Friday, December 31, 2010

The New Site and the New Year

Since my site assignment life has been very eventful and constantly changing. Back in our training community we tied up our technical training with the things that would help us get through our first few months in site and had our closing language interviews. Then it was Swear-in weekend and time to say goodbye to the family that had taken care of us for the first 10 weeks in Paraguay. Luckily this didn’t have to be a long-term goodbye as I can always just pop down to Guarambare to visit. Swear-in weekend was a huge break from daily life in Paraguay. We all travelled to Asuncion together for the ceremony which in itself only took an hour maybe two. It essentially consisted of us listening to several speeches by the US Ambassador to Paraguay, the Paraguayan Secretary of Tourism, the Paraguayan President of the World Wildlife Foundation, and some of the Peace Corps Staff as well as repeating the oath to service to the United States of America. Afterwards we were given our cell phones, ATM cards and set free to go crazy in Asuncion for a few days. So that is exactly what we did to inaugurate ourselves as official volunteers in the Peace Corps. Those few days were truly a break from our Paraguayan lifestyles; we lived in hotels for a few days, swimming in pools, speaking English with other volunteers, sleeping in until whenever we wanted, and of course enjoying the night scene to its fullest. But once the weekend was over we had until that Tuesday to be in our sites and start our duty as volunteers. I made the trek up towards my site a day early so that I could get a night in San Estanislao to decompress from the craziness of Asuncion and prepare mentally for full time Paraguay.

The past few weeks of living in site have been much busier than I had imagined they would be.  The host family I live with is an extremely guapo/hardworking family (almost unusually so by the Paraguayan standards that I know) and as a result I have been constantly working with the brothers in the kokue (fields) for the pineapple harvest and general maintenance of the fields. I can now say that I am proficient in using a hoe, machete, and the art of maintaining banana plants. However, what I have found is that at the same time I am working alongside the brothers I get the most work done that pertains to my actual job here which is environmental education and agro forestry. In this regard I have been able to have conversations about environmental issues, how to implement trees into their agricultural operation and even sparked interest about the possibility of abonos verdes (plants that fix nitrogen for the soil) but these topics all come in between constant harassment from the ‘guys’ about my love life. I suppose that it is a fair enough tradeoff. In addition to working in the fields I have gone around visiting some of the neighbors to get to know them better and for them to know who I am. In this little chats over terere I have been able to identify other possible projects and community needs that people have genuine interest in. I even learned that the area in which I am living used to have capybara (world’s largest rodent); that is until they were hunted to local extinction for food. In addition I have been accumulating tree and vegetable seeds to plant in people’s gardens and on their land in order to provide a free supply of seeds.

I have also had the privilege to spend Christmas in Paraguay which is to say the least different from the US. Instead of Christmas eve church services, gifts, trees, family gatherings, and Christmas carols we have a constant barrage of fireworks (I was definitely hit in the chest by a roman candle not to mention 3 other close calls), a Christmas shrine that includes a baby Jesus among lawn gnomes and magical mushrooms, a lot of drinking, and of course the barbecue meat. Christmas morning consists of hangovers for most and little else. But I did enjoy Christmas because I was with friends and family and really when it comes down to it that is the most important thing. Now all that is left is to celebrate the New Year which also is a lot of drinking here and another bbq. Not to mention that I had to hand wash all of my clothes in order to have all clean clothes for the New Year. It should be another good celebration and I am planning on making this a bit of an international celebration with a coordinated ‘’ties that bind’’ and an official leap into the New Year.  So have a feliz año nuevo I hope that 2011 treats you all very well. 

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Site Assignment

The news is in... I got my site assignment: 8000 Bertoni in the Department of San Pedro. This also happens to be the same site that I visited for my volunteer visit in October. I will be a follow up volunteer in the site replacing the other Gregorio that is there now. I plan to go by Cooper in order to eliminate any confusion and so far it seems to be working. The site is very rural and about 15km away from the nearest paved road. In order to leave town one either needs to find one of the few people with a car and ask for a ride or get up at 5am and wait for the one and only bus out of town. If it rains forget about it...no one will get in or out of site. The family I will be living with for the first 3 months are extremely friendly and consists of a mom, dad, and about 8 kids. I will be the oldest ´son´ living in the house since the oldest brother is 22. This family makes their living off of pineapple and banana production. They are actually one of the most well off families in town because they are part of a cooperative that exports the fruit to Argentina and Brazil. The house has a modern bathroom, a computer with less than reliable internet, and its own soccer field. So even though it is a rural site I have cush accomodations. Once I move out from the host families house I will have an apartment attached to the local school that has a living room, kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, and a random storage room. The site itself is beautiful with nice rolling hills, lots of streams, patches of forest, and at night the stars are incredible.

This past weekend was my future site visit, so I was able to meet my community contact, meet the family I would be living with and get general ideas for future projects. This biggest goal that whey want me to attain is to get funding for a new building to house the library and hopefully some computers for the school. The Greg before me had already got books for the library and has them in the teachers lounge for the kids to take out. Since the kids have expressed interest in reading and are taking out books to bring home the school has decided that they want an upgrade. In addition to this I was also invited to a dedication of a banana packaging plant that was partially funded by USAID. At this meeting I met some of the people in charge who are Americans and was told about some of the initiatives that they have funding for as well as their contact information that could get me funding for whatever project that I come up with. The idea that they were most interested in is working with a womens group that another volunteer had started up in a neighboring town. Since their is no volunteer there now I could be the contact that could coordinate any improvement to this group of women who were trained to make traditional Paraguayan dress shirts but currently lack resources to get them to market to sell.


Needless to say I have been very busy talking with people in the community and getting to know this new host family. One of the most memorable experiences of the weekend was participating in the slaughter of a pig, I was there to hold it down and cut it up until it was completely gone. Then the next two days I ate just about every part of that pig, for lunch liver and tenderloin, dinner was the feet, the head and the skin (chicharron) , the next lunch (my host moms bday) was bbq ribs and legs....and this meat consumption continued for the next 3 meals. But of course there are rules to eating pork in Paraguay, essentially you cannot drink water, fruit juice, or milk after eating pig products or else you will get chivivi (diarrhea). What you can drink is beer, whiskey, and terere (essentially just tea). Besides eating pig I also played a whole bunch of soccer and since I am so bad at it I was told that I need to practice before playing again and that I need to run to lose some weight (It isnt meant to be offensive, just the general bluntness of Paraguayan culture). Well, this week we have our Thanksgiving feast at the country directoes house and then after then in 2 short weeks we will be sworn in as official volunteers and then I will be back to 8000 Bertoni for the next 2 years.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Paraguay up to my Site Assignment

The past month has been filled with training and language learning. I have learned many many things about trees, gardens, schools, Paraguayan culture, and the Guarani language.I can officially name and identify at least 15 different Paraguayan trees, both native and non native, and can harvest and treat the seeds for planting. For some education practice we have been working in the local school in my town. We have done many activities regarding garbage. The garbage situation here in Paraguay is horrendous and generally people will just burn plastic before it rains or else just throw it in the street. The school expressed interest in garbage education so we designed some lessons addressing the situation. Teaching the kids that gargbage will remain for a long time if we just leave it in the streets and that burning plastic pollutes the air. In the end we dug a pit in which garbage will be buried, which is the best option here in Paraguay. We also did some projects with some of the younger kids to think of ways to recycle garbage such as reusing plastic bottles, using milk cartons to plant trees in, and making plastic bottles into art. This series culminated in the kids making flowers out of plastic bottles and painting them.

Last week we had our long field practice where we went to another volunteers site, Jacob, to work with the people there. In his site we planted some trees and transpanted others, we taught the school kids, both elementary students and high school students about some environmental issues including garbage, and did a review with some of the kids he has been teaching about the rapidly degrading Atlantic Forest. This site was in a beautiful rural part of the country with many low hills with streams running between. Every family here has a piece of land where the plant and harvest only enough food to feed themselves and there livestock. The livestock of choice in this region are cattle and pig which roam the streets freely grazing and feeding wherever they can find food. I lived with two younger brothers in their late 20´s who ran a butcher shop, which during the week I was there was completely out of meat. Their house was also the site of the town volleyball court where all the male village youth would come every night to play, talk, and drink wine and coke (It´s a big thing down here). This exposed me to a ton of Guarani and to being on the outside of many funny conversations. But these were very nice people and we had some fun interactions exchanging Guarani words for words in english.

This past month has been very rewarding and full of educational experiences all getting us ready for the big day (tomorrow!). Tomorrow we will find out our future sites, the place where we will be working for 2 years... The anticipation is unbelievable but I am optimistic about it.. jahechata.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Life In Paraguay

I have been in Paraguay for just about 20 days now and in some  ways that feels like forever and in others it feels as if I just got here. The training that I have gone through thus far has been  intensive. Everyday has been language training, which for me means learning Guarani. Guarani has been quite interesting, it took me a while to get a grasp of what it was about but I am starting to love how this language is formed and spoken. Most of Paraguayans will speak a mix of Spanish and Guarani called Jopara, however, others out in the campo (countryside) speak almost pure Guarani and many do not even speak Spanish. This past weekend I went for a Volunteer Visit where I went to a site that a volunteer has been working in. In my case it was a volunteer who has just about finished his service (when I swear in he will be swearing out). Anyways, this site is pure campo and while I could speak Spanish to people and they would more or less understand they all used Guarani to communicate. This was my first time seeing the challenge that I have ahead of me. Over the weekend we did a lot and not a lot at the same time. Sunday was a rainy day and here in Paraguay that means that you do nothing and for good reason, the roads all become terrible and it is difficult to walk on them much less drive on them. Yesterday, was a beatiful day and we taught in two different schools to 3 groups of kids. The first session I read a Peter Cottontail in Spanish to some 5th graders while the Volunteer also named Greg asked questions in Guarani. At the second school Greg gave his lecture on Snakes that he has developed as his main project during his service. Essentially it is an interactive talk teaching kids what the dangerous snakes look like and that snakes should not be killed as they are an important part of the ecosytem. It was a great visit all around and I am now reassured that I will want to be placed in the campo in a site not unlike that one.

Living with a Paraguayan family has been extremely rewarding. I have a big family here, my host mom and dad are in their 60´s and they have 8 children with the youngest being a son my age. There are 4 brothers and 1 sister that live at the house with me and one nephew. In our community just about everyone is related which has caused an ongoing joke between some of us aspirantes (What I am until I swear in). It turns out that one of my host brothers has an aspirante and one of the sisters has a aspirante as well which makes me their uncle. Fun stuff...tio Gregorio. The house I live in is unlike anything in the States, it is very much an outdoor lifestyle. The bulidings on the property are simply bedrooms there is no living room, dining room, or kitchen. There are chairs and tables outside and on the porch and the kitchen is attached to the backside of one of the buildings. Everything is cooked with fire and the water come from a well. We have about 8 milk cows, 2 horses, more chickens than I can count, and no more pigs as both have been slaughtered since I have been down here. The brothers are mostly brickmakers, so there is a big oven on the property that cooks the bricks that the form themselves. The rest of the property is a garden that will soon be planted with corn. In order to get to my training center I have to walk for about an hour (3 miles?) to the nearest big town which also happens to be the same place that I need to go to use the internet. This is essentially what my life looks like right now, and as we go into November we are hitting summer here where it will start to approach 100 degrees. I will try to get some picture in the near future to put up and show you all what I am seeing.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Departure

Well here I am, 5 days away from embarking on my next big adventure. It has been one heck of a roller coaster getting here after getting my nomination only 6 months ago. There has been a lot of paperwork, Dr appointments, and having my Uncle Tom driving me around Charleston, SC looking for the county jail to get fingerprints done for a background check. Truly, an adventurous 6 months! And here I am, only 5 days out and the reality of leaving my home for 27 months is hitting me. It has been a tremendous amount of preparation getting to this point but I know I will never be fully prepared for this next adventure and to me that is an appealing aspect. The unknown. Not knowing where I will be or who I will be with a week from now is really exciting! But challenges I face of getting to know new people, learning a new language, and jumping from place to place are terrifying in their own way. However, I know I can get through that. The ideal of living life in the moment is a necessity; leaving all your baggage behind and being open to a whole new world is the only way to go about a trip like this.

With that being said, I am really gonna miss everyone back home. It has been great to see all my friends and family over the past few weeks. And in the process I have had a lot of fun whether it be jet skiing up at camp with my friends or partying at John and Gina's wedding this past weekend. It has been a great few weeks to relax and say goodbyes. These goodbyes have been hard to say but at the same time they make me excited for this next adventure with the Peace Corps. It is weird to think that I will miss almost 3 football seasons (Go Giants!) and 2 baseball seasons (Go Yanks!). The fact that I will be 25 by the time my service is over. But 25 isn't that old.....right? Oh well, I have plenty more difficult goodbyes in store and then it is off to Miami next Tuesday. And in just 2 more days I will be placed with my first host family somewhere in Paraguay and thus begins my 10 weeks of intensive training to become an Environmental Educator, and language lessons in both Spanish and Guarani. It's getting real!

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

It's Official

As of July 30th I am officially going to Paraguay leaving September 29th. I can't wait to learn a new language and for this next adventure.