Manaus, the heart of the Amazon

Just 48 hours in Manaus, but a great 48. Manaus is on the Amazon river in the middle of the rainforest. Almost 2 million people live here, and it's hot, humid, bustling, and full of energy. We didn't have time to do much, mostly preparing for our boat trip to Parintins.

We went to MUSA, the Museum of the Amazon on the edge of the city. We climbed a 40 meter tall tower in the jungle, and from above the canopy we got to listen to the songs of birds and monkeys. They also had exhibits on how indigenous jungle tribes weave baskets for trapping fish, and they had dozens of plant and insect specimens. I had a picture of a tarantula but I deleted it because it was blurry and I didn't like scrolling past it in my image gallery.

We explored the port area- municipal market, banana market, and lots of small river boats going to the different towns. We bought bananas and Brazil nuts, and Priscilla informs me I bought too many souvenirs and our bags are almost exploding.

Next stop is Parintins for the Boi Bumba festival! We have a 20 hour trip downriver on the Lady Christina, and we'll be sleeping on the boat in hammocks for the festival. It's similar to Carnival, with elaborate costumes and music. Two teams, red (Garantido) and blue (Caprichoso), compete over the 3 nights of the festival to see who's presentation is the best. We'll be cheering on the blue team!

Not sure if we'll be able to post until we're back in Manaus on the 30th.

-Peter

Big sights in Brazil at Iguazu and Itaipu

We've been country-hopping through the cities of the "tres fronteras", the border area where Paraguay, Brazil, and Argentina meet near Iguazu Falls.

Cuidad del Este, Paraguay: our last stop in Paraguay. We were going to stay longer, but this was the first city I actually disliked so we left as soon as possible. It's a shopping city: street stalls and malls. Prices are much lower (especially for electronics) so during the day Brazilians and Argentines flock across the border for hot deals. By late afternoon (when we arrived) everything was closed and the streets were deserted except for piles of trash out for collection.

We stayed one night then walked across the busy "Friendship Bridge" to Brazil. This was both the easiest and hardest border crossing we've done. No one cares about checking your documents, so it's your own responsibility to figure out where you need to get stamps.

Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil: Much better! Brazil's second most popular tourist destination after Rio. Cool, fun, great tourist infrastructure, surprising number of attractions. We stayed in a hostel made from shipping containers and saw the three biggest attractions:

Iguazu Falls, the largest waterfall in the world. 275 falls across a cliff face 3km wide, much much larger then Niagra. Access paths let you get right next to the falls- ponchos are essential! Beautiful and impressive, one of the true natural wonders of the world.

Itaipu Dam, the second largest dam in the world (8 km wide!) but produces the most electricity, is one of the seven engineering wonders of the world. A joint project with Paraguay, each side has 10 turbines. The dam provides 75 percent of Paraguay's power, so much that they sell their excess back to the Brazilian side. In 2009 when a strong storm disrupted the power lines, the resulting blackout affected THE ENTIRE COUNTRY OF PARAGUAY plus Rio and Sao Paulo for two hours.

We took a tour inside the dam, where the structural architecture mimics the buttresses of cathedrals and the turbine room is 1km long. We stayed until the evening when there's a "lighting of the dam" and capybaras come out to graze.

Parque das Aves is an animal refuge for birds rescued from animal traffickers. Hundreds of parrots, flamingoes, and other tropical birds. There's an enormous (and loud) Macaw cage full of Macaws majestically swooping and majestically squawking. Priscilla's favorite place.

Puerto Iguazu, Argentina: day trip for the other half of the falls. More extensive than the Brazilian side, and it's fun, but honestly we preferred the Brazilian side. Argentina's side isn't run as well, and the eating areas are overrun with scarily large packs of fearless coatis looking to steal food. Everyone we've met preferred the Argentine side, so I guess we're just wrong.

On our way to Manaus! Flying for a change.

-Peter

Asunción and around

We seemed to have arrived in Asunción at a weird time; the long weekend. It's a national holiday, Chaco Armistice, and I guess they celebrate by closing everything. But that don't get us down!  In the heart of the city are beautiful colonial buildings which are now mostly museums. And if you go just outside of the historical center, you'll reach the suburbs that are full of shopping malls and bars. It even has the South American Futbol museum. 

It's a giant building with a giant futbol. The museum is dedicated to the futbol history and talents of all the countries in the Confederación Sudamericana. The first thing you see as you walk in is a line of all the South American trophies including the World Cup in glass cases.  I tried asking if I could hold the Copa American Cup but he said it weighed 12 kilos. That was either his polite way of saying no or that I look too tiny. 

In complete contrast to the super modern South American futbol headquarters lies the Museo de las Memorias, an unassuming building that served as a prison and torture chamber under the dictatorship of Alfredo Stroessner, from 1954-1989. 

While Asunción was resting, we took a short trip to Salta Cristal recommended by our Returned Peace Corps Paraguay Volunteer friend. The guide books only have a short blurb on the 90meter waterfall which is a pity because it's definitely worth a visit.  It's probably less mentioned because it's harder to get to - you have to take a bus to La Colmena and then drive a 4x4 or hire a guide through acres of sugar cane and eucalyptus fields. Fun fact: La Colmena is the first Japanese colony in Paraguay.

Our other day trip was to Areguá - a cute little town full of ceramics and a lake. I can see why locals come here during the summer and gorge on strawberries. 

-Priscilla 

Gran Chaco part 2: war, natives, and immigrants

We're actually in Brazil now, I'm very behind in my posts! Here's where I left off.

The Chaco makes up 60% of Paraguay's territory, but only 3% of the population. Last post I covered the nature of the Chaco; today I'll discuss the people. The human story of the Chaco is really three stories: the indigenous tribes, the Chaco War, and settlement by the Mennonites. Sources: museums in Filadelfia and Asunción.

The indigenous peoples of the Chaco didn't have much contact with the outside world until the 20th century. Pre-contact, the tribes were semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers, living in grass huts. They used plant fibers for weaving, and since the Chaco doesn't have rocks(!) they used the native hard woods for their tools and weapon points.

The Chaco War in the 1930s was devastating; both sides treated the indigenous peoples as enemy spies and killed them.

The Chaco War (1932-35) started as a territory dispute between Bolivia and Paraguay. Both countries had historical claims to the land, but never resolved the borders because for years the Chaco was viewed as dangerous, impenetrable wilderness. This changed when international oil companies speculated that the Chaco had a rich oil field, and both sides scrambled to stake a claim. Over 100,000 soldiers died in the conflict, a significant blow to the small populations at the time. There were more casualties from thirst or exposure in the harsh climate than actual fighting. Paraguay won and was awarded most of the disputed land. We saw the ruins of Ft Toledo at the Proyecto Taguá.

As a side note, after the war, some of the uncontacted tribes started scavenging metal from the wreckage to make tools.

Enter the Mennonites (well, right before the war, in 1928- all these chronologies overlap). The Mennonites of Paraguay shared with us their heroic story of escaping persecution and settling the Chaco. The Mennonites are German-speaking religious refugees, originally from Switzerland and Germany. In the 1500s they split from the Protestant church for their radical beliefs: believer's baptism (no baptizing babies) living simply, and pacifism. They've moved from country to country ever since to escape persecution, but have been able to maintain their unique culture.

The Mennonites of Paraguay had (mostly) been living in the Russian Empire, where they'd been invited to live by Catherine the Great and granted exemption from military service. Later emperors gradually imposed more and more restrictions on them, but they were able to live peacefully until the Bolshevik Revolution. As relatively wealthy landowners, they were considered class enemies. They were attacked, many sent to labor camps, and not allowed to leave the country. Some groups were finally allowed to emigrate in the late 1920s and early 1930s, but even leaving wasn't certain. They'd board trains to Latvia, but some of the trains were turned back and sent to labor camps instead. Here's a group giving thanks at their arrival in Riga:

Why Paraguay? Land was cheap in the Chaco since no one wanted it, and both Bolivia and Paraguay promised to respect their beliefs.

Arriving in the Chaco was a shock. After traveling for weeks by ship and by wagon, their promised land was hot, the soil sandy, the plants spikey, and the water salty. Whole families died from tropical diseases. Then in the 30s, the Chaco war started. During the war they were treated as neutral (and helped protect some of the native peoples from the fighting, which helped form the basis of a positive relationship that exists to this day). They persevered through all these hardships, and gradually built their communities from scratch to become an oasis of order and productivity. The colonies are now Paraguay's largest producers of beef and dairy products. The Mennonite Cooperative owns all land and runs all services (and many stores) and all members lease their land and pay taxes to the Co-op.

We stayed in Filadelfia, the largest town of the Fernheim colony. An orderly, modest suburban town of wide dirt roads. Filadelphia is so important in the Chaco that in the 90s the Paraguayan government declared them to be the capital of their provence (which has necessitated some changes to the way the Co-op administers land and services). All the locals we met were very open to explain their history and values: hard work, simplicity, and thrift. We visited several farms and Co-op businesses, including the supermarket, post office, and a saddle factory.

There are two points of friction with the colonies today. The Mennonites are actively turning wilderness into pasture: they preserve a significant percentage of the land as wild, but some conservation groups claim that it's not enough or that the regulations are ignored. The colonies are also attracting more and more ethnic Paraguayans. The Mennonites live separately to preserve their culture, so non-Mennonites live in their own barrios and intermarriage is unusual.

Filadelfia is unique, compelling, and certainly off the beaten path. Well worth the effort to visit.

-Peter

Food for Thought (in Paraguay)

Buffets - they're in all the restaurants, cost is per kilo. We've never seen so many buffets.

Japanese food - who knew there were Japanese colonies here?  

Mandioca - also known as yuca. Not to be confused with yucca. They taste like a cross between yucca and potato. 

Tereré - cold maté. Rules are to drink until you hear a slurping noise then pass it to be refilled and onto the next person. 

Sopa paraguaya - not actual soup. It's cornbread!

Chipa guazu - kinda like the sopa paraguaya but creamier and eggier. 

Empanadas - can't get enough of these. They also have pastel mandi'o. They are similar to empanadas but the pastry part is made from mandioca.

Milanesa - these are kinda everywhere in South America but we saw so many locals eat these breaded meats. 

Gran Chaco part 1: the endangered frontier

We made it to Paraguay! The bus from Bolivia was an adventure, one of those experiences where the mutual hardship brings you closer to your fellow passengers and bus crew, and by the end you get off the bus as a better (but filthy and exhausted) person. Almost 24 hot hours including two long stops for tire repairs, coated with a thin layer of dust from bumpy dirt roads with open windows, rationing water just in case. Got dropped off at the road junction to our destination (Mennonite colony at Filadelfia, more on that in part 2) and got a lift the rest of the way in to town.

The western half of Paraguay is sparsely populated, and for good reason. The Gran Chaco is a dry forest: it can go 6 months without rain. Fresh water is scarce, and the aquifer is actually salt water (from when this used to be ocean). The vegetation is thick, but everything is covered in spikes. Mosquitoes patrol in squadrons, and ant colonies can reach 10 meters wide. It's so hot that it has the nickname "the green inferno".

As hostile as it is for people, the Chaco is home to an amazingly diverse range of wildlife. Hundreds species of birds, and dozens of mammals: tapirs, peccaries, deer, rabbits, armadillos, raccoons, pumas, jaguars, and ocelots. Before we arrived it didn't seem like there were any budget options for actually getting in to the Chaco, but we were wrong! Through the Filadelfia tourist info office we were able to get a guide for both a night tour and a day tour to the Proyecto Tagua.

The night tour was mostly driving on small farm roads in a 4x4 with a huge spotlight. We saw everything listed above except for tapirs and the big cats (did see a small wildcat similar to an ocelot), plus many many insects.

The real highlight was Proyecto Tagua (www.cccipy.org). The Proyecto is a peccary reserve, with the goal to release animals back into the wild. There are all three local species of peccary at the reserve (101 animals) including the endangered Taguá, thought extinct until it was rediscovered in 1975. Peccaries are related to pigs, live in large groups, have a strong odor from their scent glands, will eat almost anything, and can be highly aggressive, but for all that are still pretty cute:

Get here while you can. The Chaco is disappearing quickly, experiencing some of the fastest rates of deforestation in the world: estimated at more than 2000 acres PER DAY. Ranchers slash and burn to clear land for cattle grazing, and the area is too remote to enforce land use regulations. At the Proyecto Tagua we met representatives from international conservation groups. If the Chaco can be better promoted as a destination for ecotourism, it stands a better chance of surviving.

-Peter