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| 6 weeks to goTime is flying by as I approach my swearing out ceremony which will be held on August 17 in the Peace Corps office in Asuncion. I feel lucky to be taking the coordinator position and don´t have to be too stressed about leaving Peace Corps and Paraguay. Although the thought of leaving Horqueta has me somewhat stressed out and emotional at times. In the next six weeks, I need to manage a $5000 project at the public library as well as complete a series of presentations on waste management in the different neighborhoods of the city. This is not to mention the important moments that I need to spend with friends in my site. | |
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| Trip Home for Sister´s Wedding I returned from the United States to Paraguay last Friday and had a wonderful if short trip to the United States. During my 11 days I went to my sister´s wedding on June 2, met my newest niece, Abigail Francis Spahr, who was born on June 1, visited my grandmother in Philadelphia, spent lots of time with my family including nieces and my nephew, spent lots of time with friends, and went to the 8th grade graduation at the Nativity School of Harrisburg where I used to teach. The wedding was spectacular. Outside and next to a beautiful creek in Perry County. The reception was full of dancing, good music, and camping next to the creek. I´m hoping that I will be home for a month in December. | | |
| Close of Service Conference and New JobThe group that I staged with in Miami, trained with in Paraguay, and was friends with for two years just had our Close of Service Conference in San Bernadino, a resort town near Asuncion. I can´t believe we are talking about close of service. It has gone incredibly fast. During the conference we spent time talking about our service, evaluating our project, thinking about opportunities after service, and working on resumes. I also found out that I have been appointed as the Peace Corps Paraguay Municipal Services Development and Rural Economic Development Projects Volunteer Coordinator which is a job I applied for about a month ago. This will extend my service another 13 months in the Peace Corps Paraguay Office in Asuncion starting in August. With this job I will coordinate the volunteers, serve as an assistant to the Program Manager, and travel all over the country visiting volunteers. It will hopefully be an exciting experience. | | |
| Inauguration of the Public LibraryThe City of Horqueta inaugurated the Public Library last Monday, a project that I have worked on for almost 2 years now. It was really rewarding to see the turnout for the inauguration especially with the cold weather and rain. When it gets cold in Paraguay, Paraguayans don't really leave their house and I don't blame them. It gets cold, the roads turn to mud, and their is no way to dry clothes. It's almost like a snow day in the United States. But on this particular night about 50 people made it out to the Public Library inauguration. So many people that we hardly had space in the library for everyone. The Director of Peace Corps Paraguay, Michael Eschleman, attended and he gave a really moving speach. The mayor and a youth from the group Juventud Que se Mueve(Youth that Move) also spoke. Juventud Que se Mueve was the group that founded the library two years ago and the pride in their faces made all of the work worth it. The Horqueta Public Library is officially open Monday through Friday from 1 PM until 5 PM and contains over 1000 books. I recently wrote a grant to receive $5,000 for the library in order to buy a photo copy machine, a computer with a printer, 84 university level books, a new bookshelf, 3 tables, 28 chairs and a desk with the hopes that it will create a sustainable public library. I will find out within the next couple of weeks if the grant is approved. Why a Public Library? Well, to buy a book in Paraguay, one will have to pay the same price that we would pay in the United States. That is rather difficult to do in Horqueta when the average citizen makes $2 a day. And now we wonder why people in Paraguay are illiterate and can't advance themselves through education. They don't have books! Even the high schools and universities in Horqueta don't have books. So, the idea of the founders of the public library is to provide books that can be lent for free so that people can advance their education and their future by learning to read and having access to books, computers, and internet. | | |
| Cold Weather in ParaguayIt has been so long since it has gotten cold in Paraguay that I forgot that it does get cold. Northern Paraguay was hit with some major rain storms yesterday that caused the weather to cool off. I am walking around in a sweater and jeans today which was unheard of a week ago. I´ll give it about two days before it is hot as h--l again. One of the major initiatives of the new mayor is to clean up the city. Part of my current work is assisting the Secretary of the Environment in the Municipality to organize a project of major city cleanup and environmental education. We invited another Peace Corps Volunteer, Shannon Smith, up to do two workshop on managing trash on Wednesday. The first workshop was for authorities of which many did not show up and the second one was for teachers and youth of which about 50 people showed up. It shows who are the ones who care about the public health disaster that is associated with the mess of trash that we have in the city. | | |
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