Tortilla Takeover

Month 13! Happy fall (for those in the northern hemisphere) and Halloween. Due to the connotations with the devil in a very Catholic country, they do not celebrate Halloween here, but of course I will still be dressing up and eating lots of candy. So let's recap what I've been up to this month.

As I mentioned in my last post, my project "cooking with the huerta" took off and was in full swing in October. I made tortillas 10 separate times, 7 of which were at my main elementary school; the profes got to eat lots of freshly made tortillas, and I have received the accolade of "Pretty Good Tortilla Maker for an American." They are a super easy snack to make, and it's a great way to harvest green onions and lettuce from the huerta, so the students get to taste the fruit of their semester-long weeding and watering labor. However, they are literally fried dough, and I have had to stop eating the tortillas as I cook them because it makes me (and my skin) feel terrible. But the teachers keep asking if I'll bring my recipe back to the US, so get ready to try them too!

On October 5th, Ziggy and I made our way to the Training Center in Capiatá and got to spend the week meeting and helping out with C12's (the new environmental cohort) Pre-Service Training. We spent the week sitting in on language classes, helping with technical training like making composts, and giving personal examples of what environmental education looks like in our lives at site. It was such a rewarding week because it just doesn't feel that long ago since I was in their exact situation (even though it's been an entire year. Hello?). The 27 trainees are all so sweet, prepared, and enthusiastic, and it was amazing to meet them at the beginning of their journey since we will have a full year in Paraguay together once they swear in as volunteers on December 3rd (my half birthday, in case you were wondering).

During this week, we made some delicious lunches, I read 3 books, a lot of time was spent with the training center cat, and also my emotional support water bottle was sadly crushed. This Owala has been by my side since the start of senior year of college and has therefore been on quite the journey with me, so I may or may not have cried over her death (but not to worry, I now have a Princess Pink replacement). I also got to visit and chat with my host mom from training, which is always wonderful.

The weekend we returned from training just so happened to be Ziggy's site's Patron Saint Day, so Sam, Aiden, Taylor, and Nico all came to celebrate in Yataity. We celebrated by going on beautiful walks and runs, listening to lots of acoustic guitar music, and attending a live music party that STARTED at 1 am (the Paraguayan timeline continues to remain a mystery). The next day there was supposed to be a torín (rodeo), but it was cancelled due to rain. Thanks to the phenomenon of El Niño, Paraguay is currently experiencing unprecedented moisture and flooding (check out this article about Iguazú Falls). So instead we spent the day cozied up, eating soup and watching Pirates of the Caribbean—sounds pretty perfect to me!

The next week, after even more tortilla-making workshops, 1/3 of C12 arrived in Guairá for their Tech Excursion. This is the first of two trips the trainees will take to visit current volunteer sites to see how they live, what kind of projects they're doing, and what to expect from service. The two-day, one-night trip was spent equally between Ziggy's site and mine. In Yataity, we watched Ziggy present and give out awards for her zero-trash Green Olympics initiative at her high school, had lunch at the German restaurant in my town famous for its gigantic döners, planted trees at Digna E. while the students were in the middle of a school-wide sports competition (yes, it was as chaotic as it sounds), then played games with the students at my host mom's school. The trainees got to see my house, and we were off back to Yatiaty to play voleí and spend the night at a gorgoues posadas (inn, basically). The next morning, we learned about the process of Ao Po'i, the traditional artisanal embroidery famous in Ziggy's town—so cool and educational.

And then these last two weeks have been spent (can you guess?) making more tortillas! But also planting and caring for the rest of the trees we didn't get to during Tech Excursion. I have been attempting to increase my running mileage, painting more, reading (anyone want to connect on Goodreads?), and being cognisant of my social media usage (i.e., engaging my critical thinking skills and pondering the increase of anti-intellectualism in America, but there's a lot to unpack there).

The last days of school are during Thanksgiving week, so we're winding down, but November will be filled with lots of end-of-year celebrations and Ferías Pedagogicas. The closest comparison I can draw to the states is a science fair, but with each grade working together on a project and presentation. They then speak about the work they've done and why it's important. Digna E had their end-of-semester fería today, and it was so cool to see all my students present on topics they have learned this year. We finished with a huge lunch for all the teachers, which was very rewarding. I will also be headed back to the Training Center one more time in November for a one-day event in which I get to talk about my reading club, so the trainees can learn about possible "secondary projects" available to them.

So that's October done and dusted! It continues to be mind-boggling that I have now spent more than a year in Paraguay, but I still have more than a year to go; every day I am realizing new aspects of how and why this Peace Corps experience is so unique. Hope you are all having a wonderful autumn—carve a pumpkin and eat a 3 Musketeers for me please! Maya 💚💚💚