More Gringos Then You Could Shake A Stick At

This was a frustrating, interesting and very quick week down in El Salvador. I guess I’ll start with the above title.

I still have the gringos down that are working with the church. Some are leaving, new ones are coming – so they are in a constant state of shift. They’re interesting because of the difference in how we live. I live out in the community, them in the confines of the church (for the most part). Some of them are truly petrified to go hang out where there are adult Salvadorians. For example, I invited some to go with me to the soccer tournament this past Sunday and they seemed excited to go. Later, when I asked if they were going to go – they weren’t so sure….someone had told them that there were a lot of drunkards at the tournament and it wasn’t a safe place to be. I told them that I go every Sunday and have never felt unsafe – so, I convinced a few to go. I think they just get easily spooked and I don’t think the priest they are with does anything to discourage it. Those that aren’t afraid don’t always have the sense they should. Saturday night, I was at the town dance and two gringas (an older woman and a 15 year old) were standing outside the front gate just to watch what was going on. I chatted with them in the beginning and then went to go tend to some other things. When I looked back, they were still there – which wouldn’t be bad if it wasn’t for the fact that they were the only to girls standing outside in the dark surrounded by men. I walked over to them and suggested they head back inside the church.

The next gringos in town had my counterpart in the town hall confused. She comes up to me on Thursday and says that my boss is in town. I was like, are you sure….he usually doesn’t show up without at least a phone call. But, whatever. As I was walking down to the internet café, I came across two gringos that looked (not really, but to a Salvadoran) like my boss and a co-worker. I presented myself and asked what they were doing in town. It turns out that they were honest to God tourists! Who knew?! They were a couple that use to be into the .com’s and got out without going bust. So, now they travel the world on their boat – retired by their 40’s, not a bad way to go. They were in my pueblo doing some land travel. We talked for a while and they suggested that I find a way to continue living ‘outside the cubicle’….I’ll have to work on that. After we chit chatted for a while, I drew them a map and sent them on their way to the waterfalls. On their way back, they stopped by my little office to say thanks and take a pic of me. It’s kinda weird, I usually take pictures of other people to remember and tell stories – I’m now someone else’s story.

Now what made these first two gringo interactions (yes, there is another afterward) interesting was listening to their viewpoints on El Salvador or development. While conversing with the church group, one of the women told me it would be nice to live down here – where life is slower and there isn’t such an importance placed on what brand of clothes you wear. I found that fascinating because those classifications do exist down here – though they can be slightly different…such as if your family has a tv or not. I have visited people way out in the countryside that didn’t even have a cement floor – but they had a tv and stereo. And as for clothes – you can tell by which kids have uniforms for school and which kids go in regular clothes because that is all they can afford. Or the little girls that go around in pretty dresses because that’s the clothes they have, not because they want to. I found the tourists to of had a more experienced viewpoint on this. Maybe because they’ve been to so many of these countries. They’ve seen what damage development can do when done incorrectly – like making people dependent on foreign aid. They also made the point that many people just don’t think ahead down here – he’s offered people $100 upfront or $20/month for two years for the work they do on the boat and they almost always go for the first option. I agreed with him, but upon reflection – who could blame that worker. They’ve never been taught to think ahead, as our .com’er has, and that $100 would go a long way with food and clothes. Besides, by the time he’s offered the option of $20/month - when the guy is done with the work - that worker has already spent that $100 in his head. And who of us doesn’t do that – I do it all the time.

Then there was my third gringo interaction of the week. Remember, months ago??, when I built 3 fuel efficient stoves – well, the guy that invented the design I used stopped by my house on Saturday. How random! It turns out that he commissioned one of my artisans to build the stove, but only out of pottery. When he was talking to her about it, she mentioned that I had built a few…so him and his two companions came and found me. Granted – I’m not that hard to find down here. He turned out to be a fascinating guy who has made designing fuel efficient stoves his job. He was thrilled that I had built three and insisted on seeing one. We drove down to one of the women that had one and he checked it out…I got approved! After, we went back to the artisans place so I could check out the new design. We got to talking about it and him and I both agreed that it might be best to make the stoves out of to pieces instead of one solid piece of clay because of how fragile the clay is and how easily it breaks while firing. I told him I would work on it and send him pics if we figured it out.

That’s all for gringos…at least for this week.

Other then that – I’ve been busy. My laptop charger decided it didn’t want to work anymore and my computer promptly ran out of charge. It wouldn’t be so bad, but I had to go to the capital to get it fixed. I found someone closer – but they were more sure of their abilities then I was….so, I went further away. It actually turned out to be a nice day in the capital. A nice breakfast of croissants and tea, then got the computer fixed (for free!), then just windowed shop before heading over to some place for lunch that also happens to have free wireless internet. I somehow convinced myself to go back to my site.

My other headache this week was my artisan fair. I’m suppose to be receiving two banners from my town hall and a third from a NGO. The only way I can get the NGO to pay for the third is to present a bill. So, I asked the town hall for this bill and they have yet to give it to me. Which wouldn’t be bad, but I have a meeting with the NGO Monday morning at 9 am…..I may not get the banner and that would be such a shame.

Alright…I’ve written enough. I’ll fill you in on the rest next time.

Barbara´s Menagerie

So far I have (whether I want to or not):

• two birds
• a turtle
• ants (small, medium and large varieties)
• lizards (small and medium varieties)
• mosquitoes (blood thirsty variety)
• one giant black rat

and the newest addition.....

• a bat.

Lazy

Yes, I’ve been bad. I haven’t written as I should, but things have gotten a little hectic and I’m just lazy.

So, I’ll just give you highlights as to what has gone down –

I’ve submitted my proposal to Partnership Program for the improvements to my artisan ovens – this will be explain more in about a week…I hope.

Power Point presentation for Riki and Lori – if you want to see it, you’ll have to email me that request. It was about a gift for them that never quite made it.

Cleaned computers – this harkens way back to the first few months of my service when two of my schools solicited computers. The computers have arrived in the capitol and I went to help clean them. Their casings were really quite gross. The work was boring but it did have it’s up points – like when that really strong tremor happened. We’ve been getting quite a few of those…but, no…it doesn’t make me nervous.

I made cinnamon rolls from scratch – go me!

Went and worked in an English class. I was showing a teacher how to play a grammar game with his students. I cut a paragraph up into words and the students had to put each sentence back into order. They eventually got them all right – took some time though. I enjoy working with the teachers – the only glitch is getting them to replicate the exercises after I’ve done them. Sometimes they want me to do them repeatedly. We’ll work on that.

Our latest round of the soccer tournament went off without anyone getting punched or disqualified. Sweet.

I have 8 other gringos in town now – there a church group that comes down once a year to play with the kids and help in the school. Apparently, their priest served down here about 12 years ago and comes back multiple times each year. I saw him around Christmas time last year. You can only imagine their surprise at running into me on the street. They were like – you live here alone? Yup. The group will be switching members sporadically, but as a whole should be around for about a month.

Working on saying farewell to Rachael – she’s the volunteer in the site next to mine and she finishes her two years of service this month. She’s already came down for a bbq (I made some really good food) and I headed up to her side for her last dance. I hope the newbie they put up there is good. I’LL MISS YOU RACHAEL!!

The only annoying stuff was when people thought I just hadn’t shown up for two days and didn’t bother to ask what I was doing. Surprisingly, I was actually working in the capital. All well – such is life.

I believe that’s all the highlights – everything else was the usual stuff. Later!

A bunch of visitors.....

This week I had a whole bunch of people out visiting.

Let’s start with this past weekend. Saturday I headed into Sononsate and had lunch with another volunteer…pizza. I’ve been having a lot of pizza recently, but I won’t go into it. It was nice to see her and I think it did her some good to talk with another volunteer. She is still a newbie and is having some slight difficulties in her community. Some are taking advantage of her and charging her more for things then they should. I can understand that.

Sunday was just a day of getting the house in order and watching some futbol. My team won….did you have any doubt? How could they lose with my ball? Also, I cleaned up as much as possible – the boss came out during the week.

Though, the most annoying thing was cleaning up the poison. My brilliant rats ripped open the bag of poison to eat it. That would have been great except that they ripped it open next to my plates and dishes = I had to wash all my plates and dishes.

Anyway, back to the week. Monday I had the second meeting with my artisans – but this time only about half showed up. Those who came, signed the contract and are ready to go. Ohh..if you didn’t know, for anyone who is going to benefit from this program, they have to sign a contract stating that they will pay for the labor, supply two bags of clay (which they all have since they work with the stuff) and that the materials will only be used for the stated purposes – they can’t change they’re minds and use the bricks to build something else. It also appears the solicitation will include the construction of one new oven. I suddenly went from under budget to a little over budget. But such is life.

This week I had my boss come out for a site visit. Peace Corps does site visits with volunteers at least 3 times during their service. It’s a good time to reconnect and talk about what’s going on, what you want to go on and where you hope things are going. I always enjoy talking with the jefe – he’s a really relaxed guy and someone you really feel you can talk to. With him came another volunteer – Stephen – just hitching a ride and Rachael was down translating something. I had four people in the house (including myself) and only three chairs. So, I sent Rachael off to Iris’s house for the final chair. Oops.

¿Que más? I had two trainees come out for immersion days. I’m not sure if you remember me writing about this about a year ago, (I know, a full freaking year) but Peace Corps sends trainees out to a volunteers site. The volunteer then sends those trainees to live with families out in the countryside. It’s only for two nights – one full day. It’s the first experience they have living by themselves. I had difficulty finding the second family, the first one is going to Iris’s parents house. The second one is going to a family of another friend. I don’t know them, but I’ve been assured they’re good people.

So, my two trainees (Stephanie and Kara) arrived around 11 am on Thursday. We went straingt to my place so they could put down their stuff and relax. It was nice to get their first impressions and answer any questions that came to mind. We ate lunch with Heidy and then started to get ready to drop them off. We were suppose to leave at 2pm – that didn’t happen. The driver was off someplace and nobody was exactly sure where. Thankfully – Lito stepped up and gave us a ride. I dropped Kara off with the Iris’s family and Stephanie went to the family of Don Kokie. I then spent the rest of Thursday, Friday and Saturday morning worrying about them.

During this time of worry, I worked on a few other things. I got my haircut ($1 special, of course), was stood-up for a meeting…things of that nature.

Finally, it was Saturday morning. Iris’s mom couldn’t get to the drop off spot till 9am – which was fine because at 8am I still didn’t have a ride to go pick them up. Thus, I hunted down Don Justo and asked for one. He said the driver would be right over. He came about 20 minutes late….which was fine, we would only be about 20 late in picking them up. But, of course, we didn’t go straight to picking them up. We went in the exact opposite direction in order to go pick someone else up. So, we were an hour late. All well.

When we got back to my place, we just relaxed a little. I made some pancakes, they took some showers and eventually, we got ourselves out the front door. We headed into Sonsonate…the local ‘big’ town. Of course, we hit up Pizza Hut for lunch before heading over to Super Selectos – the supermarket. I picked up food for dinner, a new pot (my old pots were rusting and I’ve gotten tired of scrubbing rust off of my pots) and whatever else the girls wanted. We also managed to go see a movie – Ocean’s 13…the only one that wasn’t dubbed. It was nice to sit in the air conditioning and watch a movie in English – you could almost forget where you were. Afterward, we ran back to my place, cooked dinner and got ready for the dance.

My community was having a dance on Saturday in order to present the candidates for queen (queen of the patron saint festivals). We only stayed about 2 hours, but it was enough to have a good time, dance and fend off some bolos. I think we got back to my place around 10:45ish. We were all ready for bed when we heard the evangelicals start singing. It wouldn’t of been so bad, but we could still clearly make out the music from the dance. It was like a battle of the bands…right in my house! I think I slept like a rock anyway.

That brings us to their final day here…Sunday. We woke up, had some more pancakes and hiked it over to the waterfall. It took about 40 minutes to get over there. Those girls walked so fast – I’m so slow nowadays. I’ve just gotten use to the pace that Iris walks. Anyway, we got over to the waterfall and there were more evangelicals there singing. It was so weird. We still got in and swam.

After all that, they took showers and I then threw them on the bus to head home. It was really nice having company out, but it was sooo tiring as well. I was just so nervous in taking care of them and making sure they had a good time. I believe they did.

I spent the rest of the day…..watching futbol and working. I went down to the field to watch my team play, but the game got cut short. Someone of the other team got really mad at the ref and punched him. So, that team automatically lost. Thankfully, a large fight was avoided and there was just general discontent after for a while. Once everything settle down, I went home. Once there, it was time to get the house back in order. I still haven’t finished washing everything. What a pain.