A couple years ago, when I first started planning this trip I checked what was the least visited country in Latin America, it’s Paraguay. I immediately added Paraguay to the list and started reading about its history and why it’s not a popular travel destination. I did the same thing the last time I was in Europe which led to an amazing week in Moldova, so it seems like a good philosophy.

Even before deciding to come here I knew there were Mennonites here, but I didn’t know anything more about them. From reading about Paraguay I learned that the majority of the initial Mennonites who came to Paraguay came from the exact same colonies in Russia that my family came to Canada from, meaning I would be related to a lot of the Mennonites here.

The presence of distant family here wasn’t a huge draw and didn’t really change my plans any but knowing I would spend a week or more driving past towns and colonies where I would mostly likely be related to the people living there was an odd feeling.

When the Mennonites initially came to Paraguay they were basically given the Chaco region in the north nearly for free to try to settle, because it had already been pretty much considered a no-go zone for hundreds of years, even most local indigenous groups steered clear of “the green death”.

The area is still mostly a wasteland today, it’s just pocketed with small oasis areas where the Mennonites managed to get a foothold and claw something back from the Chaco. The fact that they have been able to do this, to tame some areas of this vast nothingness is a stunning achievement, I understand their effect of the economies and on society here is a bit more nuanced but I do not have anywhere near the information to make any comment on that.

I wasn’t expecting to be all that affected by travelling through a very alien, foreign area that also happened to be partially populated by people who look like me, are related to me, and have familiar names, but I was. The eerie but also often amusing twilight zone feeling hit me over and over as I interacted with people I share a lot with in a place as alien to me as anywhere I’ve been.

These sort of subtle unusual feelings are pretty hard to get across but I’ll just list a couple small interactions I had or things I witnessed that made me smile at the oddness of things here.

1. When I first arrived it was after hours and hours of driving the Chaco Highway, it was as strange a road and as strange a nature setting as I’d ever been in, I was loving the new everything, the new soil and animals and clouds and trees….. and then I turn into Filadelfia for the first time, the main Mennonite community, and unlike every other town I’ve been through in South America, I am suddenly in a reasonable facsimile of the farm town I grew up in. The layout, the farm equipment dealers, the vehicles, the streets, the park, the swimming pool. There was a sudden rush of that twilight zone weird feeling and I grinned like an idiot at the strangeness of it all.
2. I found a hotel in Filadelfia to stay for the night, I walked into the lobby to see a group of people, patrons and staff, who each could have been plucked from my own church, or my own family. Except they only spoke Low German. I asked the front desk woman for a room, she asked my name, I said “Dean”, she nodded, wrote my first name down and handed me a room key. I asked “Do you want my license or a credit card?”, to which she replied “What for?”. It was straight from the Mennonite handbook.
3. I saw a billboard outside town with a face quite similar to mine, with my last name, that my uncle eventually confirmed to be my fourth cousin, flanked by two other faces with equally familial names.
4. I was in Filadelfia over Easter weekend so most things were closed most of the time. One night the only thing I could find for dinner was an outdoor burger grill on the outskirts of town. I sat there with my burger and beer, outdoors, watching soccer with the mostly Paraguayan group of young people also there, and felt for a second like I was back in normal Paraguay. Right up until two old 100% German looking men walked around the corner, speaking Low German, wearing Lederhosen. What is going on here, lol?!
5. I was having dinner at a German restaurant, which was amazing, and six local toughs came in and sat down. Clearly the town baddies, they were each a various mix of German and Paraguayan and each in leather and tattoos and piercings and the like, nothing that out of the ordinary, until they all started talking to each other, in the antiquated Mennonite form of Low German. It was like meeting the Sex Pistols but they all speak Shakespearean English, it broke my brain.

There’s an episode of Star Trek where they land on a desert wasteland planet, no life, nothing but blowing sand, until they suddenly find a fully functional casino hotel in the middle of the desert, and the rest of the episode is about the crew trying to figure out how this clearly impossibly out of place casino can possibly exist on a desolate, deserted, alien planet. Filadelfia is exactly like that, except it’s real.

Also, yes, I tried ordering a “Philly Cheesesteak” in Filadelfia more than once, cuz I thought that was hilarious, no one else got the joke tho, ever.

I have paid my first ever bribe.

Until now I have always managed to act like a goofy dope and charm my way out of bribe attempts while travelling. I’ve got a method that I thought was foolproof. Basically, act like a big, dumb, friendly idiot who cannot speak a single word of their language, compliment the country I’m in, the place I’m in, the person trying to bribe me. Just keep acting like I don’t understand what’s going on while backing slowly out of the situation.

This worked as it usually does at the police roadblock shakedown just outside Asuncion last week, today was different. I’m still in the far north, starting my journey back to the more populated southern part of the country. I shouldn’t have stopped at all but the two army soldiers had enough other drivers pulled over to make it impossible to get past.
The conversation went about like this (except mostly read from our phones, through a lot of Google Translate, which does NOT handle Paraguay’s very strange version of Spanish well at all, a lot of the comments below took 2-3 tries to get across):

Soldier: Where are you coming from?
Me: I was in the Chaco, it is so beautiful! Paraguay is so beautiful! Paraguayan people are the most friendly I have met so far while travelling!
Soldier: Driver’s license?
I show him my license, he makes me take it out.
Soldier: Passport?
Uh oh, the usual trick here is to take your passport and just basically refuse to return it until you pay them. I tried to say I couldn’t find it and such but he just kept waiting.
Soldier: Canada? Please, step out of the truck.
He now starts going over the entire truck, inspecting everything, the back, under the hood, etc. He asks everything, my travel plans, travel history, my job, etc.
Soldier: Do you have the rental agreement?
I do.
Soldier: Do you have the registration?
I do.

This continues for a while.

It’s 35c out and we are just standing on the highway, I’m already feeling the heat but I’m not nervous in any way, I’ve been here before and as seems to be the norm he is very friendly about it.
Soldier: There is a toll for this highway, you must pay it.
Me: Yes, there is, and it is paid at the toll collection back near Asuncion, and I will pay it tomorrow, there.
He grunts.
Soldier: Where did you sleep?
Uh oh, I’m not sure “I slept in the back of this truck” is going to push things in my favour when he’s just looking for anything to stick.
Me: I slept in Filadelfia.
Soldier: You were with family there?
Again, uh oh, he’s trying to make sure I’m foreign enough to not risk blow back on him from the bribe.
Me: No, I stayed at a hotel.
Soldier: Do you have the bill?

I do, it’s from a few nights ago but I hand it over hoping he won’t notice the date, he doesn’t, or doesn’t care.

Soldier: You were driving too fast, there is a fine.
Me: How do you know?
Each of these back and forths takes a lot of phone typing time as we try to get our points across through Google Translate, it is so hot out and I am realizing he’s not going to go away.

Soldier: If you work with us this is easier.
Me: Work? I would be happy to work with you, what work do you need done?
And I literally roll up my sleeves and laugh, looking around for what I can do.
He grunts again.
Soldier: How did you pay for your hotel?
Me: Visa, I never leave home without it.
At least I am making myself laugh, on the inside, a tiny bit.
Soldier: Show me.

I show him my visa, he sees cash in my wallet. I have a secret spot for cash while travelling and only have a small amount in my wallet at any time.
Soldier: How much cash are you carrying.
I really do not want him to start going through my bags, that would be bad, so I pretend that I think he just means in my wallet. I take out my wallet cash and count it, I have about $300,000 guarani, about $55 Canadian.
Me: I need to go now.
He nods, walks over to his compatriot, with my passport, they talk for a while, leaving me in the sun.

A police truck pulls up, I have an instant of thinking maybe I am saved before I remember where I am. The officers walk over to the soldiers, greet each other, talk for a while, point at me, shake their heads, get back in their truck and leave.
The soldier comes back.
Soldier: I need to look in the back again.
I’m realizing now he is perfectly happy to do this all day while I am dying from the heat.
Me: How long will this take.
Soldier: Until we have had lunch, we need to have our lunch.
I try to play dumb a few more times but it really isn’t working, he just stands there blank each time I try.
Soldier: It would be better if you work with us, then you can go.

The car rental place was supposed to give me a letter that supposedly I could hand over in such situations to convince them to leave me alone. I now start digging through paperwork looking for anything like this. I don’t find anything.

I sigh and realize I am beaten. Often in the past the bribe attempt took place in a public or semi-public area where I could just get louder and louder until they gave in. Here however we are hours from anywhere and I am melting in the heat.

Me: How much?
The soldier’s face explodes into a grin. He points at my wallet, shyly, like a kid pointing at an ice cream flavour.
Soldier: $500,000.
Me: You mean $50,000? ($9 Canadian).
I offer him the $50,000 bill. He shakes his head and points at the $100,000 bills sticking out of my wallet.
I put the $50,000 bill away and hand him a single $100,000 ($18 Canadian). He cannot stop smiling.
He pokes my belly, says “one more” in Spanish.
I poke his belly, say “no more” in Spanish.
He laughs and hands my passport back.
I put my passport in the truck and type into Google Translate.
Me: Now this is what I will remember about Paraguayan people.
He reads it and shrugs.

He’s right, I feel nothing bad about Paraguayan people, or him, it’s just the cost of travel in such places and it could have been so much worse.

I drove hours to the east, to where Paraguay ends and Brazil begins, on a road that appears on no maps nor on Google, most of the time I was the only car on it.

I eventually reached the end of the road, at the Paraguay River, in a tiny village called Carmelo Peralta. I got talking to a guy there by the river who explained the road is part of South America’s new ocean to ocean highway. A bridge spanning the river joining Brazil to Paraguay, the first bridge in northern Paraguay, was supposed to be completed by the time the road was complete. Work on the bridge has not even started. Hence the road has basically no purpose and is barely used.

I asked the gentleman about the road north, leading towards Bolivia, he strongly discouraged me from attempting it currently due to the rainy season. Bummer but it appears this is the end of the road.

I tried to get a ride across the river to the Brazilian side for about an hour but had no luck, Easter has made northern Paraquay even more deserted than normal.

UPDATE: IT’S COTTON… I WAS EATING COTTON…

I saw only two crops growing anywhere in Paraguay, corn and this fruit that I have yet to identify.

NOSE: I don’t think it’s quite ripe but the fruit still has a pleasant fruity, creamy smell.

TASTE: Yeah, it’s not ripe, the fruit is already sweet though, and has a generally nice fruity sorta taste.

DO I HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THIS COULD BE: No.

IS IT GOOD: I think it will be.

Fifteen years ago the Chaco Highway was one of the most infamous roads in the world, known for swallowing up vehicles and leaving drivers stuck for days on end. Eventually efforts to improve the road became more serious and I’d heard from various sources that it was a lot better now.

Before I left I asked multiple people in Asuncion about the road. They all said it had gotten safer and that I would probably be fine as long as it’s not raining. Rain turns the sandy clay into grease.

It’s been a torrential downpour all night and still is this morning.

I decided to try it and turn back if it’s crazy.

I have no idea how long the drive will take and the road is not safe to be driven after sundown, which is 6pm here, so I leave Asuncion at 6am and head north.

About an hour outside the capital the road splits and as I start onto the Chaco Highway a police roadblock pulls me over. I’m pretty sure it’s a shakedown, as I know what that looks like, but I don’t offer any cash, I just keep smiling like an idiot and repeating that I don’t speak any Spanish, making fun of myself the whole time, eventually the cop hands me back my license and sighs, waving me past.

The downpour alternated all day with full sun and 35c heat, then back to downpour again, I’ve never seen a day like it.

Some of the highway is absolutely perfect, some is rough, some is dangerous, repeat for 8 hours until I get to my stop for the night, Filidelfia.

The Bolsi is the other restaurant that matters in Asuncion, it’s the Pepsi to The Lido’s Coke. I had a whole story to post about The Bolsi but it’s late and I’m falling behind on posting, things are happening each day faster than I can post them.

So, to summarize, in the 60’s when Paraguay was still an insane wild-west Nazi dictatorship there was a power struggle for control of The Bolsi within the owner’s family. The mother hung onto control of the restaurant despite her son’s protestations. He eventually solved the problem by shooting her in the head, in the restaurant, by the door, where I am sitting tonight. He had friends in high places and the incident was made to disappear.

I say that with affection, I really, really enjoyed my time in Detroit. Asuncion, beaten and bloodied, reminded me of Detroit instantly. The emptiness, the darkness. Both feel like giant ghost towns. I know what went wrong in Detroit, I have no idea what the story is here. I noticed something simpatico in the spirit of the residents here as well, a pride. I already like it here.

My readings over the past year or two have made it clear there’s two restaurants that matter in Asuncion, the first of which is The Lido.

The Lido, for almost a century now, is the beating heart of Asuncion, I read that over and over in different places but until I saw just how beat up and bruised this capital city is, I just didn’t understand.

The Lido isn’t just the beating heart of Asuncion, it’s the lighthouse too, it’s the beacon shining out assurances into what appears an extremely uncertain city. It’s a safe harbour. A heavily armed soldier at the door helps ensure this is the case.

I’m extremely far from an expert but from multiple sources the horseshoe shaped diner counter of the Lido has been the location of multiple discussions leading to multiple changes in government and more over the years, as well as several much darker discussions. One book put it bluntly “No talk that’s ever led to anything in Asuncion didn’t start in The Lido”.

I love the place already and will spend as much time as I can here, planted at the counter.

The food is good too.

P.S. I forgot my bag at the Lido counter, with laptop and EVERYTHING of value in it, somehow I didn’t realize it until I’d walked a couple blocks away, I spun around to see the soldier from the Lido sprinting towards me with it in hand.