Lotta Stuff
Hey everyone, this update has been a long time in coming. There are a few things that have happened about which I’d like to tell you:
The futbol game Friday night a few weeks back. So, people earlier in the week had mentioned that Friday night there was going to be a rather large game of El Salvador versus Costa Rica in our big stadium here. There were a lot of us going, just in different groups. A group of 8 of us ended up going, in two different cabs. I had asked one of the becarios beforehand about what to do, what to expect, where to sit, etc., at the suggestion of one of my friends. He told us to get the more expensive seats, as the cheap seats can have riots, and also to sit higher up, as to not get bags of water, urine, or beer thrown on you. Yes, urine. We get there, and there are a lot of people outside the stadium waiting to get tickets. There aren’t very many signs, and there were many more people than I expected, and tickets were also more than I expected (we ended up sitting in the nicest seats, we found out afterwards, because that’s the section we walked up to first). Anyway, we manage to push our way through, buy our tickets, and then enter the stadium. We got searched rather fully by the police, padded down and everything, and when we get to the section, there weren’t very many open groups of seats (it’s not assigned seating). Since we were sitting in the nicest section (we didn’t really plan on that), most of the people around us were businesspeople or professionals, ie upper middle-class, and many were trying to speak to us in English. The game was a lot of fun. The other sections were crazy, and the crowd kinda died down after Costa Rica scored two quick goals in the first ten minutes. It’s funny, though, as there were riot police on the field and surrounding the top layers of the other sections. Also, they throw stuff on the field like it’s their job, especially bags of water. There’s this phenomenon in Salvador of selling purified water in little plastic sacs. It’s the same water, but they just don’t use bottles (they have bottles, and many people are drinking those nowadays, but the bags are significantly cheaper). Anyway, anytime Costa Rica had a corner kick, the player taking the kick got pegged with tons of the bags of water, so much so that the riot police had to make a circle around his back with their shields. Their goalie also got pegged. Anyway, the second half rolled around, and because things weren’t looking up for Salvador, we left with 10 minutes to play, along with much of the rest of the stadium.
The next day, we had a group hike of the volcano of Izalco, the most famous volcano in El Salvador. We went with all the becarios, as it was an entire group activity with them. Coming in, our CCs had been telling us how difficult it would be, and I didn’t really heed their comments. We drove up this mountain and entered this National Park space, waiting for the guides to start us with some other random families and tourists. It turned out that the hike included first going down the side of this mountain through natural steps of a forest, climbing the volcano, and then going back down and hiking back up the forest mountain. The first leg was easy and fun. Just basically running down the steps with the guide. Then we reached the open space of the volcano. We started to hike over the big boulders of volcanic rock until we got to the main slope. Note, because this is still a relatively active volcano (it erupted the last time about 40 years ago), there is no vegetation on the slopes of the thing, for the most part save a few weeds here and there. Also, the rocks still have not settled. Thus, we were climbing up loose little rocks and even rocks ground down into dust. So, half the problem of climbing was that you could not get footing and for every step you would sink back half a step. Thank God that the sun was not blazing that day. So we reached the top, everyone at his/her own pace, and I walked around the rim a little. The crater is completely covered over, so I walked down in there. You could see all the way out to the coast and the Pacific, which was cool. The visibility actually wasn’t as good as it could’ve been. I talked with one of our guides, who was probably about our age, and he volunteers his time there once about every 8 days. Keeps you healthy, I guess. Also, with us came a police officer fully decked out in his gear. He was more middle-aged, and he beat everyone up to the top. Crazy dude, but cool as well. I can honestly say the best part of the hike was on the way down of the volcano. We were wondering, on the way up, how we were gonna get down, especially because of the very loose rocks. Well, some of us figured out that this was our opportunity to ski in El Salvador. Yeah, we basically just moved our feet back and forth like skis and glided down the slope. Just had to watch out for rock slides from behind and the big rocks in front; but yeah was it great fun. The way back up the forest was torturous for me, but finally I got through it. It made me really angry how out of shape I am right now—probably the worst of my life. Oh well, keep forgin on.
So, the weekend following we all went on a retreat for Saturday and Sunday. It was run by two Jesuits down here, two young guys who live down the street from us, and it was based on Ignatian spirituality (a tiny introduction), with four talks given by them. It was also silent. THAT was interesting, I must say. As a group, we haven't collectively been that silent for that long. It wasn't completely silent, as we had the opportunity to meet with one or both of the Jesuits during our time there, to talk a little bit about what we were experiencing or anything else. I really got a lot out of the retreat, I believe. It was a nice time to get my life in order spiritually and to center myself a little more on the most important things here.
My praxis site has been so much better. We’ve had two days in the past few weeks that have made me feel so much more a part of the community and a part of the larger family of my praxis site supervisors. Yesterday morning was actually very “pesado”—heavy, in more than one context—as we visited the poorest family we’ve seen thus far in Mariona. The owners of the house were the parents of a coop member, Rosa Idalia, who up and emigrated to Sapin about a month ago. It was a shock for many of the community members, as they knew she was planning to leave just not when. So, in the house lived her parents, her two children under the age of five (she has no husband, though), two of her sisters, and about 9 more grandchildren (3 of whom we teach, whose father was killed 2 years ago driving his taxi). The parents basically support all of them with just tortilla making, which isn’t quite a huge cash flow. The house structure itself was rather bleak, and the open grille for making tortillas was located inside. That means that the open wood stove belched out black smoke everywhere besides making everything really hot. The stories of the parents were very sad, and Rosa’s 21-year old sister’s experience was equally-moving. It gave me a feeling of angustia – physical anguish of sorts – and I just wanted to cry for these people. But that’s not what they need or what they want. Probably the first time I really felt so much at Praxis.
Lolo and I are starting on the construction of a website from which he can sell all the products himself from all the cooperatives under his wings. They have photos of the products from last semester, and I’m attaching descriptions and prices and such to try and make his dream a reality.
We’ve been hearing a lot of testimony about gangs and violence and immigration, which is really good information and experience about Salvador. We’re going to hear more people and hopefully visit some sites later on about many issues that affect this country and its people deeply. In the plans: a discussion with a group of young people on the issues they face, visiting with a woman who emigrated to the States and was forced to return, a trip to a maquila (factory here), meeting with recovered gang members, and perhaps some interviews for my final project for our praxis seminar class. All three of us at Mariona are really looking forward to what is coming.
During our community nights every Thursday (for our own house), we have begun life stories. That entais each person taking about 45 minutes to tell us the most important stories, details, facts, trends of their lives. Four people have already gone, including myself. It’s been a very helpful way to understand a person, to really try to begin to comprehend from where they’re coming. Since we have the largest house, of about 12 people, it will take most of our community nights to finish all the stories, but it’s totally worth it.
This past weekend, the whole group took a four-day trip to Belize mainly so we could renew our visas (we had to leave the Central American floor to do that, and our directors, Kevin and Trena, knew of this place in the jungle where we could spend a couple days). Basically, I did one of the coolest things of my life there: there were huge caves from which emanated the river that ran in front of our house. So, the guides took us back, swimming, into these caves with flashlights attached to our heads with bandanas. After swimming through the darkness, climbing over three small waterfalls, we finally got to the back of the cave: and from up high on the wall came out a large waterfall, which was absolutely amazing. I lack the words, really. We didn’t take any cameras, so I can’t show pictures. We could swim under the waterfall and go behind out and look out through the water. At one point, the guides told us all to turn off all the flashlights, so we sat there in the complete darkness for a minute hearing, feeling, and experiencing it without light. What an incredible feeling, and I can only ask that God does not let me forget that image ever. The campsite was very basic, with cabins with beds and thin mattresses. We were really in the jungle. One night we went on a night hike looking for and finding bugs and animals; one morning we hiked up the mountain, through the jungle, to the top of a peak that overlooked the valley and the rest of the jungle (we tried termites too, at the advice of our guide (taste like carrots)); one morning we visited the home of one of our guides, and he and his wife taught us how to make tortillas and chocolate and palm fans (they also answered any questions we had about life there in that remote Mayan village). We swam up the river rapids with rocks to the mouth of the cave, where we could play around on those rocks and a rope swing and small waterfalls. Paradise, frankly.
Our spring break starts this Friday. I’m going to Honduras, to visit Mayan ruins, the jungle to explore, and a beach paradise to relax. Details are still being ironed out, but it’ll be a small group of us. You’ll hear all about it upon my return, for sure.
Thanks for understanding my lapses in posting—it’s ridiculously busy here. I’m just trying to experience and process all that I can in the short time I have. I hope everyone’s enduring the last stages of winter well, as it gets hotter here. Take care, everyone, y que Dios les bendiga!
Paz y amor, todos y todas—
AMDG,
Antonio
The futbol game Friday night a few weeks back. So, people earlier in the week had mentioned that Friday night there was going to be a rather large game of El Salvador versus Costa Rica in our big stadium here. There were a lot of us going, just in different groups. A group of 8 of us ended up going, in two different cabs. I had asked one of the becarios beforehand about what to do, what to expect, where to sit, etc., at the suggestion of one of my friends. He told us to get the more expensive seats, as the cheap seats can have riots, and also to sit higher up, as to not get bags of water, urine, or beer thrown on you. Yes, urine. We get there, and there are a lot of people outside the stadium waiting to get tickets. There aren’t very many signs, and there were many more people than I expected, and tickets were also more than I expected (we ended up sitting in the nicest seats, we found out afterwards, because that’s the section we walked up to first). Anyway, we manage to push our way through, buy our tickets, and then enter the stadium. We got searched rather fully by the police, padded down and everything, and when we get to the section, there weren’t very many open groups of seats (it’s not assigned seating). Since we were sitting in the nicest section (we didn’t really plan on that), most of the people around us were businesspeople or professionals, ie upper middle-class, and many were trying to speak to us in English. The game was a lot of fun. The other sections were crazy, and the crowd kinda died down after Costa Rica scored two quick goals in the first ten minutes. It’s funny, though, as there were riot police on the field and surrounding the top layers of the other sections. Also, they throw stuff on the field like it’s their job, especially bags of water. There’s this phenomenon in Salvador of selling purified water in little plastic sacs. It’s the same water, but they just don’t use bottles (they have bottles, and many people are drinking those nowadays, but the bags are significantly cheaper). Anyway, anytime Costa Rica had a corner kick, the player taking the kick got pegged with tons of the bags of water, so much so that the riot police had to make a circle around his back with their shields. Their goalie also got pegged. Anyway, the second half rolled around, and because things weren’t looking up for Salvador, we left with 10 minutes to play, along with much of the rest of the stadium.
The next day, we had a group hike of the volcano of Izalco, the most famous volcano in El Salvador. We went with all the becarios, as it was an entire group activity with them. Coming in, our CCs had been telling us how difficult it would be, and I didn’t really heed their comments. We drove up this mountain and entered this National Park space, waiting for the guides to start us with some other random families and tourists. It turned out that the hike included first going down the side of this mountain through natural steps of a forest, climbing the volcano, and then going back down and hiking back up the forest mountain. The first leg was easy and fun. Just basically running down the steps with the guide. Then we reached the open space of the volcano. We started to hike over the big boulders of volcanic rock until we got to the main slope. Note, because this is still a relatively active volcano (it erupted the last time about 40 years ago), there is no vegetation on the slopes of the thing, for the most part save a few weeds here and there. Also, the rocks still have not settled. Thus, we were climbing up loose little rocks and even rocks ground down into dust. So, half the problem of climbing was that you could not get footing and for every step you would sink back half a step. Thank God that the sun was not blazing that day. So we reached the top, everyone at his/her own pace, and I walked around the rim a little. The crater is completely covered over, so I walked down in there. You could see all the way out to the coast and the Pacific, which was cool. The visibility actually wasn’t as good as it could’ve been. I talked with one of our guides, who was probably about our age, and he volunteers his time there once about every 8 days. Keeps you healthy, I guess. Also, with us came a police officer fully decked out in his gear. He was more middle-aged, and he beat everyone up to the top. Crazy dude, but cool as well. I can honestly say the best part of the hike was on the way down of the volcano. We were wondering, on the way up, how we were gonna get down, especially because of the very loose rocks. Well, some of us figured out that this was our opportunity to ski in El Salvador. Yeah, we basically just moved our feet back and forth like skis and glided down the slope. Just had to watch out for rock slides from behind and the big rocks in front; but yeah was it great fun. The way back up the forest was torturous for me, but finally I got through it. It made me really angry how out of shape I am right now—probably the worst of my life. Oh well, keep forgin on.
So, the weekend following we all went on a retreat for Saturday and Sunday. It was run by two Jesuits down here, two young guys who live down the street from us, and it was based on Ignatian spirituality (a tiny introduction), with four talks given by them. It was also silent. THAT was interesting, I must say. As a group, we haven't collectively been that silent for that long. It wasn't completely silent, as we had the opportunity to meet with one or both of the Jesuits during our time there, to talk a little bit about what we were experiencing or anything else. I really got a lot out of the retreat, I believe. It was a nice time to get my life in order spiritually and to center myself a little more on the most important things here.
My praxis site has been so much better. We’ve had two days in the past few weeks that have made me feel so much more a part of the community and a part of the larger family of my praxis site supervisors. Yesterday morning was actually very “pesado”—heavy, in more than one context—as we visited the poorest family we’ve seen thus far in Mariona. The owners of the house were the parents of a coop member, Rosa Idalia, who up and emigrated to Sapin about a month ago. It was a shock for many of the community members, as they knew she was planning to leave just not when. So, in the house lived her parents, her two children under the age of five (she has no husband, though), two of her sisters, and about 9 more grandchildren (3 of whom we teach, whose father was killed 2 years ago driving his taxi). The parents basically support all of them with just tortilla making, which isn’t quite a huge cash flow. The house structure itself was rather bleak, and the open grille for making tortillas was located inside. That means that the open wood stove belched out black smoke everywhere besides making everything really hot. The stories of the parents were very sad, and Rosa’s 21-year old sister’s experience was equally-moving. It gave me a feeling of angustia – physical anguish of sorts – and I just wanted to cry for these people. But that’s not what they need or what they want. Probably the first time I really felt so much at Praxis.
Lolo and I are starting on the construction of a website from which he can sell all the products himself from all the cooperatives under his wings. They have photos of the products from last semester, and I’m attaching descriptions and prices and such to try and make his dream a reality.
We’ve been hearing a lot of testimony about gangs and violence and immigration, which is really good information and experience about Salvador. We’re going to hear more people and hopefully visit some sites later on about many issues that affect this country and its people deeply. In the plans: a discussion with a group of young people on the issues they face, visiting with a woman who emigrated to the States and was forced to return, a trip to a maquila (factory here), meeting with recovered gang members, and perhaps some interviews for my final project for our praxis seminar class. All three of us at Mariona are really looking forward to what is coming.
During our community nights every Thursday (for our own house), we have begun life stories. That entais each person taking about 45 minutes to tell us the most important stories, details, facts, trends of their lives. Four people have already gone, including myself. It’s been a very helpful way to understand a person, to really try to begin to comprehend from where they’re coming. Since we have the largest house, of about 12 people, it will take most of our community nights to finish all the stories, but it’s totally worth it.
This past weekend, the whole group took a four-day trip to Belize mainly so we could renew our visas (we had to leave the Central American floor to do that, and our directors, Kevin and Trena, knew of this place in the jungle where we could spend a couple days). Basically, I did one of the coolest things of my life there: there were huge caves from which emanated the river that ran in front of our house. So, the guides took us back, swimming, into these caves with flashlights attached to our heads with bandanas. After swimming through the darkness, climbing over three small waterfalls, we finally got to the back of the cave: and from up high on the wall came out a large waterfall, which was absolutely amazing. I lack the words, really. We didn’t take any cameras, so I can’t show pictures. We could swim under the waterfall and go behind out and look out through the water. At one point, the guides told us all to turn off all the flashlights, so we sat there in the complete darkness for a minute hearing, feeling, and experiencing it without light. What an incredible feeling, and I can only ask that God does not let me forget that image ever. The campsite was very basic, with cabins with beds and thin mattresses. We were really in the jungle. One night we went on a night hike looking for and finding bugs and animals; one morning we hiked up the mountain, through the jungle, to the top of a peak that overlooked the valley and the rest of the jungle (we tried termites too, at the advice of our guide (taste like carrots)); one morning we visited the home of one of our guides, and he and his wife taught us how to make tortillas and chocolate and palm fans (they also answered any questions we had about life there in that remote Mayan village). We swam up the river rapids with rocks to the mouth of the cave, where we could play around on those rocks and a rope swing and small waterfalls. Paradise, frankly.
Our spring break starts this Friday. I’m going to Honduras, to visit Mayan ruins, the jungle to explore, and a beach paradise to relax. Details are still being ironed out, but it’ll be a small group of us. You’ll hear all about it upon my return, for sure.
Thanks for understanding my lapses in posting—it’s ridiculously busy here. I’m just trying to experience and process all that I can in the short time I have. I hope everyone’s enduring the last stages of winter well, as it gets hotter here. Take care, everyone, y que Dios les bendiga!
Paz y amor, todos y todas—
AMDG,
Antonio
posted by Anthony Damelio at 6:30 PM
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