long field: long week

This last week was “long field” for all the trainees which means that we went in groups of 5 with a language teacher to go visit a current volunteer for a week to do construction projects and charlas, etc. (Charlas are talks or presentations usually in schools) Long field was definitely the longest week I have had here, and while it would take a week to fully explain the details, maybe I can give you a taste of why it was so long for me…
Day 1: We arrived and it was pouring rain, which means that our plans for the week might or might not be completely changed because we can’t do anything in the rain. My host family for the week did not have a light in their bathroom, so they put up a lantern so I could see. Before I was done showering, the lantern exploded, dumping gasoline all over my towel, my clothes fell on the wet floor, and water started shooting out of the wall from behind the lantern. (I’m still not sure why this happened) I told the señora there that I had a problem and she came and took the lantern and walked away, leaving me to figure out how to dry myself with a gasoline soaked towel and dress in wet clothes in the dark. And by the way, I had to use that towel for the rest of the week.
Day 2: It rained all morning, and thinking it would be hot all week, I was not prepared for the cold weather so I sat on the porch in shorts and a tshirt for 4 hours. That afternoon it stopped raining and we went an old guys house to start digging a letrine in literally rock hard dirt.
Day 3: We built half a fogón, the corner caved in because the ground was uneven and we had to tear everything down and start all over again. The old man decided he didn’t want his letrine so far from his house, so we were told that we would have to dig the hole all over again. We also decided rather filling in the hole we already dug, which by the way still had water in it from the rain, that we would turn it into a trash pit.
Day 4: By the end of the day, we finished the fogón and I’m praying it doesn’t fall down anytime soon. Three of us did a nutrition charla in Guarani and I didn’t understand pretty much half of what was said. Three of us finished digging the second hole for the letrine and used, I kid you not, a bowl and a shovel to dig, a coke bottle with water for a level that we set on a piece of wood, and a stick to mark the ground. I was so dirty that night I had to rub the top layer of skin off with my towel to get myself completely clean. I also calculated that we walked a total of 2 hours that day back and forth in between houses.
Day 5: We finished laying the losa (floor) for the letrine, packed up and drove home. I never thought I would miss my community and my family so much and was so excited to finally go home.

Peace Corps: The only dating service that pays YOU!

For those of you who are already jumping to conclusions, let me first say no, I’m not dating, this is just another reflection on the culture. Before I left, many of my friends told me I would find someone in Paraguay and never come back to the United States and I laughed every time I was told that. I also thought that once I left the states I would be freed from people teasing me about finding a boyfriend. Again, like so many other things in this country, I was dead wrong. In one of the first few days of training, our trainers told us they would be shocked (yes, they said shocked) if at least 5 or 6 of us out of our training group of 49 weren’t married by the end of our two years of service. Of course we all started laughing, but after they emphatically insisted it was just short of being a scientific fact, we all started looking around the room trying to figure out which one of us would be the first to go. The jokes and suggestions are not solely exclusive to Americans and I think most of us have gotten more questions from Paraguayans about significant others in the last month and a half than any other thing in our past lives. My host mom and dad have asked me at least three times if I have a boyfriend at home because apparently twice wasn’t enough, and they have told me probably over 7 times that I will find a boyfriend here. It’s almost like they think I’m worried about not having one although I’m not sure how that was ever communicated.

Apparently though, it’s not just my family that wants to see me and every other volunteer find a Paraguayan boyfriend or girlfriend while we are here. Everyone wants to know if you are dating and if you aren’t, they immediately tell you that you will find someone here and they begin “helping” you by suggesting cousins, sisters, brothers, neighbors, and anyone else they think might be suitable for you. Sometimes it doesn’t even matter if you do have a significant other because they will tell you it doesn’t matter anyway and continue suggesting other family members for you to consider. While my dad no longer asks if I have a boyfriend, he continually asks me if I’ve found someone or seen any “churros” which basically translates cute boys. While I think part of him just likes to joke with me particularly because he likes to hear my sarcastic responses, I’m pretty sure he’s partly serious.

While I’m sure my host family would be more than happy to marry me off to a Paraguayan, I’m not really sure who they are considering as viable options. There is of course the 14 year old who yells out “I lohv yuu Aleesohn!” every time he sees me and his wonderful friends have made it their personal mission in life to convince me that he is indeed my boyfriend simply because he says he’s in love with me. Although I continue telling them there is a major age difference, his apparently undying love is affirmed every time I see him or his friends. There is also the hyperactive 5 year old across the street, who also happens to be my cousin, who is friends with me because I play a little soccer with him and don’t get freaked out by his hyperactivity. When I was still new in my community and would pass him on the street, he would usually either yell out an obscenity at me or yell “Adios mi amor!” My sister of course thought that was hilarious and started calling him my boyfriend. Now when my dad teases me about boys, I laugh and tell him that the 5 year old, his nephew, is my novito, or little boyfriend. He always thinks it’s funny and while I think it gives him a further sense of pride of his nephew, he also lays off on insisting that I become interested in a Paraguayan… We’ll see how long that tactic lasts.

I think I’ve finally arrived

This weekend we went in small groups to do a “tech-overnight” which meant for me that my group built two fogóns (brick ovens) at a current volunteers site. As we were driving there through the Paraguayan countryside, I was looking at the infinite greenness of the trees and plants that I have come to appreciate so much more than when I first came here, contrasted with the bright red dirt that lines the road. I saw signs flash by, not in my first language, but in a language that I am slowly beginning to understand more. As the scenery flashed by, I all of a sudden had this crazy thought: I’m living in Paraguay, in South America… for two years! It’s actually happening now and I know one day I will look back on the years I spent in this country, probably missing it in many ways, but the thing is, it’s happening in this moment.

I know I’ve already been here for a month, but it has only been recently that I have started to feel at home in this strange, green, sub-tropical country. Recently, I have not felt so strange waking up to hearing roosters crowing and cows mooing and seeing my clothes piled on a chair next to my suitcases (both function as my dresser). I’ve gotten comfortable walking into strange people’s houses and having them immediately jump up to get me a chair and offer me tereré. Today I peed in a hole in the ground that the family uses as a latrine and it didn’t freak me out at all. I took a bucket bath while I was at the volunteer’s site this weekend, and I actually felt like I knew exactly what I was doing. I have also had spiders half the size of my palm crawl into my room and somehow I killed them without totally freaking out and for any of you who have heard of my past stories with spiders, you understand what an accomplishment this was for me. It no longer weirds me out that my sisters interrogate me about my outfit when I go to any special event and for the most part, I humor them and let them tell me what I can and can’t wear to those events. I am also no longer having minor panic attacks when I see my mom start a fire with a plastic bag and just tell myself that people in the states are making more carbon footprints with their cars and electricity than my host mom is by using her plastic trash to start her fire. Although I still don’t like the feeling, I have gotten used to being stared at almost everywhere I go, particularly when I’m doing something they haven’t seen before and I am able to resist the urge of staring back. This weekend I helped build a fogón for a real Paraguayan family and whether I use my now perfected brick-laying skills in my two years of service, there is now tangible evidence that I did something in this country. Sometime this week I had a breakthrough in Spanish and I really can’t give you an exact moment, but I realized I wasn’t working so hard to communicate certain things and I could say others without even thinking.

Of course, I have a language interview again in a few days to test where my language skills are at and I could walk out of there feeling like I couldn’t say anything I wanted to in Spanish, but I think I’m going to hit many of those moments over the next two years. Just when I feel like I’ve begun to master one thing like Spanish, I will have to start all over on something else, like starting to learn Guarani. I also have not yet encountered a tarantula, and might possibly scream and run if I see one, but at least I’ve mastered the art of killing the “medium” sized spiders. In two months, I will have to move into a new community and go through all the feelings of being the stranger all over again. Maybe next week I’ll be frustrated with not being able to speak Guarani and might run away from a spider, but this week for the first time since I’ve been here, I feel like I have really and truly arrived.

Bucket bathing in the campo

Last weekend all volunteers in training had to go visit a current volunteer at their site to see what the life of a volunteer is like. The trip in and of itself was quite entertaining as it ended with another trainee and me getting a ride from a Paraguayan guy (don’t worry, our volunteer was friends with him and had called in a favor) 40 minutes up the mountain through muddy, roads filled with pot-holes and ruts because the campo bus does not go through the campo when it rains. Oh, and did I mention this was a two-seater, stick-shift truck and somehow we fit the driver, two of us trainees, and two extremely large backpacks inside. I ended up sitting kind of sideways facing the steering wheel with one arm around the other trainee and the other arm falling asleep while the driver kept hitting my leg every time he switched gears. I found the whole thing quite entertaining.
When we finally arrived and went inside I felt like we had arrived in a sanctuary. Both me and the other trainee had gotten up at 5:30, walked half an hour, taken two busses after having waited over an hour for one of them, and stood for over 2 and a half hours on the second bus, not to mention the uncomfortable car ride up the mountain. Our volunteer had comfortable beds for both of us and told us she would cook us American food while we were there. I think I stopped mid-sentence when she pulled out the peanut butter jar and came close to jumping up and hugging her when she told me she had American coffee and a coffee maker. That night we had tacos with cheddar cheese she had brought back from the states and amazing guacamole and I remembered again how much I love real cheddar cheese (which by the way you can not buy in Paraguay).
Now before you go thinking she lives in some snazzy place let me tell you a little bit about her site. She lives in a campo that is 10k away from the nearest city and the bus only comes through her site 3 times a week, unless of course it rains, in which case it’s less than 3 times a week as we had the pleasure of experiencing. She’s also about 6-8k away from any other English speaking people and she lives on a mountain (or at least a mountain in Paraguay terms). No one in her site has running water, so she gets all her water from her well, uses a latrine, and bathes in a bucket. That means that every drop of water from drinking water to water she washes her dishes in and water she uses to brush her teeth has to get pulled up from a bucket in the well. Her latrine was built with the intention of having running water in the next few years, so it is an actual toilet seat and after you go to the bathroom you just pour water down to flush, which makes it pretty close to a normal toilet. The bucket bath was the fun part and after experiencing that, the possibility of not having running water doesn’t freak me out at all anymore. You basically have to squat down on the ground to wash yourself off and the only hard part is making sure you got all the shampoo out of your hair. While this whole daily ritual probably seems insane, it’s really quite simple, and I found it well worth the prize of a constant supply of peanut butter, coffee, and cheddar cheese for the weekend.