Rainstorms

Another photo of my first ever watermelon carving.
Definitely keeping that up. Watermelons are abundant.

The other day I survived my first tropical rainstorm outdoors. Paraguay being a subtropical country, the humidity builds up among with a really tense air until named air gets so heavy you can barely breathe.
The whole day before a storm, you know it's coming. Thick, humid, hot air surrounds and suffocates you and things are eerily silent. 

Monday was one of those days. Unfortunately I didn't recognize the symptoms of the upcoming shower in time. Happy about life in general I went with my Belgian fellows for Ice-cream.
Yes, of course we saw the lightning and the jet-black sky, but being a naive European, I didn't think it'd hit us that fast. 
Now let me get one thing clear: if you have more than 10 minutes ahead of you and start walking when it starts raining, you ARE going to get soaked.
With this in mind, I didn't even bother to run. Wouldn't have made ant significant difference. My precaution was putting my messed-up iPhone in a plastic bag before heading off (I'm coming back to my phone later, it's a mystery...).

So there I am, walking calmly among running people as the rain starts to increase. About 3 blocks from my destination (home) the nature of the rain changes.
 If you try imagine someone picking up all the water in a fairly-sized lake and putting it in a huge bucket, and subsequently turning this upsidedown over your head, you begin to get the idea. 
Trying to see something? Well, try you may. Ain't gonna happen...  
But hey, I am from one of the rainiest places in Sweden am I not? Admittedly we don't get that powerful rain, but rain I can handle alright. Lightning chasing each other over the sky and thunderclaps? I love that, bring it on.

What I was not altogether prepared to handle was the fact that the layout of San Lorenzo doesn't seem to include sufficient desviations (I don't actually know the word in english, but I assume it's similar to the spanish one..) for the HUGE amounts of rainwater . Within ten minutes, the streets are more like small rivers, with a significant current. Now, this could have been a really funny moment of jumping around in water with my already wet shoes. 
                                                       HOW ABOUT NO. 
Keep in mind that my house is basically located in a trashcan. It took me about 5 seconds to realize that the water flowing up to my ancles had with all certainty just flown over a couple of carcasses from various creatures, rotten food, human and animal excrements, vomits from the local alcoholics and god knows what else. The feeling that follows on this realization is rather hard to describe with words.... 

On a Happier note, this sunday was really nice. I invited various friends from my exchange program to come to my house for the afternoon, to do what we all do best: EAT!
And that we did. And talked... actually, my Belgian mates Charline and Simon (frequently mentioned here it seems) stayed until about 11 pm, and we talked about just about everything. So nice, I wonder why all good discussions seem to pop up at the latest of hours.

Then again, to balance the good and bad, my genious phone died. With NO REASON OR EXCUSE! Dead. Couldn't charge it, didn't react to being connected to the computer, didn't react when I tried to turn it on. Nothing.
 I mean, my phone is an iPhone 4 with two years of loyal service yet done, and it has been put though alot of climate change. BUT HEY. That's just not okay!

Upon this I also realized that I have a really hard time falling asleep without listening to an audiobook. Which is really stupid. But thinking about it, I've been listening to audiobooks before sleeping for 11 (ELEVEN!!) years now. Which could qualify me for the cathegory "mentally handicapped" or something...
But hey, having survived the night, and the morning aerobics (Which turned out to be a latino dance class, I love my instructor for that one  I headed off to Asuncion in order to go to the Apple-store located there. Funny note: the stores name is "Big Manzana". Manzana means Apple... ¿Dafuq?
So I walk in, and to my great joy fing that the guy at the desk has spent 4 years in the US and talks fluent english. Swiftly I explain my problem: Hey, my phone is dead and I don't know why.
just as swiftly, it seems, this guys turns on my phone again. 
                Wait what?? Don't tell me he did exactly what we have been doing the last 10 hours without result, and it just works for him? That fits my definition of awkward moment rather well. 

Phones -.-' (Also I notice some HTMLs are messed up in this post...)

We have some new orchids in our garden!!!

Yesteday I also recieved some bad news from Sweden. Our beautiful girl Nigra has passed on to worlds beyond after some time of illness. I'm sorry I couldn't say goodbye, but it is better this way, without the pain. You will rest in our hearts and minds, where you can forever chase deers and wooden sticks in the baltic sea...

 Rest In Peace