The other side of the Paraguayan postcard

Hi,

As a tourist in a foreign country, very often, we are enchanted with what we discover.

Living abroad is different. It's a rich experience but there are also some difficulties to face.

When people ask me for advice on living abroad, I then tend to say that one should also look at both sides of the postcard.

As an expat in Paraguay, how would you describe the two sides of your Paraguayan postcard?

Thank you for sharing your experience,

Julien

As a Paraguayan I can say that Paraguayan people are friendly especially towards Foreigners, in fact, they'll put you on a pedestal just for being american. You have to be careful though, Paraguay doesn't have rules that regulate prices on products there, so, if you want to buy things cheaper, you'll have to ask Paraguayan friends to do shopping for you, otherwise, Paraguayan Merchandizers may rise their selling price because they know that dollar has more value than guarani, therefore, they'll try to trick you on prices, but in supermarkets that's not a problem, the problem in supermarkets is that you have to be very careful when you go to the register because cashiers add the"comission," despite that is a nice country to live, people are very friendly and helpful specially with Americans, Paraguay has two national languages which are Spanish and Guarani. Guarani is an indian language that we inherited from our ancestors,as well the terere and mate, those are the national drink there by the way, nevertheless, despite the fact that we have two languages we mix them and we speak what we call YOPARA and in the borders with Brasil we mix Spanish, Guarani and Portuguese, that happens in the city where I was born Ciudad del Este and that also happens in Pedro Juan Caballero and our Spanish has Argentinian slang because we have borders with Argentina too, I think you'll be white well living in Ciudad del Este, is kinda like Miami and you have Foz do Iguazu(Brasill) crossing the Puente de la Amistad (Bridge of Frienship) grocery is cheaper there and you have all the electronic an appliances in Ciudad del Este downtown way cheaper than other place, Brazilians, Argentinians go to Ciudad del Este because of that, and you can make friendship with other foreigners like, Arabs, Brazilians, Argentinians, Chinese, Korean, people there because there's a lot of foreingers that has stores there, anyway, I hope you can decide where to go! good luck!