Photo above downloaded from Google Image. The view is exectly the same angle view from my office at Panonama apartment building. This photo dated August 2008 most probable taken from the same building.
A beautiful view of the Friendship Bridge (Puente de la Amistadthat) from Paraguay crosses into Brazil.
I used to walk across this bridge alone. But crossing this bridge for cars is a challenge during weekdays.
Its a two lane bridge and the traffic moves slow. On a Sunday day (when all shops closed) a car can get across in half an hour. But weekdays may take as long as couple of hours to cross.
November 24, 1995 (Friday)
I came back from
Brazil but Fernando stayed there because the car cannot pass on the Friendship bridge. The
Paraguay people had strike because of the new law of
Brazil.
http://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/50026.pdf
Ciudad del Este is an Informal international trade center which depends heavily on shopping "tourism."
Brazilians and Argentinians travel to Ciudad del Este just to take advantage of the low import duties to purchase consumer electronics, office equipment, perfumes, whiskey, cigarettes, and other consumer items.
This trade, along with illicit trade through the area, has earned Ciudad del Este notoriety as a smuggler's paradise.
Shopping tourism declined in 1997, the year we left Ciudad del Este for Malaysia.
This is because of weakening economic growth in Brazil and Argentina and stricter controls by Brazilian authorities.
