Moving to Paraguay from England

By mid 2004 the teaching project had come to an end and after a bit of sightseeing around South America I headed back to England.

There was not much of a plan as to what to do next other than not returning to the bank. Back in England it was good to catch up with all the friends and family I had not seen for quite a while. In the days before smartphones and easy internet access keeping in touch was a more complicated and occasional affair.

It was good to be back in England but being away for so long had cut many of the connections I felt to the place and just as before I left I could see little there for me to do.

So inevitably after a few months, and a trip to South Africa I was drawn back to Paraguay. This time to see if it would be possible to live there and treat the place as my home.

When I returned I lived for a while as a guest of the family upon whos land the school had been. Living in one of their spare rooms whist I looked around for somewhere more suitable to call my own.

In doing this it came to my attention that the owner of a small sugar cane plantation just a few hundred yards away was looking to sell his unprofitable loss making land.

This I thought would be just the place for my house. Looking out upon palm tree covered hills and large enough to place the house well back from the road. Large however was the word for it as like many expats I saw how cheap the land was and ended up buying far more than I could ever use. 20 acres, although a few years later I was able to sell most of it reducing the holding to a more sensible 5 acres.

Initially after placing a stick in the ground to say where the house would be just enough sugar cane was cleared to allow for the building to begin. It was several years before the last of the sugar cane was finally cleared.

With a rough sketch, a local work force and locally sorced materials the building began. The first of the wall rose quickly before work settled down to a more leisurly pace

Using as far as possible local materials. I saw the patch of forest from where the wood for the roof beams and door frames came from. I visited the factory where the roof tiles were made and the bricks arrived by ox cart from where they had been produced less than a mile away.

It took several months after the roof had been fitted to keep the weather out that the details inside such as plastering and floor tiles were finished.

Then there was just one more job, a day out with a lorry to buy furniture to fill the house and all was set up for a life in the Paraguayan countryside.