Chicken Assasins. Word.

Kai Pyrahe, Mandioca smuggling, and a touch of emotion

Been a while since my last entry, eh? It may be that I have run out of exciting stories to tell. Maybe they sound exciting to you, but to you they have become routine. My life. My life that will be over in 2.5 months and then it´s back to America to start all over again. I was told that once we go back, we must now get used to not really knowing how to function in American society anymore. We must adjust to never feeling like we will ever fit back into that jigsaw puzzle because for the last two years I have been learning how to fit myself comfortably into a completely different, one of a kind puzzle that can´t be replicated. Maybe us former peace corp volunteers should start our own colony like the lepers. I had a small preview this august when I went home for three weeks and felt like a total alien. Like a tourist on vacation in some foriegn country. Don´t get me wrong, I had a great time. I love my friends and my family and I especially missed driving my car and drinking good beer. It´s just culture shock in its rarest form. Culture shock in the country that I have spent 23 years of my 25 year life. I guess I am angry though. I mean, how can they (who is they anyway, relaly?) expect us to come here for 2 years, establish a new life, build a home, a new family, new close friends, and then we have to just leave it all and what, forget about it? That seems like the easiest thing to do. I am trying not to think anout leaving, but it´s hard not to when it´s just around the corner. I can´t look at my neighbor, Maria without getting nautious knowing that in 2 months the family I have spent everyday with for the last 2 years will be completely erased from my life. Unless I come back here I will never see them again. But I plan on comming back for a visit. Who knows when, but my pops wants to come with me so I am sure we will arrange something.

Anyways, on a lighter note, I had my first Pombero encounter last night (you know, the short little troll looking mythological paraguayan creature in the loin cloth who likes to mess with us and scare us, but I am pretty sure that he is harmless. He will supposedly leave you alone if you leave him liquor and cigarettes in your oven. Kind of like a twisted santa claus). Well, it all started when I was reading in bed (Absurdistan, I recommend reading it) and I heard my wire fence making a commotion and then something ran across my porch and through my yard. I´m convinced it was a large dog. Then around 10:00pm I began receiving a series of texts from the neighbor boy who lives next door in grandma´s old house. He is 21. This is what they said:

9:58pm Him- Sara, I am really scared, the pombero is after me right now and I can´t sleep. He threw an apepu (orange sized, kumquat tasting, fruit) at me. I am really scared.

10:03pm Him- Sara, the pombero is after me and I am really scared. He threw an apepu at me and I´m frightened and this is serious.

10:07pm Him- If you don´t believe me, go outside and you will hear the noise that he is making on the wire fence and he threw an apepu at me.

10:09pm Call- Sara please answer my texts (hangs up)

10:10pm Me- What do you want me to do? I am sleeping and I don´t hear anything

10:14pm Him- I only wanted to tell you that the pombero was after me. He came into my house and threw my notebook, my clothes, and my radio and I am very frightened truthfully. Thank you for responding to my message

I am convinced that is was the ghost of grandma screwing with him because she was always awesome like that. Needless to say, I didn´t sleep that well, especially when the power went out shortly after and I was left in the pitch black to comvince myself that I don´t believe in mythilogical creatures and that there isn´t one at my neighbors right now, and that I didn´t have to pee because I was too scared to get out of bed. I felt like a little kid again.

Well, the mandioca truck was packed to the brim this morning with mandioca and passengers. We were packed like sardines, on top of so much mandioca that our heads were almost touching the roof (at least mine almost was, but I am the abnormally ¨gigante¨american so that doesn´t say to much). Anyway, I wish I took a picture because we looked like a bunch of illegal immigrants trying to cross the border, while smuggling a ton of yuca in the process.

I had puppies once

My Ode to the Mandioca Truck

I wrote this song in my head at 4:00 this morning while trying to sleep in the back of the mandioca truck. Maybe its a poem. No offense to the truck. If it weren't for the truck and it's piles of mandioca I would still be rained into site, and wouldn't have made it to Asuncion today.

The road is so bumpy,

My eardrums are shaking.

The red clay mud on my clothes

Is drying and caking.

The sun's not yet up,

My poor head is aching.

Not even the confused rooster's

are ready for waking.

Well this weekend marked the one year anniversary of my parents visit to my site as well as the anniversary of the saint (Maria Auxiliadora) of my communities church, which means lots of food, music, and parties. Unfortunatly, this weekend, we also lost a very special person, my Paraguayan grandma, and next door neighbor, Bernadina. She died on Saturday, at the age of 82. These last couple of days have probably been some of the saddest and hardest that I have dealt with since arriving to Paraguay almost 2 years ago. Last week I was walking with Grandma back to her house from the other end of the community as she carried a large bundle of sticks on her head, that she refused to let me help her with. I asked her when her birthday was and she told me that she would be turning 83 in June. She also told me that numerous people have told her that she was going to live to past 100 because she was so healthy and still worked every day. I agreed.
A couple days later she fell and apparently broke her hip. She was taken to the hospital in Buena Vista, then to another in Villarica, and Saturday morning at 7am, while I was drinking maté on my porch with my buddy Antonio, watching the people decorate the church across the street and listening to the loud music and fireworks that had been going off since 3am, the news came that Abuela had passed. Out of respect and custom, the music at the church and throughout the community was shut off. Grandma was brought back home from the hospital in her coffin where she stayed over night until she was brought to be buried yesterday afternoon. All day saturday and throughout the night there were visitors and prayers. The immediate family members , and others very close to the family stay awake all night the first night after the death at the house of the deceased. I attempted to stay all night, but only made it until 2:00am, and after being harrassed by the town drunk(s), for most of the night, I decided that 7 hours of listening to them was enough. I am not German, but they can believe what ever they want. And no, I will not marry you. So I went home to get some rest, but after 6 hours of drinking caffiene filled maté it wasn´t easy.
This weekend I saw the toughest most intimidating members of my community show emotion and vulnerability. One of the hardest things I saw was my neighbor; the man who built my house, the man who never shows an ounce of emotion other than laughter or anger; with his body draped over his dead mother, sobbing, calling out her name, kissing her face, for hours. Her children and family members came from as far as Argentina to mourn her loss. Ña Bernadina was such an important member of our village. She was loved by all, and I found out this weekend that she was practically related to everyone as well, either as an aunt, mother, grandma, or inlaw.
I was unable to bring myself to go up to the casket to see her, which I regret now and I knew that I would. Apparently I have to much pride, and did not want to fall apart in front of my whole community. There will be a prayer service everyday for 9 days in a row at her house, and I will be attending them all. If you pray, please make space for her. R.I.P. Love you Aguela.