ll wrap this up. Pretty much, I’m hanging there. Nothing is great yet, but I’m doing ok. I have no idea what I am doing here, or how to go about starting work. I am going to try to get into Pilar soon, but with the rain and Christmas coming, I might not be able to post this until after the date. Nevertheless, I love and miss you all, and wish everyone a relaxing holiday!

Where do I begin? My life has changed so drastically during the last few weeks. As I mentioned, I received my site placement at the beginning of December. Everyone in my group (G31) gets placed at a different site. Some are very close to others (even in the same city) and others are further away. We get divided into VAC groups, which is basically the people living closest to you. My VAC group is really small, but with my G we added 5 new members, so it should be good. We meet up maybe once a month. There is one other Envi Ed person, but all the rest are beekeepers and Government volunteers. But we can work with anyone we want to on various future projects, so it’s good to have some diversity. Unfortunately, getting to these people’s sites is not easy and far, and most likely we will just meet in Pilar. Pilar is our central city, and my closest town (about 45km away). Some people were very happy about their placements and others not so much. I hope that it works out for everyone. While we can give preferences for site placement, we have to go where we are needed even if that is not the ideal spot for you. So pretty much, I am going to make the best of it, and I really hope to enjoy my site and the people I meet! I plan on getting a horse asap. I don’t know how the people will respond to me having a horse for a pet and companionship as they are used for work, but we shall see what happens. It will also eat into my small budget, so I hope I can afford it!

Anyway, after our site visits, we all went back to Guarambare to finish training. The last two weeks flew by. We finished up projects, spent time with family and friends, and took our language exams. Everyone passed to move onto “volunteership” if you will. However, my Guarani is extremely limited and I plan to spend a lot of time studying. It really takes awhile to learn a new language. Another cool thing is that I got to try my hand at bee keeping for the first time. There is a group of volunteers just doing beekeeping stuff, and on our self planned training, I picked bee keeping. It is a great environment to learn cause it was with the beekeeping training, so it was in English. And we were moving a wild be hive that took residence in an empty bee box at our training center into a new cleaning box. It is pretty terrifying at first, hearing thousands of bees buzzing and many landing on you. But we have protective suit for our top half and loose pants on the bottom. You use smoke to calm them and the hive we worked with was pretty calm. Only one person got stung and it was after we finished everything and had taken our suits off. Although the bee volunteers have been stung a ton, so it´s bound to happen. So what we did was take out the old comb and move them and the bees to the new box. We had to capture the queen because without her the hive will die. Its really interesting and I am planning to learn a lot more. I am lucky because I have a committee of beekeepers in my site, so I will get the opportunity to work with them. After we cleaned up the hive, we got to eat some fresh honey that was left over! Mmm. There are a few pictures of the honey.

I also spent my first birthday away from home. Not that birthdays are that exciting anymore, but I am amazed that I am already 25. I feel like I have so much more to do before I get old and 25 seems really old to me! My friends surprised me with a cake and we drank what the locals do, wine mixed with sprite (better than it sounds). It made feel very happy that people would spend the time and effort to do something nice for me when we have so many other stressful factors going on. It was a lot of fun, and I am very lucky to have gotten close to a lot of great people. That same week we left our families in Guarambare. Some people had a really hard time leaving. While I really liked my family, I never was extremely close to them, and hope that my next host family feels more like my own extended family. I will miss them however, and plan to stay with them when we go back to future IST trainings. Next, we had our swearing in ceremony. For those of you who are confused by the volunteer process, we have 3 months of training then we get approved for service and are officially sworn in. At this point, we are volunteers and begin our 2 years of service. The ceremony takes place at the American Embassy and we have a few speakers from PC, the US Ambassador, and an elected class speaker (Yeah Charles!). The embassy is super nice and we are allowed to go there to hang out when in Asuncion. We had a small reception and then we were “set loose”. Our lives have been so controlled for the last 3 months. It has felt like a combo between summer school and camp. It’s weird to suddenly be on your own and truly responsible for yourself. The same day we swore in, another G had their swearing out reception. Afterwards, it’s tradition for the G’s to go somewhere for a party. We went to a town called San Bernadino outside Asuncion. Good food and good company. After that, our G headed back to Asuncion for a few more days off. We were given a short vacation before we are required to go to our sites. Asuncion was extremely off-putting to me at first, but after a few days there, I am starting to find some of it appealling. We finally found some good parks and restaurants. I can’t tell you how great it was to pick what I wanted to eat every day. I realized that the food has been really negatively affecting me, and I am looking forward to putting my foot down in my site, and not eating some of the really gross stuff anymore just to be polite. Gracias mante. It’s hard though because food and sharing are a huge part of the culture here. I do not want to offend anyone, but at the same time, I can’t keep compromising my health. I just need to find a better balance. To be honest, the best part of Asuncion is staying in the Hotel. It’s total 70’s style, has a.c, a pool on the roof with a great view, and all our friends were there. It becomes like its own little world; a safe haven. It was very difficult to say goodbye to all of our friends, and head off to site. Luckily, we now have cell phones, which is amazing. And slightly weird because I think in some ways it defeats the purpose of the experience, but I am thankful to have it! Currently, I am staying the night in Pilar waiting for tomorrow’s bus. I can’t easily get back from Asuncion in one day. It is actually the first time I’ve had completely to myself in months, and it feels great. I needed a breather before heading to site. It is a big step to show up in your site not knowing anyone, and trying to become a part of the community: baby steps. Our first few months we are pretty much just expected to drink terrere and get to know people. It is the hottest part of the year over the next three months, and people do not do that much because the heat is so oppressive. However, despite this tranquilopa (relaxed) culture, it is still pretty intimidating. I have tonight and tomorrow morning to myself, and then I head to site tomorrow afternoon. I am staying with a different family than I originally stayed with on the first visit because of housing stuff, so I am a little nervous. I am staying with a younger couple, the woman is one of my contacts (the people who are supposed to help us out), and their niece. It will be a much different atmosphere than my previous host family with five brothers! That’s about all I have for now. I plan to go to Pilar once a week to pick up supplies, so I may actually be blogging more regularly now. If it hasn’t rained and I can get out! Thanks to everyone who has sent me mail! It is sooo nice to get letters. FYI, I have a new address. Supposedly it is a little faster since it goes through Argentina. I can still receive mail at the Asuncion address; it’s just that I won’t be going to Asuncion as often so I may not get it for a long time.

CC Nº 27

Pilar 2800

Ñeembucú, Paraguay

South America

These past couple of weeks have been a whirlwind. While at first training seemed to be endless, we are in our last few weeks before swearing in as volunteers and time is flying by. Thanksgiving came and went, my quarter of a century birthday is coming up, and it is almost Christmas. It feels so strange to be celebrating these holidays in 100 degree weather. I could definitely go for a little snow! For Thanksgiving, we were graciously invited to the house of our Country Director. His family has a beautiful house in Asuncion, with air conditioning and a small pool. Needless to say, we were all giddy with excitement as such luxuries already seem so foreign to us. We had a pot luck dinner, and it was delicious. I cooked “congo bars” (that tasted nothing like they were supposed to because we have to use their weird margarine, but were still good), and well as a cold pasta salad because of the heat. Everything was great, and it was a nice break from our routine. However, it wasn’t the same as being at home, and I miss everyone!

I also received my site placement, which has been a significant source of stress for me. I have been placed in a small (180 residents and about 25 houses) campo (rural) community in the department of Ñeembucú, which is in the southwest corner of PY. I am about 2 hours by bus from the nearest city, but the bus does not come frequently or at all if it rains, and when it does, it leaves at 330am. Total travel time to Asuncion is about 10 hours. The people mostly work small agricultural plots. There is no running water, or indoor plumbing. Needless to say, it was not the site I was expecting to placed in. Most EE volunteers get placed in larger towns and even cities. I am struggling with my reservations. Up until now, I had not had any concerns about staying for 2 years, but I am worried about the isolation/size of the community. Additionally, there are some problems with housing that need to be worked out. On the plus side, I can learn about beekeeping, and get my own horse! The people are very nice, and appear to very interested in the work and connections I have to offer them. These next 2 weeks until swearing in will be very busy, but I will try to get an update up as soon as possible. Happy Holidays!

It’s Friday afternoon and I just returned home from our “long field” visit in which groups of trainees are sent to visit current PCV’s for 5 days. Our group of 5 was accompanied by a PY language teacher, and in my case, our envi ed trainer. The goal is to get more experience working in the field. Our PCV was planning a bird festival, working in the school garden, and making homemade dish soap. We all stayed with different host families and met up during the day to work. I had an amazing time, and it really opened up my eyes to how service can be! The following is adapted from my journal while I was away.

I am staying in a compania (rural village) about an hour outside Carapegua, a large town a bit southeast of Asuncion. I am staying with a host family that is one of the current PCV’s favorites, and I see why! They are super nice, hard working, and genuinely care about my well being. It is a small family for PY, as the parents only have two sons. Osmar is in his late 20’s and is a school teacher. Diego is 22 and works in the health center as a nurse. I connected really well with Diego. He is very intelligent, guapo (guapo/a means hardworking here, they do not use it to mean handsome/pretty as in other Hispanic speaking countries), and was extremely helpful in showing me around and explaining things. This family speaks almost entirely Guarani to each other, and while they understand Spanish, the older generation doesn’t speak it as well. Diego speaks perfect Spanish and Guarani, so he would translate things for me and help me learn new Guarani words. Osmar was out working a lot or spending time with his fiancé. I stayed in the eldest brother’s room, and the rest of the family all stayed in one room together. The house has some “modern” amenities like running water and an indoor bathroom, which kinda looked like a cave, as it had dirt-eske floors and no light. The house itself was really nice. They have a good amount of land and keep an awesome huerta (garden), some simple agroforestry systems, as well as chickens, pigs, sheep, and a cow. Because of this, they don’t have to buy a lot of outside food and even sell cheese. They cook all their meals with wood and a pot on top. Needless to say, my host mom cooked the best meals I’ve had in PY, so I am no longer worried about having to live without a stove. The women in this compania are actually more empowered than in many others because they have a lot of responsibilities. My host mom milks the cow, makes cheese, cooks, works in the garden, cleans, and the main source of income for the family is the making of mantellas. These are tablecloths made from Aupo’i which is a type of material specific to PY that they use to make traditional clothes. They pretty much spend everyday sewing and decorating these mantellas to sell. They work very hard but have a comfy life for campo living because of it. I really like that the whole family pitches in, even the men! The mantellas are beautiful and I definitely plan on purchasing some in the future. They can whip out about 4 a day when they all pitch in.

Monday was pretty boring in terms of work because we went to the school and just prepared some materials for the bird festival. (I already made a million bird masks the last time I went on a PCV visit). On Tuesday we got a group of women together to make homemade dish soap. This is a great activity to teach because detergent is expensive here, and if you make it yourself it is very reasonably priced. You do have to invest in the initial ingredients and they can only be bought in larger cities, but it makes a ton of soap that could be sold for profit or fundraising. It was fun and I plan to use it in my future site. On Wed we were supposed to go on a fieldtrip with one of the local schools to a reserve for the bird festival. However, it was terrible weather and it was cancelled. This actually was great for me because I got to spend the whole day with my host family. I got up at 5am (and the following days too) to watch them milk the cow. Then I watched my host mom make cheese from the milk we just got. (Interesting, but slightly gross as they use part of a dried out cow stomach to make it coagulate, I don’t get how it works, but it does). In case you were wondering, nothing is pasteurized and I eat it all. I am still alive. Next, I helped Diego make the best drink ever! It’s a combo of some of the traditional drinks using yerba. You boil the milk well and add sugar to it that you have just melted by putting a piece of burning wood into it (they do this a lot), then you add more sugar (PY’s love their sugar) and then put that in a thermos. Then, just like drinking terere or mate, you add it to the guampo (traditional cup) on everyone’s tern to drink. What makes it delicious is that the guampo is filled with shredded coconut, anis, and yerba. It is quite possibly the best hot drink ever. Mmmmm. I plan on drinking it a ton. After breakfast, I just hung out and studied Guarani while my family sewed the tablecloths. I ended up taking two naps, a walk when the rain let up, and learned more about medicinal plants.

On Thursday the weather was still too bad to travel, as it rained in the morning and the roads were impassable in some areas. However, we were still able to do a half bird festival with the kids at school in the afternoon. We had different stations with activities relating to birds and the environment. I had to be super enthusiastic and act out things with the kids. You should all be proud of me because I actually pulled it off pretty well, and I managed to get my point across in Spanish, which was a challenge. That night, my super nice guapa host mom invited my whole group over for dinner. They LOVE to feed people here as much as they can possible eat, and it can be rude to say no. Hence, I have gained 10 lbs that I am not too pleased about. But anyway, my host family was amazing. They had me help with the dinner. I really felt like a part of the family after only a few days. This is sort of the opposite experience I am having with my other host family. While they are very nice, I still feel more like a visitor there. At this new family, I felt that I really connected well with them and I could definitely see myself living there. It is kinda ironic because we had to make our requests for what type of sites we want

(for the next 2 years we are assigned our own sites) earlier, and at that point I had only seen large towns, so I didn’t really know what to ask for. This site is exactly what I want. Unfortunately, this site is reserved for an agro volunteer, so I won’t be staying here  Hopefully, I will get another site that is similar in terms of being rural but not too far away from a city, and meet some more people that I could become part of the family with. On Friday we traveled to another school do the bird festival again. After that, I had my final yummy and fattening and colorless lunch with the family. I took some pictures of them and it is funny how excited they got. Hardly anyone has cameras and they love to look at pictures. They even changed their shirts before I could take some pictures! It was so funny, and they sent me off with a bag of fruit, and the invitation to come back at any time. I will take them up on that offer! Now I am back at training site and it is back to the upper 90’s. YUCK. Did I mention that one day last week was 112F with the humidity??? Yep. It is HOT. This week we find out our future sites!!!!

5:06 AM

I went to bed last night just as it was beginning to rain. It had been dry for days and the rain was finally bringing relief from the heat and the dust. I could feel the air cooling off as the drops hit the ground. I had my window (which is a wooden shutter) open just a little as I had already learned that my room is prone to getting wet during rainstorms and water settles under my bed. I slept normally (neither good nor horribly) and was only awoken occasionally by the thunder and lighting as the storm intensified. But at 430am, I awoke to a pesky itch on the bottom of my foot (how do mosquitoes manage to bite me everywhere?). After some scratching and tossing and turning, I was awake enough that I needed to go pee. Going to the bathroom during the night was never something that I used to do, but now it’s a habit because I often don’t get to pee before bed since the bathroom is always occupied. Eight people, one smelly bathroom. Anywho, I swung my legs over the bed and as feet were about to hit the ground, a let out a slight shriek of surprise as my toes hit water. I was standing in a puddle! I meandered towards my light switch, and as I flicked it upwards, I wondered if it is good to turn on a light when you’re standing in a puddle. I winced as the fluorescent light flickered on, and opened my eyes to find that my entire room was filled with about 2 inches of standing water. I opened my door to go tell my host family only to find that not only were the kitchen and living room flooded, but that they had turned the couch over to avoid the water. They knew it was going to flood…Normally, in the U.S. it is customary to warn people if they are going to wake up in a puddle, but hey, welcome to Paraguay. So I got to work. Luckily, since the last time it rained I learned to keep my valuables up high, and only my pack and duffle bag got wet. I moved them to the kitchen chairs and made sure nothing else was going to get ruined. The rain was still pounding down on the roof, and I could almost see the water seeping in through the side of the house (I later learned that we are not level and flooding often happens. My driveway was a 1ft tall river.) So what do you do when you are in PY, it’s 5am, and your house is flooded? Tranquiolapa. Relax. So I grabbed a snack, got back into my bed, and went back to sleep. Everything will be fine tomorrow.

well i havent had a chance to compose a long post, but just wanted to say i hope all of you enjoyed halloween for me, cause i really missed it! and it is soooo hot here. i sweat all day long. jajotopata!

I think that I have reached the point in training that was previously described to us as the “flat part on the rollercoaster”… i.e. burnt out. Things are still going well, but the rigorous schedule has all us trainees feeling exhausted and ready for a break. We just got back from an overnight tech excursion, but you can’t really call this a break because it is just as tiring as training (but more fun!). We had language class as usual on Friday morning before heading out to a current PCV’s site. The highlight of the trip I think was stopping for lunch at a restaurant. It wasn’t so much that the food was great, but more so that we finally had a chance to hang out all together. Normally, we go home for lunch and don’t have too many opportunities to really relax as a group. Although we looked super touristy, it was nice to have a break from being watched while eating (our eating habitats are a constantly scrutinized by our host families) and I got FRENCH FRIES!!! Mmm. I think that was the longest I’ve ever gone in my life without eating fries. Despite all the fried food, French fries do not show up on our plates unless we go out to eat, which PY’s do not normally do (unless you live in a big city, then it’s more common). There is a siesta from about 12ish until 3ish every day, which trainees do not get the chance to enjoy because our lunch break is only from 1130 to 1. Que lastima. I cannot wait to take a nap at lunch time every day. Sorry, I’m getting off topic… We got to visit an NGO started by a Dutch guy who provides trees for free to Paraguayan communities. It was cool to hear about and see how a small idea can really make a big impact. They work a lot with Peace Corps and hopefully I will get able to get involved in the future, as I am very interested in planting as many trees as I can in my community. Actually, they were nice enough to donate a dozen trees to my partner and I for our Dias de Practica! “Practice days” happen once a week or so to get us out in the community and start doing projects. It is sort of like a trial run of some of the experiences we will be having once we get to our sites. The good part right now is that we get to work with a partner, which softens the blow when you say something stupid and they can pick up where you left off if you have a mind fart! Anyway, we are preparing to teach a class (aka giving a charla as we call it) about the importance of trees and will be planting some at the school for the kids to take care of. So it was great to find someone to donate the trees. After that, we took a brief look at the Basilica de Caacupe, which is where thousands of people make a pilgrimage every year to on Dec 8th. Sorry I’m not good at religious details, but it is a big deal here and people walk sometimes for days to get there. Despues de that brief excursion, we were split up to stay in more host families for the night in the town were the PCV works. Homestays have their positives and negatives. It is great to get a new experience in terms of how different people live in different parts and what we might want of out future sites. They are also exhausting because you have to go through all that awkwardness of meeting people for the first time and trying to communicate in their language. And you are not always going to like everyone you meet, so it can be annoying to have to stay somewhere you don’t like. Pretty much, you can compare our first 6 months (training and then the first 3 months in our sites we are required to stay with host families) as being constant house guests. This means we constantly have to be polite, respectful and interested in our families. This is not a bad thing, but it does put a lot of pressure on you when you never quite feel like you can relax. We are all already looking forward to our own houses. This stay was only for a night, so not too bad. Needless to say, I of course got paired with a girl with the worst child ever. My host was a single 20 year old mom who lives with her sister and doesn’t work, but receives money from her family who is working abroad in Spain. A ton of PY’s leave to go work in Spain, get a lot of money, and return to PY to live better. Anyway, the girl was very nice and great to talk with, but her 2 year old son was a terror. Within the first half hour, he had repeatedly hit me and ran around screaming. The mom was telling him no, but he did not listen. Then he pulled my hair, at which point she threatened him with a branch she pulled off a bush. To top it off, he tried to spit on me! He got wacked with the branch for that one. I was satisfied, haha. But yeah, discipline here seems to be very different than the U.S. Kids run around without any supervision. There are very few rules. My regular host brother who is 8, stays up way later than me and I have never seen him do anything productive like read or do homework.

The next morning we were off to join 2 current volunteers on an excursion to a national park with some high school kids. The parks are nothing like our parks, but it’s a start! However, of course it down poured and we hiked in the rain for awhile before heading back to our training community. It was important to see how the current volunteers interact with the students, and it is amazing to hear how well they can speak Spanish and Guarani! I hope I can accomplish the same in two years. The thought seems very daunting right now. We actually have our first language test this Monday. We have to reach an intermediate level of Guarani to swear in as volunteers. I am by far the worst one in my class, so I really need to buckle down and get some studying done. It is hard when we are in class all day to come home and do more, but I guess I will have to make the effort! Well it is late, and I am exhausted. That’s all for now.

This past we week we finally had a chance to leave our little city on two adventuras. The first was a trip to Asuncion to see weather or not we could handle public transportation. Public transportation here is like a story passed down from generation to generation i.e. best known through word of mouth. There are no printed schedules to check unless you are in the main station in Asuncion. While the busses usually have numbers and a destination on the front, this isn’t of much help to us newbies, as we have no idea what cities are where, etc. While I’m sure they exist somewhere, we do not have maps. We were all assigned different areas of interest to visit and were paired off by Spanish levels (high and low so that the people who are just beginning don’t have a heart attack). Therefore, although my Spanish is not great, I was “in charge” of getting two people to Guyra, (which means bird in Guarani) an NGO that does bird and other environmental conservation. I am proud to say that I got us there with time to spare. I also really enjoyed getting to speak with one on the Paraguayan biologists that works there. They produce a lot of great educations materials including a bird guide to Paraguay (yes I bought it!) which doesn’t exist anywhere else. They work a lot with Peace Corps Volunteers and I am really looking forward to trying to work with them at my future site. After the meeting we had some time to change money, go to the supermarket, and eat lunch before meeting at the PC office. I had an amazing vegetarian lunch and a delicious chocolate pastry. Real chocolate! I was psyched (and am still dreaming about getting it the next time I’m in Asuncion) because they do not eat real chocolate here like we do. Most of their candies are just chocolate flavored. However, they do have Cadburys in the big supermarkets, and I stocked up on those of course. Sorry I just wrote excessively about chocolate, but food is consuming a lot of my thoughts these days. Anyway, the trip went fine and I should be able to manage next time we get into the city.

The next trip we took was for four days to visit a current PCV. We all went separately to these sites. I was assigned to visit a volunteer whose site was down south in a town bordering Argentina. I actually already had a chance to meet her at a previous training session, so it was nice to have a face to put with the name. She was the one who first told be about Guyra and is an avid birder. We were given instructions on how to get there of course. It averages a 6 hour bus ride. On the day of departure, I left my house at 630 am and took the local bus to a different stop to pick up the main bus for 730. Needless to say, that bus never came, nor did the next one…. I ended up waiting until 10 before I convinced some nice Paraguayan to lend me their phone to make an “emergency” call to my trainers. I was told by the locals that the next bus would be coming around 12 ( I was supposed to arrive at 1230, haha). So my trainer told me to stick it out, or go back home and try again the next day. I decided to wait it out and luckily a bus came around 1130. I waited 4 hours before finally getting on the bus for a six hour ride! Because the other bussed never showed, this bus was packed full like sardines. All in all I stood for about 4 hours. I eventually got a seat, but gave it up to an old lady, then got another one, then gave it up for a pregnant lady, then ended up sitting on a stool right next to the driver and chatting. It ended up being pretty funny and they made sure I got off at the right stop. So the moral is, do not ever count on busses coming on time, and it is best to make friends with the driver so you don’t get lost! I finally arrived in the right town at 430. It was a long day P.S. The way back my bus didn’t come either and I waited 2 hours for the next one…. I am learning the art of patience

The city I went to was significantly wealthier than the majority of PY. There is a very large dam there which generates a ton on income for the local community. There are still many poor people, but overall, it is a very wealthy area with a lot of local resources. My PCV took me with her to her envi youth group meeting, and to school on Monday and Tuesday. The differences between our school systems are many. Pretty much, they spend a lot of time copying from the board into notebooks and there is little interactive material. Plus they only go for 4 hours a day. That is were PCV’s come in with their didactic materials (Liz, I have to teach, scary). My PCV is planning a bird festival so we made masks with the kids. I got to see the various types of teachers there (they really differ in their enthusiasm, dedication, and willingness to work with an outsider). The culture is so different than ours that it’s really hard to explain. However, I am even more convinced that I want to work outside the school as much as possible….hopefully never. Haha. I also got to spend time with two new host families. While my PCV lives alone, she spends a ton of time with two families that she got really close with. They are very different. One speaks all Spanish, and the other mostly Guarani, but I really had fun with them both. It was good to see that my PCV was able to connect so well and really be a part of the community. I hope I can achieve that. And to find people I really feel at home with would be wonderful. I got to observe what she does in her community and got some good tips for the future. The highlight of the trip for me was helping to birth a pig! At one of the families, their 300 lb (I’m guessing) pig was ready to pop when I went over for lunch on Sunday. Monday night, we found out that she was giving birth, but was having complications. We went over to check it out and see if I could possibly be of any assistance (although I have no pig experience). We arrived to one little piglet. So tiny, pink, and cute. I held it up to suckle so that it didn’t get squashed by the mom. After checking her out, I could tell that something was wrong and that they needed to “go in there.” I was worried I was going to have to do it myself, but luckily, the local “vet” came and did that part. Long story short, they finally started to come out. This poor pig gave birth to 15 piglets! Two were stillborn and because there were so many, they were very underweight and not as developed as they should be. I suspect that they will loose a few more, but hopefully the little guys will hang in there. They were soo cute and it was amazing to see how quickly they got up and wanted to feed! I did get some pics taken and will someday be able to post them somewhere. Anyway, it was great and sad at the same time because all these pigs are slated to be eaten. They are planning to slaughter Momma pig for Christmas dinner. If possible, I am even more convinced of being a vegetarian…

Side note: I constantly feel like there are bugs crawling on me. It’s probably because they are.

Sorry for posting two entries at once, but I wasn’t able to get to the internet when I wanted! Entonces, I have a few updates to add. Some of our country and project directors have come to visit and conduct interviews about our future sites. This is causing a little stress because none of us know anything about the eco-regions of Paraguay, and therefore, we have no idea where we want our sites to be. However, this decision is ultimately up to the directors. The pueblos we go to all have members of the community who have requested our service. We may be the first volunteers at a site, or the 2nd or 3rd. Peace Corps usually has volunteers at a site for 3 consecutive terms (6 years) but not always. We won’t get our assignments until the 8th week of training, but I am getting ahead of myself. So far, the days are very long because we have class all day, and then are still using our brains to speak in other languages. It is funny to see the mix we are all creating. It is part English, Spanish, and Guarani. So I apologize for some spanglish in my entries. However, I am excited to report that after only a week here, I am starting to think to myself in Spanish! Not all the time, but sometimes. This didn’t happen until the end of my stay in Costa Rica and Ecuador. I am so immersed in the languages here that Spanish is coming faster. Guarani however, is another story. Our professora is a native Paraguayan. She is very patient and nice, but moves very quickly. In two days of class we are already trying to speak in the third person. I have absolutely no idea what is going on! Thankfully, we can use Spanish too. I was beginning to get stressed by how fast she is moving, but then I realized that it is probably best to get hit all at once and slowly put the pieces together. I am definitely the most remedial person in class! I am also feeling better about my homestay. My youngest brother (Manu who is 8) doesn’t seem to be afraid of me anymore, and I even gave him and his friend an English lesson tonight. I also gave them a piece of American candy at the end and they were very excited. I am also getting my family to help me with my Guarani. This is a great ice breaker because they think it’s hysterical how I pronounce things. I am used to getting laughed at, but it’s ok because I sometimes make them speak in English and then I get a good laugh. It’s amazing how the same organs (tongue, teeth, etc.) can be taught to form such different sounds. The only one who I haven’t really talked to is the 16 year old. He avoids me like the plague. No importa. The other members seem to be warming up to me and I hope they start to take me places with them. I am eating like crazy and I do not/cannot exercise. It is not the norm here, but I am already packing on the pounds… I will have to start running here even though they think we are crazy when we do! My family loves to watch me eat and always gives me a huge serving of food. As far as the temperature goes, I am FREEZING. On Sunday it was in the 90’s. The last two days have been in the low 40’s. That is a drop of about 50 degrees in about 9 hours. Quite a shock for the body! My host Dad says that this isn’t exactly normal for this time of year (normally things start to get hot in early September). However, it is still spring, so sudden changes in temperature are to be expected. The main issue is that there is nowhere to escape the cold. It’s amazing the difference insulation makes (nothing is insulated). Our training site is pretty much an open air patio with a roof, so being there for 8 hours a day has been pretty rough. I have been wearing long underwear, 4 top layers, a hat and gloves to class. Not so fun. Pretty much every warm thing I own I have on. But, it should get back to insanely hot and humid very soon and then I will be complaining about that! If nothing else, now I know that I will need to buy warmer clothes for next winter! The next weeks are going to be very busy! I will update as soon as I can.

Che cherera Emmy. Che aspirante Cuerpo de Pazpegua. Che estado unidogua. Translation in Guarani: My name is Emmy (no one can pronounce Emily so I go by Emmy now). I am a Peace Corps trainee. I am from the United States. This is the speech I have been trying to memorize for a few days now and I think I finally have it! Note: all accents will be missing from my posts because I do not know how to add them in nor do I want to spend the time figuring it out! But I will say that the words are not pronounced exactly as they appear. Many letters are silent and others are emphasized. It is a very interesting language that actually sounds more like an Asian dialect when spoken, but when the right words don’t exist, they use Spanish words. My host family speaks Jopara, which is a combination of Spanish and Guarani and is often spoken in larger towns close to Asuncion. Therefore, I understand about half of what they are saying. In Asuncion and other larger cities, Spanish is generally spoken (while Guarani is still understood), and in the very rural areas, they only speak Guarani. Most of the host families where I live speak Jopara. The Envi Ed (EE) group lives in one section of the city, but the other groups: Crop Extension (CE), Bee Keeping (BK), and Agro Forestry (AF) all live in surrounding sections. In addition to beginning to learn Guarani, there are some distinctive differences in the Spanish that is spoken here are opposed to other South American countries. Mainly, instead of the tu form (non-formal you), they have a form called vos. At first I had this very confused with vosotros which we never learned in school because hardly anyone uses it, but is actually completely different. Vos pretty much replaces tu. So I am trying to erase that from my head, but it is hard to do because that is all they used in Costa Rica and Ecuador! It sounds funny too. For example: De donde sos vos? Aks where are you from instead of De Donde eres? Hopefully I will get the hang of it soon. As I mentioned before, I somehow tested high enough to start out my language classes in Guarani. Others with less experience have to start out in Spanish. At the end of our 3 months, we have to reach a certain level of both Spanish and Guarani competence. Which brings me to my next topic, training. Training takes place five days a week from about from around 8-5 and a half day on Saturdays. Sundays are free but are really for us to try to integrate into the family and we are discouraged from traveling. We have the main training center in the city which encompasses all the villages we live in, but only go there about once a week with all 4 groups. The other days, we split into our separate groups and have training centers in our own towns. Our counterpart, the AF group, often comes to our site as we share a lot of technical training. We have classes in language, technical skills, culture, as well as dias de practica and trips to current volunteer’s sites. I am not sure yet how everything will go, as we haven’t really begun yet. I am very happy to learn that we are expected to be able to teach agro forestry as well as envi ed because I was not too thrilled about being in a school. I am really hoping to work with farmers, so hopefully I will gain the technical skills necessary to do that as a secondary project. Training will certainly keep us very busy! After the three months, we will be tested to make sure we are competent enough, and then we will be asked to swear in as a volunteer. The culture of Paraguay has many nuances, of which I only know a few! An integral part of the culture is the sharing of terere, which is a traditional drink. It is most often consumed cold because of the heat, but is also served warm in the winter and then it is called Mate. Terere consist of yerba (which is like a tea) which is mixed with water, ice, and yuyos (medicinal herbs of various kinds but usually only three are used). I am not sure exactly how they make it yet, but basically the herbs are crushed and put in a special cup that is usually made from the horn of a bull. Other herbs are mixed with the water and ice and are kept in a pitcher, or if you are “walking” (they will not walk anywhere unless they have to) around town, then they carry a thermos with the water to pour in. The way you drink it can be compared to a tea ceremony, there is a certain etiquette. Usually, drinking takes place in a circle. One person does the pouring. They pour the herb water into the cup with other herbs, and a special type of straw is used to suck it up without taking in the herbs. To refuse would be considered very rude, but is acceptable if you are sick. Otherwise, you take the guampo (cup) and drink it all at once with only one slurp. Do not touch the straw! Then you hand it back to the person who originally poured it (traditionally the youngest but this tradition is dying) and they will pour it for the next person and so on. This activity can go on for a very long time and is drunk many times throughout the day to escape the heat. It tastes like a weak tea, and I like it a lot. Mate, the hot form, is better in my opinion because it has more flavor and allows the herbs to release their medicinal components. (Jenn & Melissa: I am learning all sorts of medicinal plants! I wish I had your identification skills) People walk around with their thermos’s and guampos. It is like being invited into a social circle. I am not quite sure the etiquette with men and women. Usually, they drink it in separate sex groups, but at home with your family it is ok to share with men. I think. I am still learning. Also, I have to really watch my behavior because women do not have the same rights here as men, and everything I do can be misconstrued. For example, if I am offered a beer from a man, I should refuse, but I can drink it if a woman offers is to me. I have a lot to learn with the gender roles because my family is six men and my host mom! I don’t have a model of how a young woman should interact with men, and therefore spend most of my time with my host mom. I am very thankful that for this homestay my family has an indoor bathroom with a shower! Some of the other more campo sites have outdoor bathrooms and bucket baths to bathe with and the curtains made from rice bags don’t do the best job of keeping your privacy. I will have fewer luxuries in my permanent site, but for right now, I am thrilled to not have to deal with bucket baths in a house of men. While my family is very good to me, I am worried that they see me as more of a visitor than a member of the family. I am having trouble connecting with some of my brothers. I don’t know if it’s an adolescent thing, but they show no interest in talking to me. I hope that this situation improves. I am not sure how to act, as I am the only girl. However, I am their first norteamericano, and maybe they do not know how to act with me either! I am in my room alone right now, typing this out so I can spend as little time as possible paying for the internet café, but a girl does not normally hang out alone, so I already breaking rules. I need more culture class! Also, the vegetarian thing seems to be really throwing them off. They did receive a packet with info on how to deal with us norteamericanos, because I saw it at my friend’s house, but I haven’t seem them look at it. Today at the market my host mom pointed to various cuts of meat asking what I ate. I keep saying I do not eat meat. When we arrived at the sausage section, she asked me again. It went like this: Madre: “Comes esto?” Do you eat this? Me : “No gracias, no como carne”. No thank you, I do not eat meat. Madre: “ No es carne. Es chorizo” It’s not meat. It’s pork. That pretty much sums it up. So today at lunch when they asked me if I wanted the broth of meat juices from their meat dish, I told them I was allergic. They seemed to like this better. I am now allergic to cows, pigs, and chicken. Other birds however, I do not know what will happen. Hopefully this tactic will get me a little further without offending them. I am craving fruit like crazy. My family doesn’t appear to eat it at all. Other trainees have fruit trees so I’m going to bride them to bring me some. They do not normally eat breakfast, so for me, it consists of plain white bread rolls and tea. I don’t get why they don’t have any jam or butter because they sure enjoy condiments. My family like others purchases a bag of at least 100 rolls at a time and probably each consumes 10 a day. No joke. Lunch is the big meal (we all go home from school to eat lunch). It is usually a meat dish (asado generally), rolls, mandi’o (yucca), maybe a soup or tortillas (not hard corn based like I’ve had before but more like jewish latkes) and because of me, salad! They have been giving me salad most days (which consists of lettuce and tomatoes which I now eat gratefully) which is the only healthy thing I eat. Dinner is around 8 and is still pretty big. If often consists of a “grilled cheese” and mandi’o. Pretty much everything I eat is white, fried and of little nutritional value. I stomached eggs today for the protein. It was a challenge. And they put mayo on everything! I cannot get over my fear of mayo, but so far they haven’t put it on my food directly, it is just always on the table. That’s cool. Another side note. You cannot be a germaphobe here because you wouldn’t survive. Let’s just say that there is no “5 second” rule here.

I have safely arrived in Paraguay. These first few days have seemed like weeks! After our orientation in Miami on wed, we flew to Sao Palo Brazil. After a lot of waiting and customs we flew on to Asuncion and arrived thursday. The city is what I would expect, but I didn´t get to see a lot of it because we were on the outskirts. We then drove to Guarambare, our training site. We had family interviews and were placed with a family in a village depending on our group. I am Envi Ed (EE) but there are 3 others. Thursday afternoon we went to meet our host familes, which was a bit overwhleming! My family Martinez has 5 sons! they are 8, 16, 21, and 23 year old identical twins. I also live with my host mom and dad. One of the twins has a 1 yr old son, and it goes on from there. There are always other people around that I have no clue who they are! They are very nice, but I am their first volunteer, so I think they are having some trouble relating to me. I will keep trying to be a part of the family, not just a visitor! so far I am craving vegetables. Everything we eat is white and fried. being a vegetarian is going to be a challenge. Meat is loved here. The other people in my group are very nice, and hopefully i will make some good friends. Our first day of training began today and our days are going to be jam packed. because of this, i haven´t had any time to feel homesick and am doing well. I tested high enough in spanish to start off learning guarani. after i get proficient in guarani, i will go back to spanish. i am going to set up a skype account so thati can talk easier. my phone cards only work in asuncion. if you are going to send a package, regular mail is ok. please make it as light as possible and tape it up really well. chances are it will get opened and i do have to pay taxes to get it, so please be light! i live on a few dollars a week here. until i can write a more appropriate post...adio

Hi Everyone,

This is my first blog entry ever, so I apologize in advance for my lack of "tech-saviness". I don't have much to say yet, I just wanted to make sure that I can get this up and running before I go. Right now, I am just trying to figure out how I can carry enough stuff for 2 years and all types of weather by myself...