The News From Paraguay

Asuncion, Paraguay
6 de abril de 2009

Lily Tuck won the 2004 National Book Award for her dark witted, lushly characterized novel, The News From Paraguay. It fictionalizes the life of the country´s founding father, Francisco Lopez and his Irish mistress, Ella Lynch. I´d saved the book until I got to Parguay; it´s been a great read. I recommend it.
The good news from Paraguay is that it´s been an abundant week full of surprises, warm people and great weather. It isn´t very often that countries spook me, but Paraguay caused some anxiety. I only remember Romania and India doing that to me, and it´s simply because I´d functioned on very little information. But...truth is Paraguay spooked me. I know of absolutely no one else who´s ever been here. Not a single person I´ve met this winter, even those traveling for a long time, entered the country nor intended to enter the country. Some people who asked where I was going would look at me in a funny way when I told them where I was going, then they´d change the subject. Needless to say I was a bit uneasy in the days and weeks leading up to my time in this interesting, unexplored corner of South America. Paraguay should give no one cause for alarm.
But...WOW! I arrived in a small city a week ago with the intention of using Encarnacion as a base to explore the Jesusit Missions on this side of the Parana River. After those days, I bussed north to the capital, Asuncion, and have been based here since then.

Paraguay is the Latin America I know and love. To be a bit honest, I was getting a bit bored in Argentina and Uruguay. They were settled by millions of Italians and one has the feeling he´s in Europe instead of South America. There´s no diversity and there´s very little evidence of indigenous culture. Paraguay, on the other hand, is full of non-Latino immigrants from Korea, Japan (like this couple seeing flowers at a street market), and the Middle East and it´s got a strong indigineous culture in the Guarani people who are Paraguay´s first people. The culture is so dominant that most everyone in the country speaks Guarani first and Spanish second. The government, in its respect for its indigenous, named its currency the Guarini. ($1.00 buys 5050 Guarinis. To be a millionaire costs less than $200.00 US.)

In Buenos Aires I´d met an Argentian who reduced all Paraguayans to coke-sniffing addicts. What I´ve found were incredibly nice people who went out of their way to help me when I appeared lost or confused, which is most of the time. :)

This is what I like:

In most of Latin America church and state and normal life blend together rather easily. It´s quite common to see stores and businesses having names that invoke religion. I have seen the Virgin of Pilar bus company, the Virgin of Fatima Pharmacy, and the Virgin of Caaupe grocery store. (So many virgins!) My favorite, though, is the Niño Jesus Peluqueria--the Baby Jesus Barber Shop. In our culture, the fundies would have a field day saying the church was being mocked, and the far left would tell the businesses to keep church out of public life. That´s just not the case in most of Latin America, and it´s kind of fun to see how shops and stores are named.

Most people do not have cars so public transportation is wide-spread, cheap and really efficient. It´s also a GREAT place to people watch. Yesterday, I spent two hours on two different buses. In the course of those two hours all sorts of people got off and on the buses selling all sorts of things: one guy had a basket of apples, pears and plums; another man was selling belts. A granddad and his grandson got on for a time. Grandad played the accordian and both of them sang. Another man played his guitar for ten minutes. All manner of kids sell candy, gum, dried bananas and papayas, batteries, potato chips and soft drinks. My favorite, after rattling along on Paraguay´s not-the-greatest-in-the-world roads was a Coca Cola vendor selling bottles of Coke that he´d pour in a glass for you. Right behind him was a young woman selling chipa, a yummy cheese bread that´s found all over Paraguay. Heck...no need to get off the bus to buy food. Local bus ride are never boring with this sort of on-going entertainment. 
 
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I’ve been reading Lily Tuck’s The News from Paraguay and liking it a lot.  It’s 1854 and the future dictator of Paraguay, Francisco Solano, begins his courtship of the young, beautiful Irish courtesan Ella Lynch. Ella follows Francisco to Asunción and reigns there as his mistress.   The books has been one of my left-handed guides  to the country, and especially to its capital, Asuncion.

But, as good as the book is, the country is even better.

I arrived in Asuncion shortly after the celebratory birthday and the city has been a delight, all due to some unexpected surprises.

 

On my first night in the city I was eating in a small restaurant and I overhead two young Americans.  American English was not something I was hearing a lot  of, so I finally interrupted their conversation to ask them a few questions, assuming that they were tourists. Far from it. They were in the Peace Corps and I think they needed to talk to another countryman just I needed to talk to them. We joined tables and chatted for over two hours.

 

Both Justin and Audrey had trained deep in the countryside outside of Asuncion, but were now stationed six hours away. The next day was Saturday and Justin was going to visit his host family. Would I like to join him? Well, dah! One of my primary travel philosophies is dropping Plan A when a better Plan B emerges.

      Saturday morning we met at 9:00 a.m., hopped on the first of three busses and rode two hours out of the city. I had no idea where I was, so it was very good to have a tour guide. From the bus stop, we walked another three kilometers down a red clay road, under a searing mid-day sun, past farms, past crops of sugar-cane, yucca and soy; past cows and horses and chickens and goats and pigs; past acres and acres and acres of coconut palms until, finally, he ducked down another dirt path which led us to a small family compound. What a wonderful opportunity Justin had given me.  We were way off the normal tourist track and I had a chance to spend time with Justin and his Paraguayan family.

 

 

 

 

     For me it was an opportunity to see how the majority of Paraguayan´s live, to see their pet monkey, to meet the aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews and grandparents, to share a simple meal that had been prepared in Justin´s honor; to see the garden that Justin helped plant. (He´s a bee keeper and agro-specialist, and had Justin not shown this family how to plant and maintain a small subsistence garden, they wouldn´t have one.) It was a wonderfully quiet visit, something no tour could ever have provided.

On the way back to Asuncion the hot, sunny day turned suddenly dark. The most powerful front I´ve ever seen pushed black, black clouds in coupled with a black rain. I later learned it had mixed with a volcano that had erupted earlier in Chile. It was so weird to have the gorgeous day turn into night time in a matter of minutes.

 But Paraguay hasn’t been bereft of problems.  Poverty has loomed about me in frightening ways.

This is the second poorest country in South America.  Children often get on busses and ask for money or food.  One boy, this evening, barefooted and dirty, passed out religious pictures then attempted to sing a song. Locals often hand out a few coins. I was left with a sadness in my stomach. Is this boy homeless? Is he choosing to do this as some kids do? What´s his family like?  Should I take him off the bus to buy him some food? In the end, I take my lead from locals and dig into my pockets.

 

Of course, not everyone who gets on the bus is begging. Vendors get on and sell everything imaginable.  My favorites are freshly poured glasses of Coca Cola and chipa—a uniquely Paraguayan cheese biscuit that is sold everywhere.  They’re addictive and I’ve been buying them at every turn.

 

As it´s been with all the places I´ve liked, I really didn´t want to leave Paraguay. There was still so much more to experience but, in truth, Paraguay is a place best visited in their winter. 95 degrees each day was growing a bit tedious. Easter beckoned in Bolivia and I had a flight that had to be kept, so I left Asuncion for Santa Cruz, Bolivia and an up-close-and-personal encounter with Semana Santa--Holy Week in Latin America.