Roaming South America

Yby Yaú, Paraguay

July 1, 2023

Yby Yaú, Paraguay, has a population of about 36,000. The town is quite new in regard to its founding—in 1984, it was declared a district. That's it, the end. I looked at both the city government website and the Wikipedia and that is the extent of historical information. A district is not a town or a city. From what I've discovered, a village becomes a district (or vice versa), then it is decreed a town, then it is decreed a city. At any rate, I found this description on a mining organization website: "Populated place - a city, town, village, or other agglomeration of buildings where people live and work." I got a chuckle out of that, it seems they also don't know what to refer to this place as.

As I arrived in town at 7 pm, I picked up some chicken wings to eat in the park, and the man selling the wings mentioned to me the word "Yby Yaú" is the name of a bird in the Guaraní language. I looked for info on the web and found a photographer page that also said it was a bird but had no picture or other info about the said bird. I even tried the ChatGPT/OpenAI chatbot and it appears to know nothing of a bird called "Yby Yaú" in the Guaraní language. It did say that birds hold special meanings to the Guaraní people. And it said to ask a local person for more information.

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The economy of Yby Yaú depends mostly on agriculture, cotton, watermelon, maize (corn), locote (bell peppers), tomatoes, and sesame, and some cattle ranching.

Yby Yaú has a tropical climate. The average daytime high of 29° C (84° F), and the nightly average low of 20° C (68° F). The city's elevation averages 163 meters (534 feet). The average yearly rainfall amounts to 1628 mm (64 inches) of rain.

So, my impressions: This town may have a population of 36,000, but I can't imagine it. The small amount of businesses seems much too small for that many people. I'm sure I've seen towns half this size with bigger central business districts. At any rate, this town is littered, everywhere. Every street is littered even when there are more than sufficient garbage cans at the street corners and in the parks. Probably needless to say, I didn't like this town, so I got the 10 am bus out the morning after arriving.

My goal is to find a new place to live. So to reach that goal, I am traveling most of South America, visiting the countries of Ecuador, Perú, Bolivia, and Chile, passing through Argentina, visiting Paraguay, passing through a bit of Brazil, and finally visiting Uruguay. I have a list of towns, about 70 that meet these qualifications: Cities with average day temperatures of 22-28° C (72-83° F) and night temps of 14° C (57° F) and higher; and a population between 28,000-300,000. I analyzed climate and population data of around 700 towns in the countries mentioned above and then pulled out the ones that meet the previously mentioned criteria, which leaves about 70. My preference leans towards towns of less than 100,000 people.  And, now that I have visited more than 30 towns/cities, I've decided I will probably want an inland town. I love the beach and walking in the warm water, but getting sunburned is just too easy, even on a cloudy day. At least here in Ecuador. I've also decided that any town with more than 100,000 population will be too big. I've decided that any small town/city (less than around 80,000 population) that meets the temp specifications and has a supermarket and ATM is one worth considering to live in.

My goal is to visit the towns and discover which one calls out to me - "Chip, Chip, make your new home here, this is your new home town". That hasn't happened yet, but the towns listed below are very close to giving me that feeling. At any rate, I am not visiting tourist attractions or archeological sites, etc, those will have to wait for another trip through South America.

At this point in my journey, I had ten towns on my Top 10 list, but I narrowed it down to four:

• Tingo Maria, Perú
• Moyobamba, Perú
• Catamayo, Ecuador
• Puyo, Ecuador

During my travels in Ecuador I visited 32 towns/cities. In Perú, I visited 26 towns/cities; in Chile, only five towns; and in Argentina, I visited 15 towns. In Uruguay, I visited five towns, and in Brazil, three. So far, I have visited 23 cities in Paraguay.

Next up: Concepción, Paraguay.