Sheraton Hotel Asuncion

Hi all,
I'm just writing to check in and update my blog since really nothing too exciting has been happening lately. I am in Asuncion now for the weekend and yesterday got out of In-Service Training. We all had to go back to Guarambare to take a few more days of language training. I got to stay with my host family that I stayed with in training, and that was nice to see them all again.

Otherwise, not much has been going on. It has warmed up a bit, so ...

ok so the internet here is super slow and i have to be leading a discussion group in 12 minutes!" i arrived on wednesday night, and now we´re in our second day of GYS. it´s crazy but in a good way. <i´m meeting tons of people from all over. as delegates we´re shaing together and learning a lot from each other, from our differences and our similarities. i´m getting to speak every langauge i know -spanish, and german too, and i love it! there are 5 ...

... Foz de Iguazu. We had to leave the bus to get the stamp out of Brazil and we had to go to the Paraguayan customs to get the stamp into Paraguay. In between there is a bridge, which we crossed walking. At the other end of the bridge I did realize that a German guy in the hostel told me the day before that if you cross the bridge over the river walking than the change you would get mugged would be close to 100%. The travel guide said something ...

... more colourful towns tended to include something dedicated to Eva Peron)) Having only bought two bags of crips for the journey between us we scraped together the coins and small notes we had and lined up in a shack where we we offered home made Empanadas and Humitas. This was most certainly a highlight of the entire trip. It's so refreshing after weeks of company with english speakers and a relatively comfortable exsistance in Salta to come face to face with small ...

... I imagine it must be quite difficult for them to have a new person in the house at this time, and I´m trying to be as respectful as possible. This morning there was a bad rain storm and the electricity went out at the house, which meant showering by candlelight. It had not come back when I left, and I hope it will be back by the time I get back this afternoon. The dirt road out to the village (which is really more a cluster of rural houses than a village ...

... eso. cab ride from bus station to centre bout 7 dollars hotel room without a/c or tv but large with bathroom 10 dollars in the centre of town shorts with zipper 7 dollars food in a nice restaurant 6ish dollars depending on what you order 5 random snacks for my bus ride tomorrow and a tooth brush. 2 dollars mercado cuatro so the locals think its really funny that all the backpackers love mercado cuatro, but believe it or not shoping at mercado cuatro makes the rest of ...

... of, my mom is coming down in April! I'm also going to use this spot for a little advertising... PC has a way that people from the states can donate money to projects that PCVs are doing. There are a ton of these project going on in the world, and I'm going to push 1 here: https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?sh ell=resources.donors.contribute.projDet ail&projdesc=526-187 That has a good ...

Morgen ist mein letzter Tag. Dummerweise habe ich letzte Woche Terere ueber meinen Laptop geschuettet, sodass er jetzt nicht mehr geht und meine Case Study auch erst mal weg ist. Ich hoffe aber, wieder auf sie zugreifen zu koennen, sobald ich zuhause bin. Ich schaetze mal, das kommt davon, wenn ein Gringo meint, er muesse die lokalen Rituale uebernehmen. Immerhin hatte ich diese Woche eine gute Ausrede, um auszuschlafen :-) Und es war endlich genuegend ...

Am now in Ascuncion, the capital of Paraguay. What can I say. Not a lot. A real shame - this was once a beautiful 18th century Spanish colonial town and in the push to make it a real up and coming efficent place they tore down most of the buildings and put up breeze blocks. Not a lot to see here at all. It is also extremely poor - the country is landlocked so there is little trade to be done and most people farm. Asuncion does have a river ...

... drink here too, but they drink it cold with nice. Tastes great though. We saw some nice old museums and the presidential palace. I think this evening we´re getting a bus trip back to argentina. It looks like the roads are better there. A trip to Bolivia (where we both wanna go) would take 30 plus hours, and theres nowhere to stop on the way. If we go via argentina there should be nice places to break up the trip with. Oh and big thanks to Ed for uploading so many photos.