365 Days And Counting

It's official people. I have been living in my little community in El Salvador, The Savior, for one whole year. It is crazy how time slips away. Almost every volunteer I have spoken to says that the second year flies by. And I believe it. I feel like I blinked and the last 14 months passed by. I went through two months of training, my census, more training, I got chickens and a dog, my family visited, I tried out a women's group, I had an embassy Thanksgiving, I went home for the holidays, I basked in the glory of the dry season, I enjoyed the beginning of my second mango season, I watched many of my friends leave the country early, saw Peace Corps totally restructure its program and now I am here. One year in. My bosses are visiting me tomorrow for my 'year in site visit'. It is hard to believe that this time last year I was just arriving to my community, figuring everything out. It is actually a little scary when I think about it. In 11 months and 3 weeks I am going to go back to Florida. Then what? I will be 25 and jobless. It might seem silly, but 25 seems like such a huge milestone. My Dad always says that your 20s are for doing everything you can. Do everything, go everywhere, see it all. Game on.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programing:
Sometimes I am overwhelmed by how nice people in my community are. The other day I returned from a couple days in the capital. While I was away there was a heavy rain storm. (A storm that has left an absurd amount of humidity and don't even get me started on the fact that it is supposed to be the dry season right now.) This rain storm eroded a bunch of dirt from my downward sloped front yard and made a mud block in front of my gate. So when I returned I was unable to enter through my gate. As I approached my gate and came to this realization a neighbor of mine was out. I commented to him on my inability to enter, but decided to just walk around to my host families house. Our yards are connected, so it is not a problem. I got to my house and put my bags down. Then I heard something so I went out on my porch and saw my neighbor, who had seen me unable to enter through my gate, digging out the blocked area. It only took him a few minutes to clear the area, but it meant so much to me. If he had not cleared it I would have probably avoided clearing it for at least a week and just used my host families entrance any time I needed to leave. It's the little things.

Speaking of little things, when I was in San Salvador this week I stopped at the grocery store. The grocery stores are way fancier in the capital and have a larger variety of goods. I had not planned on buying anything specific, but when I came across a bag of brussel sprouts I could not say no. I truly believe my Mom must be the best mom ever because everyone in my family loves brussel sprouts. So I bought them and had them for dinner tonight. It was fantastic. (I also purchased two Dr Peppers. Also fantastic.)

A couple of weeks ago were the elections for mayor here in El Salvador. The elections were all over the country, and due to past unrest during election time, Peace Corps put its volunteers on standfast for a few days while the elections took place. There are five main political parties (ARENA, FMLN, GANA, PDC, and PCN). There were signs for each party littering the streets of every city, pueblo, canton and casarillo. Most signs consisted of a photo of the person running and the name of the party with a huge X through it. For the longest time I thought each of the signs had been vandalized by someone who disliked that party. But I did think it was strange that these ne'er-do-wells took the time to X out every single sign in the county. But what do I know about Salvadorian politics? Maybe this is a problem that comes up every year. I eventually figured out that the X through the party name is how voting is conducted. Voting is still conducted on paper down here. So when you get your ballot you mark your vote with an X through the party you are voting for. Too confusing for me.

Baby pig! We named him Pumpkin. 

Neri, Joelle and I at a new restaurant in Metapan.
(Please ignore my terrible bangs.)

It's Never A Hair

Ok so amongst the turmoil of life down here, I have been finding solace and comfort in small things. Like discovering a singer you forgot you liked (*ahem* David Bowie) or someone totally new. Joelle introduced me to a group, The Black Keys. Their music is kind of bluesie rockish. Here is one of their songs I really like, it is kind of an odd video, but it gets stuck in your head and you end up listening to it on repeat.

I have also just been introduced to an NPR podcast called Radiolab. It is fantastic. If you are not familiar with it, you should become familiar with it. The podcasts last anywhere from 10 min to over an hour and range in topics. Basically the hosts take a topic, like a part of the brain or biblical stories or different aspects of why humans do the things we do, and they dissect it. They interview experts, play devil's advocate and try to get to the bottom of many topics. The stories they unearth are incredible and teach me about so many different topics. I encourage you to look them up. The podcasts are free to download, you know it being NPR and all. Start with Oops or Detective Stories. They are my favorite so far. 

Another great part of my life right now is the blender I just purchased. I have been contemplating buying a blender for months.  The main thing holding me back was budget. Even the cheapest blenders cost about a tenth of my monthly salary. So every month I would say to my self, this is it, this is the month I will buy a blender. And every month something else came up that required me to put it off. But February was the magic month. I put down the money and walked out of the store a happier person. I have made a licuado (smoothie) (or two) every day since the purchase. Yay for great investments!

Alex and I at the Safety and Security conference. 

My good friend Alex made an interesting observation the other day. Before we came down here to El Salvador if we felt something tickling us, it was pretty safe to assume it was a stray hair or something equally benign like a piece of string. But down here it is never a hair. It is always something terrible like a bug, so our reactions have changed significantly. Swatting, swearing and shuttering are the new and necessary reactions. When I do eventually go back to the states, and bugs are not as prevalent indoors or in my bed, I have a feeling this habit will be hard to shake. It's never a hair. 

My Salvadoran family: Orlando, Evania, Melissa
Melida, Katharine and Josselin. 

With all of the drama going down in PC down here I am so glad to have really exciting events happening in the next few months. First one of my closest friends is coming to visit. Paige and I have known each other, basically since we were in utero. Our dads went to high school together and when my family moved to Virginia, we moved into a house just down the street from Paige and her family. They are like a second family. She is coming for almost two weeks and I am thrilled! Also in May I am taking another trip to the states. I was not expecting to make it back again during my service but a couple of my friends from my time in Little Rock are getting married and I just cannot pass up the opportunity to celebrate with them. I am taking a mini one week vacation, flying in and out of Boston. So family and friends in the greater Boston area, get ready! 

The other day I was at a lunch with some people in my community, including my host dad Orlando. The man whose house we were at was commenting how he wished he could lay down in his hammock, but his dog had ripped a hole in it. Orlando pipes up that he can fix it, no problem. This is when Orlando whips out his sweet hammock making skills that I never knew he had. On the walk back to our houses, we start talking about how he could put this skill to good use and make a little money. So I am going to go into Metapan on Friday and talk to the owner of a tienda I know of and see if he would be willing to sell Orlando's hammocks. Also I am hoping to sell a few while I am in the states. Let me know if you are interested! It is supporting a family that supports me everyday.

Happy Leap Day!

Ground Control To Major Tom

It has been almost a month since I posted. Lo siento a todos.  Per usual I have written out a series of stories, thoughts and updates for your entertainment

First of all let me give you all an update on the status of the Peace Corps in El Salvador. A couple of weeks ago we had a security conference. Members of the PC Washington staff came down and all of the volunteers and in country staff gathered to listen to what they had to say. Several issues were brought up regarding our safety. Basically El Salvador has one of the highest homicide rates in the world. Also something like one in seven volunteers has been a victim of a violent crime. Most of these crimes happen when we are out of our communities, on public transportation or in the capital. Right now we are in the middle of a two week safety and security assessment. Part of the assessment team came up to my corner of El Salvador to get a general sense of how the volunteers up here feel safety wise. I am very lucky to be living in one of the safest areas of the country. One option PCES is considering is clustering the volunteers around the safest areas of the country. Hopefully if that is implemented I will not have to re-locate. I can hardly imagine starting over in a new site this far into my service. Speaking of that, I am officially half way through my time in El Salvador! How crazy is that? In less than 13 months, I will be headed back to the states. 

When I came back to El Salvador from my winter vacation, I brought back my Dad's computer. My computer bit the dust shortly before arriving home and I have been so grateful that he was willing to give up his so that I might have some sanity. The other day I was browsing through his iTunes and started listing to my Dad's vast David Bowie collection. Now I cannot stop listening, Bowie is great. I keep being reminded of this time in high school that my Dad and I went to this little grungy movie theater somewhere in DC and saw a documentary called Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars. I remember David Bowie blowing my mind then as well. I also remember thinking my Dad was pretty cool, which was a big feat for a time in my life when most kids tend to think their parents are lame.

My Girls

So in this time of uncertainty down here, when volunteers are being forced to change sites, projects are put on hold and I am listening to too much Bowie, some of my closest friends have decided to leave early. I won't name names just yet, as the wounds are still too fresh. Volunteers come into the Peace Corps knowing that once we are put in our communities, there is a chance that we will have little to no interaction with other volunteers. Sites are rural and volunteers are placed all over these countries so it is not surprising. El Salvador has a unique program since the country is so small. El Salvador being about the size of Massachusetts, averaging 130 volunteers and having easy access to the capital make it really easy for us to stay close. It also helps that we have a great phone plan so we can call each other for free. I had a really fantastic training group, and really bonded with several girls. Two of them were placed in communities close to me. We met every week to grab breakfast, grocery shop and vent about crazy experiences. One of them is already back in the states and the other will be back within two weeks. It feels surreal. So even though I am staying in my community, I can already feel that this next year will be quite different than I initially expected. (God having no expectations is hard.)

More to come soon!

Life Is Calling... A New Path

Life Is Calling is a series of reader submissions. It is an attempt to allow people to tell their personal stories and experiences about life as a recent college graduate conquering the real world. If you would like to submit a story to this series, shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment with your e-mail. Today’s post is by Ali, she is working as an au-pair and English teacher in Paris.  

Life Is Calling...

One of my best post college experiences was being rejected from law school. For years I thought I wanted to be a big, confident, smart ass lawyer like Alex Cabot on Law & Order SVU. After a summer interning with lawyers, I quickly changed my mind and I couldn’t be more happy things worked they way they did. 

After shocking my parents and most of my friends, I somehow figured out how to move across the Atlantic to France. I've never been one to solidly believe in "things happen for a reason" but while I saw coming to Paris as an opportunity to escape "the real world" after graduating college, I didn't realize how much my future would be affected. After only a couple months in France, I decided I wanted to stay longer and applied for temporary jobs in Paris to extend my stay another year. Now, after 14 months in France, I want to stay long term. Immediately, a question comes to mind, “why?”  

Paris is home now. My parents moved from the house I grew up in outside Philadelphia last April to San Francisco and after graduating from UMass, my college family has spread in various directions around the world. While I love and miss them all, I needed a new place to call home and took comfort in Paris.  

I spent two weeks in San Francisco this past summer. It was my first trip to northern California and first time visiting my parents’ new house. But that’s exactly what it was - my parents’ house. All of my old things were in the house. I have my own room, as does my brother, but it’s not home. I don’t know many people in SF and I got lost more times than not. I fit in with the American culture too much. One of the best parts of living in a different country is standing out. While it was amazing to see my parents after many months, I was very excited to get back on the plane and head to Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport. One thing I have learned about myself is that I like being different. I have become more comfortable as the foreigner than the native.

My first week back from SF, I started my job as a teaching assistant at a French high school. I introduced myself and the kids asked me questions about myself. The hardest question my students put forth to me was, "do you prefer France or the United States?" My response is still the same. The US is home. It is somewhere familiar where I will always be welcome and never an outsider. It's where my family is and where I grew up. But for the time being, I prefer France. I learn something new every day.

Although, it's not all fun and games living in the luxury land of Paris. It's an adventure with struggle, hardships, and sometimes glamour. It takes courage and will to get through each day. However, it's the daily struggles which make life interesting. Some days are easier than others. I am not French and I will never be French and I'm constantly faced with trying to break negative stereotypes of Americans. But that's what makes it exciting. While I'm not always aware of the fact, I am representing the United States every day. I am not an ambassador or foreign service agent but I am an American and when people talk to me, they take what I say and it reflects on the United States. In some ways, I think it holds higher value. I do not have a political agenda to be in France. I choose to live here to learn, explore, grow, and enjoy life.

One Ring To Rule Them All, Or Something

Peace Corps El Salvador is undergoing some serious changes. The big bosses in Washington have decided that for the amount of security incidences involving volunteers that have been occurring in the Northern Triangle countries (El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala), we need a safety and security revamp. Among the changes we know about in El Salvador so far are a ban from the capital, travel restriction (temporary for now, but possibly permanent?) and possible ban from public transportation all together. These are big changes for us as a large part of our service is based on travel. Also PC Wash is sending the two groups ahead of me home early. They are trying to get the number of volunteers down to a more manageable number for the types of changes they want to put in place. Peace Corps has also decided to offer an interrupted service option for those who wish to take it. Basically if we feel unsafe or the changes being made are too drastic, PC is giving us an out.

As of now, I have decided to stay. I have big plans for my second year in my community and I just got voted president of the Gender and Development committee. School starts back up next week. There is only one teacher for all six grades that attend the school in my community. Not many kids go to the school, maybe 15 in the morning and 15 in the afternoon, but still, that is a lot of material for one teacher. So I have plans to start helping out more over there. Also my community is still trying to figure out a potable water project. That battle is ongoing.  Hopefully something can be done. 

One of cramps this is putting on my life is my very limited access to Dr Pepper just got even more limited. (And, clearly, this is the most important thing to take away from this post.) On a lucky trip to the capital, I will be able to find Dr Pepper. But now I have had that chance snatched out of my hands. I kind of feel like Gollum in Lord of the Rings. You know, when he realizes that he lost The Ring to Bilbo. He freaks out. Now I probably would not kill for Dr Pepper, but I totally relate to Gollum right now. One soda to rule them all.

Many of my friends are leaving with the interrupted service option and many are leaving as a part of PC El Salvador's downsizing efforts. My second year is pretty much guaranteed to be a 180 from my first year of service. It is yet to be determined what life will look like when the dust settles from these new rules and evaluations. But for now I am here, putting one foot in front of the other.