Day 2: We made it!

As we arrived late last night, we almost had a big problem. Hannah forgot her passport on the plane as we were arriving in Asuncion. Luckily, she remembered shortly after she exited the plane, so her and Dr. White were running to go get it. We were all so relieved when they came back with the passport before the plane departed to its' next stop.

We were greeted by our hosts, Christopher & Marcelo. They were very friendly and welcoming to us. They took us to our hotel and on the way we experienced the extreme traffic. It was mind blowing to see because of the mass amount of cars and motorcycles as well as people walking. We had asked what the speed limit was and they replied, "I don't know, I know there is one but no one follows it." We all thought it was quite humorous. After we changed we went to watch the end of a trail class at the huge fair going on here. Marcelo showed us around the fair grounds and we got to see the native horse breed they named Criollo. The breed interested all of us because they were short, while still maintaining a thick bone structure, and displaying diverse colored coats. It was definitely a breed that all of us would be interested in owning one day.

To end the night, they took us to a steak house at the fair grounds. We got to meet Marcelo's girlfriend, Dirce. She was a foreign exchange student in Alaska during part of her high school career so she speaks very good English. She has been our saving grace as far as translating when we are out with her so Brenda can get a break from all of us asking her to translate for us!! At dinner, they ordered an appetizer that had their form of potatoe, with pork and lamb sausage. This was all served on a skillet like plate that was kept warm at the table because there were coals under it. Later they brought out some beef to add with the sausage. It turned out that steak house carried Brangus beef which is absolutely delicious. They also had an assorted bread basket set out that had soft rolls, colored cracker sticks, and small pieces of toasted garlic bread (brucheta). With this, they had two types of sauces that you could put on everything. One was similar to our pico de gallo but had more of an olive oil base and was called chime churi. They also had a parsley, olive oil, and garlic mix that added great flavor. Both of these were very good and could be used with all the different breads. Later, they had us try a famous food from Paraguay called chipa. They ordered two different types of this which had very different tastes, texture, and looks. Sopa (thicker type more similar to corn bread but had a thick pastry texture), and original chepa (larger pieces of corn but looks to be more "gooey" and had a more tart taste. This one was also more crisp on the edges and had a darker color.

The meat on a skillet

A delicious assortment of bread

It was strange when we looked at the menu and saw that the price of a hamburger we 12,000 or 12 mil. It probably freaked you out also seeing this but it's really not that much, only about $5.00 US. For dinner everyone ordered something different which was nice to see the differences of their culture. Our hosts and their friends were very kind and shared their food so we could try a little bit of everything. We all carried on conversations throughout the night asking them about their culture and lives along with answering questions they had about us. Overall it was a nice pleasant dinner, and everyone was so welcoming to us and our minimal Spanish speaking skills (besides Brenda) who has been our saving grace. After dinner, we went back to the hotel and all fell asleep after a long few days of traveling. Our first days experience was quite a show. We got to experience the rush of adrenaline in the airport, the fear of driving across town in the traffic, their agricultural expo, dinner with close friends, and currency exchange. The language barrier has been a challenge but everyone here has been a huge help and all of us estamos practicando (are practicing). We are all very grateful for the amount of time and effort Dr. White has put into this trip so we could all have this amazing life experience! Thank you, Dr. White, AQHA, and APCM. Until next time hasta luego! :)