Guess what???? I cut my hair. It's back to normal now, all nice and short.
From Sunday to Thursday I was in a city called Ciudad del Este with all of the AFSers from the US for Thanksgiving, just a week late. If I would explain all the details this post would be REALLY long, to say the least. To sum it up, it was probably one of the most memorable Thanksgivings I'll ever have, and I'm pretty much ok with that. But there were a few things we did outside of the norm. Like the fact that we couldn't find turkey, so we had chicken. Or the fact that it was 85 degrees out when we had our dinner. Those are only minor details though. =) Afterwards, with our stomachs filled, we just hung out, talking and sharing stories from past Thanksgivings we'd had. All of us AFSers from the US are like family, (I feel like I have three families, my real one, my host one, and my AFS family. It's awesome.) because we're all so close, but we've really only known each other for four months, so we never run out of things to talk about, because we've got our whole lives to talk about.
(My dinner. Don't worry mom, I kept it healthy. :P)
(Hanging out ((literally)) in the hammoks outside after dinner, just chillin.)
However, Thanksgiving was only day one. The next day all of us headed down to el centro to check out the cheap electronics market they've got there. I bought a pair of decent headphones for only $10. I'm proud. But we couldn't do that all day, so we split up. Half went back home to rest and chill, and the rest of us went to Itaipu, the largest hydro-electric dam in three of the four hemispheres. Honestly, I was amazed. This thing was HUGE, and I really can't wrap my mind around how they made it. But anyhoo, we we tourists in the real sense, taking the tour bus and watching the 20-year-old intro video and everything. So THAT was fun. don't worry, I took tons of pictures.
The next day we split up again. Me, Emerson, Cara and Kate stayed back and hung out all day while the rest of them went to see the waterfalls in Brasil. We decided not to go, because we didn't want to get caught without a visa and end up in Brasillian prison, even though it'd be a pretty sweet reason why you got sent home. But, what you need to understand is in Paraguay, everybody knows everybody, and the gossip is crazy. So most Paraguayans we talked to said that we were allowed 40 km into Brasil without a visa, (the falls are right at the 40 km mark) and as long as we showed the police there our visas for Paraguay, we'd be ok. However, my friend Cara called the American embassy and talked to them about it, and the representative there was pretty sure that'd we would be arrested and thrown into prison, then deported. So those who went wanted to risk it; the rest of us just stayed home and chilled, and I'm ok with that.
But, it turns out that those who went were turned down for whatever reason, so we really just spent the day hanging out and recovering from the past two days of madness. However, that night we threw a surprize birthday party for our friend, and then we took a bus home at 1.20 in the morning, so the recovery was necesary. Overall, I had a blast, and I really miss it, but I'm glad to be home in Asunción.
We're planning on going back soon though, because we all had so much fun. The feeling of family that we have when we're together is SO strong. These people aren't my friends anymore. They're my family - a very important part of my life and I want it to stay that way. =)
