the real reason i'm here

it would be nice to say i was here for a two month vacation, enjoying my second winter of this year, sleeping in every morning, going to every museum, drinking too much mate or terre, going to exhibits and petting zoos...

drinking terrere offered by one of the women

but i'm here for business.

a serious business.

i'm interning for Fundacion Paraguaya in the microfinance sector. it's a really cool program. i first heard about it at Brigham Young University when i was applying to an on campus internship in Students for Social Entrepreneurship (SSE). i was interested in microfinancing because it sounded like a successful way to alleviate poverty and my papi has connections to paraguay. last semester i was the team lead for Fundación Paraguaya in SSE, which lead me to come here for two months.

if you don't know what micro-finance is, here is a good site to check out:
http://www.kiva.org/about/microfinance. (kiva, a well known micro-finance organization)



i work in an office with a great group of people. the girls teach me guarani, and Laura and I teach them english. Don Rodrigo often shares his terrere with us too. we start work at eight in the morning to about six in the evening. the sun goes down around 5:30, and we are tend to stay inside after it gets dark.


office. me, fanny, laura, nancy and karen

our project for the next two months is to create guides for women who need direction when starting their micro-business. they may not know what they are interested in, don't know where to start, where to buy the goods they need. so what Laura and I are doing is creating 56 different surveys for 56 different micro businesses. (ex. empanadas, ice cream, fruit, lingerie, shoes, etc.) we will give these surveys to women who have already started their businesses and are successful. our 3 week goal is to make 5 different surveys, speak to at least 4 different women for each one of those businesses and putting together guides that have information like the amount of money it would cost to start a business, where the best places are to purchase the essentials etc.

we joined Fanny (very right) and Nancy (on left) to complete some surveys for fundación

today we finished writing our surveys, we are hoping that we will be able to go tomorrow and schedule times we could visit women cooperatives.

it's a big project. a little overwhelming. i wish i paid more attention in my business class. shoot.


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