Nomadic Behavior: October 2010

Choosing the right piece of meat is a difficult task, but that what men are so. At least that's what the baby says. So add this and another item to the short list of things that men are good for.

Here in Paraguay there is a wide variety of meats and sausages to choose from: Butifarra , morcillas and besitos (tiny spicy sausages) are my three favorites so I decided to get a few of each.

Before

after

One of my favorite things in the whole wide world is eating chicken hearts, I just love them. There 's something about eating chicken hearts (or any other kind of heart for that matter) that makes me very very content. I know it must gross some people out frankly, I don't care. Not my problem. I am a meat eater and my favorite meat of all time is heart and that will never change.

The heats are in the tray way at the back. I forget what they call the things in the in the front tray but they're some kind of insides too.

My cousin Lujan, savoring the hearts-a-bob.

Just beautiful.

Man, that bus was crowded!

We took the but to Aregua, I don't remember if it was the weekend or not, but scenes like this are very common. Try to avoid

a)6 am - 8 am
b) 11 am - 2 pm
c) 5pm - 8pm

Well, basically it's always crowded! but alas! we must take public transportation because taxis are just as expensive as in NYC.

The Main Square

The bus we took let us off right at the top of the hill where the church was. Just like most Latin American Catholic countries, Paraguay has a Church and a Virgin of everything. “Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria”, literally translated as Our Lady of the Candelaria. This colonial church was built in 1862 on on part of the land that the Order of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mercy used to make local the local indigenous communities pray to God to save their savage soul from eternal damnation. It was rebuilt in 1914 without changing its original colonial design

Party time is on February 2 when they have "Fiestas Partonales".In honor of The Virgen of the Candelaria, local folk gather for mass and then further celebration and games. In the heat of summer cold beverages and beer is plentiful, and at roughly a US dollar a liter, a very inexpensive way to quench your thirst. What better way that to spend a nice afternoon in the Virgen of Candelaria's front yard drinking beer and contemplating Lake Ypacara'i

What a great view! Can you just imagine waking up from a hangover and contemplating this beautiful landscape?

After taking all these beautiful pictures Joaquin walked in to one of the little grocery stores and got a pack of cigarettes while I took more pictures of the little houses that were around the church. Right next to it in fact, like they were meant for nuns or something.

Someone once told me that writer Josefina Pla lived in one of those little houses but I'd have to Google to be sure. People still live there in those houses, as you can see in the pictures below.

The baby getting cigarettes

La despensa de la esquina ... Of course the baby needs tobacco so we popped into the corner shop. Most of these local mom and pop shops are pretty old fashioned, you still have to ask the owner for what you want to buy instead of pulling it off the shelf yourself.

pics of the houses right next to the church- those lucky people with the view

La Peatonal

Or that's what people call long streets that have a sidewalk in the middle. Tons of houses that all seem abandoned. I wonder what they go for? Probably too much, for some reason real estate prices here are way over-priced. I think it's money laundry, but then again everything pretty much is here. Gotta love Paraguay.

Some of these houses look really old. I don't think anyone lives in them, except for ghosts. Just kidding, I meant squatters.

At the end of the road where you take the bus back to town you start seeing more stuff on sale. Clay pigs, frogs and other figures either associated with soccer teams, mythology or Christianity. There is also a TON of food, mostly sweet jams made out of guava, strawberries or papaya

local business woman selling jelly

I think the birds are made out of a very lightweight and easy to carve wood.

I forgot to mention plant pots

The Museum/Gift Shop

The closer you get to the train tracks, the more commercial things get and you can tell by all the stuff hanging out on the sidewalk. The 'museum' (which is what they called it with the only difference that EVERYTHING was for sale) was pretty nice, they let me take all the pictures I wanted as long as I took the price list home with me. Why not right? I gathered that more than a museum it was really a type of common place for artisans that could afford to keep their stuff in a house and not have to haul it back and forth everyday like the vendors on the street.

The front of the gallery

the right side- pretty cool hu? I bet it gets pretty active at night.
I wonder if they sell booze?

YUP, I thought so.

Inside

As you go down to the river, you will pass by the"Casa de los buenos Bollos". Bollos are a lot like donuts but without the hole in the middle. They are usually filled with dulce de leche or dulce de guayaba (guava jelly) or cream. The one you see in the pic is the cream filled one and my personal favorite.

trying to get a little attention here.

Most of the time, and specially during siesta there are not many people working. As hard as it may be to believe most homes don't have a doorbell, so it is customary to clap your hands three times as loud as you can to get their attention. People do the same thing when they visit each other, this applies to any situation where you need someones attention or you need to get someone to open a door and let you in. No doorbell? no problem. Use your hands.

Making these are really simple. All you need is
Flour 1/2 kilo

Butter: 100 grams

Milk 3/4 liter

3 Eggs

Yeast 15 grams (1 little pack)

Pinch of salt

Free lance bollo vendor- they don't usually sell the cream filled ones though :(

Our restaurant

Just in case you weren't sure

Lunch

We had a not so traditional lunch in a very traditional place. It used to be the place where they made chipas, really good ones too. Now they moved to the shopping malls and supermarkets so guess they left the restaurant to their previous owners. We ordered a paella. HINT: you can tell the quality of a restaurant in Paraguay by the quality of their seafood. I you don't get food poisoning the next day then 2 thumbs up.

How nice :)

Before

After

Our bill along with a bottle of spring water and a jug of orange juice. A whopping 33 dollars.

the bill

a vintage coffee ad

another vintage ad (for artichoke?)

a vintage ad for Gin (yum!) and the well

A lot of the houses here have wells too. Most of them work as the water company Essap doesn't provide clean water to all the homes in the country.

Personally, I prefer artisan wells. Not that you can drink directly out of any of them, but Essap puts so much chlorine in their water you can see it precipitate.

two of out hosts. I think they were Amazons- not sure

This was the first time I had ever eaten here. Definitely a mom and pop restaurant, as most of them are here in Paraguay.

We sat near the kitchen because it was just he two of us, but large families were sitting in the back under the shade.

The kitchen under constant supervision for quality control.

It was a REALLY HOT DAY, but believe it or now we didn't even need the fan on. It really is amazing how vegetation can really control an areas temperature.

The back part of the restaurant

The first train built in Latin America was supposedly built in Paraguay, that's what I was told anyway. On Sundays you can take the train from Asuncion to Aregua in some of the original passenger wagons. There is supposed to be live entertainment and they stop in Aregua for a couple of hours and then you ride the same train back.