Paraguay is burning...

I wanted to comment briefly on the situation in Paraguay right now. I realize that Paraguay rarely makes the news in the United States, but if a report were to run right now it would include words like "drought","widespread fires", and "national state of emergency." I know that some of you have the tendency to worry, so I want to preemptively put the worries to rest. The weather has been unusually dry for months now, and as a result the plains and forests of Paraguay are catching fire at an alarming rate. (I live in the city, which is not so much in danger of catching fire for this reason. The electrical wiring is a bit sketchy however...) There are images on the news of people in the Chaco beating the fire back with branches, which seems a bit archaic even for South America. What they really need is rain.

Asuncion got a pretty good rain this weekend, so now it is pleasantly cool. Glorious. It makes me miss the cloudy fall days of Kansas. Sigh...

Workin´ It!

For the last two weeks I have been working part time for ADRA—The Adventist Development and Relief Association. This is an international organization that has various social assistance projects all over the world. My responsibilities with ADRA fall into two categories: office work and street work. The office work is easy—writing and translating proposals in English to (hopefully) get funding for new projects, visiting project sites to do analyses and thorough write-ups (in English!) of existing projects. This is no sweat for me. Old hat.

The other part of my job is the most stretching experience I have had in a while. Two days a week I go to one of ADRA’s projects in Asuncion, where I work with street children. For two hours I (attempt to) teach them English because Paraguayans, like much of the rest of the world, are fascinated with American popular culture. The English is not so much the end goal, but a way to connect with the kids, get them in of the streets and sober for a couple of hours, help them learn how to learn, work on developing some discipline, etc. This is a rough crowd much of the time, but t here are also times when they just act like kids who want to be loved and taken care of. The kids have serious behavioral, emotional, and drug problems. The first day I visited I was offered cocaine by an 8-year-old. Very shocking and very sad, but not beyond the hope. I often have to remind myself that some of the kids at the Hogar lived on the streets and had many of the same problems before ending up in that home.

Dinner reservation for 75, please…

Last weekend Jon and I had the unique experience of cooking dinner at the Hogar for everyone over 13 years of age. A missionary named Claudio was coming from Chile to visit, and they wanted to have a special dinner for him. When a special guest is coming, the most logical thing to do is to put two foreigners in charge of a sizable operation with which they have no experience. Well, the actual logic used by the leaders of the Hogar was this: Claudio is a fan of spicy foods. Americans like spicy foods too. We should ask Jon to cook a lot of spicy food.

Jon is not one to say no to a challenge, but he also knows when he needs help. To procure this assistance he did two very important things. First, he wrote to his mother for a recipe. As expected, the lovely Mrs. Birney delivered detailed instructions for red beans and rice. But he knew that the recipe alone would not be enough. He needed help in the trenches too--someone with experience, someone who would be calm under pressure, someone who could turn a gigantic pile of ingredients into a delicious meal for 75 people. Why he instead called me, I will never understand.

What followed was a busy, hot, joyful 7-hour process of chopping, “measuring,” boiling, stirring, dancing, singing, chatting (in English and Spanish), baby-bouncing, joking, and general mayhem. We had more help than we could handle. And shockingly enough, it actually tasted really good when it was all done. Along with our entrée we made the biggest pan of brownies I have ever seen in my life. (Really, the brownies turned out more like cake because there is no way to accurately measure ingredients here. Also, the ovens do not have temperature gauges—there is only “hot” and “really hot.”)

During a good dinner at the Hogar it is not uncommon for someone to shout “Thanks to the cooks!” This is followed by some amount of clapping and cheering. On this particular night there was resounding applause the likes of which I had not heard before. This has more to do, I think, with their appreciation than the food itself, but I still loved to hear it.

How did you come up with that name for your blog?

Because someone asked (and because I am terribly obliging…) below is the poem from which my blog takes its name. It was written by Caryll Houselander, a modern-day mystic of sorts, and published in 1945. While it was written about war-torn London, I feel the ideas contained in the poem are in no way limited to that time and place. I hope you enjoy it.

A TREE IN THE CITY

At last on the little black tree
In the city square,
There is a green leaf.

Hesitating,
A ray of the sun, comes down.
It is a white finger of light,
Pointing to life.

In the offices,
The row of pales faces are lifted,
They are turned to the green spark,
Unlit candles, wistful for flame.

They are not dreaming,
Merely of the distant countryside,
Of passing loveliness.
They know, that loveliness
Runs out, even through privileged hearts,
Like sand through an hour glass.
They want to begin to live,
And to live for ever.

The spark of life
In each of their souls
Is a gem in a locked casket.
It suddenly burns more brightly.
Waxes and wanes,
Like a breathing ember.
Now it could be fanned to a great flame,
by a mere breath.
Will no one come,
Into the city of London,
With the gift of his breath,
To answer,
The people’s wordless supplication
For Life?

(PS--the picture is of a funny type of tree that grows in the chaco. It stores water in the trunk and has spikes all around the bark, so one must hug with caution!)

San Miguel

On Wednesday this week my friend Sofi invited me to come with her to the nearby town of Capiata. Sofi’s friend Anna, a volunteer from Germany, has been working in a school there for the past three months. In this town there is a neighborhood called San Miguel, which looks very different today than it did five years ago. Situated in a rural area outside of the city proper, San Miguel used to suffer from all of the typical problem associated with rural poverty in South America—poor housing, bad water supply, a terrible school, lack of transportation, and little (or no) access to health care.

Even in the midst of all of the poverty in Paraguay, San Miguel had a reputation—sort of a rural version of the Chacarita. For this reason, Sofi’s church began to invest in this community in a thorough and dedicated manner. As a result, the neighborhood has changed dramatically. There is a health and dental clinic where doctors come to volunteer every week, and people come from miles around to receive care. There is a small, symbolic fee (less than $1) attached to services, but the bulk of the cost is covered by donations. Probably because of these health clinics, several buses now run within walking distance of the barrio. Simple, tidy houses have been built along the narrow red-earth roads. A large water tower provides a clean water supply to the surrounding homes. There is a modest but useful library that everyone in town can use. There is a sizable bakery where some individuals from the town work and make food for the school and homes. Best of all, there is a charming, colorful little school with five classrooms (including a Special Ed. Class), where the teachers use rather progressive methods of teaching that encourage freedom and exploration. All of the kids have a padrino, a sponsor from the church who pays for their tuition, uniform, etc. These padrinos come from the same church movement, but live in different countries around the world. Nancy, the director of the school took us around to all the classes to introduce us. The kids sang songs to us in Spanish and Guarani, although they seemed a bit baffled as to why the German girl had brought an American and a Paraguayan with her that day. It is unfortunate that the school is too small to accommodate all of the kids in San Miguel. But in the afternoon the school provides merienda (snack) for all of the kids in the neighborhood, and all kids have access to the building and the library. The three of us (Sofi, Anna, and I) ate lunch with a couple of the teachers who live in that community. While I generally find foreigners easier to understand than Paraguayans, the German accent in Spanish is especially difficult. Even so, we did all right.

After all of our introductions in the school, Javier, the grounds keeper, took us on a tour of the town. He showed us the homes and the water tower. He showed us the river where people used to drink and bathe that the town cleans up every spring. He showed us a small, organic farm that a number of the men of the community work on. (Sofi and I both bought a kilo of strawberries for less than $1. Yum!) He showed us the avocado trees and told me that in a month of so giant fruit would be falling on their heads. They use the avocados not only for food but also as a treatment for various skin ailments. Incidentally, both Sofi and Javier were disgusted to learn that Americans generally eat avocado as a salty food and not mixed with milk and sugar. Anna, however, seemed to agree that avocado was not meant to be eaten as dessert. They pointed out small yellow wild flowers that they add to their terere and matte herbs. Javier showed us the guava trees and explained the medicinal uses of the leaves and buds. I was sent home with some branches because I had a sore throat. I was told to boil a number of broken leaves and buds in water for about 10 minutes and then gargle the water when it cooled a bit. Gargle, not drink—they made this distinction several times with lively pantomime despite the fact that I understood them perfectly the first time. I did, in fact, try this when I got home. It did not taste very good, but it made my mouth tingly and numbed by throat. At the end of the afternoon Javier and Anna walked us to the bus stop about a half a kilometer down the road. Javier asked me if we had coconut trees in Kansas and told me about his seven kids. I described the Kansas landscape and weather as best I could, and told him about my brother who lives in California.

It was an encouraging day for several reasons. For me, it was one of my better days in Spanish—I was able to understand nearly everything (as long as I was paying attention) and communicate my questions as well. It was also wonderful to see a place that has been transformed so completely. What was once a burden is now a resource and a hope for surrounding communities. And the work that has been done was not simply an intervention performed by outsiders, but a partnership. The people of San Miguel are proud of where they live and continue working to make it better.