looking out my bedroom window at a really beautiful sunset...sorry about the fence and buildings in the way, but hey, cool sunset right?
these are from a weekend side trip to Aregua with some local friends...they told me to look "cute" and you can decide if I succeeded...
this is one of the Fransiscan churches in the area...really impressive
Suzanne this one's for you!!
me posing with a really creative shirt adorned with cheap nanduti, but innovative enough to merit a picture
Amazing ceramic designs fill the road across Aregua--i bought the missing flower pots in the foreground...
taking time to get to know each other while we were visiting an Argentine 'estancia' or private ranch. the girl in the middle, Maya, is working in Chile, while i had just finished some real bonding conversations with Jaein on the other side--of Korean descent but grew up in Paraguay and is now working in Buenos Aires
me riding horses....how I miss that!! but they wouldn't let us do more than a slow walk. :(
Me and my new best friend Sarita Role--studying with me in paraguay but working at an agricultural school up in the Chaco region.
meeting back up with old friends at a pizza joint
this is one of my many new boyfriends--a muchacho I like to call Mario the pizza guy, guardian of the corner shop La Americana or "the American" restaurant that only serves empanadas and pizza.
we went on a visit to the American embassy and got a short visit with the current ambassador, Wayne. Amazingly diplomatic and talented in talking for half an hour without saying anything, but interesting nonetheless
if you've never seen a tango show, it's almost worth the $1500 plane ticket to go to Argentina to see one! Unfortunately this particular show wasn't my favorite, but still a good night out.
An artisan market in one of the only colonial remnants of urban Buenos Aires--San Telmo. Visiting San Telmo comes complete with plenty of English-speaking gringos, cheap trickets and fine art, pickpockets, and tango street dancers all rushing around in an otherwise traffic-ridden thoroughfare. I had a hilarious incident watching a fat linen-donning, sunburnt American lean over the merchandise and ask, in English "How much?" and when the vendor didn't under the question, begin to wave her arms around the objects and saying much louder and much slower, again in English "HOW MUCH??" and then when the vendor guessed she was asking about prices told her "ocho" or "eight" which she then repeated loudly and slowly to the vendor "eight pesos?? EIGHT pesos??" When the body signals and the price inquiries apparently didn't conform to her budget expenses, she started walking away saying "this really shouldn't be that difficult--doesn't anyone speak English around here??" Ah sometimes i hate tourists. Wait, let me change that, most of the time I hate tourists...
then, low and behold, in the middle of the San Telmo artisan market, i ran across some very interesting...nanduti!! I asked the guy where he had learned to make it and after correctly identifying it as nanduti, he told me that he had learned in a local high school where they were teaching various weaving techniques. a great find to show the versatility and growing "web" of influence of this artform. I thought I was going to Buenos Aires to get away from work, but found some great new information!
These are some fun candid pictures taken in Recoleta Cementery when one of the other students was going through "camera withdrawal" and so I lent him my camera. I have no idea what we were looking at, but apparently it must have been quite perplexing as the tour guide and one of the advisors scratch their heads in contemplation...
Meeting with some of my good friends from the Juncal ward in Buenos Aires...and a surprise visit from Elder Salazar. He is from the same home stake as my companion's then-boyfriend now husband from Bahia Blanca. Long story, but just an interesting connection. He had been serving in Bs. As. while i was there, but I can't honestly remember what we had talked about when I had met him before, he is going home in 2 months and was really excited to see me again after a year. Ah, young missionaries. What are you to do with them?
Hey everyone!! I am just getting back into Paraguay after a whirlwind Fulbrighter-filled tour of Buenos Aires. It was a great conference and, in getting to know the rest of the Fulbrighters in the area, I really gained an appreciation for what this program is all about. students from Argentina, Chile, Brazil, and Uruguay joined with our small cohort of 3 students in Paraguay for a rocking week full of presentations, sight-seeing, project discussions, partying out, and networking. I got to meet some other great researchers and it was amazing to see how diverse their topics and expertises were--from Marine Biology in Chile to public health projects in the slums of Brazil to measuring distances to nearby galaxies. Interesting people, lots of good food, pampering in a hotel, and more English than I've spoken in the past 6 months. I also made fantastic friends especially with another girl Sarita who has been here in Paraguay but because of distance and schedules we never met up but ended up having some incredibly thought-provoking, humbling, and life-changing conversations on the various bus rides and airpline rides throughout the trip. I also connected with an adorably energetic girl of Korean descent who grew up in Paraguay but then went to the States and is now studying Korean populations in Buenos Aires Argentina. I felt so at home with the group and it was an emotional, spiritual, and cultural retreat from months of frustration and isolation and really helped me to kick back into the larger picture and working to integrate my experiences into the overall macrocosmos rather than getting sucked into only seeing my local experiences as reality. It was fun to talk about nanduti too and actually see that i had worthwhile observations to contribute and find out that most of them had never heard of, let alone learned about this artform. It really energizes me to keep going with my work and get something more concrete and published for others to enjoy.
i also took advantage of my stay to reconnect with old friends from Buenos Aires and thoroughly enjoyed going out to lunch and dinner with old buddies. I got to B.A. on Sunday just in time for the second day of Conference, and dared myself to actually attend the meetings at the Stake Center, knowing without a doubt that Fernando would be there and afraid of how I migh react in seeing him after breaking up last year. But, I managed to let him see me without actually having a single conversation with him and I'm sure the gossip will fly in the next couple weeks about how I came back to Argentina and didn't even say hi to the twerp. ah, the drama.
Otherwise, things are great. I am excited to finish up my last month and a half here in Paraguay if i can get all the logistics worked out for graduate school and all. enjoy the pics!! Love you all tons!!
Kristine
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