Alejandro

So as Lady Gaga says that she has given up on love and seems to do nothing else but cater to us gays... my search for love continues. i mean yes my project is urban youth development which means that i´m working with kids, but i can have a second...more personal project. which is not to spend two years alone!!! i mean, i know that i have my fam, my friends, my co-workers and the my kids, but damn can a brother also get some love down here?!

this is how the situation goes down here: gay ppl are extremely closeted! as, to be proper, homosexuality is not widely accepted. i feel lucky because my contact is super gay and is like my sister! we are always hangin out and complaining about the men here. and i wish i could do more to jump start the gay revolution here but just being almost two months in my site and spending almost 5 months in the country in total, i am still trying to figure shit out. i´m working on elevating my language. i mean i really feel like it is a million times better than what it used to be and i can hold my own, but i have a wayyyyyyys to go.

what is interesting about my site is the transiency! there are 5 colleges and a military base. so there is movement here and learning. and some of my students are cadets in the military base which means they come from all parts of paraguay. this is cool because my powers can reach far and wide! i got in one conversation with the soldiers about gay marriage which i think went pretty well as they still talk to me. but the soldiers were joking one day and saying that two of the soldiers wanted to get married. and i said that was cool with me because in the states we are more open and that i have gay friends and blah blah. and told them about how one time that i went to a lesbian wedding and talked about that for a bit. and then one was very serious and started talking about ricky martin and how he is going to get married to his boyfriend from colombia. it was a brief convo but one that left me confused. like peace corps said that homosexuality is taboo to talk about here and we should avoid the subject at all costs and here i am in a group of paraguayan soldiers talking about homosexuality. the fact of the matter is i believe that things are changing in paraguay faster than peace corps imagines or that i can imagine right now.

i have hope in the young people here and would go as far as to say that they are more open minded than i was lead to believe. i don´t know. right now i still talk about my pretend girlfriend in the states and continue to observe how it is.

i would like to have a boyfriend here, but ya know there´s that communication barrier. i am working real hard to get my spanish up so that i can get to that level and have someone to be with and have intelligent conversations with. i must say that every day is an adventure and i am learning much about myself as i am about paraguayan culture. one thing i definitely am learning is that i am not very patient... this culture moves a lot slower than american culture and one thing i need to learn is...you got it... patience. and i´m learning how to go with the flow of things and be more tranquilo. although, i am a little resistant to adapt to this because i don´t want to be too tranquilo where when i return to the states i get left behind. hahaha.

right now i am planning a winter camp for my kids which starts july 12th and goes through july 26th. should be fun, stressful and tiring, but i´m up to the challege. right now i´m immersing myself in work and hope that love will happen to come my way...

Sexy,
Stephen.