Meeting my friend Brad... How I Met Your Mother Style

HIMYM -Brad

Kids, we always meet people who we know we will forget, the man on the street or the woman sitting next to you on the subway and normally, your Uncle Brad would have been one of those guys. But the universe has a funny way of doing things.

You see in the Spring of 2011 I was a brand new Peace Corps Volunteer serving in Paraguay and soon to embark on a journey that would change my life forever. That day I was in the Peace Corps headquarters finishing the last paperwork before heading yo my rural site in the Department of Misiones where I would live for 2 whole years and where I hoped to make a lasting impact on people's lives. Our training group had just finished lunch when he walked up.

“What? Everyone got Lomita Arabe? Aw man. How come nobody told me?” He was wearing an Abercrombie sweatshirt and clearly from the South.

“Sorry man, you wern't here when we ordered and it was kinda our G's idea anyway.” I said.

“It's okay, no worries, I actually just got in. Brad by the way.” We shook hands.

“RiSo, nice to meet you. Hey, you're my VAC President aren't you?” Too clarify, the VAC was the Peace Corps version of student government.

“So you're in Misiones too? You're lucky. Our VAC is awesome!”

To be honest, when I first saw Brad's photo days before on our Misiones volunteer sheet I thought he would be an awkward square, someone you said hi to and smiled politely at. His picture was pretty nerdy but, I was in Paraguay and didn't have many friends and so Brad and I bought Lomita Arabe, yes I ate twice, and chatted about his Peace Corps experience. After lunch we went our seperate ways.

“Hey I got to go dude but catch you later.”

“ For sure RiSo.”

As you know, Brad and I would become best of friends. Without Brad there would have been no Waldorf bathroom story, no water tower story, no face punch story and I may never gotten together with Natasha. But those are other stories. Brad would go on to become the successful venture capitalist you know today but back then he was just Brad, from South Carolina, who needed a 730 on his GMAT. Brad who shared my passion for bro-dom, drinking games and random internet meems. Brad who bro-ed out with me and ate sandwiches on the top of Machu Pichu. Brad who after I suggested we go to a bar after his GMAT said it would be legend... wait for it... dary. I said legend, he said dary.

During our time in Paraguay, Brad would prove de-brotion and bra-someness. When I met Natasha, he encouraged me to approach one of the hottest girls in Peace Corps Paraguay. During my first night with her, he purposely ducked out so that Natasha and I could walk home alone together. He continued to watch Jersey Shore as if nothing was happening while Natasha and I made out behind him. Sorry Brad. For my part, I supported him 110% as he tackled the GMAT and continued to support him even after he went on, and on, and on about his GMAT. Its just what bros do. And guys Brad didn't get the 730 he wanted. He got a 750, which is what allowed him to come to Stanford and the rest is well I don't have to tell you that story.

Meeting my friend Andy... How I Met Your Mother Style

Sometime s in site you have extra time to be creative. As many of you know I love the show How I Met Your Mother. Here is my take on A story in Paraguay as if I was Ted. 

Kids, as you know, my time in Paraguay with the Peace Corps changed my life. I met your Uncle Brad there, Aunt Natasha, and of course your Uncle Andy. In fact it was your Uncle Andy who helped me through some of my worst days in Peace Corps. This is the story of how I met Andy Golub. It may not look it but believe it or not, your Uncle Andy wasn't always so , well, put together. He was a bit of a nonsequiter as he likes to say. He had lived as a street kid in Spain, stolen pants and been subsequently beaten by the Spanish police, squatted in an abandoned mansion and sold mushroom.. uh .. sandwiches back in Salt Lake. Oh and been deported from Russia but those kids, are stories you need to ask him to tell. Anyway, I first heard of Andy as he was to be my closest neighboring volunteer. He was an education volunteer who had been in service for a year. Like Brad's, Andy's picture did'nt look so promising and I was prepared for the worst. Then again Brad had turned out great so I was excited to meet Andy. During my first week in site I was getting to know my community when I got a call from Andy inviting me to his house. When I arrived, I opened the door to find Andy suited up, smoking a cigar and sipping on fine whiskey.

“ So you're the new kid huh?” He swiveled his chair around to face me. “Andy Golub, nice to meet you and welcome to Peace Corps.” Okay, okay, okay that wasn't how I met your Uncle Andy but we thought it would be cool to meet that way. Here's how it actually happened. Like I said I was getting to know my community by walking around house to house when I noticed someone with blondish hair standing in front of a wall at my elementary school. As I approached I knew he was definitely American, baseball cap turned backwards, Ipod earphones in, drawing a grid on the wall. I walked up right beside hi and said, “Whats up?”

He turned slightly and said, Que tal?” and went back to work. It took him a second before he turned, laughed and said, “ Sorry man, I thought you were one of those Asian Paraguayans. How you doing?”

Over the next few weeks I visited Andy frequently. He was an 8 minute bike ride away. We drank beer and cana and he told me the craziest stories I have ever heard. Having Andy's carefree and Carpe Diem attitude, gracious hospitality and valuable advice really kept me going those first days and that kids was just the beginning.   

These Days

Blog entry 10/1/11

Hey anybody who is still following this. It has been forever since I have written mostly because not having internet access on a normal basis makes it hard to keep in the habit of posting things when you can. Anyway, I a lot has happened since I last wrote. Probably the biggest thing was my vacation to Bolivia and Peru. The trip was a blast with good friends of mine. We did a salt flat tour and drove across the largest salt flat in the world which was stunning. Endless whiteness. It had an eerie fantasy realism feeling to it. There is also a train line through it which reminded me of the train in I think Spirited away, you know the one that runs impossibly through the water with nothing around it. It felt like that in real life. Check out my facebook for some awesome pictures. Then we did a jungle tour that was equally awesome. From the highland dry cold we took a 45 minute plane into the jungle. It was a complete change. Then it was a bumpy 4 hour jeep ride to the river. It was hot and humid and reminded me of troops being transported to a post in the jungle. Yes I watch too many war movies. At the river you get on a motor powered large canoe and ride about an hour to the bungalows that we stayed in for our 3 or 4 days there. All along the way there was wild life on the sides of the river. Tons of Capibarra and a smaller version of alligators. They were everywhere and only perhaps 20 feet away on the shore. The Capibarra are those giant hampster things. I think they are the largest rodent on the planet. There were also lots of birds, small monkeys and fish. Highlights included our guide who was like Tarzan in real life, the river, the animals, fishing for piranha and eating what we caught. I also ate a cockroach pretty much for fun after a friend ate a moth and shamed me because I wouldnt eat it. During our trip we took buses and stayed at popular party hostals. It was a great experience seeing fellow travelers, people on vacation, finding themselves and just drifting and traveling. Something I also really liked was doing a real mountain biking tour which was challenging and really adrenaline rushing. It ended up only being me and my friend on the tour so we set the pace and chatted up the guide. After that there was Machu Pichu of course. The 3 day hike was incredible, visiting ancient sites and getting information the entire time from our guide who was like an older and less extreme but wiser version of the Tarzan jungle guide. I carried my stuff up the mountain with me. Our group consisted of 9 tourists. Our group of 5 and 4 Irish girls. The tour brought 15 porters because pack animals are not allowed on the trail to preserve the cobbled path which is mostly original from the Incan times. You might be wondering why so many porters were needed. The trip included complete tents, a dinning tent, a cooking tent, plastic stools to sit and food that could have been from a restaurant and was better than some Paraguayan restaurant food. We had 4 course meals. I thought it a bit excessive but hey that was the deal. Something particularly fun was the opportunity to carry a porter's pack for an hour and a half. I was given the chance on the easiest part of the trail and I have so say it is truly incredible what the porters do. They each carry 30 kilos or 66 pounds up the mountain each day faster than every tourist as they must get to the camp sites to set up and be ready when the tourists arrive. George and Phillip if you are reading this you know we like physical challenges and tend not to give up. This %$^! was hard. After an hour in I found my stride and felt better but I doubt I could do it for more than 3 hours and impossible on any of the major uphill parts. Machu Pichu itself was breathtaking. The Incans ground down stones to fit perfectly to the others without cement or mortar of any type on the most important buildings. The city was large and it was astonishing to think that people created such magnificent buildings and societies so long ago. Again, there are pictures on facebook. My return to Paraguay was a different adventure, taking 3 buses of length, 16 hours, 18 hours and 26 hours approximately. We had to get off and ride a ferry once, cross borders on foot, go through border immigration, visit Lake Titicaca, eat trout from the lake and more. Once back in site I have continued my work with my women's group which I hope to have at least 10 meet monthly. So far we have had 4 or 5 meetings making soap or detergent each time but the numbers of those in attendance has shifted from as many as 10 to as little as 3 which is dissapointing since the last meeting had only 3. My problem is communicating the time of the meetings which I do now by telling the professors in the school to tell their students about the meetings. Then those kids are supposed to relay the message back to parents but I dont know if that really happens and how often. Anyway the soap is homemade bar soap made from cow fat and other ingredients. Its actually not bad at all. The detergents and other more advanced products are bought in kit form in Asuncion and brought back to site so yes... less sustainable but it works for now and I only get the kits when im already in the capital for a reason. I am having my first Fogon meeting this coming Saturday which I am hoping will draw 30 families or more. According to my census data from 50 houses, the majority need these brick stoves. I printed fliers for the meeting and posted them at the 4 local dispensas, which are houses of families that have converted a part of their home to little stores. I also plan to tell the teachers so we will see what happens. Uh in other news I am still living with my host family. I have been slowly trying to prep the House I am to live by myself in but it has been a slow process. I was trying to do it all on my Peace Corps living allowance which has been extremely difficult. I had to invest heavily to build a bathroom in the home and the home came with absolutely nothing in it but the electric infrastructure. That meant buying a bed, dresser, sink, stove, tables, chairs and anything else I wanted or needed. I have currently procured a dresser, bed, sink, table, chairs and completed most of the bathroom. The septic system still needs to be closed but cannot because im waiting for a contact to bring the bricks in at a decent price. I have hopefully procured a gas 2 burner stove and the bed needs a little work but I must pick them up from a persons house which is difficult because people dont have trucks or charge you for using them. There is a major any problem in the house of these giant black ants which dont really tend to bother inhabitants because they live in the roof and dont often eat human food but who knows. All in all I am close to moving in and cant wait. I am planning on making a little garden for myself to grow something that I cant really get around my site. So far im definitely growing cucumber, cilantro and basil. I'll buy ginger from the closest large town. Thanks George for the computer and external although I am trying to ration shows because not having a computer is better for my work and physical condition. I dont feel like my Spanish is getting any better which id a bummer but it must so im just going to trust that lol. I still dont get internet in my site and at this point probably never will. Uh what else. I guess I can lay out my normal days these days. I wake up around 8 wheras all the Paraguayans wake up at around 5:30. I'l eat my breakfast of super weak and milky coffee or cocido and bread circle thingys which I have come to love. Think crunchy, hard bread sticks in circle form. Real actually soft bread is hard to get in my site because the bread they do have here is always pretty far into the staling process. Then I will go off to the school to chat with professors or check on the garden or check on anything that needs a check up. Ill hang out at the school, play with kids or visit families until around lunch time when ill return home and eat lunch which is usual some form of meat soup that's always too oily with giant beef bones. It is pretty delicious in my perspective. It almost always comes with mandioca which is yucca. Look it up. Its boiled and really plain but does wonders to fill an empty stomach. There are always things to do about my house, cleaning, re-figuring out when people are supposed to finish it or fumigate it. Then sometimes I teach ingles to random kids who are my friends or study some Guarani. Sometimes I visit Andy in my neighboring site or Andrea two sites away. Both are within a 30 minutes bike ride. Sometimes I go into town on a really early morning bus or if I can catch a ride later to do things like print fliers, use internet, buy house things, copy keys and such. Then when the afternoon school session ends around 5 we all head to the soccer field to play which I have restarted doing because its fun and I keep trying to memorize the kids names lol. I really want to take a picture of each one and write their names under but I dont want to be weird. At 6 ish when it gets dark I head back to the host family to eat dinner whch can range from a real meal to the bread circles and coffee. And sometimes I either miss dinner or there isnt any like today for example. Then I end up hungry but meh. Oh the one fluorescent light in the room im staying in got fixed too so now I have light. I had gotten used to not having light except via flashlight and computer for a month or so so that's good news. The dirt floor a d holes in the roof are still annoying. OH and hey I never thought the quality of your bed would really matter but the bed im staying on right now has a maybe 3 inch super old grimy foam mattress over wooden planks that arent even and it sucks sleeping. For real. After dinner at around 7 sometimes I play bingo for bits of money for up to an hour and then I retreat to my room and mess around on my computer, work out, figure out my month plans and such. Im currently trying to get to sleep at earlier times to get up at Paraguayan time. That means going to sleep at like 10 or 11. We will see.  

Paraguayan TIme

Today i tried to go to a Paraguayan police station and file what is called a Denucia or a report that i lost some money that im pretty sure someone took from my bag at a hotel. I have done such a procedure before when i lost my cell phone. On that occasion, I walked 10 minutes from the Peace Corps office, waited about 15 minutes and was attended to. The whole process took mas o menos, 45 minutes. That wasnt so bad. Today i was told that i had to file my denucia in the distrct where the hotel is. That meant a 15 minute bus ride into the center of town. Once there i discovered that i needed to walk about 8 blocks to the above mentioned police station. Once at the police station i was told that i was at the wrong district station and would need to visit another station...... 15 blocks away. I should reveal that today in Paraguay it felt like Hong Kong. HOt as #$%^ and humid as #$%^.  I proceded to run the blocks and arrive at the so called correct police station. I then had to wait another 20 minutes for the one dude who does denuncias despite two other dudes who were apparently working extremely hard at standing around and looking bored. Finally I get up to the guy and explain what happened. IT takes about 30 minutes at which point he proceeds to stare at my 3 forms of ID, my bank card, paraguayan ID and California Dirver's license. I ask him what he is looking for or needs at which point he turns and says. I can not do this unless i have your passport. I do not have my passport on me, it is blazing hot, i am sweating bullets and am quickly losing hope. As i start to inquire about the next time i can come i decide that i will not stand for all of this. I begin on this long explanation of the classes i have to teach tomorrow morning and the work i am doing and how i simply cannot stay in Asuncion for another day. After another 20 minutes he concedes and continues to write down this official explanation of what happened. He finishes this task and relieved, I ask for a copy of it to turn into Peace Corps. "Nope you have to come back tomorrow for.... ill finish this later

a normal day

Ill try to outline a normal day here in my home town of Santa Librada. Ill start at the very beginning. Santa Librada is located about 4 hours away from the capital of Paraguay, Asuncion by bus. Asuncion is what I would call a 3^rd world developing modern city. Unlike China's quickly modernizing cities, Asuncion does not have the developing infrastructure or buildings that other cities like shanghai have. There is no real skyscraper skyline and the tallest building are maybe 6 or 7 tall apartment buildings. There are no big electric signs or anything. However the city does of course have running water, electricity and pretty much every modern convienience. Like other 3^rd world cities the rich and the upper class have the same things we would have in the states. Some of their homes are similar as well. The middle class are office workers in modern businesses such as banks and law firms. There is trash pick up and a basic recycling system. The biggest give away that the city is still 3^rd world is that stores are not super clean or organized. Store signs are home painted and a dishevel of products. The stores are normally small and cramped often no bigger than the size of 2 bedrooms put together. There is a lack of corporate stores with the exception of several chain grocery stores that look much more like american grocery stores. To get to Santa Librada you take one of 4 major “Rutas” that transverse the country of Paraguay. The primary one and most extensive is Ruta 1 which runs from the capital east to about the center of the country and then turns directly south until the bottom of the country. To get to my site you would take this “highway” directly passed many other smaller cities to  a 4 way crossing that is in between 2 bigger cities. The crossing is called 4 mouths because it is a 4 way crossing but the cross street from ruta are dirt roads. From this road its a 30ish to 40ish minute car ride into my site driving on a red dirt road. The scenery is kinda hard to explain. Think farmland like in America but in a tropical climate without machinery, much less organized and clean and animals kinda roaming around everywhere. When I am traveling to and from site I ride buses that are like old unclean American tour buses. The buses drop me in front of 4 mouths and if im not lucky I have to walk about 2 hrs into site but if im lucky a truck passes by and I can hitch a ride. Other than that there is one community bus that takes me to the Ruta but it only runs Mondays Wednesdays and Fridays at around 7 AM and 12 lunch time. If I ever come back in the afternoon I have to walk or hitch a ride. My site is made of about 80 houses spread out with some houses practically next to each other and others with a 10 minute walk between it and the next house. Most of the families have farming land somewhere near their house and animals on their home property. Everyone has chickens, usually 1 or two pigs and sometimes ducks.  There is an elementary school in my community and its a nice building. Often the church and school are the nicest buildings in town because of the importance of the church and the government funding for the school. Children go to school each day except when it rains hard. When it rains hard nothing happens. People dont leave their homes and the roads often become rivers. Power also goes out when it rains. School quality is pretty poor. Class usually consists of kids copying stuff written on the board verbatum and class goes from 7 am to lunch time or from around 1 to 5 depending on what age group the kid is in. Okay on to a normal day. If I am being a good volunteer I will wake up around 6 or 6:30 to start my day. Help the family with any house work like sweeping their property of leaves and stuff, maybe getting some wood for fire for cooking. Many families still cook on fires on the ground even though they have gas or electric stoves. The gas is relatively expensive and most people have free wood on their property. In addition there is a strong custom of cooking with wood. Breakfast is usually some sort of grain food made of corn flour, cheese, milk and egg cooked in a pan. It is usually kind of like a homemade toasted dough. To drink people here drink instant coffee that has much more milk than coffee or this drink called cocido which has an herbal mixture with sugar and milk. I drink cocido most days. After that its off to do a days work which is maybe visiting the school and talking to the teachers and kids about future talks I can give in the school. Or I might try to talk to people to solidify plans to speak at a community comission meeting. My community has 3 or 4 commissions. 1 for maintaining the running water. 1 for the school. 1 for the church and there may be one for the farmers. I am planning to do a fagon commission. A fagon is a type of cooking apparatus that includes 4 “burner” spots and an oven. It is made completely of brick and mud and fixes most of the problems that occur from cooking with fire on the ground. There is no bending down to cook. There are 4 cooking surfaces to cook more than 1 thing at a time. The smoke is channeled through a chimney to prevent inhalation and the wood burns more effeciently. I am hoping to get many families to buy into the idea and begin the process of procuring government funds to assist the community in building the fagons. I would then likely sit down with any of the families and drink terere which is a very common custom here where people sit in a circle and drink out of the same cup that has a herb mixture in it. 1 person is assigned as the pourer and has a pitcher or thermos of ice water sometimes with natural plants in it. The cup which is about 3/4^th filled with this mashed herb mixture (bought in stores) is filled the rest of the way with water and passed around to each person who uses a metal straw to drink the liquid. When the liquid is drank it is passed back to the server to be refilled. The flavor is quite refreshing and its fun to do. At least I think. On the other hand the sharing of liquid and straw would wreck havoc if someone was sick but all in all nothing bad usually happens. Lunch would probably consist of oily pasta with some sort of meat sauce in the sense that the sauce has tough chewy beef in it and the sauce would consist of oil onions and green peppers chopped into tiny pieces and cooked for hella long. Then people generally take a nap or terere some more. Then I could probably dig more trash pits or build hand washing stations or play soccer with kids who are way younger and way better than me at soccer. It is kinda depressing. Then its back home for dinner usually consisting of more fried food meat and rice with cheese or something similar with no vegetables. But more commonly dinner is just bread and cocido or cafe again. Dinner isnt a big meal here unless you have the money to make it lol. And then its off to chill in my room for couple hours and sleep at 10 ish. 

So I hope that gives you a grasp of what I am doing here. The above day is an ideal day by the way. Sometimes I wake up late and do nothing. Sometimes I spend a lot of time on the phone talking to other Americans.

its a peace corps life.

About 3 months in site

Its been a long time since I´ve written and i apologize. I don´t realy have good internet options so that is partially to blame. Lets see i am currently working to finish my house by house census of which i have done 33 of 50. Then i will be able to start my commisions which i am really excited to do. In terms of more interesting things, a 2 yr old i am currently living with walked into my room and pooped and then proceeded to drag some of my things through it. That was unpleasant. I am working on the house i am going to rent and will be shortly helping build a modern bathroom in the house. Its a rather daunting and expensive task but it should be fun. My computer broke which is also a reason i have not updated this blog. I have successfully made soap with community members out of chemicals and cow fat. That was fun. I will be trying detergent and softener next. Right now i need to work on speaking more Guarani which i keep putting off but it really makes talking to people hard. I just wish people spoke more Spanish. Being in paraguay without internet or a lot of conviences really gives you a chance to see how much we have and others do not. People here spend a lot of time really doing nothing, sitting together and talking and not talking. the whole awkward silence thing isnt very awkward here. I was in the capital the other week and ate chinese food for 3 days in a row and you would be suprised at how good the food was despite the lack of roast duck which made me quite pissed. Anyway it is crazy to see full blood asians speaking fluent spanish. I feel like so much time is passed but i really dont have that much to say. There are some young community members who i cant wait to start working with more and teach english. That is one thing. You see a lot of youngsters with so much potential and really realize they wont have the resources to explore that potential. Again if any of you have questions please ask.

updates and post swear in

In America, updating requires you to turn around and type some %^&* on your laptop or desktop. Thus we get awe inspiring updates such as "ate a potato today." This action requires no energy because your  sedintary lifestyle has already left you unable to move from your computer.

In Paraguay  internet is challenging. In my training community  i would need to get on a broke a%^ bus, travel 30 minutes to the closest town and sit in a boiling hot room jimmying with sites and downloads in the hopes that i can download or upload 2 pictures in the 40 minutes i sit there. In my site i will have to bike 1 hr and hopefully encounter a bus which will allow me to take a bike onto it instead of driving by at full spead with a "no bueno" face. Or bike in a different direction for 1.5 hours into the closest town where the internet willl likely laugh in my face when i try to sign on.

Swear in was really fun. Ate out and other than the massive toilet destroying chivivi that ravaged several volunteers including myself, we enjoyed ourselfs and went to a pretty awesome night club. I was also able to download like 28 things, mostly movies so i wont feel cut off from civilization. Ok thats all for now. Ill try to update more but there is the likelyhood my internet access with be once a month maybe so be patient dudes.

Jajotopata! - see you later!