Almost Famous

I said it might happen earlier, but today I was in La Prensa Grafica which is a local newspaper as part of an insert for SalvaNatura. So my press debut has happened in El Salvador and I think I may have a future in eco-tourism modeling and Angie agrees with me. In reality it never mentions my name or that of Peace Corps, but I'm in pictures all the same. Several other volunteers have already mentioned that they saw me in the paper. I tried to get my hands on a few copies for posterity sake, but so far I have only gotten one copy. I will try to buy more on my way back tonight.

As stated in the last post, one year in country has come and gone, so quite a few of the volunteers from my group met up and celebrated at playa El Tunco (The Pig) which is named after a rock which bares no resemblance to its name's sake. It had all the hall marks of a classic beach bash; friends, alcohol, playing in the waves, creeping girls out with mustaches, sunburns, non-potable water, basically the works. Seriously though, I had a good time mostly because I got to sit back and hang out with lots of people I talk to often, but see very seldom. Mostly I played Euchre, my new favorite card game, which I only get to play in large groups of volunteers. A very Salvo thing happened when I got there, my sandals broke within two hours of arriving, and before most people were around, so I spent the entire weekend walking around barefoot. I did this because, like I said my sandals broke, but I also happened to have left my shoes at the hostal in San Sal. So I made like the locals and walked around sans footwear, which amused the other volunteers. Then on the way back a large truck managed to spill corn on the highway and a scene that could only happen in El Salvador ensued. The other cars pulled over, but not to help out or for any other humanitarian reason, but to stop and collect some free corn for themselves. At first it was a bit of a "whoa, what is going on?" moment, but we saw it for what it was after a few seconds.

Now I am crashing in San Sal for the rest of the week helping my program director get started on a documentary for our Municipal Developement program. It is a good effort and more reason for me to play with computers. The only downside is that the revolving door of volunteers makes it so I have nobody to hang out with on a regular basis.

A Whole Year

As Matt Ladd so pleasantly reminded me, today marks 365 fateful days since I departed that magical place known as the USA. Add two if you want the number of days since I left home with nothing but two bags packed with hopes and dreams or rather clothes and bug spray.

As I sit here eating a bag of chopped mango drenched in hot sauce and salt an reading online manuals for MySQL, PHP and CSS I am struck by how much of my life hasn't changed, but so much has. What makes me Me is still all there and persisting no matter what surroundings I find myself in. You just can't seem to tear me away from computers and projects that involve them. So I find I am researching the possibility of implementing a database system to track the actions of a team of social promoters here, which would serve to modernize the Alcaldía and better understand the work the promoters are doing. Another project entirely, but somewhat related is the possibility of putting up a website for my municipality. (A schoolboy type dream has me designing the site, then asking them if they would like to host the database online so anyone could see what the promoters are doing.) So yeah, same old me, chugging away at learning new things on a computer, but this time it has real world applications.

Meantime everything else around me is different. I don't think I ever would have had mango as a mid-morning snack in the USA. Not that I didn't like mangos before, but they sort of seemed like a luxury before and were only available for a short time. Not to mention I bought my mango from a lady who walks around with a basket of fruit on her head and sells all manner of local fruits for a quarter. I wouldn't have tolerated my current living situation in the USA, but it has made for a fairly comfortable and regular existence for me here. I mean my backyard isn't fully enclosed, I can see the Police next door (and in turn they can see me) when I walk to my shower or bathroom or am out washing clothes. At first I was sure to be fully dressed, but I have given up caring. My landlord also makes use of my backyard for a sort of rotating storage area of his materials and for growing of whatever he sees fit, plus there are always workers coming and going, so the doors stay open. Really it doesn't get to me except occasionally when they use up all my toilet paper or soap, and the small fact that I can't just let my dog run around my yard ever. But occasionally if I am in a rush and leave my dishes out, I come back to a pile of clean and stacked stuff, so it has its perks. Plus I don't really have to clean up after my dog, since one of the workers always seems to do that. I mean Kaya always goes to the same place, so its not hard, but its nice have it done for you.

What do I miss and what don't I miss? Well I miss driving for sure. I could use a hot shower now and then. Strangely I could really use a Nacho Cheese Chalupa from Taco Bell. I am completely wanting for Thai food. A couch or some other large, comfortable place to relax would be a welcome change from plastic chairs. And a washer and dryer would be a godsend based on the endlessly growing pile of dirty, sweaty clothes. But I am glad to be away from the mad dash that is commuting and working (not that I was really doing either) in at least LA. I could be fine if I never saw another Starbucks. I am still glad I am not in school I enjoy being one of the tallest people around. I am enjoying not being surrounded on all sides by suburban sprawl. I didn't watch too much television as it was, but I am glad to only get a glimpse of it occasionally.

All in all it has been a long haul so far, but I don't regret it. Certainly I am looking forward to the day I can say I am a returned Peace Corps Volunteer, but mostly for the experience of redefining myself in the US and not really to rush out of here.

What Happened?

For those that are interested in what transpired in my meeting with my counterparts and my program director, things worked out alright I think. As far as I can tell they were a bit concerned that I am not doing as much of the kind of work they were expecting coupled with the fact that the rumor mill has been working over time in my area and somehow they go word that I have been saying less than flattering things about the local government. My response was basically to ignore the complaints about my work and just present some ideas I had already had. With regards to the rumors, I just assured them that I am not supposed to enter into politics and that I think they were just that, rumors. I also assured them that I would be a little more conscious of what I said and who I said it to. My program director thinks I handled the situation well and thinks things will work out just fine. I have my fingers crossed.

The rainy season has officially begun and so has my task of sweeping my house every hour or so. This may sound strange because nobody in the US thinks of it, but I have to sweep water out of my house. Yes, you read that correctly, SWEEPING WATER. Basically my roof leaks during heavy rains making a mini lake by my front door and window. There is just too much water to soak up with a towel and quite frankly if I tried that it would never dry. So I sweep the water out under the space under my doors. You would be surprised how well this actually works.

Yesterday in and of itself was a strange adventure. It all started early in the morning with my friend Erin getting a call from one of her counterparts asking if she could round up a few Peace Corps friends to bring into El Imposible for some sort of event for SalvaNatura, the NGO that runs the park. I agreed to tag along and it turns out it was a hike to some pretty spots in the park for a photo shoot which will eventually be used for an insert about SalvaNatura in one of the newspapers here. It was a nice hike and all but I felt super awkward. They had insisted on Peace Corps volunteers because they wanted white "tourists" for their photos. So I spent the day feeling a little self conscious and posing for really strange photos. Maybe I'll be famous, we'll see. If I can get my hands on some of the inserts and I'm in it I will try to send some copies out to people.

The Great Debate

I'm referring to Coke vs. Pepsi. And while I find I am a Pepsi man in the US, here in El Sal I have converted to a Coke man. I am not leaving my old favorite out in the cold for no reason, I find the formulas here are different and the flavors are screwy primarily from the use of sugar instead of corn syrup. So while in the US Coke is too fizzy and sorta coats your mouth with a corn syrupy cinnamon flavor (which I don't like), it doesn't do that here. On the contrary Pepsi here is too fizzy for me.

More than just the Pepsi/Coke issue though, I have been a little struck lately by the dynamic between the reality of Peace Corps work and what my City Hall and the people there seem to expect of me. They seem to think I have done next to nothing in my time here, which isn't entirely incorrect, I don't do as much with them as I originally thought I would. However somehow I think they have taken this to mean that I am not doing anything at all. Oh if that were only true and I was just relaxing. And so I have had to deal with a series of calls to my supervisor and the nail biting experience of waiting for a big meeting with my boss, my counterpart and my mayor in which I need to reinvent myself so to speak and present old ideas in a fresh way. Plus I need to find a way to ask them to be more open with me without criticizing or offending them. I'm trying to relax about it, but it sorta stays in the back of my mind.

Mean time I checked out a possible project today and I'm ready to present to others and start work on them. So as I get close to my second year things are starting to look busy and I'm feeling the pressure to succeed from my office.

Dress Me Up In Stitches

She's doing fine, but photos seemed in order.



I feel like I should rename my blog so it has more to do with Kaya. That seems to be most of what I talk about.

I am working on getting a 3 day camp together for the beginning of June, which is approaching very quickly. It will cover self esteem, gender, sexually transmitted diseases, AIDS/HIV, reproductive biology and family planning. Those are all big topics that I think get glossed over in schools here. I am specifically working on a condom activity, a few gender activities and an activity where they burn phrases including the words "I can't ...". Plus I am soliciting transport from the alcaldia since I am the Municipal Developement volunteer.

Also I have become a bit of an unofficial go to person to translate visa applications. I mean several people here speak English, but somehow I am the guy. Thats ok, at least I feel like I am contributing to the legal process rather than illegal immigration. If promoting that means being their visa translating bitch, so be it.

Big Things

Ok not really any big things, I lied. Things have been relatively quiet here as usual, but with a little less for me to do recently in terms of work so I've been enjoying a little bit of exploration and whatnot.

Two weeks ago a new group of volunteers swore in so on a Thursday I headed to the capital to meet some of them and join them to party in their honor. That was fun as the swearing in party usually is, but this time it was a bit smaller, which is fine by me because I am not one for huge dance clubs and so much noise I can't think. I prefer a pub or dive bar any day. The following night I stayed in the capital because on Saturday there was a Peace Corps soccer game. Friday I think wound up being more fun than Thursday because we stopped at Happy Hour at the Intercontinental for 2 for 1 margaritas and a free Nacho Bar. The occasion was to say goodbye to the 2005 Rural Health volunteers who are leaving as of now. We also went to a second bar where the Peace Corps crowd was a decent size and I had a good time hanging out with volunteers I don't usually get to see.

The soccer game was a bit more eventful than usual, owing in part to the strange start it had due to the previous evening's debauchery on the part of several volunteers and the difficulty in getting an early start. One or two volunteers never got over the previous evening's alcohol and decided a little hair o' the dog was in order, but that just led to further drunkenness on the field. On top of all of our other minor issues, it was stiflingly hot and humid. I thought I would honestly pass out the first half. The second half we decided to play skins and for some reason this had a huge effect on our game and we actually scored a few goals. I still thoroughly enjoyed myself even with all the set backs in the game and the blisters on my feet.'

This last weekend the Alcaldia was closed Monday and Tuesday, so at the suggestion of a few volunteers in the area we set up a hike for Sunday that would take us into El Imposible, over the peak in the park and out into Tacuba, the pueblo to our north. I have no idea the distance we hiked, but it took us a little over 6 hours and at least 4 of them were spent hiking uphill. The hike was absolutely gorgeous and I wish we had spent a tad bit more time just relaxing and looking, but we wanted to get into Tacuba at a reasonable hour and relax some. On the way we saw the bridge that is actually named El Imposible and gives the park its name. The view from there is pretty spectacular and on either side there is a pretty severe drop. It was a little overcast so we couldn't see as well as I had hoped, but people say you can see the ocean, Guatemala and the city of Ahuachapan from the bridge. We continued on to the peak where there is a community called Naranjitos in which a new volunteer got assigned. We stopped for a few to meet him and relax. After as steep descent we came upon Tacuba where we lunched upon ice cream and soda and then had some time for showers and hammocks at our hostel. We spent the night in Tacuba playing some cards and having a few well earned beers before heading back by bus on Monday which took us about 4 hours in total. I am glad we did the hike and I am surprised that I'm not actually sore after all that. I plan to try this hike again at some point, hopefully when the ground isn't as muddy.

Tomorrow I am taking my dog to the Capital to have her spayed since she is already 6 months old and I don't want any male dogs coming a suiting. I am taking her so far because of a horror story with another volunteer in my area and her dog which almost died as a result of a less than professional job if you ask me. So its nothing but the best and most difficult for Kaya. I'll let you all know how it goes.

54 and counting

EDIT: 55
Thats how many books I've read since I've been in El Salvador. Actually probably tonight or tomorrow that will be 55. As you can tell I am a reading junkie, its how I pass time here. And we aren't talking little dinky books here, some of them are pretty substantial like The Fountainhead and The Count of Monte Cristo, while others are the 6 Harry Potter books. Still I feel like I'm at least expanding my mind in my down time and it keeps me busy.

As for my trip to LA I'll sum it up that no matter how long I spend in the US, it seems to fly by. The result of being there is that LA will always be familiar to me and it will always hold a place in my heart as where I grew up, but for now I felt just a little out of place there. Its the feeling when some place is no longer exactly home. I felt like I was driving around a ghost town or something, so many places hold memories, but the people connected to them are no longer there, or are some other place in LA. I used to get that feeling a little bit back in college, but often enough some of my friends were around, so the feeling wasn't so complete.

In term of my cultural reaction to being in LA, I wouldn't call it reverse culture shock, but it puts things in stark contrast. There are things that being in the US we take as the base level of necessity which very much aren't. Things we have learned to take for granted which I never want to take for granted again in my life. Things like constantly running water, let alone hot water. Or trash service. I want to remind myself in the future that I had lived without, and it really wasn't so bad. Being back here I like it, but the US has made me lazy. I can't seem to bring myself to hand wash anything for the time being having been so close to washing machines and dish washers for a short while. I'm sure that rugged defiance will fall apart in the next day or two as I run out of passable clothing and need to cook again.

After every small trip back to see my friends and family it puts the cultural and economic differences into stark contrast. During training we all say we experiences culture shock, but I really feel we were eased into it what with the first few days in a hotel, living with a family, the training center, other trainees and whatnot. By the time I was completely immersed in and participating in the life here I was pleasantly becoming unaware of exactly how different it really was because my sense of comparison was fading. Now that I can jet straight back to my community and my life here I am allowed a better comparison that I hope never to forget and I think I would be hard pressed to put into understandable words except with lots of time and lots of pages. I don't know I'll ever have that urge.

Minutia

Well one of the things I wanted to accomplish on a personal level while on this crazy escapade called Peace Corps was get myself back in to drawing, both with pencil and paper and on the computer. I have made big steps in that direction and gotten back to my DeviantArt Gallery which is also now in the links section on the right side of this page. It features some old digital art and some more recent stuff. Beware that most of the pencil and paper stuff looks pretty lousy on there because I have to photograph it rather than scan it, so the contrast if off as well as the color.


Cambia La Vida by ~if0rg0t2remember on deviantART
That is my most recent digital piece. Anyway, check out the gallery if you like and let me know what you think.

Also due to my Stateside visit at the end of this month I'm a little scatter brained to wrap up some work here before I run off for a while.

I'm also all confused about what to do about music. My iPod got stolen on a bus and since its HD is as big as my computer's I hadn't backed up most of my music, that means I will have to try to reconstruct my music library very quickly while home and make a fast choice about whether to get another iPod or some other player. It also means that instead of trying to a newer, more reliable digital camera I will have to go for a music player since I can live with an old digicam, but I can't live without portable music.

Kaya is good and I can already see myself missing her and feeling guilty for leaving her behind. I'll have to bring her back something to win her love back after she forgets about me.

March and April are the hottest months here, so I'm sweating up a storm. This is made more maddening by the 2 or so hours a day that I actually get water at my house, so I have to make sure to fill my pilas and take showers whenever I can if I don't want to bucket bathe. A fridge full of cold water helps a bunch. Also I've been going to a waterfall recently thats about 45 minutes from my house to cool down when other volunteers hang out. Its fun and I take Kaya. I jump off the waterfall and try to teach Kaya to swim, which she doesn't seem to want to do. I'll get some photos of the waterfall up pretty soon.

Easier Than Expected

Ok, we all know El Salvador is a poor country. The average person here makes less than $5 per day and the magic thing they seem to want from us Peace Corps volunteers is some way of bringing them free money for projects. With that being said I had assumed that soliciting any Salvadoran entity, shop, person or otherwise, for a little cash to do a project would be difficult. I was ever so wrong.

The other volunteers in my area and myself are planning a 3 day camp for teenagers to teach them about HIV/AIDS, family planning, STDs and other related topics. We are writing a grant to get the majority of our funding, but it requires at least a 25% community contribution in money or in kind. We were struggling to get the in kind contribution up to a reasonable level and concluded that soliciting a little cash from high profile local stores, especially pharmacies, would get us a little more wiggle room, but we weren't expecting much. In a little under 2 hours we raised nearly $100 dollars and managed to have the manager of the local supermarket promise to solicit donations from his distributors on our account to get us free food for refreshments. Honestly most places that had an owner present easily handed over a few dollars with only the promise of putting their name on a small sign indicating our donors.

Color me surprised and I'd like to say that yesterday was one of the most fulfilling and productive days of my Peace Corps service. I doubt I will have as many pleasantly surprising days like that in my time here, but that one will keep me going for a while.

No News

I've been running around a lot lately, mostly to Cara Sucia and other volunteer's sites right around me to work on workshops I have been planning for various things. It is keeping me scatterbrained and adding a sense of being busy an rushing around. Its not so bad though, at least its a change of pace from sitting around and feeling like I live in a sleepy little town. I'm still finding time for stuff like reading, possibly to the exclusion of things like laundry.

I think the time has finally come to break down and pay someone to wash up a bunch of my stuff just so I can get it back down to a manageable level. My pile of laundry has been steadily growing and I have been cutting into it little by little, but I have basically wound up washing my favorite articles of clothing over and over again and my less favorite things sit in my hamper because I just don't feel like doing hours of laundry except on weekends, but I've been using my weekends lately.

I've also gotta get things all together because my parents finally got their way and I am going back to the states for a bit at the end of this month. What that really means is officially filing for vacation time, figuring out who will watch my dog and when and making a list of what I am taking to the states and what I will be bringing back. I want to pack light if I can, thats just how I travel. I am looking forward to sleeping in my old bed for a change and seeing some friends though. Most of all I am looking forward to driving my car. It has been 9 months since I've driven anything, let alone my car, and lets face it I like driving.

The Other 6 Months

I know I already had a post titled 6 Months, but this one is actually more meaningful, though the other one seemed really cool and important at the time. This time I have actually been in my site, that means actually working in my community for 6 months. Which also means that I am 1/4 done with my Peace Corps service. Crazy Stuff I know.

On the work side of things my Municipio has become the first in the country to create a municipal secretariat of women's affairs. I will be doing some behind the scenes work for this movement since the three people in charge of it want some assistance in designing a schedule and looking for groups to provide the trainings and workshops they hope to bring to our area. I have several ideas, but I will need to see some of the diagnostics that were done at the first meeting before really getting my feet wet.



It is all very exciting, but as a man it is hard to be completely on the inside of this thing. It is also hard to be publicly proud about this seeing as how El Salvador works, but I'm behind it and secretly proud.

Time still seems to be cruising by at an insanely fast pace, especially since I got Kaya. I just realised it has been over a month since I got her and a sudden change of scenery yesterday made me realize how big she has gotten. Photos can't seem to capture the change as I examined them as closely as I could, but at least I can't see it. Maybe someone else can. I updated photos of her in my gallery as well as some stuff of my community. Click my webshots link on the right if you haven't for a while.

You Can't Go Back

Just to mix it up and not combine seperate thoughts, this is a completely different post.

For some time now I've been having little day dreams and very vivid actual dreams of Meadow Oaks Camp. Yeah yeah, I know that was like forever ago, but the kicker is I am 100% sure it is some sort of mental trigger for the delights of my childhood. I mean I have these very vivid sort of daydreams and whatnot of places and things that used to happen there, specifically the camp part not the school, which I have all but forgotten about.

I often dream I am paddling a boat around on Secret Lake and Greg (the counselor) is rushing up to turn on the sprinkler under the bridge to soak me before I go through. Or perhaps I am imagining swinging on the rope swing and splashing into Secret Lake, which few people used to do because there were rumors it was full of sewage water. I felt in on some secret as a school goer because I used to see it filled with fresh water near the end of the school year and know they cleaned it, although it acted as a bus parking lot a good portion of the time.

Secret Lake was the site of my first meeting with long time school companion Geoff Plitt and the site of my permanent image of him. He was a chubby kid in my group, a little older than me, wearing a Home Depot painting hat with pride and basically flaunting the dork he would become. He always wore who he was with pride, and I look back on it remembering how torn I was over that hat. I hated it, but secretly I liked it and I wanted into the dork club. Well I got in eventually.

I also vividly remember nearly every turn of the water slide, climbing up, sliding down, the changing rooms, the mysterious ticket booth that sat nearby, and sitting in the shade playing geeky dice games. I was a self proclaimed king of the slide, going down as fast as I was capable and skimming the water in the pool all the way to the steps. Ah good times.

There was the pool, where I used to pretend I couldn't swim. Unless of course I was going down the small slide or jumping off the diving board.

There were the jerks that stole my very first G-Shock watch and used to come to camp with Jack in the Box twisty fries every day.

The Snack Shack and the Slim Jims it sold.

That waft of horse dung as you walked to the lame little horse area. Which also happened to be where I mischievously locked my cousin Daniel in a latrine and shook it trying to tip it over.

Moto and getting my "liscense". In retrospect those undersized quads aren't nearly as cool, but hey, they were close to the mini golf course.

Right, the good ole days. The point is that is all gone now. Its gone, caput, over and done with. Nobody else will ever learn those secrets and have those memories because they are gone, making way for the expansion of Viewpoint School. I went to Viewpoint too, but it wasn't the same, that was school, Meadow Oaks was always more of a camp with long school times thrown in to me. I secretly never wanted that buyout to happen years ago because I knew that it eventually meant Meadow Oaks would slowly disappear. Now I have no place to sneak a peak at those years of my childhood except while daydreaming or sleeping. I didn't think I would get all nostalgic for that sort of stuff, but the years are coming on quickly and staring the rest of your life in the face sometimes does that to you. I mean I've been having these little flights of fancy since before departing for El Sal, but they come more frequently the longer I am gone.

Mostly though I miss Secret Lake and I don't know why.

Dia de Amistad

Happy Valentine's Day, or as they call it here, Dia de Amistad.

I'm not doing anything special, unless you count hanging out with Kaya, maybe doing some laundry and getting some pupusas for dinner something special. I personally wouldn't consider it special because I do most of that every day. So continues another year in a huge streak of having nothing in particular to do for Valentine's day. Every seems to want to be on the other side of whatever they have, meaning if you have nobody you feel like junk and if you have a ball and chain you wish you were single instead of forced into this hokey holiday.

Been a little while since I last posted. With regards to my dog I finally got the supplies my parents sent and everything is working out great. A proper crate is something my dog totally needed and the rest of the supplies give me extra stuff as the dog grows, like a larger collar and a cloth leash as soon as she stops trying to chew on her leash, until then I am using a chain.

Its been a busy time, but not all directly work related. I've been in and out of my site, which makes me sorta scramble around trying to figure out what to do with my dog. I spent two nights in order to go to the monthly soccer game and one night in order to go to a regional conference for all western volunteers. There have also been a rash of meetings for volunteers in my micro-region (four adjacent municipalities with 11 total volunteers). I am happy to be doing a little more group work, but it doesn't seem all that developed other than my area's planning a workshop for adolescents. Hopefully we can get on the same page as a group of volunteers and find a way to use the micro-region to support our projects and bring each other in.

As I stated I am finally working a little more closely with the other volunteers in my immediate vicinity. It is nice because they all live pretty close and I am getting to know where they all live by going to their respective houses for meetings. I also bring my dog along to their places because they don't mind and several of them also have dogs. So its like two meetings at once, we are working and our dogs are meeting. It kind of makes me look forward to when my dog is a little older and I can take her wherever I go outside the Alcaldia.

Speaking of outside the Alcaldia, I finally got my chance to enter El Imposible with some community members. i wanted to take my dog but I was advised against it, and I'm glad I didn't. The hike was a little to long and hard for Kaya to have accomplished at this point. We hiked out to the source of water for our town and I finally have a full understanding of why we only get water for about an hour and a half a day. The system is really rather poor and old. I can't even begin to describe it in a reasonable manner here. I took pictures, but they just seem to highlight the innate beauty of the forest rather than the water system. Still, I am glad I finally got in there and have a better understanding of both the water system and the forest now. I can't wait to get back in there for a purpose other than work. All this of course is because we are trying to find a way to upgrade or replace the current water system. 2 hours of water a day just doesn't cut it, and often times I don't get home at the correct hours to fill my pila up. That means restricted water use for bathing and washing of clothes and such.

I'm also hopeful to start a project with Habitat for Humanity. I don't want to jinx it, but the lady I spoke to seemed interested in trying to get a meeting together with my mayor and see whats up. They are spreading into our region and I think they can provide some support for replacement housing for families that lost their homes in October floods. Personally I like the way Habitat works rather than other NGOs. Families have to work and pay for part of the project with them and I think that adds value to the home and teaches Salvadorans to take matters in their own hands rather than wait for a free project from some crazy rich country. Seems much more sustainable to me and I have made a conscious decision to avoid projects that just hand people stuff with a non-visible money source and a management that isn't of the community.

Walk the Dog

It is amazing how quickly once can settle into a routine. Before I picked up Kaya I never really thought about my comings or goings. My house was where I slept and where I could catch some time alone without people constantly asking me why I don't have a girlfriend and why I don't go out with Alana. (Another Volunteer, surprisingly everyone seems to know her and they all think we should be married by now.) But now my house is that place I have to go to every few hours to take care of my dog. And I can't think about spending more than a few hours away without making special arrangements. My day pretty much goes like this now:

-Get up at 6 or earlier and take the dog out, then feed her and do my thing while she is eating. Take her out again just before leaving.
-Go and do whatever morning work I have, usually meetings in the Alcaldia or Cara Sucia.
-Get back after lunch and let the dog out again. Spend a little more time with her, then head out again.
-Get back around 4, take the dog out and then play with her for a while. Or perhaps take her for a walk and get looked at like a crazy man.
-Make the dog's dinner around 6 and either concurrently make mine or go get some food after she eats. Either way, she eats before me.
-Relax and do my thing at night, but keep a constant watchful eye out for house soiling. Get a few minutes of obedience training in here and there. (She can pretty much sit on command now)

So with all that I am set to try to leave Kaya for about 2.5 days and play some fútbol in the East. I hope she takes it well and I hope she doesn't revert to peeing all over Erin's house while I am gone. I don't really know how she will respond to staying with someone other than me for any period of time, but its gonna happen eventually, so we'll see now.

Work is going pretty well. There are lots of regional type meetings happening so there is plenty of time to interact with other Volunteers right now. My Social Promotion team is going full steam teaching some of the themes I had written and I am tying to search out some other work to do since I neither get invited to each workshop, no do I want to be at all of them. I will attend the ones that are for the communities closest to mine. I seem set to help behind the scenes starting a municipality wide women's movement, which seems like it might be pretty interesting. Of course I won't be able to enjoy the fruits of that or flaunt my involvement, but thats ok.

Anywho, I got bored and shaved my beard into a fu manchu. I get bored with my facial hair easily, and what else can I do with the prohibitive amounts of hair on my face? So I goof around a bit for funsies. Interstingly enough only one comment so far. I would have expected a slightly larger response, especially from all the female volunteers. I guess the stache is so popular here that any variation means I'm a real man.

Kaya

Ok so I talked about it for a while and thought about it even longer and I finally just went for it and got a puppy. She is a 2.5 month old Boxer and I named her Kaya. Obviously you all want pictures, so here you go.



Kaya

I am still figuring things out a bit, so I am temporarily using a stacking cube shelving unit as a substitute crate for training purposes. (Crate training is a humane way to housebreak a dog and keep your house safe from chewing.) She doesn't have any proper toys yet since there isn't exactly a pet store around here and people don't think of dogs the same way we are used to up north. But I am working on it. On the 26th I will head to the capital for other reasons and check out a pet store with my program director while I am there. Erin, the other volunteer in my town, is excited to babysit for me whenever I need to leave for a short time and she has already met Kaya.

Obviously I am super excited and don't want to leave her ever, but she needs to learn that I won't be there all the time. For now she is a little crybaby when I leave, but hopefully that will change with time.

Translate This

So I got into the capital yesterday after a few days spent at another volunteer's site translating for a group of engineering students from CSU working with Engineers Without Borders. Basically it was a good experience and I am glad to have tried it out, and will be heading out this afternoon to try out a different sort of translating, for children.

Basically my translating time was spent with a team of the engineers that were surveying the community so they can properly estimate costs for the water project they are working on. Since there were only two translators, and the other was busy with another task for the engineers I was running back and forth between the people by the surveying viewfinder and the pole. That got interesting in spots where curious community members wanted to know why some houses were having marks put in front and others not, and also when some over-zealous men wanted to flirt a bit with the women engineers who don't speak Spanish. It can be hard to notice exactly when and where you should be to translate, especially when someone is barely within your view. Certainly it can be fun to watch the fireworks as complete chaos ensues due to inability to communicate, at least it can be amusing to the party that actually understands what is going on.

Aside from funny occurrences, translating can be an odd job. It is very difficult to keep yourself out of a conversation and instead simply translate what is being said or asked. One good example is that someone will often ask a question that I know the answer to, and I need to remember to pose the question to the other people instead of simply answering it myself. Plus it is hard to know how much of side conversations to translate, since the natural tendency of people who can speak a different language is to use it as a bit of a cover knowing that the other parties will never know exactly what was said. I do enjoy it though and I want to keep trying to do it as time goes on to see if I can get a little better at translating while people are still talking. I think the need to immediately repeat what was said in a different language could also result in better comprehension.

Happy New year

Let me start by wishing the obvious Happy New Year to the maybe 7 people who read this blog. I missed the opportunity to wish anyone a Merry Christmas or Happy Chanukah, but my internet schedule was limited in December.

I had big plans for December, and most of them that were work related wound up falling through. I had planned to run a little workshop for my social promotion team to teach them how to run a meeting better and how to give a more effective informal training, but it got canceled. I had planned for one of the Volunteer Coordinators to come out and help me, but alas, since it was canceled she couldn't come. My plan to teach them some ice breakers went awry and got canceled as well because the meeting that I was to present them in went way overtime and my chance was lost. The city hall closed on the 22nd, so after that there was no working in that capacity. All work I did after that day was either done in the Peace Corps office or shut up in my house on my computer.

As much as work failed I did manage to get along pretty well otherwise. I went to San Sal a few times for meetings for other projects with Peace Corps Volunteers. Also I met up with a work friend of my mother's and spent Christmas Eve and day with them. They took me to a nice beach and to a town that is literally all pupuserias. I managed to eat a few pupusas that stand out in my mind as some of the best I have had, which is hard to do considering the sheer quantity of pupusas I wind up eating.


cslom

I also hung out with some community members who are part of a festivities committee and we went to a waterpark in a different department. I spent the day back and forth hanging out with the kids in the kiddie pools and trying to convince the guys to go down the water slides. Eventually I got some of the guys to go down the big, slow, curvy slide and some of the guys and a few of the kids to go down the slide that used the inner-tubes. There was a third slide, a big red one that had about a thirty foot straight down drop that nobody was going on all day. I figured it couldn't be that bad and so I did it and got a standing ovation by the people in the pool below. I wound up being one of only 3 people to go down that slide all day. I would have gone down it several more times, but I almost lost one of my brand new contact lenses on the first go and that was enough for me not to encore my performance. But now lots of my community members are talking about my trip to the waterpark and especially my love of slides.


cslom

We also had a bit of a holiday party with the social promotion team, complete with secret santa gifts and a home grilled hairless sheep. It was good fun and good bonding. I left just in time for everyone to start drinking, which I am not fond of sticking around for, for various reasons including my inability to understand drunken spanish and my desire not to promote drinking. Either way it was fun and a good chance to bond with the people I work with.

Now I am back in the City Hall and preparing to get back to the grind. This month I plan to get out and try my hand at translating, first for some engineers in a friend's site and second at a children's camp at a gorgeous lake. I have never translated before and I think this will be a good opportunity to see how I do. also this month I will finish up some work with other volunteers getting some charlas together and head out to play a soccer game. All in all I'd say it looks pretty exciting for January.

6 months

In all the excitement I completely forgot to mention that as of December 5th it has been 6 months since I departed for my life in the Peace Corps.

There is a a saying in the Peace Corps community that the days crawl by at a snail's pace, but the months and years fly by. I must admit that as cliche as it is, that is how it has been going. Each day feels like it is never going to end and that it will only bring about another endless day. However time has flown by in aggregate and I can't believe how long I've been away. Seriously it feels like training just ended, but another group of volunteers has already come in, trained, swore in and moved into their sites, and that is nearly a 3 month process. I am already filling out my second quarterly report, which means 6 months and I stare at my computer screen dumbfounded at all the time that has gone by and all the activities I need to recall in order to fill in all the boxes and such.

I am now realizing that I have been more out of contact than I need to be with nearly everyone except my family. I have missed friend's birthdays and have been otherwise derelict in my duty to actually talk to people. I mean I have a cell phone and internet access on a semi-regular basis now, and I could call people if I just knew their phone numbers.

Busy Busy Busy

Been a little while since my last post. I've been a little busy since Thanksgiving. Mostly Peace Corps stuff and lots of trips in and out of my site.

I had a meeting with my program director and all the Municipal Developement volunteers from my region of the country that was both refreshing and beautiful. We went to an area in my department called Juayua where we stayed in a quaint little hotel for a night and discussed our work and our problems. These things get us a little more connected with our job and give us a little kickstart when we are running out of steam.

I also managed to get out to San Vicente for what was several days of language class and what is called In Service Training. That basically means I sat through about 20 hours of spanish and about 10 hours of technical training. We learned some of the more technical stuff like how to properly fill out a few types of grant forms and what we should do before helping our communities look for grant money.

December snuck up on me in the midst of being pretty busy and it doesn't look like December will really bring about a change of pace. I am on my way back to my site today, but will be returning to the capital in only 3 days to work on putting together a presentation on how to run meetings. In between now and then I will be teaching my social promoters how to run some ice-breakers to freshen up their ability to run capacity building meetings. Somewhere in there I need to find time to organize my personal life because I just decided to move houses and packed my stuff up and put it in a temporary room in my new house. Then if that is all not enough, I need to brush up my web developement skills and head back to the capital on the 20th to put together a training for that. The end goal of course being a day workshop to teach a group of volunteers how to put together a simple website to promote their communities. Before I get that website workshop put together I need to find time to have another little training session for my social promoters on how to run a meeting and how to run a capacity building workshop, hopefully with the help of someone on the staff.

Of course December also has the holidays so that will also take up a bit of time.