Almost Done

Its been a while since we did a posting, but we have been really busy and haven´t really had reliable internet. We spent 3 days in Corrientes, it is a very old city that was settled by the spanish. It is the city of murals. We had 2 radio interview and 2 newspaper interviews. We had two Rotary meeting in Corrientes that were a little difficult, but we made it through it. After Corrientes the Club from Resistencia picked us up and we boarded a boat and went up river to Paso de la Patria to a vacation beach house. It was awesome and we really needed the down time. We spent Fathers Day there and we all had our families on our mind. Then we took the boat back down to Resistencia where we spent a night there. We had a great pizza party dinner with some great dancing after dinner.

The next morning we spent some time in Resistencia where we learned more about the culture. Resistencia is the city of sculptures and we met some local artists and viewed some of the sculptures. After lunch the club drove us to General San Martin, where we were well recieved. We spent two nights in San Martin and the people in the club were awesome. You could say we were smothered with kindness. On the last night we gave our best presentation and then had another great night of dancing. The club in San Martin is the youngest in district and it showed. We were sad to leave.

We are now in Formosa and we spent one night here. We were treated to some great live music last night at the Formosa club. It was our last Rotary club meeting of the trip. Today we leave for Asuncion and we will spend one night there and we catch a plane to Buenos Aires tomorrow evening. Tim leaves from Asuncion to the States. Rod, Nima, and I will spend two nights in Buenos where we are free to do as we please. After 4 weeks of having everything planned for us, it will be nice to finally be in charge of what we want to do. We have had a great trip and met so many wonderful people, but we are exhausted. We will show our photos when we return. This might be the last posting of the trip, but we will see. Thanks for reading!
Neil

Damn Big Dam!

We had a great meeting in Encarnacion, with TV cameras, interviews, everything. We find out we are spending a night in Posadas, across the border in Argentina, so we pack up and head out. Some Rotarians from Posadas pick us up and drive us across the border. We are delivered to our families. Before we eat lunch, we are interviewed by the local newspaper and they take a photo of the group. Lunch is at the family I am staying with, Claudio and Marta. They are a great couple and they prepare an awesome lunch with plenty of carne and wine. After such a meal we all rest for a while.

We have a Rotary meeting that night, and there are a lot of people at the meeting, probably the biggest one yet. We give a great presentation and everybody loves it. The presentations are getting easier everytime we do one.

After the meeting we head out to check out the town a little bit. Posadas is a great little city, awesome downtown with fountains and tons of places to eat and drink. You can walk to everything. We have a few drinks at one of the bars along the shoreline.

However, there is a dark side here called Yacyreta. It is a huge dam that has flooded a huge area, parts of Posadas and Encarnacion have been submerged. Thousands and thousands of people have been relocated. Its taken about 20 years to complete and cost 10 times the proposed amount, largely due to all the relocation and construction associated with the new shoreline. My host family describes it as a model of corruption. Many people are very opposed to the project.

We pack up and head out of Posadas on our way to Corrientes. We pick up the paper with our interview and photo, we are all named by name, very cool. Along the way to Corrientes we stop and visit the Yacycreta Dam. It is enormous, but its different than Itaipu. It really seems like a poor place to build a dam, it make us wonder who really profited from the dam.

We are meet some Rotarians from Corrientes at a restaurant and eat lunch. They drive us to Corrientes and deliver us to our host families. We will be here for 3 days and we have meetings tonight and tomorrow night.

Neil

Encarnacion, Paraguay

Need to catch up on a few things. Since leaving Puerto Iguazu in Argentina we traveled to the town of El Dorado, but on the way we stopped at a posh hotel to check it out. I think I know where my next getaway will be. We arrive in El Dorado and its just after Argentina won its first World Cup game and tons of people are in the streets waving flags, honking horns, and everybody is wearing an Argentina jersey. Nima and I stay with a nice family and Rod and Tim stay with a German family, in different houses. We go out to a horse ranch and ride horse, drink mate and have some snacks. The ranch is awesome, out in the county just how a ranch should be. We go to a nice dinner that night, its just an informal gathering.

The next morning we board a bus and head to Posadas, Argentina where we are met by some Rotarians that drive us across the border to Encarnacion, Paraguay. They put us up in hotel because they think we might be tired of staying with families, not true, but we go along. Once we get checked in we call our best friend in Encarnacion, Belen (from Team 4845)! She comes out to meet us and takes us on a nice tour of the city and we get to meet her family, very cool, and of course they are a great family. We have another nice informal dinner at one of the Rotarians house, everybody is so kind! Belen, the sweetheart she is brings us all Paraguay World Cup jerseys, we love Belen!

This morning (monday) we eat breakfast and go out to the Jesuit Ruins, "Ruinas Jesuiticas", built in 1720. Belen once again is our tour guide, well sort of, she translates from the real tour guide. Really cool, and an amazing sight. We have lunch with some Rotarians out in some smaller towns outside of Encarnacion. The area has a strong agriculture economy based mainly on soy and mate. It is causing some problems with the aquifer, acuifero Guarani, one of the largest aquifers in the world. We visit with the University where we hear about studies on the aquifer, there is much work to be done and I think I might have found potential work, very exciting. They are very eager to receive professional help. Just have to see what happens.

Afterwards we go to Roberto's house and catch the second half of the Paraguay World Cup match against Italy and there are a bunch of people there. Today was declared a national holiday due to the match and everybody is wearing their Paraguay jerseys. Tonight we have a presentation with all of the Rotary clubs here (3). We love it in Paraguay! We leave tomorrow to Corrientes Argentina, we think? There is something exciting about not knowing exactly what is going on and what we are doing! We are looking forward to seeing our friends in Corrientes (Albertina, Ana, Grima, and Gustavo from Resistencia)!
Neil

Back home Paraguay!

We are back in Paraguay for the next two days, the beer is flowing and the women are beautiful! The city we are in is Encarnacion, it is known for its beautiful women and I forgot what else. I updated the comments section so everyone can post an anonymous post, just leave your name in the post if you want. We will post a more complete update with some photos a little later. Thanks for reading!
Neil

Iguazu Falls!

We are now Puerto Iguazu in Argentina. We arrived last night, but that was after hanging out with our friends in Cuidad del Este for most of the day. We were treated to an amazing lunch at a 5 star hotel, best meal of the trip so far. Then we drove to the 3 points, where Paraguay, Argentina, and Brazil meet, it is a confluence where the Rio Iguazu meets the Rio Parana . We took the ferry over to the nice tourist town Puerto Iguazu in Argentina. We are sad to leave Paraguay because we have been treated so well, the people are so kind and generous there.

We are staying in nice hotel in the town. After checking in we took a walk to an overlook of the 3 points, its beautiful. For dinner we went to a nice restaurant that had some awesome live music. They described it as mountain music, but it was pretty much one guy that played guitar and the flute, with a base player. Some other people would join in playing a drum. A couple would do some traditional dances also, and I think I fell in love with the girl dancer, beautiful and a great dancer. It was the most fun night of the trip.

We got up this morning and ate some breakfast then went to the Iguazu Falls National Park. We had our own personal tour guide. There are many falls and they are incredible. We take a few different walks to different vantage points of the falls, then we take a boat ride that goes under one of the falls, we get soaked. Then we eat a late lunch and go back to the hotel for a siesta. We leave for El Dorado in the morning.
Neil

El Ciudad del Este

The party was last night was great, lots of food, mostly meat of course. I think I might be a vegetarian for a while when I get back home. We spent the day today checking out the sites of El Ciudad del Este. First we go to an orphanage, then we go to El Centro in el ciudad, it is a outdoor shopping area where you literally are walking through tunnels of merchandise along the side walks. Seems like you can buy anything. Its crazy. Then we walk out to the bridge over the Rio Parana, which borders Brazil so we can say we went to Brazil, actually we went to Brazil yesterday because the Itaipu Dam is on the border too. The border is crazy! Then we eat some lunch and visit the Salto Falls on the Rio Monday. They are awesome falls, but everybody here doesn't think much of them because the Iguazu falls are so much bigger, still impressive though. We see Iguazu in a couple of days. Tonight we have a Rotary Meeting and we leave for Puerto Iguazu tomorrow about mid-day. We have been well taken care of here in El Cuidad del Este and we are very grateful to our hosts.

Dam big day!

Yesterday we were in el campo of Paraguay in the town of Colonel Olviedo. We had a Rotary meeting the night before, it was outside and it was cold, but the food was good. We had a meeting with the mayor, had a TV interview, met with the university, and visited another water plant. Things are interesting when they don't tell you what you are going to do, the TV interview was a complete shock. They have many problems with water out in el campo and they need help. The differences between the cities and el campo are amazing. We left for Cuidad del Este at dusk. Its winter here and the days are short. It would be nice to travel in the day so we can see the country we are traveling through. Always interesting to arrive at night and wake up to see what is around you.

El Cuidad del Este is the city of electronics and Itaipu Dam, the biggest Dam in the world (right now, but those Chinese have to be #1). Everything about the Dam is huge, it is amazing how big it is. Very cool and interesting. A couple of girls from the Youth Rotary Exchange program join us, fun to have them on the tour and hear about their experiences in the program. We only spend a couple hours at the Dam and we really could spend all day.

We eat an amazing lunch at the Hotel Guarani in El Cuidad del Este and visit the Museo de Itaipu. Very interesting to hear about the Guarani people and their customs and history. The Dam displaced many people and animals in the process of filling, very sad.

Big fiesta for Raul tonight, the son of Nima and I's host family. Should be good! Not sure what is on the agenda for tomorrow, but we visit the water falls soon.
Neil