Wild fires season Forest fires Here in the sierras we have no rain over the winter, and sadly every year we confront forest fires. This last weeks we have one fire after another, in some cases more than one at the same time. Despite the firemans have hydrant planes that support them, they do almost all the work by hand. I admire them, they are voluntary fireman and they do a great job by nothing. They have a hard and risky work when they are moving over the rocks on the hills fighting the fires with only a piece of leather or a shovel. Of course they have more tools like maybe a chainsaw, but an interesting tool that they use on lower fires is a stick with a piece of leather to hit the fire and turn it off. The picture is a view from home right now, the base of the smoke is at least 20km wide

Childrens Day Today in some countries is the "Childrens Day", at Paraguay this day is different. Today is remembered the last battle of the "War of the Triple Alliance". Paraguay was an advanced and highly independent country, with foundries, trains, moderns hospitals and the highest income by person of the zone. Paraguay was a "bad" example for the region, so "mysteriously" between 1864 and 1870 Argentina, Brasil and Uruguay start a 6 years war sponsored by the British Empire. Argentina, Brasil and Uruguay sponsored by the British Empire agains 1 country. Took to this alliance 6 years to almost extermine all the paraguayan population. In the last battle, 20.000 brasilean soldiers plus argentinian soldiers fought 8 hours against 3.500 paraguayan children from 6 to 14 years old. The battle ended with 2000 childrens dead and only 46 loss on the brasilian troops. The war ended because almost all male population was exterminated. 160 years later, you can walk through paraguay and see some signs of the previous golden age.

Home improvements Today I was coating the masonry wall of the laundry area of my home. The first thing I had noticed is I'm in a bad shape, after making the mortar my back was killing me and this was only the begining of the work. Four hours later I have finished the coating, is not a profesional coating but is enough to keep clean and paintable the mansonry wall. Now I'm remembering the high school time were I learnt all this handy tricks. My first assigned task on the school was to make a hammer head from a piece of metal using only an abrasive file ("lima" on Spanish). This work took me 3 months, working 3 afternoons by week. The more exciting was the foundry workshop, where we had have made molds with a special soil and then we had melt aluminum to fill the molds. Working with such temperatures was unforgettable. The metal milling workshop was interesting too, starting with a raw metal piece and ending with a shiny and perfect object that accomplish with a given specification was felt great. Picture of one of the workshops today:

My car is asking for a technical service In a regular day I drive the car for 12 km to go and come to my work twice a day (I like to eat at home). The last weeks I was using the car in a non regular way, some times I was driving up to 200 km because of some meetings on other city. My car is asking for some technical service, but I don't have a second car so I don't know when I will be able to stop the car soon. During those trips a lot of thoughts came to my head, a recurrent one was "would be nice to have an automatic gearbox" I know that in other countries, the default gearbox to have is an automatic one, but here the default gearbox is a manual gearbox. People here think that the automatic cars are slow, expensive to maintain and made for the ladies. Last year a friend let me drive their automatic car for 100 km crossing the hills and lakes. This was fantastic, very relaxing and more safe because I had one less thing to take care of. I hope that my next car will have an automatic gearbox.

Bad hands I allways thought that I'm bad when I work with my hands. When I paint is not perfect, when I do a cut on a wood is not a polished cut and so on. By this, I spend almost all my time working with computers where I have more than 15years of expertice and I'm confident that I can deliver a polished work. Despite this I love to work in several areas and feel I'm doing something in the real world with real things. After some years I got a better understanding about myself and now I understand that I'm not "so bad" on working with my hands. My real trouble is I'm too anxious. Is hard to accept our limitations, but by accepting our goods and bads then we can adapt our work (or life) to get better results. This wooden bench is made from junk and looks ok, but it have a bad center of gravity. Works but is not perfect.

Storm at Iguazú Falls I have written previously about the Iguazú Falls, today I want to share an interesting fact. When you walk through the trails and bridges, you may note different colors on the metal parts of the railing. During a storm, the power of the water is so big that the bridges can fall down or get damaged. One week later, you are walking trought a new and shiny bridge. Don't be afraid, the rails are closed to people when a storm is close. An operator can manually fold the railing to allow a better water flow and protect the instalations. I love these waterfalls and I feel goosebumps thinking on such power that can't be described in words. If you think this may be a quality trouble, you haven't visited the falls when these are showing their power. This first picture is from a security cam, claims to be a picture from a storm happening this last jun 22. If you know this place you may note that the railing had have been properly folded.

The "Asador" For the standard Argentinian, an "Asado" is not just cook a slice of meat in a grill, is an entire ritual where each step have a personal meaning. All starts with the "Asador", is the person who will be in charge of the entire process. This guy will feel that have all the power and the people around will encourage their attitude. This guy will clean the grill, start the fire, take care of the condiments on the meat, take care of the fire, take care of the cooking process, savor some pieces, serve every one and, finally, will eat. In each family, in general the father is the "Asador", but in greater meetings only the masters accept to cook for others. No one wants to make the foolish in public. This guy will feel that is the best "Asador" in the world even if is not. If you find a some one that want to have all this work in a sunday then you will do every you can to make this guy feel the best "Asador" of the world. The guy from the picture must be the guru of the "asado", this is not standard ;)

Mate Cocido I have wrote about "Mate" and "Tereré". Today I want to write about "Mate Cocido", the last of the three infusions that you can obtain from the leaves of the "Yerba Mate". The leaves of the "Yerba Mate" are collected by hand and are dried for storage. The leaves are collected with some pieces of wood of the branches. After have been dried, the leaves are ground on different sizes to obtain stronger or smoother flavors. One of the sizes is almost a dust, and it is sold in teabags. In the milling process, the pieces of wood can be separated or not, giving to the clients more options like "Con Palo" (with small pieces of wood and smooth flavor) and so on. The "Mate Cocido" is prepared just like you prepare a tea, you can buy the teabags type or put some of the standard size in a strainer and pass hot water on it. The water temperature can be from hot to almost boiling, it depends on how strong you want to make the infusion. Like tea, you can add ice to it and make a cool beverage I drink a "Mate Cocido" in the mornings, tea on the lunch and a coffee in the afternoon. I love the coffee, but I can't drink more than a cup daily (because the heartburn) and I only like tea when is iced, so the "Mate Cocido" is a great alternative to me.