Time seems to be flying and crawling here in Paraguay. We´ve finally got a temporary 4x4 and treated it like a rented mule. It responded well and ate up all the rain and mud we could throw at it. Now we have a different 4x4 and so far it´s been a keeper as well. It has a little more clearance and that means a lot here. We´ve been taking lots of pictures and some video clips as well. Unfortunately we have to wait till we get home to post them as the internet is slow here. Besides I´ll have to edit them first (for size, not necessarily content).
Yesterday Raquel, her brother, and I went pig shopping. We bought one for about $70 and hauled back home. The plan is to slaughter it and cook it this weekend. Raquel plans to invite all the kids from Portrero Guazu to come over to eat. I´ve been around two pig preps here so far and it´s not a pretty sight and the sound is horrible. Reminds me of Silence of the Lambs. I prefer to go to the local supermarket in the US and buy the meat and poultry ready to go.
I guess the big news is the ground breaking on a little house here for us. Yep, a house. My father-in-law gave us his property and house to do as we see fit. The current house is old and a little disheveled. We contracted a guy to come and build next to the house the beginnings of a house. To start it will be one bedroom with private bath and a small all-purpose room. As money becomes available, we´ll add on to it. Anyway, this will be our comfortable place to stay instead of getting a hotel. Also we probably won´t need a rental vehicle anymore on the next visits.
Well, I´ve got to go for now. More soon.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Saturday, October 18, 2008
I´m a bit behind....
Somehow I´ve let the days, weeks, and months slip speedily by without an update. Well, I did post a few photos on the flickr thingy.
I knew some might suspect something might have been wrong because my last post was in June and we were expecting our baby in late June or early July. I apologize for not posting - I just kept thinking I´d get to it sooner or later.
Anyhoo, we were blessed with a wonderful, healthy baby boy on June 26th. Everything went pretty smooth over all. Richard Theodore was born in the early afternoon and has been growing rapidly ever since.
Lots of things have happened since, but just a couple really stand out right now. First, Lourdes started her Bright Futures (pre-school) and seems to be enjoying it.
Second, a friend´s mom died recently, but it was really great to have some friends get together to celebrate life.
Third, we lost two of our three dogs. The dachshunds escaped and one was hit and killed and the other just disappeared.
Finally, we´re in Paraguay on vacation.
We´ve been here for just over a week and it´s been great over all. The family all seems to be doing well. We wanted to rent a four wheel drive vehicle, but one wasn´t available from our agency when we arrived. We´ve been getting around in a nice little sedan that was doing really well over all. Then it rained. We were out in the country visiting my wife´s parents at the time. It rained really hard. We waited for it stop raining and hoped the road wasn´t a disaster. Our trip back to the city started off a little squirrelly with some difficulty getting up a slight hill. But I made it up that hill and thought about turning around. Against my better judgement, we went for it. I drove like a champion rally racer for a long while, sometimes suprising myself with my skills. The Corsa was eating up the mud for the longest time and then we finally hit a really bad spot. I think that if I had stayed out of the ruts caused by a previous vehicle (a truck no doubt) I might have made it (probably not). We sunk up to the frame and couldn´t go forwards or backwards. Luckily we were very near a house and Raquel went to ask for help. She ended up getting a man to come with a tractor and pull us quite a distance to where we knew we were safe. Lots of things go through your mind when you´re stuck in the mud in the middle of nowhere. Oh well, we made it out and it´s just another sidenote in our Paragauyan adventure. By the way, we should be getting that four-wheel drive rental tomorrow. The roads should be dried out enough to make it out to the in-laws for a visit.
More some other time.
I knew some might suspect something might have been wrong because my last post was in June and we were expecting our baby in late June or early July. I apologize for not posting - I just kept thinking I´d get to it sooner or later.
Anyhoo, we were blessed with a wonderful, healthy baby boy on June 26th. Everything went pretty smooth over all. Richard Theodore was born in the early afternoon and has been growing rapidly ever since.
Lots of things have happened since, but just a couple really stand out right now. First, Lourdes started her Bright Futures (pre-school) and seems to be enjoying it.
Second, a friend´s mom died recently, but it was really great to have some friends get together to celebrate life.
Third, we lost two of our three dogs. The dachshunds escaped and one was hit and killed and the other just disappeared.
Finally, we´re in Paraguay on vacation.
We´ve been here for just over a week and it´s been great over all. The family all seems to be doing well. We wanted to rent a four wheel drive vehicle, but one wasn´t available from our agency when we arrived. We´ve been getting around in a nice little sedan that was doing really well over all. Then it rained. We were out in the country visiting my wife´s parents at the time. It rained really hard. We waited for it stop raining and hoped the road wasn´t a disaster. Our trip back to the city started off a little squirrelly with some difficulty getting up a slight hill. But I made it up that hill and thought about turning around. Against my better judgement, we went for it. I drove like a champion rally racer for a long while, sometimes suprising myself with my skills. The Corsa was eating up the mud for the longest time and then we finally hit a really bad spot. I think that if I had stayed out of the ruts caused by a previous vehicle (a truck no doubt) I might have made it (probably not). We sunk up to the frame and couldn´t go forwards or backwards. Luckily we were very near a house and Raquel went to ask for help. She ended up getting a man to come with a tractor and pull us quite a distance to where we knew we were safe. Lots of things go through your mind when you´re stuck in the mud in the middle of nowhere. Oh well, we made it out and it´s just another sidenote in our Paragauyan adventure. By the way, we should be getting that four-wheel drive rental tomorrow. The roads should be dried out enough to make it out to the in-laws for a visit.
More some other time.
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