Below are the 2 most recent journal entries recorded in sippablo's LiveJournal:

Saturday, July 23rd, 2005
10:44 am	te digo en la mañana Dearest friends- A warm greeting from a relaxed but tired dude in a little country I am growing to love. Thinking over how to begin to describe the last 3 weeks… I opted for the snopshot method and description of little scenes of learning and joy… hur it goes… Last Tuesday about 9:30am On a bus headed to the little town of Jucuarán, an hour south and west of the OIKOS office. One of the many excursions that my work here invites. (refresher on the work... it was a while ago when I explained it... So I work with OIKOS- an office of studs that offer classes and support on agricultural production, environmental risk management, soil conservation and political engagement. They work very closely with "La Intercomunal", a roundtable of 12 leaders of different community organizations located in 9 municipios around the office. My assignment is to visit each one of these communities, sit down with the leader(s), talk about their work, needs, difficulties... scribble it all down and write up the diagnostico in the office...) So I´m on this bus creeping up a mountain with a goofy smile on my face because the Pacific is over my shoulder. Now if you had told me that I would be on this bus to find some house across from a church that I´m nooooooot quite sure of the location of… in a town I´ve been too once to interview this woman I´ve met twice, I would have shot you one of those patent Paul looks of scepticism/ sarcasm. But there I was, a little later sitting down with half of the Comité Norte de Jucuarán (an organization I soon found had 14 (!) members I needed to interview) Now my spanish was definitely tested and my management of the history of the region and the Salvadoran legal system is shaky at best... so this encounter was one of my weaker patience moments. But these 7 awesome people supplied the patience and 4 hours later I was on a bus back down the mountain with the necessary info and a quiet wish for more time to grow to know the communities we breezed though with broken conversation. Three wednesdays ago. 8am or so. Sitting on the side of the Pan American Highway with my homestay father, cousin Norma and little one Issac. I wrote in the last email that these two were to take off in a couple of hours for the states without the necessary papers... well- while I was in the capital, the coyote showed up at the house and said that it was best to wait a week. So- Norma and Issac enjoyed a few more days in San Rafael before the big morning. 5:00am came and hostfather Atilio woke me up before the roosters did. Mother and son were leaving to the meeting point with the coyote... and did I want to say goodbye. The fam had already said their goodbye`s and mine were the last hugs. Her eyes were red from crying and his face was as innocent and goofy as ever. They asked me if I wanted to come along. I didn´t think very hard and hopped in the back of the truck. We climbed over a volcano, found the highway and sat on a bench waiting for the coyote... a lanky white kid, a 55 year old campesino, 4 year old latent can of mischeif and his 25 year old mother who looked to tense to cry. We sat in silence for a bit staring intently at nothing until a clean black Sequoia with tinted windows rolled up and pulled over. As the two piled in the car, I got a strong handshake and a racial quip from a savvy business man and driver on the first leg of our friends´ uncertainly filled journey. When we got back home, the fam thanked me for going... for being there, then. I really didn´t know what to say. I felt like I should be thanking them. What an incredible presumption/ honor it was to share those moments... all the moments these past 2 months, but especially those preparing for their trek... At that moment, I felt so thankful for Norma Arely and Noé Issac, quick friends who were willing to share time with me. Last Thursday, Norma´s husband called the house to say that he called the coyote and found out that they were in Puebla, but that was all they knew. So friends- if you believe in prayers of petition and/or guardian angels- please send some to the border. A couple nights a week Usually between 5 and 9pm Over at the extended family`s house… about 20m from ours, holding the just about one month old Salvadoran… Jefferson Ernesto, beautiful son of Maria, my homestay cousin. After dinner… when I see mother and little one chillin the hammock, I`ll waaander over to the house to say hello and look excited and surprised when she asks me if I want to hold Jefferson… when that was my secret hope from the beginning. He is a healthy little dude (he spent his 7th through 15th days in the hospital with pneumonia) who is finally growing into his skin. He makes the most hilarious faces, can totally pull off the Zoolander “blue steel”, falls asleep in the funniest positions and often forgets that Paul cannot breast feed. His father/ Maria`s husband just immigrated to Virginia to support the little one… it must be real real difficult on the little family, but the word is that he does not really dig the 70 hour weeks and the pace of the USA and will be return when the big guy turns three… that is their hope… Every Sunday about 5:00pm Always invited to the humble home of Don José Santos Flores, 70-year old leader at the local parish, retired teacher of high school teachers, commander of an intensely welcoming presence and “be-er” of peace. I met him the third Saturday in the community at a retreat organized by the local parish… was introduced and knew quickly that we would be friends. He met me with a huge smile, warm hug, listening ears and a willingness to talk to me that conquered a certain timidity I carry when first meeting people. And when he invited me over to his house the next day (a Sunday) to watch a Spanish mass given by a fellow gringo in the east of the country… I instantly accepted. (The mass is actually broadcasted from a community called AGAPE. Yes. The often often referred to Greek word describing Christian love. I really wish I had time to go and feel around.) Anyway… these visits have become routine and Sunday after mass, I walk home with Dan Santos, we talk/ he answers my barrage of questions about teaching, Romero, family etc. I`ll leave you with a brief retelling of a story he told me after I asked if he was ever frustrated as a teacher… He said never. Never could he be pulled down by frustration and though he always had to be honest about his own knowledge and ability to share it with his students… he told me that he always saw his deficiencies as an invitation to learn. His story was this (warning- this may loose a little bit because it will not be in grandfatherly spanish and will be summarized. ok here it is.) There once was a hacienca owner, renowned for his wisdom and justice. A worker was making the long trek from the fields one night and noticed clouds and lightening in the distance. Upon arriving at the house, the worker approached the wise owner and asked if it was going to rain in the night… because if it was he needed to make certain preparations. The owner`s answer: Te digo en la mañana. I`ll tell you in the morning. Now when he first told me… I have to say that I was not really affected or impressed. Maybe I missed something in the language gap… but I didn`t think so. But I kept thinking about it in the days and weeks that followed. Here, I was/am sporadically bogged down by things I do not know or understand… the history here, how it affected/ continues to affect people, the material privilege I have been handed as a member of the first world, why I am sometimes uncomfortable with my host family, how to run meeting with the Comité Norte, my place in the office and in the community as my 2+ months is a sneeze in the present moment of this region… I was often frustrated but my mind kept returning to that story and the owner`s response. And the meaning for me grew… With his quick response, the owner honestly confesses his limits, does not mislead his friend/ student and promising a response in the morning, assumes a huge responsibility to search out and ask questions of what he does not know. Words very much needed by a kid who really digs learning but often lacks patience in the search. There are a ton of questions my mind flips through daily… y al amanecer… te digo en la mañana. Friends. There is tons more to say… but I must catch a bus back out west. I am really diggin the time here… but at the same time am eager to see and talk with you and my mind turns to late August probably more than it should. Take care and keep asking the questions. Yours, Pablo (Comment on this)
Friday, July 1st, 2005
11:53 am	a little tardy So I arrived on May 31 and today is the first of July. I suppose I have started this journal business a little late... and I`ve been staring at this computer screen for almost half an hour thinking how to explain a month of learning, discomfort, questions. I am already on week five of this business and though I feel I have been here forever... it all seems very new. Ah. Where to start. East of the capital, I work in El Transito and live in San Rafael Oriente... two little towns linked by a little road that I cruise every morning to work on the most lovely buses, loaded with decoration and character. My hostfamily (ooo- it sounds like i am some sort of parasite) lives about a 15 min walk north and west of the small town center, well off of the paved roads and where a patchwork of farms streching west begin. The fam is pretty big... mis papas (Atilio and Marta) are about fifty, quietly-friendly, wise in unique ways and ridiculously accomodating. At first I was quite startled by their preferential treatment and my self-righteousness independence startled... I expected to slide right into the fam and not BE served by anyone. I am quickly learning that listening to tough tough memories, walking with Atilio to take the cows to the field, visiting someone I met in church and gratiously recieving that preferential treatment is the giving of a gift as well. Besides, to ask my hostfamily and friends to not be incredibly hospitable would be to ask them not to be Salvadoran. My momentary "I`m 17 and definately do not need a governess" just didn`t translate. And to think that this preferential treatment was even a small sacrifice for them was ignorance... both had to drop out of school at first grade and starve through years working on cotton and coffee haciendas to provide for their families and buy a little plot of land... they raised 4 awesome kids through 12 years of a civil war that was particularly rough in thier region. For me, thier humble strength is unfathomable. I digress, back to the fam. Mis padres have 4 kids... Blanca Lidia lives in our house with son Herson (we get along famously), Rosa Angelica lives close by with hubby and Katherine, an adorable four year old who bursts into tears everytime she sees me. And 2 sons, Julio and Atilio live in the United States. (another digression... the government`s cut of agricultural support following the war has made farming an impossible profession. Subsidized food floods the Salvadoran market and with the price of fertilizer and pesticide needed to sustain the crops, farmers barely break even... and to break even, they have to pay hired help 3 bucks for a day of work. Since this work is only available for half of the year and families cannot eat on that little... individuals are forced north to the states so their families do not starve... approx. half of El Salvador`s GDP comes from money sent from the USA. This exodus from rural areas breaks up families and bleeds the community of youth... but alternatives are hard to come by.) So- THere are 5 in my house (a 6mx6m pad built by an international aid organization 2 years after a nasty nasty earthquake destroyed there adobe house in 2001) The extended fam lives in 2 identical houses right next door... Abuela Rosa, Tia Carmen, her viejo Ernesto and hijo Beto, Prima Norma and hijo Noé Issac, Prima Maria and newborn Jefferson. We usually congregate around our house and private time is a little scarce... they are present to eachother, talking and sharing from 5am to about 10pm. Such a healthy lifestyle, but again, startling for an American kid. We have 4 cows, 7 hens, 5 chicks, 2 impaired roosters (that whole cock-a-doodle-do thing when the sun comes up deal is a nasty nasty myth... they start around 3am), 3 dogs and one rather ill-tempered pig who grandma swears at when cleaning its pin. Tough circumstances have faced the fam lately... 3 days ago, little Jefferson was admited to the hospital for pneumonia and a skin infection... we visited him and he seems to be doing better. But the public hospital (the only one for about an hour in any direction) was pitifully inadequate... the gov doesnt see that as a priority. But the patients and family I saw and chatted with teach endurance and emotional strength with thier patient presence. And Norma and 4 year old Issac decided to immigrate illegally to find hubby/dad in NY. This entails a 15 day trek through Guatemala and Mexico and substantial amount of walking through desert. Thinking about what lies ahead of them makes my stomach skrunch. They left this morning. oog. what else. My work placement has really worked out nicely. I work with OIKOS Solidaridad, a team of about eight dudes trained in agricultural cultivation, environmental risk management, environmental preservation, political engagement and community organizing. They work in 9 municipios all around El Transito (El Salvador is broken up into around 200) giving training to the local campesinos on a variety of topics. They also worked to construct a large web of organized communities (92 in all)... and have chosen the 9 strongest to form a `directiva` or exec board of sorts. My work is to interview each one of those community leaders about thier work and organisations, their histories... and other bits of info that will help the intercomunal run smoother. (To give an example of the type of work of one of these organisations... the most impresive ADESCOZAJO is currently pressing thier municipal rep to follow through on campaign promises of aid to the agricultural industry, sustaining a link with a German NGO that pays the teachers` salaries at a lcal school, educating the community about risks from natural disasters, building new bathrooms in the school, setting up a community bakery, lobbying for another health promotor in the region...simple, constructive things that build a livable community) Though initially intimidated by the assignment, I have settled in and am finding what I can share... namely, as a product of a competition-based school system, a comparitively beastly prodestant work ethic and nuerotic attention for detail. Questions are definately arising in the ol mente about the healthiness of such a training, but it seems to be tempered by the Latino pace here... y vamos muy bien... The zone spans the volcano and surrounding hills south to the beach, an area in contention for basically the entire war from 1980-1992. My boss, Alex, worked as a reporter in the region during the war... bringing pictures, video and stories of the reality the poor were living to the US and Europe. His work allowed him to emotionally support the communities and is like a big brother, sharing laughs, energy and social capital with a strong, tired people. If this comparision isn`t cheap... his interactions with the people reminds me a ton of the protagonist of the Motorcycle Diaries... His drive and sacrifice are almost intimidating, and though he has a very weathered view of the reality here... he makes a hope for change his business. As we cruise to his classes on political participation, meetings with community leaders, the weekly radio show on environmental conservation... he educates me about heart-breaking realities... the possession of the poor`s lands, clouds of mosquito repelent blown directly in houses w/ no questions asked, the sad reality of immigration, an ex-president`s greed, participation in the drug trade and the selling of the nation`s utilities to US corporations. One day at lunch we were reading the paper, and in a special father`s day edition appeared the ex-leader of the government`s death squads during the war. He was presented as a model father for having just chosen adopt... another example of the current government/press gilding the national reality. Alex looked up from the paper. "Estamos bien Pablo." ("We`re doing well?" ... I didn`t catch his sarchasm at first.) Seeing my confused glance, he corrected himself... "Estamos bien fregados..." in this case `bien` changes meaning to "very" and the additional word translating as "in major trouble"... and he may have or may not have used a stronger adjective depending if my mother is reading this or not. So our refrain has become "Estamos BIEN"... bien pronounced strongly with a scrunched-up forehead smile/grimace that knows what this little country is up against... and is always followed by a knowing laugh of a veteran of the `long defeat` and a kid who is only beginning to learn. Friends. There is so much to say. People pop up every day that I feel the need to sit and talk to for hours... and know that I miss talking to you all hard core. But now I must take off to find some supper. Take care dudes*, and know that I think of you often. Yours, Pablito ps- this email has not been proofread for spelling errors. Apologies to my current and former educators on this email list. *"dudes" has been used as a nuetral noun, embracing both male and female recipients. (1 Comment |Comment on this)