As April comes to and end and May blooms in...

Back from Bolivia- getting settled in from adventure to the slow-lifestyle of Paraguayan culture. So, we decided since we work artisans and the nanduti hardcraft- we ought to learn how to do it too! The needlework is so meticulous; it is def MUCH harder than it looks and requires A LOT of patience! Monetti is making a patch design. Early morning in the office-nanduti and mate-with Griz!

 

 Im attempting to make leaf earrings.

Sidenote: The cans of peas here are huge....ahahhahahaaa...

My English class continues to be something I look forward to each week. Im giving them an exam in June so we have been preping/reviewing for that. What else? We went to a Peace Corps party and hung out/met a lot of volunteers. Krystina and I are the only two international volunteers in our town. Peace Corps hosts 2 parties a year in Asuncion- the main city- to gather all volunteers/check-in and well just be around each other since most volunteers are very far away from each other and isolated in small pueblitos. People travel 20 hours just to come to the party bc its only two times a year and most of us live in the middle of nowhere so its a nice gathering!  We have two Peace Corps buddies that invited us- that was fun! There was also the Korean Volunteers Program there. There are about 200 Peace Corps volunteers here in Paraguay, two Good Shepherd Volunteers (Krystina and I), and about 50 or something Korean volunteers- all of which we never see bc every one is SO spread out but it was still cool and fun to dance and talk about our experiences together for that night.

What else goes on here in PY? We had to host U.S. students/cultural exchange type program. They came for one day where we showed them all the work we do here in the Obra- from Escuela Taller, to English classes, to Community Development, to the Fair Trade Program. We mostly talk about the Fair trade program. I guess after the visit, they have to do research on fair trade and propose some sort of research or something about Tekojoja- specifically, which is cool. So that was fun to be around energetic college students in a cultural exchange program because they have the "Im gonna change the world" energy and drive. It was also fun to talk English for a little bit! :)

April has brought about three very special birthday: Michael Simonetti, Kelly McConnell, and Ms. Krystina Monetti. Birthday celebrations! Cooked breakfast for my wifey. Our friend Silvana greeted the Birthday girl with a bunch of fresh avocados, grapefruit, and mandarins that fell from the trees in our yard. Do I really live with fruit trees two feet from my house!? Paraguay awesomeness!

Raining Avacados

Silvana and her tray of avacados

Birthday dinner bash with our besties- The retired sisters and Lourdes, Alba, and Silvana.

Lourders Mo Alba and Silvana

The only candle we had was a "2"

Oh wait, no birthday is celebrated with out Sister Mary Euphrasia! SMEEEEE ahahahha..this is my favorite photo of all the birthday photos.....ahhhha classic.

Hm, what else? Fabi house...hangin out....

One of our friends, Danny, really doesnt like cats and is always shoeing them away and Im usually yellling at him to stop. Anyways, I loved this moment bc he got up to go to the bathroom and this little kitten jumped onto his chair and instantly fell asleep like a baby. When he returned to his chair from the bathroom, this is what he saw..haha

So as April swings out and May rains in, there are more birthdays starting with baby Shelly.

Oh this is a random fun sidenote: So one of the days I was in the office working, and was called out for "an emergency empanada making" and had to rush out of the office to make 50 empanadas for the retired sisters to hand out after mass. How often do you get emergency called out of work for an "emergencia de empanadas?" Classic Paraguay. love it.

So we sow with Sister Gasparina. She loves to sow and said for our birthday gifts she is going to teach us how to sow bc every girl should know how to sow. Krystina and I dont practice bc to be honest, on our off time, we dont want to sow and really only sow to spend time with her bc we know how important sowing is to her. My favorite part of sowing lessons is when we are getting yelled at. She literally yells at us for not getting a stitch right. I definitely get in bad class kid mode and silently die laughing when Krystina is getting yelled at! ha

Speaking of retired sisters, Hermana Claudia fractured some bones in her knee/pelvis. Hospital visits. There is no security at the hospitals, at all. When we went to visit her, we looked at her knees and she had two screws coming out the sides of her knees. They put a glass bottle around each screw to keep the screw in/infection out. Glass bottles? I continue to be fascinated by the medical world of Paraguay.

Okay, what else can I tell you? Monetti and I put on talent shows for each other. She is perfecting her drag queen lip sink for your life performance featuring Cece Peniston's "Finally."

 I am perfecting my "running man" and my twirling routine. We both find it quite amusing that back in my elementary school days, I used to be a superstar twirler and had a macaroni and cheese yellow colored leotard that hard fringe and went to twirling competitions. So, I decided to bring out my twirling skills for the talent show. Although...my baton is a broom stick and its sort of hard to twirl with it bc its so long. Haha. Oh, and we have recently been into Black out Pictionary. So, when we loose electricity at night and sit in the house in COMPLETE darkness, we stumble for pens and paper and play pictionary- draw this scene. Then finally when the electricity comes back, whether that night or the next day- we get to find quite the humor in our creative black out drawings. Self Entertainment never gets old.

Chalice is the program that sponsors all that we do here. It is based out of Canada. They came to visit in May so every one was sure to have everything neat and together/presentable. There were 4 woymn who came, one of which couldnt speak Spanish. I had to go out to one of the communities with her to translate. But, most of the people we serve speak guarani- the indigenous language. I have probably a vocabulary of 20 guarani words. So, we went out to visit one of the sponsored elderly womyn, 84 years old. It was really cool. There we were sitting in a circle- the elderly womyn speaking in guarani to my friend Fabi, Fabi translating from guarani to spanish to me and then me translating from spanish to english to the Canadian womyn. That was really cool and quite hilarious in some moments!

What else goes on in May? MOTHERRRSSS DAYYYY!!
USA Mother's Day May 13th- SO much love to Gigi and Mickie.

Paraguay Mothers Day May 15th! Spent the day at Lourdes house with the girls celebrating 4 moms in that house! This was cool because we skyped our families from home in the US so they can meet them via skype for the first time!

Valentina and Lujan danced for our families :)

What else? We hung out, got our feet muddy from street soccer with the kids, and made some kick ass Yucca Empanadas with our friend Silvana.

Me Silvana and Laura, one of her daughters

It was quite the work but lots of fun to learn how to make. Boil the yucca, then mash it with a fork, then re-mash/squish it/ pat/roll it with your hands until it because like a thick mashed potato like consistency. Add a little corn flour, salt and oil then fill it with whatever you want- eggs, meat, veggies, really whatever you want. We filled it with soy meat and veggies. Then mold and fold the empanadas, rub a little egg on the tops of them and put them in the oven to cook.Very very very delicious and vegetarian friendly!

There was a neighborhood cookout this month- where the local neighbors each cook a typical Paraguay dish....I guess sort of like a bbq type thing--with a bunch of neighbors cooking their own dish. Then you go through each of their dishes and pick out a little something from everyone/pay them for whatever it is you pick. We tried Mbeju, which is this tortilla type pancake made of flour, anis, eggs, and cheese. We also tried Villaruel, which was a boiled egg inside of fried yucca. We tried a new type of chipa called Chipa Asador which was this hollowed out grilled chipa. It was really chill. Music, traditional/typical food made with love by our friends/neighbors. Oh, we also played bingo! The chickens were oh so generous for donating some of their food (corn kernels) for our bingo chips!

May 14th was Paraguay's Independence Day so we spent 2 days in the city-Asuncion- because thats where all the traditional/fun activities were going on. Not much going on in small Itaugua. We hung out with our friend Nico who lives in Asuncion and his friend Miguel. He is our friend Lourde's cousin. He took us around the city where we went to different museums that were free that night, explored the local hand crafts/artisan stands, listened to popular Paraguay band/harp/piano/guitar bands, and saw some fire crackers! We also went to a free concert to see one of Niko's favorite bands form Ypacarai, Paraguay named "Salamandras."

Fireworks! Nico and I

Me Nico and Mo- Lit up in Paraguays Flag Colors- red, white and blue 

Me Mo Nico and Miguel

May 17th, 2012- we saw signs for a LGBTQ Besaton rally. Besar in spanish means to kiss. It was basically a rally to fight for LGBTQ rights and show people that we are here. 

There were some crappy moments and people being really mean but also moments of swirling, twirling, and vogue-ing to Madonna- celebrating the dignity and love for all people!

This past weekend, Monetti and I headed to Ayolas, Paraguay which is in the department of Misiones- a 6 hour drive from Itaugua to visit Sister Gregoria and Sister Nidia.  The call Ayolas "the tail or butt of Paraguay" bc it is the very end of Paraguay/border of Argentina. The Parana River separates Paraguay and Argentina. Typical Paraguay bus ride adventure. Ayolas is a very very empty, calm, and peaceful town. Upon arrival, Sister Gregoria was clapping and hopping so excited to have us! haha, like a proud mom at a kindergarden play! so cute. So, ya spent a really calm and fun weekend with them. We visited the hydroelectric Yacyreta, "country of the moon," which provides electricity to 20% of Paraguay and a large portion to Argentina. 

Ayolas is also know for its fishing. What else? We cooked with them every day - learned how to make "Mandioshururu" aka Madioca frita aka fried yucca. It was good. Boil yucca. Then fried it, add onions, little bit of cheese and eggs. Yum!

We loved when they told us to wear their aprons!

The Sisters here basically work in the same projects as we are involved in, in Itaugua. We actually translate their childrens letters for them. They also play a major role in trying to diminish the prostitution  there in Ayolas. We had some really cool conversations about service and the work they have done throughout their lives (Sister Nidia is 72 years old- so much life experience we were trying to soak up!) We got to visit the center where they work with the children and womyn and all that which was fun/cool. I did some errands on a moto (moped/motorcyle) with one of the local girls that work for them which obviously I loved!

What else happened this weekend? Oh, we went to mass with the Sisters on Sunday and the sisters introduced us to the priest before mass - volunteers from the US/the work we do/into, whatever. So the mass goes on- Monetti and I play games like immature kids in church, typical. The mass is about to come to an end and all of a sudden the priest gets on a microphone and announces that there are two North American girls here. So we are like oh crap, thats us! Then he asks us to stand up. I slightly raise my hand bc I didnt want to stand up! The church was filled!! Then Sister Nidia hits me like an aggravated mom telling me to stand up!! So we stand up- embarrassed/slightly nervous. Then he asks us to say our names outloud- meanwhile everyone in the church is staring right at us- so we say our names and Sister Nidia hits me again telling me LOUDER LOUDER! Im like Sister, I dont wantt to!! Shes like Jessica do it!! Im like ohhh man Jessica! ahahaha then the priest asks us to come up!! to the front of the church- in front of everyone...Im like this is notttt happening. So we stand there, not moving and once again Sister Nidia drop elbows me to get my ass up there- so we nervously walk up to the front of the church- thinking okay the priest will say a few things about us and then we can go sit. Oh No...he simply hands me the microphone. Monetti looks at me with a look that says dont you dare hand me that microphone. He says "Can you tell everyone where you are from?" I say Estados Unidos. He says "how old are you?" I say 24. Then he asks me to explain my we are here in Paraguay/what work we are doing, etc. I looked at Monetti and we both wanted to start cracking up but were equally nervous at the same time. I was nervous about speaking in front of all those people, let alone in a 2nd language! Anyways, after the first 5-10 seconds of beginning to speak, the nerves went away and it all just flowed out- THANK GOD! ahahahah but we were dying!! I cant. Then later on the bus ride back from Ayolas to Itaugua, some random lady approached us and was like HEY YOU TWO ARE THE GIRLS FROM CHURCH!! ARENT YOU!!! A moment to remember for sure.

Oh, I definitely had a moment of humility this weekend. So, at one point when the Sisters and Monetti were taking siesta (nap time), I was awake reading my book "The Monk Who Sold His Ferari" by Robin Sharma- EXCELLENT book! Yes, excellent! haha- it is such a great read and highllyyyy recommended! Anyways, a womyn came to the door speaking guarani- the indigenous language. She was asking for the Sister but they were sleeping and both their doors were shut and locked/I felt weird about waking them. I couldnt really make out anything she was saying. I think she was trying to sell her chicken/wanted the Sisters to help her find some one to buy it but was not positive and didnt want to pass on the wrong message. I apologized to her in Spanish telling her Im sorry I cant understand her/Im from the US/dont know how to speak guarani well with my vocab of 15-20 words. So, I told her to wait and ran inside and grabbed a piece of paper and pen so that maybe she could write her message down- in guarani to the sisters bc obviously they speak the indigenous language. I KNEW this womyn came from the neighborhood in which I was staying, which had one room houses, dirt flooring, owning nothing outside of chickens. And then there I go asking her to write a note for the Sister, assuming that she knew how to write. She just shook her head no at me- and I felt a rush of lkjdfdsjfdsjfsdljdf;ljsf-ness in that moment!! Talk about pushing my education privilege in my face. I felt humiliated in that moment and like I know better!!! I've been in Paraguay for over 9 months now and know that putting food on the table even just once a day for the kids IS the day's job, not learning how to write.- Jess!! Come on! Anyways, I suppose the universe wanted me to repeat a lesson/learn. Humility.

Mate sharing, cooking, playing with the Sister's dogs Oli and Tuki, playing with their chickens, ducks, and dickens.

Sister Naida and I are good pals even though she hits me in church.

Cows, always cows :) Cow milk in our coffee every day. Going for long walks getting lost amongst the peaceful silence of the town. During siesta time one of the days, I couldnt sleep so I went for a walk- passed a family all sitting out on the grass--there were 6 adults talking and passing around mate (herbal tea), while this boy was on the roof of their house picking mandarins from the highest parts of the tree and throwing them down to a teenage girl who was trying to catch them. They were hysterically laughing. Then 10 feet from them were the kids- 5 of them under 10 years old playing a soccer game using a grapefruit as their ball. It was such a perfect moment and I felt blessed to be a witness. Everything about everything was perfect- and in sync- Paraguay awesomeness full fuel.

There are so many amazing things about this country and all/who that are in it. It has been such a privilege to share life with Paraguay and Krystina and I are starting to feel the weird ancy beans that our year's contract is coming to an end soon.

Until then, we are determined to continue to squeeze out the fun, love, and amazingness that Paraguay offers each day....and so this wild and precious adventure continues....