A possible new project!

I finished up my last business class for the flip-flop making women last week, with a total of 3 students.  3 is better than 0, and maybe they will teach the info to other people.  It was pretty cool to teach profit-margin and break-even point concepts in Spanish, especially since I’d never tried to explain this to anyone in English before.

Also last week, I met with a completely different organization.  It’s an artisan organization that helps people sell their 100% handmade Paraguayan artwork.  Some of the things they sell include clothes, purses, lace products, and many recycled products.  Many of the artisans would really like my help with sales and marketing strategies!  The people pay a small fee to the NGO I am working with to get a prime spot (including tent, table, and chair) in one of the main plazas of Asuncion.  They also travel a lot to sell their goods at artisan fairs in other cities.  In fact, I will be traveling with them to Encarnacion, a city in the south of Paraguay, to go see what it’s all about.  We will all be taking a bus together tomorrow night, and arriving for the fair early Tuesday morning.  I believe its about 5-7 hours away.  I will return to Asuncion on Thursday.

This weekend I spent a lot of time looking for apartments.  I can live on my own starting in November, but just wanted to get an idea of what apartments look like here.  I’ve seen 3 apartments so far, and will be visiting one more tomorrow.  So far, I am not impressed.  All of the apartments are way over the budget I am given, and quite old and dirty.  I’m going to keep looking…

Yesterday I got to play tennis with my host sister and 2 of her friends.  It was so much fun :).  The courts here are made of red dirt.  After tennis, we drove to a park and walked around a walking path for about an hour.  It was a day full of exercise!  Luckily, my ankle is almost completely healed.

That’s it for the highlights of my week!

Yours Truly, Julie G