Jump into Action: Typical Day At The Office

Learning the dos and don'ts of turtle releasing

The fog was thick and the full moon hung low in the sky as the 25 of us pulled away from the entrance of my community. Alex Boy brought his 13 kids, I had my nine, plus the driver on loan from the mayor's office. We were on our way to starting an adventure these kids would probably remember for the rest of their lives.

About two months ago I got together with two other volunteers, Alex Boy and Natalie, and we decided we wanted to do a joint project that included youth in our respective communities and was based on the environment. What we came up with was an environment based youth group. In each of our communities we have started youth groups that meet once a week, but there is a slight twist. We have planned three trips where all three of the communities will unite and participate in activities together. We applied for a grant to help fund everything, and just recently received the money to get the ball rolling.

Bucket of baby sea turtles!

After several weeks of youth group meetings we had the first trip this past Saturday. Us three volunteers took 35 kids to the beach to release baby sea turtles. None of the kids in my youth group had ever been to the beach before. Since the beach is such a big part of American culture, it is hard to imagine a childhood without sand and waves. Needless to say my kids were blown away by every aspect of the beach, from the hotness of the sand to the immensity of the water.

Getting ready to hand out the sea turtles!

We were collaborating on this project with an NGO called FUNZEL. This organization has seven beaches in El Salvador where they work to protect baby sea turtles. They were so helpful with our project. We did apply and receive grant money to help with the costs of this project, but it would have been almost impossible for this part of the project to have been as successful as it was without this NGO. They set us up with a member of the beach community where we were who collaborates with FUNZEL. This guy was awesome, he let us completely take over his beach front house, bathrooms, kitchen and pool. Also the NGO did not charge us to participate. Usually they charge something like $5 a person for the experience (which if I were doing this on my own would be totally worth it), but since they know about the work Peace Corps does and since we agreed to have the kids do a trash clean up, we were not charged.

Juan with a baby turtle

The NGO brought about 100 one day old sea turtles for us to release. We stood behind a rope in the sand and freed our little turtles to take their chances in the wild. As they clambered off towards their future I could not help but think what a tough life it will be for the little nuggets. Most of them will not make it. Many will be eaten by another animal, while some will be killed through more human methods such as pollution.

After we released the sea turtles, the kids broke into teams and we held a little competition to see who could collect the most trash on the beach. It was very impressive how motivated the kids got with the promise of a prize for the winner. We were able to collect a ton of trash, maybe the equivalent of ten of the big black trash bags.

After the trash pick up we headed down the beach a bit to visit a protected turtle nest. These eggs are guarded 24 hours a day by a guard hired by the NGO. Turtle egg theft is huge in El Salvador because there is a huge market of people who sell them for consumption. NGOs like FUNZEL are staging massive campaigns all over the country to promote the protection of these eggs. But unfortunately it is still common, a quick tour into just about any street market in El Salvador and you will surly find turtle eggs for sale.

The line we stood behind to release the turtles

For the rest of the morning and into the afternoon the kids had free time to explore the beach and take advantage of the house/ pool that was generously being lent to us.

All alone in the great wide ocean

It was great to see the kids getting to know and working with people from other communities. It is our, the volunteers', hope that these kids will come away from this experience not only with more knowledge of their environment, but with some new experiences and lasting friendships. Our groups will continue to meet every week in our own communities, until our next excursion in late October. We will be headed to the Zoo in San Salvador next. Can't wait!