Good things happening...Inspiring lives...TV again

Jan 17. Good things are happening. 

A wise man once said, “If you throw enough [stuff] against the wall, some of it’s bound to stick.” 

That’s about how I would describe my service right now. I don’t know which project is going to come through and which will fail. How will I start an online store in the middle of a global financial crisis? Will the people to whom I’m teaching computers really go on to teach others? Will I really be yappin’ it up in Guaraní by this time next year?

That’s professionally. My personal to-do list boggles my mind as well. Learn those pesky two languages, learn to cook, write every day, exercise every morning, be a good volunteer, 

be a good friend, be a good daughter, read more. 

All I can do each morning is say, “What can I throw at the wall today?”

Here’s what I’ve thrown this week. 

1. I heard that some new funds have become available for libraries, so I finally met with the guy who I heard was on a committe to start one. I really wanted to impress him, so I brought the makings of terere: leather-bound thermos with the guampa in the holster, with a mix of three different juyos, chopped up in my blender. As we terered I found out he’s on a committee of young people who have already planted a lot of trees, put public trash cans around town and have more plans to better their community. 

We had a great talk just about why libraries are important, and he said things about how education is the key to a good life. I realized that, back home, I never even imagined not having a library. 

We’re going to fill out the application together, and I have a great feeling about working with the group. 

2. I’m starting my radio program Tuesday. The plan is to put on American/English music that the people here like, but don’t fully understand due to the language barrier. This means Nirvana, Guns N Roses, Queen, Coldplay, Bob Marley, etc. My friend Brennan and I are going to explain the lyrics and a little about the group, kind of like radio Pop U

p Video, leaving out all the sex and drugs and curse words, and the fact that Freddy Mercury was gay. We’re going to read the news from around the world, and educate people about all kinds of stuff, like what is this crazy thing called the internet and how not frying everything might prevent diabetes. And I’m going to end each show with a quote, because I love quotes. My first one will be Gandi’s “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” 

3. After witnessing firsthand the devouring of a pig’s head, I’m more ontrack to vegetarianism than ever. You really can never go back after you’ve seen someone strip the snout of a pig off the bone, dip it in lime juice, then take a big, wet bite. “Excuse me, señora, um, you have a little nose on your chin. Might want to get that.” 

My other friends and I who don’t know how to cook decided to make a veggie meal together every Saturday. Tonight we make eggplant parmesan and it came out delicioso.

4. I’ve gone to Guarani-only texting with my Pyan friends and I’m climbing my mountain of flash cards for one hour a day. 

When I’m feeling helpless or overwhelmed, all I can do is keep throwing. And right now, I’m feeling good that some things will stick, even after I’m gone. 

Jan 17: Inspiration

My neighbor told me that her 13-year-old daughter said she wants to be like me, traveling and learning new languages. I actually haven’t met this daughter yet, and I hadn’t thought that just my presence could get someone thinking differently like that. 

It’s fun to think back to all the people I’ve known who opened life up a little more. When I was a reporte, that was one of my favorite things. You meet so many people who live so many different ways. You realize how arbitrary lifestyle can be. 

I met one guy who’s parents raised him on a sailboat, sailing and painting around the Caribbean. Another one of my heroes is a tattoo artist in St. Augustine, with “Que sera sera” tattooed on the back of her neck. What a bad ass. Or the guy who won a grant to travel around the U.S. looking at endangered American foods.

You see that way some people live and you’re like, “Oh, that’s an option?” 

Another time I was assigned to do a story on artist’s retreats. Did you know you can just go for a few weeks to the woods and make paper or jewelry or ceramics? I didn’t. But as soon as I found out I could, I said “I’m going to do that one day.” A year later I went to Penland Craft School, paying my way by working in the kitchen at night. And it was awesome. 

Find out all that is possible. Choose amongst the options. Repeat. 

It’s like this quote I highlighted out of this book Ishmael, which is a great read for a whole shift in your thinking about the world. It says, “I don’t think you can start wanting something till you know it exists.”

So if all I do here is show people that another kind of life, that a whole world outside of Yataity, Paraguay, exists, I guess that’s not so bad. And it’s already done. 

My own personal cheerleaders

And more specifically, the people who urged me along the road that brought me here. 

I was interviewing Malcom Wolff, a sculpture, who mentioned that he left to go live alone in the woods for 12 years. That made all my worrying about a measly 27 months seem silly. He was tapping away at the stone when I mentioned that I was thinking about joining the Peace Corps. He stopped and looked right at me and said, “Go. Get out of here. It’ll change your life.” 

And my PC recruiter, who gave me a pep talk when I needed one and was there for me when if and when I needed more. 

And my friends, who listened to my verbal pros and cons lists over and over. Who played Devil’s advocate when I needed. 

And my poor mother, who raised me to be independent and brave and now has to suffer the consequences. 

So many people who heard my anxiety and shook me out of my fear. 

Thanks.

So if anyone needs that person to say this, then I say to you: Go. 

There are no guarantees, but I love this Henry David Thoreau quote: “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams; Live the live you’ve imagined.” 

If you keep just nudging your life toward that which you can’t explain, but you can feel,  some day you’ll end up right where you should be. 

Jan. 19. New Addiction

So I had gone cold turkey, on the Internet thing, when we first got to country. Then I was back, just a once-a-week user. Now I’m at the cyber cafe, with my laptop hooked up in the back, five, six times a week. I go after work, un ratito (just a little bit) I always say to my friend who works there. Then it’s 8 p.m., like it is right now. I’m just coming back and my neighbors ask where I’ve been. I don’t want to tell them. I should have been here, speaking Guarani, instead of keeping one foot back in the states. 

“I want the world to witness my youth,” confessed Dave Eggars. And this same desire I fear we’re all falling into. 

Wherever we go, there we are, taking photos to upload on Facebook. Updating our living advertisement of ourselves. And each new thing that’s invented, I scoff at, then eventually give in. 

On Facebook you can upload exactly what you’re doing, right now, which seemed creepy to me when I first saw it. But after I put my first little one, made the present moment exist in virtual reality, I had to put more. 

When you’re recording everything you do, having something occur and not be recorded gives you a panic attack. This is how you know that who you are has become a list of updates. 

It’s as if we think one day people will gather up all that we’ve written, print all the photos we’ve posted, read all our comments. And they’ll lay them out on the floor, and we’ll look down and be able to see who we were. 

Sometimes I’m typing and Skyping and suddenly I look up and --whoa-- I’m in South America. It’s like when you wake from a daydream that was like a wormhole leading you farther from reality. I’m in Paraguay. Shouldn’t I be in Paraguay, having the time of my life, instead off in the virtual world, shouting to everyone that I’m in Paraguay, having the time of my life?

Jan 20. Añe’ekuri radiope. (I spoke on the radio)

First radio show, done. We showed up to learn all the equipment and no one was there. My buddy at the radio station didn’t show up until 10 minutes before we were supposed to go on air. 

When I say radio station, I mean the room in the back of the store, where a computer is set up with living room furniture. My buddy Brennan and I sat in love seats with mics pointed at us. It felt a little as if we should be in front of a fireplace. During our show, Radio Station friend poured the terere and chatted online with the one other person in Yataity who has Internet, or, more accurately, the girl who works at the Internet cafe. 

Our first week of course  we had to choose The Beatles for our group. Radio Station friend kept playing the cheesy radio promo over the songs, which was killin’ me. We also are going to have a joke of the week, because they love a good joke here, and we did the Ghandi quote at the end. We had extra time, so I played one song from Beck, pretty much because he was the next person in my iTunes. But I was happy to know that out in the streets of Yataity, “Hell Yes” was blasting. 

Jan 22. Television, again.

Before, television was always just there, from as far back as time, as far as us kids were concerned. We watched it, learning how life was supposed to be, and modeled our own lives accordingly, waiting to grow up to be just like the high schoolers on “Saved by the Bell.”

What’s interesting is when you do it backwards. Take a month off from tv, I challenge you. Soak in a little real life, then watch some tv. 

Yesterday I saw a commercial. It showed a woman with long, curly blond hair falling over her shoulders and down her cleavage. From behind translucent curtains it looked as if she was on top of a muscular, shirtless man with a big tribal tattoo down his shoulder. They shared some sensual moments, as she held a guampa (the cup for terere). To the rhythm of the music she moved, then slowly touched his face with the bombilla (the metal straw for terere) and glided it down his cheek. 

This was a commercial for a brand of yerba, from which you make terere. I don’t think I need to tell you that when Paraguayans drink terere, it ususally looks a little different.  

The television is just a box, not a bad thing on it’s own. And there is such a thing as good programs. But I’m talking about the networks, commercials, what most people see every day. What the average American takes in for 4 1/2 hours daily. 

Here they watch the telenovelas. Always in the coop I’m trying to kick it with my ladies, and from the television there’s the screaming of a dramatic fight between lovers, the wailing of a mother over another dead person, the piercing cry of a woman about to be raped. All I can think is that the people on the show have everything we think we want -- beautiful bodies, mansions, cars -- but none of what we really want -- peace. 

I just find so much more that our perceptions of life depend so much on what we invite in. And it seems that whenever the tv is turned on, we invited in all the worst parts. 

Thanks

I really want to thank everyone who sent me packages. I love it every time the mail lady comes looking for me. Sometimes I keep a package for a few hours before I open it, or tell myself I get to open it after I study. I love just as much e-mails (even though I can't eat them) or comments or any way you guys let me know I'm still loved and thought about. Thank you so much. 

Buenos Aires Wrong...Getting Lost...Being Back

There are plenty of blogs about how to do Buenos Aires right. Bor-ring. You gotta write what you know, so here's my advice on

How to Do Buenos Aires Wrong.

• Do not make anything that might be referred to as a “Game Plan.”
  
• Reservations schmeservations
• Do not be tempted to save money by cooking at home, even if your accomadations are equipped with a kitchen.
  
• Do not designate a specific pocket or bag for your wallet or passport.
• Distribute important information on scraps of paper kept in various pockets or as bookmarks.
  
• Don't worry about having a guidebook that's up-to-date. I'm sure that bus line is still in business.
  
• Do not familiarize yourself with exact exchange rates.
  
• Do not research restaurants before deciding to eat there.

To see vacation photos, click here.

The People of Buenos Aires

The people, as I peruse their tabletops of handmade jewelry or read their menus, smile and are patient with my Spanish. They use English when they know it.

Things are done with style. We passed by a georgeous, ornate building, and while we were awwing, our cab driver told us that's the city's water management building.

On the subway, a man in his golden years was whistling "Strangers in the Night." He got off at our stop and serenaded us on the walk to the next train, what were the chances? Down the stairs then up again, like a radio I was carrying, and into the next train, he continued. I smiled at him, we exchanged glances, but I didn't want him to stop. He did, right before we got off, to ask me where I was from. I wanted to say how wonderful it was that people whistled Strangers In the Night for trains on end, but I only had time to say Los Estados Unidos before I rushed through the doors.

People from the U.S.

Our group is mixed in with visitors from the states, siblings and friends of Peace Corps people. It's fun to tell them about Paraguay, ask about the U.S. The big joke is that we're heroes. As in, when one of them walks to the kitchen, one of us will call out from lying down on the couch: "While you're up, how would you like to get some more ice for a hero."

It's crazy to imagine they just came down for the trip, and their already back cozy in the states. For us volunteers, it was more like a trip within a trip.

Getting Lost

First, I have to say that my agreement with the group on this trip was that I would plan nothing and in return have no preference as to what we did. I would be a fish at the end of the school, just following the tail in front of me.

I was lead to a lunch on the plaza one day, where we waited two hours to eat, after getting there at 3 p.m.. A coup was afoot when we found out our food hadn't even been made yet. So we left.

A group of a dozen people storming out of a restaurant is a hard thing to contain. We strung out along the sidewalk, in groups of two or three mixed in with the foot traffic. People toward the front wanted to go to a steak restaurant. Toward the back there was talk of going to La Boca, a neighborhood nearby.

Rebecca was walking about 30 feet behind me, and I considered her my loose buddy, until I turned around and saw her walking back, toward the La Boca camp.

She got in a cab, and I assumed she was going to pick me up.

I looked and the cab had 4 people in it. Drivers wouldn’t fit more.

“Come to La Boca!” yelled Rebecca out the window as they passed me.

“Where?” I said, as La Boca is a whole neighborhood.

“I don’t know!” she said, her hands held up apologetically.

Then the cab turned the corner, and they were gone. I looked up in front of me and didn’t see anyone but strangers.

Suddenly I had gone from being surrounded by a group to alone on a crowded street with no phone, no address to the hotel and little idea where I was. I felt the same grip a claustrophobe might feel when the doors close in a hot elevator.

I was too proud to run, but I walked fast through the crowd, trying to catch up to the steak group. The crowd thinned a few blocks up and I realized I didn’t see them anywhere.

Surely they thought I was in La Boca, while the others thought I was eating steak.

I tried not to cry. Because I’m an adult. But as I was going to restaurant window to restaurant I felt like a lost little girl. So I

started to cry like one, a little.

A half-hour later, trying to tame my anxiety, I decided to hail a cab and together we found the hotel, off a plaza I knew was near there. No one was there.

I had to accept what had happened and just said, OK, I have to pretend that I chose to have an evening alone in B.A.

I decided to go for a site-seeing walk, where the thought, "How could she just leave me like that?" kept popping into my head, but I pushed it down. I came upon a guy painting graffiti and decided to talk to him. He was a cute Brazilian painting one of the cartoony characters you see around town. He mistook me for a porteña (someone from B.A.), or at least he said he did. We were chatting when I heard "Rubia!" from across the street. It was my friends.

By the last day in B.A. I was rushing to get somewhere. I had only seen a site, the cemetery Recoleta. I needed at least one more, needed to have a plural, "I've seen the sites."

"Come on people," I said to the rumpled logs in the dorm-style bunks.

We went to a private building with a great view, then we saw the Pink House, their version of the White House, on the way to the boat to Uruguay.

Uruguay

Rebecca left before Uruguay, shaving off the top level of responsiblity, like a nanny leaving the day care. All of us irresponsible ones left keep trying to help each other. When I have to hold the bus tickets, I say loudly, "Ok, I'm putting the bus tickets in the long zippered pocket of my purse." I do so with an exaggerated arm swing for the witnesses. "Long zippered pocket," I say.

We purchased our bus tickets to Punta del Diablo, then it was announced that we had no where to stay. Arriving past the New Year, we figured people would have cleared out by then. This was not the case. We searched online for places, with Shola Googling then passing the numbers to me to call. "No hay nada" (There isn’t anything) said the people on the line. Something about their chuckles and tones made me think they were referring to all of the town instead of just their houses.

In a chatroom online I found a conversation about reserving a place. It's a hot spot so it's best to book now said the person responding. It was dated in August.

Our choices were to go look in person, risking not finding anything, or to lose out on our bus ticket money.

We arrived at 10:30 to a street crowded with people milling around on their way to party. We were weighed down by our bags and the knowledge that we might not have a place to sleep that night.

The first place where Liam and Shola stopped in, the lady told them to give up, that it would be impossible. They came outside and told the group she said there might be something farther from the beach.

We walked farther and farther from the hot spots. We were in a quite a cold spot, actually, and had asked about a dozen places, when we mentioned our plight to a shopkeeper.

And bam. She knew someone, who turned out to be a realtor for some guy who had a house. We negotiated for the rental at midnight.

The Tree House

If you saw the roof of the house from the main road, over the pine trees, you might make a little excursion to see the rest. It is straw-roofed, a series of levels topped with a tiny glass-enclosed room akin to a lighthouse. Inside, it is a main floor and two stories of lofts, which offer almost no privacy, even through the floors, which have peephole lines between the wood. Some walls are straw, some wood. The owner, Fernando, told me he built it himself, and I believe him. He showed me the patios, the outward slants of which startle my equilibrium. He kept saying, “Ocho, no,” (Eight, no) referring to the number in our party and the weight limit of his creations. Almost anything that is stepped on, opened or twisted in the house makes some kind of complaint, as if the house doesn’t want to get up.

We had three members of our mobile party over 6’5”, who had to crouch in certain rooms and duck under doorways. Even I couldn't stand up straight in the little sitting room. On the second story room one board seemed to be just nailed above the others and camoflauged in the same paint. Taking in all the house’s abnormal formations, the bump/“Ouch!”/profanity sequence is common among the squeaks and whines.

The land around the house looks like Florida scrub to me, low bushes and sand and palms and pines, which I always think look weird in tropical climates. There is a bird flying around that is so red, it looks like a digital add-in on a old movie of grey grass. Two green parrots flew around this morning, diving down and landing next a big pit which has a snake at the bottom of it.

The beach is wonderful.

We’re on Uruguayan time. We get to dinner at midnight. Then go out. The pictures of our nights out look like they’re in reverse order, starting out with dark backgrounds and flashes and ending with the pastel sky and the natural light of what could be sunset, but is really sunrise.

The morning is shot, obviously. Naps are taken on the beach and in the house on the top floor to avoid the noise. Last night I took my nap from 9 to midnight.

At night I walk with my neck arched back, because I can't stop looking at the stars. Orion's belt, which used to be out on its own somewhere, is now in the middle of the Milky Way, a thick band of stars over us. I try to imagine that some are closer than others. I try to think about how big and far they are, but they just look like skylights poked in a black dome tent.

Anyone who was looking saw shooting stars that weekend. I saw about six over three nights.

There's staring to be done during they day, as well, especially for the menfolk. The girls look like that one girls that’s in every high school class: really cute, beautiful, just stylish-no-matter-how-she-looks...only in a thong bikini and cloned everywhere.

When you see groups of people milling around the bus station, you can tell which ones are coming and which ones are going. They’re coming from the city, done up in new holiday clothes. They leave in beach wraps, their hair up, dangling shell jewelry around their neck. It’s a nuicance to see people leave. It pops me out of that mental dream that we give ourselves over to on vacation: That life really could be like this forever.

Which is why you can’t really count the last day, which is today, of a vacation. Because you get up and someone says something like, “Last day,” in either a sing-songy way or a drag kind of way. Either that or someone will ask you about your flight or bus time the next day. You’re forced to picture yourself getting on a bus and leaving this place, and the non-vacation life waiting, which you had started to think was a dream.

It's been the anti-vacation

I never worried about how many stars our hostel had. In hostels you just want a bathroom door that locks. We never worried much about how we looked. We didn't buy stupid trinkets or ugly shirts that had the name of everywhere we visited, to advertised our well-traveledness. I didn't stress out about making sure I got my money's worth of fun, because I wasn't traveling on my credit card.

So the point is

The more I travel the more I see the point of traveling as this: Seeing the similarities. I cand stand out on that beach and imagine pretty easily that I’m in St. Augustine, Fl.

You go so damn far and the grass is still grass. Sand sand. It's not just a yellow area on a map.

Teenage girls cross their arms over their bellies when they sit. Little boys watch how the men bait their fish hooks. Women whisper and laugh. There are the same jerks, the same sweet people. Some people just invite you into their world and you make friends across language barriers.

Here on the street, twice a shopkeeper has called out to me that he can see my wallet sticking out of my pocket and I should hide my money better. They do this little sticking in the purse motion, then zipping it up, a dainty move with their man hands. When I zipped up my purse one of the men gave me a thumbs up and a smile.

When I asked the landlady of this house if I could buy body boards here, she drew me a detailed map of where I could find them, with the roads drawn carefully, two lines. There were five other landmarks as well.

I don’t want to sound naïve. I have a former Marine sister who works in security and a teacher mom who works on worrying. They remind me all the time of the dangers. So I lock my computer up in my house before I go. I put my wallet in the inside pocket of my purse and zip it up, when I don't forget. I don’t walk alone at night.

However I do not do it as acts of war, saying, “Those damn (insert name of persons from country of travel here.) They’ll rip ya off every chance you get.”

I am careful but not afraid, and that frightens people. Especially my mother.

I used to be all concerned about which country I would serve in. I almost asked for a country change when I was sent somewhere with no beach or mountains. But that was never the point. The point of getting out of your world is this: Go somewhere where the people don't look like you, dress like you, or talk like you and see how exactly the same you are.

Jan 15. Back

And I'm back, to where Argentina where mom's tell their kids they have to go work, before leaving.

I'm back, and had about 7 wonderful packages waiting from family and friends. Once, I told my friend how much a package costs to send, lowballing it as we do sometimes to $20 (which, in Guaranis, is half my rent), and her jaw dropped. Now I'm carrying loads and loads of them down the street.

My sister sent me a photo album with old pictures: skydiving, my aunt's beautiful beach house, Hawaii, my mom's beautiful wedding, and the story I had told myself about my life seems all wrong. I've seen all these photos before, but it looks different now.

I'm back, and my friend asked me in front of the whole board of the coop how much money I spent on my vacation. Did I lie? The raw numbers, of just how much more money we have, embarrass me.

I'm back, and I'm sorry again.

The voice says, "So sorry that you could forget about it and blow $??? for a two-week vacation?"

I feel guilty and helpless and small. But I can't cash in my guilt, and helplessness will get me nowhere. I can't understand why life is divided this way. All I can do is try to reach across the crevasse, I guess.

Feliz Año Nuevo

Yes, hello. Feliz año nuevo.

We spent our new year at an Indian restaurant called Katmandu, the last thing to be booked up before the new year. Almost all the other party were big Indian families with kids. We drank red wine and ate really delicious Indian food.

Near midnight they passed out plastic rimmed hats and started dance music from the dj near the carpeted table with the big elephants, while bubbles fell from the ceiling. At midnight we counted down and kissed. Then the music changed to the theme song from Star Wars. And I said, ¨The future! We`re in the future!¨

People shot off fireworks in the streets, so we went out there a bit, where it was windy and cold, then came back in to dance. The Indian people filmed us, a lot, and we danced with them.

At about two we left, and, having befriended the two girl waitresses, went to their apartment to afterparty. There´s nothing like being invited to a local`s house to make you feel like you´ve ascended from tourist idiot back to actual human.

We came back at 5 to where there were people gathered in the plaza near our hostel, a few playing drums and dancing. We came back to the hostel, where some people went to bed, then we went back to the plaza to eat a ham and cheese toasted sandwich. Then we walked home in the sun to sleep.

Now I`m waiting for Eric to get back and tell me if the Japanese restaurant is open. I must energize with the powers of wasabi.

Big Group in B.A.

It takes a group like us until about noon to actually move from the hotel, after everyone has woken up, shuffled out to eat the crossoint and coffee breakfast and decided where we´re going to eat. We`re starving by the time we sit down to lunch, by the time we´ve figured out if we´ve all got the right change for the bus, and we`ve figured out that yes, the bus stops here, and yes, we all think eating at the brewery. We order lunch at 4 p.m.

We have to have meeting times, like at the front of La Recoleta Cemetery at 6:15. We break up into smaller, more managable groups, until I find a few of my friends walking after a bleary-eyed gravekeeper who has a key in his hand. ¨We`re going in one¨says Eric of the moseleums. ¨He gave us gin.¨ The great thing about traveling with crazies is that they attract other crazies, and at least the entertainment is always there. So we walk down into someone`s grave, 31 graves exactly, that smell like a basement, but those aren´t carboard boxes on the shelves. We go down to the drain that holds the bones and ashes of other people, I couldn´t understand the spanish exactly.

Then we peruse the market. I look up to see that I can see at least one person I know. I could be lost any second, like a 2-year-old. I kind of wish I had a harness with a leash attached to Rebecca`s hand.

p.s. Mom, I`m ok, stop worrying.

American Underneath

The women of Buenos Aires intimidate me. They are not headed to Wal-Mart. They don't have on flip-flops, they have heels. They have jewelry, not expensive but just a little something to celebrate the day. They kiss on the cheek and hold hands and their hair bounces. 

I packed one red dress in the hopes of having one night to pretend I was a glamorous porteña, a woman from Buenos Aires. I saw myself tangoing, just once. 

 

I discovered I was alone in this fantasy, however, after surveying my traveling buddies. The Peace Corps boys were not into it. We were more about shamelessly not giving a crap about fitting in.  There was nothing to do but accept that this was going to be a Sin Vergüenza Vaca (Vacation Without Shame). The joke is to say “Keep it classy,” because that’s about the last thing we’re going to do. 

So when Eric unbuttoned his shirt, for instance, in the middle of a restaurant because he was hot after a meal, I told myself not to blush; Or when he busted out the portable speakers in the middle of a lunch crowd in a plaza and started playing a Kanye West skit, I did not sheild my eyes; When we forgot that more people here speak English than in Paraguay, but went on talking about their bad haircuts like English is a magical code language that only we know, I just joined in...It didn't bother me, because I've accepted that we are bad American tourists, sin vergüenza. 

Tonight is New Year's, perhaps my last night for this fantasy of dressing up for a night out, for actually keeping it classy. And I decided yes, I will wear the red dress. I want my one night. 

I realized I was out of clean undies, and, even though I was going to the laundry that day, I decided to go buy some new ones, something to celebrate the day, as all I still have are my granny panties that Peace Corps told us we should bring. I lugged my laundry with me to pick up a pair and drop off the whole load at the cleaners. 

I'm perusing the undies in a hip little shop. There's one pair that just says Fancy New Year's in Buenos Aires. Not literally, but you know what I mean. The saleswoman takes them off the rack and stretches them out wide to show me that one size fits all. I nod and say I'll take them just so she'll stop that. 

I'm carrying my laundry sack in one hand and a cardboard bag with rope handles in the other, where the one pair of unders is wrapped in tissue paper. For some reason I decide the middle of the sidewalk is the best place to transfer them over to the laundry bag so I don't have to do it in front of the laundry guy. 

I balance the laundry bag between my knees and take great pains to descreetly unwrap the undies from the tissue paper, sticking my hand in the bag so that no peek of their color shows. I find the tag and bring the bag to my face to break the plastic tie with my teeth. To the fancy passersby I'm afraid are staring at me, it might have looked like I was taking a bite out of a sandwich I was hiding. 

I break the plastic tie but see another one. Just as I find the plastic between my front teeth, my laundry slips from between my knees. My hand jerks to grab it. At that moment the cardboard bag falls and slips from around the underwear like a curtain unveiling a statue. This left me on a Buenos Aires street, staring wide-eyed at the Argentinians on the street with wide eyes and a pair of underwear dangling from between my teeth. 

Argentine morning

Turns out my phone will not be working down here. In case of emergency I'm staying at the Hostel Nomade II. Phone: 5411-4307-1045.

Also my friend has a cell: 0992428356. I'm pretty sure to call from the states it's 011 595 0992428356.

Hello from B.A.

Hello from the Hostel Nomade in Buenos Aires. I`m starving and ready to get out there, but we`re in the lobby waiting on someone to meet up with us...so what can you do?

We started our trip in Asuncion. Let me tell you a little about the group I´m with by throwing back to my last big trip to California. I went with my very responsible friend and I was not allowed to hold anything important. She would hand me the map then five minutes later ask me where it is, and I`d pat my pockets. By the end of the trip, my nickname was The Black Hole.

If you want to give our name a group on this trip, it would be The Black Holes. In Asuncion after just one night, stuff was everywhere. We were packing up to leave and everyone`s like, ¨Where did my iPod go?¨and ¨Has anyone seen my toothbrush?¨I looked at it all and said, ¨Well, this has disaster written all over it.¨

My buddy Liam changed his mind at the last minute and decided to bring his laptop, and as he was packing it up I said, ¨I have the same feeling watching that computer come on this trip as I do watching a baby get on a moto. No little one, it`s not safe.¨

So we have little alliances. Every time I ask Liam, ¨Where`s your computer?¨ He asks me, ¨Do you have your passport, wallet and cell phone?¨And we check.

The only one among us we trust with the kitty money is Rebecca, the older and wiser and the planner of the group.

We left the hotel at 11:45 a.m. for our 1:30 bus which takes 18 hours. I`ve learned there`s nothing that reminds you you´re not a kid anymore like 18 hours on a bus. But it was a double-decker and we got the top front seats.

We slept, kind of, and arrived at about 9. We got a croissat and coffee at the terminal. After the subway and walking, we arrived at our hotel at 11:45.

Off to B.A.

Yay! I`m off to my first international vacation. I remember this being one of the reasons I joined the PC, getting to travel from site. I thought by seven months in I`d be dying for a vacation, but it`s nice that I would really be happy staying in site. But if I have to go to Argentina, I guess that`s just fine too.

This is the least prepared I`ve ever been for any trip. We are winging it. I have my guide book and a bus ticket to B.A. and I`ve overpacked as usual. We might go to Uruguay too. We`ll see. I`ll be out of touch until the 10th.

Rich People!...Christmas

Dec. 19: Rich People!

My buddy Auxi needed to go measure some windows at some guy’s house to make Ao Poi curtains. That’s all I knew when I agreed to go with her.

We were picked up in an SUV by some guy, I wasn’t sure if it was the owner of the house or what. This is just one of the facts that falls under the I Don´t Know Now But I´ll Find Out Soon Enough category, with so much else. We rode in air conditioning for about an hour, listening to songs like “What is Love?” Then we turned off the routa and bounced at high speeds along dirt roads, arriving at a gate, where someone from a nearby house let us in. I thought, “Oh nice, this guy has an assistant here.”

Then we rode farther and farther in rolling green hills, and I realized we were within this guy’s fencing, and I started to wonder exactly where we were going and who we were dealing with here.

Where we went was the largest, nicest estate I’ve ever visited in my life. Who we were dealing with was one of the richest men in Paraguay.

If before I thought that I was a spiritual person who treated all humans the same, that self-image was dashed by the grin on my face as we entered the side door to the huge kitchen covered in Spanish-style tiles, where maids at the center island stopped chopping meat long enough to stare at us. I linked my hands in front of me like a nervous little girl.

It took about a millisecond to imagine myself living there. There would be a son (maybe he’d approach on horseback with the sunlight in his hair), who rejected his wealth in principal but still had use of the pool. We could go to lavish fund-raisers and eat our home-chef-made steaks without guilt.

Then in they came. Actual rich people! There was an older man and a man in his 40s, (there goes my age requirements). But I didn’t know who was who. Are you the gardener or do you sign the paychecks?

I finally figured it was the older man who lived there. I looked at him and wondered if he was really happy and at peace, then I counted how many chairs were at his huge dining room table (14!) so that I could quantify how rich the guy was later in a detailed report to all friends and family.

They were very nice, not at all snooty. The older man showed us around the house:

Through the dining room with all the silver and the wide 14-seater. Through a billiard room where we walked over the skin of a large animal. Into another dining room. More silver. More paintings. A chandelier. A marble fireplace. Then a hallway as wide as my room, with benches lining one wall and tables with silver frames lining the other. Doorways with wood frames with angel faces carved into them lead to bedrooms. Paintings covered every wall.

The long carpets lead to another sitting room, then around the corner a space with more seating, a lit case with guns and knives and more animal skins. Wooden stairs with iron railings lead up to a lit marble statue of Jesus, then around to the master bedroom, the size of a small school auditorium. By the door were his boots, next to a packed bag with a handgun resting on top.

With that, he left us to measure. I wanted a map of the house to find my way. We all went back to the kitchen, where I asked to use a restroom. Around a back corner, I passed a marble door that radiated cool air, then turned another corner and caught site of the biggest painting I’ve ever seen. It was in a room that was the biggest room I’d ever seen in a house, like a large lodge with a bar in one side. “Oh. My. God.” I said. Then I went pee and giggled in the mirror as I washed my hands in a marble sink.

While we measured the dining room, the maid came around looking for Him, holding his bag in one hand and the gun in the other, in a manner I think gun safety experts would frown upon.

Throughout the house, the same symbol on his cow´s derier was everywhere: embroidered on the sheets, printed on the ash trays, on the smock of the maid who followed us from room to room.

We went to another house on property, and I asked his assistant (our driver) who lived there. “This is the pilot’s house,” he said. I made a note to include that little tidbit in the ol’ blog.

Then we went by the pool with the huge lodge and saw some iguanas running around as we went to measure the windows in the church on property.

We finished and left, driving through more of the property, the maid´s quarters, the horse stalls. Then right outside his gate we drove back into reality. Poor kids running without shoes.

I felt a twinge of guilt and shame, remembering that I´m here on a mission not only to help others but to help myself, partially by rejecting the seduction of wealth. My relapse was strong with just the first scent of riches. It’s amazing to me how much it sucked me in, how quickly I imagined getting my hands on it, how eager I was to report how close I got to it.

Dec. 25: Feliz Navidad

So I cried on Christmas Eve, when I realized I wouldn’t have Internet to video call my family and friends. I hid in my house and called my mom on my expensive cell phone. Then I went to sit out with the fam here and my host brother said, “Were you crying?” So I started crying some more trying to explain. Then he made fun of me.

But my host mom said sure you’re going to cry, you’re so far from your family.

We sat out back and they decorated a pesebre, or manger. My host family grew theirs out of the bushes people shape into topiaries and even ducks and dragons. They hang candy from its branches, light candles and put in a Baby Jesus and all the animals. It’s funny, they make an alter to Jesus, we make an alter to our presents.

Instead of going around to see different house’s lights, people visit to see each pesebre. We went down the street and were offered a seat and a drink. I did some good meeting-of-people to terere with later.

Back at the house, we drank beer and champagne. I offered to help cook, then was fake kung fu fighting with my host brother when host mom jokingly grabbed me by the back of my ao poi and said, “You said you were going to help me.” She pulled me over to where a knife waited by some veggies to be chopped, so I grabbed it and continued with a knife kung fu fight. Then I did chop the veggies. As the meat (pork, beef and chicken) cooked, we visited with neighbors and passersby. My host mom kept telling all the visitors I’d been crying.

At midnight everyone double-kissed and gave “Felicidades!” I made the mistake of going to the local fiesta. I wore really high heels so no one would try to dance with me, as this puts me at about 4 inches taller than almost everyone. But they were really uncomfortable. My belly was full of meats. I just kind of stood against the wall, wishing I had a car and entertaining myself by watching one especially bad dancer until 4 a.m. when we walked home with our shoes in hand.

Christmas

I slept with my sleeping mask on so the sun coming through my bathroom window wouldn’t wake me. I slept until 11, then went over the fam’s house. We watched Shrek in Spanish, which made me happy. We ate the triple-meat leftover special. Then I came back to the house not wanting to think about Christmases and slept until 5. This would be nice if I hadn’t accidentally bought sheets that were 50% polyester. Everytime I turn over, the part touching the sheets feels like it’s been laying against a wet beach towel, as the fan breaths its hot air down on it.

Just some pics

Celebrating the reception of some Taste of Thai rice mixes from my aunt.

This is where I put my feet while I´m eating, studying, reading, whatever.


I call these tire squeelers, when I´m just riding around town on my bike and I see something I have to stop and take a picture of: