A funeral here in Paraguay

I wanted to write a quick post about my friend Guille's dad suddenly dying last Thursday. It was quite sudden and therefore extremely unexpected. He is hanging in there, I haven't actually had a chance to talk to him since last week.

But that night, a bunch of us drove to his family's house 2+ hours away that night for the wake. I wasn't sure what to expect, but since it was different, I thought I would share the death/funeral traditions here.

Basically when someone dies here, they have a viewing/wake like we would. The difference though is that it is at the person's house. So when we got to his parents' house, the coffin was open and on their porch. It was a simple wooden coffin. His dad was lying in this beautiful lace material. There were wild flowers at his feet and the cloth covered his eyes. Behind the coffin was electric candles and a figure of Jesus on the cross. Then behind that were the HUGE flower decorations that people had sent. By huge I mean like min 3 feet across! I wanted to take pics, but got the feeling it wasn't super appropriate. Under the coffin there is also a cup of water in case the dead spirit gets thirsty (Catholic thing I think, or maybe a PY Catholic thing, not sure about that).



So everyone comes to the house to pay their respects. It was actually SUPER cold that night. So they passed around hot coffee and mate and then cookies and stuff to munch on. A few of the women did a Catholic praying thing with the Rosary. Frank used the Bible and shared some scriptures for everyone. We prayed and sang some songs. Guille and his sisters shared a few kind memories and that was it.


If you can, most people stay through the night and on to the next day. At 10am the next day, I guess they took the coffin to the cemetery where he was quickly buried. My friends and I ended up leaving around 2am, so I didn't see that part. Gotta be honest though, I am really glad we don't have the tradition about staying up all night. It was super cold and most people just sat around outside in plastic chairs all night! But it was really cool to be able to share about our traditions in the US and to hear about their traditions here. Most were surprised that we wait a few days before the actual funeral. Although I am told they have funeral homes in Asuncion, they don't in the country-side, which is why you need to bury the body quickly. But the tradition still holds in Asuncion.

Anyway, just thought you all would be interested to learn the cultural differences down here.

I definitely love and miss you all very much!
Thanks for all of your prayers and continued support!

Hangin' with the singles for Semana Santa

Easter weekend, also known as Semana Santa here means a 4 day weekend for everyone here. Most people work a half day on Wed and then get the rest of the week off. Good Friday is actually the day when everything is closed down. With most of the country being Catholic, Good Friday is their big holiday. So Friday a group of singles from my church and I traveled about 30-45 mins away and stayed at this hotel/"resort" area. The place has an actual hotel with a few rooms, but also has cabins that you can rent out, which is what we did. It was absolutely gorgeous there and we had a blast!

Here is the gang:


The place had a small lake with a boat and a kayak that you could you take out for a bit. Here are the girls in the boat; the guys are in the next photo! All the girls wanted to sit in the boat so they wouldn't fall in...as you can tell, the guys weren't really concerned about that! LOL







A couple of photos of me and the bridges they had over the lake:







Before dinner, (hamburgers that the guys grilled for us) I pulled out the cards and ended up teaching the guys how to play poker and everyone blackjack. None of them knew how to play, which really surprised me. They all enjoyed blackjack more though, mainly b/c I think it was easier to pick up! We used pebbles to bet with, which was fun.



After dinner, we went for a walk around the area. We even sat for awhile and people told ghost stories. They wanted me to tell one, but I just couldn't think of one, plus I don't know that my Spanish is quite up to ghost story-telling level yet! LOL




Saturday we got up, ate breakfast together and a bunch of us ended up spending most of the day swimming in their Olympic size pool (4 - 25 meter lanes, for those who know swimming) Most of them couldn't swim very well, which isn't too surprising since a) we are not near the ocean and b)pools are only for the rich here. But everyone eventually got in and paddled around if nothing else! =)
While we had to be out of the cabin around 3pm, we ended up sticking around until 6 or so, just swimming and chatting. It was so much fun! A few of us even ended the trip with a stop at an ice cream place in town! I am so glad that we were able to do this, I enjoyed it so much!

We are officially into fall, but it is STILL hot and sticky here. But I am LOVING all the flowers that are still everywhere. Here is a tiny one I found in the grass near our cabin.



Easter Sunday was a normal day here. Everything was open as normal. We ended up having service at 6pm to give everyone time to come back into town (most people head out of the city to visit relatives in the country side). But unlike the packed Easter services in the US, ours was pretty light. There was some easter candy/chocolate being sold in the stores, but that pretty much seemed to be the extent of Easter here. Def no colored eggs or easter egg hunts to be found!