Snakes, Sponges and a 10km Race

10-21-10
The new Argiculture Volunteers are in Paraguay and have started training so I have been busy helping with that the past few weeks.  They will get their sites in November and we will be on our way out of here!  It is exciting but also crazy how little time is left!
My neighbor came over today to go check on a baby cow across the road that got bit by a venomous snake.  We tried to catch it, but even with a bad limp it ran way from us. Then we went to where he said the snake lives and started digging up around it's hole at the base of a tree.  I wasn't thrilled about trying to catch a venomous snake after seeing that cow's swollen leg but my neighbor said he wanted to catch it and pull the fangs out so it couldn't bite anybody.  Have I ever said that my contact is a complete bad ass?  I wasn't too disappointed when we didn't find it.
I built a trellis on the north side of my house for some mburukuja (passion fruit) and loofa sponge plants to climb on and shade the house.  The sponge plants grow faster than anything I have ever seen.  I swear you can actually watch them grow up the poles.  I'll take a picture before I leave in a month or so and I imagine my entire house will be enveloped by these sponge plants.
La Colmena is hosting the first ever 10km race on Oct. 30th! I think most of the participants will be Volunteers, but hopefully some Paraguayans will give it a try.  This is a pretty new idea for them I think.   I was training a little, but then got busy helping out the new Volunteers and haven't been hitting it as hard as I should.  But hopefully I can run the whole thing and finish before they close the course.  I imagine they will pass out terere and mandioca to the runners instead of Gatorade and bananas.
Speaking of the race, I should go on a run and try to do some last minute training.  The whole community thinks I am nuts.  Well I think digging for venomous snakes is nuts.  Hasta la proxima!  Peace!