Life in the City

It has been so long since I have written that I really don’t know where to start. Sorry I have not kept all of you updated. I have had little access to computers lately and been busy moving house to house with only about half of my belongings.

Well since my last entry, I have officially sworn in as a volunteer and been living in Carapegua for the last month. The Swearing in ceremony was at the American embassy in Asuncion where the Ambassador invited us into his residence for cake and snacks. All 40 of the new volunteers then spent 3 or 4 days in Asuncion after the ceremony to de-wind from and intense 3 months of training. We blissfully ate at Italian and American restaurants, sat in air conditioned hotels and got to go swimming. The unfortunate part of staying in Asuncion is the tendency to spend a whole months salary in a day, which many volunteers did do.

After Asuncion, every volunteer went to their respective sites across Paraguay to have little contact with each other for the next two years. The Peace Corps is represented by ~160 volunteers in just about every region in Paraguay minus a few places around the Brazilian border which are considered “too dangerous” like areas around Ciudad del Este. Understandably all sorts of illegal things go on in these regions (money laundering, and vehicle/electronic/drug trafficking), though from what I know there is little anti-Americanism anywhere in the country and seems relatively safe. We do have permission to visit Ciudad del Este if traveling to Brazil, which I would love to do to visit the one big tourist attraction in Paraguay (Itapua falls, which, from what I hear makes Niagara looks microscopic). Crimes do happen to volunteers, though almost all are petty thefts and a few robberies.

After swearing in I moved to Carapegua, and am currently living with families for the first 3 months of service until I can move into my own house. I have already stayed in 5 different houses in the last month, which is good when getting to know the community but a bit exhausting when lugging your things all around the city, re-packing over and over, and having the first awkwardness of living with people you just met. Though the families have all been great and interesting. One family fed me horse meat sandwiches every morning and makes hand made blankets for a living. Another family I stayed with included one of my “contacts” - the vice principle of a school and 8 other members including an English student my age who showed me around and took me to play soccer, meet other families, etc. I also stayed with a single man who has 17 siblings spread out over the area. I spent Christmas with his lively family. Christmas here is 1) hot 2) filled with food and fireworks. Mostly BBQ pork. 3) the families stay up to midnight for dinner, then walk around until 5 am or so talking to other families. 4) the men in the family played cards and drank beer all day while the women cooked. I then spent New Years with a different family. What is New Years like? -See numbers 1-4 for Christmas.

Now I am staying at the fire department which has been quite the experience...they are all quite characters! There is a room which is like a hostel where there are three bunk beds and an extra 20 or so mattresses, no pillows or sheets. The firefighters (bomberos) take turns using this room when they are on shift. So lately I have been spending nights listening to 6 or 7 firefighters snoring. There are 36 or so volunteers coming in and out of the station mostly in their young 20s and only one person is paid a salary. To say that their equipment is old would be the understatement of the century. They have all donated equipment from various countries and two trucks (one truck from 1960... they say that they don’t use that one very much). They also have 20 radios but only have enough money to buy chargeable batteries for two of them, so when there is a fire and do not have enough personnel at the station they just sound the alarm on the 1960 truck and the fire fighters who hear it in town come running. Don’t worry, though, the head staff has guaranteed me that at least 3 staff are on call 24 hours a day and for a population of 30,000 in the city and somehow they get things done. 99% of their calls are vehicle accidents and usually come back to the station bloody. I got to go out on a call yesterday to observe, it was a small car fire, and I hope to go out again in the next couple of days.

Another interesting part of staying with the Bomberos is that it is attached to the police station, and I am not exactly going up to every police officer introducing myself. Heres why...the police in Paraguay have had a long history. Until the early 90’s it was illegal for people to go out at night. The dictatorial government reasoned that the people were plotting to overthrow the government. If the police caught someone out of their house after dark, or if the police thought you were secretly meeting with others the community members disappeared to jail and often were tortured into talking about their “communist” activities. Obviously this created a society that was very afraid of leaving their houses even during the day. Nowadays the people seem to be divided into two generations: those who lived through the dictatorship, and the new generation who is much more open minded. Many people, especially women, are still very accustomed to staying in the house day after day. So how does all this relate to me? Well this was not happening all that long ago and at the moment I am living next to the police annex where I often pass, talk to , shake hands with some of the same police that were police during the dictatorship and still when walking down the street many people won’t look at out of fear. I also walk pass the jail cell when I take a pee at night. The cell has a plastic Pepsi bottle full of water and a Styrofoam mat on the floor and currently a drunk driver.

On the bright side I think democracy/capitalism is doing wonders for this country, and though very poor and underdeveloped is changing relatively quickly. The governmental “reformation” as it is called since the Dictatorship focuses on education, democracy and the environment. There are many organizations that are trying to help fulfill these new governmental goals, but very hard to do with an extremely corrupt government and corrupt organizations.

So that is why I am here trying to do a small part in environmental education by teaching about deforestation, health, crop management, teaching strategies, and interchanging cultural ideals between the people I know of the US and Paraguay. As far as my work goes, things have been slow over the summer here (Dec and Jan) because everyone is out of school and it is usually 95 - 105 degrees every day...people just don‘t do that much in this kind of heat. Another volunteer and I are organizing an environmentally themed summer camp that will take place at the end of the summer. Then during the school year I am planning to work with teachers developing lesson plans at “head schools” that are in charge of the curriculum for 5 or 6 other schools. I am also hoping to be involved with HIV/Aids and sex-ed related projects during the year. A teacher/friend in the states and I are setting up a correspondence program between classes which I am looking foreward to. I have also been teaching English when there is time.

Overall things are going well and I am excited to move into my own place. It is nice to have a cell phone and get calls from family and friends from home. My Dad is talking about visiting in April and going to Brazil which will be awesome. For thoes of you that I have not been able to talk with lately: I hope all is well! I wish that I could write to everyone individually but just don’t have the time in front of a computer, but I do like the e-mails letting me know what you are all up to. Take care, I will write again soon!