Let´s talk Salt

Now, before I go any further let me say that I dont like making generalizations. Living as a foreigner, I´ve been the subject of many generalizations about Americans. Some of these include me being a millionare, since all Americans are millionares. Ive been accused of being a spy by many Paraguayans, since to them all Americans that come here are spys. To this I always want to respond ''What is there to spy on???'' but I hold back and reassure them that I am surely no spy. Then they say that all Americans come to spy and steal Paraguays water. This always caught me off guard. Steal their water...hm. To this I want to respond ''No, señor, I do not want to steal your water...it has given me a bacterial infection in my intestines as well as Ghiardia more times than I can count...literrally.'' But I hold myself back and tell them that no, we have enough water in America, thanks.
With that said I will make a generalization. Paraguayans, atleast ALL the Paraguayans I have met and ALL the Paraguayan food Ive eaten, LOVE salt and sugar. Those are their two spices. To be fair I have met some families that throw in some cumin or garlic but salt is spice numero uno. For example, the other night we were eating meat for dinner and the father pulls out ketchup. I declined, since I didn´t think ketchup went will with grissle but he then poured some in his plate and told me it didnt have enough salt. He then added three tablespoons of salt to his ketchup....I was shocked. And the family ate it, they loved it.
Example two. The daughter made fresh orange juice, awesome! However after squeezing the oranges we had about 2 liters of juice. She then added sugar. How many spoons? 1? 2? 5? no, 10....10 spoonfulls of sugar. My teeth felt like they were rotting just watching her add the sugar. They love it like that.

Now, I may sound bitter about the food subject, and I am. But I will survive it. Im actualy feeling really good lately, work is good...lots of sesame harvesting. The house is slowly coming. But life in general is good. Though it has been hot. Probably the hottest days so far, around 42C which is hot. Really hot. On top of that we havnt had water, they are working on the water tank so I have been hauling dirty water from the well. Luckily it hasnt made me sick.

I have been doing a lot of work with the bees, which I am really enjoying. We harvested honey from one hive two days ago. We went out late afternoon, smoked the bees, then took out the shelves of hive that had around 80% capped honey. Capped honey refers to the honey in the comb that is ready, thus the bees cap it with wax. So we harvested 8 shelves worth, brought it back to the house where we take a really sharp nife and slice off the cap. Then we pop them in a centrifuge and spin the honey out leaving the comb intact. This works well because you can put the shelf back in and instead of remaking the hive the bees go right back to work filling the comb with honey. I also got to eat pollen. It was amazing. There are little packets of it in the comb that the bees feed the young larvae. They mix pollen with a bit of water and yeast to preserve it. This pollen must have come from the orange blossoms because it tasted like a fruit candy chew. Trully a delight. Anyways, we harvest 12 liters of honey from that one hive, thats a lot of honey. Im working on better ways for this guy to sell his honey. In the meantime Im selling it for him to other volunteers. I have plans inthe future to make mead, the alcoholic beverage made from honey.

Currently Im reading ''I´m a stranger here myself'' by Bill bryson. A really, really funny book.
Now if you all will excuse me, I have some salt to add to my empanadas.