Raw Paraguay – Ciudad del Este

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Come check crazy, chaotic and juicy Paraguay!

Mood of the post: Leon Bridge’s Smooth Sailin’. Press play! 🙂

After a short hiatus due to airplanes, a crazy wedding and even crazier family / friends re-unions, I felt like editing and showing some of the photos of a short trip I took to Paraguay earlier this month.

I always preached that travelling isn’t just meant to be a vacation. Visiting a place shouldn’t be necessarily done just to admire common beauty. Beauty indeed IS in the eye of the beholder – and can be seen in very unusual places. Every culture has something interesting, every aesthetic can be made into a composition.

Taking by example my sister-in-law, Andrea Motta, one of the most talented photographers I know: If asked, when in any city, if she wants to visit first the fancy, comfortable part of it, or the ghetto, she’ll go invariable for the second option – especially if it involves authentic samples of local street food. 🙂 Oh, check her work and her coverage on the Middle East emigration crisis here.

I was spending a couple of weeks in Foz do Iguazu, Brazil (you probably heard of it because of its giant waterfall complex). It is a Triple Border area – Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina. So, like almost every multiple-bordered area, things are a bit (ha-ha) chaotic. Brazilians cross often to Paraguay for shopping and to Argentina for good food (shhhh!).

So when in Ciudad el Este you will find yourself surrounded by heavy-armed men securing shops, a couple of malls with most of the best world’s fashion designers’ collections, and hawkers selling all sorts of stuff EVERYWHERE. Oh yeah, and there is this “baked pastry thing” (stuff sometimes is untranslatable) that will make this day in Paraguay worth! Found the name, it’s called Pastel Mandió, they are made of Yuca and there is a simple recipe here. I am though missing a photo of it, sorry – it was delicious and hunger spoke louder.

It’s one of these places where you look at things with all five senses… And with no prejudice.

¡Viva Paraguay!

Tatiana Bastos Photography. More on instagram.com/tatyart11