Relatives

After over 9 months in the country and 7 in my site I am feeling decently adjusted and a part of my community...maybe a little much so.

April is the "hottest" month of the year, though I have to disagree and say that March was the hottest around here. Reason why? May is the start of the rains, but the rains don't follow months and they have already started to fall here. Last week we had four days straight of rain and this week we had two huge thunder and lightning storms with a calm rain day in between. It's raining here, to say the least. I love the rain, so I'm thrilled. Plus, it drops significantly in temperature during and after a rain. Here's where my first relative comes in. I am so well adjusted that when the temperature drops below 76 degrees Fahrenheit I get cold and put on a sweatshirt. I'm not kidding. It's pretty pathetic.

Relative number 2. I have started individual reading lessons with specific 4th, 5th, and 6th graders who can still not read, (a troubling fact in and of itself). One of my 5th graders that showed up yesterday doesn't know what any of the following things are: a comma, a period, a sentence, an accent, quotations, parenthesis, or paragraphs. Slowly I'm trying to clue him in to the world of reading. So when I heard him add inflection at the end of a question yesterday (by accident or not), I was thrilled. I don't think I ever thought I would be so thrilled by such a seemingly minor action.

I have a number of reasons to hold meetings and will often associate a time with them...something helpful to have to that everyone shows up around together. I used to be a 10-minutes-early-is-on-time-and-on-time-is-late person (and probably still am at heart), but have changed here. I am lucky if I arrive on time to my own meetings (or others for that matter), and I always seem bummed that I arrived when I did because I am always ahead of everyone else. While I am still a little frustrated by late arrival policy of people here, I know that I will never start a meeting at least until a half an hour after the set time (if I'm lucky). And it doesn't seem to bother me much now.

Last relative for the day. With the modern convenience of cars or buses I remember arriving to places relatively quick in order to make the most of a trip. For El Salvador (the most densely populated country in Central America), I live in a rural area. I am a half an hour walk from the nearest town with a store Due to these distances most people in my site stay at home most of the time, but it is not uncommon to go do other things in nearby communities. Sometimes the soccer team will travel 1.5 hours each way to play a soccer game and then come back. Last week I went to the graduation of the savings group that I'm a part of in my community (they have been organized for a year), in a community "nearby." A pickup truck came to get us – well, he came, we got in, and then had to get out to walk up the hill before we got in again (that’s how steep the walk out of my community is). Then we drove for an hour and fifteen to say a prayer, hear a few people say a few words, take some pictures, and eat tamales with coffee and bread. Before that seemed to me like a whole lot of transportation for such a minor activity, but around here it seems to be decently insignificant...and I'd have to agree. It is about the experience, meeting new people, and celebrating accomplishments, and the standard 2-3 hour round trip experience is just part of it.

In daily news, I am trying to pull off an Earth Day celebration for this Friday. I'm not really confident in how everything has progressed though and it ought to be interesting. I've started weekly story time with the pre-schoolers and, as mentioned, started reading lessons with the 4th, 5th, and 6th graders that still can't read. I just received the great news that my eco-club and I received a Kids-to-Kids grant that will allow us to start the school garden, go on a couple of field trips, as well as a few other things. Plus, on Friday we went to the creek installing a few signs asking people not to throw trash in the area, and did a cleanup campaign along the way. (And we went swimming for a little bit too when we got down to the stream.) Nubia and I had our first youth group meeting last week and had around 20 people show up. The youth group is meant to be a thinking-about-your-future-life-planning group. Monday will be our first day of material. And lastly, Nubia and I have a meeting with a USAID employee to talk about potential funding for a bigger project in my community. I guess I'm kind of busy...it's stressing me out a little bit, but is also a good feeling. It's been a while since I've busy. :-)