Simon.Speaks.Paraguay

Whist winter is still several months away and it would be quite an exaggeration to call it cold the weather now is very different from that of just a couple of days ago. Summer here is a long hot season and although it is a time of great pleasure by mid February everyone has had quite enough of being baked and is looking forward to some cooler days. The first of these cool snaps usually arrives in late February. With this one being forecast for a few days now the change in the weather has become one of the main topics of conversation here abouts. Second only to the start of the new school year. The change when it arrived was sudden. One day hot, sweaty and nearly 40 degrees and the next barely above 20 with the air now very dry. As always the cold weather arrived from the south. A strong wind blowing off the South Atlantic, across the Argentine Pampas and then onwards to Paraguay by which time it had lost all it's moisture. Weather fronts arriving in this way are why Para...

The days started early in our English school in Naranjo, Piribebuy. At first light a strong bright sun burst into life. If that was not enough to waken everybody in their tents and huts then the sound of the chickens getting going for the day certainly was. Once outside a quick wash to open the eyes and a queue for the toilet and all were soon ready for the day ahead. First stop the kitchen to light a fire to boil some water for the morning drink. Coffee, or if someone felt adventurous, cocido, Paraguayan style. That done we had then a little time to sit and enjoy breakfast. Also the ideal time to remember where today's props and lesson plans were and to chat through who was teaching who before the children started to arrive. That happened very soon after breakast as with schools starting early the children are used to getting going in the morning. They came from throughout the surrounding area. Some walking half an hour to be taught a little English. The children gradu...

The cocotero is the ubiquitous tree of Paraguay. There may be more graceful trees and there may be trees with more edible fruits but it is the tree many think of first when describing Paraguayan trees. No scene or image of Paraguay would be complete without one and outside of Asunción it is hard to look anywhere without spotting one. Even one of the junior school text books is named after the cocotero. It is a type of palm found throughout South America but it's commonness in Paraguay in particular has aquired for it the name Coco Paraguayo. Across it's range there are several local names but there is agreed common name and no name at all in English. There the only title available is it's scientific name of Acrocomia Aculeata. Needless to say I have never heard one refered to as such. As with with all palms it has a straight fiberous trunk which can grow to in excess of 20 metres. Being a palm there are no branches just a mass of fronds sprouting from it's summi...

Despite the inevitable illegal logging and forest fires Paraguay remains a very green and heavily wooded land.  Even where the trees have been cleared they are on the whole replaced by pasture rather than concrete. The picture is a little different in the thorn bush srub of the Chaco in the north west, but the image of a green and fertile land holds true for the rest of the country. Even Asunción, by far the biggest city in the country has plenty of green spaces. There are large plazas full of mature trees, shady trees lining the sidewalks and several large city parks. The largest of these are the Botanical Gardens a little way from the center and Park Nu Guazu on the road towards the airport. All this greenery makes Asunción a pleasant place to walk around even in high summer. The parks and plazas are popular places to relax and recharge away from the bustle of the city. Heading away from Asunción and into the interior the surroundings become still greener. Travelling on...

Anyone eating out in Paraguay will very quickly discover how common buffet restaurants are. They are to be found everywhere from high streets to supermarkets to shopping centers. What they offer is good reasonably priced food without all the hassle of making a selection from a menu. Ideal for trying a selection of foods and for when you are not quite sure as to the name of dishes. Also with menus I have been to more than one restaurant where although there was a menu of sorts it came in the form of verbal suggestions from the waiter rather than anything commited to writing. The system of payment here is unlike that in England, and presumably other countries as well, where buffets are charged per person. In Paraguay instead the food is billed by weight at the till. This I personally think is a far fairer system as a person is therefore only charged for what they intend to eat. The great majority of these restaurants have a similar selection of foods on offer. Various meats alo...

Winter in Paraguay is the dry season, a time of year when the grass dry or if there has been frost, die back leaving just straw behind. All this turns the ground to a tinderbox in grave danger from fire. So it was for me a couple of winters back. I returned home after doing my business in town to be confronted with the alarming sight of a garden on fire. I quickly rushed back to the house, changed into old clothes and then headed out to find the cause and see what was being done about it. It was clear that the fire had been burning for sometime and was well established. It was burning about ten metres within my boundries on a front at least one hundred metres across. Already I could see a large blackened area of land beyond my fence where the flames had already passed turning everything to ash. It did not take long to locate the culprit for he was standing to the side of the flames looking resigned to watching everything burn. He was the groundkeeper of the neighbouring prope...

In rural Paraguay it is common for a household to own a cow or two and for some to own many more than that. Those animals are often to be seen tied up along roadsides or in gardens chomping away on the grass. As well as representing an investment a cow can also provide a family with milk and cheese. For someone with a milk cow one of the very first jobs every morning is to milk it, and then once that has been done it must be taken to pasture. Every day the cattle must be taken to and from pasture for at night they are bought back to the house to be tied to a tree or a post over night where they can be watched over. A cow is far too valuable to a family to be left in some distant place over night. These cows must also be attended to during the day as in being succured with ropes they cannot seek fresh grass once all that is within reach has been eaten or take themselves to water. These cows on the whole other than eating the odd plant or trampling the odd flower bed cause no...

To get anything done in Paraguay it is vital to remain calm and relaxed, knowing that in all likelyhood some sort of solution will shortly come along and that even if it doesn't not to worry. The Paraguayans have a word for this, tranquilo. All that ever happens is calmed with a few utterances of "tranquilo ", getting stressed and excited is never going to solve anything in Paraguay. And so it was once more shone to be true this afternoon. Being one of this worlds more relaxed people I long ago fell in with this particular South American version of "no worries ". I guess the trouble began a couple of days ago. I lent a friend my motorbike to do something or other. What ever it was it was really urgent and really important. Things are always really urgent and really important when someone wants something and it's rude not to help if you are able. Anyway I was so surprised when the bike returned at almost the agreed time that I didn't think to qu...

The use of plants and herbs in traditional medicine is widespread in Paraguay. Everyone knows which plants or yuyo to use and where they grow. In addition every market has a stall piled high with remedies. They are all picked growing wild and are of course all organic. The two main uses for them is either as flavouring and preventative medicine in drinks of terere or mate or taken as curative medicine using knowledge passed down from generation to generation. This knowledge goes right back to before the arrival of the Spanish and to the original Guaraní inhabitants of the land. Any Paraguayan walking past what could be mistaken as a clump of weeds would quickly spot anything useful. On the curative side many of the remedies have been used for centuries, ample time for the most effective cures to be found and for the whole culture of forest medicine to become an important part of the countries folk law. Many modern medicines derive from plants and it is more than possible that t...

No scene in Paraguay would be complete without someone filling a small cup from a flask and then sucking up the liquid through a silver straw. England may have it's tea, but in Paraguay it is terere that rules supreme. All day everyday terere is being drunk and every household contains that items for it's preperation so that as well as being enjoyed by the householders it can be offered to any visitors. The drinking of terere is more than just refreshment it also provides a social bond. The equipment required is simple. A flask or termos, the cup the guampa and the straw or bombilla. The bombilla has a flitered end so that when the water is drawn up the herbs remain in the guampa. The guampa itself is a handleless cup like a small beaker and may be made from horn or a gourd but it more often wooden. Generally the guampa has a desgin painted on it's exterior. This may be something traditional such as the Paraguayan flag or some cultural reference or may simply be som...

With so much green open space and a low population density outside Asunción Paraguay is a haven for wild life. Those wild spaces cover a number of habitats, from forest to grassland, from swamp to semi desert each ideal for different species. One group of animals containing members who can thrive in these varied landscapes is lizards. No part of Paraguay is without it's resident lizards. Living as I do surrounded by the woods and grasslands of the Piribebuy area I have my own particular suite of lizards adapted to the local conditions. As a result of that two of the largest Paraguayan lizards are absent The first of these is the Green Iguana. A creature of thick forests, especially of trees over hanging the rivers and streams that run through them. This is a large lizard growning to over a metre in length which spends much of it's life up in the trees living on the fruits of the forest. If however an iguana were to fall from the branches into the waters below it would...

Lying across the Tropic of Capricorn Paraguay has a generally hot and dry subtropical climate with many days of cloudless blue skies. However a look at the abundance of lush green plants would tell that the land must also be well watered. The rains do come and are often very heavy putting down an inch or more of rain over a realativly short period of time. The rains can then continue to fall for a day or two, but a few hours or even just a short sharp shower are more the norm. Being placed in the center of the continent and with evaporation drawing moisture from the ground for all but the winter months electrical storms are the bringers of the rain. These often start with the building of large thunder clouds between which silent lightning flashes. As the storm builds the sky darkens with a band of thick almost black clouds forming across the sky. By this time the lightning is reaching the ground and so is now accompanied by thunder. The growing claps of thunder build to a const...

98km from Asunción and 4km outside the town of Caraguatay is the Paraguayan naval museam at Vapor Cue. It is final resting place for the remains of the Paraguayan fleet abandoned at the end of the War of the Triple Alliance in the late 19th century. Although Paraguay lies far from the sea the size of it's rivers are such that there were a number of naval confrontations during the war. On the whole these were between the fleets of Paraguay and Brazil. The technology avalible to the Brazilians was far superior to that of the Paraguayans. With modern iron clad vessels facing the wooden barques of Paraguay. However as with the rest of the war this was to be no easy onesided affair as their opponents were fighting for the very existence of their homeland. As with the rest of the war though the Paraguayan forces were slowly worn down by their opponents and by mid 1869 following the loss of Asunción the fleet was like the rest of the army on the retreat heading deeper and deeper i...

Sitting on the outskirts of the town of Paraguari is the old abandoned train station. It was not always out on the edge of town but after being closed for more than 100 years the town has had ample time to shift it's focus from rail to road. The railways of Paraguay were amongst the very first to be built in South America. The aim was for a line from Asunción to Encarnación in the south which lay just across the river from Argentina. From there goods and people could travel onwards to Buenos Aires and the world. Work on the railway began in 1861 in Asunción with initially a short 4km stretch to the town of Trinidad. The materials and managers were on the whole supplied by the English firm Blyth. Work then continued southwards along the line reaching Paraguari in 1864. The construction of the station was overseen by the English engineer Alonso Taylor. Later that same year the station building was completed and opened. The timing unfortunatly though was very bad as the very...

Situated 66km from Asunción stands the market town of Paraguari. In addition to serving as a retail and business hub for the surrounding districts it is also the county town of the department also named Paraguari. Sitting on the main road to Asunción it is idealy placed for the transport of it's goods to market there. The town itself sits on the flat lowland savanna lands at the base of nearby hill country. The town is surrounded by hills with such names as Santo Tomás, Hu and M'batovi. Within the town it the large chuch of St Thomas which is unusual in having twin bell towers sitting apart from the main chuch building. The chuch sits in the center of a large well kept grassy plaza. Reflecting however the main focus of the town it does not lie in it's center. This place is taken instead by another plaza much more heavily planted with trees and with a far more hectic mercantile atmosphere. This plaza is circled all day long by a steady stream of traffic and constantly ...