Paraguay, “an Island Surrounded by Land”.

This is a quote from Augusto Roa Bastos, a Paraguayan writer.  I could add surrounded by unfriendly lands. I thought of an alternative title for this blog: “Paraguay, the land of hard soup”.  The famed hard soup resulted from a kitchen misstep: the cook put too much corn flour, and the soup hardened into a cake.  It conveys the country’s toils and struggles.

A friend and I, decided to escape the rowdy Carnival of Rio de Janeiro and travel to Paraguay, Brazil’s most unassuming and little-known neighbor.  We spent five days in the capital Asunción sweating under temperature hovering round 40º, hot even by Asunción summer standards.  Less than 7 million people live in the land-lock country about the size of California.  95% are of mixed European and Guarani Indian descent.  We stayed in the Palmaroga Hilton, the House of Palm hotel in Guarani, the second official language with Spanish.  80% of the population speaks Guarani according to Helmut, our tour guide.  The son of an Austrian father and a criolla mother, Helmut disappointed my Austrian friend by not speaking a word of German, however he is fluent in Guarani, and evidently in Spanish.

We arrived during an extended holiday.  March1st is Heroes Day; as it fell on a Saturday, the heroes were therefore celebrated on the following Monday.  The most prestigious hero is President Francisco Solano Lopez who was killed on March 1^st, 1870, at the battle of Cerro Cora, effectively ending the War of the Triple Alliance.  Lopez had started the conflict in1864 against his more powerful neighbors, Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay.  Paraguay lost the war, and countless Paraguayan heroes lost their life.  Only 28,000 men survived from a prewar population of approximately 525,000. The country also lost 40% of its territory.  It is the bloodiest inter-state war in Latin America, and many historians regard it as an imperialist massacre.

I had heard of Solano Lopez not as a hero but as a brutal dictator. This is the opinion in Brazil.  Since history is written by the victors, a bad reputation still sticks to Paraguay.  The country is associated with dictators, nazis, smuggling, drug trafficking and money laundering.  Let’s start with dictators.  During the holiday, most places of interest were closed in the historic downtown area where our hotel is located.  On the Day of Heroes, it was too hot to walk around, we decided to seek shade in the National Pantheon of Heroes.  In 1864, Solano Lopez ordered its construction as a church, but it remained unfinished.  In 1936, it was finally inaugurated as a mausoleum for the remains of heroes including those of Solano Lopez.  A mass was being celebrated to honor them, it was very moving to see how people paid homage to the sacrifice of these men and women. 

 

For many Paraguayans, Solano Lopez has redeemed himself.  20th century dictator Alfredo Stroessner has not, the legacy of his brutal regime is still felt today.  As Latin America caudillos’s lore goes, general Stroessner was top dog, he ruled supremo for 35 years (1954-1989).  He is remembered for having joined forces with Brazilian dictators to build the huge hydroelectric dam of Itaipu, and to have taken part in the repressive Operation Condor, for strengthening the Colorado party which still runs the country today and for fathering some 30 illegal children.  Stroessner is also known for having welcomed many nazi war criminals on the run.  The most notorious is Josef Mengele, the Angel of death, who may have sought refuge with a pro nazi Mennonite community.  During WW2, Paraguay was a hotspot of nazi activists.

Most of the post-Stroessner presidents were members the Colorado party. The party has ditched its former dictatorial credentials to openly support illegal activities like narcos, smuggling and money laundering, a far more profitable business, and clientelism has become an accepted governing practice.  The former president, a cigarette tycoon, cannot travel outside Paraguay for being labeled “significantly corrupt” by the US government.

Despite some nicely restored official buildings like the pink Palace of Solana Lopez and the Palmaroga Hotel, downtown Asunción is very run down.  We nonetheless managed to visit the colonial House of Independence, the museum of the Manzana de la Riveira, the Cabildo cultural center, the cathedral, and the very interesting Economy Museum. The middle class has moved eastward to the modern city, which is a jumble of houses, some grand and non-descript high-rises.  In this barely urbanized maze, where shopping malls are landmarks, the Museo del Barro is a cultural oasis, it is private museum showcasing Paraguayan and indigenous art.

We also enjoyed a day tour around Asunción, highlights of which were the colonial Franciscan church of Yaguarón and the lovely city of San Bernardino on the Yacarai lake.  The city holds a dark secret, this is where proto-Nazi and antisemite Bernhard Förster committed suicide in1889 following the faltering of his brainchild the Aryan colony Nueva Germania.

We did not taste hard soup.