An estimated 30,000 Paraguayans live in the US.  In comparison, the US is home to 1.9 million Dominicans and 2.1 million Colombians.  It is a huge difference.  With a GDP per capita of $9,785, Paraguay is #109 in the world, i.e. in the middle of the table. It is not dirt poor.

 

Outside of the squatter areas, Paraguayans look neat, well kept, and healthy. There are no beggars in the streets and no homeless in plain sight. With good education and healthcare provided for free, or at affordable cost by the state, they live a modest but happy life at home. Those who choose to leave, emigrate to the two next-door giants: Brazil and Argentina.

 

The country is making a slow but effective evolution toward universal human rights, but it has a major challenge with wealth disparity.    A minuscule fraction of the population controls all the means of production. The Paraguayan Dream in which a regular citizen would ascend from rags to riches has been quelled.  The way out seems to be a popular revolution with a displacement of property, but it is not likely to happen since the elite is heavily protected by a large and well-trained military.

 

Most Paraguayans are racially mixed. Therefore, they look more like their Brazilian counterparts and much less like the Argentinians. The latter, in the past, had been ferociously set against miscegenation (race mixing). They see themselves as Caucasians; Argentinian blacks and Amerindians fell victim of systematic genocide in the 19th century.

 

Yes, Paraguay does produce a pre-Lent popular carnaval. But it only happens in Concepcion, in the South. It does not rival the ones held in Brazil or Trinidad.

 

………….

 

The email came one hour before I left for the airport.  The Aerolineas Argentina flight from Asuncion will be delayed, therefore I will miss my Buenos-Aires – JFK connection.  At the airport, I was re-routed on Copa, with a connection in Panama City, Panama. The first flight left Asuncion at 2:00 AM.  The connecting flight landed at JFK some four hours later than my original itinerary predicted…

 

At the airport, Kemp was waiting. I walked out. I was slapped by an assault of cold air. The temperature in New York was 34*F, a grand contrast with the 78*F in Asuncion. The commute was uneventful.  It took me less than two hours to reach home.

 

…………..

 

I am back from a new trip abroad. I have reinforced my conviction that there is only one human race, with one single set of dramas and dreams.

 

Paraguay is filled with beautiful people inside and an out, with obstinate joie de vivre and the passion for the rest of the world. From their landlocked Heart of South America, it is astonishing how much a random taxi driver or an hotel receptionist knows about the happenstances in Mali, Malaysia, or Martinique.   But their dreams remain similar and generic: a safer world and a better tomorrow for their progeny.

 

The Traveler missed his trip to Iguazu Falls, but he will be back to this friendly and affordable land, where life is so inexpensive, the food so delicious and the music so captivating.

 

I am a citizen of the world. If a blue-watered Caribbean island is my homeland, the world is my patria, and Warrenville is my home… Yes, I have returned home to the rat race. It is so good to be back home.

 

Until the next adventure, that was The Traveller.

 

The Traveller

(Odler Robert Jeanlouie, Monday, December 17, 2018)

 

*Join the Travel Club for Professionals on:
World Travelers Facebook group

 

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