Before going to Curuguaty, we had unsuccessfully tried to call Don Insfran and Doña Elva’s (the owners of the house that we had rented in Curuguaty) brother-in-law, Diosnel. The number for Diosnel and Dora’s landline phone didn’t work (I later learned that 2 digits had been added to Curuguaty phone numbers). We had also tried unsuccessfully to get in contact with them through Vicente & Filipina’s son who works in Curuguaty. We thought that everything would be okay, as long as we could find them in Curuguaty. They would probably have a room where we could spend the night, and if not, we could stay at a hotel.
After getting into our taxi for Curuguaty, John asked me where exactly we should tell our taxi driver to go. I had thought that we could just direct him where to go when we arrived in Curuguaty. I was wrong. That would have been almost impossible. In 13 years, Curuguaty had changed so much that it was almost completely unrecognizable. Fortunately, I remembered that their house was a block away from Supermercado Arco Iris – one of the two supermarkets in Curuguaty. Well, 13 years later, Supermercado Arco Iris had disappeared and was replaced by a nice appliances store. The whole street corner had completely changed. As Curuguaty’s economy grew, the property owners built much nicer buildings and boosted the rent prices. Fortunately, our taxi driver remembered where Arco Iris had been located. When we arrived, I did not recognize Diosnel and Dora’s storefront and house (it had completely changed) and at first I did not recognize Doña Elva and Don Insfran’s house (they had built two housing units on either side of their house). As I looked closer, their smaller patio seemed familiar.
Nobody was home when we first arrived. It was election day and they were voting. Doña Elva soon came home with her 14 year-old granddaughter (Leticia) who we had met as a baby when we returned to visit Paraguay in 2002.
After getting into our taxi for Curuguaty, John asked me where exactly we should tell our taxi driver to go. I had thought that we could just direct him where to go when we arrived in Curuguaty. I was wrong. That would have been almost impossible. In 13 years, Curuguaty had changed so much that it was almost completely unrecognizable. Fortunately, I remembered that their house was a block away from Supermercado Arco Iris – one of the two supermarkets in Curuguaty. Well, 13 years later, Supermercado Arco Iris had disappeared and was replaced by a nice appliances store. The whole street corner had completely changed. As Curuguaty’s economy grew, the property owners built much nicer buildings and boosted the rent prices. Fortunately, our taxi driver remembered where Arco Iris had been located. When we arrived, I did not recognize Diosnel and Dora’s storefront and house (it had completely changed) and at first I did not recognize Doña Elva and Don Insfran’s house (they had built two housing units on either side of their house). As I looked closer, their smaller patio seemed familiar.
Nobody was home when we first arrived. It was election day and they were voting. Doña Elva soon came home with her 14 year-old granddaughter (Leticia) who we had met as a baby when we returned to visit Paraguay in 2002.
We had a wonderful reunion with Elva, her daughter (Elvita), her son-in-law (Alberto), Leticia, Diosnel, Dora, and Diana (Diosnel & Dora’s daughter). They were so happy to see us and immediately welcomed us. Of course they made a delicious asado with 2 different salads, sopa Paraguaya (similar to cornbread but with cheese and onions and without sugar), mandioca, soda, and wine. It was a warm, lovely day – perfect for an asado. Unfortunately, Don Insfran was in Asunción visiting family to mourn someone’s death. We missed not seeing him during our visit.
After lunch, we explored Curuguaty. Diana (Diosnel and Dora’s daughter) had a car, so she was our chauffeur. Diana has clearly benefited from Curuguaty’s economic growth. When we lived in Curuguaty, most young people who were fortunate enough to be able to continue their studies beyond secondary schools had studied education because becoming a teacher was one of the few options. Now, we were told, UniNorte had stopped teaching education because of lack of demand. The most popular degree was business administration. Indeed, Diana had received a degree in business education about seven years ago from UniNorte. She is in her 20s and works at a bank. Such a career path would have been impossible when we had lived in Curuguaty – there had been only one bank in the entire town! While this is a great opportunity for Diana, I was also saddened to hear about her hours. She has to be at work by 7:30AM and she generally leaves around 6:00PM on Monday through Friday. In addition, she has to work for part of the day on Saturday. The bank requires her to literally clock-in every day. In compensation, she earns the minimum wage for the banking industry.
Diana’s car was nice but small so only John, Elva, XX, the boys, and I fit. Of course nobody wore seatbelts. The car was likely a used car from Asia – its GPS system had everything written in an Asian language. Elvita and Alberto also wanted to accompany us on our tour so they road their motorcycle.
Curuguaty had really developed. The streets were packed with cars and motorcycles and a number of the streets were paved. There were tons of businesses and numerous hotels. Many of them looked new and modern. We also saw a couple true mansions – something that we had never seen before in Curuguaty. We were told that they belonged to the owner of the supermarket or Brazilians involved in large scale farming near Curuguaty.
Diana’s car was nice but small so only John, Elva, XX, the boys, and I fit. Of course nobody wore seatbelts. The car was likely a used car from Asia – its GPS system had everything written in an Asian language. Elvita and Alberto also wanted to accompany us on our tour so they road their motorcycle.
Curuguaty had really developed. The streets were packed with cars and motorcycles and a number of the streets were paved. There were tons of businesses and numerous hotels. Many of them looked new and modern. We also saw a couple true mansions – something that we had never seen before in Curuguaty. We were told that they belonged to the owner of the supermarket or Brazilians involved in large scale farming near Curuguaty.
We stopped by one of the new supermarkets. It had quite a selection of items. For example, when we lived in Curuguaty, there was the option of maybe 2 types of boxed wines and one bottled wine. Now there were many different options to choose from.
As we were walking, a woman ran up to me and excitedly called “Julia.” At first, I didn’t recognize her and I was shocked that someone knew who I was. It was Terecio’s wife from Santa Rosa Cué. She was in Curuguaty to vote on election day. We were both thrilled to see each other.
During our tour of Curuguaty, we looked at our old house. It was completely unrecognizable. The street had developed and changed. Before, there hadn’t been a sidewalk, business, or metal fence and gate. Also, new houses had been constructed. Before, we had had lots of open space, grass, and beautiful flowers and plants.
When we lived in Curuguaty, the first university branch (UniNorte) opened in the town. One of the required classes was English so we became university teachers. Now, there are various universities with locations in Curuguaty. The latest is a branch of the national university, which has much more prestige than the other private, for-profit universities. Our hosts proudly showed us the new campus.
There is money to be made through private, for-profit universities. They generally have just one building where classes are offered. They don’t have the university-feel like most American universities.
After touring Curuguaty by car, we got an ice cream and walked around the central park. Economic growth has brought many amenities and development to Curuguaty but the city is now very hectic. It is nice that the city has maintained a large central park. Otherwise, there is relatively little green space in the city.
We returned to Elva’s house where we showered and then ate some delicious empanadas that she had made. They gave us some very nice gifts and we took photos. Diana has facebook so she uploaded a lot of great photos. Times have certainly changed – some of our friends in Curuguaty can even look at this blog.
After dinner, we went to a major intersection to celebrate Elvita’s candidate winning the election for mayor earlier in the day. A lot of people were celebrating.