Many parties and still no running water

Just got back from Playa Tunco, one of the most famous beaches in El Salvador. There we had a goodbye party for one of our group who is going home early because his wife (who was also here with him but is already back in the States) is pregnant! Of course everyone is sad to see this awesome couple go, but of all the reasons to leave Peace Corps early, that has to be one of the best.

Tunco is a really cool beach. We couldn't go out too far into the water, though, because the current is crazy strong. It's really popular for Peace Corps volunteers and tourists and we ran into one of my friends there who is an ex-volunteer. Unlike American beaches, Tunco lets you drink on the sand all day, and at night there was a bonfire and a drum circle.

I also got to shower twice, which was a huge relief since there is still no water in my site. Earlier this week my host family told me the big water pump for the entire municipality had broken completely that the utility will have to install an entirely new one, which they say will take a month. So I have a long month ahead of me, probably full of leaving site to shower and wash clothes in San Salvador, at nearby volunteers' houses or even at my boss's country house, conveniently located near my village. The latter option might be awkward but it's actually the most convenient for me...

My town is in the middle of our patron saint festival. Thursday night a friend from a nearby site came and we went to an alborada, where they set off fireworks and teenagers run around inside toritos, which are shaped like bulls and spray fireworks into the crowd, which screams and runs. Some sparks actually burned my neck and face during the alborada, and I got pushed around a lot, but there's no permanent damage.

I wanted to upload some pictures of the fiestas patronales, but this computer won't have it. Maybe next time.

Paz y amor.

No cae agua

Every so often, a pipe or the town water pump breaks and no one in the village has running water for a few days. It's usually not that big a deal because water doesn't run 24/7 anyway and everyone has big cisterns to store lots of water for the times when it's not running. But this time we've gone a week without water and I finally had to escape to San Salvador just to take a shower (I am not publishing how long it's been since my last shower.)

I'm also spending the day organizing props for the Peace Corps/El Salvador theater group that I'm in charge of. Which makes me happy because at least it's one productive thing I've done in a long time. This has been a very boring month. I planned to hit the ground running on a bunch of new projects as soon as I got back from vacation, but everything I'm working on has been pushed back to February, as I might have mentioned earlier. So much for trying to space projects out. If all this stuff does actually happen in February, my head just might explode.

Yesterday my boss came to my site and met with me for our routine one-year site visit. Peace Corps volunteers enjoy a stunning lack of supervision, which is mostly fun, but I realized yesterday that I really do need to interact with my boss sometimes. It was nice to get recommendations about problems I'm having in my site and to put things in perspective -- I complained of boredom and my community's lack of willingness to work and was comforted (I guess) by his reassurance that this is par for the course. At least I personally am not doing anything wrong.

I will conclude with Emily's gem of a quote (for more gems, see my Facebook or just talk to the girl):
"i can't believe conan put a horse in a mink snuggie when there are places without running water
i am disullusioned now"

Paz y amor.

Temblores y teatro

Right before I started writing this post, I felt a strong tremor here in San Pedro Nonualco, El Salvador. It always starts the same way, with the ground moving slowly, slightly, almost undetectably, like when you're lying in a hammock and you're not even sure whether it's still swinging.

Then it started to get stronger and everyone started looking up and around. With one final jerk, it ended.

As soon as it was over, we turned on the news and found out that the tremor registered 5.8 on the Richter scale in Guatemala near the border of El Salvador. As far as I know there's been no damage, but this literally just happened and any damage might not have been reported.

El Salvador has always been prone to earthquakes, including two huge ones in 2001 that devastated the entire region I live in. As if the memory of those quakes isn't terrifying enough, what happened in Haiti six days ago is all over the news here too. One tremor and people get really paranoid. And I have to say I feel the same way.

The other day some people in my village formed an emergency committee to coordinate rescue efforts whenever a disaster happens. I live next door to the community center where the meeting was happening, walked into it and thus was sworn in as a member of the committee. It was formed as a reaction not only to the earthquake in Haiti but to the disaster we suffered in November as a result of Hurricane Ida. Of course I think the emergency committee is a good idea, but we're mostly forming it because no one wants to form a permanent legal village council, which I have been pushing since I got here and which would be proactive rather than reactive. It's typical of my site to write off work and organization until it's necessary for some temporary goal.

In terms of post-Ida aid, what my village really needs is food donations, but those are actually being provided for the next three months by an NGO here. I'll be meeting with some people hopefully this week to see if there's anything more I can do, but I don't want to start my own private fund if the NGOs are giving us everything we need.

In other news, the theater group I run is kicking it into high gear with educational performances scheduled throughout the country in the next three months. Which makes me feel like I'm actually doing something worthwhile here, because projects in my site keep getting pushed back. I'm playing the waiting game with the three major projects I'm working on right now: a community clean-up with the school, the fuel-efficient stove project and another project where we paint a map of the world on one of the school's exterior walls.

Miss everyone at home. Paz y amor!

I'm COLD!!!

And I'm in El Salvador!

How is this happening???

Everyone says that October and November are the coldest months in El Salvador, but it's Jan. 7 and I'm colder than I've ever been in my site. There must be some kind of cold front coming through. I just read in The Washington Post that things might get icy even in the South today, and temperatures in Iowa are supposed to hit -52 (!!!) so we must be sharing the same winds or something...

I should really stop being such a baby, because I'm guessing the temps this morning were in the 50s. Not the -50s.

In other news, being back is good and I'm starting a lot of fun new projects (notably the stove one). The work year has already started for teachers and classes start next week, so I should be getting busy pretty soon. It does feel weird to not be constantly talking to friends and not to have plans every night, and my sleep schedule is STILL off...at home I went to bed at like 2 a.m. every night and usually slept until 11, so I'm having trouble getting up really early and as a result I've been exhausted 24/7 since I got back.

Miss you all! Paz y amor!

Adios America, otra vez

These past three weeks at home have been nothing short of magical. I head back to El Salvador at 3:30 a.m. tomorrow, leaving from Reagan National Airport, which is a HUGE deja vu...our training group flew into ES for the first time from National at 3 a.m. more than 15 months ago.

There were so many great things about this vacation: seeing all my friends, going out in D.C., hanging out at home with TV and Internet in 18 inches of snow. And it's really put my experiences in the Peace Corps in perspective. Sometimes it's really tough, but I will come back to America in November that much stronger, and I will always my have fantastic friends here, and hopefully a job that I love.

At the end of my last trip to the States, I didn't want to go back to El Salvador. Thankfully, I don't feel that way now. I'm really excited to go back and finish up a million projects I've been planning. While I've been here, the Peace Corps approved my rather expensive proposal to build 50 fuel-efficient stoves in my community! I'm super stoked about that especially. But I am dreading the relative loneliness of the Peace Corps. The hardest thing about being there is no longer the dirt and bugs and lack of amenities. The hardest thing is not being surrounded daily by good friends.

We'll see what happens. I've also been compiling a list in my mind of things I found strange upon returning to America:

• EVERYONE has an iPhone or a BlackBerry now. When I left, only rich and important people had them. Now I wouldn't be surprised to see a homeless guy on the street with one.
• I used to be a guru of pop culture knowledge. Now I don't know what any of these TV shows or who any of these pop stars are. The most ridiculous one is Justin Bieber, the latest in a long line of prepubescent boy singers I thought were girls the first time I heard them on the radio.
• Speaking of the radio, I sometimes complain about the lack of variety in the Salvadoran radio repertoire...but America is much worse. I swear it's worse even than when I left. The local top 40 station (Hot 99.5, for you DC natives) literally plays the same 5 songs over and over.
• THINGS COST SO MUCH! The money I spend on a coffee or a beer could feed me for a whole day in El Salvador.
• A ton of new restaraunts opened up in DC.
• Almost everyone I know is now engaged or married. WTF.

And a few things that were surprisingly the same...

• I remembered how to drive and how to get everywhere in DC and Maryland.
• I fell very quickly into my old news-junkie ways and was discussing news, the funny articles of the day and media industry gossip as soon as I got home.
• The people I worked with at the college paper still get together and gossip endlessly...thank God! Same with my high school friends.
• I apparently cannot go home for a single break without hanging out at the Barnes & Noble where I used to work. I actually tried to avoid it this time and ended up there three times.

My next post will be from El Salvador! Paz y amor!