Empanadas are Everywhere

and that is not a problem

the latest of many empanadas we have eaten

What’s up, y’all!

I thought I was going to be able to showcase a picture of our new truck for you this week, but it wasn’t meant to be. So instead, enjoy these empanadas! I know we certainly have been. They are like crack - they’re really cheap (about 50 cents) and they’re on every corner. They come stuffed with your choice of beef, chicken, or ham & cheese.

We’ve probably already eaten way too many of them, but they’re so good!

As I was saying, we thought we would have a truck this week. The problem is, as always, money. It’s proving to be extremely difficult to get our hands on it. First, we tried to wire ourselves money using Western Union. That was a big fail, but we’re still not quite sure why. They gave us many excuses for why they couldn’t complete the transaction, but none of them made any sense.

So next, on someone else’s advice, we tried something called Remitly. Last week, gnob downloaded the app and created a transfer. Supposedly, they partner with a local bank here, and once the app tells you that your money is ready to pick up, you go to the bank and get it.

We were told up front that sometimes it takes an hour and a half at the bank to get your money, which sounds dumb, but we were prepared for that.

So, assured that we would be able to get money this week, on Monday, we drove into the city again to look at a truck. After some negotiation, during which the seller agreed to replace the air compressor on Tuesday so that we would have air conditioning, we told him we would be back on Wednesday to complete the sale.

On Tuesday (after a five day wait), Remitly said our money was ready. Knowing that it would be a long wait, we decided to go ahead and get the money that day. So we drove into town and went to the bank. After an hour and a half of nonsense, and providing documents that had already been provided to Remitly, the bank said, “maybe we’ll have your money for you tomorrow, it still needs approval.”

If you know gnob at all, you know he was not pleased to hear this.

It’s understandable. Why should we need approval and provide all kinds of private information to this random bank to get our own money that we wired to ourselves? Especially when Remitly already told us the money was ready, now the bank was making us jump through more hoops?

We decided to give it a chance, though, because we really needed the money for the next day.

At 2pm on Wednesday, the bank texted to say they needed more documentation. (All businesses and people here communicate through WhatsApp.) That was the last straw, gnob cancelled the transaction. I messaged the seller to say that we wouldn’t be able to get the truck until next week, and that I hoped he would hold it for us. He has agreed to, thankfully.

In the meantime, we’re hitting the atm limits every day until we have the amount we need for the truck. Looks like that will be Monday, so hopefully, you’ll get to see our new ride next week. And that can’t happen soon enough, because we’re still paying for our rental van, and that thing is expensive!

gnob has told me that the worst thing about the whole experience is that I was right, because I told him not to bother with the wire transfer and to start hitting the ATM last week. He can’t stand it when he’s wrong and I’m right!🤣

Here’s another picture of empanadas. You may notice some bread in this picture. Paraguayans like to put their empanadas on bread and eat them like a sandwich.

our first empanadas in Paraguay. This meal cost $3.45

Now on to something that did go well this week. We have Paraguay phone numbers now! The country calling code here is +595 (vs +1 for the United States). Let me take a minute to explain how we’re handling the phone situation.

For the time being, we are still maintaining an address in the United States. We need US phone numbers so that we can receive “local” calls – for example, when the bank sends a verification text notification, we need to be able to respond.

Of course, lucky us, our phones work differently, so we each had to use a different solution.

gnob was able to port his number straight over to Google Voice, so now his number is virtual, and not connected to any US carrier. The flip side is that it now works through an app, and apps don’t work unless they’re connected to internet, either through wi-fi or cell service. Since he didn’t have cell service anymore, his phone has only been working on wi-fi for the past month.

I had a different issue. Google Voice wouldn’t accept my number, so I had to get a brand new number. Not a big deal, I feel like I change my number every couple of years anyway since I move around so much. (Side note: once my dad showed me his address book, and I had a whole page of crossed out numbers under my name!)

However, some businesses won’t accept virtual numbers, because of the chance of fraud, so we’ve still been paying Verizon for my old number. This is because, as I said earlier, everyone here uses WhatsApp, and of course, WhatsApp doesn’t accept virtual numbers.

But I needed it to communicate, so we left it on for the time being.

Thought I paid for service, my sim card wouldn’t work in a foreign country, so I bought an e-sim before we left the United States. It’s a virtual sim card, rather than a physical one, but it works just the same. gnob couldn’t do that because his phone doesn’t accept e-sims - not all phones do, so check and see if yours does before you buy one.

Anyway, between my e-sim and wi-fi, we’ve been getting by just fine. But when all the drama went down at the bank, and gnob was unable to retrieve documents because his phone doesn’t work away from wi-fi, we knew it was time to go deal with getting actual Paraguay sim cards for our phones.

Luckily, the house across the street sells sim cards. It’s been weird getting used to, but lots of people run businesses out of their houses here. On our street alone is the cell phone shop (that also sells playstation3 and video games!), an internet provider, and a small market. All run out of the front of their houses.

So I walked across the street and talked to Liliana about what we needed. (en español, por supuesto!) A half hour later, I had sim cards for both of our phones, a month’s worth of data, and a new cell phone charger, all for the grand total of $14.

I knew it would be cheap here, but I’m still in shock when it happens.

Oh, and why did we need a new cell phone charger? Because in case I didn’t mention before, Paraguay’s electrical grid runs on 220V (50Hz), not 110V. So we bought a huge converter before we left, and have been lugging it around with us. I wouldn’t be able to charge my laptop, otherwise. Or anything else. But now we can charge our phones straight from the wall! Woohoo, it’s the little things.

It’s been one month today since we arrived, and this week, I have really begun to feel at home. We’re starting to get the hang of things here. Yesterday I had a long conversation with my neighbor, and it was completely in Spanish. We love our new neighborhood that has everything within walking distance, though maybe we don’t care too much for the rooster that lives next door.🐓😡😁

I’ll leave you with this sunset from our back steps.

Thanks for reading this week’s update! Feel free to use the button below to leave a comment or ask a question. We love to hear from you!

Have a great week!

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A Short Video

gnob shot a quick walkthrough of our house on the day we moved in. I meant to share it last week, but forgot. Here it is if you want to check it out.

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