The Start of Year 2

February just started and there’s barely a week left. It truly is the shortest month.

Time really flies. They say your second Peace Corps year goes faster than your first, but that is hard for me to imagine. I can’t believe I’ve been here 1 year already.

We rented a beach house to celebrate completing 1 year in this beautiful yet peculiar little country. Can you imagine, $25 for 2 nights, a fully equipped house with hammocks, a pool, a maid, air conditioned rooms with beds, situated on a private beach? Needless to say, it was a lovely time and delightful vacation.

I headed back to the countryside after spoiling myself for too many days at Playa Barra de Santiago, knowing I had a busy week ahead of me.

You see, every month, somewhere in this country, some pueblo is celebrating a Patron Saint’s Day. This means, lots of dances, festivals, community events, etc. Returning from the beach, I was ready for my community’s first time celebrating in my site. I helped plan most of the events so I was excited to see how it would turn out.

Most everything went well. We had a day we celebrated for children: creepy clowns, men dancing on stilts (not too exciting) and a parade (not fun on dusty, rocky road). We had competitions for the men: who can ride a horse and try to grab a greased duck’s head and pull it off (kid you not- see facebook photos), who could climb a greased pole to find money on top, and who could win a soccer tournament (no greasing). We had a dance at night where the girls had a beauty contest. I was proud to have a representative from my Artesania Youth group and my Girls Soccer team. And I planned and hosted a girls soccer tournament with my team, of which we got 4th place (out of 5) but we had a fun time. We also got the mayor to donate money for prizes and tropheys from another institution.

I finished the fiestas with a smile on my face, and decided to make an overnight trip to visit my old host family in San Vicente. It was great to see them again. I can’t believe it was a year ago that I lived with them during training!

Returning back to my site this week I found some lovely packages of soccer equipment from friends back home and dog supplies from my Daddy at the post office :D. I entered my community with successful news that the organization I contact will be donating me wheelchairs for some people in need in my community. I have been working on filling out the forms and checking in on my other community projects.

I decided tonight I needed some chill time so I went to visit some friends.
I decided to stop by my neighbor’s house. A nice little 74 year old lady lives across the street from me. She lives alone and she invited me in for coffee. We spent over an hour talking over coffee. I learned about her hard past, her war-time experience of being held captive, the children who abandoned her and the husband she lost. She told me stories of people in the community, pasts I had never known about. She told me how she gets sad to live alone and how people have robbed many of her precious belongings. Yet she said she was happy. She said there are good people here in El Salvador. She said people will help you. She said she couldn’t live how you live in the US, with so much stress, in so much of a hurry.

She ended our conversation by telling me about a program she saw on the TV about people in Africa. She told me about how poor they were. How some didn’t have clothes and how they would eat just whatever. She asked me if that was true.

She has very little. Yet she does not complain. In fact, she feels for those who have even less than her.

I’m glad I had coffee with her and I’ll be sure to visit her often.

This weekend I head to San Salvador to participate in the “Yo Amo El Salvador” Half-Marathon. I have barely trained and I have seen better days of running. But I believe you can do what you put your mind to. And when I’m in a good state of mind, things come easy. People like my neighbor are my motivation...