It depends...

I got back from Practica Larga today and I must say, I missed Santo Domingo a LOT. I never thought I would feel so at home with a family that was not my own and that spoke another language but I really do love it here and I was so happy to be back. I really missed the other volunteers too.

Long Field was really good. I was near the town of Caraguatay in Cordillera. Our group was super guapo (“guapo” meaning hard-working in this country, not handsome. Although we were pretty good-looking too). We built a fogón, a trash pit (supposed to be a latrine but the guy changed his mind about where he wanted the hole), a latrine, visited a school, and did a couple charlas. My group did our nutrition charla in Guaraní while we cooked with a women's commission. Our plans changed a lot throughout the week due to rain and mishaps with the fogón but it all worked out. We were supposed to do a radio show but it rained all day Tuesday.

The town was very interesting. The family I stayed with had a very chuchi house—tile floors, real living room, electric shower (I got a warm shower one night for the first time in 7 weeks!), maltise poodles, and a computer with internet. But then we walked 3km to build the fogón, which was veeeery far away according to my family, and it was completely different. Five people were living in one room, they cooked on the ground outside and had a latrine. And kids from both of these barrios went to the same school. It was interesting, and sad, to see the dichotomy there.

I named this blog what I did because I was thinking about daylight savings time. You all in the States have already changed your clocks but we have yet to do so. When I asked my tech trainer when daylight savings time is here, he said that we actually might not do it this year. Huh?! So I guess it's usually in April but who knows. It might not happen this year. Which gets me to my point. Peace Corps so far has been a lot of “Oh it depends...” and “We'll see” and “Maybe”. Not to mention that when you ask a Paraguayan a question, they will give you an answer even if it's not the right one. So you should probably ask 3 or 4 people and accept the answer you get the most.

Two months ago, this way of doing things would have driven me nuts. I am someone who likes to be on time to things and who likes to know when stuff (like daylight savings time) is going to happen. But ya know, it doesn't really matter. I'm learning to live one day at a time and to enjoy the time that I have. The Paraguayan view is that people should not be a slave to time but that time works for people. It's a lot less stressful when you just go with the flow.