Lightning Strikes Again

As I mentioned previously, I had been hoping that my agriculture workshop would help to remind the community of what I´m here for and help to present myself as someone who knows about teh field, and not just some girl who cooks and works in the garden. I am by no mean demeaning these activities, but I also want to do the job I´ve been trained to do, which is a challenge as a female volunteer. It seems to be working. The conversations continue. I just talked to a farmer about ¨curvas de nivel,¨ a technique I´ve been itching to try that involved planting in lines that curve to the slope of the hill to prevent erosion and loss of nutrients.

I´ve become accustomed to visiting certain families that I know, but it feels good to branch out and have new people be interested in working with me, and because of the knowledge I have to offer and not just because I´m a weird enigma or because they think I´m going to give them money. Paraguayans assume that I´m the rich American, but I had to borrow money from my host dad this week. First, my stove ran out of propane, and I realized that I didn´t have the funds to refill it. So I´ve been dropping in on families during feeding time, which is more than satisfactory. Then my fridge broke. I was freaking out to a neighbor about not having ice and my food going bad, and an hour later, when I got back from hoeing in the field, two guys showed up on moto to fix my fridge. I was happy for the quick response, but it sent me running around looking for someone to lend me 200,000Gs ($40). So now I can´t cook, but I do have ice, and, at this time of year, that´s way more important. It is a luxury, though, to have that. Jorge´s family has no electricity or running water.

As I was also saying before, I finally have the energy to communicate with home. In fact, I missed my bus for teh sake of computer communication. I took a later bus that drops me off at a crossroads in the middle of sugarcane fields 10k from my house. When I left my house at 4:30am the sky was clear, and I felt comfortable in a skirt and sandals. When I began my walk, however, it was raining with a chilly wind blowing in from the south. I had to take my shoes off to get better traction in the mud. I´m usually able to hitchhike on that road, but with the combination of bad weather and a broken bridge, it was deserted. I started singing to distract myself from the groceries in my backpack weighing me down as the puddles in the road turned into full-fledged streams. I enjoy the rain, but I started thinking about the 20-year-old kid in my community who was struck my lightning two weeks ago. He was walking back from the field with a hoe on his shoulder, alongside his wife and parents-in-law, when lightning struck him dead on the spot. Lightning strikes are common here, at least more common than back home. A few days ago, my friend, Steve, was struck by lightning while sitting on his porch! Luckily he´s okay, but has a burn on his back from it.

When I reached the broken bridge, it really was broken, with most of the boards missing. A temporary path of plywood laid between the banks kept me on my way. Two hours later, I arrived at my house to find a huge piece of the tree beside my house on the ground, right beside--and luckily not on top of--my house. I quickly realized the irony of this, as it was he same kind of tree whose blossoms I had picked to make a boquet the other day. I was on a run, and all of the sudden, caught a whiff of lilacs. The scent immediately brought me back home, and I tried to make out where the smell was coming from. Unsure, I picked a few branches from a large tree, dripping white blossoms. I don´t think that was the lilac smell, but if I was ever in doubt, I now have a bouquet to fill my entire house and then some.



During Thursday´s cooking class, we made media lunas (criossants). At the end of the class, we discussed what we would make the following week, and they came to the decision that we would just celebrate my birthday that day, and everyone would bring something to share and be ready for a reggaeton dance-off. I´ve come to love that group of women. They range in age from teens to 50s, and I´ve enjoyed the female compañionship and mothering. I´ve had mostly male friends since I´ve been in PC, but I grew up in a community of girls and women, and I hadn´t realized how beneficial it´s been for me to have these women in my life. I feel honored that they want to take the time to celebrate my life.

Make it Rain

I realize that I´ve been slacking on my updates (bad), but I´ve had a lot of work to do in my community (good). I´ve been planning, organizing, and orchestrating an agriculture workshop on Soil Recuperation techniques. The weeks prior were spent inviting participants (on bike, uphill both ways, and, yes, it´s hot again), and confirming and reconfirming with invited guests and specialists. It all went down Friday, so now I finally have the energy to communicate with the outside world. As I mentioned, things have been busy and frustrating, and, of course, as seems to be the trend with events that I organize, it rained the day of the workshop. More significantly, it poured the day before, complete with peachpit-sized hail, so the roads were in a terrible, muddy condition and bridges washed out. I invited five of my volunteer friends to come and assist with the workshop, but the bus didn´t leave my community, so they had to take a different bus to the next town over and walk (and ox-cart ride) the 9k to my house.

The first night that everyone was there, we played soccer with the neighborhood kids in my yard--Paraguay versus the US. Those little rugrats won. Two of my friends are 6´4´´ and one is 6´2´´, so it was amusing to watch the interactions. We all crammed in my house, which fits one, and worked on our presentations for the following day. That morning I had been given the keys to the church, so my friend, Romelia (pictured with me) and I could straigten up. I´m continually surprized by the trust people place in me. I´m given church keys, school keys, and cash donations without question.

Of course, that responsibility also means I´m expected to take on extra burdens, and I need to learn to say ¨no¨when it´s too much. The problem is that I thrive on taking on responsibility, and I feel confident in my abilities to complete things successfully. But then, the unexpected interferes; it rains, for people are not as reliable as I think, or my email is compromised...I want to be able to trust people as much as they trust me. For the most part, though, I have to say, people general pleasantly surprize me. Still, sometimes I´m pushed to my limit. Because I was coordinating with a number ocf specialists and visitors for my workshop, I was continuously confirming and reconfirming with them because I have come to realize that Paraguayans will lie to my face and would rather tell me what I want to hear and save what they think I don´t want to hear until the last possible minute, or when I´m going to figure it out anyway. It´s not that they´re mean or spiteful people. They´re just used to reading between the lines and communicating something berbally while part of them is communicating the opposite. I just have trouble seeing the lines.

Like conversations people have around me, I think I understand because I do comprehend the words. But often the words have double or triple meanings, so that I think they´re talking about going fishing, but really they´re discussing my love life, shamelessly, right in front of me. There are not that many words in this language, compared to our vocabulary in English, but they make up for that in many subtle, and not-so-subtle, nuances.


It rained the moring of the workshop, and most of the técnicos and my Peace Corps boss showed up late because of the road conditions. The fancy people showed up with mud on their pants, including the Secretary of Agriculture, and other important people he invited. But at least they came, and so did the empanadas. And, surprizingly, for the bad weather, so did thirty participants. There would ahve been a lot more from surrounding communities, but I was satisfied with than number, knowing that Paraguayans tend to do nothing withen it rains.

I had my friends and the Paraguayan specialists each cover a topic under the subject of soil recuperation, and present on it for 10-15 muntues. I had a topic as well, but my biggest role, I quickly realized, was that of MC. It´s always been frightening for me to present in fron of a large group in my own language, but it was empowering to be in front a of a group speaking Guarani.

After the workshop, we had a raffle with tools for prizes that I received in various donations. Then we went to my house, where a couple Señoras from my comité had been cooking lunch all morning, and we feasted in my yard. Then I passed out certificates to everyone, including the técnicos, who crowded around me like little kid. They go nuts over these little papers. I´ve heard that instead of the stress we place upon resumes when visiting potential employers, they bring in these certificates and make it rain all over their could-be boss.

Finally, everyone went home, and I breathed a sigh of relief that the biggest thing I´ve done in my community--and might ever do---was done. That night, my friends and I made a bonfire and had a BBQ for some of my Paraguayan friends and family, serenading them with live American music.

I had been hoping that this ag workshop would help to advertize my presense in the community as someone who knows about agriculture. And it may be working. I´ve already been having new conversations with people. The other morning I went to a family´s house to make compost tea for their watermelon crop. That same afternoon, a man asked me how he could naturally control the bugs attacking his tomatoes. And another couple wants my advice and agroforestry systems. It´s nice to have people asking my advice about agriculture and not just resorting to chemical pesticides and fertilizers. I think the word is getting around about how dangerous it is to use that stuff, especially the way many do here, without proper equipment and protection. Two kids in the very small high school have terminal cancer, and I can´t help but thing these cases are related to ag chemicals.

And I don´t think I mentioned that I had a visit from a future volunteer, Amanda, who is going through training right now. I got to show off my community and my command of the language and customs after a year of living here. I remember being in her position last year and visiting a current volunteer. I remember being so exhausted and happy to just watch movies on her portable DVD player and not living with Paraguayans for a few days. On Amanda´s first night, my neighbor´s soccer team won the game (and a pig), and the guys invited us over the the pig roast and wine. It was good visit, and she got to witness what I love about Paraguay, and what drives me crazy. Sometimes that´s a fine line...