Questioning My Orientation

Hello again. It´s monday now - the internet cafe was closed yesterday so no blog! I was really disappointed - I was full of beans after a really fun night on Saturday and wanted to share it. After I last wrote, I met up with Sile (it´s Irish - pronounced Sheila) who had just arrived at the flat. Veronica (the very lovely In-Country Coordinator, who looks a lot like Kylie) came to pick us up at 9 to take us out on the town. Also there were her husband Marcelo, who unfortunately for him speaks no English at all, and Carolina, Vero´s assistant, who looks like Cameron Diaz a bit and has amazing English, despite never having been abroad. They took all 4 of us out to a club called Mantecata - that was the place the boys had been to the night before. I tried to order a vodka and lemonade, but everyone seemed really unsure of what this was and eventually the barman brought me a Caipirinha - which was delicious to the point of being juice-like. I ordered a second one which turned out to be utterly lethal. Oops! Then Argentine gang left us about 2am (that´s the time the clubs open here!) and dropped us at Power, which is apparently the "Saturday Club", while Mantecata is for Fridays! Power is a massive warren of rooms packed with people. Some parts are inside and some outside. It was mental! I managed to survive until 4am, when Sile and I bowed out and left the boys trying out their amusingly weak pulling techniques on the local ladies! Apparently they were unsuccessful! I was pleased to find out too that Power is on the same street as our house, and it cost us the equivalent of about 50p to get home in the taxi.

I slept in really late in the morning and woke up with a rather fuzzy head after the late night and incredibly cheap drink. Sile said that the beer she had ordered cost around $1.50 a litre - dearie me! We were picked up by Vero and Marcelo at 4 and taken back to their house for our official i-to-i orientation. This covered everything from doing our washing to our dress code at work and tourist stuff that we might like to do. We were told that Posadas is a very small place (maybe more like Dalkeith than I had thought!) and that everyone will know who we are, so we have to behave ourselves! Yikes!

We were shown a dvd from the company that was quite cheesily presented, but made a good point about not taking risks here that we wouldn´t do at home, and it explained where the money that we have paid is going. The money doesn´t go to the projects themselves (such as the Orphanage or the Animal Sanctuary) as it´s not an aid organisation, but their commitment is to keep providing a constant flow of humans resources to the projects. Our money goes on our accommodation and the service of being looked after by the team members, which I have to say so far has been worth the price!

We were also given a look at some photos and brochures from the Iguazu falls, which are spectacular waterfalls 6hours away by bus on the Brazil border. Half the falls are on the Argentine side and half on the Brazilian side, and there is a wildlife park there as well, so wer were advised to take 3 days there. We´ve all decided to go there next weekend, as Oli is only here for one more weekend. We can get the bed bus (cochecama) at 3.30am on Saturday morning and wake up in the morning having arrived at Iguazu, then we´re allowed Monday off work to make the most of our trip. I can´t wait.

On Wednesday as well, there´s a festival celebrating the cultural melting pot that is Argentina in a town 1 and a half hours away - the Festival de Inmigrantes - festival of immigrants. We´re going to go there too, it looks amazing. More about that later.

We had a brief look around the town later, we went back down to the waterfront where everyone gathers here on a Sunday. It´s amazing that Paraguay is visible across the river. We mentioned our intention of going there, and were told that there´s not really much to see, but that doesn´t bother me - I really just want to get the stamp on my passport and to know that I´ve been!

I´m supposed to be rendez-vousing with everyone back at mine at 10am to get the bus to Encarnacion, the town over the river in Paraguay, which gives me about 5 minutes more here. We get the bus to the International Bridge, which spans the River Parana (no piranhas included, apparently) get our passports stamped, then jump back on and get them stamped on the other side too. I have just introduced myself to Nicolas, the owner of the locutorio (the word here for internet cafes and telephone box shops) and had a great Standard Grade Spanish conversation about where I was from and so on. He asked if I´d been to Spain and when I said I´d lived there, he commented that my Spanish was very good. Phew!

I´m starting to understand Cuca, my homestay mum, a lot better, although her chat is totally full on and random and jumps all over the place. I´ll leave you with a priceless story that she came out with on Saturday night - I was so bemused, I didn´t want to laugh but it was hilarious! She was just chatting away about her family when suddenly she came out with "inseminacion artificial". I just about spat out my quiche. Apparently she was talking about her daughter´s dog, though! Not exactly table talk!

Hasta mañana....