Simple and Easy are Not the Same

One of the first things Elvio said about the United States was "I love it here. Life is so easy!"

In Paraguay if you don't have something you make it from scratch or just go without. Here it's just a short drive to the store where you can find 25 varieties of the thing you want. If that's not simple enough for you, you can buy everything you could possibly want on the internet and have it shipped straight to your doorstep.

To have a car in Paraguay is a status symbol. I knew two families in my community with a car. Elvio was noticing how every house we passed had at least one car in the driveway and many time two or three.

The last few weeks we spent out at Elvio's parent's house we passed much of the day around the wood-burning stove drinking mate, cooking meals together and just spending time together. At night we would all cuddle under blankets in one bed and watch a movie on TV.

A friend of the family was telling us yesterday how much he would love to live that slower pace of life but how it's nearly impossible to do so in our society. When I translated that for Elvio he laughed and told me that most Paraguayans want to come to the US because we have it so easy. Creature comforts, jobs, money in the bank account (yes, I realize that it not true for everyone but from the perspective of someone from a developing country, everyone here is rich).

I do love the creature comforts and I have been stuffing my face at every meal and taking abnormally long hot showers. But we still take the time to slow it down each day. We drink our mate and terere and spend time together. We don't have jobs right now but I sincerely hope that once school and work start in August we'll be able to hold on to some of the simple life.