With time this came to the attention of the Mburuvicha, chief, of the tribe and he decided that Pora-sy should become totally devoted to Mboi to gain his favour for her community but there was a young man, a rebellious member of the tribe called Tarova who disagreed.

During the celebrations to consecrate Pora-sy to Mboi the young rebel Tarova kidnapped the young girl and they tried to escape down the Iguassu River in a canoe. Angry at this brash move Mboi promptly moved under the river bed and with a snapping of his giant body he created the Iguassu Falls just ahead of the escaping couple. Pora-sy and Tarova fells into the abyss of the falls and drowned, never to be seen again.

Mboi transformed Pora-sy into a rock beneath the falling waters of the Iguassu Falls, and Tarova became a palm tree, standing on the border of the abyss. Mboi intended that the young couple should never come together again. Yet it is said that the young lovers still today defy Mboi and find a way to come together. It is said on sunny days when the sunlight shines through the mist of the waterfalls a rainbow appears with its extremes touching both the rock and the palm tree. Its only brief and said Mboi doesn not notice. Tarova and Pora-sy’s love still defies the powerful Mboi today and it is said that this can be witnessed when visiting the Iguassu Falls.

This story was one of a series, all passed down from one generation to the next within the Paraguayan culture. The Guarani beliefs are so strong it seems that even today they are held true, forming part of the culture of Paraguay. The names given to the characters only add to the meaning as Pora-sy means ‘mother of beauty’, Mboi is commonly used to refer to snakes, and Tarova means crazy in Guarani. This story is not thought strange but are considered part of the culture of Paraguay and the spirit of the falls.

La Catedral Metropolitiana is noted for its very large gilded altar and religious art. It is one of the
 oldest and largest sacred buildings in the western hemisphere and dominates the square alongside the National Palace. Beneath the cathedral is part of a former Aztec temple with the Wall of the Skulls and the Temple of Xipe Tolec. The original cathedral was begun in 1525 but was partially demolished and partially reconstructed. The current cathedral dates back to 1563, it took 250 years to build. Its façade has a baroque feel with its massive covings and spiral columns, as well as its two neo-classical open work towers. The bell towers were added in 1793 and in 1813 the dome was completed and three statues were added to the clock tower representing faith, hope and compassion. The bells are uncommon in that they vary in size with the largest, named Guadalupe, is a massive 5,600kg. Inside there are three naves, a main one plus two side naves as well as fourteen side altars. Visitors can admire the architecture here.

Construction began in 1857 built for Francisco Solano Lopez, the son of the President of the Republic. The work began on it under the guidance of English architect Alonso Taylor, though planned by Hungarian Francisco Wisner. It was built in the neo-classical style, abandoned after the war of the Triple Alliance and not completed till the late 19th Century. The Palacio is one of the most beautiful buildings of Asuncion and overlooks the bay.

Paraguay and preparing one of its most traditional dishes, Bife Koygua, which is a steak dish topped with grilled onions and fried eggs. Here is my version of this dish.

• BIFE KOYGUA

Ingredients

4 New York steaks (any size you like)

Salt and pepper, to taste

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

4 tablespoons butter

4 cups diced potatoes

1 cup fresh chopped herbs (parsley, cilantro and thyme)

2 tablespoons chopped garlic

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

1 teaspoon vegetable oil

2 large onions, sliced into rings

8 large eggs

Putting it together

Season the steaks with salt, pepper and cayenne pepper and set aside.

In a large sauté pan over low heat, add the butter and the potatoes and cook for about 20 minutes or until potatoes are soft. Add the fresh herbs, garlic and smoked paprika and cook for another five minutes.

Sprinkle the steaks and onions with the vegetable oil and grill them until they reach desired doneness. When the onions and the steaks are done, begin to fry the eggs, trying not to break the yolks, since the yolk will become the sauce for the dish.

Serve each steak topped with some grilled onions, two fried eggs and a side of the sautéed potatoes.

Crecer (Grow) is the latest government initiative which focuses on child malnutrition.

25 percent of children under five years have stunted growth in relation to their age and this rises to 66 percent in the seven poorest regions. The aim is to reduce the average to 20 percent by 2011.

Almost half the population is poor, significantly higher in the rural areas, and 20 percent are classed as extremely poor. In the urban areas poverty is the most unequal.

More than 39 percent of the total population and two thirds of the rural population in Peru live below the poverty line.

Inequalities in human development can be seen between urban and rural areas, Spanish and non-Spanish speakers and across the climate zones. Most of the extreme poor live in rural areas in the highlands and the rural jungles and have Quechua, Aymara and other languages as their native tongue rather than Spanish. They have fewer opportunities to progress through life due to the obvious discrimination caused by language barriers.

Despite National trends showing a reduction in child mortality and an increase in school enrolment since the mid 1990s chronic rates of under – nutrition prevail in rural areas. Children’s growth and development are affected by poor nutrition. Despite progress in access to services for the poor, disparities between urban and rural areas and across different regions mortality remains high. A quarter of the population has no access to health services despite free health care since 2002.

Children are the most vulnerable and unprotected. Of the 3.8 million people living in extreme poverty 2.1 million are children. Of the 10.2 million under 18 population 6.5 million live below the poverty line. Poverty remains high and the proportion of children who live in poverty is much higher than figures for the population as a whole often indicates.

Socio – economic disparities and exclusion continue to affect children and adolescents who are not benefitting from the economic growth. Enrolment for school declines with age due to the expense of keeping a child in school. Child labor is a factor here as nearly 90 percent of children help out at home or work on the family farm.

Levels of poverty, mortality rates and malnourishment among indigenous groups are twice as high as national averages. Peru has one of the highest levels of income inequality and the gap between the rich and poor is widening.

Amnesty International has condemned the move as “unacceptable and one that risks the lives of 90 indigenous families.”

The Yakye Axa indigenous community has been forced to live on the side of a road linking Pozo Colorado and Concepción for over 10 years while awaiting resolution of their land claim. Living in such conditions they have severely limited access to clean water, food and medicines.

Nearby, members of the Sawhoyamaxa indigenous community also live along the side of the road awaiting the outcome of government negotiations with the individual who currently owns their traditional land. In a separate judgement, the Inter-American Court ordered the Paraguayan State to return their traditional lands. Since this judgement was passed in 2006, 22 members of the Sawhoyamaxa community have died from preventable causes. Most recently four infants under the age of two died after suffering from diarrhoea and vomiting.

The decision on the Yakye Axa case by a Congressional committee, although not binding, strikes a fatal blow to the attempts of this community to get their land back. It comes almost a year after the deadline set by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which in 2005 stated that the Paraguayan state should return the land to the Yakye Axa community.

Both communities have been demanding the return of their traditional land for more than 15 years.

In its ruling, the Inter-American Court said in their cases, it would be legitimate to put their right to land as Indigenous Peoples above the private interests at stake in these lands.

The Court set a deadline of 13 July 2008 for the return of traditional lands to the Yakye Axa and of 19 May 2009 for the Sawhoyamaxa.

Amnesty International warned that behind these latest votes there could be economic interests that are endangering the rights and welfare of Indigenous Peoples across Paraguay.

“The Paraguayan state as a whole, including the Congress but also the Executive, must urgently find a viable solution to the terrible situation faced by these indigenous communities,” urged Louise Finer.

The right of Indigenous Peoples to their communal lands is reflected in article 64 of the Paraguayan Constitution and in international legal instruments to which Paraguay is a party.

One of the chief obstacles that gender violence victims face in terms of access to justice is scarce awareness of or sensitivity to women’s issues and the lack of gender-centred training and knowledge of women’s rights evidenced by law enforcement personnel.

One woman’s ordeal is representative of thousands of other cases. When Blanca,* a mother of two, showed up at the police station to file a domestic violence complaint against her husband, the bruises from his latest beating were still visible.

The police officers took down her complaint and informed her that she would need an order from a justice of the peace to retrieve her belongings from the home she shared with her husband and which she was trying to flee with her children.

But when she arrived at the justice of the peace court they told her that she had to stay away from her home for three days before they could even process her complaint. Blanca felt so ill-treated by the court officers that she turned to the non-governmental Kuña Aty (“meeting of women,” in the Guarani language) Foundation, where she received psychological and legal counselling.

It was only after the foundation stepped in that the justice of the peace agreed to admit her complaint.

“Court officers are fed up because many women report their husbands repeatedly but then decide to go back home. They don’t understand the depth of the problem, and they handle these cases as they would any other,” Clara Rosa Gagliardone, president of Kuña Aty, told IPS.

Gagliardone says that the men and women in Paraguay’s justice system are conditioned by the biases, education and social baggage of a sexist society.

Institutions and studies agree that there is a prevailing ignorance among justice system workers regarding the effects of violence on the lives of women and those around them. Moreover, only recently have efforts begun to be made to ensure the implementation of the international human rights instruments ratified by Paraguay.

A project to shake the system into action

“Just filing a complaint in court is seen by women as an obstacle, because they always fear they won’t find a response,” Nimia Guanes, a criminal court judge in the country’s north and eastern provinces of San Pedro and Caaguazú, told IPS.

“Women who are victims of violence have very low self-esteem, and when they turn to the justice system they run into a hostile environment,” she added.

Guanes is part of a team of women facilitators that work under the Monitoring and Training Project to Improve Access to Justice for Female Victims of Violence in Paraguay. The project, MAJUVI, is part of one of the four strategic areas of Paraguay’s Human Rights Office created in the year 2000 as a specialised technical body of the Supreme Court.

The project began in 2007, promoted by the Paraguayan chapter of the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defence of Women’s Rights (CLADEM), and in addition to the Supreme Court, it is backed by the Attorney General’s Office.

“Our aim is to tackle the limitations and obstacles identified in the assessment of domestic violence and the justice system carried out by CLADEM,” MAJUVI project coordinator Elba Núñez explained to IPS.

That assessment “revealed that the men and women that work in the justice system have little sensitivity towards gender issues and the human rights of women, and lack training in that area,” she said.

It also evidenced that justice system workers have little knowledge of international human rights conventions, and fail to apply them in their rulings and orders, Núñez said.

In 2005, two United Nations expert bodies, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) – established in 1982 to monitor progress on the implementation of the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, ratified by Paraguay in 1987 – and the Human Rights Committee – created to monitor the implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and its protocols – expressed their concern to the Paraguayan government over the extent of sexist violence in the country.

They also criticised the inadequacy of laws and administrative provisions for combating gender violence, protecting victims, and punishing perpetrators.

According to Guanes, there are judges, both male and female, who have an excellent approach to cases of gender violence. But many others fall short, which means that access to justice depends on the person who happens to be in charge of the case, she said.

In Paraguay, justice of the peace courts are judicial bodies with minor civil and criminal jurisdiction in each of the 223 municipalities distributed throughout the 17 provinces that make up this landlocked South American nation. One of the main functions of these courts is solving family disputes.

“A great hurdle is the deeply-entrenched mentality that leads court officers to perceive these cases as a ‘women’s thing,’ disregarding them as not worthy of consideration because ‘women will just withdraw their complaints as easily as they filed them.’ That’s the attitude that still prevails,” Guanes said.

The numbers behind the victims

In Paraguay as elsewhere, women and girls are the leading victims of domestic violence. According to the last National Population and Sexual and Reproductive Health Survey, one out of every seven adolescent girls under 15 has suffered physical violence, and one in every five has heard or witnessed acts of physical violence.

The governmental Women’s Aid Service received 2,035 complaints in 2008 and 1,298 in the first five months of this year.

Although all sources agree that the victims who seek help are still a minority, a breakdown of the 2009 figures gives a good idea of the range of cases. A total of 253 cases of physical violence were reported, 523 of the complaints were for psychological violence, 386 for economic violence, 71 for sexual violence, four for sexual coercion, and 61 were death threats.

Sixteen women were murdered by their partners or exes last year, according to the incomplete records kept by the Office for Women’s Issues, based on information published in the press.

Against that backdrop, the MAJUVI project focuses on providing support for the enforcement of laws and the implementation of policies and action plans in the administration of justice.

“Our priority is to sensitise and train court officers in order to educate them on the application of gender standards in the justice system, and to commit them to guarantee the full observance of the human rights of women in their legal decisions and orders,” Núñez explained.

The aim is for them to “act diligently, change revictimising practices, and remove obstacles that prevent victims from obtaining fast and effective justice,” the project’s coordinator said.

Greater training and awareness

For Julio César Cabañas, a member of the Appeals Court of the northern province of Concepción, two factors conspire to prevent these women from receiving a proper response from the justice system: a lack of infrastructure, and ignorance.

“People living in rural areas know very little or nothing about their rights. That is why it is so important to educate both officers and the population,” he told IPS.

Cabañas is one of the judges that have participated in the workshops, and he admits that when he was first invited he knew very little about domestic violence and its social and legal implications.

Now, he said, he has a more comprehensive perspective of gender violence in the country, he is better prepared to enforce applicable laws, and, more importantly, he has gained a greater sensitivity to deal with criminal cases involving aggression against women.

In its first two years, the project trained around 1,000 justice officers through workshops held in Asunción and seven provinces. The workshops included court, prosecution and defence officers, 608 of whom were women and 399 men.

The project has also published a guide, with the title “Gender, Access to Justice, and Violence Against Women”, based on the experiences, lessons and insights gained through the initiative.

Over the second half of 2009, the project plans to take its workshops to other judicial jurisdictions and expand its monitoring and surveillance plan. The aim of this strategy is to multiply efforts to apply the standards guaranteed by international human rights instruments in the country’s judicial decisions.

But the MAJUVI project is not alone in the justice system’s efforts to improve the response to gender violence. The new Strategic Plan for the Administration of Justice aims to have a gender approach that cuts across all its areas of action.

This plan will also make it possible to strengthen the Human Rights Office’s Gender Division.

Lastly, the efforts to promote ‘a more just justice’ for abused women have another, more ambitious aim. The MAJUVI project calls for an amendment of the Domestic Violence Act, which it considers inadequate and partially unenforceable. Both the prevailing situation and judicial practice make this amendment necessary, project members say.

I thought so. I’m probably even more excited than you are about this country, which I first ‘discovered’ in 2003 and I have returned to many times since. You might be surprised when I tell you what country I’m talking about, but here goes anyway. It’s the Republic of Paraguay, in South America.

Paraguayans fondly describe their country, in fact, as the heart of South America. Their neighbours in Brazil and Argentina, however, have frequently used less flattering corporal analogies when referring to this small (by South American standards), little-known landlocked country.

But that attitude is changing… and fast! August 15th this year saw the swearing in of new Paraguayan President Lugo, a former Catholic archbishop, now ex-communicated (whatever you may like to deduce from that). The point is the change that is coming. More and more smart investors in just those neighboring countries – Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay – are profiting from the head start they have simply from being nearby and understanding the regional situation. Paraguay in late 2008 looks increasingly attractive as a place to live and do business.

This article is about how you can become involved. Paraguay is of interest to offshore wealth builders for several reasons:

• Excellent investment opportunities
• Tax Free Residence
• Second Citizenship and Passport

Whether you are looking for a place to live and retire, invest, save taxes or all three – and most importantly, why you would want to!

As somebody told me last month, in Paraguay “everything is virgin.” That is the reason for investing in Paraguay right now. There is lots of opportunity in all areas. But my prediction is that for the next decade or so, natural resources will be the driving force in the economy. In the very short term (read now), speculation on land prices looks interesting, bearing in mind that you can buy vast tracts of virgin land for as little as $25 per acre (up from $15 in 2007) Many smart investors from the US and Europe are joining Paraguay’s neighbours in snapping up bargains. It was even rumoured that family of President George Bush has been buying up land in Paraguay, though I have been unable to confirm this.

After a number of visits to Paraguay over the past five years, I’ve recently set up and am now in the process of developing a website for those who are interested in doing business, living and/or investing in Paraguay. This article will serve as an introduction, and if you would like to know more or follow updates as they are added, I’ll give you my web address in the Resource Section at the end.

Paraguay is a poor country on the surface, but it is very rich in natural resources, which are only now attracting serious attention from outsiders. Paraguay has water, oil, iron ore, gold… and vast unexploited agricultural capacity. With commodity and food prices at record highs and still climbing, these factors mean Paraguay has suddenly popped up on the radar of international investors. By the way, it’s also one of the world’s few forgotten tax havens, with no personal income taxes.

Nobody Bothers Paraguay

For many years travelers had little reason to visit poor, empty, landlocked Paraguay. Those who did had specific reasons to seek out its remoteness and the resultant freedom and privacy. Varied immigrants included both the persecutors and the persecuted from European wars, as well as religious groups as varied as the Mennonites and the Moonies who searched for and found their safe havens.

In Paraguay, nobody really bothers you, or even watches what you are doing, provided you don’t upset locals. From that point of view it’s very much “live and let live.” There is no Big Brother in Paraguay. (The rumour of a secret American military base in Paraguay is not true – I checked it out personally)

Back in 1864-1870, around the time North America was embroiled in its own civil war, the second bloodiest war ever to be fought in the western hemisphere, The War of the Triple Alliance, was being fought. After the war, having lost two thirds of its male population, Paraguay was in no fit state to carry on its development for the next few generations.

Somehow, as the Paraguayan population slowly recovered, the world passed Paraguay by. A few million poor, mainly indigenous people were simply not worth a second look, as the world was far more concerned with the Eva Peron in Argentina or the bikinis on Brazilian beaches.

From 1954-1989, military man Alfredo Stroessner ruled Paraguay with an iron first, throttling all political opposition but dividing his significant financial gains enough to keep enough people happy. The country became still more isolated, relying mainly on smuggling. Luxury goods were extremely highly taxed in Brazil and Argentina at that time, while Paraguay had only a few, very low taxes and a very liberal if under-developed economy.

Stroessner’s grand project was the Itaipu power plant, the construction of which in the 1970s gave Paraguay the highest growth rate of all Latin America. Still today, Paraguay is the world’s largest exporter of hydro-electric power. Paraguay doesn’t need oil at all, because it already has far more electrical energy than it needs. That’s one reason why those hydrocarbon reserves in the Chaco were never really developed.

After Stroessner’s exile in 1989, his Colorado Party remained in power through a series of debatably-free elections. High levels of corruption have ensured that the country’s significant natural wealth has been concentrated in the hands of a few, maybe 500, families. This elite shipped nearly all their wealth out of the country, in the form of foreign investments and importation of luxury goods like cars.

Now fast forward to 2008, the end of the Colorado regime. The new President Lugo, a former Archbishop who was excommunicated by the Catholic Church, has just been sworn in. Nobody I talked to will give a committal answer about Lugo. He might be the next ally of Hugo Chavez and neighbor Evo Morales. Then again, most signs point towards him following the successful, free market moderate stance of another ex Communist neighbor, Brazil’s President Lula.

On the other side we have first lady turned Presidenta Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, running Argentina. Incredibly, she tried to all but ban export of one of Argentina’s major, well, exports – beef. Of course the wealthy Argentine farmers are furious and are fast buying up Paraguayan land over the border, with high commodity prices and lack of export taxes (or even income taxes, for that matter) making the small additional transport costs worthwhile.

Paraguay’s economy today is still hard to judge, because of the large informal sector. There is little industry, which I see as an opportunity over the longer term, as the country gradually grows wealthier.

Agriculture, too, is a great opportunity, in the shorter term. Many Argentine farmers have already noticed. Land prices in the Chaco have approximately doubled in the past year or so. That means they increased from $25 to $50 per acre. Yes, you read that right! European and American investors, too, have been quietly buying up vast tracts of virgin land recently.

Here are a few of the reasons why Paraguay is looking interesting:

• Water

What will happen when the oil runs out? People will find renewable energy sources. What will happen when the water runs out? Some of the world’s biggest cities, for example Los Angeles and Mexico City, are perilously short of water already. Paraguay does not have this problem. There is plenty of water to go around, most of it in sparsely populated areas. This creates ideal conditions for agriculture.

• Electricity

The Itaipu power plant is one of the seven wonders of the modern world. It produces 14 Megawatts of power (for comparative purposes, that is four times as much as America’s largest coal power plant, Plant Scherer). In terms of power, the energy this monster dam creates every day is equivalent to 433,000 barrels of oil. Except, of course, this is not oil. This is green, renewable energy. The total estimated hydropower potential of the River Pirana and its upstream tributaries is 40,000 megawatts. Wow! Paraguay is already the world’s largest exporter of hydroelectric power, but most of it is sold to Brazil at a fraction of market value as a result of cosy agreements made between corrupt politicians on both sides back during the military regimes of the 1970s. The new government is determined to change this. This will be interesting to watch.

• Oil and Gas

The Bolivian territory directly to the north-west of Paraguay has South America’s second largest natural gas reserves (second to Venezuela that is). It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Paraguay’s northern Chaco bordering Bolivia might have similar resources. And that the country’s economy could transform almost overnight with a big find and the start of commercial production. The simple fact is there have been easier areas in the world for oil and gas exploration and distribution, which is why after the Suez Crisis big oil companies like Texaco who were looking for oil in Paraguay invested in exploration elsewhere instead. But with the high prices of today, exploration in remote areas is worthwhile, and technology makes it easier than it was a few decades ago. Oil and gas companies like Pantera Petroleum from the USA and CDS Oil and Gas UK are already there exploring and claim already to have identified substantial reserves.

• Land

This is another thing Paraguay has an abundance of. The land exists, is fertile and natural irrigation is easy. It is virgin. There are no people there. So nobody got around to developing it or putting in roads. High prices for soya, beef and other commodities have changed this. Argentina’s ban on beef exports has helped too… Argentinean farmers can’t export beef anymore, so they are quietly exporting their whole beef industry with all its expertise instead… to Paraguay. Meanwhile Brazilian farmers, hurt by the strong real, are also looking to reduce costs without having to move far from their familiar territory. Where are they headed? You guessed it – Paraguay.

• Minerals

Paraguay has established iron reserves, in the south of the country, along the Paraguay River and near the capital. It is likely that there is much more iron in the unexplored Chaco region. Once again, high iron ore prices are making exploration worthwhile. The new excitement, however, focuses on Gold and Uranium, which have been found in Paraguay and extracted informally by locals, but is not yet commercially mined. Most of the investment is coming from Canada, in particular the companies Latin American Minerals, Cue Resources and Crescent Resources. Cue’s COO Chris Healey was quoted as saying last month, to Business News Americas, “People are just starting to realize that there is something there. There is a lot of potential for gold, probably base metals, certainly uranium.” Of the new government, he says: “They are very keen on getting foreign investment and the new government is pretty favourable for us.”

These developments have not been lost on world markets. The Paraguayan currency, the Guarani, has long been the butt of jokes. But it appreciated more than 25% against the dollar over the past year. Paraguay is a dual currency country. Day-to-day business in Paraguay is in Guaranies, but most higher-priced items are tagged in US dollars. ATM machines pay out both currencies.

Paraguay is also very attractive as a personal tax haven, due to the fact that it has no income taxes on foreign source income. It is a relatively simple process to acquire formal residency as a foreigner, which can be used to reduce your tax liabilities elsewhere (depending, of course, on your personal situation). Then after as little as two to three years, you can apply for a Paraguayan passport with visa-free travel to Europe and much of the rest of the world. Dual citizenship is permitted.

Jaques Mahien, professor at the University of Buenas Aries, Argentina wrote several books about the Runic Inscriptions of Pre-Columbus Paraguay.

Runic Inscriptions that were written in the 13th Century.

In 1974, Mahiel wrote that he had extensive evidence to prove that a Nomadic Tribe of “White Indians,” in Paraguay, had Ancestors who were “White Aryans of the Nordic Race.” Near Cerio Plilla he found Runes and Giant statue of Odin.

At Guazu, Paraguay, he found 31 Runic messages at the site of a Viking temple. These Artifacts can be traced to the year 967.

Rune Mysteries Peru

Professor Helmut Zettc of Vienna, believes that the Inca royalty was largely Vikings.

Zettc has a lot of evidence to prove his theory. In the Chririmoto Village, Peru, half the population are blue eyed and blond. They ride Norse Fjord ponies. Their language, Quechua, has many words that can be traced to Old Norse.

There is a sharp contrast between the blond, blue eyed children of Norse descent and the darker complexion, black hair of the Peruvian Native.

It is on record that Pizarro asked who the white skinned, red heads were. The Inca’s replied that they were the last descendants of the Viracohas, a divine race of white men with beards.

There is an immense conspiracy to smother historical facts pertaining to Viking artifacts. One well known archaeologist, boasted that he had opened and torn apart more than three thousand Viking Stone graves. These men and women are firmly entrenched. The reason for this furious defense of the status quo is “self preservation.” There is no market for millions of outdated erroneous texts, or discredited professors.

Ellis Peterson AKA Ragnar Storyteller is a retired math professor and electronics engineer. He has been studying astrology, runes, radionics, metaphysics and alternate healing treatments for over 30 years. He is 70+, in very good health and lives in the boonies of the Pocono mountains with his wife Lory. His writings are unique and refreshing. To see more of his writings visit his websites.

1.) Iguassu Falls

Iguassu Falls lies in the border of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, churning some 553-m3 of water per second down its 269 feet. These Falls are centrally located in the ecological heart of the forest It is one of the most recommended places for nature lovers travelers and photographers who want to experience and capture one of the most magnificent falls in all of south America.

2.) Ciudad del Este

One of the most popular places to go shopping is in Cuidad Del Este and the bustling flea market that has hundreds of things to see and to do. People will scurry across the street like ants scurrying there supplies for their homes. You can get some really great bargains in this area so come early and shop walk and tastes a different side of the life of a Paraguayans life

3.) Museum of the Guarani Land

One of the most visited places for a historical perspective in Paraguay is in the Museum of Guarani. You can submerse yourself in the ancient history of occupation, culture and tradition that will go back over 10 thousand years. This is a great way to learn about many aspects of Paraguayan culture so go and check it out while you’re down there.

4.) Refugio Biológico Tatí Yupí

Paraguay is in the process of building and expanding a national refuge after the building of the Itaipu Dam. They are making a wonderful example of how modern and natural landscapes can function together to create something useful to man but not destroy nature in the process. The dams shadow protects a wide area of forested land and it is prohibited from disturbing the natural order of things in this area. It also is one of the sublime locations for some of the wonderful ecological tours that you can take on horseback, hiking or by helicopter. After your trip through the forest you can then come back and camp under the stars ad is a must for people who are staying nearby.

5.) Casa de la Independencia

There is a great pride in the country for building called Casa de la Independencia. For three hundred years the country of Paraguay was colonized, There was a unfairness felt in this tiny jurisdiction with the natives so in 1811 they all decided to stand up in one voice and declare no more. It is amazing to see and read about the history of the revolution in Paraguay remember to bring a dictionary or knowledge of the Spanish language because most of the texts and communication will be in full Spanish.

6.) The Chaco

The Chaco is national park is one of the largest parks in the southern hemisphere covering not only Paraguay but also Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia. The Gran is a place to enjoy the best ecological and biodiversity that South America has to offer. In this protected range are extensive collections of natural animals, avian birds, and bugs. In Paraguay you can enjoy the varying topographical conditions in the country and see and hear the people who continue to this day to maintain there original cultural heritage.

7.) Asado

There is one food that if you go you will have to savor that is ASADO. Asado is a selection of grilled meats roasted in a open fire. This is one of the more poular dishes in Paraguay, thanks to a large butcher market and cattle hustlers in the area. Anywhere you go in the country you will never run out of this delicacy.

8.) Asuncion

This is another famous historical place in Paraguay. It is one of the few places that you will see some of the original architecture built by some of Paraguay’s founding fathers. You can enjoy a number of different events and colorful festivals throughout the year. You can dance your way into the crowd and lose control of your soul as you inhale the deep aroma of the Paraguay culture.

9.) Lago Ypacari

This is a very unique lake with a very interesting legend that surrounds it. It is one of the few lakes in the are regarded as scared by the locals. This lake is thought to have magical curing powers so when you take a dip make sure you enjoy the healing properties of the lake and come out completely refreshed. But, you can also enjoy a number of water sports and parasailing on here as well.

10.) Trinidad & Jesús

Trinidad & Jesús is a Jesuit settlement in Paraguay built for religious, educational and defensive measures. You can hire a local tour guide that speaks English German and Spanish so need to worry about language barriers. With this you can enjoy an extensive tour around the area and then camp out near the local ruins.