The Honeymoon is Over...

I´ve had a hot and cold romance with Paraguay. It´s home to me now, but I must come to terms with what I don´t like about Paraguay...and Paraguayans. While I´m grateful for the welcome I have received in my community, there are things I abhore. It´s mostly ignorance I´m confronted with, which is no fault of theirs, but that doesn´t make it any easier for me. I´m tired of listening to gossip--even if it´s true. Funny thing is that they tell me, no, it´s not gossip if it´s true. Still gossip, I say, and say´s who? it´s true. I know it´s gotten to me when I spend an hour with a dictionary looking up comebacks. Another thing I dislike? Child abuse. I´m just funny like that. Dislike is a mild word. I should say it sickens me to the point that I cry and want to vomit, mostly from feeling helpless. I can´t stand that physical beauty means everything. It doesn´t matter how intelligent, driven, or thoughtful someone is--just don´t get ugly. And if they think someone is ugly, they´ll make a loud point of expressing their opinion, even to that person. And I don´t understand why my Paraguayan friends don´t warn me about things--they don´t tell me about the creepy guy or the rip-off almacén. And I can´t just be friends with a man. And that I should find a husband before I´m old.


That´s the bitchfest I usually save for my fellow volunteers. But apart from all that, I´m giddily happy. Maybe it´s because this all just feels like a game. It doesn´t matter if I screw up, I can just just over. My friend compared this life to being the star of a TV sitcom. It feels like that sometimes. If people back home were watching this, it would be funny, or at the least, entertaining. I can almost hear the laughtrack in the background.

I´m in the process of building my chicken coop, so I can eat eggs...and chickens. I get another week off from teaching English. Winter break was extended because of the swine flu scare. My hands are all cracked and scratched from working in the sugarcane field and from putting the straw roof on my hen house. Sugarcane is taking everyone´s time right now. It is cut and stripped by hand, and then hauled off on oxcart and tractor to where a larger truck loads it off to a nearby factory. There it is processed into sugar and ¨black honey¨, or molasses, the byproduct of sugar, which I actually prefer. My neighbor´s just made mosta, the juice made from grinding up the sugarcane stalks. It looks like green koolaid, and is super yummy.

I felt like I was getting used to the cold, roving from house to house to get warm by the fire and drink hot mate, while we talk about how cold it is. Which is basically what we do in the summer, except we talk about how hot is is while drinking ice-cold terere. You may not think it could get cold in Paraguay; I didn´t believe it, arriving here at the start of the warm season. I have to protect my tomato starts from frost, and my ¨shower¨ consists of splashing water on my face and neck and putting a hat on. Lastnight I changed into the clothes I´m wearing today, so I wouldn´t have to change at 4am to catch the bus.


And I guess it´s about time I admit to having a Paraguayan boyfriend, though it´s still a secret in site. I´m trying (probably unsuccessfully) to keep gossip at bay. But he´s super cute and makes me smile!

Her feet have already widened at the ball of the foot, beginning to take the shape of the men who work barefoot or in flipflops all day in the field. Eventually the delicate arch will disappear altogether, an unnecessary frill in a vocation that demands all the square coverage possible to grip this earth, as if she might fall off the face of it. It strikes me as sad or nostalic, though she is smiling. I make a mental note to think about it later when I´m alone in my house. I look forward to having a good cry that will put me into a deep sleep. But later, lying in bed, I try to conjure the feeling back up, and I find I feel nothing at all.