Hello everyone,
Reporting from the Department of Morazan! I have my site, it is a great little canton nestled in the mountains of Morazan. The town has less than 1000 people and has three separate smaller villages that make up the whole. These smaller villages are very far away, almost an hour walk up the mountain to get from end to end in my community. I moved into a brick home with a dirt floor. I have a small electric hotplate to cook some of my meals, a bed, two desks, a hammock, and some plastic chairs for visitors. One of my desks is full of Spanish material right now - I study every night for about two hours as I need to increase my comprehension of this language before school starts in January.
As an Environmental Ed volunteer the agency I will be working with the most is the local school. I'll be teaching English and Environmental Ed classes, starting in January. Which means until than, my job is to get to know the community and plan with the teachers once they come back in early January. I've gotten to know a number of community members so far. I eat lunch and dinner at Nina Marta's home, who is a really sweet woman. We watch Barcelona and Real Madrid soccer games (people here like Spanish league more than the team in their backyard, Vista Hermosa) and telenovelas. Telenovelas are soap operas, but with even more drama than those in the US, good for Spanish I guess. I also joined the community soccer team, we have a game tomorrow up by the border which will be pretty sweet, nice and cool playing in the afternoon.
The Christmas tradition in my town is very cool. About 18 different soccer teams from all around the area come to play in a tournament. The tournament lasts all day as there is only one field to play on. After, there is a baile and tons of food to eat. I'm excited to play and join in the Navidad celebrations. There is also no Black Friday here, which was a relief to me - but people are into the commercial Christmas here as well. I saw two other volunteers for Thanksgiving the other day which was good. Dia de los Pavos, as they call it here, has no significance to Salvadorans, so it was nice to celebrate with friends. And I just saw the Lions lost again, keeping that tradition alive as well!
Zach
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
My Site
Hey all,
I got my site! I am heading to the department of Morazan, in the northeast portion of El Salvador. I received a site report from the previous volunteer, Evan, on the day we found out. I will be working with two schools, one K-5 and one K-9. The community I'll be living in has less than 1,000 people and around 200 families. So, very small. I will also be working alongside the local ADESCO (Associacion DEsarrollo COmunal - in English, Community Development Association). They are trying to improve their potable water - when it is the dry season in El Salvador there are a lot of problems with water. Rivers dry up, rain doesn't fall for months, and people generally have to put a lot more effort to get clean water. Twisting the faucet head doesn't work here. The volunteer also wrote that there is ambition to start an agricultural cooperative in the community. I'm very excited for this, as it has so many benefits for a community.
We are going to the US embassy for our swearing-in ceremony this weekend. We have a training day with our counterparts, a teacher from the school I'll be working at will be with me. After this we have the formal ceremony, I still have to buy a tie for this, ugh. The Peace Corps group from one year ago is hosting a party after a hotel swimming pool, should be a good last hurrah for us. The next time I post a blog I'll be in Morazan, hope all is well back home.
Zach
I got my site! I am heading to the department of Morazan, in the northeast portion of El Salvador. I received a site report from the previous volunteer, Evan, on the day we found out. I will be working with two schools, one K-5 and one K-9. The community I'll be living in has less than 1,000 people and around 200 families. So, very small. I will also be working alongside the local ADESCO (Associacion DEsarrollo COmunal - in English, Community Development Association). They are trying to improve their potable water - when it is the dry season in El Salvador there are a lot of problems with water. Rivers dry up, rain doesn't fall for months, and people generally have to put a lot more effort to get clean water. Twisting the faucet head doesn't work here. The volunteer also wrote that there is ambition to start an agricultural cooperative in the community. I'm very excited for this, as it has so many benefits for a community.
We are going to the US embassy for our swearing-in ceremony this weekend. We have a training day with our counterparts, a teacher from the school I'll be working at will be with me. After this we have the formal ceremony, I still have to buy a tie for this, ugh. The Peace Corps group from one year ago is hosting a party after a hotel swimming pool, should be a good last hurrah for us. The next time I post a blog I'll be in Morazan, hope all is well back home.
Zach
Monday, November 3, 2008
2 Weeks To Site
I have two weeks left in Concepcion de Canas, El Salvador. It has been pretty great. My family has been awesome and has shown me everything in this area. The other day we went to a waterpark, Peace Corps didn´t tell us about this, even though it was only a five minute pickup ride from the training center! The waterpark was natural too which was great. Trees all over the place, a waterfall and instead of chlorine, they had fish in the pools that ate all the gross stuff (I think they had some means of cleaning other than that too). It was great! I also went to my first baile (dance) at another trainee´s house. Here is a typical dance in El Salvador, it starts at 9, all the guys drink a lot, all the girls don´t touch alcohol, and they play reggaeton all night. We had a good time observing and trying to blend in as much as possible (never going to happen at dances here).
The next day we went to a couple cemeteries for ¨Dia de los Disfuntos.¨It is an awesome tradition. Everyone goes to the cemetary with flowers for their relatives that have died to celebrate their lives. And I mean EVERYONE. At the cemetary in San Sebastian, there were vendors with water, coca-cola, mangos, french fries, etc. walking through the graveyard! People sit on tombs, repaint their old tombs and gravestones, and generally just have a good time. The best part about it is that everyone brings gorgeous flowers to put on the graves so the whole cemetary is bright. It stays bright for awhile too because they´re mostly fake as dengue fever is a big problem here. It is illegal to have vases of water because mosquitos breed in them and spread dengue, the bone-break fever.
A group of us went to Lago Coatepeque the other weekend for our vacation, and it was gorgeous. It is an extinct volcano that has filled up with water and is the only clean surface water in El Salvador, because all of the wealthy people own the land. The only ¨public access¨is from the three hotels, one of which we stayed at. It was a good break. Spanish is going well but I still feel under-prepared to go to site. For the first two months we are supposed to get to know the community and we have some objectives, but not really. We are going to meet everyone, play some soccer, visit with the schools and try and plan some activities, and try to find a project before our second training session in January. I hope to plant some seeds of environmental ed in my community during this period and come back with some technical knowledge to start the real work. We shall see. When I get my site I will post again, I hope all is well in the states.
We are all taking over a hotel tomorrow for the election, all 22 Peace Corps Trainees. We´ll be watching stateside and are all excited for ----- to win! I hope to call some of you tomorrow!
PEACE
The next day we went to a couple cemeteries for ¨Dia de los Disfuntos.¨It is an awesome tradition. Everyone goes to the cemetary with flowers for their relatives that have died to celebrate their lives. And I mean EVERYONE. At the cemetary in San Sebastian, there were vendors with water, coca-cola, mangos, french fries, etc. walking through the graveyard! People sit on tombs, repaint their old tombs and gravestones, and generally just have a good time. The best part about it is that everyone brings gorgeous flowers to put on the graves so the whole cemetary is bright. It stays bright for awhile too because they´re mostly fake as dengue fever is a big problem here. It is illegal to have vases of water because mosquitos breed in them and spread dengue, the bone-break fever.
A group of us went to Lago Coatepeque the other weekend for our vacation, and it was gorgeous. It is an extinct volcano that has filled up with water and is the only clean surface water in El Salvador, because all of the wealthy people own the land. The only ¨public access¨is from the three hotels, one of which we stayed at. It was a good break. Spanish is going well but I still feel under-prepared to go to site. For the first two months we are supposed to get to know the community and we have some objectives, but not really. We are going to meet everyone, play some soccer, visit with the schools and try and plan some activities, and try to find a project before our second training session in January. I hope to plant some seeds of environmental ed in my community during this period and come back with some technical knowledge to start the real work. We shall see. When I get my site I will post again, I hope all is well in the states.
We are all taking over a hotel tomorrow for the election, all 22 Peace Corps Trainees. We´ll be watching stateside and are all excited for ----- to win! I hope to call some of you tomorrow!
PEACE
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