March 17th 2011

Today I was sworn in as a volunteer and my 2 year commitment begins today!!! We said goodbye to our host families and will meet our counterparts tomorrow in San Salvador and then go to our new sites!! Scary!!! My site is in the department of Morazan and is hot and dusty. I will be living in a cantone (village) of about 100 houses and be surrounded by 4 different casarios (neighborhoods/groups of houses) which I will be working with. I am close to a pueblo (town) and have good cell phone and bus services. I will be living with a host family but will have my own room separate from their house. My host family has a little tienda (store) so there will be a lot of people around a lot of the time, but I will have great access to some really great snacks. My address will change so Ill keep people update on my new address.

Need to know spanish in El Salvador:
saldo-what you call the money you put on your rechargeable cell phone
chucho- dog in caliche (slang)
puchika!- an exclamation for anything good or bad
guacal- the plastic dish they scoop water out of the pila with
pila- cement thing they store water in
charla- a lecture
cesta- a plastic basket that every salvadoranean woman owns

if you want to see some pictures go to my friends blog at jumpintoaction.blogspot.com she lived in the same training community as me

THREE MORE WEEKS!

This past weekend was our free weekend and most of our training group went to a beach called Tunco. It is a popular place to surf and there were a lot of Australians, Canadians, and Americans there. We stayed in this really nice hostel that had a pool. The beach has black sand because of the volcanoes and the water is really warm! We played volleyball and spent a lot of time on the beach or in the pool, where I became very sunburnt.

            When we were not on the beach or in the pool we were eating all the foods we don’t get here in El Salvador. We found this great café that we later learned is owned by an American and serves a lot of foods you can’t find here. Our first meal was peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on wheat bread, and some other girls got grilled cheese. We also enjoyed iced coffee (the ice cubes were made of coffee) and milkshakes (which was less like a milkshake and more like milk but was wonderful just the same) and finally bagels and cream cheese.

            To and from the beach we hired a microbus to drive us, and both ways (four hour round trip) we listened to the same one CD. I am pretty sure it is a best of the 80s CD which was pretty great! Also the speakers were in the back and in order for the people in the front to hear the music (at the level people here can only enjoy music) people in the back were blasted with music. I however luckily had earplugs and was able to keep my hearing. Also, I am almost positive the bus that takes us to San Vicente has the same CD because every time we take the bus we also jam out to Lady in Red and Hotel California.

            Only three weeks left! I have recently received a bit of information on my future site! It will be in the east and will be very hot and dusty (not so great) but I apparently have great counterparts (health clinic and a mayor) which will help a lot! The cantone is pretty large with about 200-300 houses and is outside a pretty large town. My host family owns a tienda and I will be living in a house/room that is on their property which will be perfect.

            March and April are the hottest months of the year and it is soooo hot! Not great but after that will begin the wet season, which I am very excited for.  I am so excited to be here and some days I just can’t believe I really am! Thank you everyone for your support and you letters, you will never understand how much they mean to me!

You know you are in El Salvador when:

·        You are in the mayors office waiting to talk to him and a random dog walks through the office

·        You ask someone for directions, they tell you then continue to  ask you how to say random names in English (most of them being the same in both languages)

·        The guy on the bus asking for money lifts up his shirt to show you his stomach connected to a blood bag by a tube. (I wanted to vomit!)

·        You get your picture taken blatantly by strangers with camera phones.

·        TV cable receiver is connected to a large bamboo stick

·        In Spanish class you are distracted by chickens and roosters squawking and running under your feet.

·        The bus you are riding on has a huge crack across the middle that has been patched with some metal plates (super sketchy)

·        You can buy lunch with $0.50 (pupusas are $0.25 each)

·        The men put 5x the amount of gel in their hair than women.

·        When the chickens take over your latrine.

·        When your soup consists of large vegetables. (like corn on the cob and banana with the peal on it)

·        All the women carry everything on their heads.

·        Your not allowed to take a shower after exercising because its “bad for your blood”

·        Women breast feed their children on the bus, letting it all show.

·        You can eat coconuts, mangos, papayas, watermelon and pan dulce whenever you feel like it.

·        You get to eat pupusas and choco bananas (a frozen banana on a stick dipped in chocolate and covered with nuts!)

·        You are on the beach and a random horse is just walking the beach by itself, making its way around all the people and its normal.

·        Dead people and people being pulled out of accidents are displayed on TV and in the news paper.