I turned 26 on October 6th and I wasn't sure if I wanted to have a big party or not. My neighbor's birthday was on the 5th so we talked about celebrating together. In the end I decided to have what I thought was going to be a small party at my house. As I started inviting people I thought of more people who I thought would be upset if I didn't invite them. About 25 people ended up coming. A friend of mine made a cake and two other volunteers came over and helped cook. I call it an "Ameriguyan" birthday because I made pizza, which they eat here, but I made Hawaiian pizza and pizza with sausage and green peppers which they don't do here, and fruit skewers. The Paraguayan part were the empanadas and sopa Paraguaya which is kind of like corn bread. In total we made 8 pizza, 50 empanadas, and 25 fruit skewers. My neighbors gave me a dish of sopa Paraguaya. Everybody thought it was very strange that I put pineapple on the pizza, but they ate it and liked it.
Cake and presents. It isn't uncommon here to get underwear.
As environmental volunteers we are encouraged to have gardens. Mine was never very big or good, and then it frosted and killed my biggest tomato plants and my huge basil plant so I kind of gave up. But recently my broccoli plant produced some nice heads and my little string bean plants have a few beans. The tomato plants that survived even have a couple little green tomatoes. The other day I planted 12 watermelon plants so I'm excited to see if those do well.
Preparing for the party.
Pizza and all the guests.
Now that I am almost half way through my service it means that there is a new group of environmental volunteers who are in training now in Guarambare, just like I was a year ago. The trainers asked me to come and talk to the trainees about doing recycled art and show them a few things they can make. It was a lot of fun to teach them and meet the new volunteers. It was interesting as well to be "on the other side" in the sense that I have already gone through training and been a volunteer for almost a year. While I was back for trainig I visited my old host family and my friend Lorena and her daughter Monce came over to see me as well.
My host mom, Carolina, and Lorena, Monce and me and my host sister Lujan with Monce.
Another part of training is visiting a volunteer in order see what their life is like. Last week I had two girls come stay with me for four days. I showed them around Morinigo and they came with me to teach the 7th graders to make recycled paper. I showed them how to make bread, banana bread, and cinnamon rolls as well. The last full day they were here we took a little trip to Pindoyu, which is the little community where my friend Brook lives. It is about 10 kilometers from Morinigo. We took the bus the first 5 kilometers and then we had to walk to rest of the way. Pindoyu is very different from Morinigo because it is a very small community and the girls wanted to see what it is like. Brook and her visitor came with us back to my house to spend the night so they wouldn't have to walk out in the morning and also so her visitor could see Morinigo.
Here in Paraguay all of the schools have Olimpiadas (Olympics). All the grades compete against each other in soccer, volleyball and a few other games. They even have an opening ceremony with a torch. Also each grade has a queen. During the opening ceremony each queen presented themselves and then each grade did a little routine. It didn't start until almost 9:00pm. By 11:00pm they were only to fourth grade, it went up to 9th grade, and I was tired so I headed home.
Opening ceremony
Presentation of the classes and their queens
As environmental volunteers we are encouraged to have gardens. Mine was never very big or good, and then it frosted and killed my biggest tomato plants and my huge basil plant so I kind of gave up. But recently my broccoli plant produced some nice heads and my little string bean plants have a few beans. The tomato plants that survived even have a couple little green tomatoes. The other day I planted 12 watermelon plants so I'm excited to see if those do well.
I'm doing my last few classes in the school because in November they will have final exams so I won't teach. I'm still having book club when I'm in town and there are rumors that I will be teaching English. I'm not super excited about doing it, but I might do a short course over the summer. We'll see.
Teaching the parts of a plant
Book club
Recently there were a bunch of kinds who got confirmed in the Catholic Church. I didn't go to the ceremony but one of my friends invited me over for a BBQ.
