the paraguayan reverie

Time away from paraguay has been a very interesting experience for me. And not just because of the places ive gotten a chance to see, but also because of the perspective ive been able to experience as not only a foreigner on vacation in another country, but as a foreigner from two different countries with a mix of two sets of cultural norms applying them to yet a third place.

Geographically, northern argentina is not that far from paraguay. If one were to fly from asuncion to salta it would only take a few hours. But the culture is so much more influenced by the incan empire that spread down along the andes that it really felt like a completly different country, no only in comparison to the paraguayn country lifestyle, but also to buenos aires in the south which was very european. The scenery was high-desert like, with scrub and large cactus on the hills and some larger vegetation down in the low lands. Packs of donkeys, little mud brick houses in backwater towns, packs of children staring at the buses as they pass by their front porches. All of this is much like paraguay (minus the donkeys), but it was kinda strange to hear people speaking heavily accented spanish instead of guarani in the smaller communities.

I actually was kinda taken aback at the conditions in some of the towns that we passed on the way to our destination place a few hours south of salta in cafayate (pronounced cafaCHAte). I know that argentina is pretty well developed in many parts, so i never expected to see people living in simple mud brick houses with no windows or doors like the ones ive encountered while exploring ruins in death valley. Ive seen plenty of tin and plastic sheet shack houses (even in my paraguayan community) but just being in the desert again and seeing the way some families lives out there, with just a little heard of goats and disintegrating mud house kinda threw me a bit.

For most of my vacation id been traveling with a pretty large group of 9 to 11 people, so being able to go into the last week of my vacation and travel with only one other person was super refreshing. It was get really trying when people are pulling a group in all different directions, and no one can make up their minds. One just ends up sitting around feeling irritated. This is in contrast to my last week, where if we wanted to go somewhere it was relativly simple to make the decision. However, this is not to say that traveling with just one other person does not have its difficulties. There were certainly times toward the end of the trip where we had spent so much time together, talking about anything and everything, that there was really nothing left but to just sit there and enjoy the scenery passing. Too, one cant as easily have alone time when traveling as a duo, since the other person would naturally have other people to hang out with in a larger group setting. Also, it kinda goes without saying that whether you enjoy the company of your travel companion can make or break the trip; theres nothing worse than feeling trapped in an difficult situation where one would of course want to instead be having a plesant, vacation-esque time. Luckily for me, although id known gina for only a short while before then trip, we got along well enough to have things go smoothly for the majority of the time.

The highlights of the final part of my nearly month long vacation were a hiking trek we took for a day around the valley to see some of the landscape that bore a striking resemblance to many parts of death valley - the jutting rock formations, box canyons and yellow blooming desert scrub was very nostalgic. At the end of the treck we hiked into the back of a canyon where a man was waiting to give a flute and drum performance in this natural rock theatre. It completly unexpected, and exactly what i would have done had i been there by myself. Thus, to sit and have this wonderful music washing over us and around the canyon while the wind rushed up and out into the sunset spotted valley was better than anything I could have asked for as a terminus to my trip.

So I am happy to be back in Paraguay, ready to see things in a new light, with a slightly new perspective. As gina and I kept realizing throughout the week, everything thing you do is built on the foundation of your past experiences, your memories and all the things you value enough to remember. I am happy to have had the opportunity to build on who I am while I was away, to have had conversations about things that really matter, to have been able to listen and share, to feel like i do not just let time pass, but am an active participant in shaping what comes to be. And as I told a good friend of mine, "Heres to the little moments - the times that connect moments to moments, between the bright flashes of experience. They define us, but we wont remember them with any clarity as time selectivly shreds the fabric of our memory. So heres to who we are in this moment - heres to now."