The Holiday Edition

Hey all, it's blog time again! This one I'm going to go over the adventurous activities of the holidays here in Paraguay!

My first time being outside of the US for Christmas was certainly an interesting experience! When I was living in Finland the lead-up to the holidays was very similar, with lots of snow, shopping, and holiday activities. Here in Paraguay, things could not be more different. As Paraguay is situated in the Southern Hemisphere, all of our seasons are switched from the US. Which means that while there were epic snowstorms and airport closures in the US, we've been trying to manage the tropical heat, complete with ridiculous humidity! People here don't really go all-out for Christmas the way we know it; most people only have a few strings of Christmas lights up and seeing a Christmas Tree would be rare (though I did see a few!). In the Spanish tradition, most gifts are given on January 6th-La Dia de los Tres Reyes (Three Kings Day)-which marks the date the three wise-men arrived at Christ's manger to present gold, frankincense and myrrh. But even so, the gift giving is much more focused on children and toys.

As far as the holiday traditions go, Christmas here resembles something closer to a mix between the 4th of July and New Years. Every hangs out in their family's or neighbor's house on Christmas Eve (rather than Christmas Day). They have a huge barbecue, light off fireworks, drink A TON, and then have a countdown til midnight, at which point they drunkenly and dangerously light off a fireworks finale and give each other hugs, wishing them a Feliz Navidad (at least this was my experience; several other volunteers have confirmed it's a fairly accurate representation of the celebration as a whole). After the fireworks finale, all the young people (generally 35 or younger) then leave around 12:30 to go out to parties and dances, which last most of the night. The return home in the wee hours of the morning, and everyone takes Christmas Day off to sleep and eat leftovers. Absolutely NOTHING is open on Christmas, with maybe the exception of a local corner store.

For my Christmas Eve celebration I was fortunate to have a fellow volunteer visit (his plans fell through in his site) and we spent time in my host family's house, as well as watching the debaucherous fireworks finale presented by their crazy neighbor. He's usually a lot of fun, and tells great stories, but I couldn't get over the feeling that we might have to visit the hospital at some point in the evening. Thankfully, we didn't.

Christmas Day I spent opening some presents from the States, talking to the family on the phone, and receiving my Christmas Basket from the Cooperative. This basket was very comical, as it included some things you would normally associate with Christmas, as well as some fairly random items. Per normal, there were several loaves of fruitcake, cookies, and candy, some bottles of wine and sparkling cider, and snack crackers. Some of the more interesting items included a can of peaches, a container of sweet potato paste, and sweetened condensed milk. I would have to say that my favorite item was the card they included, not for the message-a typical holiday biblical blessing-but for the name they addressed it to: "Brett Mycrosoft." The story goes that my co-workers in the Cooperative had some trouble pronouncing my last name. After telling them I was from Washington state, I explained that they might know some of our more well-known companies: Boeing, Starbucks, and Microsoft (actually Boeing has moved their headquarters out of WA, but that's besides the point). Because of this story, one of the guys who works in the Credit department decided that my last name sounded like Microsoft, and the joke just grew from there.

With Christmas over, I spoke to some other volunteers about potential New Years plans. According to volunteers who had been here for one holiday season already, New Years was basically a repeat of Christmas: barbecue, fireworks, booze, countdown, and "felicidades." The only difference is that they say "Feliz Año Nuevo" rather than "Feliz Navidad." While Christmas was a phenomenal cultural experience, and I had a lot of fun, I wasn't keen on repeating the experience so soon. Thus we decided to meet up in Asuncion and have an American-style New Years: we would get dressed up really nice, go out to a fancy dinner, and then go out to a club and toast at midnight. This was a great plan, but we vastly underestimated how much the Paraguayan culture permeates every corner of this country, even the capitol.

We arrived in Asuncion on New Years Eve and grabbed a quick lunch with plans to see a movie afterward. We were very disappointed to find that all the movies had been canceled for the day. Returning to the hotel we all took a siesta with the intention of meeting up around 9 for dinner (it is very common in Latin America to eat dinner much later, around 9 or 10). Looking very dressed up, we left the hotel and headed to a nearby Korean restaurant. When we got there, we were disappointed to find it closed. So we defaulted to another, more Paraguayan, restaurant. But it too was closed. We began to realize that EVERYTHING was closed. We were devastated. As a last minute decision, we decided to take a taxi over to the more Americanized part of town, which looks like a mini-Miami, complete with an Irish Pub, a Hooters, and a TGI Fridays. We concluded that since it was so American, it HAD to be open. Again, we were disappointed. Everything was closed. Hungry, and a little desperate, we finally asked some security guards if they knew of anywhere at all that was open. They thought about it for a minute, and then informed us that two blocks away there was a Karaoke Bar that they thought was open. They told us we weren't the first Americans they had seen wandering, and were curious why we didn't know better. "Everyone passes the New Year in their house, and then goes out after that. That's why nothing opens until midnight." It seems that even in Asuncion the Paraguayan traditions stand firm.

Finally, we had a small stroke of luck. The Karaoke Bar, called Melody, was indeed open. And the other Americans the security guards had spoken of were some Peace Corps friends of ours, from our same group, that we hadn't know were going to be in Asuncion for New Years! Aside from our Peace Corps group, the only other people who were there were a group of Brazilians, who were also on vacation. After eating some pizza, we had A BLAST with the Brazilians! We ended up having very comical and VERY broken conversations in a mix between English, Spanish, and Portuguese. These conversations led to an informal Karaoke battle, with the songs going back and fourth between English and Portuguese. We honestly only noticed it was New Years two minutes before, and then we gave each other and the Brazilians hugs, wishing each other Happy New Year. It seems as though Paraguayan culture caught up with us, like it or not.

Around 1am, we took a taxi back to the city center near our hotel, and found out that most of the other Peace Corps volunteers from other groups were at a bar that had opened up at midnight. We went there and stayed out until very late, having drinks and celebrating the completion of a very interesting and eventful year for all of us.

Getting up around noon the next day, my friend and I headed to the mall to grab some pasta or maybe McDonalds (we really hadn't decided how American we wanted to be). However, we were defeated by Paraguayan culture yet again. Just like Christmas, New Years was a day of rest, where EVERYTHING is closed and Paraguayans sleep all day. Downtrodden, we found a Chinese restaurant open, and then figured out that at least the movies were playing again. We saw the new Tron movie, and then headed back to the hotel to siesta yet again. Thus (more or less) ends my holiday experience here in Paraguay.


Back in my site, Peace Corps life continues as usual. My English class has absorbed my life, and I hardly have time to do anything else! Now that the first few weeks are over, the committed students have been weeded out, and I really have a great group! My students are very eager to come to class and learn more, play games, and just generally ask me questions about why the heck I'm here! They were crestfallen when I told them we would have to cancel class next week (due to a leadership camp). One student even went so far as to ask me, "But teacher, can't we just make the class up on Friday?!" I had to explain to him that the camp ran through Saturday.

Aside from my English class, I also have been spending a lot of time getting to know my community, drinking terere or having lunch and/or dinner with my neighbors. It has been a blast, and when you are invited over for food it really makes you feel welcome in your community. My language skills are coming along fantastically, and I no longer am afraid to go up to someone and start chatting with them. Sure, there are still things I don't understand, and I am nowhere even near to speaking Guarani (though it is one of my New Years resolutions), but for the most part I feel great about my Spanish.

I continue to work at the accounting office in my cooperative, a task that makes everyone here think that I am incredibly hard working even though half the time I just hang out and drink terere or work on preparing my English class. It is convenient to have an air conditioned office space I can use, however. At my meetings for the Education Committee at the Cooperative, we have entered a phase where we are planning this years activities. On the agenda are my Business and Family Finance classes, as well as an environmental project where we will be working with a local NGO to plant trees and pick up garbage in the city. I'm really excited about all of these, as well as other potential activities we will be promoting in the area.

Thinking on a bit larger scale, we also have two events coming up that are "sector-wide," meaning that they involve all volunteers in our "Community Economic Development" sector. The first is the Leadership Camp, which takes place next week from the 12-15 of January. Each volunteer has the opportunity to bring 2-3 youth from their site to attend a four day camp on leadership, civic education, and volunteerism. The goal is that after the camp, the youth will bring these skills back to their respective sites and assist each volunteer with similar activities on a smaller, more localized scale. Some projects in the past have included the collection of secondhand clothes to distribute to the less fortunate, food drives, and mini-lectures on the importance of active participation in government. At the Leadership Camp I will be leading a small talk about the formation of social networks between the youth, and the importance of maintaining contact and working together to improve individual projects.

The second activity that we have been planning and has taken up quite a bit of time is the Business Workshop, which will take place the 4-6 of March. Each volunteer will have the option to bring 2-3 members of their community, who have some basic business background, to attend conferences on empowerment, innovation, and social responsibility, among other themes. The goal is that they will then return to their communities and share what they have learned, energizing their respective economies. This is the first time we have organized anything like this, and it is still in it's infancy. I have been on the planning committee, and we are really excited about this project's potential. Some ideas that have been tossed around include a business plan competition, regional workshops, and cooperation with local large businesses, all of which would go a long way towards encouraging sustainable economic development here in Paraguay.

Anyways, I hope you all had a great time over the holidays, got some rest, and ate some great food! Until the next post!