This Week

I'd like to continue the new tradition of sharing t-shirt phrases I see here in English. An eleven-year old was wearing a "I don't like being the bitch, but somebody has got to do it."

On Tuesday afternoon I headed over to Erica's for a farewell hang out. She tore her ACL and has to go to DC for surgery and can't come back until she can walk around normally in her site. For emergency medical leave, volunteers are given 45 days to recover, so hopefully I'll see her then. She's the closest volunteer to me and helps keep me sane so I'll be sad to see her go for a bit. Anyway, I was at her house and the rain started pouring down. I waited and waited and didn't stop so I decided to stay for the night. At around seven, after dinner, her twenty-year-old neighbor came over and asked if we wanted to go to the feria, the festivals in Santa Rosa (It was the last night of the fair and the last night of vacation for the school kids). All my clothes were soaked from the rain, but I was lent pants from Erica's neighbor and we decided to head over.

We got a ride from a kid who was definitely not old enough to drive, but you see twelve-year-olds driving around in this country, so it wasn't anything unusual. We start driving down the main highway and get stuck in bumper to bumper traffic; everyone from the surrounding areas are heading in for one last party filled night. Being the cool kid, our driver decided to take a detour into the bush of El Salvador. We were definitely not driving on any road and it was extremely dark and isolated out there. All I could think was "great, this is where they bring people to be murdered," or at least, "this is where they dump the bodies." I kind of joked around about it for awhile until our car got stuck in a ditch in the mud. Perfect. After about twenty minutes of pushing and frustration we continued on and made it to Santa Rosa. Thank god.

The feria was fun. We ate, shopped, saw a parade, rode a few nauseating rides (I mean, I liked Tilt a Whirl as a kid, but I'm too old for that now...this country is really aging me), played a few games (I won tupperware) and went to a baile, dancing with a group of teenagers while using the tupperware as a prop.

The rest of the week was pretty uneventfully spent at the school. A lot of kids didn't show up this week because of vacation earlier on in the week. I guess they just decided Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday just weren't too important.
Friday went well. I finally got all the teachers together for another meeting. The outcomes: I'm starting to teach "Como planear mi vida" a cirriculum used in Latin America to teach kids about the importance of communication, self-esteem, education, work, sexuality etc (5th, 6th, and 7th grades); I'm beginning an interactive HIV/AIDS course for the 8th and 9th grades; and I'm starting a trash treatment program for the younger grades (composting and recycling). Hopefully all of this will go well and I can get some good projects happening...finally.

Anyway, I'm too broke to buy internet this month; I'm trying to live on a $300 budget. I'll try to keep the blog up when I go into the pueblo this month. Also, I get free internet the 7th through the 9th because we have a mandatory training in Ataco, aka free hotel, if anyone wants to skype.