I was hoping to report a smooth return to Paraguay, but now I know that all the other hectic travel I have experienced were merely training for what I faced in my return flight. Peace Corps scheduled my flight and I was only too grateful to be flying directly out of Willard. I had an 11 hour wait in Dallas/Fort Worth, but even that passed quickly enough. I can tell you exactly how to get to each terminal via the Skylink tram and I must have look knowledgeable because I was asked for directions on more than one occasion. I even had an opportunity to go to a chapel service—who knew they had such things at airports.
When I finally boarded the plane for Buenos Aires, I was relieved to see how spacious the exit row seats are. The lady behind me wondered how I possibly could have reserved it. I told her I picked it out yesterday. The flight went smoothly enough although I did accidentally fall sleep on the guy next to me. In my groggy state I realized my mistake and quickly shifted to the other side. He was sounds asleep himself and I don’t think he was even aware what happened. It was a 10 ½ hr overnight flight.
We arrived in Buenos Aires at 8:05am local time. My flight to Asuncion: 9:00am. As I followed the yellow line for connecting flights it dawned on me that I was not ready to board my flight. I did not have the next boarding pass and my luggage had only been tagged as far as B.A. I did not think much about this when I was in Champaign, but now I realized this might get complicated. I was not disappointed. Instead of continuing through to the gates, I went to customs with my flight itinerary. Because my bags were not checked all the way through I was technically entering the country and therefore required to pay the 130 USD entrance tax.
“Al mismo, al mismo Senorita (minimal, minimal, Miss) ,” the customs agent said when I asked how much.
I kept explaining that it was not my fault and tried to look innocent as I stood in the little office while more agents got involved. They were all drinking mate(the hot tea like drink) and I wished I could have some too. Finally, someone made a phone call, they had me fill out some forms, stamped it, and I was free to proceed, free of charge. By this point I had 40 minutes until the flight left. I knew I was in trouble.
My grabbed my waiting bags from the carousel and loaded them onto an empty cart while searching for the shortest exit line. After asking for Aerolines Argentina Airlines I jogged with my cart to the counter. Breathless, I slid my itinerary to the agent.
“Why are you so late?” she wanted to know.
“I just arrived,” I explained. I gave her a rundown of my transfer problem.
She made a phone call.
“I am sorry, but the flight is boarding now. We can’t let you on. You were supposed to be here 2 hours before the flight. We can get you on a 3pm flight.”
I exchanged some Guarani’s for pesos and purchased my bus fare. After 1 hour and 40 minutes of driving through downtown B.A. we reached a small airport by the ocean.
My 3pm flight was supposed to board at 2:15pm and after running from gate to gate they finally called my flight at 2:45pm.
I finally arrived in Asuncion at 4pm local time. I had only been traveling since 7am Sunday morning.
Now I am back in site. It’s beautiful here and projects are starting to pick up again. Everyone was overjoyed to finally have me back and wondered at my extended absence.
Yesterday, I visited Ña Asunción. The abonos verdes (green manures) I planted with her husband and brother-in-law are just starting to flower. There are still a plethora of vegetables from the garden we planted together. Most of the broccoli was flowering and I learned that they did not know how to eat it. I snapped a good head off and offered her a taste while explaining that you can also boil it. We shared it with the other women and kids who were also hanging out with her at that time. They were all impressed and just loved it. This afternoon we are going to plant some sweet corn and pumpkins from the states—and more broccoli. When the corn is about knee high I want to incorporate some summer abonos verdes in between the rows. It’s just another average day here in Paraguay.
