An attempt at Tourism

Vanessa and I had been warned before coming that there was not a whole lot to do in Paraguay, that it was really the people that made those who had come enjoy the country. Even though we were prepared for that coming in, by this past weekend after a long week of data collection (if you’re really interested in it, you can see the “boring post” below), we were itching to do something, see SOMETHING cool! I don’t think it helps that every time we get on Facebook one of our peers from school is posting a picture of them in a gorgeous spot, or with a giraffe, or mentioning monkeys in their status updates. Thus far we have seen urban, and urban slums basically. We’ve seen plenty of mice, dogs and cats, but no wild animals.

So Saturday we decided to head to a town that is known for its silver jewelry. We had seen some of the artesanal jewelry in two craft markets in Asunción, and had been told that this town had tons of little jewelry stores lining the streets. A lady at the Instituto Nacional de Salud told us how to get there, telling us it should really only take about 20 minutes. When we got on the bus, we asked the driver to tell us when we were in the center of town. After an hour, and passing through what looked like it might be a downtown, the bus driver looked at us and said, “oh yeah, you passed it”. So we got off, hopped on another bus 10 minutes back to the downtown, and started looking for the jewelry stores. We wandered around a bit through the streets, which were filled with little stores selling everything from baskets to flip-flops to party decorations. We asked around for the jewelry stores, and were directed to another street. The jewelry stores were interspersed with other small stores, had pretty standard chains, trinkets and earrings that you could probably find anywhere. I guess they were real silver, which made them a good deal, but let’s be serious, I couldn’t tell the difference between real and fake silver anyways, so we weren't that impressed with the stores.

After being a bit disappointed, we decided to go to the cementary across the street. Cemetaries are always interesting, and a good fallback if you can’t find anything else interesting to see. We saw some family mausoleums, the little lockers where they store coffins, and plenty of coffins themselves. We felt a little better after that.

That night we decided to go downtown to a famous Paraguayan restaurant and then try to meet up with a Peace Corps Volunteer we had met the week before. The restaurant was nice, decent food and right across from a historic building, however the downtown itself seemed pretty dead. I kept wondering where the music was and why it was so quiet. We headed to an expat bar and did meet a few volunteers, but there was STILL no music, and no dancing to be seen. After our underwhelming day, we decided to call it a night and try again next weekend. On the one hand, I feel better knowing I’m not really missing much; instead I can focus on my work and really understanding the Banado and culture of Paraguay, and enjoy the people, who have been incredibly nice and helpfu. But we’re still going to try and get out and see some things—Lonely Planet promises a few cute towns and nice views around Asuncion. In the meantime, it’s back to the Banado!

Though I said I wasn’t going to compare the DR and Paraguay, I can’t help it so I figure I’ll just embrace it.

Here’s my list thus far:

Things from the DR I wish Paraguay had:
Motoconchos
Rice and beans
Bachata and merengue
No verguenza (embarrassment) about dancing
The tendency to greet everyone as you get on a bus

What Paraguay has that I wish the DR had (in my opinion):
Dulce de leche
Good beef
People saying “Gracias”
No use of the word “Dame” (give me)--Haven't heard it once!
Fewer piropos (catcalls) (I haven’t even received a marriage proposal yet!!)