does he know how to do it, or does he know how to do it.....

basketbal court update.....

and now we have something to put it into...

oooo.....

abd the camp is called

ñande hae tenonderá...


this means ´we are the future´ pretyt much in guarani

been a while....

so yes i know its been a while since my last post.......wellll december was a month filled with visiting other volunteers, other cities, but nothing dramatically exciting

this past week however was the youth leadership camp in Itaipu, resort Tati Yupi. (itaipu means the sound a rock makes, and tati yupi means rising smoke). Side note, itaipu is THE largest functioning hydro electric dam in the world....haha and located in such a tiny middle of nowhere place. crazy.

anways for four days 20 volunteers from all over the country brought 3 or 4 jovenes or youth ages 15 to 19, to this resort for a leadership camp. i brought jorge, hernan and jose. there were a variety of speaches and presentations from youth to the youth and also done by volunteers. we taught them a variety of things pertaining to what it takes to be a leader in their community. there was also a number of activities done.

there was a lot of down time too, to play futbol, volei, talk and walk around exploring the amazingly beautiful park, forest, lake. friday night we took a fieldtrip to the dam to watch them light it up at night. it was pretty intense. amazingly huge. one second there was just darkness and the next, BAM a huge lit up dam.

but anways, more importantly was that the kids loved it!!! they had such a good time, learned a lot, and made a ton of new friends! the goal is that they go back to their communities and do a community project within the next 6 months. then we have another camp where all the same jovenes meet up to present the projects they have complete. this is only the second time the camp has been done but from what it seems like, it will be around for a while. awesomeness!!

so this is how you know your in peace corps paraguay...

my mom sent me a basketball in the mail. but in my pueblo there is nowhere to play....so what do you have to do?

you have to build yourself a basketball court.


and thats wat i have recently started doing. i got the support of the mayor to place it next to the highschool. the carpenter made me the backboard which i am in the middle of painting and the father of the family who i am living with is going to make me the hoop out of iron.....

i will keep you updated on this and hopefully post pictures!!!

...btw

in the background of the photo on the blackboard is a crazy little story that i wrote in perfect Guaraní....how freakin awesome is that!!

Colación de mi primera Clase de Inglés

so yesterday was the last day of english class and this morning we had our little graduation party. only three of the five kids could make it but still everybody brought food and we had a good time. i handed out certificates and we took pictures. it was awesome. i feel like this picture pretty much expresses how everybody felt.

i am planning on starting class again in january after the holidays and all the kids showed interest in coming and entering my class again. I am excited to see their enthusiasm.

it was an awesome morning!!

......

this last weekend was the celebration of the foundation of my town of fulgencio yegros. it turned 119 years old. wow!!
haha the festival started thursday ngiht with a play and talent show in the amphiteatre. friday night there was a festival in the plaza along with bull fighting in the amphiteatre. afterwards there was a concert until about 5 or 6 in the morning.

sooo many people came from all over to be here and the town was hopping.

saturday night was the big night though. there was bulfighting followed by a dance party followed by a concert given by the most famous singer in paraguay right now.

her name i La Kchorra which means the puppy. but her songs are heard alll the time everywhere!!! so to have her come to our little town was a big deal. she didnt end up going on stage until about 5 am which meant that almost the entire town was up to see the sunrise together. kind fo cool

i think i ended up making it back to my bed around 1030 the next day.

then sunday night was one last night a bullfighting.


the bullfighting is pretty awesome. its not the one where they kill the bull but there are guys in nice outfits with the red capes and a clown and cowboys. like a bulfight slash rodeo almost. but was really neat to see.

cant really right too much more write now. but more to come soon!

love you all

charley

so the last couple weeks....

so havent been able to post in a while. ive been travelling a lot throughout paraguay...started with thanksgiving.

about 100 peacecorps volunteers met up in the southern city of incarnacion where we all stayed at this really nice hotel with a giant pool. there were a variety of activities and amazing food. we got to eat everything. turkey with gravey, potatoes, stuffing, and i even got a slice of canned cranberry sauce...

the culmination of the weekended was the dance party the last night of our stay. my friend had come to the dance floor and not realizing it had knocked over a wine bottle which broke and the glass had entered her foot. she finally realized that she was leaking blood all over the place and somebody carried her out of the room. when the lights went on we saw that there was blood all over the floor. i had never seen so much blood before in my life. haha they blocked off the area then every just moved over the the other side of the dance floor, the lights went off, and the majority kept dancing.

me and a few others went over to take care of her. we wrapped her foot up with our shirts. she was bleeding heavily and almost fainted. finally me and my friend carried her to the car where a driver took the three of us to the hostpital travelling at 100 miles per hour. the greatest part was that me and my friend were both shirtless and my friend didnt even have any pants on. dont ask why...another story for another time.

we arrived at the hospital and my friend who is in his boxers waits in the lobby and falls asleep so i enter into the emergency room shirtless to help hold my friends hand and watch them stitch her up.

she made it out alive. and i think its finally reached the point where we can retell the story and just laugh about how ridiculous it was.


soo after thanksgiving my group travels across the country to the capital asuncion to have a reunion and talk about our problems and also learn some new tools to help out us. we were also able to stay with our original host families in ypane. it was nice to get to see everyone again.

the following weekend i travelled to villa rica to celebrate my birthday and my best friends birthday. we danced the night away. i ended up getting stuck there for a few days due to rain....


and finally we reach my brithday which was last tuesday.....did i have a birthday!!!

i ended up buying 1000 40`s of cerveza and almost half a cow. we had a bbq at my house and half the town came. we partied all day and then at night there was the highschool graduation where we continued to celebrate my brithday until the sun came up at about 7 am.....finally it was time to call it quits haha

and finally this last weekend almost all the volunteers went to asuncion to celebrate the new group of volunteer´s graduation and also for a concert consisting of bands created by the volunteers themselves. it was a very lindo party and we celebrate to the utmost......


so that has been a recap of my past two weeks......sorry i kind of rushed through it all but estoy un poco apurado

te amo
ciao
karlo!!