Visitors!! (Parte 1: Asunción y Circuito de Oro)

I haven’t posted in a while, but I’ve got a pretty good excuse. I had visitors! My mom and Grandma came to Paraguay for a little over two weeks to get a glimpse of my life here as well as to see some of the history of Paraguay. It was an amazing trip, and I couldn’t be more grateful for their visit.

My part of the trip began about 3 weeks ago when I left for Asunción via La Encarnacena (bus) at noon. I arrived in Asunción a little after 6 p.m. with our hotel address in hand. Unfortunately even with the address the driver still had no idea where it was, so he stopped to ask two people and called/texted others while driving to find out. I’m positive we didn’t take the most direct route, but I made it and survived. Cab drivers in Asunción are crazy, and texting while driving is nowhere close to the worst part. There were several times during this trip where we felt sure that we were going to be in an accident, but somehow scathed by with nothing.

Our hotel, Hotel Royal Gardens, was a pleasant surprise, nothing  fancy, but super cute, and the front desk staff was extremely nice. They let me ride with them to the airport to pick up mom and grandma, and the owner was a really interesting guy. I’m pretty sure he said he was American (sounded like a very native Spanish speaker to me) or at least he lived in the US for at least 30 years (working in the casino and beauty shop businesses), lived in London for 5 years and has lived in Paraguay for the last 30 years although he. He said my Spanish was pretty good, but I’m sure I made him eat his words quite a few times during the next few days.

Our first day, we visited Caacupé (Caw-koo-pay), the spiritual capital of Paraguay.  The legend of Caacupé goes that there was a native named José who lived in the Franciscan Reduction of Tobatí and was being hunted by natives from another tribe in the forest. As he was hiding he made a promise to Mary that if his life was saved he would carve a statue of the Virgin from the wood of the tree he was hiding behind. When his life was spared, he carved two identical virgins (one for the church in Tobatí and another for his personal worship). The larger statue remains in the church at Tobatí and the smaller one can be found in the basilica in Caacupé. The feast day of the Virgen of Caacupé is celebrated on December 8, the same as the Immaculate Conception, and around one million people travel to the basilica to make the pilgrimage some walking all the way from Asunción.

One would think that a bus that says Caacupé on the top goes to Caacupé and stops. And that's where you'd be wrong…As we were on the bus I saw a sign that said Caacupé and something about the basilica. Being a novice Paraguayan bus rider at this point, I figured that we would be stopping at some sort of terminal. We continued to ride the bus out of town ( probably for at least 5 or 10 more minutes) with all of us thinking we must just be making some sort of loop before coming back to the city center. As I start to look around and make eye contact with the bus driver, he kindly told me that yes, we had indeed passed Caacupé and needed to get off to take another bus. Oops! On our way back to Caacupé we got on one of the most crowded buses I’ve ever been on. Mom was standing right next to the door, which the driver didn’t close because he either thought he couldn’t or didn’t want to stifle the bus more than it already was. So, when at the next stop there were three people waiting I thought no way. However, the driver summoned them on. He finally drew the line when a man with a huge basket of Chipa tried to get on. Thank goodness. At this point I’m pretty sure mom was practically sitting on his shoulder.

Mom & Grandma's first of many Paraguaany bus rides.

 The basilica was beautiful, and I’m pretty sure we spent more time there than the average person, partly because I read/translated all of the signs (with the help of my dictionary) and story of the Virgin that was depicted and told as we climbed the stairs to the rotunda, and I am unfortunately not quite as fast as Google Translate.

The basilica at Caacupé.

 

The stained glass window depicting the story of the Virgen de Caacupe.

One of the images on the way up to the rotunda explaining the story.

View from the rooftop.

We also stopped by a small chapel and well, the Tupãsý Ykuá óé, where the water is supposed to have healing qualities.

Day two began at the U.S. Embassy because I needed to add pages to my passport. It was nothing what I expected and to be honest a letdown. I didn’t even talk to a single American! The two people that helped me were Paraguayan contractors and though they spoke English, it just wasn’t the same. There was however, a very American U.S. citizen (that we assume was married to a Paraguayan) wearing a Pittsburgh Steelers  sweatshirt and baseball cap. Upon walking into the embassy he said, “Man it really sucks when you don’t see George W. Bush’s photo on the wall,” as he saw the photo of President Obama. Later, his wife told him in Spanish to get number. His reply, “I got my numero.” Spanglish in its truest form. They both obviously understood everything the other was saying, but each spoke pretty much in their native tongue. Loved it. I wasn’t allowed to take photos of the embassy even from the street, although I did quickly snap one which led to some finger shaking from the (Paraguayan) guards. Regardless of the letdown, I now have 26 more pages to fill! However, I’m pretty sure people are scared to stamp them because so far they’ve just looked at them and then squeezed stamps onto other pages that in my opinion are already full.

From the embassy we hopped on a city bus and headed downtown to see the sights. We stopped by the Plaza Uruguaya first, and then moved onto the Estación de Ferrocarril (the old train station), the Plaza de los Héroes for souvenirs, the Panteón, the Casa de la Independencia museum, Manzana de la Rivera museum, Palacio de Lopez, Plaza de Marzo Paraguayo, Cabildo, the Cathedral and then to the same restaurant where Caitlin and I went the last time we were in Asunción for a delicious lunch. My first Caesar salad in 6 months, and it was great! After lunch we headed a little bit outside the city center and stopped by La Encarnación Church. From there we continued to walk even further to find the Jesuit Cristo Rey Church. After much walking and only finding the school, I made the executive decision to head back to the hotel for a much needed dinner (a girl with limited Spanish can only translate and ask questions to strangers for so long). We hopped on a city bus again and made it back to the hotel in one piece, although a nice lady did tell Grandma to hide her gold cross necklace because someone might try to yank it off—a little reality check for Mom and Grandma. I think one of the things I’m most proud of from our trip is our ability to master public transit and the crowded buses of Asunción. It is no small feat, and considering my guide book only mentions specific buses to take for the airport we were amazing. With no signs or vocal indications of where you’re arriving and having my space invaded on a constant basis we did good.

Our hotel was in a nice quiet neighborhood, Las Carmelitas, (an American consulate and French consulate lived a few houses down) and it was close to the newer (and nicer) part of Asunción. If you only saw that part you wouldn’t even know you were in Paraguay, not what I was expecting, but we headed to a Mexican restaurant and although the Paraguayan take on Mexican food is different from what I experienced in New Mexico and definitely from the TexMex we call Mexican in the rest of the States it was delicious. And, our margarita was the perfect way to top off the night.

Day three we headed to Luque, Itá and Yaguarón. Luque is known for harps, guitars and silver filigree. It was a cute town with a picturesque church. I introduced Mom and Grandma to Amandau too, a Paraguayan ice cream chain, that I and the sisters frequent.

From Luque (after asking at least five different people including another bus driver) we hopped on the most crowded bus I’ve ever been on (people were literally hanging out the door) to Itá. After about 20 minutes Mom and Grandma were able to score some seats, but I had to stand for the remaining 20 minutes. Luckily though, I met a young girl, Joanna, who I had a great conversation with and who helped us know when it was time to get off. We learned our lesson in Caacupé. Our visit to Itá was short (it’s known for its ceramic pottery), mainly just to see the church that is dedicated to Saint Blaise. However, once we got to the church we realized there was a funeral going on so we snapped a few pictures of the outside and headed back to catch another bus.

It was a quick ride to Yaguarón, in comparison, and I struck up another conversation with someone to ensure that we got off at the right spot. The church in Yaguarón is definitely the main attraction and rightly so. It is beautiful. It is the original church from the Franciscan Reductions that were founded around 1586. The church was restored in the 1880s and again in the 20^th century. The wood carvings and painted ceilings are impressive to say the least. It was by far my favorite church that we saw.

Sunday we headed to Encarnación after doing the day’s readings in our hotel by ourselves as we were unsuccessful in finding a nearby church that was having Mass. Masstimes.org isn’t quite as up-to-date in Paraguay as in the U.S. and we learned that unlike in the U.S. where most churches post Mass times outside it’s not always the custom in Paraguay.

Click here or visit my Photos page to see my whole facebook album of photos from our trip because uploading them how I want them on my blog just takes WAY too much time.