I am siting in reception "licking my wounds" per se when a fella who owns a laundry business said something in English, my ears pricked up and I asked, do you speak English and in very good English he replied yes.
Now, this is where doom and gloom ended with more power than a nuclear plant.
He said four very powerful words with sincerity "do you need help?" well I replied yes we do and the discussion followed, we needed our new stator that was sitting in BMW Paraguay in Asuncion across the other side of the country and we could not get it.
No problem he (Aldo) said, I have a Paraguay cellphone and I will be back in 10 minutes, we will ring the guy!!!, so things are now looking up, sure enough within 20 minutes Aldo had organised for our stator to be sent across Paraguay to his Paraguay address saving us $100s in taxes, couriers and import duties. I nearly
with joy.He asked what else we needed?, so yes we need a new charger for the lappy and we had been looking for an oil cooler for Maya to help her keep her cool in the slower going stuff.
We had a great lunch with Aldo, his wife Sara, and three great kids, Isabella, Isodora and Peter, thanks guys it was a very warm and homely thing to do.
The three trouble makers
Ellen reciprocated the following night with dumplings which went down a real treat, Sara and Ellen with the goodies
That following morning we were in the car and off illegally into Paraguay (felt good to knowing the two fat ladies didn't know ) to the KTM dealership, the guys were absolutely taken with our ride and insisted we return with the bike for photos, given they too went out of their way we were very happy to go back with Maya, it made their day to see the SE
They also had a cuddly KTM dog
They found us an oil cooler from a late model Honda 300, it was second hand but mint condition, although not perfect in size it was all we could get, we had looked all over Bolivia so decided we would make this work, style points not very high but function points 150%, it works a bloody treat
In cruzing zig zigs and tight back roads Maya belts out a lot of heat and in 35 - 40 deg days the fans are on a lot so to help keep her cool we added the oil cooler which will help oil and engine life in these hotter parts
So, back to our Ponta Pora God Aldo, we needed an engineering shop to fab some brackets and buy some oil hose and clamps.
We found one, the owner Wagner said we close at 12 30, it was 10.00am already, talking with Aldo I said not worth starting the job as it will take longer.
As quick as a flash, Wagner says hey no problem, take all the time you need and gave me full access to his workshop, he left and came back with the parts, Aldo left and returned with our new stator in hand so today the stars aligned and everything was going to the new plan.
This is happiness in a box, thank your Jaime for getting it sorted mate
The burnt one
, all 18 poles burnt but it was still working as long as there was no load or very little anyway.
Wagner the shop owner then organised some mates to come over, it was beers, barb que and bullshit all in Portuguese of course.....good times
Wagner soon realized he did not have to spoon feed me and we had the tank off, cleaned the air prefilters, fitted the new stator and fabricated brackets for the oil cooler all while eating steaks and drinking coke and beers.... we just needed the dancing girls to finish off a perfect day.
Wagner is a Jiu Jitsu fighter with lots of international titles to his name, we watched a couple of 10 round fights that were literally over in 60 seconds with knockouts and Wagner not even breaking a sweat ... the dude is good, if Ellen had him that day in Bolivia the would be dead.
Ellen with her new found boyfriend ... she had stars in her eyes
While we had access to the workshop we straightened out Ellens case and racks after our off in Bolivia, having the right tools made it easy, to top it off we were invited to stay and meet their family who were also keen to meet the crazy people from New Zealand riding a motorbike from the top of the world to the bottom of the world...it was cool
Aldo and his wife Sara have lived in the USA and Guatemala and had been planning to move to New Zealand or Australia, preferably New Zealand.
Now Aldo and his family are practicing Christians and had prayed to the big fella for a sign and guidance, as you may know Ellen and I are not religious but we believe in a higher power than humans as we are not the top of the chain in the universe, what is a higher power we d not know tho.
Anyway, after Aldo had helped us without a blink of an eye then we sat down and he asked so where are you from?, ....New Zealand ..... next thing silence (hard to photograph that) and the conversation sparked up all about New Zealand as he wants his two girls to go Medical School there.
We helped him with a monumental amount of information only known by locals so to say they were over the moon would be and understatement.
In a funny kinda international way where people meet from across the world with a bunch of mutual help it does make the mind think how do these incredible events happen.
On a side note and nothing to do with any of this ... yes they do exist, see the engine case name
.
There are massive shops here too as it is a duty free zone, they did not have my colour
Motos that I can stand over, Wagners mum, she was really cool
Ponto Pora, funny wee town split by a border that does not exist so you can roam freely to either country, golden hearted people .....
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