Peacin' Out: Talk about awkward

Okay, here´s a long one for you all. I wrote it earlier this week so it´s a little dated but I hope you enjoy:

Even though it’s been less than a week, I have become quite the carnivore since entering Paraguayan life. Almost every lunch and dinner has involved meat somehow, usually as the main part of the meal. I was somewhat expecting this, so I tried to prepare a little before coming, but I had no idea that the meat would be this abundant. I think all of the meat I’m eating at my host family’s house is from their animals (cows, chickens, pigs), so I feel a little bit better about it, but I also feel kind of like a cannibal. Weird. If I’m lucky, there are some vegetables scattered here and there but I get the feeling the vegetables are added to make the Norteamericana happy. Which I am.

Saturday night introduced me to the Paraguayan social life, complete with lots and lots of meat. Asado to be exact. My host mama’s cousin’s baby (or some derivative thereof) had a baptism earlier that day so there was a “party” that night. Party is in quotations because it is nothing like what we’re used to, aside from getting lots of people together. First of all, everyone was related (cousin, second cousin, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, sister, brother, etc.). Second, there was very little mingling amongst the sexes. When we got there, the women immediately sat down in chairs arranged in a somewhat semi-circle (but more of a line, where no one was facing anyone else) while the men went over to the fire pit where they were roasting a sh*t ton of meat (pork and beef). This arrangement continued for at least 2 hours. I have no idea what went on in the men’s circle, but the women’s chair line was fairly uneventful. We chatted, I was introduced to all my mama’s relatives, we all drank soda out of the same glass, we stared at nothing and on and on, all the while Paraguayan polka music played in the background. Finally (and I mean finally) the food was ready. This was the big moment when the sexes got close enough to talk to each other, but only from across the table. Did I mention they eat a lot of meat here? They prepared a plate for everyone with some sort of beef steaky thing, pork ribs (I think) and a piece of sausage. The sausage was by far the best. And the knives were really dull, so I was practically ripping the very-cooked meat apart by whatever means necessary to get it into bite-sized chunks. Once again, feeling like a cannibal and surely making a fool of myself in front of the boys sitting across from me. Who, by the way, did not say a word to me and would barely glance in my direction. Very Paraguayan, from what I’ve gathered so far. After dinner, we all resumed our respective positions and there was more chatting and staring from the women’s chairs. At some point, someone broke out the Reggaeton (which the young crowd LOVES down here) so that livened things up a bit, but still no one moved from their seats. Another hour or so went by, the cake was busted out, we ate it and then got a ride home in someone’s truck. We only live about a 5 minute walk away, so this amused me quite a bit. And that was that. The typical Paraguayan party. Rock on.

Sunday presented more typical Paraguayan stuff to me. I woke up fairly late (8:00 am is late when everyone else gets up around 5:30 am) and it was pretty hot already (we’re moving into Summer) so my host sister and I started drinking tereré almost immediately. I’ll get into the details of tereré in a later post because it’s pretty involved, but for now all you need to know is that it’s cold yerba mate. And, of course, everyone in the tereré circle drinks it out of the same cup so you fill up the cup, drink it all, fill up the cup, pass it to the next person, etc. We sat on the patio and drank tereré for a good 3 hours, with different people joining and leaving the circle. But I stayed the whole time (what else did I have to do?). There was lots of chatting, both in Guaraní and Spanish. I, of course, was only speaking Spanish (if you can call it that) and saying “Que?” and “Como?” constantly whenever people tried to talk to me. All I can say is that my language skills can only get better. But everyone is super nice and patient and they like to learn about life in the US, so they’re willing to wade through my incomprehensible Spanish to get the answer. Surprisingly, sitting around doing nothing when it’s really hot (besides drinking tea) really works up an appetite. So then we ate lunch, which was my favorite so far. We had noodles and chicken and salad and orange soda (we have orange soda with every meal) and it was deliciosa. My mama suggested I rest after this (because I had done so much earlier) so there was more sitting and chatting, this time under a huge tree in the front yard area. My host sister doesn’t like to do ANYTHING except sit around when it’s hot (and it was only about 80°F today) so I sit around with her. I broke out the binoculars and watched some birds, I wrote down a lot of Spanish/Guaraní words I don’t know, we drank some more tereré, etc. Talk about a lazy Sunday. Just when I was about to lay down and take a nap (because I was exhausted from all the activity), the rest of the volunteers in my community (there are 8 of us here) showed up at my house with a huge group of local kids. The kids wanted to take us all to a fútbol (soccer) game that was going on, so we walked to a nearby school and watched some fútbol. I don’t have many little kids around my house, so it was fun talking to them and being around them. We drank more tereré at the game and us Norteamericanos were definitely a spectacle. Fun times.

All in all, a very fun/awkward/interesting/educational weekend. I look forward to more, especially this coming weekend when I´m going to help my host family kill some of their chickens and then eat them on Sunday. Woo hoo!

Here are some more pictures of what I see everyday. I don´t have any from the asado or the futbol game because I didn´t want to be that foreigner with the camera. Maybe later.....