(The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.)

I am finally free from training … but it’s more like “free again” in general and my new home-base of Santaní couldn't be more of a breath of fresh air.


(Hand-filling the bus with fuel on my way down Ruta 3 from Asuncion to San Estanislao, aka Santaní)

It’s day three and I woke up this morning from a revitalizing dream, where ♫ We built this city on rock-and-roll ♪ was playing in the background and I must have been dancing. What can be a better tune to start the day for a Community Economic Development Peace Corps volunteer?

I have already met with a representative from the international NGO, PLAN Paraguay, and will be covering a story this Friday for Día de los Ninos, where I’ll be dressed as a clown and playing games with disabled children along-side the ROTARACT club members. The ROTARACT Club, aka Rotary International, is a local community group of 18 to 30-year-olds and is one of my contacts here. (A contact is someone involved in the group that put the request in for a PC volunteer).

My other contact, Profesora Myrian and I also met and are working to get the Peace Corps business plan course I will be teaching instituted into the education system. My plan for sustainability is to both implement it into the curriculum in certain vocational schools and universities, and to teach Paraguayan instructors to teach it. (It’s currently in the classrooms of PC volunteers only).

And there’s more action in the works involving a charla or talk at Día de la Alfabetizacion, aka Literacy Day, and training indigenous women about entrepreneurship and micro-financing through PLAN … but again, it’s day three!

Although, I must add to my happy launch of goodness rant, that I found a stunning and topographically challenging fire-road run through the countryside that begins a half mile from my door, and I built a desk at a total cost of ₲23,000, which is roughly $5.23 and a bit of elbow grease.


(Veggie crates from the local market, nails, sand paper and some thick string = cute, rustic efficiency)

♫Don't tell us you need us, 'cause we're the ship of fools,
Looking for America coming through your schools

Don't you remember, we built this city
We built this city on rock and roll ø