Buenas tardes a todo desde Libertad del Sur! Hope you’re all doing super bien out there and gettin ready for summer or winter or whatever is comin your way. As for me, I’m on the summer side of the globe and it’s starting to warm up. The past week saw the shaving of the winter beard and an end to two day’s of wear for shirts – consequently, more laundry… Mosquitoes are picking up and I’ve taken out the third pike this month (remember the egg laying insect that likes to burrow into the feet?). The garden is coming along nicely, newly featuring some super fast growing cucumber and some of the biggest cabbage heads I’ve eaten, and plenty of carrots and beets just screaming for the purchase of a blender to make some juice.
Speaking of gardening, before I start wandering too far into the rambling stories of a campo gringo, I feel the need to hit anyone who may be reading this up for some cash. I’m hoping to help out my local school with some infrastructure that will help to expand the role of the school garden within the community. As mentioned before here, several people have gardens here, but many of them are extremely limited in the variety of veggies they grow as well as the times of the year they try to grow them. The school garden is mandatory in Paraguayan schools, but to varying success of implementation and maintenance. In Libertad del Sur the garden is currently looking pretty good, but about to fall into disarray over the 3 month summer break. The parents committee recently constructed a comedor ( a school kitchen) on the grounds next to the garden. By purchasing shading, posts, wire and some wood we can make the necessary renovations to the current garden (with the parents committee’s help) that would allow them to grow veggies year round and feed a portion of the comedor’s supply needs. As it is now, without the shading, it is hard to maintain many veggies under an incredibly intense sun. When school starts again in February we can plant again, but then it isn’t ready until near the end of the semester. I plan to hold monthly trainings with all community members invited at the school garden as well as rotating daily watering responsibilities through the summer months with the students families. They’ll get more involved in the school and community, while learning a lot about new/different styles of gardening and varieties of food. I’m also hoping to cook with the mothers of the students in the comedor to show many ways to cook unappreciated things like brocoli and cauliflower. Anyways, it would be a big help! If you’d like to contribute go to www.peacecorps.gov , click on ‘donate to volunteer projects’ and then look up Pattullo, or project number 526-216.

In other news, the hopes grow for the grand agroforestry/reforestation project with yerba mate. The application will be re-submitted by the end of the month and hopefully I’ll get started on some trainings and such in March. The school garden is looking fine, but needing to be replanted. Afraid to do that until there’s some shading (hint hint).
The well is going on nearly a month with consistent relatively clean water! The lake in the forest of the San Rafael Reserve is getting warmer and I’ve gotten to take a few croc and snake free swims so far this year.
Sadly, the mora berry season is closed, but the peach season is coming in strong! Won’t be too long before the pineapple and watermelons abound. Sweaty summer afternoons passing the terere guampa and a half of a watermelon with a spoon among friends and family are in the very near future. As hot as it may get, it is always nice to shower in an open ceiling wooden ‘bathin box’ in my backyard watching the moonrise over the soy fields and sporadic wood lots at the end of a long hot day. After a chilly winter and lots of hurried heated bucket baths, I’m excited for the warmth and the charms that come with a summer in the simple silent campo Paraguay. Silent except for these crazy shrieking beetles that cling to the trees and scream for 10 second intervals throughout the day – at first I hated it when the kids would kill them with the slingshots, but after a few months of EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE I started to understand.
Thats all for now, terrehoporaite…