Earlier this week my parents and I went to the chaco, a place which can vaguely be considered as the countryside of Paraguay. It's about a three-hour drive to my parents' ranch. However, only an hour of this drive is on paved roads. The other two are on this dirt road, swerving through cows and trying to avoid mud puddles that the truck could get stuck in. The other members of my family don't find this very appealing, but I had a smile on my face the whole way. Getting out of the city and into the country is one of my favorite things, and I got to have that rubbed in my face for almost two hours :)

After the potencially dangerous drive through other people's plots of land, we finnally arrived to the Perez-Ramierez ranch. Before we had left, my mom had told me 'don't expect lots' about their house in the Chaco, but once again, my family surprized me. There I was, expecting some random hut in the middle of nowhere, but the random hut was actually a small cottage, bigger than my friend Emerson's entire house. When we got inside the walls were covered in pelts from the carnivors who had unsucessfully tried to hunt their cattle.

The next day I walked outside expecting to explore a little, but what I found was a saddled horse, waiting for me. I then spent the whole day riding and getting my farmer's tan back. I also helped the gauchos (cowboys, in a sense) do a cattle run, and once again I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of cows overtaking me, but it was still fun :). Once we got the cows in, we met my dad and then had to give them a shot (and when I say them, I mean about 500 calves.) I wanted to help so my dad set me up at the beginning of the chute, and had me poke the calves with a stick when then needed to go in. It probably wasn't a real job, but I still had tons of fun doing it.

So basically, I got to do what I do best for two days. I didn't want to leave, but (as I found out when we got back into cell phone reception) my friends didn't want me to go. But do I really ever listen? I don't think so. Once Jorge finishes his exams we'll be back. Yay!