County Fair and Naming Babies

Saturday
7-18-09

Last night I went to the Expo with my host siblings, their 13 year old cousin and other 16 year old amigo. The Expo happens for about two weeks per year in Roque Alonso, which is even more of a turnpike town located between Asuncion and Limpio. The Expo was basically a supped up county fair. It is held in a shopping area/fair ground. They have an absurd amount of tractor displays (especially considering most small farmers still use animals to pull their plows), lots of car displays (complete with scantily clad women), a double-decker tour bus that you could explore (that you can take for the 16 hour trip to Buenos Aires). Some guys doing basic bike tricks drew a considerable crowd, though the bands playing in the stables of cattle didn’t seem to be a particular favorite. You could see new types of roofs, the (surprising to me) amazement of a basic fountain, how Itaipu dam was spending money, get a vaccination at the Health tent, get something inscribed on a necklace (which my 17 year old host sister did twice for her boyfriend), get your name put on a bead of rice (something I remember my real sister doing over a decade ago), get a characature drawn of yourself… It was like a county fair meets the board walk.

The way we spent the vast majority of the four hours was waiting for, and then finally watching, motocrosss. There were two motorcyclers—one from Australia with a bright yellow-with-flame-details jumpsuit who is supposedly the 2nd best in the world and a skinny kid from the US who was dressed like he was going to the mall with his high school buddies. The announcer was down in the field with them and would ask questions in English then translate their answers to the crowd of 8,000. The problem was that the announcer just made up his own answers. At one point, one of the riders said he was looking forward to going home soon. The announcer translated it as “He said that Paraguay is the best country he has ever been to!” What? Also amusing to me is that vendors of soda and beer yell that they’re selling soda and milk. They do this on the buses as well. Leche, anyone?

ALSO! Somehow I neglected to write a few weeks ago that there is this one excellent group of kids from the comedor that I spend a lot of time with. They’re siblings, kind of crazy, but sweet and generally listen to me. I hang out at their house sometimes, talking with them, their teenage brother, and their mom holding her infant. I asked the baby’s name after hearing he was 45 days old. The mom said she hadn’t decided yet, which struck me as slightly sad and odd. Offhandedly I mentioned that I like the name Alejandro. A few days later I was at the house again and the mom told me she had named the baby. I froze. She formally introduced me to David Alejandro…I’m just glad I don’t have the kind of pull to choose the first name!