Che Ro'y

  "Che ro'y" means I am cold in Guaraní.  We have officially entered into winter and it shows.  In the past two weeks we have had about an hour of partial sun.  The cold and rain isn't fun, but even worse is all the mud.  All of my pants are super muddy but if I wash them they will never dry.  My fridge can only handle one shirt or pair of pants at a time and even there they take at least two days to dry completely, or as dry as the will ever be in a humid country.  Everything always feels just slightly damp here, even when it isn't rainy for weeks on end.  

Speaking of the climate, I recently attended a three day workshop, put on by Peace Corps Paraguay, about climate change.  It was held at a place called CAFASA, which is also where we spent our first night in Paragauay when we arrived back in September.  The workshop was combined with our Project Design and Management workshop.  Each volunteer brought a contact from their community.  We discussed climate change in general and specifically in Paraguay.  Deforestation is the biggest factor contributing to climate change in this country.  We talked about alternative energy, such as methane and solar.  We also planted a few trees.  For the design and management part of the workshop I worked with my contact on developing a plan for a project we could implement in Gral. Morinigo.  We planned a project to install garbage cans along the streets.  I don't know if we will actually do this particular project but at least it got us thinking about possible projects and how to go about designing them.

CAFASA

Our volunteer coordinator talking about the solar cooker.

A model of a biodigester which is used to collect methane gas to cook with.

Raquel and me with a baby tree.

Raquel and me hard at work on our project plan.

Our work complete!

The group who attended the workshop.

In the one school we finally started construction on our garbage can.  The class is really small, there are only 7 students, so it is nice to work with them.  We have built two levels so far.  It is turning out to be a lot smaller than I had imagined, but it will at least be an example for when we make more.

The 8th grade class working on the garbage can.

In the other school we continued work on the home made insecticides.  The "paraiso" leaves have to soak in water for a few days.  In our case it turned out to be a week.  One of the down sides of the home made insecticide is when it is ready it smells really bad.  In order to use it we have to strain out the big leaves. The kids were reluctant to even get close to it let alone hold the bag we were using as a make shift strainer.  With a little bit of encouragement and help from me we finally got all the insecticide strained and put into bottles to use.

A few brave students straining the insecticide.

Bottling the insecticide.

I finally made it to a neighboring town of Villarica.  I have herd that it is a nice place, and finally my contact offered to show me around.  She studies at one of the universities there. We spent the afternoon strolling around and checking out the sites. There is a nice park with a pond and a few capybaras.  

Capybaras!

This week I had my first official meeting with my bosses to talk about how things are going in my community.  We have to fill out an official form reporting what we are doing, how many people are involved and which Peace Corps objectives we are achieving through our projects.  This information is sent to the Peace Corps office in Washington D.C.  Sometimes when I have to quantify the work I'm doing it feels like I haven't done a lot.  But after talking to my bosses they assured me that the projects I am doing are great and that bigger projects will come later in my service.  The fist six month are really about forming relationships and building trust within the community.  It was very encouraging to hear that from them.