Tuesday, April 22, 2014
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Wind
The coconut trees, the most salient protrusions from the
greenest horizon these eyes have ever seen, have a list – not one is spared.
The leaves of the trees, a shape both ubiquitously recognizable and adored due
to its appeal in vacation magazines and Corona advertisements, are pinned
reluctantly in one direction as if each and every coconut tree tall enough
tower the copses and receive direct sunlight has been the butt of some cruel
joke. Gone are the beautiful,
spontaneous arches exploding from the tops of the calm, orderly trunks, forcefully
replaced by sad arboreta, traumatized and convinced into dramatic, uneasy
figures overlooking Estancia.
This was my first distinct impression of Panay when I
arrived over a month ago. The stubborn trees, those that remained standing, embodied
paralyzed witnesses to a heinous crime, seemingly screaming to everybody and
nobody in particular: She went that way. The
culprit went that way.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Such a long, long time to be gone and a short time to be there.
Such a long, long time to be gone and a short time to be there.
-The Grateful Dead
It’s been coming at an alarming rate, the end of this time here in El Salvador. I was hoping to slip out of this place without feeling compelled to put time into staring at this hp mini and putting my life here into a concluding paragraph. Alas, I don’t know what sort of justice I would be serving to my ever dwindling population of avid followers if I didn’t offer up a proper farewell to the country that has treated me as one of its own since February 3rd, 2010.
So here goes.
They always tell us the same old clichés. Allow me to clarify: ‘They’ are the people who have experienced going home after such a long time abroad and ‘us’ are we people who do not yet know what it is like to go home after such a long time abroad.
They say things like ‘You’re going to freak out when you turn the hot water on.’ They tell us ‘I know you don’t believe me, but you’re going to miss the roosters in the mornings. I mean, dude, don’t get me wrong, there is no way in hell you’ll miss the dogs barking in the middle of the night, but I am serious, you will miss the roosters.’ I’ve heard ‘You might seriously want to wear a helmet when you walk into the cereal aisle at the supermarket just in case you faint at the sight of such a colorful cultural abomination.’ Believe me; I’ve heard so many I really do think that I could write a book of them that anyone who has spent enough time away from home would truly understand. I’ll save you all a trip to Amazon.com (sell outs), though, and simply write a final blog absolutely teeming with the clichés.
Sandwiched between moments of complete elation (at the idea of seeing friends and family who I have not seen in almost two and a half years) and utter fear (of leaving a life that my family and friends here have made so comfortable for me) are conversations about weather, about los bichos que ya se fueron pa’l norte, and how damn upset the entire country is that Pancho Lopez and his Familia con Suerte ya no va salir del tele. It is in these moments when my responses aren’t thought out, when words roll right off my tongue, when laughter fills dusty rooms with a suffocating desire to freeze that moment in our minds and never forget it. I’ve regularly thought of how great it would be to bottle that emotion and that carefree ambiance, to capture those moments in a way that photos never can, into a jug large enough to never need refilling but small enough to take with me everywhere I go. Alas, I cannot, so I sit back, wrap an arm around the nearest shoulder, and enjoy the ride.
If I may loosely (mejor dicho ‘incorrectly’) quote one of my all-time favorite films, Almost Famous: The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone when you genuinely understand each other.
In over two years in La Peña I have naturally had my ups and downs. (If you’ll allow for that cliché to go unnoticed I would sincerely appreciate it. Thank you.) I have gotten stitches, broken fingers, made a complete ass of myself due to my bilingual shortcomings, found myself in an empty bus in Santa Ana in the middle of a nighttime downpour unaware of where exactly I was, been robbed by the police, relieved myself on a mountainside in the weeds for months on end, bribed my way into Guatemala from Mexico, bribed my way into Guatemala from El Salvador, gotten dengue, and even lost my dog, Guanaco, to intentional poisoning. I can honestly say that I have run the gauntlet of absurdities until the bitter end, never once looking back.
Life here has its own set of rules, its own set of disappointments, its own rhythms, and a twist of fate that could make your head spin. Like last Friday, the 25th of May, when I saw off two of my closest friends on their way illegally northward.
On Thursday the 24th of May I was in the local store in town chotiando with my good friend Antonio when I got a text message from his cousin, Rina, asking for help with her English homework. Antonio and I, up to this point, had been talking about Friday the 25th for a few weeks now – me trying to motivate him to use all the English he’s learned, meet a nice gringa, and marry her, him telling me that it would be much more difficult than it sounds. Rina showed up with many a question and I put Antonio to work. Antonio, despite not being able to be a Lifting La Peña scholar due to the fact that he only completed 3rd grade before dropping out of school, is a brilliant kid and without a doubt the most devoted student I had for the two years I taught English in La Peña. Within about a half an hour Antonio had shaken off the rust of not having studied English in about 5 months and helped fill up all 5 of Rina’s blank pages with answers that would eventually be deemed correct (by me). Antonio then got up to relieve himself behind the house and Rina asked me ‘Hey, why isn’t Antonio working?’ I knew the answer, that he was being a lazy ass knowing that the next day he was setting off on a trip Siempre al Norte, but I played dumb, ‘I don’t know, maybe he’s just lazy.’
By the time Antonio had come back Rina had gone. I immediately asked him ‘Hey, dude, does Rina not know that you are leaving tomorrow?’ ‘No,’ he told me, ‘Nobody knows except my parents, my brothers, Tito, Jorge, and you.’
The next morning, the day of departure for Tito and Antonio, we heard the news that was resonating throughout the entire community: that of the 6 people who had gone north the month before one 20 year old girl had been left in Mexico, one boy, a minor, was being held in juvenile detention in Houston, and two others were grabbed at the border, one of whom had already been deported once and was sure to face a rather extensive prison sentence before inevitably being sent back to El Salvador – back to square one.
In Metapán we sat at a table eating fried chicken at 8 AM; Tito, my brother, Antonio, my best friend, our friend Jorge, and I. ‘Ni modo,’ says Jorge seeing in the eyes of Tito and Antonio that the terrible news of the morning was not deterring them, ‘Los que no se arriesgan no ganan.’
Those that don’t take risks don’t win.
We ate heartily and happily if not nerously, Jorge potentially saying goodbye to two of his closest friends for the last time in his life, and me knowing that with any luck I would see my friends very soon upon their arrivals to New York and Boston. We got up and I paid, the least I could do after Tito’s and Antonio’s parents had filled by belly innumerable times these past few years, and made way for the door. We walked along the street until we finally reached an intersection; I was going up the hill and them down.
No hugs, no tears. Two ‘good luck’s, two Salvadoran handshakes, and a surprisingly curt ‘Nos miramos, bichos,’ before I did an about-face and headed up the hill, not allowing the overwhelming awkwardness of saying goodbye to get the best of me. After a few paces I did take a look back to see, despite my bird’s eye view, that all three of them were completely lost in the chaotic morning crowd in the Metapán market. Moving farther and farther away from them I thought of whether or not I did a disservice to all of us by avoiding any and all sentiment in saying goodbye. I hopped on my bike and, riding through the streets of the pueblo, paid attention to little more than the ropes of thoughts, as thick as smoke, filling my helmet with positive premonitions (the only sort I would allow myself) of eating Chinese food with Antonio in NYC, inviting Tito to the beach in Rhode Island, and knowing that no matter the outcome of their month-long trip of outrageously dangerous uncertainty I had just parted ways with two of the best friends a kid can find in today’s world.
‘Mi patria son los amigos.’
-Alfredo Bryce Echenique
These past two years have gone by in a blur; time traveling so fast that it seems like the only thing you can do in order to catch up with it is to slow yourself down, take control of the sensory overload. I know that in these 854 days that I missed some opportunities, that I took steps in the wrong direction, that I ignored some responsibilities to friends, to family, or to my work, that I spent what little money I had frivolously, that I took stupid risks, that I cut corners, and that I was not necessarily as culturally sensitive as I could have been.
Despite it all, despite all my shortcomings, despite all missed opportunities, the one thing that I can say with enough pride to humble the noontime sun is that I put every ounce of me into the time that I have spent here in El Salvador, that I never shied away from the moment, and in return have made friends and have been adopted into families that make me proud to be called ‘mi hijo.’
If you can’t tell from my goodbye with Tito and Antonio, I am awful with goodbyes and these next two days are going to be no different. I am genuinely scared to leave…
…but I’ve got a beautiful niece who is going to be waiting for me at the airport and I owe her two and half years worth of hugs that I intend to repay in one sweeping dance across Logan Airport, tears flowing, knowing that no matter how hard leaving all of this is that I am going home to be with people I love, people I adore, people I miss.
I may be woeful at goodbyes, but I am great at hellos.
Shameless plug: Please, please, please continue to donate to Lifting La Peña! Our funds are running low and will not, at this rate, last through the end of the school year in November. We would like to continue raising funds in order for these kids to have the opportunity to continue their educations in local universities next year! Why stop at high school, right?
Please, please, please donate. No donation is too small. No donation is insignificant. On top of that they threw me a party last night in my own house and made me realize that these kids really, truly deserve the opportunities that we can help provide them. They truly are, if you'll take my word for it, wonderful people.
-The Grateful Dead
It’s been coming at an alarming rate, the end of this time here in El Salvador. I was hoping to slip out of this place without feeling compelled to put time into staring at this hp mini and putting my life here into a concluding paragraph. Alas, I don’t know what sort of justice I would be serving to my ever dwindling population of avid followers if I didn’t offer up a proper farewell to the country that has treated me as one of its own since February 3rd, 2010.
So here goes.
They always tell us the same old clichés. Allow me to clarify: ‘They’ are the people who have experienced going home after such a long time abroad and ‘us’ are we people who do not yet know what it is like to go home after such a long time abroad.
They say things like ‘You’re going to freak out when you turn the hot water on.’ They tell us ‘I know you don’t believe me, but you’re going to miss the roosters in the mornings. I mean, dude, don’t get me wrong, there is no way in hell you’ll miss the dogs barking in the middle of the night, but I am serious, you will miss the roosters.’ I’ve heard ‘You might seriously want to wear a helmet when you walk into the cereal aisle at the supermarket just in case you faint at the sight of such a colorful cultural abomination.’ Believe me; I’ve heard so many I really do think that I could write a book of them that anyone who has spent enough time away from home would truly understand. I’ll save you all a trip to Amazon.com (sell outs), though, and simply write a final blog absolutely teeming with the clichés.
Sandwiched between moments of complete elation (at the idea of seeing friends and family who I have not seen in almost two and a half years) and utter fear (of leaving a life that my family and friends here have made so comfortable for me) are conversations about weather, about los bichos que ya se fueron pa’l norte, and how damn upset the entire country is that Pancho Lopez and his Familia con Suerte ya no va salir del tele. It is in these moments when my responses aren’t thought out, when words roll right off my tongue, when laughter fills dusty rooms with a suffocating desire to freeze that moment in our minds and never forget it. I’ve regularly thought of how great it would be to bottle that emotion and that carefree ambiance, to capture those moments in a way that photos never can, into a jug large enough to never need refilling but small enough to take with me everywhere I go. Alas, I cannot, so I sit back, wrap an arm around the nearest shoulder, and enjoy the ride.
If I may loosely (mejor dicho ‘incorrectly’) quote one of my all-time favorite films, Almost Famous: The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone when you genuinely understand each other.
In over two years in La Peña I have naturally had my ups and downs. (If you’ll allow for that cliché to go unnoticed I would sincerely appreciate it. Thank you.) I have gotten stitches, broken fingers, made a complete ass of myself due to my bilingual shortcomings, found myself in an empty bus in Santa Ana in the middle of a nighttime downpour unaware of where exactly I was, been robbed by the police, relieved myself on a mountainside in the weeds for months on end, bribed my way into Guatemala from Mexico, bribed my way into Guatemala from El Salvador, gotten dengue, and even lost my dog, Guanaco, to intentional poisoning. I can honestly say that I have run the gauntlet of absurdities until the bitter end, never once looking back.
Life here has its own set of rules, its own set of disappointments, its own rhythms, and a twist of fate that could make your head spin. Like last Friday, the 25th of May, when I saw off two of my closest friends on their way illegally northward.
On Thursday the 24th of May I was in the local store in town chotiando with my good friend Antonio when I got a text message from his cousin, Rina, asking for help with her English homework. Antonio and I, up to this point, had been talking about Friday the 25th for a few weeks now – me trying to motivate him to use all the English he’s learned, meet a nice gringa, and marry her, him telling me that it would be much more difficult than it sounds. Rina showed up with many a question and I put Antonio to work. Antonio, despite not being able to be a Lifting La Peña scholar due to the fact that he only completed 3rd grade before dropping out of school, is a brilliant kid and without a doubt the most devoted student I had for the two years I taught English in La Peña. Within about a half an hour Antonio had shaken off the rust of not having studied English in about 5 months and helped fill up all 5 of Rina’s blank pages with answers that would eventually be deemed correct (by me). Antonio then got up to relieve himself behind the house and Rina asked me ‘Hey, why isn’t Antonio working?’ I knew the answer, that he was being a lazy ass knowing that the next day he was setting off on a trip Siempre al Norte, but I played dumb, ‘I don’t know, maybe he’s just lazy.’
By the time Antonio had come back Rina had gone. I immediately asked him ‘Hey, dude, does Rina not know that you are leaving tomorrow?’ ‘No,’ he told me, ‘Nobody knows except my parents, my brothers, Tito, Jorge, and you.’
The next morning, the day of departure for Tito and Antonio, we heard the news that was resonating throughout the entire community: that of the 6 people who had gone north the month before one 20 year old girl had been left in Mexico, one boy, a minor, was being held in juvenile detention in Houston, and two others were grabbed at the border, one of whom had already been deported once and was sure to face a rather extensive prison sentence before inevitably being sent back to El Salvador – back to square one.
In Metapán we sat at a table eating fried chicken at 8 AM; Tito, my brother, Antonio, my best friend, our friend Jorge, and I. ‘Ni modo,’ says Jorge seeing in the eyes of Tito and Antonio that the terrible news of the morning was not deterring them, ‘Los que no se arriesgan no ganan.’
Those that don’t take risks don’t win.
We ate heartily and happily if not nerously, Jorge potentially saying goodbye to two of his closest friends for the last time in his life, and me knowing that with any luck I would see my friends very soon upon their arrivals to New York and Boston. We got up and I paid, the least I could do after Tito’s and Antonio’s parents had filled by belly innumerable times these past few years, and made way for the door. We walked along the street until we finally reached an intersection; I was going up the hill and them down.
No hugs, no tears. Two ‘good luck’s, two Salvadoran handshakes, and a surprisingly curt ‘Nos miramos, bichos,’ before I did an about-face and headed up the hill, not allowing the overwhelming awkwardness of saying goodbye to get the best of me. After a few paces I did take a look back to see, despite my bird’s eye view, that all three of them were completely lost in the chaotic morning crowd in the Metapán market. Moving farther and farther away from them I thought of whether or not I did a disservice to all of us by avoiding any and all sentiment in saying goodbye. I hopped on my bike and, riding through the streets of the pueblo, paid attention to little more than the ropes of thoughts, as thick as smoke, filling my helmet with positive premonitions (the only sort I would allow myself) of eating Chinese food with Antonio in NYC, inviting Tito to the beach in Rhode Island, and knowing that no matter the outcome of their month-long trip of outrageously dangerous uncertainty I had just parted ways with two of the best friends a kid can find in today’s world.
‘Mi patria son los amigos.’
-Alfredo Bryce Echenique
These past two years have gone by in a blur; time traveling so fast that it seems like the only thing you can do in order to catch up with it is to slow yourself down, take control of the sensory overload. I know that in these 854 days that I missed some opportunities, that I took steps in the wrong direction, that I ignored some responsibilities to friends, to family, or to my work, that I spent what little money I had frivolously, that I took stupid risks, that I cut corners, and that I was not necessarily as culturally sensitive as I could have been.
Despite it all, despite all my shortcomings, despite all missed opportunities, the one thing that I can say with enough pride to humble the noontime sun is that I put every ounce of me into the time that I have spent here in El Salvador, that I never shied away from the moment, and in return have made friends and have been adopted into families that make me proud to be called ‘mi hijo.’
If you can’t tell from my goodbye with Tito and Antonio, I am awful with goodbyes and these next two days are going to be no different. I am genuinely scared to leave…
…but I’ve got a beautiful niece who is going to be waiting for me at the airport and I owe her two and half years worth of hugs that I intend to repay in one sweeping dance across Logan Airport, tears flowing, knowing that no matter how hard leaving all of this is that I am going home to be with people I love, people I adore, people I miss.
I may be woeful at goodbyes, but I am great at hellos.
Shameless plug: Please, please, please continue to donate to Lifting La Peña! Our funds are running low and will not, at this rate, last through the end of the school year in November. We would like to continue raising funds in order for these kids to have the opportunity to continue their educations in local universities next year! Why stop at high school, right?
Please, please, please donate. No donation is too small. No donation is insignificant. On top of that they threw me a party last night in my own house and made me realize that these kids really, truly deserve the opportunities that we can help provide them. They truly are, if you'll take my word for it, wonderful people.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Changing the World, Puppy Chow, and the Dalai Lama
This blog was inspired by two very thought-provoking parties.
The first: My grandmother who hounds me every time that I speak to her (not as often as she’d like) that I need to write another blog so she can have something to fill her time at work. Imagine that?
Me - ‘Happy Mother’s Day, Meme!’
Grandmotha – ‘You should really update your blog, you know?’
The nerve of some people. You think she’d be happy enough that I wasn’t in her basement wasting electricity by leaving the fan on all day, but no, she feels the need to assign me chores despite the fact that I am thousands and thousand of miles away. That’s how she provokes thought; through insistence.
The second: While wasting time (isn’t it always wasting time?) on facebook I stumbled upon something that my good friend, KC, wrote to another good friend, Jaime, on her wall. It read:
Don’t exaggerate your experiences, to yourself or others.
KC had written this to Jaime quoting something that Jaime had written in her blog. Well I damn near busted a move this quote excited me so much. ‘Wow,’ I thought ‘Jaime really hit the nail on the head on that one.’ It turns out, however, that Jaime just copied it from a book written by the Dolly Llama, (that’s how you spell his name, right?) but either way (sorry for taking your thunder Jaim) it really is something that needs to be acknowledged.
So here we go.
To those of you who are wondering, I have not yet saved the world. Furthermore, I don’t think I’ll be able to fit that in my agenda in the 2 years or so that I will be here. I am sorry but I just haven’t got it in me; the time, the resources, or the know-how.
My students that Lifting La Peña sponsors do not get all A’s. To be honest, out of a 10 point scale, our average grade right now in Social Studies is 5.5.
Last year I did a dental campaign. This year there wasn't any more toothpaste left, so I laid the responsibilities to raise money for more toothpaste on the teachers of the school. After three months of school the students still were without toothpaste. I had to buy it myself. I guess I'll be the one organizing raffles and fruit sales in order to raise these kids $10 for toothpaste. How's that for sustainable?
Last year I ran a reforesting campaign, too. We planted about 500 trees of 17 different class of tree here in La Peña in an effort to reforest the most rapidly deforesting country on the planet. Just yesterday while chopping my lawn a man stopped by my house to chit chat and he, like so many others before, told me about how the majority of his trees already died and didn’t make it to the rainy season.
In all honesty, I often times find it hard to find interesting things to write about. You see, there is a certain dilemma to being here and actually successfully conveying even the slightest glimpse into what is really going on around me and putting enough spin on it that you’ll give a damn. Let me reassure you though, whatever it is that I am doing is not saving this world or the next. Most days are filled with small, almost obnoxious tasks that to be honest, when completed, fill me with more pride than you can imagine. For example, today I had to, again, fix the water that runs to my house from a little hole in a rock at the top of the mountain. Do you have any idea how unbelievable it feels to finally, after days of poorly thought out solutions, figure out a way to provide yourself with water when you were without before? You better believe I let out a sigh of relief and enjoyed the moment while I could before I had to wash 13 pairs of dirty socks, a bunch of underwear, TWO pairs of jean shorts (I am a part of the Proud Jean Short Wearer Club of Western El Salvador), and a whole boat load of T-shirts by hand.
As if that doesn’t get your skin tickling, right? How is that for ‘making the world a better place?’
Let’s not fool ourselves here. Although I love being here, and I really and truly do, I think what Dolly Parton said was right… I can’t exaggerate any part of this experience. I haven’t found a free cure for AIDS or helped train some Salvadoran ninja-warrior who can take down FOX News…like I said, I probably won’t save the world.
I haven’t met the president yet, and I haven’t supplied La Peña with running water, and the road into town is unpaved, and we are STILL without a Health Promotor, and on top of that there are still a few houses in this town that are without electricity, and although I can imagine how great it would be to have a positive influence in these peoples’ lives there is an overwhelming possibility that I just can’t make those particulars happen.
But sometimes I do get lucky and feel like I may be heading in the right direction.
About a month ago my friend (and Lifting La Peña scholarship recipient) Marvin came by the house. It had rained the night before and a small landslide had made the dirt road to my house inaccessible so he came climbing up to my house from the face of the mountain. I am not going to lie to you, I was a little taken aback to him come stomping up the side of the mountain, walking through the brush, but he explained what had happened to the street as I poured his cup of coffee and handed him a large bowl of Puppy Chow (thanks again, Cindy!).
After a few minutes of laughing at how dirty his shoes were from the hike I made a comment about how great it must feel to have a Saturday off from school for Semana Santa.
(My most sincere apologies for the 'he said, he said.')
Marvin looked up from his cup of coffee and told me that was what he had come to talk about: that he was not going to continue with school.
My face got really red and a brick settled very abruptly in my stomach.
He told me that he would pay me back for the calculator and the uniform. He told me that he would just need a few weeks to make the money, but he would find a way to raise the $22.50 to pay me back.
‘Slow down,’ I told him after I could bring myself to speak, ‘Why aren’t you?’
Marvin is a genuinely great kid. He is the eldest in a family of six without a father. He plays guitar in the La Peña Catholic Church every Thursday and Sunday. He is the President of the Directive of the school in La Peña. He is a ‘vocal’ on the La Peña local governance committee. He is the captain of the La Peña soccer team. He is exactly who I had in mind when the opportunity to start the scholarship came up back in February. Marvin is the one who took me, a complete stranger at the time, to a swimming hole over an hours walk away from town the day after I arrived in La Peña last year. He is the kind of kid you’d wish your sons could be like. He’s the kind of kid I hope my sons are like.
He told me that the father of his brothers and sisters (different fathers, his own father doesn't acknowledge him) who lives in the US stopped sending money a few months ago and probably won’t be sending any more. Because of that he needs to find ways to earn a little money to buy sugar, rice, toilet paper and other things of that sort for the family. On top of that he said the rainy season is coming and he needs to plant all the corn and the beans to put food on his family’s table for the next year. He looked me in the eyes and told me that he just couldn’t keep up with all of it and have time to study every night and give up his Saturdays to go to school. He said he would need those days to work in the milpa.
I didn’t know what to say, and believe me, it’s the worst feeling in the world when you not only can’t think of the words, but in a foreign language.
I was broken, crushed. This wasn’t just any student. This was Marvin. Marvin who despite having so much work to do in providing for his family still voluntarily holds soccer practice for the younger kids in town every Wednesday afternoon.
I told him that the money was not an issue at all, that he was not to worry about it in the least, but that I really wished that he would reconsider because education is important and this is a great opportunity.
He told me that the students in Metapán were too far advanced.
I told him I would give him more classes, private classes if he needed, every single night if it came to it. I would permanently fuse a dry erase marker to my right hand in order to teach him every single date in Social Studies, every single pronunciation in English, every single step in the Water Cycle, whatever it took.
He told me ‘That’s just it, Grego, I just do not have the time.’
It was really, really heart wrenching. I explained to him that he is one of my best friends here and he was, more than anyone, who I wanted to see benefit from this opportunity.
He told me he was the man of the house, the only one who works, and he needs to feed his family.
He was right. I couldn’t argue against it.
I told him I would do anything, anything at all, except do his homework for him or give him money.
He told me he understands, but with planting, harvesting, and fertalizing his own milpa how would he have time to do his homework and give up one day of work a week AND help other people in their work in order to earn money?
So I asked him if the problem was the workload or the ganas. Did he want to continue and not have time or did he just simply not want to continue with school? I told him to tell me the truth... I told him that he always has and I wouldn't expect any different now.
He got really red in the face, with all the pena of his 20 years so incredibly apparent in every syllable, he told me he didn't want to continue.
I almost lost it. I looked to the floor to hide my disappointment.
I told him to think about it. I told him he has an entire week and a half to think about it before the next classes homework should be started and finished. A week and a half. I told him to talk it over with his mother again and see what she says.
I told him if he doesn't feel like he is advanced enough we can make him advanced enough. I told him I may not speak Spanish very well but Math is in English.
I poured my heart out to him.
I told him how education is incredibly important. I told him that to me education is THE most important thing in the world. I told him it’s the only way that we can better ourselves without the help of any gringo, or the help of some mayor, or the help of remittances from the United States.
I told him if it came down to it I personally would go to the milpa with him every single day from the first day he plants until the last day of aporreando so that he could spend less time in the cornfield and more time studying. I promised him. I told him I KNEW that he could graduate if he was just given the chance, that I understood his situation, that I was going to help if I could, and of all the people in this town who deserve this opportunity, it is him. I told him that maybe graduating from High School doesn’t get him anywhere new, any extra money, or Claro satellite television, but that I didn’t want him throwing this golden ticket away. I told him that if any other student from La Peña had approached me about wanting to quit, I wouldn’t take it to heart or offer to spend months in the corn field, but he is different. I told him he's been one of my best friends since the day I got here and I mean it when I say that I will do anything in the world that I can to help you, Marvin. One week, Marvin, just go home and talk to Niña Miriam and think about it…
And then he interrupted me...
'La verdad es que voy a seguir,' with a very bashful smile, eyes half closed and filled to their brims with tears. 'Cuando me habla asi, me da la fuerza a seguir.'
‘The truth is that I am going to continue. When you speak to me like that you give me the strength to continue.’
I almost cried.
I almost jumped for joy.
I didn’t know which would have been more appropriate, but I was elated. I promised him again, just in case he didn’t believe me, that I would be there every single day. I told him I still had a lot to learn, but I would learn quickly and help as much as I possibly could. I told him to tell me when we begin, that I am really excited to get myself out of the house and learn how to plant.
He looked up from his Puppy Chow, smiled, and said ‘Hey, lets go back to that swimming hole we went to last year.’
On our way out of my house he nudged me and said 'Hey, Profe Doris told me that I can become a policeman with just a High School diploma.'
The reality is that what I do every day is a far cry from saving the world. I am not providing clean water or jobs to the marginalized, ending poverty, or even doing anything that is worth the space this blog takes up on the interweb, but every once in a while, despite all of the 5.5s out of 10 and the dead trees, I get lucky and find a smile hidden behind all these doubts and failures.
So for any of you who stuck around until the end of this blog, please understand exactly what it is that I DO do without any exaggerations: I chop my yard with a machete, I dig trenches behind my house to keep the water from rushing in, I spend hours every week unclogging the 300 meters of tubes that run water to my house, and soon I will spend my time planting and harvesting corn. Let's not kid ourselves, I have not changed the world and I can safely say that I never will, but I am thinking that the next few months of planting corn with Marvin may be what I had hoped for all along.
The first: My grandmother who hounds me every time that I speak to her (not as often as she’d like) that I need to write another blog so she can have something to fill her time at work. Imagine that?
Me - ‘Happy Mother’s Day, Meme!’
Grandmotha – ‘You should really update your blog, you know?’
The nerve of some people. You think she’d be happy enough that I wasn’t in her basement wasting electricity by leaving the fan on all day, but no, she feels the need to assign me chores despite the fact that I am thousands and thousand of miles away. That’s how she provokes thought; through insistence.
The second: While wasting time (isn’t it always wasting time?) on facebook I stumbled upon something that my good friend, KC, wrote to another good friend, Jaime, on her wall. It read:
Don’t exaggerate your experiences, to yourself or others.
KC had written this to Jaime quoting something that Jaime had written in her blog. Well I damn near busted a move this quote excited me so much. ‘Wow,’ I thought ‘Jaime really hit the nail on the head on that one.’ It turns out, however, that Jaime just copied it from a book written by the Dolly Llama, (that’s how you spell his name, right?) but either way (sorry for taking your thunder Jaim) it really is something that needs to be acknowledged.
So here we go.
To those of you who are wondering, I have not yet saved the world. Furthermore, I don’t think I’ll be able to fit that in my agenda in the 2 years or so that I will be here. I am sorry but I just haven’t got it in me; the time, the resources, or the know-how.
My students that Lifting La Peña sponsors do not get all A’s. To be honest, out of a 10 point scale, our average grade right now in Social Studies is 5.5.
Last year I did a dental campaign. This year there wasn't any more toothpaste left, so I laid the responsibilities to raise money for more toothpaste on the teachers of the school. After three months of school the students still were without toothpaste. I had to buy it myself. I guess I'll be the one organizing raffles and fruit sales in order to raise these kids $10 for toothpaste. How's that for sustainable?
Last year I ran a reforesting campaign, too. We planted about 500 trees of 17 different class of tree here in La Peña in an effort to reforest the most rapidly deforesting country on the planet. Just yesterday while chopping my lawn a man stopped by my house to chit chat and he, like so many others before, told me about how the majority of his trees already died and didn’t make it to the rainy season.
In all honesty, I often times find it hard to find interesting things to write about. You see, there is a certain dilemma to being here and actually successfully conveying even the slightest glimpse into what is really going on around me and putting enough spin on it that you’ll give a damn. Let me reassure you though, whatever it is that I am doing is not saving this world or the next. Most days are filled with small, almost obnoxious tasks that to be honest, when completed, fill me with more pride than you can imagine. For example, today I had to, again, fix the water that runs to my house from a little hole in a rock at the top of the mountain. Do you have any idea how unbelievable it feels to finally, after days of poorly thought out solutions, figure out a way to provide yourself with water when you were without before? You better believe I let out a sigh of relief and enjoyed the moment while I could before I had to wash 13 pairs of dirty socks, a bunch of underwear, TWO pairs of jean shorts (I am a part of the Proud Jean Short Wearer Club of Western El Salvador), and a whole boat load of T-shirts by hand.
As if that doesn’t get your skin tickling, right? How is that for ‘making the world a better place?’
Let’s not fool ourselves here. Although I love being here, and I really and truly do, I think what Dolly Parton said was right… I can’t exaggerate any part of this experience. I haven’t found a free cure for AIDS or helped train some Salvadoran ninja-warrior who can take down FOX News…like I said, I probably won’t save the world.
I haven’t met the president yet, and I haven’t supplied La Peña with running water, and the road into town is unpaved, and we are STILL without a Health Promotor, and on top of that there are still a few houses in this town that are without electricity, and although I can imagine how great it would be to have a positive influence in these peoples’ lives there is an overwhelming possibility that I just can’t make those particulars happen.
But sometimes I do get lucky and feel like I may be heading in the right direction.
About a month ago my friend (and Lifting La Peña scholarship recipient) Marvin came by the house. It had rained the night before and a small landslide had made the dirt road to my house inaccessible so he came climbing up to my house from the face of the mountain. I am not going to lie to you, I was a little taken aback to him come stomping up the side of the mountain, walking through the brush, but he explained what had happened to the street as I poured his cup of coffee and handed him a large bowl of Puppy Chow (thanks again, Cindy!).
After a few minutes of laughing at how dirty his shoes were from the hike I made a comment about how great it must feel to have a Saturday off from school for Semana Santa.
(My most sincere apologies for the 'he said, he said.')
Marvin looked up from his cup of coffee and told me that was what he had come to talk about: that he was not going to continue with school.
My face got really red and a brick settled very abruptly in my stomach.
He told me that he would pay me back for the calculator and the uniform. He told me that he would just need a few weeks to make the money, but he would find a way to raise the $22.50 to pay me back.
‘Slow down,’ I told him after I could bring myself to speak, ‘Why aren’t you?’
Marvin is a genuinely great kid. He is the eldest in a family of six without a father. He plays guitar in the La Peña Catholic Church every Thursday and Sunday. He is the President of the Directive of the school in La Peña. He is a ‘vocal’ on the La Peña local governance committee. He is the captain of the La Peña soccer team. He is exactly who I had in mind when the opportunity to start the scholarship came up back in February. Marvin is the one who took me, a complete stranger at the time, to a swimming hole over an hours walk away from town the day after I arrived in La Peña last year. He is the kind of kid you’d wish your sons could be like. He’s the kind of kid I hope my sons are like.
He told me that the father of his brothers and sisters (different fathers, his own father doesn't acknowledge him) who lives in the US stopped sending money a few months ago and probably won’t be sending any more. Because of that he needs to find ways to earn a little money to buy sugar, rice, toilet paper and other things of that sort for the family. On top of that he said the rainy season is coming and he needs to plant all the corn and the beans to put food on his family’s table for the next year. He looked me in the eyes and told me that he just couldn’t keep up with all of it and have time to study every night and give up his Saturdays to go to school. He said he would need those days to work in the milpa.
I didn’t know what to say, and believe me, it’s the worst feeling in the world when you not only can’t think of the words, but in a foreign language.
I was broken, crushed. This wasn’t just any student. This was Marvin. Marvin who despite having so much work to do in providing for his family still voluntarily holds soccer practice for the younger kids in town every Wednesday afternoon.
I told him that the money was not an issue at all, that he was not to worry about it in the least, but that I really wished that he would reconsider because education is important and this is a great opportunity.
He told me that the students in Metapán were too far advanced.
I told him I would give him more classes, private classes if he needed, every single night if it came to it. I would permanently fuse a dry erase marker to my right hand in order to teach him every single date in Social Studies, every single pronunciation in English, every single step in the Water Cycle, whatever it took.
He told me ‘That’s just it, Grego, I just do not have the time.’
It was really, really heart wrenching. I explained to him that he is one of my best friends here and he was, more than anyone, who I wanted to see benefit from this opportunity.
He told me he was the man of the house, the only one who works, and he needs to feed his family.
He was right. I couldn’t argue against it.
I told him I would do anything, anything at all, except do his homework for him or give him money.
He told me he understands, but with planting, harvesting, and fertalizing his own milpa how would he have time to do his homework and give up one day of work a week AND help other people in their work in order to earn money?
So I asked him if the problem was the workload or the ganas. Did he want to continue and not have time or did he just simply not want to continue with school? I told him to tell me the truth... I told him that he always has and I wouldn't expect any different now.
He got really red in the face, with all the pena of his 20 years so incredibly apparent in every syllable, he told me he didn't want to continue.
I almost lost it. I looked to the floor to hide my disappointment.
I told him to think about it. I told him he has an entire week and a half to think about it before the next classes homework should be started and finished. A week and a half. I told him to talk it over with his mother again and see what she says.
I told him if he doesn't feel like he is advanced enough we can make him advanced enough. I told him I may not speak Spanish very well but Math is in English.
I poured my heart out to him.
I told him how education is incredibly important. I told him that to me education is THE most important thing in the world. I told him it’s the only way that we can better ourselves without the help of any gringo, or the help of some mayor, or the help of remittances from the United States.
I told him if it came down to it I personally would go to the milpa with him every single day from the first day he plants until the last day of aporreando so that he could spend less time in the cornfield and more time studying. I promised him. I told him I KNEW that he could graduate if he was just given the chance, that I understood his situation, that I was going to help if I could, and of all the people in this town who deserve this opportunity, it is him. I told him that maybe graduating from High School doesn’t get him anywhere new, any extra money, or Claro satellite television, but that I didn’t want him throwing this golden ticket away. I told him that if any other student from La Peña had approached me about wanting to quit, I wouldn’t take it to heart or offer to spend months in the corn field, but he is different. I told him he's been one of my best friends since the day I got here and I mean it when I say that I will do anything in the world that I can to help you, Marvin. One week, Marvin, just go home and talk to Niña Miriam and think about it…
And then he interrupted me...
'La verdad es que voy a seguir,' with a very bashful smile, eyes half closed and filled to their brims with tears. 'Cuando me habla asi, me da la fuerza a seguir.'
‘The truth is that I am going to continue. When you speak to me like that you give me the strength to continue.’
I almost cried.
I almost jumped for joy.
I didn’t know which would have been more appropriate, but I was elated. I promised him again, just in case he didn’t believe me, that I would be there every single day. I told him I still had a lot to learn, but I would learn quickly and help as much as I possibly could. I told him to tell me when we begin, that I am really excited to get myself out of the house and learn how to plant.
He looked up from his Puppy Chow, smiled, and said ‘Hey, lets go back to that swimming hole we went to last year.’
On our way out of my house he nudged me and said 'Hey, Profe Doris told me that I can become a policeman with just a High School diploma.'
The reality is that what I do every day is a far cry from saving the world. I am not providing clean water or jobs to the marginalized, ending poverty, or even doing anything that is worth the space this blog takes up on the interweb, but every once in a while, despite all of the 5.5s out of 10 and the dead trees, I get lucky and find a smile hidden behind all these doubts and failures.
So for any of you who stuck around until the end of this blog, please understand exactly what it is that I DO do without any exaggerations: I chop my yard with a machete, I dig trenches behind my house to keep the water from rushing in, I spend hours every week unclogging the 300 meters of tubes that run water to my house, and soon I will spend my time planting and harvesting corn. Let's not kid ourselves, I have not changed the world and I can safely say that I never will, but I am thinking that the next few months of planting corn with Marvin may be what I had hoped for all along.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
High School, Pandolor, and Rock, Paper, Old Reliable
I don’t want to waste any time or space or bore you to death with my increasingly worsening story telling without first explaining something very important to you first. I promise there will be time for Gregorio in Wonderland after I get this off my skinny little chest.
In the 12 years that La Peña has had a school only 18 students have graduated from the 9th grade. For more reasons than I could possibly have time to write and explain, I decided not only was this number extremely low, but also realized that these graduates have had no educational opportunities since they left school.
The problem here in La Peña is pretty simple, really. We are 29 kilometers outside of our nearest pueblo, Metapán, and there is absolutely zero public transportation. We, as a community, only have transportation on Mondays at 6 AM or on Fridays at 6 AM; nothing in between. No student from La Peña has ever gone to high school before due to this overwhelming distance, lack of transportation, and, most important of all, money. It literally has just never been a possibility for them.
Now the kind of high school I am talking about here is not what you folks back home are thinking of. The particular classes that I was interested in are Distance Learning and only have classes once a week, on Saturday, from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM. They study Language Arts, Computers, English, Math, Science, Social Studies, and people of the opposite gender (this is Latin America, remember). Although far from perfect, this system gives an incredible opportunity to people who live in the campo, in very rural areas, who at a young age are forced to work every day of the week in the corn fields or in the kitchen. Distance Learning was created exactly for us, for them.
So I started asking questions. I set up a meeting with the director of Rodrigro Leiva School, Don Roberto, in Metapán and between the two of us tried to work out some possibilities. After a few meetings in La Peña with all graduated students and their parents I knew that this project had to get off the ground immediately. I had 11 of 18 possible graduates up in arms with excitement about going back to school and I wanted more than anything to help them achieve this. I called Don Roberto that night and asked him a favor: although the school year had already started three weeks ago, could he please admit 11 students from La Peña to Leiva?
When I was a senior in high school I didn’t think I was going to go to college because I just didn’t think it’d be possible. I met questions about college with about as much forced apathy as most of the graduates from La Peña did saying things like ‘No, I am not going to college. I just don’t think I want to,’ when in reality I wanted nothing short of that. Then a little birdy named Hegarty sat me down daily and demanded I fill out Financial Aid forms, bypassed a few college application fees, and told me that despite what I lack, I should still get a chance to give this whole ‘learning how to read good’ thing a shot. Without help like her, I’d probably be working at Chubbies Liquors, playing scratch tickets, and hoping one day to finally be able to request a decent song on JAMN 94.5.
And look at me now!!! – poorer than I have ever been, living in one room brick shack, bathing with river water, and mowing my lawn with a machete. All that made possible with the help from people who told me I deserved a shot even when I probably didn’t. Ain’t I just livin’ the American Dream?
But seriously, I genuinely believe these young guns deserve their opportunity to get out of La Peña, continue learning, reading, maturing, learn a skill, meet a nice boy or girl that isn’t their first or second cousin, and hopefully move back to La Peña to take care of their parents and become the President, Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary, and/or Vocales of the ADESCO.
When I brought the students into Leiva on Monday the 14th of February Don Roberto looked each one of them in the eye and said (allow me to paraphrase):
‘This is not going to be easy. You have already missed the first 4 classes, the first two lessons. Do you understand me? I don’t ask for perfection, I ask for ganas. Gregorio has spoken on your behalf, has offered his help. Now it’s up to you guys. If you don’t feel up for it, feel free to tell me, do not be shy. This is a serious commitment and needs to be approached as such. If you have any doubts you better put them away right now because in my desk I have a whole lot of papers for you to sign. If I didn’t have faith in you, I wouldn’t have asked you to come here today. So what do you say? (My students say absolutely nothing. Crickets try their hardest to conquer the silence at 9:30 AM) Alright! Let’s get started!’
Even though the Distance Learning Classes were at capacity, Don Roberto did me, did us, this huge favor and stuck his neck out to allow our 11 students into Leiva. He made an extra trip to the capital, San Salvador, to meet with the Director of Education there and bring all the necessary documents from our students out of the goodness of his heart. He did us an enormous favor and it is because of kindness from people like this that we were able to start this project.
So there you have it, damas y caballeros. The first 11 high school students ever out of La Peña.
That is not the end of this fable, though. I forgot to tell you that this was all just a really poorly written solicitude to you, my incredibly unfaithful audience, to help me raise some money.
This whole process would not have been possible without the help of two very generous donations from family friends. With these donations I have paid for uniforms, lesson plans, notebooks, classes, food, and transportation for the first few months. Unfortunately, these students won’t graduate within the next few months so I will need to continually fundraise to keep this project going. All in all it costs about $225 a month for these 11 students to graduate from high school but the future possibilities are astounding. One of my best friends, and one of the most intelligent and dedicated English students I have, Antonio, never graduated from high school here in La Peña. I asked him why and he said because you don’t really learn anything between 6th and 9th grade and his hard work was more valuable in the fields. What a shame, really, that they had such a glass ceiling. This sentiment isn’t felt by just Antonio, its felt by everyone in the community. Last year only three students graduated from 9th grade in La Peña, all girls, because people do not see any importance of graduating from the 9th grade when papi needs two extra hands to plant corn. What could they have really done past 9th grade before this? Nothing. It’s a damn shame that kids like Antonio have to cut themselves so short. I am hoping this project not only boosts the graduation rate because students can look forward to going to high school every year, but maybe even puts pressure on La Peña’s terrible school director to better teach these kids in order to better prepare them for high school. We will see.
So what I am asking is this: If you are feeling overly generous, slightly altruistic, deep pocketed, thirsty, kind, funny in the tummy, light headed, in love, cold, tired, buzzed, or just want to donate please, please, please contact me at gregcormier17@gmail.com. The amount doesn’t matter. You could send a check for a million dollars or use the US Postal Service to mail down a jar of pennies; anything and everything will be a huge help.
This is the first real project that I have done that I am genuinely, head over heels in love with. I want nothing more than to see La Peña’s future in the hands of the educated youth. I have already created a bank account for all the funds and within a short time will be appointing a Directive from this group of 11 students. Hopefully within the next year and a half I will have a new bank account created where one or two members of the community can be in charge of the monthly fees and can take care of the bill paying after I am gone.
So what do you say? Can you help me out? Can you spread the word? This donation will absolutely not be tax deductable, and it probably won’t turn bad karma around (if you’ve got any) but any little tiny donation will help immensely. Please keep us in mind and the begger in me is asking that you do not be shy, feel free to pass this information on to anyone you think may be interested. Yeah, just go ahead and do that.
On top of that, my application for a new $1300 project was approved by USAID to replace my very porous school roof with a much more durable, longer lasting, and sexier metal roof. Maybe now my students will stop coming to class with shampoo and towels.
Story time.
My buddy Gabe asked me ‘Who goes on vacation just to continue working?’
So for the past two and a half weeks I have been in Nicaragua helping and hindering a group of doctors and Tufts medical students run clinics in rural communities.
Here are some very true stories (with some not-so-true exaggerations) that made me realize I wasn’t in Kansas anymore.
In the two and a half weeks that I was in Nicaragua I ate approximately 5 tortillas.
-----Here in El Salvador I eat at least 5 tortillas per meal. I never, ever, ever (ever) thought that I would miss these little flavorless disks of lovin’ but I sincerely did. The 5 that I ate in Nicaragua I had to specifically ask for. Nicaraguans apparently prefer to eat things with an upside to them, like rice, fruits, and vegetables. Those damn quacks.
People and dogs alike laughed themselves into convulsions when I fleetingly yelled ‘Shhhhh, chucho’ to get the mutts out of the kitchen. I didn’t understand why all the women left the kitchen blushing while the dogs stared at me blankly.
-----The Spanish word for dog is ‘perro.’ I have not called a dog a ‘perro’ in the 13 months that I have been pretending to know Spanish. That word is foreign to me and absolutely does not exist in my lexicon. Here in El Salvador, we lovingly refer to dogs as ‘chuchos.’ Well, I learned the hard way that in Nicaragua ‘perro’ is the word for dog and that ‘chucho’ is a vulgar word for vagina. I was never really allowed back in the kitchen after Day 1.
On our way out to Rosa Grande from Siuna I was chitting and chatting with Don Margarito and Albita about traveling and telling them about how I hadn’t brought much for this trip. Albita almost threw up into the box of eggs she was carrying and Don Margarito damn near drove off the rode in raucous, over-the-top laughter when I said ‘Yo no cargo mucho.’
-----Before figuring out what was so funny, we decided to take advantage of Margarito crashing into a ravine by washing off all the eggs that Albita has thrown up on in the crook that we ended up in. After all 250 eggs were sparkling clean, the two Nicaraguans explained to me that they heard me say ‘Yo no cago mucho.’ Apparently they did not understand my use of the verb ‘cargar’ which means to carry. They thought I used the verb ‘cagar’ which means to take a shit.
Most confusing of all, though, was how Harry threw his arms to the sky as if to thank dios for his most incredible bendición yet when I told him that I didn’t want to bother him: ‘No te quiero chingar, hombre.’
-----Long story short, Harry is a wise-ass from Bluefields and one of the most animated people you could ever meet. He did not waste the opportunity to make fun of me when I told him that I didn’t want to have sex with him. Chingar in El Salvador: To Bother. Chingar in Nicaragua: To Bang.
Those are just a few examples of how I made a complete ass of myself in my short time in Nicaragua.
These laughers aside, Nicaragua was a truly unbelievable experience. A close family friend, Brian Lisse, invited me to work with him and his 10 medical students running clinics in rural Northern Nicaragua. In those two weeks I met some of the most ridiculous, inspiring, and beautiful people I could have possibly hoped for. And the med students were alright, too.
Clinics were great. I spent from 730 AM til about 4 PM every day pretending to speak Spanish. The students’ job was to diagnose each patient that came into the clinic. My job was to act very confident being an intermediary between the patient and the student/soon to be doctor. I learned a lot of unbelievable things about PanDolor, Wei Wei taught me how to stitch people, Sharad taught me how to talk to mothers about their pandolorian babies, Sarah definitely taught me that headaches, kidney pain, and lazy eyes are all signs of Raging Cervicitus and that I should immediately ask all women if they are sexually active and to please remove their clothes, Cho taught me that kids gummy vitamins are an incredible way to avoid scurvy in the campo, and Rebecca taught me what a good ear drum looks like and then what a bad, shrapnel filled ear drum looks like and then proceeded to up the excitement by allowing me to clean out his compacted earwax into a sandwich baggy. The students were unbelievable.
One Friday we decided that we wanted to eat pig. Enough of this rice and beans bologna (or is it bolonie?, balony?). Lets eat some meat!
So Harry and I wrestled a pig away from some local man, brought him back to the house and decided, with a really intense look in our eyes, that it was time, as Harry would say, ‘to slice up this haaaag.’ We had a problem, though. Both Sharad and I wanted to kill the pig. Only one person can kill a pig at a time (I learned that from Don Luis, the Sandista) so Sharad and I settled the argument the civilized way: Rock, Papers, Scissors, best two out of three. After a lengthy battle, a series of 5 straight where no one threw anything but scissors, we found ourselves tied at one. 10 battles down, and we were only tied 1 to 1. I started to feel the pressure. I was up big, 1-0, and I let the lead slip away. I had to get my head back in the game. I did a couple jumping jacks, stretched out my hammies, and gave the pig a quick glance. He seemed to look at me as if to say ‘Buen provecho, Goyo. It’s time to eat’ and I knew that he was mine. Sharad and I gave each other a nod, it was on…
‘Rock!!!! Paper!!!! Scissors!!!!....’ time seems to stand still, everything moving in slow motion. My body starts to relax, my mind goes blank, I think about how funny it was that I told Harry I didn’t want to bang him and instinctively I throw old reliable…
‘SHOOOOOOOT!!!’
I stand upright and wave to the crowd (of two). Sharad leans back against the kitchen wall, defeated. I’m in shock. They tell me to grab the knife, that it’s time, but I can’t…my fingers seem to be permanently stuck in the shape of old reliable…
Needless to say the trip was amazing and I owe at least my first 13 children to Brian and Cindy for making it possible. I met some really great people, got a taste of home, killed a pig, cliff jumped, caught my first wave, drank pandolorian blood, learned how to stitch up serious cuts (I am doing my own stitches from here on in), learned some English Creole, danced my ass off, diagnosed at least 100 patients with kidney cancer, swung from vines, and cured one patient with a serious cup of smokey tea.
And although I spent about 42 hours in clinic in a 6 day span, those loonies sure didn’t make it feel like work at all. My words could hardly do any justice to how great of a trip that one was. Most important of all I learned that I will never trust my future children in the hands of a Tufts educated doctor.
In the 12 years that La Peña has had a school only 18 students have graduated from the 9th grade. For more reasons than I could possibly have time to write and explain, I decided not only was this number extremely low, but also realized that these graduates have had no educational opportunities since they left school.
The problem here in La Peña is pretty simple, really. We are 29 kilometers outside of our nearest pueblo, Metapán, and there is absolutely zero public transportation. We, as a community, only have transportation on Mondays at 6 AM or on Fridays at 6 AM; nothing in between. No student from La Peña has ever gone to high school before due to this overwhelming distance, lack of transportation, and, most important of all, money. It literally has just never been a possibility for them.
Now the kind of high school I am talking about here is not what you folks back home are thinking of. The particular classes that I was interested in are Distance Learning and only have classes once a week, on Saturday, from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM. They study Language Arts, Computers, English, Math, Science, Social Studies, and people of the opposite gender (this is Latin America, remember). Although far from perfect, this system gives an incredible opportunity to people who live in the campo, in very rural areas, who at a young age are forced to work every day of the week in the corn fields or in the kitchen. Distance Learning was created exactly for us, for them.
So I started asking questions. I set up a meeting with the director of Rodrigro Leiva School, Don Roberto, in Metapán and between the two of us tried to work out some possibilities. After a few meetings in La Peña with all graduated students and their parents I knew that this project had to get off the ground immediately. I had 11 of 18 possible graduates up in arms with excitement about going back to school and I wanted more than anything to help them achieve this. I called Don Roberto that night and asked him a favor: although the school year had already started three weeks ago, could he please admit 11 students from La Peña to Leiva?
When I was a senior in high school I didn’t think I was going to go to college because I just didn’t think it’d be possible. I met questions about college with about as much forced apathy as most of the graduates from La Peña did saying things like ‘No, I am not going to college. I just don’t think I want to,’ when in reality I wanted nothing short of that. Then a little birdy named Hegarty sat me down daily and demanded I fill out Financial Aid forms, bypassed a few college application fees, and told me that despite what I lack, I should still get a chance to give this whole ‘learning how to read good’ thing a shot. Without help like her, I’d probably be working at Chubbies Liquors, playing scratch tickets, and hoping one day to finally be able to request a decent song on JAMN 94.5.
And look at me now!!! – poorer than I have ever been, living in one room brick shack, bathing with river water, and mowing my lawn with a machete. All that made possible with the help from people who told me I deserved a shot even when I probably didn’t. Ain’t I just livin’ the American Dream?
But seriously, I genuinely believe these young guns deserve their opportunity to get out of La Peña, continue learning, reading, maturing, learn a skill, meet a nice boy or girl that isn’t their first or second cousin, and hopefully move back to La Peña to take care of their parents and become the President, Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary, and/or Vocales of the ADESCO.
When I brought the students into Leiva on Monday the 14th of February Don Roberto looked each one of them in the eye and said (allow me to paraphrase):
‘This is not going to be easy. You have already missed the first 4 classes, the first two lessons. Do you understand me? I don’t ask for perfection, I ask for ganas. Gregorio has spoken on your behalf, has offered his help. Now it’s up to you guys. If you don’t feel up for it, feel free to tell me, do not be shy. This is a serious commitment and needs to be approached as such. If you have any doubts you better put them away right now because in my desk I have a whole lot of papers for you to sign. If I didn’t have faith in you, I wouldn’t have asked you to come here today. So what do you say? (My students say absolutely nothing. Crickets try their hardest to conquer the silence at 9:30 AM) Alright! Let’s get started!’
Even though the Distance Learning Classes were at capacity, Don Roberto did me, did us, this huge favor and stuck his neck out to allow our 11 students into Leiva. He made an extra trip to the capital, San Salvador, to meet with the Director of Education there and bring all the necessary documents from our students out of the goodness of his heart. He did us an enormous favor and it is because of kindness from people like this that we were able to start this project.
So there you have it, damas y caballeros. The first 11 high school students ever out of La Peña.
That is not the end of this fable, though. I forgot to tell you that this was all just a really poorly written solicitude to you, my incredibly unfaithful audience, to help me raise some money.
This whole process would not have been possible without the help of two very generous donations from family friends. With these donations I have paid for uniforms, lesson plans, notebooks, classes, food, and transportation for the first few months. Unfortunately, these students won’t graduate within the next few months so I will need to continually fundraise to keep this project going. All in all it costs about $225 a month for these 11 students to graduate from high school but the future possibilities are astounding. One of my best friends, and one of the most intelligent and dedicated English students I have, Antonio, never graduated from high school here in La Peña. I asked him why and he said because you don’t really learn anything between 6th and 9th grade and his hard work was more valuable in the fields. What a shame, really, that they had such a glass ceiling. This sentiment isn’t felt by just Antonio, its felt by everyone in the community. Last year only three students graduated from 9th grade in La Peña, all girls, because people do not see any importance of graduating from the 9th grade when papi needs two extra hands to plant corn. What could they have really done past 9th grade before this? Nothing. It’s a damn shame that kids like Antonio have to cut themselves so short. I am hoping this project not only boosts the graduation rate because students can look forward to going to high school every year, but maybe even puts pressure on La Peña’s terrible school director to better teach these kids in order to better prepare them for high school. We will see.
So what I am asking is this: If you are feeling overly generous, slightly altruistic, deep pocketed, thirsty, kind, funny in the tummy, light headed, in love, cold, tired, buzzed, or just want to donate please, please, please contact me at gregcormier17@gmail.com. The amount doesn’t matter. You could send a check for a million dollars or use the US Postal Service to mail down a jar of pennies; anything and everything will be a huge help.
This is the first real project that I have done that I am genuinely, head over heels in love with. I want nothing more than to see La Peña’s future in the hands of the educated youth. I have already created a bank account for all the funds and within a short time will be appointing a Directive from this group of 11 students. Hopefully within the next year and a half I will have a new bank account created where one or two members of the community can be in charge of the monthly fees and can take care of the bill paying after I am gone.
So what do you say? Can you help me out? Can you spread the word? This donation will absolutely not be tax deductable, and it probably won’t turn bad karma around (if you’ve got any) but any little tiny donation will help immensely. Please keep us in mind and the begger in me is asking that you do not be shy, feel free to pass this information on to anyone you think may be interested. Yeah, just go ahead and do that.
On top of that, my application for a new $1300 project was approved by USAID to replace my very porous school roof with a much more durable, longer lasting, and sexier metal roof. Maybe now my students will stop coming to class with shampoo and towels.
Story time.
My buddy Gabe asked me ‘Who goes on vacation just to continue working?’
So for the past two and a half weeks I have been in Nicaragua helping and hindering a group of doctors and Tufts medical students run clinics in rural communities.
Here are some very true stories (with some not-so-true exaggerations) that made me realize I wasn’t in Kansas anymore.
In the two and a half weeks that I was in Nicaragua I ate approximately 5 tortillas.
-----Here in El Salvador I eat at least 5 tortillas per meal. I never, ever, ever (ever) thought that I would miss these little flavorless disks of lovin’ but I sincerely did. The 5 that I ate in Nicaragua I had to specifically ask for. Nicaraguans apparently prefer to eat things with an upside to them, like rice, fruits, and vegetables. Those damn quacks.
People and dogs alike laughed themselves into convulsions when I fleetingly yelled ‘Shhhhh, chucho’ to get the mutts out of the kitchen. I didn’t understand why all the women left the kitchen blushing while the dogs stared at me blankly.
-----The Spanish word for dog is ‘perro.’ I have not called a dog a ‘perro’ in the 13 months that I have been pretending to know Spanish. That word is foreign to me and absolutely does not exist in my lexicon. Here in El Salvador, we lovingly refer to dogs as ‘chuchos.’ Well, I learned the hard way that in Nicaragua ‘perro’ is the word for dog and that ‘chucho’ is a vulgar word for vagina. I was never really allowed back in the kitchen after Day 1.
On our way out to Rosa Grande from Siuna I was chitting and chatting with Don Margarito and Albita about traveling and telling them about how I hadn’t brought much for this trip. Albita almost threw up into the box of eggs she was carrying and Don Margarito damn near drove off the rode in raucous, over-the-top laughter when I said ‘Yo no cargo mucho.’
-----Before figuring out what was so funny, we decided to take advantage of Margarito crashing into a ravine by washing off all the eggs that Albita has thrown up on in the crook that we ended up in. After all 250 eggs were sparkling clean, the two Nicaraguans explained to me that they heard me say ‘Yo no cago mucho.’ Apparently they did not understand my use of the verb ‘cargar’ which means to carry. They thought I used the verb ‘cagar’ which means to take a shit.
Most confusing of all, though, was how Harry threw his arms to the sky as if to thank dios for his most incredible bendición yet when I told him that I didn’t want to bother him: ‘No te quiero chingar, hombre.’
-----Long story short, Harry is a wise-ass from Bluefields and one of the most animated people you could ever meet. He did not waste the opportunity to make fun of me when I told him that I didn’t want to have sex with him. Chingar in El Salvador: To Bother. Chingar in Nicaragua: To Bang.
Those are just a few examples of how I made a complete ass of myself in my short time in Nicaragua.
These laughers aside, Nicaragua was a truly unbelievable experience. A close family friend, Brian Lisse, invited me to work with him and his 10 medical students running clinics in rural Northern Nicaragua. In those two weeks I met some of the most ridiculous, inspiring, and beautiful people I could have possibly hoped for. And the med students were alright, too.
Clinics were great. I spent from 730 AM til about 4 PM every day pretending to speak Spanish. The students’ job was to diagnose each patient that came into the clinic. My job was to act very confident being an intermediary between the patient and the student/soon to be doctor. I learned a lot of unbelievable things about PanDolor, Wei Wei taught me how to stitch people, Sharad taught me how to talk to mothers about their pandolorian babies, Sarah definitely taught me that headaches, kidney pain, and lazy eyes are all signs of Raging Cervicitus and that I should immediately ask all women if they are sexually active and to please remove their clothes, Cho taught me that kids gummy vitamins are an incredible way to avoid scurvy in the campo, and Rebecca taught me what a good ear drum looks like and then what a bad, shrapnel filled ear drum looks like and then proceeded to up the excitement by allowing me to clean out his compacted earwax into a sandwich baggy. The students were unbelievable.
One Friday we decided that we wanted to eat pig. Enough of this rice and beans bologna (or is it bolonie?, balony?). Lets eat some meat!
So Harry and I wrestled a pig away from some local man, brought him back to the house and decided, with a really intense look in our eyes, that it was time, as Harry would say, ‘to slice up this haaaag.’ We had a problem, though. Both Sharad and I wanted to kill the pig. Only one person can kill a pig at a time (I learned that from Don Luis, the Sandista) so Sharad and I settled the argument the civilized way: Rock, Papers, Scissors, best two out of three. After a lengthy battle, a series of 5 straight where no one threw anything but scissors, we found ourselves tied at one. 10 battles down, and we were only tied 1 to 1. I started to feel the pressure. I was up big, 1-0, and I let the lead slip away. I had to get my head back in the game. I did a couple jumping jacks, stretched out my hammies, and gave the pig a quick glance. He seemed to look at me as if to say ‘Buen provecho, Goyo. It’s time to eat’ and I knew that he was mine. Sharad and I gave each other a nod, it was on…
‘Rock!!!! Paper!!!! Scissors!!!!....’ time seems to stand still, everything moving in slow motion. My body starts to relax, my mind goes blank, I think about how funny it was that I told Harry I didn’t want to bang him and instinctively I throw old reliable…
‘SHOOOOOOOT!!!’
I stand upright and wave to the crowd (of two). Sharad leans back against the kitchen wall, defeated. I’m in shock. They tell me to grab the knife, that it’s time, but I can’t…my fingers seem to be permanently stuck in the shape of old reliable…
Needless to say the trip was amazing and I owe at least my first 13 children to Brian and Cindy for making it possible. I met some really great people, got a taste of home, killed a pig, cliff jumped, caught my first wave, drank pandolorian blood, learned how to stitch up serious cuts (I am doing my own stitches from here on in), learned some English Creole, danced my ass off, diagnosed at least 100 patients with kidney cancer, swung from vines, and cured one patient with a serious cup of smokey tea.
And although I spent about 42 hours in clinic in a 6 day span, those loonies sure didn’t make it feel like work at all. My words could hardly do any justice to how great of a trip that one was. Most important of all I learned that I will never trust my future children in the hands of a Tufts educated doctor.
Monday, December 27, 2010
The Holiday Season
Christmas 2010
Last Monday I left home with a duffle bag, about 80 bucks, and a pretty girl. By the time I got back this past Monday I was broke, alone, and carrying nothing but a bag full of clothes almost as dirty as the ones I was wearing. I was exhausted and I was a mess. Thankfully I left my door unlocked for the week, the dirty dishes all over the place, the bed unmade, and found the inside of my house to be absolutely swamped in dead leaves that crept in through the holes in my roof. It was good to be home.
Its been a rough week over here in the brick house in La Peña, but thanks to some Puppy Chow and a few melted Snickers from America I have been weathering the storm.
For the week that I have been home there have been doing nightly posadas at different houses within the community. A posada is essentially a church service performed in a new house within the community every night and they play and sing songs for the La Navidad. Here is a video of Alfredo y los Chamaquitos.
Christmas is, for all intents and purposes, celebrated on the 24th of December here in La Peña. This is the story of Christmas 2010.
I crawled out of bed on Christmas Eve, still very aware of the obvious lack of levity within my four brick walls, with a poorly thought up list of distractions. I skipped coffee and breakfast and by 7 AM I was cursing every ant that has ever been hungry in its life. I haven’t got a very large wardrobe down here so I was extremely perturbed to find that some rogue insects found their way to my Biggs AP Chemistry T Shirt and chowed down. Gluttons. By 7:13 AM I was cursing mold for finally pounding my Amherst Rotary Club T Shirt into submission. RIP to two of my favorites. You’ve both served me well. To be honest I wouldn’t be terribly upset to be haunted by T Shirts of Christmas Past at this point. I’m running low on my stock from the Amherst Salvation Army. (That was not a plug. Please do not send me T Shirts. Seriously. I don’t care how many Target gift cards you got this holiday season.)
Niña Chepa had invited me to eat Christmas dinner at her house around ‘la hora de almuerzo’ so I showed up a little after the point of starvation. I didn’t really know what to expect so I dressed up nicely (it was Christmas after all), and strolled up her little dirt hill ready to eat whatever was to be put in front of me. I had totally forgotten about the pig. Man, you should have seen this damn pig.
I guess the story is that Niña Chepa and Don Andres have six kids still living with them in their house. Every single day you would see a different combination of the six kids going door to door in the community looking for suero by the gallon to give to their pig.
Side Note: For those fortunate enough not to know what suero is, it is the very last liquid form that a cows milk can have. First they leave the cows milk out for a day and the cream will rise to the top. Then they skim all the cream off and store it. That cream is delectable. Next they put a combination of entirely too much salt and a little pill inside the remaining milk so that the milk will curd. After about 12 hours that milk will have curded and you can sift out all the curded cheese with a dirty rag and squeeze all the juices out. That cheese is delectable, too, believe it or not. What’s left at the bottom of the bucket of milk is suero, a thoroughly abused liquid meant only for ruthless teenage pranks and fattening up pigs.
With the help of hundreds of gallons of said suero the pig, at 7 months old, was about 170 pounds of the fattest, most agile animal-athlete you could ever possibly imagine. Like a swine version of Chris Farley.
When I walked up there was an enormous pot of boiling pig fat over an open flame, father and son tending it nicely, both pretending like they were being useful. The first thing I was offered was a half full cup of clear liquid and I didn’t turn it down. We talked shit about Barcelona, coached Real Madrid through the rest of the Champions League, smoked a cigarette or two, and played guitar for a few hours before it was time to eat.
Around 3 Christmas dinner was served as a very tall glass of the bitterest vodka on the market, two tortillas, a few very tasty pieces of pork meat, and as much fried pig fat as I could fit in my stomach. We took it all down with a glass of Salva Cola and laid back to talk more shit about Barcelona.
We set off fireworks for about 36 straight hours in Jesus’ honor and I went to bed happy.
This is Tio Chepe lighting off cuetes at midnight.
Christmas dinner.
Melissita lighting off her propio fireworks.
Now that’s the way to celebrate the holidays.
Other noteworthy volados.
It’s the dry season. It hasn’t rained in about a two months and it won’t rain again until about April.
I have lost two of my beautiful chickens to disappearance. I think maybe a ‘gato de monte’ or a snake may have selected them as the weakest of the pack. Either way, I have put them on milk cartons from here to Zacatecaluca in hopes of getting a phone call.
Halloween was an absolute blast. We had bobbing for apples, pan dulce on a string, three legged races, all sorts of candy, and a water balloon toss. These are some of the photos.
I went to help translate for a group of engineers from University of Minnesota and I hope to never ever meet such incompetent people again in my life.
Nora and I spent Thanksgiving with an Embassy family in the capital. We drank beer, had spiced wine, ate turkey (turkey with bacon on it, by the way), mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing, gravy, and had real cheese for an appetizer. What a damn treat. Good people, too. Who woulda thunk that the United States Embassy could produce genuinely good people?
La Peña and myself have been very, very fortunate. About a month after submitting our Engineers Without Borders application for latrines and a running water project we were adopted by George Washington University. This is incredible for a litany of reasons. Most volunteers have to wait for about 6 to 12 months to be adopted by a chapter and we, very luckily, only had to wait one month. On top of that we were accepted by a chapter that has experience here in El Salvador doing water projects. Just last year they raised close to $100,000 dollars with the help of Rotary International to put toward an enormous water project in my friend Sean Cox’s site in Santa Clara, San Miguel. They are an experienced chapter, they are from DC, and they are apparently very, very good at raising money to help us out. Our community is significantly smaller than Santa Clara (there are only 33 houses in my community) so we shouldn’t need that much money or be that much of a pain in the ass (pardon my French).
If all goes as planned the engineers and their professional mentors should be here in March to get things under way.
Rotary Club is an incredible institution. You may know that the Rotary Club of Hudson donated close to $600 dollars to help me provide efficient stoves for my community back in the summer. Well, Rotary Club International has an incredible Matching Gift policy that states they will match any and all single donations above $10,000 by a local Rotary Club.
So how can you help? If you know an extremely rich Rotary Club (anywhere in the country is fine) that has the ability to help out a lowly Peace Corps Volunteer with some larger than life projects to benefit some very humble people here in El Salvador please send me an e-mail at gregcormier17@gmail.com.
New photos on facebook. Aren't I so technologically capable?
Last Monday I left home with a duffle bag, about 80 bucks, and a pretty girl. By the time I got back this past Monday I was broke, alone, and carrying nothing but a bag full of clothes almost as dirty as the ones I was wearing. I was exhausted and I was a mess. Thankfully I left my door unlocked for the week, the dirty dishes all over the place, the bed unmade, and found the inside of my house to be absolutely swamped in dead leaves that crept in through the holes in my roof. It was good to be home.
Its been a rough week over here in the brick house in La Peña, but thanks to some Puppy Chow and a few melted Snickers from America I have been weathering the storm.
For the week that I have been home there have been doing nightly posadas at different houses within the community. A posada is essentially a church service performed in a new house within the community every night and they play and sing songs for the La Navidad. Here is a video of Alfredo y los Chamaquitos.
Christmas is, for all intents and purposes, celebrated on the 24th of December here in La Peña. This is the story of Christmas 2010.
I crawled out of bed on Christmas Eve, still very aware of the obvious lack of levity within my four brick walls, with a poorly thought up list of distractions. I skipped coffee and breakfast and by 7 AM I was cursing every ant that has ever been hungry in its life. I haven’t got a very large wardrobe down here so I was extremely perturbed to find that some rogue insects found their way to my Biggs AP Chemistry T Shirt and chowed down. Gluttons. By 7:13 AM I was cursing mold for finally pounding my Amherst Rotary Club T Shirt into submission. RIP to two of my favorites. You’ve both served me well. To be honest I wouldn’t be terribly upset to be haunted by T Shirts of Christmas Past at this point. I’m running low on my stock from the Amherst Salvation Army. (That was not a plug. Please do not send me T Shirts. Seriously. I don’t care how many Target gift cards you got this holiday season.)
Niña Chepa had invited me to eat Christmas dinner at her house around ‘la hora de almuerzo’ so I showed up a little after the point of starvation. I didn’t really know what to expect so I dressed up nicely (it was Christmas after all), and strolled up her little dirt hill ready to eat whatever was to be put in front of me. I had totally forgotten about the pig. Man, you should have seen this damn pig.
I guess the story is that Niña Chepa and Don Andres have six kids still living with them in their house. Every single day you would see a different combination of the six kids going door to door in the community looking for suero by the gallon to give to their pig.
Side Note: For those fortunate enough not to know what suero is, it is the very last liquid form that a cows milk can have. First they leave the cows milk out for a day and the cream will rise to the top. Then they skim all the cream off and store it. That cream is delectable. Next they put a combination of entirely too much salt and a little pill inside the remaining milk so that the milk will curd. After about 12 hours that milk will have curded and you can sift out all the curded cheese with a dirty rag and squeeze all the juices out. That cheese is delectable, too, believe it or not. What’s left at the bottom of the bucket of milk is suero, a thoroughly abused liquid meant only for ruthless teenage pranks and fattening up pigs.
With the help of hundreds of gallons of said suero the pig, at 7 months old, was about 170 pounds of the fattest, most agile animal-athlete you could ever possibly imagine. Like a swine version of Chris Farley.
When I walked up there was an enormous pot of boiling pig fat over an open flame, father and son tending it nicely, both pretending like they were being useful. The first thing I was offered was a half full cup of clear liquid and I didn’t turn it down. We talked shit about Barcelona, coached Real Madrid through the rest of the Champions League, smoked a cigarette or two, and played guitar for a few hours before it was time to eat.
Around 3 Christmas dinner was served as a very tall glass of the bitterest vodka on the market, two tortillas, a few very tasty pieces of pork meat, and as much fried pig fat as I could fit in my stomach. We took it all down with a glass of Salva Cola and laid back to talk more shit about Barcelona.
We set off fireworks for about 36 straight hours in Jesus’ honor and I went to bed happy.
This is Tio Chepe lighting off cuetes at midnight.
Christmas dinner.
Melissita lighting off her propio fireworks.
Now that’s the way to celebrate the holidays.
Other noteworthy volados.
It’s the dry season. It hasn’t rained in about a two months and it won’t rain again until about April.
I have lost two of my beautiful chickens to disappearance. I think maybe a ‘gato de monte’ or a snake may have selected them as the weakest of the pack. Either way, I have put them on milk cartons from here to Zacatecaluca in hopes of getting a phone call.
Halloween was an absolute blast. We had bobbing for apples, pan dulce on a string, three legged races, all sorts of candy, and a water balloon toss. These are some of the photos.
I went to help translate for a group of engineers from University of Minnesota and I hope to never ever meet such incompetent people again in my life.
Nora and I spent Thanksgiving with an Embassy family in the capital. We drank beer, had spiced wine, ate turkey (turkey with bacon on it, by the way), mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, stuffing, gravy, and had real cheese for an appetizer. What a damn treat. Good people, too. Who woulda thunk that the United States Embassy could produce genuinely good people?
La Peña and myself have been very, very fortunate. About a month after submitting our Engineers Without Borders application for latrines and a running water project we were adopted by George Washington University. This is incredible for a litany of reasons. Most volunteers have to wait for about 6 to 12 months to be adopted by a chapter and we, very luckily, only had to wait one month. On top of that we were accepted by a chapter that has experience here in El Salvador doing water projects. Just last year they raised close to $100,000 dollars with the help of Rotary International to put toward an enormous water project in my friend Sean Cox’s site in Santa Clara, San Miguel. They are an experienced chapter, they are from DC, and they are apparently very, very good at raising money to help us out. Our community is significantly smaller than Santa Clara (there are only 33 houses in my community) so we shouldn’t need that much money or be that much of a pain in the ass (pardon my French).
If all goes as planned the engineers and their professional mentors should be here in March to get things under way.
Rotary Club is an incredible institution. You may know that the Rotary Club of Hudson donated close to $600 dollars to help me provide efficient stoves for my community back in the summer. Well, Rotary Club International has an incredible Matching Gift policy that states they will match any and all single donations above $10,000 by a local Rotary Club.
So how can you help? If you know an extremely rich Rotary Club (anywhere in the country is fine) that has the ability to help out a lowly Peace Corps Volunteer with some larger than life projects to benefit some very humble people here in El Salvador please send me an e-mail at gregcormier17@gmail.com.
New photos on facebook. Aren't I so technologically capable?
Friday, October 29, 2010
Forgive me for writing this.
Well, well, well.
It's always real awkward trying to start off one of these fancy blog things, I never really know how to do it. Do I need to start off with something really catching, funny, or inspiring? Like perhaps 'The 5 AM sunrise seemed to scream purples, pinks, and blues so brightly that you could taste each hue sweetening Nora's best effort at coffee making.'
Or maybe I should start out with a good old fashioned Thesis Statement that would make even Professor Indiana Jones proud? Maybe 'Although not entirely sure how great of a job they were doing, our aimless protaganist Greg and his dashing girlfriend used their youthful charm, a pinch of luck, and an incredible lack of shame to win over the hearts, minds, and confianza of a community looking to learn how many times a day they should wash their hands.'
Or maybe just start it off with something really senseless like 'Where did I leave my dust pan, Gerald?' would get you guys in the mood.
Well, now that the awkward 'starting the blog' part is over with, lets get down to business.
I felt like you readers needed to see the sunrise this morning. Its a sunrise just like any other morning, but I thought since I was coming into town, why not give you a taste, too? This is the view from my front door.
Nora has picked up the pace of our women's group and is now teaching yoga every Friday evening from 5 PM to about 630. We started a walking group, too, but unfortunately they chose days that I like to play soccer in the campo. They have decided that they don't need my supervision to put one foot in front of the other, nor need me to lead them in putting said feet in front of other said feet to make large circles, so I have been freed of those guidance responibilities. They walked once or twice, but the numbers fell very, very quickly. Maybe I need to attend in order to inspire animo. we'll see. I am trying my hardest to win the good fight over Vericose Veins.
I have got a garden and we just ate the first cucumber of the year. Here is proof that it exists.
I have got a tomato plant that is literally taller than Nora and has about 15 tomatoes growing on it now. With the amount of plants that we have, we are going to have a years worth of salsa and ketchup stores within weeks. You are jealous and you know it. I have watermelons on the up and up, too, but they seem to take a long time.
Side note: Nora and I get in weekly fights about the immense amounts of cow shit I throw all over the yard trying to help these things put some damn food on our plate. Its for the good of everyone that our house smells like this, Nora. Don't you get it? Free tomatoes!
This is my host sister, Jamileth, and the rest of our camión filled with the people of La Peña on our way into Metapàn last Friday morning.
This is my new bathroom that we just built. It is still without a door and will continue to stay that way because we have the beautiful view of the mountains while on the John. It's a gorgeous view; it really is.
This is a picture of my house, again. Most call it disgusting. I call it quaint.
Here are the ten new ladies in my life. Beautiful, beautiful bichas. I will have free eggs, and free vegetables sooner than you can say 'Toy boat, toy boat, toy boat' correctly.
This weekend we are throwing a Halloween bash in my community. Only the few men that have gone to the United States and come back have ever even heard of this fantasti-excuse-to-drink-an-unhealthy-amount-of-beer-day that we like to call a 'Holiday.'
No, but seriously, I have been loaned the projector from the Metapán mayor's office and will commence Halloween weekend with a showing of a very scary American movie in Spanish tonight for the entire town. We will have one scary movie each night for the whole weekend and celebrate Halloween in the best costumes we can muster at a party we are throwing for the children tomorrow afternoon. It should be a blast. Most people in town say that they have never seen a scary movie, so let's see how these 68 year old farmers react when oversized (from the projector) Chucky goes wild with a baby sized chainsaw. This could be the best Halloween ever considering how I spent last year's, right Wilcox?
Anyway, thats all I got for you today, a lot of photos, hardly any stories, and a really uncomfortable beginning to a blog. I hope you liked it.
Tune in next time for just as few (maybe less) significant stories. Happiest of Halloweens you goons.
It's always real awkward trying to start off one of these fancy blog things, I never really know how to do it. Do I need to start off with something really catching, funny, or inspiring? Like perhaps 'The 5 AM sunrise seemed to scream purples, pinks, and blues so brightly that you could taste each hue sweetening Nora's best effort at coffee making.'
Or maybe I should start out with a good old fashioned Thesis Statement that would make even Professor Indiana Jones proud? Maybe 'Although not entirely sure how great of a job they were doing, our aimless protaganist Greg and his dashing girlfriend used their youthful charm, a pinch of luck, and an incredible lack of shame to win over the hearts, minds, and confianza of a community looking to learn how many times a day they should wash their hands.'
Or maybe just start it off with something really senseless like 'Where did I leave my dust pan, Gerald?' would get you guys in the mood.
Well, now that the awkward 'starting the blog' part is over with, lets get down to business.
I felt like you readers needed to see the sunrise this morning. Its a sunrise just like any other morning, but I thought since I was coming into town, why not give you a taste, too? This is the view from my front door.
Nora has picked up the pace of our women's group and is now teaching yoga every Friday evening from 5 PM to about 630. We started a walking group, too, but unfortunately they chose days that I like to play soccer in the campo. They have decided that they don't need my supervision to put one foot in front of the other, nor need me to lead them in putting said feet in front of other said feet to make large circles, so I have been freed of those guidance responibilities. They walked once or twice, but the numbers fell very, very quickly. Maybe I need to attend in order to inspire animo. we'll see. I am trying my hardest to win the good fight over Vericose Veins.
I have got a garden and we just ate the first cucumber of the year. Here is proof that it exists.
I have got a tomato plant that is literally taller than Nora and has about 15 tomatoes growing on it now. With the amount of plants that we have, we are going to have a years worth of salsa and ketchup stores within weeks. You are jealous and you know it. I have watermelons on the up and up, too, but they seem to take a long time.
Side note: Nora and I get in weekly fights about the immense amounts of cow shit I throw all over the yard trying to help these things put some damn food on our plate. Its for the good of everyone that our house smells like this, Nora. Don't you get it? Free tomatoes!
This is my host sister, Jamileth, and the rest of our camión filled with the people of La Peña on our way into Metapàn last Friday morning.
This is my new bathroom that we just built. It is still without a door and will continue to stay that way because we have the beautiful view of the mountains while on the John. It's a gorgeous view; it really is.
This is a picture of my house, again. Most call it disgusting. I call it quaint.
Here are the ten new ladies in my life. Beautiful, beautiful bichas. I will have free eggs, and free vegetables sooner than you can say 'Toy boat, toy boat, toy boat' correctly.
This weekend we are throwing a Halloween bash in my community. Only the few men that have gone to the United States and come back have ever even heard of this fantasti-excuse-to-drink-an-unhealthy-amount-of-beer-day that we like to call a 'Holiday.'
No, but seriously, I have been loaned the projector from the Metapán mayor's office and will commence Halloween weekend with a showing of a very scary American movie in Spanish tonight for the entire town. We will have one scary movie each night for the whole weekend and celebrate Halloween in the best costumes we can muster at a party we are throwing for the children tomorrow afternoon. It should be a blast. Most people in town say that they have never seen a scary movie, so let's see how these 68 year old farmers react when oversized (from the projector) Chucky goes wild with a baby sized chainsaw. This could be the best Halloween ever considering how I spent last year's, right Wilcox?
Anyway, thats all I got for you today, a lot of photos, hardly any stories, and a really uncomfortable beginning to a blog. I hope you liked it.
Tune in next time for just as few (maybe less) significant stories. Happiest of Halloweens you goons.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)