Its a Small World and Underpants on my Head

6-3-09

Time is flying! This past weekend a bunch of other volunteers came into Asunción for meetings and rendezvous. It was great to see everyone--and to celebrate some birthdays! We went out to karaoke after a delicious dinner of Mexican food where I promptly ran into a Paraguayan who stopped me by saying my host brother-during-training´s name. Apparently he used to work with the host brother and recognized me from Guarambarè. I could have sworn I had never seen him before in my life. I sang. Then, yesterday I was sss-ed at from a parked car while waiting for a bus in Limpio. (I hate the sss-ing but it is an awfully effective way to get someone´s attention.) He did the ¨Ven aqui¨ motion--palm down, fingers move together from flat hand to closed hand and back. Then he told me he recognized me from Guarambaré, that I walked by his house at 7:30 every morning for 3 months. Weird--two Guarambarè spottings in 5 days. Good thing I blend in here, right? Then, a half hour away in a big super market I saw two kids from a school I`m working in. They were working bagging groceries. All these small world Paraguayan meetings of course come now that swine flu has hit the country. My host family says that lots of schools in Asunción are now requiring the nose-mouth covers by students and teachers.

This week has been interesting thus far. I had a good break through with the principal of the high school I`m working with in Limpio. I thought she wasn`t going to allow me to come back after I deliver the survey results but after some sweet talking, she is now giving me pretty much a free pass to do whatever I want. I found a school in Limpio also that does environmental education support for other schools. They have trees that are ready to be planted, a vegetable garden, and apparently a bunch of animals--some that you can rent (cows, pigs, goats) and some that you can`t (like alligators). I don`t know why you can`t rent alligators. That makes me slightly sad. I`m going back Friday. What else is going on in my life? Today I walked back with a bunch of kids from their school. I didn´t know any of them but they had plenty of questions for me. Unfortunately, one found a pair of underwear on the road. They started throwing it on each other. I apparently have no control over kids I don`t know because I couldn`t make them stop. Then suddenly, it was on my head. Yes, underwear was on my head. Some probably dirty, stranger´s underwear that had previously been laying in the dirt by the road was on my head. After my response they didn`t pick it up or throw it on anyone else. And they were suddenly much nicer and more respectful. I`m pleased with the final result but EWWWW.

Today, after that super fun experience I went to the community comedor, which I`ve mentioned before. This women`s group put together this place where kids 7-12 can eat breakfast and lunch for free. The same two or three women are always working. It is a new project and seems to have burn out written all over it, as far as I`m concerned. Those women work 25 hours a week. They`re having a lot of drama with the really well-intentioned but spread-too-thin president, lack of transparency with food stuff and money, and a general communication break down. As these women were telling me all about the drama I couldn´t help but think of the frequently exhausting union meetings from Rosemont. They have a meeting on Friday that I`m going to. I`m interested to see how this works out. In the meantime I`m going to try to stay as neutral as possible. And so tomorrow I`m doing an art project with the kids. I`m thinking no political statements with the art...probably less Banksy and more finger paint.