Good things and the bus

After re-reading my last post, this one definitely needs to have a more positive spin. Someone said to me that it sounded like a 'boiling hot bureaucratic nightmare', which it is, but it is other things too so let me explain some of the aspects of Asunción that make me glad to be here.

The first thing has to be the view. This city is so green. Everywhere you look you can see big trees. They line every street and spill out onto the roads. They grow through the pavements and even through the buildings. You can walk through the door of a building and expect to find yourself indoors, only to walk into an open space with trees growing up from the floor, negating the need for any kind of roof. My second favourite thing is the practicality of it all. The people who live in this country seem to be much better at adapting to things and inventing ways around problems or just generally making life easier than they are in the UK because things are much less controlled here. A couple of my favourites are a shopping basket that you pull along behind you on wheels and diners where you go in and pick from a large range of food then take your plate to be weighed to determine the cost. The baskets on wheels aren't as clumsy as trolleys and don't break your arm as soon as you put a carton of milk in them. Buffet style meals where you can eat as much, or more importantly, as little as you like and only pay for what you have seems like a perfect idea. It reduces waste generated by people trying to put all they can fit on one plate to make sure they get their moneys worth.

I also feel the need to say something about buses. It's a wonderful experience taking the bus around the city. All the buses seem to be so old that its some kind of miracle that they are still even moving. Every time you step on one, (which is a feat in itself as the drivers tend to think that stopping to let people on is more of an inconvenience than a necessity) the bus driver looks at you as if to say 'what the hell are you doing on my bus?'. That always makes me smile. Knowing exactly how much it's going to cost you to get where you are going and having the exact money in your hand before you get on is recommended because there is little time for conversation. After you pull your second foot half way towards the step, the driver is likely to slam his foot on the accelerator, then perhaps on the brake shortly afterwards in an effort to throw you clean through the windscreen. If you make it past the driver in one piece, hanging onto the first thing you see is a good idea then just don't let go until you see where you have to get off and start making the equally traumatic journey to the back of the bus and jump off as fast as you can to avoid losing a leg. The Paraguayans are expert at the whole experience. Even old people and children manage to negotiate the buses, nimble as cats and standing without even holding on while they find their purses and make their way casually to their seat. I like getting the bus so much because once I am off and have reached my destination, I feel like I've really achieved something. The other thing that's great about buses is the people who jump on and off trying to sell you something in-between. They are the true masters of the bus. The range of things for sale is enormous too. You could almost do all your shopping just by taking the bus. You can buy all the common stuff like bread, juice, sweets, chocolate etc, but every so often, someone comes on the bus wearing a suit and you feel like he is a professional on-bus salesman. The other day, Jeni and I took the bus across town and one such man boarded. He began his sell by explaining that the item he was about to show us would change our lives and that it was the most important personal item we would ever own, before producing several multicoloured toothbrushes. Brilliant.