2nd attempt at photos before a busyyy week!

this is the street that I live on

this is a cow in front of a house on the main road i our town

This is the pig that lives at Erik´s house (and rebecca petting it) soon to be dinner

This is part of the Muni group when we stopped at my house during the home tour (Mark, Liam, Rebecca, Courtney, Joan, and Shola) Notice Courtneys VT sweatshirt, we graduated the same year!!

These are my scary dogs, not looking so scary at the moment... but don´t be fooled

This is Frederico, who can also be scary and part of our patio with well in back

This is my host sister and one of the cutest 1 year olds in the world, drinking the drink that Paraguayans swear by, Terrere

This is Shola and the neighbors and my host cousin, I guess, Carlito playing soccer in our backyard

This is the view of Asuncion from the plane, look at all those dirt roads, even in the capital!

This is also in our yard, basically every room opens up the the patio, it´s an open air set up house... there is the pit where we burn trash, que mala

These are the chickens and ducks that provide us meat and eggs

This is the kitchen, with many lards and a large freezer :) They make a lot of good meals here and on the outdoor stove. Everything from scratch, que bueno!

Thats all for now, I probably won´t be able to update this for a while. MISS YOU ALL :)

Julie

I wanted to upload photos....

but I can´t because the computers are too slow.. but I¨ll try to make them smaller so it won´t take as long.

It`s unfortunate because my latest picture is of a bug that looks like a fly but is the size of my hand!! it´s gross! today it is really hot even though it is supposed to be further into winter than when we arrived, but apparently the cold and then hot temperature changes are very common for Paraguay! If I had to guess I´d say it´s 85 and the humidity os at 92 percent, according to my profe.

Here is some more info from my Journal-

Last night I really felt like I was a part of the family. Everyone calls me Tia (aunt) Julie and I took care of the baby and it was really nice. I hope that my Spanish can get better and my Guarani so that I can get more of what they are saying, as well as a lot of the jokes.

Today we did a tour of everyone’s houses and I was surprised to see basically everyone’s house was nicer than mine and I thought I had it good! Everyone is so hospitable and everyone invited us in to eat and drink something and by the end of the tour I couldn’t eat or drink anything else. That is until we got to my house and I had a café con leche. One house had a pig that wasn’t full grown and it was soo nice. I’m glad I don’t have that at my house because I would feel bad eating it later. I already feel bad about eating the chickens that run around the house. There was one on the kitchen table today, which made it seem like it was just asking to be eaten. I’ve never eaten more meat in my life. Hot dog for breakfast, carne asado (I’m not sure what it is.. ribs?) for lunch, chicken for dinner. We also had this food called chipaguas’y.. That would be my guess on how to spell it, but it was really yummy. Basically a type of corn blended with onions, eggs and cheese… it was kind of like corn bread and kind of like Tortilla in Spain. J I went to church tonight and it was pretty interesting. It actually was a Catholic church and it was pretty and big, especially for this little town. The father of the church was from Poland and he spoke a bit of English. Mano walked me there because I didn’t want to go alone, he is a very helpful 13 year-old, and sometimes they aren’t that helpful at that age. He said something that struck me, “no hay reglas en Paraguay”… there are no rules in Paraguay, which is something that seems simple, but it really hit me for various reasons based on various things I have encountered here.

That´s all for now !!
I would draw a smiley but I can´t find the right keys!

Paraguay, Para Que?!

The title of this blog is a well known joke in South America which translated into English means “Paraguay, for what?” but I like to say “Paraguay? Que Guay!! “Which means Paraguay? How cool!” (In Spain Spanish, they don’t use Guay here) I’ve been in Paraguay for three days, and training for 3 days, yet I feel like I could write a thousand pages. There are soo many differences, even more so than I had noticed in Peru. You get such a good look at the culture by staying with a family. So I’ll start there first, mi familia is pretty great. I love my sister Azucena (27) and her 1 year old, Favricio. Her husband Francisco is really funny. The grandma lives here and she is 74. The “aunt” is the one who decided to take on a volunteer and she is really nice too. She is a teacher of teachers and she is very religious. We are going to church tomorrow, but it’s not Catholic, which is kind of rare. I can’t remember what church it is exactly. And finally a 30 year old brother who lives here too, he is a teacher as well. That, along with 3 dogs, 7 birds and lots of chickens and ducks, all of which are very mean except Sancho, a small and long dog. It’s definitely a full house, but it’s a lot of fun. I have my own room and I have a pretty big bed too, fit with a corner dedicated to Jesus Cristo. There are three others that are here most of the time. A nanny for the one-year old, an aunt that lives down the street and her two boys, one is 7 and one is 13. The 13 year old is very helpful and he is very close with this family.

The house is open air, which is probably really nice in the summer, but right now it’s about 40 degrees and there is no escaping the cold. I am super super glad I brought that sleeping bag, because I’m only slightly cold at night, and it gets down to 32 F. I’ve been sick since staging and they gave me some yuyo (pronounced JuuJoo) as a remedy. It’s basically hot water with different herbs from their garden. I don’t know if it’s just a coincidence but I am starting to feel a little better. My family told me not to wash my hair this morning because I will get even more sick, so I didn’t. They have some interesting ideas about health and similar topics. I don’t know about this one, but apparently owning cats makes you infertile. We don’t have any cats here.

The town we are in is very cute, all the roads are a mix of really red dirt and cobblestones. But mostly it is dirt. There is a main road that runs through the town that is paved but that’s all. There are many animals running around, like in Peru, but the scariest of all the animals in Paraguay live at my house (it’s true!). I want to take pictures of the town but I don’t want to be flashing around my camera, so maybe I will on the last day that we are here.

The water here is apparently a lot cleaner than the rest of South America so eventually I might be able to drink the water without getting sick. We had our first shots through the PC, and we had to get the flu shot and the yellow fever one. My arm is still sore from the flu shot, but I apparently am the only one that is still in pain so I don’t know. We have to get more on Wednesday.

Another interesting thing about Paraguay is that for a country where things tend to move very slow, news moves very fast. One night I didn’t drink cola when offered to me by my aunt and the next day my host brother asked me why I didn’t like it, even though he wasn’t there when this occurred. I also keep hearing about other volunteers and what their families think of them and how they adjusting and what they eat. For example, I’m not sure which volunteer, but one that lives on my street apparently refused to eat anything or watch telenovelas (soap operas) with his family and also really loved the tea cocido… I’m not sure why these things are important or need to be talked about, but it is funny how that kind of stuff gets around.

So this first week has already been quite the expereince, I could write a lot more but I will leave it at that for now.. Hopefully next week I can upload some pictures, esp of Favricio bc he is sooo cute!!

MUCH LOVE!! miss you all!
Julie

MAILING ADDRESS

ahh! I can't believe I leave so soon-- 5 days!!

Here is my mailing address, I believe for the whole time I'm there, but definitely for the first three months.


"Julie __, PCV"
Cuerpo de Paz
162 Chaco Boreal c/Mcal. López
Asunción, 1580 Paraguay
South America

PCT stands for Peace Corps Trainee, which will turn to PCV for volunteer after the first 3 months. This is not where I will be living, it is just a PC office where I can go to claim packages.

Apparently mail in Paraguay is pretty reliable compared to other developing countries.. 80% of letter actually arrive haha. Airmail can take two to three weeks to and from Paraguay and surface mails can take months. Although recently airmail has been backed up because their are only two airlines that go to Paraguay, American airlines and Varig, and they are short on cargo space.

Numbering letters is recommended since some might get lost. It is suggested to not declare any value above 5 bucks on packages or else they will either be stolen or I will have to pay a fee to receive them.. also, I read something about packages being under a certain weight or else you have to claim them. For now, it's probably safe to send anything in those big envelopes, since they will prob be underweight, but more than that might be questionable until i get more info.

I will update this entry later with more info!

Breakthrough: The Women, Faith and Development Summit to End Global Poverty

On April 13th I went to a conference at the Washington National Cathedral and I thought I would tell you all a little about it, because it was really inspiring in so many ways. First, I really admired the National Cathedral for its open approach to religion and change. They hosted many conversations that morning talking about the churches traditional approach to birth control and how counter effective it is to the spread of HIV/AIDS and poverty. They continually used the term "my brothers and sisters of all faiths" which reemphasized their attempt to unite rather than divide. Normally I don't feel the most comfortable in churches, but it was a very open and loving environment, a perfect place to host this conference.

Many inspiring people attended the conference, Madelyn Albright, Kim Campbell (former PM of Canada), Rev. Dr. Ishmael Noko, Her Excellency Mary Robinson (Former President of Ireland) and Ashley Judd (haha- she is the ambassador of Global Youth AIDS). There were also many executive directors of the multi-million dollar nonprofits that operate all over the world.
Some of the most inspiring words that were expressed include:

(paraphrasing) Poverty is not something inherent in our society, it is a collective choice we make to allow people to live in those conditions. If we can choose it, we can change it -Madelyn Albright

Youth are the heartbeat of the breakthrough [in ending global poverty] - Youth Ambassador from Jamaica

This is gender apartheid, and it is happening, and it is real. It is sexual terror and I am absolutely determined to be a part of the solution- Ashley Judd, speaking about rape as a tool in war

The youth were tools of destruction, the youth were tools of pain, and I was ashamed to be called a youth because we were part of the problem. We were part of the people going to the fields - Youth Ambassador from Kenya talking about the violence in her country .. So they started a campaign "Give tomorrow a chance...because we needed that tomorrow"

[Young Women] want to be part of the solution, we don't want to be pitied, we don't want to be victims.. we want to make a difference and the difference we acknowledge starts with us - Kenyan Youth Ambassador

We must challenge partriarchy. -Religious leader

One of the reasons this conference was so inspiring was beyond the words that were spoken, but the commitments made by the nonprofits. Millions of dollars were committed to empower women in girls in the struggle against poverty. Other nonprofits committed not to monetary amounts but to the number of women impacted. For example Islamic Relief Services committed themselves to over 1 million women and girls in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East to break out of the cycle of poverty by providing aid that makes life-changing through increased programs for girls education, provision of jobs, income generating projects, clean water, support of female orphans, basic nutritional medical support.

At the end was an interpretative dance that was so beautiful I almost wanted to cry, tears of joy :) It is hard to explain in words, but the cover of the program for the conference was a young girl "breaking through" a finish line ribbon way out ahead of a lot of boys.. Well, at the end of the ceremony there were these ribbon dancers who were jumping over each other weaving together three ribbons into one braid and then dancing with the braid. At the end, they turned they held the ribbon straight out and a beautiful woman in a flowing red dress leaped through the ribbon with the biggest smile on her face. It was beautiful, and here is a picture that almost captures it.

These were the ribbons that were weaved together to make the "finish line"

Here are some more of the beautiful moments in the conference:

The Young drummer boys in the background were crazy-awesome!

This is the same woman who ran through the ribbon- beautiful

We are Virginia Tech.

We are Virginia Tech.

We are sad today, and we will be sad for quite a while. We are not moving on, we are embracing our mourning.

We are Virginia Tech.

We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly, we are brave enough to bend to cry, and we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again.

We are Virginia Tech.

We do not understand this tragedy. We know we did nothing to deserve it, but neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS, neither do the invisible children walking the night away to avoid being captured by the rogue army, neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devestated for ivory, neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water, neither does the Appalachian infant killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized. No one deserves a tragedy.

We are Virginia Tech.

The Hokie Nation embraces our own and reaches out with open heart and hands to those who offer their hearts and minds. We are strong, and brave, and innocent, and unafraid. We are better than we think we are and not quite what we want to be. We are alive to the imaginations and the possibilities. We will continue to invent the future through our blood and tears and through all our sadness.

We are the Hokies.

We will prevail.
We will prevail.
We will prevail.

We are Virginia Tech.

-Nikki Giovanni

FREE HUGS!

This is so cute! You have to watch this video!
http://www.freehugscampaign.org/



The concept behind this campaign has been on my mind a whole lot lately because I have come to realize something about the American culture's individualism...It can lead to the isolation of its members. It seems to me that it is very easy for a person in the United States to become completely disconnected from the world because our culture is one where we constantly ignore people we pass on the streets while trying not to make direct eye contact. This just seems to perpetuate the loneliness in some members of our society, and can even lead to events, similar to what happened at my school on April 16th. In my opinion, which is not a professional one, it seems like in societies where people are forced to communicate with one another would at least give those who feel lonely the ability to have social interaction, instead of assuming that everyone has friends and family of their own and don't need to talk to anyone outside of those circles. For example, In Spain people were much more friendly on the streets and actually used the time on the bus to talk to one another rather than to stare off into space. There were even old people whose job it was (or that's how it seemed ha) to sit on a bench and converse with those who passed by. I think it's a healthier outlook on life and can lead to a happier society with less people who feel isolated and end up doing the unimaginable. Just a thought. P.S. If you ever need a hug, mine are always free :D