Moving forward...

Katie

2011-01-15T20:52:00.000-06:00

My current entertainment...

2008-07-03T02:36:00.001-05:00

Best video ever...

Just some random thoughts

2008-03-29T09:54:00.000-05:00

My random thoughts at the moment:

It snowed this week in Illinois. SNOWED. We're practically in April! San Diego, San Diego, oh how I love San Diego!

A quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson that I took from http://famous-quotes-quotations.com/quote.html that I'm really digging at the moment:

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

An excerpt from a recent online chat with a friend:

Today's office quote reminds me of you in front of a computer except Michael is talking about Basket Ball:

When I'm playing hoops, all the stress and responsibility of my position melt away. In the zone. It's zen. It's physical...Who am I? I don't know. A basketball machine. What is Dundler-Mifflin? Never heard of it. Filling? Paperwork? Who cares?

That's Michelle in front of an excel spreadsheet. I love the "basketball machine" part. The "database machine".

Five Months Back...

2008-02-04T00:18:00.000-06:00

You know it's the perfect time of year right now in El Salvador? It's 70 to 80 degrees each day, sunny, and pretty much no humidity or rain. In Illinois it's about 20 below zero every day with ice, snow, and slush. I'm missing El Salvador and my friends there! But I'm also loving living here at home again, in a place where I feel safe.

I miss these girls so much!!

After five months of being done with Peace Corps, I'm still shocked about some things, mainly the way we interact with immigrants here in the US. How is it that I could go to another country where I couldn't speak the language, didn't understand the customs, etc., but have such a welcome from the people there? People ALWAYS had so much patience in listening to me attempt to get across an idea and help me whenever I needed it. People always invited me into their homes to eat with them and spend time with them. When I see people from outside the US in the community, I always feel like they're shunned or something. No one has any patience to even attempt to figure out what they need/how we can help them. Don't get me wrong; people living here should absolutely learn English just as we should learn the language(s) of other countries we visit. But there is always a learning curve in new things like languages and we don't care to interact with people who haven't achieved absolute 100% success in learning the language. Why is that? How can we ignore the same people who had so much patience with me and who helped me whenever I needed it (which was a lot, trust me)! It's irritating to me and I'm not even sure how to even begin to address and/or change it. I suppose this is exactly what the third goal of Peace Corps aims to achieve: to spread what we've learned during our service with other Americans.

Anyway, enough ranting about that. After traveling around like crazy at the end of last year and early this year (the Bahamas this January were awesome), I decided to start working here to save some cash before moving anywhere. Two weeks ago, I started working at a manufacturing company in Rockford and LOVE it! The people and environment are both amazing. Everyone is very driven and friendly and there is a ton of natural light coming into the workspaces. I have no doubt that this company will end up on the list of best companies to work for in the near future. In addition to having wonderful people and work areas, they do fun things! Example? At Thanksgiving, they decided to attempt to break the world record for the fastest cooking of a turkey. They moved one of the super huge ovens/burners (we're talking like the size of a truck) out on the lawn, invited a whole lot of customers, brought in a boatload of food, and all stood on the lawn while throwing a huge fireball into this oven to roast the turkey. How could you NOT fall in love with a company like that??

So where do I stand currently in the "big" issues? ("Big" being identified as the things people ALWAYS ask immediately upon meeting.) Job? I have one. It's going amazingly well. I get to design databases and be a total nerd on the computer so I'm as happy as can be. Home? Living at home with the parents is actually working out better than I would have guessed. After 12 years of living alone, I figured it would be quite a change. But it's surprisingly working out quite nicely. Friends? This one could be going better. Friends from school, Peace Corps, and work are living in Washington, Ohio, DC, Florida, California, Virginia, Texas, and Chicago just to name a few places. Of course Chicago isn't that far away, but it's far enough where I can't just go out with them at night and then come back home so planning and figuring out who I will stay with always has to be figured out. And since we're living in one of those common incredibly small communities in Illinois, I'm surrounded by families, not single people my age. I'm finding that it's quite difficult to meet people to do things with and I'm missing that. I missed it while I was in El Salvador, but I figured it would come back once I was back in the US. I suppose it won't come back until I'm living in a big city again so that's definitely still in my future.

Well, that's about it with me at the moment! We'll see how these next few months go...

Traveling and Job Searching

2007-12-06T03:17:00.000-06:00

Ok, it's definitely been awhile since I've posted anything! Traveling and starting the job search has taken the majority of my time, and now that I'm not in El Salvador, it just seems like people aren't as interested in what's going on!

November was a month FULL of travel! Dad and I went to Singapore November 3 and then flew to China November 6. We returned home on the 13th and then I got onto another plane on the 14th to start my west coast tour - LA, San Diego, and Phoenix. Basically, I was scoping out where I want to focus my job search and San Diego won hands down.

LA was fun; I was able to stay with fellow Peace Corps volunteer Jen and her new husband Noe and we were able to meet up with some other returned volunteers from our group one night for dinner. I liked areas of LA, but the smog and traffic were horrendous! The sun and heat were amazingly soothing, though!!

The other half of the 1998 John T. Mount Leadership award, Aaron, hosted me during my San Diego stay and we had a blast! We watched Ohio State win against arch-rival Michigan and then visited Tijuana - both of our first visits to Mexico - on the first day. I walked around San Diego like crazy. It's a big place, but feels like a small town. It's right on the beach, but you can easily get away from that if you want. It's really a great city and I'm excited about the prospect of moving there!

I spent Thanksgiving in Phoenix with my grandma, aunt, uncle, and cousins. It was definitely a week of eating incredibly delicious food and spending time with family! Also, grandma and I were able to get up to beautiful Sedona to explore a bit!

Singapore and China were also amazingly fun. Things that stuck out to me in Singapore:
The cars drive on the opposite sides of the road, like in England
The escalators run A LOT faster and are flatter at the top and bottom to give people time and room to get off safely (I liked this much better)
It's VERY clean and has a great subway system much like DC's
The national language is English but it can definitely be spoken in a unique manner

And in China:
Beijing is a great city to walk around and explore
The traffic and smog can be worse than LA
The Great Wall is WAAAY wider and steeper than I ever envisioned it to be
The fake goods market is hoppin' for about anything and everything you can think of
The Forbidden City is HUGE

Those are just some thoughts at the moment... There are stories, of course. Those are for another day...

My Last Week

2007-08-29T07:51:00.000-05:00

* Photos to be posted soon

My Last Week
My dad came to visit and help me during my last week in El Salvador which was awesome. It was especially entertaining when we walked into my house after he arrived. I've never been sure what causes this, but always after I've been gone for a couple of days, 10 minutes after walking back into the house, this smell begins to permeate the kitchen and/or bedroom. Personally, I think there is some random animal living behind one of the walls and it starts thinking it owns the place and gets all mad when I come back. But I've never seen it, just smelled it. So, of course that happened when my dad and I walked in. Also, my dad saw a mouse run across the kitchen floor so he had to set out my "awesome" Christmas presents (the "reusable mousetraps"). Anyway, while he was inside going on about the mouse, I was outside in the bathroom. I just happened to look up for a moment and saw the largest spider ever. Don't get me wrong; I've seen this spider before. But never from below like I did that day! It spanned a space larger than my hand and it's body was suspended 3" from the wall because its legs were so long! I just said, "Woah" quickly followed by, "Dad! You have to see this!" He came out and didn't see it at first, but when he did, he responded with, "WHAT....is THAT??! Oh my FREAKING God....how long are we staying in this little shindig?" I was DYING laughing. So I figured it was a good time to point out a couple of other things, like my lizard friends that were chilling in my bathing bucket and the bats that did warm up laps each evening outside my door. Also, I informed him not to be alarmed if he heard someone walking on the roof at night and/or saw the roof cave in from footsteps because it wasn't a person; it was an animal that I had never seen, but a friend had freaked out over after seeing. Something about it looking like the giant opossum that the guy in the Princess Bride fought. Anyway, after all of this discussion, dad just stared at me with a look of disbelief. Then he said, "How many days are we staying here? Are you sure you don't want to go back to a hotel?" "Ah...está bien." And everything was ok until he found a cockroach in the bed the second night (he freaked) and the mouse was caught in one of the traps (I freaked). But good stories I guess.

Apart from all the house visitor fun, we did have a great last week. There were quite a few going away parties that we attended, including the last one that was thrown by the kids who worked on writing the plan for the technology project last year. They bought food, we played cards, I gave them photos from their graduations, and they went around a circle and one by one thanked me for coming to San Isidro and changing their lives. It was unbelievably touching and something I won't forget anytime soon.

And....thanks to all of you....the technology project is finished! The Friday before I left we picked up 56 computers from the Ministry of Education (it took FIVE pickups to transport them). The electricity in the elementary/middle school was installed by Saturday (the high school already had electricity in the computer lab). We got the donation of cable and switches from the Ministry of Education so we met the goal for the community-wide technology center. The check is on the way and Mary Susan, the volunteer living in the community next to mine, will be overseeing the reconstruction of that building with the funds you all donated. So, I just want to say THANK YOU to all of you for your support in this project. It has totally transformed education for the current and future students in San Isidro.

Back in the US of A
I'm really enjoying being back in the US. In DC, I did feel that everyone was moving extremely fast and prices were pretty high. And when we went out to dinner the first night, I was overwhelmed by the number of food and drink choices with all of the talking (there were about 12 of us), but I got over it. It hasn't seemed too hard to readjust (thus far). And I've loved having the opportunity to catch up with a lot of lost friends during the past week (and I'm happy people are still willing to let me stay on their couches at night). Currently, I'm in Columbus and will be driving with baby bro back to Illinois on Friday.

Well, that's about it for me! In the coming months, I'll be hanging out with friends and family, doing some traveling, and getting the surgery redone. I probably won't be sending out updates anymore since my life is now pretty much like all of yours...but I will update the blog when something interesting happens, like maybe during our Yosemite and/or China trips.

Thanks to all of you for your support and friendship! It was sure a roller coaster ride during these two years that definitely ended up at the end!

Peace out!

* Photos to be posted soon

37 days...

2007-07-15T18:59:00.001-05:00

Coming Home
Hello again from El Salvador! My final day here is August 20th and it looks like I'll be flying out August 21st for Washington DC to hang out with some friends for a short time and then will head on back to Illinois. And lucky me, I'll be back just in time for my 10 year high school reunion (after attending 3 different high schools, I'm bound to be back in time for at least one of them) so I'll be able to update former classmates with what I recently wrote for another reunion (that I missed): "I'm not married. I don't have any kids. I don't have a job. I'm penniless. And I was excited that my last house had electricity AND water (at night)." That should garner some attention.

Project Status
The project is coming along nicely. Again, thank you to everyone that has donated! (And you still can donate here.) We have over $6,000 now and I've been working with the Ministry of Education here to get an additional donation of materials that would make up another $1,000 or so. Also, the school director told me he thinks he can round up some volunteers to help out with the work, cutting the labor costs, so I think we're actually pretty darn close to finishing the fundraising! FINALMENTE (feeeeeee-nuuuuuul-ment-ay) is all I have to say about that - I HATE asking people for money! The real fun is going to begin just as I leave, and the new volunteer that is living about 5 minutes away will probably get to enjoy it all and tell us all about it. :) At least I know my time here made a difference (thanks to your support)! Oh yeah, and the Lima News (Lima, OH) wrote up a nice article about our project down here! You can read it here.

Short Story
There is not a lot to write about this week since I've just been in cold air-conditioned doctors' offices in the capital the entire week getting everything checked out before I go home. So, in case you missed this short conversation I posted to my blog last week, here it is again:

What made me MELT last week:

I had just dropped off a Peace Corps trainee to spend a few nights with a family in a neighboring community (you all remember my immersion day experiences from training) and was walking back to my house. A little girl, probably about eight years old, yelled, "Buenas, señorita Michelle!" And I said, "Buenas!" And the following conversation ensued:

Little girl: "Are you coming to school tomorrow?"

Me: "I don't think I can tomorrow."

Little Girl: "But we want to have a party!"

Me: "And you can have a party if I go?"

Little Girl: "Yes!"

Me: "And why is that?"

Little Girl: "Because we're celebrating teacher day and we need to celebrate you!"

Me: "Ohhhh...that's so sweet!" (giving her a hug)

Little Girl: (with her face lighting up) "So you'll come?"

Me: "Oh...I want to...but I have a meeting in the capital with some people from the Ministry of Education really early in the morning! I'm sorry!"

Little Girl: (looking down and all sad) "Ok....I guess we'll just save your present until Monday."

Oh my goodness!!! SUPER SWEET! The only time I'm with the little kids is during their weekly computer classes this year. And she still wanted me to go! Seriously, I was ready to melt!

Just for Fun
Ok, and this part is just for fun. My group created a facebook account and the site is incredibly addictive. One of the things I recently found on it is a Personality DNA test (basically just a fun personality test). You can take it at www.PersonalDNA.com. My result? I am a "benevolent leader". Anyway, I normally don't include things like this in emails, but it's interesting and an example of what I've been doing this last week between medical appointments! :)

See ya soon! Really!

28% to go!

2007-07-08T20:49:00.000-05:00

We're almost there - we have $6,120 (72%)! You can help us with our project by donating now or matching a gift from your employee(s)! Or read "The Complete Plan" (in PDF format) to get more info!

Sending a check via mail:
Include project #519-082, M Gullett, Community Technology Center in the memo field and mail to:

Peace Corps
OPSI Partnership Program
1111 20th Street NW, 8th Floor
Washington, DC 20526
------------------------------------------------------------
What made me MELT last week:

I had just dropped off a Peace Corps trainee to spend a few nights with a family in a neighboring community (you all remember my immersion day experiences from training) and was walking back to my house. A little girl, probably about eight years old, yelled, "Buenas, señorita Michelle!" And I said, "Buenas!" And the following conversation ensued:

Little girl: "Are you coming to school tomorrow?"

Me: "I don't think I can tomorrow."

Little Girl: "But we want to have a party!"

Me: "And you can have a party if I go?"

Little Girl: "Yes!"

Me: "And why is that?"

Little Girl: "Because we're celebrating teacher day and we need to celebrate you!"

Me: "Ohhhh...that's so sweet!" (giving her a hug)

Little Girl: (with her face lighting up) "So you'll come?"

Me: "Oh...I want to...but I have a meeting in the capital with some people from the Ministry of Education really early in the morning! I'm sorry!"

Little Girl: (looking down and all sad) "Ok....I guess we'll just save your present until Monday."

Oh my goodness!!! SUPER SWEET! The only time I'm with the little kids is during their weekly computer classes this year. And she still wanted me to go! Seriously, I was ready to melt!

Oh, and read today's (Sunday's) Lima News article about our project!

A couple fun stories...

2007-06-15T16:40:00.000-05:00

Onto lighter topics. As you´ve probably noticed, I don´t have a lot of funny stories anymore (at least I feel that way), but I´ve been laughing a lot during the last week! Two events that make me smile:

The Form Pick-Up:
There is now a new volunteer living like 5 minutes away from me in the next town, Mary Susan. We decided that we were going to Sonsonate together to do some grocery shopping and other errands. She came to my site to observe a computer class for teachers and then we were off. On our way out, I asked the school secretary if there was anything she needed from Sonsonate and she told me she needed a form. Ok, no problem. We wrote down all the relevant information (form name, building location, etc.) and we´re off.

After stopping in Izalco for some lunch and completing a few short visits with people in the mayor´s office, we ended up arriving in Sonsonate at 4 PM. We decided to pick up the form first because the building was located right next to the bus terminal. The bus driver was nice enough to walk us to the building and just as we arrived, the cleaning lady opened the door to sweep out the dirt from inside. As I attempted to walk in, she stopped me and informed me that they closed at 3.30. I was like, "Oh, I´m sorry. I didn´t know that. I don´t need to talk to anyone though; I just need this form." And she said, "Well, you can come back tomorrow morning at 7:30 AM. We´re closed." And I said, "I don´t think you understand. I only need a form. I don´t need anything else." She said, "Oh, ok, well I have to get permission from our boss." I said ok and she shut the door and walked away. Now, this door is a glass door. I can see all of them and they can see all of me. All of the workers were still at their desks working, or at least it appeared that´s what they were doing. I watched the cleaning lady walk into a back room, stay there for about 5 minutes, then come back out and continue cleaning, ignoring me! She basically LIED to me to get me to away!! I couldn´t believe it! I mean, seriously, maybe that works with Salvadorans, but it doesn´t work with Americans! Or at least not this one!! Who thinks you can lie to someone to get them to go away!! Unbelievable.

At this point, Mary Susan, the other volunteer with me, said, "I don´t think they´re coming back and it´s pretty late...we should get going." I was like, "I´m not leaving!! She lied to me!!" And she said, "Well, we´re not in the US; we´re in El Salvador! There´s not really anything you can do about it." I said, "What do you mean? They have to leave sometime and they have to come through this door. I don´t care if I have to wait all night and sleep here! They´re talking to me!" She was pretty irritated at this point and informed me she could wait 5 more minutes but then we would have to go. So I started staring at the people inside. I mean, I was standing directly in front of this glass door just staring. As you can imagine, the workers inside became somewhat uncomfortable. They started talking amongst themselves, clearly saying things like, "What´s wrong with this gringa? Why isn´t she going away? It´s obvious we´re closed and are not going to help her." And of course by this point, the cleaning lady was milling about going about her business also obviously ignoring me.

Five minutes passed with the staring with no results and Mary Susan, unable to convince me to leave with her, left to run the errands we had planned, while I continued the starting. I watched 2 of the women close up their computers and pack up. They still were pretty uncomfortable with the idea of approaching me, so they asked the security guard to escort them out. So, the security guard from across the room struts over with his huge gun, unlocks the door, and lets them out. Of course, they run by without making any eye contact whatsoever and I immediately take advantage of the door being open and step in.

The security guard informs me that they´re closed. I say, "I know. I´m sorry. I don´t need to do anything here; I just need to pick up this form and I can leave." And he said, "Right, but we´re closed." And I said, "I don´t understand what the problem is. I don´t think it´s difficult to hand me a form. Is there not an organized system here?" He said, "Ok, I have to talk to my boss." I said, "Ok" but didn´t move. He said, "I have to shut the door if I´m going to leave it." I said, "Yeah, well that´s exactly what she (pointing to the cleaning lady) told me and she never came back. So since people here obviously lie, I´m going to wait right here. I won´t walk in anymore, but I´m not walking out." At this point, he was very uncomfortable and certainly not used to someone, especially a woman, being so direct, so he started to question the cleaning lady who got super irritated she was being called out for lying by someone who was showing up late and didn´t have any reason to complain about anything.

The security guard at this point didn´t know what to say or do so I encouraged him to ask the boss to join us and the three of us could talk about it. So, reluctantly, he asked the supervisor to come over and the supervisor asked me what the problem was. I said, "Hi. I know you closed at 3:30. I´m really sorry I´m arriving late, but all I need is this form. I don´t need to talk to anyone. I don´t need anyone to do anything for me except hand me this form." And he said, "Ok, I´ll give it to you now, but in the future, please try to come before we close." I said, "I really appreciate it. Thank you so much." And he reached to my left, pulled out a sheet of paper, and gave it to me. Can you believe that??? It took like 0.1 seconds to give me that form and I had to create this huge scene to get it!! I mean, 30 minutes of me staring at them, being super direct with them, ect., for them to take 0.1 seconds to give me the form!! He didn´t even have to walk anywhere to get it!! Wouldn´t it have just been easier to give me the paper in the first place?

Anyway, I walked to where Mary Susan was and told the story to her and all she had to say was, ´"I can´t believe you got the paper." I just said, "Oh, I knew I was getting the paper; I just didn´t know how long I was going to have to wait to get it!" And she said, "Do you ever take no? You seem like you´re kind of a determined person." Well, maybe...

Calling MINED

We needed to set up a meeting with the National Technology Director in the Ministry of Education, so one morning I called the general Ministry number since I didn´t have his direct line. The woman answering the phone told me she didn´t know who he was so I told her he worked in technology and before I could correct his name (she thought I said "Rodriguez" instead of "Urias"), she had transferred me. I was thinking, "Great. I´m going to be talking to like 10 people here to get his secretary." So the next person picked up and I said, "Good morning. Could I please speak with Carlos Urias?" And she said, "Michelle!" Dude. I don´t know about you, but when I´m calling the secretary of a national officer and she immediately knows it´s me from asking if I can talk to him, she is either amazing at remembering people and voices or I´ve done my job and made an impression (hopefully a good one). I was so shocked I couldn´t even speak. She informed me the day of the meeting that she "knows my voice". I jokingly said, "Are you sure it´s not my gringa accent?" And she said, "Oh, well that too.". Puchica. 2 years of speaking Spanish and it´s still clear to everyone living here that I´m DEFINITELY from the states.

Alright. Those were pretty lengthy. Good for now. I´m sure I´ll have more... :)

Miss ya all!!

Still taking donations!

2007-06-01T17:15:00.000-05:00

Help us with our project by donating now or matching a gift from your employee(s)! Or read "The Complete Plan" (in PDF format) to get more info!

Sending a check via mail:
Include project #519-082, M Gullett, Community Technology Center in the memo field and mail to:

Peace Corps
OPSI Partnership Program
1111 20th Street NW
8th Floor
Washington, DC 20526
------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you again to everyone who has donated to the project! Thus far, we have received $2,675 and are awaiting $5,823. We're more than 30% of the way there! Remember, the more people that know, the sooner we'll get the dough! (Yeah, I JUST made up that catchy little line.) :)

My friend Ky is hosting a fundraiser tonight in Columbus - thanks Ky! If you have any creative ideas on how to help out, go for them! You'll be making a difference in the lives of 4,100+ students just this year! And think about how many family members and future students you'll be affecting with your donation!

Thanks again to everyone who has helped out! We're nearing the end!

I know you wanna donate...

2007-04-23T18:28:00.000-05:00

Ok, so good news! In one week, all of you awesome people helping my community and me donated $650 to the "Community Technology Center" project meaning that we now need $7,848! Thanks to everyone who donated!

For those of you who didn´t have time or thought, "later"...well, what about now? :) You can do it (I can hear the guy from Waterboy yelling that) here.

Oh, and someone voiced a concern that the Peace Corps site wasn´t secure because it is missing the "lock" image that most secure sites have. (And rightly so; we´re all told to NEVER submit data on a site without that lock to protect ourselves against identity theft!) However, on the page BEFORE entering your credit card information, there is the following notice:
-------------------------------------------------------
Why This is a Secure Transaction:

The secure server software (SSL) that processes Peace Corps donations is the industry standard and among the best software available today for secure commerce transactions. It encrypts all of your personal data including credit card number, name, and address, so that it cannot be read as the information travels over the Internet. You can tell when you are protected by encryption — the lock or key at the bottom of your browser changes color or is no longer broken. To use this option, you must have a browser that supports SSL ( e.g. Microsoft Internet Explorer, AOL, or Netscape Navigator).

Due to the layout of our transaction web pages, a secure connection icon may not be visible in your browser window at certain times. This occurs because outer frame information (pictures, fund and/or project details, etc.) does not require SSL security and would significantly increase the wait time during the checkout procedure. However, as stated above, all pertinent ordering information is encrypted using state-of-the-art SSL technology and is secure from tampering by outside sources.
-------------------------------------------------------
So, back to the raising money part. I know, I know, you´re all dying to know: "What ELSE can I possible do to help out my good friend Michelle?" :) Well, I just happen to have some suggestions!

1) Forward the info to others!
This is pretty self-explanatory...spread the word to others who (A) work in any of the companies listed in #3 and/or (B) may be interested in participating in projects like this. :)

2) Put donation cans around your office/church
My friend Karen emailed me this great suggestion. This way, you can help me out by (A) spreading the word about my work and educating others about El Salvador WHILE drumming up support for this specific project! Thanks for the suggestion, Karen!!

3) Check the recent "matching" list
Check the list below for businesses that HAVE recently supported a Peace Corps project (and this is a RECENT list, meaning that there are probably a lot more that have done it in the past!) If your company is NOT on the list, well, then YOU can be the very important person to add it and if it IS on this list, ask them if they´re willing to support this project too! And if you need to fill out paperwork and don´t have time, scan it and I´ll fill it out so all you have to do is sign it! (I like to make it as easy as possible!) :) There is more info regarding matching gifts here.

A. D. Marble Company matched a gift to support a latrine and sanitation project in Ghana.

American International Group (AIG) matched gifts to support a mentoring program in Ukraine and a youth group in Uganda.

Analog Devices, Inc. matched a gift to support a health clinic in Niger.

AON Foundation matched a gift to promote diversity and multicultural acceptance in Romania.

AXA Foundation matched a gift to support a summer school program in Malawi.

BAM Studio matched a gift to support grain mill construction project in Togo.

Bank of America matched gifts to support women in development camp in Romania, to improve sanitation in Togo, to purchase English textbooks in the Ukraine, and to the Tsunami Relief Fund.

Bear Stearns matched gifts to support the Tsunami Relief Fund.

Black and Decker matched a gift to support a resource center for teachers in Moldova.

BP Foundation matched a gift to improve a kindergarten in Moldova and repair a pre-school and community center in Togo.

Branch Banking & Trust matched a gift to support a primary school renovation in Tanzania.

Countrywide matched a gift to support a project which will provide furniture for a school in Azerbaijan.

Deutsche Bank matched a gift to bring potable water to a community in Ghana.

Financial Security Assurance Inc. matched a gift to build a well in Togo.

GAP Foundation matched a gift to support a gender and development conference in Morocco.

Genentech matched a gift for development projects in Panama.

GlaxoSmith Kline matched a gift to support a computer-training center in Tanzania and a School and Community Center in Togo.

Greif matched a gift to support a school cafeteria project in Moldova.

Harcourt Education matched a gift to support a Foreign Language Teacher Association in Kazakhstan.

Hatch Mott MacDonald matched a gift to build a garden well in Mali.

Houghton Mifflin matched a gift to support Model UN project in Moldova.

IAC Foundation matched a gift to the Tsunami Relief Fund.

JP Morgan Chase matched a gift to develop an internet café in the Ukraine and a gift to build a garden well in Niger.

Land America Foundation matched a gift supporting a basketball court project in Togo.

McMaster-Carr Supply Company matched a gift to improve sanitation in Togo.

Mentor Graphics matched a gift to support a Youth Summer Camp in Burkina Faso.

Microsoft matched gifts to support a Library in Ghana and the HIV/AIDS Prevention and Education Fund and Tsunami Relief Fund.

Motorola Foundation matched a gift to support the HIV/AIDS fund.

National Instruments matched a gift to provide science books for a secondary school in Ghana.

Neiman Marcus matched a gift supporting a health sanitation project in Nicaragua.

News America Inc matched a gift to support Peace Corps Tsunami Relief Fund.

Overbrook Foundation matched a gift to support a health clinic expansion project in Thailand.

Pfizer matched a gift supporting a national gender and youth development conference in Ghana.

Putnam Saving Bank matched a gift to support a health clinic in Niger.

RH Donnelly matched a gift to improve food security and small business enterprise in the Dominican Republic.

Sallie Mae matched a gift supporting a Business Resource Center in the Ukraine.

Tellabs matched a gift to support a Summer School project in Malawi.

UBS Foundation USA matched a gift to support an orphanage library in the Ukraine.

Wachovia Foundation matched a gift to improve sanitation in South Africa and to build a library in Guinea.

Washington Mutual matched a gift to provided a school furniture in Ghana.

Still haven´t donated? You have time...YOU KNOW YOU WANNA DONATE!

So, I added an entry onto the other blog about what I PLANNED to email about last week before I got the awesome news that we could all donate online to the project. Immigration in the United States. Hot topic right now, huh? Well, read my current thoughts in Benefits for Illegal Immigrants?. I would love to hear your thoughts on all of this (after you´ve donated to the project, of course!) which again, you can do HERE. :)

Miss ya!

* "Money" photo taken from cheriewillers.blogspot.com.

* "Illegal Immigrant" photo taken from vivirlatino.com. I couldn´t find the photographer name to give credit.

A MUCH needed update and request from you!

2007-04-17T22:07:00.000-05:00

Oh my goodness. It´s been FOREVER since I wrote! I was talking to a friend this past week and I told him that in the next couple of weeks I was going to start bombarding people with emails, so it was kind of better that I hadn´t written in a while. So, here we are.

56 computers are indeed on their way to our community here. We solicited them through the World Computer Exchange Program and are responsible for paying around $70/computer. The parents passed a resolution to donate $0.25 per student per week (we have 1400 students) to raise the $4053.20 we need to pay for them and they are estimated to arrive in June. SUPER EXCITING, I know! :) As you can imagine, I´ve been working like crazy with parents, teachers, and students to set up a trustworthy system of collecting money so everything runs smoothly and we don´t have gossip about whomever stealing. And yes, I created a database.

When the computers arrive, we´re dividing them as follows: 15 for the high school, 30 for the elementary/middle school, and 11 for the cyber cafe. The last part in my opinion, the cyber cafe, is the most important piece. It´s how we´re sustaining this project. When computers go bad, we need to purchase new software/equipment, etc., we´ll have a source of income to do so. And, the community will have access to information and technology that they´ve never had before. I´m seriously SO excited. Two years of work and I´m finally going to see some tangible results!!

However...and it´s a big however... The building where we are constructing the cyber cafe is currently constucted with adobe (not too secure or computer/electricity friendly), has no electricity, has no floor (just cement), and needs a new roof and ceiling. So, basically, it needs everything. :) The community is raising approximately $10,000 for all of the equipment and reconstruction of the school labs, but we need an additional $8498 to do all of the reconstruction that needs to be done to the future cyber building.

Since I am frequently asked by all of you, "What can I do to help?", I decided to finally cash in on your offers - I´m going to ask you to donate $100. I know, it´s a lot of money, but (1) it´s totally tax deductible (so definitely feel free to donate more), (2) you´re totally opening a new world to around 5,000 people, if not more, and (3) this is 2 years of MY blood sweat and tears to make this thing a reality and I would hate for it to die during the last stretch because I couldn´t drum up enough support!! Now how many times can you say you help out so many people with one donation WHILE making 2 years of your friend´s/family´s work meaningful? I mean, really, you´re donating like $0.02 per person. You know you´re going to feel good all day about it!!

I know, you´re DYING to know, "How can I donate now?" Well, I just happen to have a website for you: https://www.peacecorps.gov/resources/donors/contribute/projdetail.cfm?projdesc=519-082&region=latinamerica. Again, tax deductible. Helping me out. Making a difference in thousands of people´s lives. Seriously. I can´t believe you´re still reading this and haven´t donated yet!! :)

Ok, I guess you´re going to do it another day. Onto more topics. Teaching computer classes.
So, I apparently have not mentioned in any of my updates that I am teaching computer classes. We have 16 computers at the high school at the moment and every Sunday, we have "distancia", basically the equivalent of getting a GED. We have 7th-12th grade classes for people that have not received their diploma/certification in those grades yet. It´s really amazing to see how so many people here only have education through elementry school and it´s a big thing to have a 9th grade diploma, and even bigger to have a high school diploma. Drop out rates from schools usually happen around 3rd grade, 6th grade, and 9th grade. So anyway, I´m teaching to mostly adults that want to improve their level of education.

So I started teaching in January so I´ve had about 12 classes thus far. Last month, the electricity stopped working in the computer lab, so now each week I move a computer into a different classroom with the projector and I demonstrate how to do something. (We´re working with an electrician to get that prob solved ASAP.) Then I ask if I explained it well and if they say yes, then I start calling people to the front of the room, when I inform them that we´re at work and I´m their boss and I ask them to do something for me. It´s working out ok because everyone in the class can see what the person on the computer is doing (or not doing as the case may be) and help out if they get lost. Then I know that they understand what I´m talking about which is always nice since I´m doing all of this in a foreign language.

As you can imagine, this is the first time that many of them have EVER had contact with a computer, so we start with basics. And many people get really nervous when I tell them they have to come to the front of the room to do something. So I get a lot of excuses. Remember, I´ve been with them 12 weeks now. You would think after 12 weeks with me, they would know that excuses don´t work to get out of participating. Last week, I swear, I had the best one. I couldn´t even believe this kid was trying this out on me. When I called him up, this is the conversation that ensued:

Him: I can´t.
Me: Why not?
Him: I´m stuck.
Me: What do you mean you´re "stuck"?
Him: I mean, I can´t move from behind my desk. It´s too close to me. (Note that these desks are 1 person desks that are moveable. I´m talking super light easy to move desks.)
Me: (with incredulous look) OOOhhhhhh. Well, let me just help you out then! (I take 2 steps towards him.)
Him: (look of fear passing over his face, immediately followed by him getting up from his desk and walking to the front of the room and doing what I asked him to do in the beginning)
Me: Look. I have taught a lot of classes in the states. I´ve heard all the excuses. When I ask you to come up here, you´re coming up here!
Students: Laughter.

Seriously. "I´m stuck"?? They should know by now that I make it WAY more difficult if they try to pull crap like that on me! Although, other students LOVE it when someone starts giving me excuses because they all know that that person IS going up there and I AM going to make them do stuff. There are a lot of laughs in my classes. :)

Ok, well it´s really late now so I have to go, but you´ll be hearing from me again VERY soon!!

Lots of hugs!

Unbelievable...

2007-03-30T19:18:00.000-05:00

Yeah, so this is UNBELIEVABLE!! I mean, I NEVER thought this would EVER happen in El Salvador during my time here. I think it´s made my entire year! Are you ready??

I went to Office Depot last week and was walking up to the front of the store when I saw something that stopped me in my tracks and made me make me squeal (very loudly) with happiness. (Many people turned to look at me when I made that noise.) Anyway, they are now selling THIS:

Granted, it´s $0.99 per package, but it´s AVAILABLE!! I bought one immediately! I know, I know, you´re too much in shock to react right now. But I´m sure this wonderful news will make your day!! :)

Ah, and apparently, the test for cancer came back negative, so that´s exciting. And the tech project is moving along quite nicely...more to come on that soon!

My Medical Saga Begins...

2007-03-09T10:29:00.000-06:00

Ok, sorry I haven´t written in a while. So much has happened in the last month and I´ve spent most of it in the capital...

Our Director leaves us
First things first. At the end of February, our awesome Peace Corps El Salvador director, Mike Wise, finally retired. He´s been the director here in El Salvador for 9 years and has been awesome to work with. So, we decided to give him a book of memories from Peace Corps and El Salvador and I volunteered to head up the project. The final book turned out beautifully and I think he really liked it. It has some really nice photos of El Salvador (and most of the scenery shots are from around my site); if you´d like to view it, click here.

The Computer Project
We have a new building. We have a new budget. And soon, I hope, I will have a link where all of you can donate $$ (tax-deductible) to rennovate the building for the cyber. (The community is providing everything for the cyber once the building is ready.) I´ll send more info about that shortly.

My Medical Saga
This is what has been taking the majority of my time here in the last month. It feels like I´ve seen a million doctors down here over the last 2 months! It all started when I got back here after the Dec trip back home. Because I felt like there were a lot of odd things going on with my body, I went to see the nurse to just tell her about them, you know, to get them documented. I figured that there should be a record of them since Peace Corps pays for all medical care relating to stuff that occurs/starts during service. The nurse ordered a lot of tests based on our conversation: urine test, stool test, gynecologist visit, and an ultrasound, which I have to say is SUPER cool.

From all of those tests, we discovered that I had a urinary tract infection, some type of parasite, and had possibly had a tumor growing in my uterus. Nice, huh? So I got to take some pills for the urinary tract infection and got to reschedule another ultrasound to be completed after my period. During this ultrasound, which, by the way, they injected a boatload of saline into my uterus which is NOT super cool, they found that I indeed did have a tumor growing which (A) could have been cancerous and (B) wouldn´t allow me to get pregnant. So, after many calls and emails back and forth between Washington and here to get approvals for surgery, we decided I would have the operation here in El Salvador. Needless to say, I was somewhat nervous about it, but it only ended up taking about 15 minutes to complete and I only had to stay in the hospital for 1 night. However, after the operation, the doctor informed me that since I have not been pregnant before or given birth, my uterus is small and it´s hard to dilate my cervix and she´s "not sure we got all of it". That´s nice to hear. Apparently, I might get to repeat this surgery in the US when I get back. Oh, and the stuff that she did remove was sent to Washington to be tested for cancer, and fijate que, they haven´t finished testing it yet even though they were supposed to be done with it 3 weeks ago. I hope it wasn´t lost in the mail.

So, after the surgery, I was all good and happy for about 3 days. Then, on day 4, I started getting sick and got a fever and SUPER weak. So, I had to do another urine test, stool test, and blood test. During these tests, they found that I still had the parasites (which were probably making me feel like crap) and additionally, had high cholesterol. So I got to take pills for 3 days to kill the parasites (and I´ve gone from NEVER being hungry to ALWAYS being hungry) and go see another doctor to figure out what to do about the cholesterol. He informed me that I shouldn´t eat eggs or foods with oil or fat and I responded with, "You know I live in El Salvador, right? You just told me not to eat Salvadoran food." He laughed and we talked a little more and he gave me a sheet with foods that I should and should not eat. Fabulous. Then, about a week later, I returned to see the gynecologist (this is now 2 weeks after the operation) so she could check me to make sure I was cool after the surgery. All good below, but, fijate que, she felt some weird lumps in my breast so I got to see yet another doctor for a sonogram, which apparently is an ultrasound for your breasts. During this fun experience, I got to see a couple potential cancerous centers scattered throughout my breasts, then go see the gyno again for her to tell me that they´re probably not cancer, but we´ll repeat the test in 6 months to check that they haven´t grown in size. Needless to say, the last month I´ve been in the capital A LOT and experienced a lot of medical stuff. What´s up with that anyway? Nothing happens to me until last August when I get dengue, and now I´m on a first-name basis with half the doctors in the country. Is this what happens when you turn 28? I´m not a fan... :) I said to my counterpart´s wife, "Every time I see a doctor, he/she finds something else wrong with me! I´m only 28! What´s going to happen when I´m 50?! I´m not going to make it!" I guess we´ll see about that...

More to come.

Yeah, I'm still alive...

2007-02-05T15:45:00.000-06:00

I know, I know...it's been FOREVER since I posted something. There has just been a boatload going on here and I haven't had a moment to write for awhile. But I've received some emails from you asking if I'm still alive and all, so I just want to say it's good to know you haven't forgotten about me. :)

So much has happened in the last 2 months (I'm really wondering if I should back-date this so I have at least one entry in January), I don't know where to start. I guess I'll start with Christmas and just give you some short stories about what's been happening.

Christmas 2006
As many of you know, I ended up going back to Illinois around Christmas. It wasn't planned at all, but my step-mom's dad died so I went back to the funeral and ended up staying about 10 days. It was really nice to have some time with the family (including aunts, uncles, cousins, grandma, etc.), and there is one little story that just CRACKED me up. And, of course, it's about baby bro.

So Christmas Eve (or at least the eve when Santa came to our house), baby bro and I were playing cards. Now, he's a bar back in Columbus, so his hours are like wake up at 2 PM, do whatever, go to work at 4 PM, and leave work at 4 AM. Something like that. And I can usually stay up quite late myself, so we ended up playing cards until like 2 AM. As we got ready to go upstairs to bed, he said, "Ok. Let's fix this stocking situation." I said, "Stocking situation? What's the stocking situation?" And he said, "That's not my stocking. I'm getting out the real one."

When baby bro was about 4 or 5, he got a new stocking as a gift one year for Christmas. At the time, the stocking was bigger than he was; it's about 4 feet tall and 2.5 feet wide. (I really wish I could post the photo of him standing inside it when he first got it...too bad we didn't have a digital camera at the time.)

Anyway, so he starts rummaging through boxes looking for his "real" stocking, not the normal-sized one like the rest of us have. And he actually finds it, takes down the normal sized one, and puts up his "real" stocking. It was so heavy that the stocking holder was barely able to keep it up on the mantle. (See photo below.) I was laughing so hard just thinking about my dad's reaction when he saw THAT (which I knew we would unfortunately be sleeping through.)

So we went to bed.

The next morning, we got up around 9ish and walked downstairs, of course forgetting about the whole stocking ordeal. We sat down at the table to have some breakfast, and I walked through the living room to get something. As I passed through, I noticed something different, but I couldn't quite place what it was. I turned towards the fireplace, and saw this:

Oh my goodness. I could NOT stop laughing!! And my dad came out laughing his butt off as well and said, "I was thinking that I was really sad I wasn't going to get to see your faces when you saw that!" And I said, "That's what I said to Jeff last night before we went to bed! That we weren't going to see YOUR face!" Memorable.

There is information about the cyber cafe and photos of the final world map here if you're interested.

Dad Turns 50!

2006-12-10T11:42:00.000-06:00

December 4, 2006. My dad turned 50! 5 decades! And he came to celebrate it with me. For 5 days. So, guess what we did? We celebrated a decade of his life each day. (Some days the theme worked out great, some days, it was pretty lame.) Here's how it worked out:

Day 1: 1956 - 1966
He depended on his parents for everything, so the theme was money. I gave him a colon (the money El Salvador used before switching to the US dollar) and he got to pay for dinner. :)

Day 2: 1966 - 1976
He was going to school, learning about everything, and started his hobbies, like photography, the theme for the day. I told him I wanted to give him a memory book from his visit from last year, but all the photos he sent me were low resolution so I couldn't do it until he got me higher res photos. (This was a lame theme day.) :)

Day 3: 1976 - 1986
He was having kids, graduating from college, working multiple jobs to support the family, etc. So, the theme was getting through the tough times. We hiked a volcano. And when I say hiked a volcano, what I mean is, started on top of a hill above the volcano, walked down, then walked UP the volcano, then surfed down rocks on the other side (because it's made up of loose rocks), then hiked back UP the huge freaking hill. That was an experience...

Day 4: 1986 - 1996
During these years, he was raising the kids, so the theme was family trips. And we went to visit another volunteer, Leah, to plan a 2008 trip to Alaska. (She used to be a tour guide there.)

Day 5: 1996 - 2006
He was adjusting to life with kids living apart and getting back into his hobbies. So, the theme was relaxation. We just chilled that day and he got a massage.

We had a blast while he was here! And ate some darn good food here in El Salvador! Hopefully, he'll remember it for awhile!

To view videos from the week, visit here.

Another reason to love Peace Corps...

2006-12-03T04:19:00.000-06:00

Oh my goodness! I just had to share this AWESOME email that I just received from one of the kids that I've been working with! His name is Omar and like the others, he just finished his senior year of high school and is now working, as you'll see, in San Miguel, a state located in the eastern part of the country. (I live in the western part of the country.)

I asked the students to create in-depth final presentations about the Ciber Cafe that included their calculations for points of equilibrium, how much they thought we should charge customers per hour, the org chart for how the ciber should run, how we should report earnings to the community, etc. It took them about 20-30 hours to finish these (and they did ALL of this work during their vacations...school is out.)

This student, Omar, worked during all of that time, but the day before the actual presentation, he told me he couldn't attend because he had to start working on the other side of the country. But the fact that he emailed me means that he's continuing to use Internet! (They had never used it previously and I was worried that they would stop when they weren't with me.)

I was about ready to start crying when I read this!! (I hope my translation is ok...it's hard to get across meanings sometimes and make it flow the way it should in another language!)
--------------------------------------------------------
Hey, Michelle,

I hope that you liked the presentation that Gilberto and I did and that it was what you wanted. We worked on it really hard.

I really want you to forgive me for not attending the ciber presentation on Monday the 27th. I wanted to be there but it was difficult for me. I knew how important it was for you that all of us attended, but really I couldn't, although, I had all of the intentions of the world to attend.

I wanted, also, to give you my sincere thanks for all that you taught me during this year. I learned a lot from you, for example, not to throw trash in the street and how to look for a place to throw it, not to ruin walls and furniture...those are some examples of what I learned from you not mentioning everything you taught us on the computer. You know a lot about that and I admire you a lot.

The reason I couldn't attend the presentation is because I came here to San Miguel to work and you can find me here now.

I hope that you continue with the ciber project; you've already done a lot to make it happen. You are very intelligent. You can count on me anytime. I will always remember you as a great friend, co-worker, and teacher.

Thank you so much, "thekc you" or something like that.

I hope that you write to me and remember me.
Omar
--------------------------------------------------------
Oh, and you can view a project update here, if you're interested.

A video of where I work...

2006-11-26T18:25:00.000-06:00

This is a video of the school where I'm normally working...

The rockin' youth camps...

2006-11-24T18:22:00.000-06:00

I took this video during the last youth camp that the kids in my community planned and held. I hope you can tell from the video (A) how AWESOME the location is (between 2 volcanoes and a national park) and (B) how FABULOUS the kids and school director are from my community in terms of planning and executing leadership events like this. They usually have camps like this frequently (1-2 per month) and hold them all over the country! I really feel like they are the best in the country, and for that matter, probably in all of Central America. And they're planned by the peeps in MY SITE!! How lucky am I??

I'm planning a youth camp for February with other volunteers (right now there are 35 interested) where volunteers can bring kids from their communities and we can discuss thinking outside the box. It's something that's not taught or talked about in this culture, so it will be really awesome if we can pull it off. Life-changing type stuff for the kids that attend. And, I'm trying to hold it right here in this location. So, we'll see.

Anyway, thought you might be interested to see what types of youth activities are going on down here...I'm super lucky, huh?!

The Christmas 2005 Sugar Cane Testing

2006-11-13T11:01:00.000-06:00

Allie and the Pig

2006-10-24T16:42:00.000-05:00

I thought of another super funny story that was told to me by another volunteer, Allie, about an experience she had here. So I´m going to share (and hopefully tell it as well as she did).
-------------------------------------------

Allie and the Pig

Allie, a Peace Corps volunteer, lives in a quaint little house in a small community somewhere in the middle of northwestern El Salvador. As most Peace Corps volunteers do, she lives as the locals live - eating eggs, beans, and tortillas, speaking another language all day everyday, waking up at 4 AM when the roosters start crowing and the bread man starts his bicycle route, announcing his presence during his route with a cross between a horn and a bell going off every couple of seconds. And she´s learned to live with all the stray animals exploring around throughout the day - cows, horses, pigs, dogs, cats, lizards, frogs, snakes, mice, etc.

Many people don´t know what it´s like to be a Peace Corps volunteer. Allie had finished one year in country and still had one ahead of her. This is exactly the point in time when Peace Corps volunteers tend to lose their patience and sanity and Allie was no exception. The pig across the street just gave her a reason.

Allie woke up one morning feeling that her mattress and pillow had been indoors too long; they were started to smell of mold and mildew as most things in El Salvador do during the rainy season. So, like everyone in El Salvador does, Allie found a spot in her front yard where she could sun her mattress and pillows to dry out the humidity/rain water that had accumulated during the last few weeks. The area, of course, was covered in mud due to the rain that had fallen the night before, so she brought out 4 chairs to hold her mattress up while it dried.

Everything was great. There they were, drying out in the hot sun. She decided to go inside to pack up some things for her upcoming trip to the capital.

Just as she entered her room, she heard an odd sound outside. She waited for a moment, and then out of curiosity, walked to the door to see what was going on outside. As she approached the door, she saw her mattress laying in the middle of the mud, her pillow a few yards away, with feathers covering the muddy ground, and the next door pig happily trotting away.

As you can imagine, when a person is already feeling unraveled, this tiny problem grows in magnitude to something that you would think would cause the end of the planet´s existence.

As any normal 1-year PCV would do, she angrily stomped outside, yanked her mattress and pillow up into her arms (causing more feathers to start flying around her), and furiously marched across the street to her woman neighbor´s house where she just began screaming at the top of her lungs and waving around her pillow (again causing feathers to fly everywhere).

"LOOOOOOK at what your STUPID PIG did to my stuff!!!!! I HATE your pig! I´ve told you before to keep that stupid thing TIED UP! WHAT is wrong with you??! WHAT am I going to do NOW??!! The next time that pig comes anywhere CLOSE to my house, I´m getting out my machete and STABBING IT until it dies and then I´m CUTTING IT UP into a thousand pieces!!!! THAT´S what I think about your PIG!!!"

Of course, all of this yelling and feathers flying caused interest from the other neighbors, so by the end, she was covered in the white pillow feathers and had an audience of her community members standing in front of their homes watching the gringa entertainment. Just as she finished describing her killing methods, she gained a moment of clarity and thought, "What am I doing? I need to breathe."

She lowered the pillow and mattress and just concentrated on breathing while looking at her neighbor woman. The woman just stared back for about 15 seconds, then slowly turned to the pig and....started yelling at the pig.

"What were you thinking??!! Look at what you did, you stupid pig!" And then started whipping it as the pig started squealing and running away.

Allie just lowered her head, turned around, and walked back into her house dragging her mud-covered mattress and now lifeless pillow.

She continues to dislike the pig. As far as we know, the pig has not returned to visit Allie. Stay tuned for more developments in the next year.

Two recent memorable stories...

2006-10-23T16:07:00.000-05:00

Ok. Don´t kill me. I´m still alive...I´ve just been really busy and haven´t been motivated to write anything when I have time. So...a few recaps.

IMMERSION WEEKEND TAKE 2
You (and I) thought my immersion day experience was memorable. (See here if you don´t remember it.) Well, I got to have another one. Sort of.

Two new volunteers who are in training came to my site to have their immersion days. I selected 2 families in 2 different locations for them to stay with. Both locations want a volunteer, so I figured it would be good to hear from new people what they thought about the locations.

They arrived early to my town and started asking people if they "knew where the gringa lived". Apparently, EVERYONE that they asked was like, "Oh! Michelle lives up the road." or "Oh! Michelle left her house this morning at 9:00 and walked down this street and then waited for the bus."...etc. And when I finally arrived at the place and time for our meeting, like 5 community members saw me and were like, "Your friends have been looking for you!"

Natalie and Jen (the two trainees) said that in training they learn that people get to know the gringa and everything that she does, but they didn´t actually believe it until coming to visit me. They were like,"Yeah. EVERYONE here knows EVERYTHING about you!!!" And I, of course, asked, "Did anyone say anything bad?" They said no...

Anyway, we ended up hanging out a bit in my house until early afternoon when we left to go to their host families´ homes for the next 2 days. We visited Jen´s family first. We left her bag there, and started the journey to host family #2. Of course, as we started walking, it started pouring down rain, and Jen had left her umbrella in the host family´s house, so the 3 of us walked in the rain to the bus stop, Jen and I sharing an umbrella.

We reached the bus stop, got on the bus, and I saw that my khakis were DRENCHED to the point of being able to see my skin! Now THAT is pretty wet. But no big deal...whatever. We arrive in the next town where Natalie is staying and start the trek up to her house. Again, in the pouring rain. Through muddy roads/paths and all. Finally, we arrive at her house, but it´s all closed up (due to the downpour). So we´re all standing out on the road in the pouring rain looking at the closed gate and I decide to start yelling the name of the kid that lives there to let him know we´re there. So there I am, shivering under an umbrella with Jen, with water POURING down around us, screaming, "MAR-VIN!!! MAR-VIN!!!" This lasted about 10 seconds. Surprisingly, he didn´t hear me. (Hmm...maybe it was all the rain pounding down on the tin roof that makes it sound like a train is right next to you....)

So, I decide I´m just opening the gate. Again, this is difficult because the fence is made of wood branches standing vertically with wire running horizontally between them. And the door opens with someone removes the wire that ties the fence to the posts. (I don´t know if I explained that very well...it´s much easier to see it.) Anyway, I had to undo the loop at the top of the last branch and at the bottom. Still, while rain is falling in buckets. FINALLY, I get the fence open and Jen and I run up to the door where there is cover (while apparently Jen decides to close the fence again) and I start pounding on the door, again screaming for Marvin. No one comes to the door.

I was like, "OK....Maybe since it´s raining, Marvin couldn´t come home from school yet." So I decide to ask the next door neighbor if she knows where Marvin is and, AGAIN, have to open and close that stupid fence! But, when I got to her house, she was super helpful. She said, "Oh no!! Well, I´ll go over there with you and we´ll find Marvin!" So she gets her umbrella, and we walk back over. As we approach the fence, I start to tell her I can open it because I´ve just done it like 10 times (ok, a bit of a stretch) and just as I am yelling this out to her, she approaches this tin metal thing next to the fence and presses on it with her PINKY (ok, maybe it was her entire hand, but whatever), the door just easily swings open. I just stood there with my mouth HANGING OPEN and the trainees got a glimpse of what happened and just started ROLLING laughing! That WHOLE time, there was a DOOR that I could have just BLEW on to open up, and I was messing around, getting covered in mud trying to open that stupid fence!!! I REALLY wish I had a video of all that.

Anyway, once we FINALLY stopped laughing (about 10 minutes later), the neighbor (who didn´t really ever understand why we were dying laughing I don´t think) finally located Marvin and he told us he left to buy something and was stuck there because of the rain. And we ended up waiting about 30 more minutes for his mom so I could explain everything to her - why Natalie was there, why she might not be able to eat much, etc. By the time we finished with all of that, it was dark outside and I had to still take Jen back to her community! We found that there were no more buses running, so I called in a favor from my neighbor, who graciously assisted us by driving us to her community. Thank goodness for awesome neighbors!!! :)

Anyway, I felt like it was an excursion and something they probably won´t forget for awhile...

ARAÑA DE CABALLO
Here is something I never want to talk about again, but, probably will. :) Arañas de Caballos. Translation? Horse spiders. Does anyone know what these are? I have photos, but don´t have my flash drive at the moment, so you´ll just have to look it up until I can post the photos. These are the NASTIEST spiders because they´re HUGE, and furry, and I swear, they have brains.

As I was talking on the phone to a student planning our meeting the next day, I see this big, black...creature...start crawling into my kitchen. And my reaction...in mid sentence...is, "AH!! WHAT is THAT??!!" He stopped talking and I immediately said, "There´s an animal in my house. Have to call you back!" and hung up the phone. I get my "kill anything that can move" strength RAID and start approaching this THING. I spray like half the can on it, and it´s STILL MOVING!! So I get my broom out and start pounding it while probably yelping a bit each time because I´m so grossed out. FINALLY, it more or less, stops moving and I sweep it outside. I noted that I was probably yelping a bit, because the majority of my neighbors were standing outside their homes trying to see what was happening with the crazy gringa. When I saw them, I started waving my arms like crazy screaming, "VENGA VENGA VENGA VENGA VENGA!!" ("Come here! Come here! Come here....)
The woman across the street shows up and I point to the convulsing creature and say, "WHAT is that??!!" And she bends over and says, "Ah...¡una araña de caballo! ¡Que grande! ¡Muy peligroso." (Ah...a horse spider! It´s huge! Those are dangerous!") Then she informs me that they live in holes in the ground and she and her son start scouring the land for where it came from. I´m like, "Oh, so you think the FAMILY lives here?" KIDDING. And she´s like, "Maybe." GREAT.

What do they find? THREE HUGE HOLES in the ground in front of my house. And inside, they see MORE of these things. UGH. So we spend two HOURS pouring water in the holes (that supposedly is supposed to make them come out) and stabbing machetes into the holes (that supposedly is supposed to kill them). And when I say "we", I really mean I got buckets of water and observed (while snapping a few photos) from afar while THEY did all of this. No more emerged, so after this effort, we (and I mean they) stuffed big rocks into the holes to block the creatures from leaving. So I was like, "Good. My awesome neighbors got rid of those nasty things."

Yeah. That´s what I thought until the other day another one emerged and I had to kill it. Again, impossible to kill, so I wounded it so it wouldn´t move, and then smacked it with my shoe and watched this yellow trail of nastiness (it appeared to be brains) fly out everywhere. Yeah. Nice, huh? I have photos of that too. And yes, I´ll definitely send them. And I´ve proclaimed to all the creatures outside that I don´t like things with brains (especially SPIDERS) in or around my house, unless they can speak MY language!!!

Nastiness, I tell you.

Well, that´s probably enough stories for the moment. If you´re wondering what the heck I´m up to at this moment, visit here.

Independence Day 09/15/06

2006-10-10T14:15:00.000-05:00

There is a recap. More to come...

Entering month 16...

2006-09-09T11:18:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking a lot about why the Peace Corps experience is so hard. Read "Just why is it that way?" here if you're interested on my take. Updates from the last couple of weeks are below...

June 2006 swearing-in ceremony at the Embassy
1 Year Anniversary: Celebrating in Black
Andrea, Steph, Tara, me, Josephine, Jen

My identity has been defined...
Before leaving for the states, the new group of volunteers were sworn in and we had a huge party for them. Because they came in exactly one year after my group, we all planned the festivities. Each of the new volunteers received a goodie bag from us that included an assortment of helpful items here, one being an "emergency contact list" with the contact info for everyone in my group and a reason each of us should be contacted. I didn't help come up with this list, but for me it said, "Contact if you need to organize your life and then put it into a database." Fitting I suppose. :)

The Student Tech Team:
Marielos, Rigoberto, Gilberto, Adrián, Marta, Ronald, Carlos, Salvador, Omar

The Technology Project: A small, but important, accomplishment
Before I left for the states, I told the kids that they needed to visit with the non-profit organizations while I was gone to find out what types of projects they work in, and give them a description of our project. Kind of a first visit sort of thing. And you probably remember me talking about my attempt at the motivational talk. Well, when I was home in Illinois, curiosity just got the best of me, so I called my counterpart (the director of the school) and asked if any of the kids had given him a permission form to sign. And he said, "Yeah! They all did! They told me they didn't have the print out of the project description, but still HAD to go, because they didn't want to think about telling you they didn't do it. They're scared of you!" I could NOT stop laughing. Sweet. So my motivation to them was scaring the living daylights out of them. Well, I guess whatever works... But I was SO happy to meet with them and see accomplishment in their faces. They traveled alone, to offices that they had never been to, and talked to professional people about our project. Awesome. I'm SUPER excited about the project. We definitely still have a ton to do, but we're on our way. :)

More Miami Muddles
As many of you know, I had planned to leave the states on August 29th. I didn't actually leave until September 1st. I spent 2 extra days in Columbus because I knew ahead of time those two days that I wouldn't be able to leave from Miami. The last day, September 1st, the Miami plane was cancelled while we were in route to Miami, so I ended up staying an additional night there. Here's a tidbit that just might help you in the future: When the airline people ask you if you want your checked luggage, don't say, "Whatever is easiest." Say, "Yes." Because if you let them decide what to do (especially if you're in Miami where NOTHING ever works right), they just might leave your luggage out on the tarmack overnight, where it can get drenched from the rain, causing (A) all of your clothing to reek when you arrive to your final destination and (B) all of your dark clothing to bleed onto all of your light clothing, leaving you with nothing to wear. It's not fun. And you will continue hating the stupid airport that you can never enter and leave from without problems.

Stupider, indeed...
Baby bro did indeed graduate and now is looking forward to moving to Alaska where he wants to be part of the ski patrol at a local resort. I had such a good time visiting with everyone back home; thank you to everyone for that! I have to admit, though, this is the first time that I felt like a visitor. I was freezing the ENTIRE time! I kept my hotel room at 85 degrees (only because the system prevented me from making it hotter) and was still freezing!! And that feeling was just amplified when I returned to my community. It was such a relief to be back and I was so happy to see everyone. I guess I really do consider this home now. Strange, huh? (Side note: it was 84 degrees in San Salvador when we landed and I started sweating again the MOMENT I got off the plane! 85 in Columbus is NOT the same as 85 here!) Anyway, when I saw people in my community, they were so welcoming and I could tell that they genuinely missed me, and I them. It was a strange, but good, feeling. :)

I've also realized in the last week back that for some reason, I've lost ALL ability to have social conversations. (And I'm talking in English here.) It started dawning on me during a fellow volunteer's birthday party that we were celebrating in the capital. I didn't talk much during dinner, and afterwards, I decided to talk to one of the former staff members for Peace Corps. The conversation was probably the worst conversation I've ever had in my life in terms of flow. There was NONE. He was being sarcastic. I didn't get it. He had to tell me. Then the awkward silence followed. And I mean things like this happened constantly during our conversation. I hope I never have to see him again in my lifetime because I'm pretty sure he considers me one of the dumbest people he's ever met. Then, a fellow volunteer texted me and I started responding back like a mad woman. I mean, I sent like 10 messages to this volunteer about absolutely nothing! And like 5 minutes after the last one, I was like, "What the heck was I just doing?" I really came across as a crazy woman. Finally, one of the volunteers from my group visited me this week and we had a blast talking and listening to music all night. And I said to her that I really thought I had no abilities to communicate anymore. And she said, "I KNOW!!! We've gotten STUPIDER here!" And I was like, "You mean...more stupid?" And we just both LOST it laughing. That about sums it up on where I stand. I really hope I get back SOME sort of social ability... :)

A dose of reality
Yesterday, apparently our 15th anniversary of arriving in country, I had my first security incident. I was riding a local bus in San Salvador (and of course was only on this bus because I was lazy and didn't want to walk) and these 2 guys in the back walked up to the front of the bus, to the passenger (a professional looking woman) right behind the driver. The 2nd guy, as he walked to the front, pulled a pocket-knife out of his pocket, opened it, and held it behind his leg so ALL of us in the back of the bus could see it. And I'm not talking regular pocket knife. I'm talking, when opened, a knife that spanned twice the length of the palm of my hand. The Peace Corps security officer later told me this is called a "ninja knife", or something like that. Anyway, then the first guy asked the woman for something and I just saw her shake her head no. And then the bus stopped at its next stop. EVERYONE behind these guys jumped up (including me) and RAN to the back of the bus to get off. I, and a woman carrying her baby, were two of the first ones there because we were sitting close to the exit. When we arrived, we ran into a 3rd guy that was blocking the exit and all of us from getting off. He starts in with, "Tranquilo. Nada pasa. Está bien." ("Calm down. Nothing is happening. It's all good.") Yeah, RIGHT. We RUSHED him, pushing him off the bus onto the sidewalk, and RAN in all different directions. I ran to a side street up to a small business and asked if I could come in. They let me in and I called our security officer and just LOST it. Nothing even happened to me, but I was shaking like mad and bawling. I could barely even tell her what happened! She was great, though. She came to pick me up and brought me to the office. Then I talked to our PC medical officer and she let me know that I could go talk to the PC psychologist, if I wanted to and asked me for a short description to report the incident to Washington. Man. I really thought I had prepared myself for something like that, with all the security info that we've received. But I guess I hadn't. I was shaken up really badly. I spent the afternoon swimming in the pool at the Sheraton. I needed it. (And thanks to my friend that I called to help me calm down...it helped a lot.)

Ok, that's about it from down here in El Sal! Hope you're all doing well!

That's a fun one to follow...

2006-08-20T02:33:00.000-05:00

Today was travel day. And I made it! I'm sitting here at the nice computer at my dad's giving you the update...

Miami Airport
Yep. I had to go there again! It wasn't pleasant by any means, but I did run into a situation that made me laugh my butt off. Picture this:

Flight lands. The hoard of people take off to customs and their connecting flights. On the way, a lot of people stop at the bathroom, including me. The one I happen to stop in only has 1 stall, so there is a line. There are 3 people in front of me, and about 5 behind me. There is a middle-aged woman immediately behind me that is literally physically jumping up and down like a 4-year old when he/she has to go to the bathroom. And she yells at this airport worker asking if there are other stalls somewhere. The worker replies no.

Just as the worker says no, the person in the stall opens the door to leave and the first person in line moves forward to enter. She's halfway in, and this woman behind me just runs up, pushes her out of the way, and says, "Is it ok if I go?" And, of course, the girl doesn't really have a choice since she was just shoved out of the way. So the middle-aged woman slams the door shut. We hear her pull her pants down, and then very soon after, we hear...how to describe it...well...squishy squishy farty noises. (That's the best I can do, man.) :) I'm pretty sure it would fit into the category of explosive diarrhea...

Of course, ALL of us look at each other and everyone in front starts moaning, "Ohhhhh...." I left. I could wait. I'm not sure what happened with the other girls (or with the middle-aged woman when she came out) but I bet THAT was someone fun to follow...

My last 4 days...

2006-08-15T17:04:00.000-05:00

Oh my goodness. The last 4 days have been CRAZY and the next 3-4 are planned to be just the same! Recap:

Saturday August 12th
That is the day that I sent the last update. I wanted to finish the introduction letter and project description so all of the heads of organizations working on this Internet project could sign the letter and put their stamp next to their name. (That's important here. Stamping. If you don't have a stamp, you might as well just go home because no one will take you seriously.) :) Anyway, I didn't finish it Friday because the woman I wanted to consult about it got sick and I ended up asking my coordinator at like 4 PM if she could look it over, and - obviously - she told me she would get it to me on Monday. So...I decided to finish everything I could without their help on Friday night and Saturday morning.

Saturday afternoon, I hopped on a bus and returned to San Isidro after my marathon week of medical check-ups. I met with a community leader about the work I had done, went to the local pupuseria to chow down and socialize, and then went home and went to bed.

Sunday, August 13th
I woke up at 7 AM and threw on some clothes and made it over to the elementary/middle school to attempt to finally finish the world map. I stayed from 7 AM to 1:30 AM on Monday! I didn't eat lunch. I didn't eat dinner. I outlined countries. I identified countries that were missing or in the wrong place. (Hey, man, we did this by HAND!) I numbered all the countries. I painted an area to write the names of the countries and world facts. Then, I collapsed on a bench in the priancipal's office, waking up each hour for the next 2 hours FREEZING and then finally asked the security guard to walk me home at 4 AM, where I bathed (and the water felt WARM since I was freezing), and then got on a bus headed for San Vicente, about 4 hours away. Click here for more photos of this project.

Monday, August 14th
I arrived in San V and immediately went to the office to work on the presentation I was going to give that afternoon to the trainees. There were tons of people working on the 1 computer available to us, so I decided to use the cyber cafe down the street. When I got there, I found that (A) they didn't have ANY Microsoft products - only Internet and notebook and (B) I couldn't download ANY photos on the computer. So much for that plan...

But I did get to check my email and had some conversations with the family. So it was all good. :)

I returned to the training center and just talked to some folks, got all the new volunteer contact info, and then did some last minute prep for the session I had. It was about the world map project. I feel like the session was a bit boring, but I gave them a lot of info and showed them a variety of photos from other volunteer maps, so hopefully they took what they needed from it. We ended around 3:30 and I left for my site.

We got into San Salvador around 5:30 and I decided to grab a bite to eat out of town and stop by the office to print out the changes that the PC staff recommended for the Internet project. By the time I got to the office, it was getting dark out so I decided to just stay there and work. I saw that one person had sent me her comments, but she recommended that another staff member review it and that staff member told me she would do it first thing the next day. So I decided to sleep in the office (again) and get an early start.

Tuesday, August 15th
I woke up around 7:00 AM and made some changes in the Internet documents based on what the first staff member recommended. Later in the morning, the second staff member sent me her edits and I made some more changes. Let me just say, I saw JUST where my Spanish was when I got these edits back. Take a look at Click here to view the edited document in Word if you want to see just how many errors I made. The entire document is freaking RED!!!! :) Oh well. Thank goodness I have a bunch of super supportive staff members here to correct all my mistakes. And thank goodness the people in my community have figured out my gringa Spanish so we can communicate!

Anyway, back to the documents. I realized that I STILL did not have the legal information for the city council in my town. (I started asking for this a month ago, from about 3 different organizations.) So I decided to go straight to the source: the public record. Now, this entailed getting in a taxi (apparently, it's in a dangerous area of town), and then having the following fun experience:

Security Guard (a woman!): Welcome. What do you need?

Michelle: Good afternoon. I need to go to the library downstairs to get some legal information for a city council.

Security Guard: I need your identification.

[Michelle panics when she realizes she left her ID in the Peace Corps office with everything else she didn't need since she was going to a dangerous part of town.]

Michelle: Um....I left my ID in my office. (and KNOWS she is going to hear "fijate que...")

Security Guard: [a little apprehension] ....well.....ok....here is a badge. You can go into that room.

Michelle: [SHOCKED that she is allowed in without meeting the requirement of showing ID] Ok....but I was told that I needed to get the info from the library downstairs.

Security Guard: You need to start in that room.

Michelle: Ok, thanks. [Enters the room and waits for 10 minutes for an available clerk.]

Clerk: How can I help you?

Michelle: I need the legal information for a city council.

Clerk: When did it become legal?

Michelle: I don't know the exact date; I was told 2004, probably in November.

[Clerk begins opening EVERY PDF version of the official publication in November 2004 (about 15 in total) and searches each one for San Isidro, part of the name of the city council. She finds nothing and tells Michelle she needs to go to the library downstairs.]

[Michelle is escorted downstairs where she tells the next clerk what she needs.]

Clerk2: When did it become legalized?

Michelle: I don't know exactly. Just sometime in 2004.

Clerk2: What is it's legal code?

Michelle: I don't know. I need to find that information. I just have the name and that it was legalized in 2004.

Clerk2: Then I can't help you. You have to have that information.

Michelle: But that's the information I need!

Clerk2: Well, there is nothing I can do.

[Michelle calls the director of the munipal development program, the person that described where she should go to get this info and asks him to talk to this woman.]

[They talk and she agrees to help Michelle. Again, thank goodness for awesome staff members!]

[Clerk2 brings out a 3" binder with about 1000 sheets of paper in it. This binder contains ALL of the laws that were passed in 2004, including the ones legalizing city councils. She tells Michelle that she needs to read line by line to find the information she wants. Michelle does this (and constantly is wondering HOW she can convince them to hire her to build them a searchable database). After 2 hours, she finishes the book with only locating the legal information for a city council that is part of her town, but not the one she needs. She asks for the book for 2005 and is told that is in room #1 where she started. She returns to room #1 and explains what she needs to a new clerk. THIS clerk opens a DATABASE, that's right, I said a DATABASE, and starts trying to search for it.]

Michelle: Wait! You have a database with this information!

Clerk3: Only for 2005.

Michelle: Ok. Click here. Now here. Now here. Now here. Now type in Sonsonate. Now click here. Now move this. etc. [Clerk3 does everything she asks, but is unable to find the info. The name of the city council is about 200 characters long, and the space illustrating this name is big enough for about 25 characters, all of which are the same for each city council in the country. Michelle asks to take over his computer explaining that she will NOT change any data. And he agrees!!! Michelle changes the design of the form so they can actually view the data and does some quick searches. Nothing comes up. It wasn't created in 2005 either. PUCHICA!]

Michelle: I guess it's not here. Thanks for your time.

Clerk3: You really know what you're doing with computers.

Michelle: Yeah. Thanks.

[Talks with the coordinator for municipal development and the coordinator suggests asking for ALL of the legal information for the city council that Michelle found that she thinks is incorrect. She goes back downstairs and asks the woman if she can view that and the woman says, "not for 45 minutes." Michelle walks back up to the first room, because it's air conditioned, and looks over, again, the Internet proposal information. She gets thirsty and realizes the 5 gallon jug of water is empty but there is another one on the floor that needs to be put into the contraption that gives water. So she starts opening it until a woman runs over flailing her arms wildly saying that she'll get a man to do it. Michelle continues doing it and lifts the water up, turns it over, and places it perfectly into the container just in time for the woman to come back and see it happen. There you go...teaching the women that they can do "manly" stuff too! :) Michelle walks back downstairs and starts reviewing the detailed legal information of the wrong city council to make sure it's the wrong city council. And guess what? It is!]

Michelle: Do you have a phone number here that I could call once I receive the information?

Clerk2 (Michelle's new friend, Maria Dolores): Yes! I have a couple. Just give me a call and I'll get you whatever I need. (What a difference being friends makes! Geez, at first she couldn't help me AT ALL and now she's willing to do whatever I need!)

[So, after all that, Michelle leaves with a phone number, empty-handed of the info she wanted and waits at the office until people get off work in her site to, yet again, attempt to obtain this info.]

And now she's waiting.....waiting...waiting...waiting....and needs to shower....shower....shower...

Stay tuned for more fun with this one! :)

The dengue passed...

2006-08-12T09:31:00.000-05:00

...and I didn't die. :) It took 9 days to get over all the symptoms. I went home for 3 days, then returned to the capital to go through my mid-service medical exams. Can you believe I only have one year left? I can't! I feel like this last year is going to FLY BY!

Anyway, back to the mid-service medical exams. All of us got to do all the fun medical stuff you can think of. Dentist exams. Gynecologist exams. Blood and excrement tests. (Side note: Due to me never having parasites and/or amoebas, I was pretty nervous about hitting the cup while going #2, but it's actually fairly easy to do! You know, just in case any of you need to do that in your lives.) Tuberculosis tests. The outcome of all of that? Nothing is wrong with me. :) I'm actually amazed. I thought for sure after a year in country, I would hear from these professionals, "Fijate que...you have 10 cavities" or "Fijate que...you have 5 types of parasites and amoebas", etc. But I heard none of that. Although, the gynecologist did find something (that many of the gals in my group also had) and I had to take 1 pill to clear it up. (Due to the reactions I got from all of you during the underwear shopping story, I will leave out most of the details of what she found...)

So, here I am a week later totally healthy. Now onto the project status of the Cyber Cafe and Internet in town...

If you're interested in seeing the project overview (I translated it to English), here and see "The 3rd World Cyber Cafe Project: Draft I".

I haven't talked about this in a while, but we're doing great with the planning of the project. One of the high school classes needs to complete a mini-project for credit, and I convinced a group of them to use the Internet project as their mini-project. So I meet with them for about 4 hours per week to work on it. In the last month, they've created an objective, a time line, a project description, calculated the beneficiaries, and have identified non-profit organizations that we plan to solicit for help in the project. I'm doing the budget part of it, and I'm VERY close to being done with it. I'm just waiting to hear back from a Peace Corps staff member about salary information for computer lab personnel. We're planning to use students (and possibly 1-2 adults) to run the cyber because each high school student is required to complete 4-5 social hours per week in order to graduate. This will allow them to learn more about networking and computers during their studies, and allow the cyber to run without the heavy cost of a salary. But I need to assign a cost to that work. The school superintendent/principal told me that normally students are paid $3/hour and engineers $10/hour to run a computer lab. So I split the difference and assigned $6.50/hour for the work. But it comes out to $28,080 as an annual cost and that seems WAY high for an El Salvador salary. And it's something that the community will be "paying" for, so I want it to be reasonable. I don't want the organizations that we will be soliciting to think that we're inflating that number to increase the percentage of the project cost that we will be covering. But, otherwise it's going pretty well.

Also, the city council, the cooperative of farmers, and the entire educational system support this project. I feel like that will help a lot when we start soliciting from other organizations. It really demonstrates that this is a community-driven effort, not just some small group of people. Also, since there are no Internet sites close by, this project will make Internet accessible for 2 other communities apart from ours. In total, it will end up helping about 18,700 people. (Or at least they will all have easy access to it.)

Many of you have told me in the past that you'd be interested in helping financially with projects. Don't think I won't ask for it. :) However, the people in this country have a mentality that they can't do anything without money from the United States. So, I'm trying to show them that it IS possible to get things done with community support and support from non-profits in the area. I really don't want to get ANY help from the states, if possible, in this part of it. If....wait, no....when....we get this project done, we will be starting a new phase of the project: building a computer lab in the elementary/middle school. During THAT part of it, I will most likely be more open to receiving money from the states because they won't count on it so much.

Anyway, that's the plan for now. We'll see what actually transpires...

We've created a very tight schedule to implement this project; we want to open the Cyber in November of this year. Whether or not this happens will really depend on 2 things: (1) how much work the students put into raising community awareness and funds and (2) whether non-profits are able to allocate money within a month for the project. Since we're close to the end of the year, I'm really worried about these organizations saying they'll let us know next year. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

In the last meeting we had, the students were a little...nervous. No, that's not a good description. They were scared to DEATH. I showed them the amount of money we need to raise and told them it was up to them to get it done. I said, "Look. I could do this project. But then what will happen? Everyone will say, 'That's just the gringa's project' and no one will use the cyber cafe and you will all lose Internet here at the high school because we won't be able to pay for it. But if you do this, and you get community support now to make it happen, what is the result? It will work."

And they still looked pretty unmotivated in my opinion, so we went back and forth:
-------------------------------------------------
Me: What benefit will you all receive from doing this?

Students: We'll have Internet.

Me: And?

Students: We'll finish our project for our class.

Me: And?

Students: The community will learn more about computers.

Me: (sigh) And?

[long pause]

Students: It will help us.

Me: How?

Students: To find work.

Me: That's RIGHT!! You can put this on your resumes. Who do you think a company is going to hire? Someone with a diploma that's done activities like pick up trash, or someone that has experience working with a non-profit, someone that has a RELATIONSHIP with a non-profit that brought thousands of dollars here to COMPLETE a project?

Students: The second one.

Me: Uh huh. So, even if you DON'T want to do this for a grade, and you DON'T want to do this to have Internet here, do it so you'll have experience that can help you get a job!
-------------------------------------------------

That seemed to motivate them. We're living in a country where people get college degrees, like lawyers, doctors, engineers, teachers, etc. and can't find a job. Experience REALLY makes a difference here.

So, this email has been quite long enough, huh? I just wanted to let you all know I'm still living and working hard down here! I miss you all!! Oh, and I'll be going back to the US at the end of the month. I'm flying into Chicago on the 19th and flying out of Columbus on the 29th. Let me know if you're interested in hanging out and we'll try to set something up.

Talk to you all soon! I hope you're doing well!!

A brief history...

2006-08-01T17:53:00.000-05:00

May 2005
My friend Gretchen gives a last-ditch effort to keep me in the states by informing me about all of the potential diseases I can get in 3rd-world countries in Latin America.

July 2005
Our Peace Corps Medical officer reinforces Gretchen's horrific stories with actual data about all the fun diseases we can get while we're here with all the information about terrible symptoms that we will experience if we're ever lucky enough to catch one.

July 27, 2006
Michelle wakes up with a headache and takes some Tylenol. As the day progresses, she feels worse and worse but has to do some work for the technology project in San Salvador.

July 28th, 2006
Michelle wakes up with a SPLITTING headache (eyes feeling like there are daggers inside twisting around) and feels like someone has been beating her all night long. Every muscle in her body ACHES and she feels like she's going to collapse. Her throat hurts. Her stomach hurts. She's nautious. And she's freezing. She goes back to sleep until noon when she pulls out her medical booklet (that every PCV gets at swearing-in) and reviews all the scary Latin America disease information. Fever is a common symptom with all the fun diseases, so she takes hers. 101.5. Malaria and Dengue appear to offer the wonderful symptoms that she's been feeling so she confers with the medical staff in the capital and is told that she needs to get tested immediately for Dengue because she can die from it. She travels to the capital (in car comfort, thanks to her friend Ernie that is willing to take her). The test takes about 3 minutes and comes back positive. She has Dengue.

July 29th-July 30th, 2006
Sleeping. Taking Tylenol. Drinking water. Repeat. And eating a bit. Rash appears all over body. Michelle has difficulty sleeping at night. Fever comes and goes.

July 31st, 2006
Michelle's blood is tested again. Bad news. Platelet levels have fallen from the normal 150,000-450,000 level to 126,000. Medical staff advise Michelle to continue resting, drinking water, and taking Tylenol.

August 1st, 2006
Michelle meets with medical staff to review previous tests and set up additional blood test for following morning. Fever is gone. Rash is gone (well, almost). If platelet levels are normal again, she can return home. If not, she continues to stay in San Salvador on a watch. Why? Because if the numbers continue to fall, she has internal bleeding (probably). And if they go up, then she doesn't.

You can never have too many stories in Peace Corps! Stay tuned...And don't worry. I won't die. Peace Corps doesn't like it when its volunteers die. :) For more info on Dengue, click here and read "What is Dengue?".

World Map Project, Part I

2006-07-21T12:02:00.000-05:00

The World Map Project
Things are going amazingly well in my site. I know right before I left for home in May, I was having somewhat of a difficult time, but I am SO loving Peace Corps right now! For any of you that will be joining Peace Corps in the future, I'd just like to say that it's SO worth it to get through the bad times (even when you're thinking that there is NO WAY you're going to be able to stay)!

We started a project in the elementary/middle school last week. Actually, I started planning for it about a month ago, but the student involvement started a week ago. We basically made a freaking huge world map on one of the school walls. (Photos of the process so far can be viewed at here.) The kids have been LOVING it! We still have a lot to do, but most of the student participation has finished.

Here is an outline of the process and my little commentary about how it's been going:

1) Clear the wall that you plan to use.
Not too hard. But I was surprised at how many kids wanted all the stuff up on the wall! There were kindergartners crowded around me as I took down the decorations yelling, "Give me the flower! Give me the person! Give me the cloud! Give me the butterfly!" etc. etc.

2) Paint ocean blue in the area where the map will be.
We're using oil-based paint. Painting a large area is not fun. There were about 3 high school students helping with this step. We all had paint remaining on our hands for a couple of days. (YES, we used paint thinner but it didn't do much good...)

3) Draw the map on top of the ocean blue.
We did this at night, 7-9 PM because wee were using a projector and could see the country lines better. This took about 2 hours with 5 of us. Even the school security guard helped out!

4) Paint the countries.
I talked to all the kids ahead of time and had interested students from 3rd-9th grade sign up, and then I assigned each of them an hour to come in and paint a country. (There are 2 sessions, morning and afternoon, of classes each day and each student only attends one of those sessions. So the kids attending the morning session were scheduled for the afternoon and vice versa for the other session. Talk about logistics!) I made one paper for each country that contained the country name in Spanish and in English, the continent where it is located, and the color that the student would use to paint. All of these papers were put into containers, by country color, and each student arrived, signed in, selected their country by randomly pulling out a piece of paper from their selected container. Then they had to find the continent where their country was located on a map, then had to identify the country on the wall map (where they would be painting) and finally after all that went to work painting it. Some kids were SUPER detailed and took like 30 minutes to paint their tiny country, while others just slapped the paint on. All in all, however, it was a really good idea to only allow them to paint 1 country (I did make a few exceptions for kids that chose an island country that was basically just a dot) because they paid more attention to making it look good.

5) Outline the countries.
This is the step we are in now.

6) Write the name of each country.
We are going to number each country and have a list to the right of the map with all the names. This will allow teachers to use the map for exercises and tests later on.

7) Paint shapes to contain world information.
I compiled this info from www.worldatlas.com.

8) Write the world information in the shapes you made in step #7.

9) Paint dark blue (because that is a national color) around the map and world data info.

10) Each student dips his/her hand in a paint color and places his/her hand in the dark blue section.

11) Each student writes his/her name inside his/her hand.

We're on step #5. :) Check back soon for more info!

And we all thought Americans were direct...

2006-07-10T17:25:00.000-05:00

OK. I don´t have a lot of time right now, but I haven´t posted anything in a while, so I´m going to post a short entry.

So much has happened in the last 2 weeks, there is no way I can recap any of it. But here is a little short story about something that continues to make me laugh:

While waiting for 2 trainees at the bus stop in my community, I began talking to 2 community members, a woman in her 70´s and her daughter in her 30´s. They, as most people are, were very interested in what the gringa (me) eats. I explained that I cook my food (which floored them) and also that I didn´t cook tortillas or beans, and usually not eggs, all of which can be classified as the typical food here.

They were like, "So...what do you eat?" I told them sandwiches, soup, vegetables, fruits, etc. And I explained that I don´t like salt or oil or fat in my food (because they saturate their food like mad here with that stuff). And they were like, "Ohhhh! You´re SO healthy!" And I just kind of shook my head since I´ve had this same conversation like 5 million times.

And then the grandma said, "So....then...............why are you so fat?"

I just started shaking my head (yeah, Americans are the direct ones) and laughed and said, "Well....................I like chocolate a lot."

"Ah. That explains it." That was the response.

So I guess I´m not just the gringa in town. I´m the FAT gringa in town! !PUCHICA! :)

Visit http://www.developingwords.org/el_salvador/michelle/2006/07/ to read about peeps in my community.

La Jungla y Yo (The Jungle 'n Me)

2006-06-19T15:27:00.000-05:00

The subject pretty much explains what this update is all about...

As you are aware, I was somewhat down before and immediately after I went to the states for a vacation. I'm much better now. How do I know this? Because since I've been back, I've had a multitude of fun guests in my house. And when I say "guests", I mean fun friends from nature.

You all know about the frog and scorpion experiences. The frogs haven't come back even though I made no attempt to get rid of them. I guess there are not enough bugs in the house to keep them attracted. Darn. But, a couple of new guests arrived during my trip. See below.

VISITA 1 - SLITH
But, a few days after arriving at my house from the stateside trip, I was sitting on my bench in my living room reading. And I finished a chapter and closed my book. Of course, just as I closed it, my eyes wandered to the floor where I found a snake slithering right past my right foot and I jumped up and screamed, "AHHHH!!" And of course, this snake just slithered right past into the space between the wall and the floor. Now, don't get me wrong. The snake wasn't huge. But it was a SNAKE. I mean, come on. I draw the line there. I can't STAND snakes! UGH! And I can't stand killing things so I was wondering, "WHAT am I going to do about THIS??" Since it was so slender (but REALLY fast), there was no way I was going to be able to kill it with a shoe. And I think it knew I wanted it OUT. So it just stopped moving. And stayed there. So, I thought, "Well, I have some Raid that is able to kill scorpions. I'll just try that." So I got the Raid from the kitchen, walked back into the living room, and sprayed the snake. Uh huh. If I ever thought I hated snakes BEFORE this incident, I know now that it was nothing compared with how I feel now. The snake started SPASMING like mad! I'm talking wriggling, squirming, trying to flee with its body convulsing in a manner that was making it bounce off the floor, while squirming and doing its s-moves. I was like, "AHHHHH!" Finally, I managed to get a broom to try to sweep it out only to find that it was getting stuck IN the broom wriggling all about. I RAN outside and started banging the broom against the fence and watched it fall into the trenches below. Ugh. That's all I have to say about THAT visit.

VISITA 2 - THE GRAY FURBALL
A mouse. There was a mouse in my house. I realized it quickly after returning by the chewed into bag of rice that I had, along with all of its droppings scattered around the bag. Nice. Again. Don't like to kill animals. And don't like to live with them. Such a dilemma. All of the people in my site told me I had to catch it in this mouse trap, and then drop it into a bucket of water because if I let it go somewhere, it would just come back. Great. What to do. I thought, "Maybe I can just move everything and it will leave." So I moved ALL of my stuff away from the walls and floor. And it moved out. But, it moved close so it could still ENTER my house and eat stuff in my kitchen. No good for me. I finally broke down and bought mouse poison. I bought the most humane thing I could find...poison that killed in a week and made the mouse think it was dying of old age. That's ok, right? Anyway, the mouse is gone. I removed it's dead body last week. Again, not my favorite thing to do! And, FYI, mice can CLIMB walls! Just random good-to-know info for ya. :)

VISITA 3 - THE SLUGS
I know slugs are plentiful in Washington where it rains all the time, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised that they exist here too during the rainy season. But, nonetheless, I was. There was only 1 inside the house, but 3 outside. They were promptly killed. I was over it. :)

VISITAS 4-5 - THE PEOPLE
I was surprised to see that within 2 weeks (during the beginning of the rainy season, mind you), the plants in front of my house blossomed to unbelievable levels. I'm talking 9 feet high sunflower plants, weeds, bushes, grass up to my calves, etc. My landlord told me that she was going to come to my house to cut things down, but couldn't find her key to get past the gate. I told her to call me when she wanted to come over so I could let her in and we could do it together. I also told my friend Adolfo that I needed to get rid of some stuff and asked about the possibility of just burning away the weeds and grass. He suggested that I use a big clipper to clip away problem areas.

So, one Saturday, he drove in to lend me this stuff and said upon arrival, "THIS is what you're talking about?? You have a freaking JUNGLE in front of your house! I'm surprised you don't have more animals inside! GEEZ!" And then he walked inside and somehow managed to get covered in this green natural velcro ballI stuff. It was ALL over his pants and I said, "What's all that?" And he was like, "I don't know!!! It's from your jungle!!" was laughing SO hard. Because it was raining, he left the clippers.

The next day, I woke up all ready to go at it and cut away. And on the first sunflower branch, the clippers BREAK. Unbelievable! So I tell Adolfo. And listen to him laugh. And laugh. And laugh. And finally, he says, "Ok. I'll bring a machete and we'll get it done." FINE.

Another day passes and I'm sitting in my house preparing to make some lunch when I hear slashing outside my door. So I walk outside, and there is my landlord chopping away at stuff with a machete. And I said, "I thought you were going to CALL me!" And she said, "Ah...I decided not to." I guess she found the key. :) So she chopped and I hauled all the big plants to a corner of the area. With the weeds and grass, we had to PULL THEM OUT. Did you hear that? Imagine going to your front lawn and pulling out all of your grass! That's what I did. Granted, it was only about a 15' x 15' area, but still. It's IRRITATING and hard. When I was growing up, my dad made my brother and I do crazy things. Things like clean the FOREST. You know, anal retentive crazy things that no one else in the world does. His reason? To "prepare us for life". Yeah, nice prep work. I never practiced pulling grass out of the ground! :) But...I found out during this experience that my landlord is JUST as crazy and anal about the landscape as my dad. Great. What luck. 3 hours later, when we had finished chopping and yanking, she decided we needed to clean the ditch with all the plants. What? I said, "Why?" And she said, "Because God says we have to." I helped for about 5 minutes and then was like, "Ok...I have some stuff to do." Seriously. No way.

So, that is my fun life update for the moment. Lots of fun encounters about wildlife. And I've lived through all of them...and even laughed a bit about them. :)

Click here and read "Why I'm happy again..." to learn about what happened to make me feel a little better.

Talk to ya soon!

Say what??

2006-06-09T18:19:00.000-05:00

Ok. I just have to put this out there so SOMEONE can explain to me why ANYONE, let alone world leaders, are thinking this is a good idea.

Russian president Vladimir Putin has inadvertently spotlighted one of today's momentous mysteries: collapsing birthrates in industrialized countries. Putin proposed that Russia pay women to have children to remedy a "critical" population outlook.

-Newsweek (05/29/06), "The End of Motherhood"

PAYING women to have children?? Is this a joke? I mean, seriously, if women don't want children, who is going to be enticed to have them for a financial gain? (And I'm sure only in the first year...kids are EXPENSIVE!) I understand the problem: if population decreases, there will be a time where there are more elderly than young workers, causing an economic problem for the country. So this is the best solution?? Not only will the wrong women (in my opinion) start having kids, but there are all kinds of environmental issues too, right? I mean, the world is already overpopulated now. My goodness, China puts a LIMIT to how many kids one family can have! And now we're seeing a country decide to put money that could go to 5 million other things into THIS? Can someone please explain to me what I'm missing??

Visit here to read full article.

And it finally happened...

2006-06-01T10:18:00.000-05:00

Well, it finally happened. I've done my best to prevent it, but I guess you can only do so much.

Yesterday afternoon, after having a bawl-out session with the Peace Corps psychologist, I went to MetroCentro, the big mall in San Salvador, with another volunteer. We were planning to see a movie. I had left-over pizza from lunch that I was carrying in a bag that I was also using to carry all my crap (umbrella, papers from the office, water bottle, etc.). We knew that there was no way that the movie theatre was going to let me take food and a drink into the theatre, so we decided to put it in Jermain's backpack. We walked over to a table nearby, set his backpack on it, and I started to open it.

I felt a little tingle on my finger, like I was hitting something prickly inside his bag, so I moved my hand away to see what it was, and I saw a scorpion wrapped around my pinkie finger. That's right, folks. A SCORPION. Ugh. I yelled and threw my hand down, causing the scorpion to fly off. But it was too late. It had already stung me. I was jumping around flailing my hand around, trying to shake off the pain. FYI, that doesn't work. (But I think you THINK it helps when you're doing it.) People around me were staring at me with the look of, "What's the crazy gringa doing?"

Anyway, I went into the bathroom at the theatre to wash it with soap and water, as our nurse told us time and time again to do during training. By this point (about 2 minutes after it happened), my finger was super red, swollen, and REALLY hot. And I was losing feeling in it. Due to my continued attempts at shaking away the pain, women in the restroom just stared at me. I explained that a scorpion had just stung me, and suddenly, I had an entourage of women surrounding me trying to help. Even theatre personnel ran to get medical kits for me. During this time, I whipped out my phone to dial the nurse (another thing we are told to do immediately) and was told I needed to go to the office ASAP. So much for the movie break.

Off I went, in a cab. Of course, I end up in the slowest cab in the city with a driver that wasn't too with it. It would have been faster to take a bus! Anyway, FINALLY, we made it to the office, with my finger burning like crazy, unable for me to move it, and went in.

Apparently, scorpion stings can cause analectic shock, so it's important to take 2 Benedryl, which the nurse gave me. She also re-washed it (apparently there was no faith in my ability to do so), and gave me ice. Oh, man. That ice was the BEST feeling EVER!!!

So, after coming to the office twice that day for fun medical stuff, I left a second time, returning to the hostel where I was staying. On the bus ride back, the Benedryl started to kick in, and I was READY to just lay down and SLEEP. About halfway into the ride back, it started to sprinkle and I realized the umbrella that I had been carrying around all day was with Jermain, along with the rest of my stuff. So, I sent him a text message telling him that he could use it if he needed it. He responded, "What about you?" I said, "A little rain isn't going to kill me...I was a swimmer."

Of course this little conversation that we had through messaging each other continued close to my stop. As we moved closer to where I was going to get off, I moved to the back of the bus so I would be ready to get off. However, as I tried to read one of the last messages, I inadvertently got off one stop too soon. So, instead of walking about 2 blocks to the hostel, I needed to walk about 8. And just as I got off, it started POURING. Great.
I walked into a pharmacy close by and asked if I could have a small plastic bag to protect my paper identity and just sucked it up and walked it. Of course, I walked into the hostel DRENCHED. I went to the bathroom, walked to my room, and COLLAPSED. I slept until 1:00 AM, when I took my second installment of Benedryl, got ready for bed, and then slept until morning.

I've had enough time in the capital. I'm going back to my site now. :)

Oh, and if you're wondering what a scorpion sting feels like, the best way I can describe it is by comparing it to stubbing your toe. You know how that feels at first? Well, that's how a sting feels, but the immediate pain doesn't go away for about 3-4 hours. And then, you have about 12 hours of what it feels like right after the immediate pain (of stubbing your toe) leaves you. Even now, 18 hours later, I can still feel numbness in my finger!

You think this story is good? Read what happened to Laura Boddington last fall by clicking here.

It was TOTALLY worth it!!

2006-05-30T17:56:00.000-05:00

Obviously, as you noticed from my last email/post, I very much needed a trip back home. Fabulous I thought it would be and, fabulous it was. I attended 2 weddings, celebrated my baby bro's 23rd birthday, attended my dad's MBA graduation, and hung out with tons of friends and family (and ate and drank it up!). It was amazing and fun! Thank you so much to everyone that made it that way!! :)

For my current Peace Corps thoughts, click here and read "Reality".

The BIG Question...
I was at Motorola on the last day in the states, and a co-worker of my dad's started talking to me. She and her husband (who also works at Motorola) had a daughter a year ago and right before I left the country, I went to the hospital with my dad to congratulate them. Since then, I've received notes and gifts from them.

Melanie (the mom) was showing me a photo of Elizabeth (her daughter) and said, "Bui (her husband) and I want to ask you something. He wanted to ask me with you, but he had to go to China, and since you're here for only a short time, I am going to ask for the 2 of us. Bui is always talking about you and how he wants Elizabeth to be just like you when she grows up. So we were wondering, would you be willing to be Elizabeth's Godmother?" I was like, "What?" She said, "Really, we want Elizabeth to have someone to talk to when she doesn't want to listen to us. We want her to have a role model. And we want her to be like you."

Needless to say...the tears started. It was SUPER sweet! So...I guess that's the role I'm going to play. I keep wondering, "Am I even old enough to be a Godmother??" But, I guess I am... :)

The Columbus Voyage...
It didn't look so promising as I was leaving El Salvador. One of my closest friends (that, as a side note, was taking me to the airport) was really irritated at me, and likewise, me at him. So that made for somewhat of an uncomfortable trip. But, when I got to the airport, everything was good. I was excited, happy, blah blah blah. Then I reached the counter and had the following conversation:

Airline attendant: Fijate que (yeah, you know what is coming)...your flight is delayed which is going to cause you to miss your connection in Florida which means you'll get into Columbus a day late.

Michelle: What? Well, can you put me on a different plane or through somewhere else?

Airline attendant: Fijate que, since your ticket is not a full-fare ticket, we can't do anything.

Michelle: What are you talking about?

Airline attendant: It appears that this ticket was purchased with miles, so it's not considered full fare so we can't do anything about it.

Michelle: What are you talking about? American Airlines told me they would get me to Columbus, Ohio tonight at this price. It doesn't matter what the PRICE of the ticket is...it was an OFFER from your company!! That's like me going to get my hair cut and the girl telling me it will cost $5. Then, when she's halfway done, she has a seizure and dies and the haircut place says, "Oh, sorry. That isn't our normal cost." Are you kidding me??!
Airline attendant: [silently begins looking for other options]....[joined by 2 additional attendants]

...blah blah blah...[we look for connections through DC, Chicago, Iowa, etc., then flights into Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dayton, etc.]

...an hour and a half passes at the counter and nothing comes up...

Michelle: Ok, well, thank you for looking.

Airline attendants: No problem. Sorry we couldn't find anything. When you get to Miami, the American representatives will provide you with vouchers for transportation, food, and a hotel.

Michelle: Thanks. [back to being super excited about going home]

...flight takes off, gets into Miami 2 hours late to catch connection...Michelle finds (after about 30 minutes of looking around with this other passenger) the rebooking area.

Miami Airline Rep: Here are you new tickets. Because this flight was delayed due to weather conditions (FYI, "weather conditions" from the day BEFORE), American cannot pay for any hotels.

Michelle: The people in El Salvador told me I would be receiving vouchers.

Miami Rep: Yes, well, apparently they told EVERYONE that [hands Michelle a form letter]. If you have a problem, please talk to our supervisor at the end.

Michelle: Thanks. [thinks, "At least she told me right away who I need to talk to...]

...walks to supervisor...

Michelle: Hi. I am coming from El Salvador and missed my connection because we were delayed. The people in El Salvador told me I would be receiving vouchers for a hotel, transportation, and food, but the woman at the end told me that is not feasible. I am currently a Peace Corps volunteer and make like $5/day and don't have money to pay for a hotel, but need to shower before leaving tomorrow. What do you suggest I do?

Miami Supervisor: I don't know.

Michelle: Ok...well, can you honor what I was told in El Salvador?

Miami Supervisor: I am not authorized to give out vouchers.

Michelle: Ok, can I please talk to who is?

Miami Supervisor: No, it's late and everyone is at home.

Michelle: Ok, can we call them on their cell phones or home phones?

Miami Supervisor: No. You're not getting anything! This is a weather-related delay!

Michelle: Ok...but your employees in El Salvador they told me I would receive a hotel. So are they incompetent, or liars?

Miami Supervisor: If I give you a room, I will have to give everyone a room. (and he's a TOTAL jerk, by the way...just making sure you're reading it the way it was...)

Michelle: Listen. Everyone else has left. They're obviously FINE with your decision. I am still here. I am definitely NOT fine with that!

Miami Supervisor: Well, I'm not doing it.

Michelle: Well then I'm not leaving until I talk to someone else!

Miami Supervisor: Well, no one else is here. If you have a problem, you can call our 1-800 customer line!

Michelle: I want your business card!

[he throws it across the desk]

Ok, I'm getting irritated all over again. Let's just say I will NEVER be going back to Miami EVER again. (I thought it was American that I was irritated with, until I got to New York.) I ended up staying in a hotel room, thanks to my dad footing the bill and calming me down after I called him collect screaming about the incompetence of American. But I got room service and a hot shower. :)

Anyway, I had to fly from Miami to New York, and then from New York to Columbus. I cannot even explain to you what happened when I got to New York. It was like a wave of calmness overtook me. I mean, I could PHYSICALLY feel a difference. I had no idea I was so wound up in El Salvador until that happened. And it stayed for the entire time I was back home. I was myself - supper happy, enjoying life, etc. And the minute I got back to El Salvador, the same thing happened in reverse - a wave of anxiety hit me, physically. I don't know what the deal is. But I'm in the capital right now talking with the nurse to figure it out and solve it.

Another Day?!
So, I was delayed on the way in, and the same thing happened on the way out. THIS time, however, when I was stranded in Los Angeles (for a real weather-related delay, I might add), they gave me (and everyone else in the room) vouchers for everything, including a hotel room for 2 nights! I was like, "Darn. I have to stay in Los Angeles for a day. Whatever will I do?" So, of course I took a city tour, and ordered movies in my hotel room. What a bummer. :)

Foot in the Mouth
There are 4 geographic sections of the country and there are 2 Peace Corps volunteers (warden and asst warden) that are in charge of each geographic area (in case of emergencies and for any geographic conferences that we want to have). The last conference was held while I was back in the states and a new warden and asst warden were elected.

I found out via email that I was elected as the new warden of the western region. So I have a little bit of an idea of what I am supposed to do, but would like to get a job description or something so I make sure I do everything.

So, I was going back to my community on Sunday with another volunteer that lives close to me. And I said to her, "Do you know what I'm supposed to do as warden?" She said, "YOU are the new warden?" I said, "Apparently. I got an email about it." She said, "That was a BAD decision." I just looked at her. She was like, "Wait...I don't mean....I mean....you'll be GREAT at the job...the best warden ever...I just meant...you're already a representative on the volunteer action committee...and..." I was laughing SOOO hard. Thanks, Rachel. :)

That's all for now. I have to go sort out my current emotional instability. :)

Ugh...I´m in that stage...

2006-05-15T16:59:00.000-05:00

My group arrived here on June 8th. 11+ months ago. And everyone that I have talked to in my group is irritated at the moment. In the past week, I´ve had 2 breakdowns of just total bawling my eyes out from the frustration. I am going back to the states tomorrow. Many more of the people in my group have already gone home for a visit, or will be in the next month. We´re sick of everything. On the positive side, I hope this means that we´re all going through a stage. One that will hopefully pass soon. From my viewpoint (I can´t speak for the rest in my group), here is what is going on.

I´m sick of taking the buses. I´m sick of sweating my butt off every single day (or not sweating my butt off because it´s like 5 million percent humidity). I´m sick of never feeling clean. I´m sick of always being broke. I´m sick of EVERYONE staring at me because I´m different. I´m sick of hearing, "Ah, Michelle! Tengo muchos días sin verla!" ("Ah, Michelle! I haven´t seen you in a LONG time!" when I feel like replying, "Yeah. there are 5,000 people living here. You´re not going to see me everyday, FYI.") I´m sick of having 2 personalities (my normal gringa personality and my "I have to think about everything I say before I say it so I don´t offend you and/or so you don´t decide to stop working with me" Salvadoran personality. I´m tired of everyone having to know always, what I´m doing, where I´m going, what I´ve been doing, where I´ve been going, etc. I´m sick of people being all excited about something, and then doing NOTHING when it comes time to actually work. I´m sick of seeing (and smelling) trash everywhere. I´m sick of asking someone something and hearing (because they ASSUME I´m speaking English), "No entiendo." ("I don´t understand.") I´m pretty much sick of everything. Now that I´m done with venting, I´m going to explain what happened last week with the Technology project.

1.5 weeks ago
Peace Corps offered a Project Design and Management workshop. I was super excited about it, because I knew there were lots of people in my community that would benefit from it. I initially invited a woman that´s involved in the leadership in her church, is the only management women in the cooperative (the association of farmers), and has attended a university in the states through a leadership scholarship targeted towards poor youth in Central America (only about 10 students from all of Central America are chosen). I also initially invited a man that is working on developing tourism in my town, and who works in the cooperative. They both initially were excited about it, but of course, late in the game, informed me they couldn´t go. So I took the President of the city council, and a woman that is working on the cyber cafe project (as is the president of the city council).

We had a great time at the workshop and made a list of TONS of things that we could do when we returned to get the cybercafe project off and running. Our Fiestas Patronales (week-long religious celebration where tons of vendors come in, music is blared, and carnival rides are available) are this week, so many of our ideas from the workshop centered on using the fiestas opportunity to fundraise.

6 days ago
So, the last meeting before the fiestas was last Tuesday night. I was leaving for Nicaragua on Thursday morning, so I spent the entire day (even though I was super sick) getting everything ready to allow vendors to "sponsor" the project (giving us X% of their profit). We were going to have kind of a battle of the businesses kind of thing. And the winner could win something like candy from the US, or...I don´t know...something else. I made up all of the materials that we needed and talked to a few businesses in town to get feedback to make sure everything would run smoothly. ALL that needed to happen Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, was committee members getting sponsorship from the vendors. (And, the person from the committee that got the most sponsorship would win a prize too.) Anyway, the meeting started, and 2 people showed up - the 2 people I took to the PDM. We started calling the other members of the committee and everyone had an excuse: "I don´t feel good." "I have lots of work to do." in addition to no answers.

Do you know what was decided? Since we didn´t have enough people to find sponsorship (the President is organizing the entire event and I was leaving for Nicaragua), we decided to do a raffle. The most money we can POSSIBLY get for this little raffle is $20. And as far as I can tell, no one besides me will be able to sell tickets. That´s it. That is the entire fundraising idea for the entire event. The meeting ended and I was so frustrated I broke down. And I continued breaking down at other times during the week. Thank goodness I got a trip to Nicaragua to get away. And thank goodness I´m leaving tomorrow for the states.

Today
I know this isn´t a huge deal. I just feel like there is a pattern here of people saying, "Oh yeah! Let´s do it!" But to actually get things done is nearly impossible. And I can´t do everything myself. I mean, I could, but what would the point be? I´m here to FACILITATE things happening. And I can´t so much "facilitate" when people are unwilling to do ANYTHING. I know I´m being broad right now. There are a few people who seem dedicated. But we need more. And right now, that is my problem. Figuring out how to hold people accountable for what they say. I could post something in town that shows what everyone has promised to do, but I really feel like people wouldn´t even care if others didn´t follow through. So what exactly can I use for motivation?? It´s definitely a problem that I will be considering during this trip home. So, when you´re tempted (as I know you will be) to say, "So...how is everything going in El Salvador?", just be ready for my response of, "It´s definitely full of ups and downs and I´m kind of in a ´down´ right now." :)

I can´t wait to see you all!! My trip to Nicaragua was pretty sweet. I´ll post photos soon, but until then, if you want to read about my thoughts (they´re positive), visit here.

Some book reviews...

2006-05-02T16:10:00.000-05:00

So my last entry was typed up rather quickly. I had to go to the bathroom SO BADLY and of course, there were no bathrooms to be found, and I would have to take a 20 minute bus back to my community and walk 5 minutes to my house to use that one. So, I typed up everything SUPER fast (without re-reading as I normally do) and posted. I realize that I introduced a couple of things in the introduction and then said nothing more about them, like the 2 books I've recently finished reading: Ishmael and The Story of B.

When I found out I was leaving for Peace Corps, my friend Naveen said, "You should read Ishmael before you go." So I did. Reading is fun. Everyone does it. But I have to say, these 2 books are amazing. Really, when you finish with them (The Story of B more so than Ishmael in my opinion), you look at the world differently. So, if any of you have some free time and would like to read up, check them out. I definitely recommend reading Ishmael before The Story of B, though.

A BIT ABOUT ISHMAEL
From www.ishmael.org, I found the following information that might inspire you to read the book (in case my recommendation isn't reason enough):

Mr. Quinn is best known as the author of Ishmael, the novel that in 1991 won the Turner Tomorrow Fellowship, established to encourage authors to seek "creative and positive solutions to global problems." Ishmael has been in print continuously since its publication in 1992 and is currently available in twenty languages. Thoroughout the U.S. and Canada and in other countries as well, Ishmael is used as a text in a broad range of classes that include anthropology, ecology, history, literature, philosophy, ethics, biology, and psychology, at age levels from middle school through graduate level.

What others have said about it:

"From now on I will divide the books I have read into two categories -- the ones I read before Ishmael and those read after."
-- Jim Britell, Whole Earth Review

"A thoughtful, fearlessly low-key novel about the role of our species in the planet... laid out for us with an originality and a clarity that few would deny."
-- The New York Times Book Review

"...Suspenseful, inventive and socially urgent as any fiction or nonfiction book you are likely to read this or any other year."
-- The Austin Chronicle

"... fascinating... Quinn's smooth style and his intriguing proposals should hold the attention of readers interested in daunting dilemmas that beset our planet."
-- Publishers Weekly

If you're interested in reading more about The Story of B, click here.

A whirlwind last 3 weeks...

2006-04-26T14:40:00.000-05:00

Wow. What a whirlwind last 3 weeks it`s been! I`ve had 3 visitors from the states, we`ve had the monthly earthquake, I´m experiencing the invasion of the frogs, rainy season has started, English classes are ready to end, we`re getting estimates for the Cyber Cafe, and I`ve finished 2 books: Ishmael and The Story of B. Whew!

PROJECT UPDATES
English classes
Course I is coming to an end. I gave a test last on Monday to the adult class and they did surprisingly very well. I made them write in complete sentences for everything, and their subject verb agreement was good and they remembered to put adjectives BEFORE nouns. We`re getting somewhere! :) After Monday night, however, I`m not sure when we`re going to start course II. (Click here for further details on that...)

Cyber Cafe
We have a location. Do you know how exciting that is?? It definitely needs to be fixed up, but it has great potential. The Cooperativa (association of farmers) is going to let us use it for free and provide us with a security guard free of cost. They`re huge supporters of the idea and I`m ecstatic. Now comes the dreaded part (for me, anyway)...finding the money to fund the project. I hate asking people for money...I know it will come...it`s just the part of the job I dislike. Too bad my man Robinson isn`t here to make that happen... :)

Band
We`re starting again in mid-May. Since I`ll be traveling all over during most of May, I`ll probably start in June with them. But I`m excited about it.

THINGS THAT HAVE HAVE CRACKED ME UP...
The visits...
Wow. So many with so little space here. The three visitors: my mom, my step-dad, Norm and my friend, Jeff. Let`s just say that my mom and Norm stayed for 3 days and on the last day, my mom said, "Michelle, can we just please stay somewhere with air conditioning, a nice bed, and a hot shower? We stayed in the Sheraton. It was AWESOME!! And when she got out of the shower, she said, "That was the BEST shower I have ever had in my life!" I was like, "Mom! You`ve only been here 3 days!!" :) It was memorable. But we had TONS of fun. (See photos above.) We went to my site (obviously), where we attended one of the English classes and ate pupusas, El Pital, the highest point in El Salvador, San Ignacio, a little town located in the northern part of the country where you can see Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala at the same time, to Juayua, where we hiked to waterfalls and swam in them, and to San Salvador.

Then, a week later, my friend Jeff came. Here is what we did:

Day 1:
Arrive and go to my site to attend English class. Jeff`s comments, "Wow! This is cool! I can`t believe I`m in El Salvador!"

Day 2:
Jeff wakes up to Michelle screaming, "Jeff! Get up!! We have to go outside NOW!!" because an earthquake occurs. Eat breakfast and hang out at Lago Coatepeque. Jeff`s comments: "I can`t believe I experienced an earthquake in day 2." Michelle: "You`re getting the FULL experience."

Day 3:
Go to Perquín. This involves taking 2 buses and a pick-up. 1st bus from San Salvador.
[Bus 1 from San Salvador]
Jeff: ...as EVERY seat is taken..."Well, this is a little crowded."
Michelle: "What are you talking about?? This is ROOMY!!"
Jeff: stares at Michelle

[Town where we catch a pick-up, 3 hours later, in like 110 degree heat]
Michelle: ...asks a man how long to Perqín, he answers 20-30 minutes...
...Jeff and Michelle find the pick-up that they need to take. It`s packed full with people hanging out the back and Michelle says to wait for next pick-up...Jeff gets icecream...
...next pick-up arrives (covered in plastic) and is acosted by tons of people...Jeff and Michelle shove their way on with their backpacks...the temperature inside quickly doubles what it is outside due to the nice plastic covering and 30 bodies crammed together...
Michelle: sweating profusely...asks seated woman where she`s going...Woman replies a town about 30 minutes away...Michelle asks if it`s by Perquín, woman laughs and says Perquín is way farther away...Michelle asks how long...Woman says at least an hour...Michelle looks at Jeff and says
Michelle: Are you going to be able to hang out the back like that for an hour?
Jeff: I thought you said it was 20-30 minutes!
Michelle: That`s what the other guy said, but no, it`s an hour.
Jeff: Well, I don`t really have a choice, do I?
Michelle: Sure you do! ...gets the guy next to her to touch her body instead of having the comfortable between space so Jeff can stand INSIDE the pick-up instead of hanging out...
Jeff: ...stares at Michelle during the whole trip with the look of, "THIS is my vacation??"
Michelle: ...laughs...

We arrive to Perquín to find that our hotel room is at the top of this hill. We finally get to it and collapse on the bed. But only for about 10 minutes, when we decide we´d better get going to the War Museum, since it closes at 4. We walk up the mountain into town, breathing hard from the walk. We get directions to the museum that include the local saying, "It`s up up up!" and turn the corner to the street we have to use and see we have another 45 degree incline to hike to the next turn, where we find more of the same. But, we finally make it to the museum, and have a good time going through it. On the way out, Michelle sees a sign for a "view". So, of course, she says, "Hey, let`s go see what the view is!" Jeff stares at her like, "Are you kidding me? You want to walk UP even higher??" So, we did, with a local guide that Jeff remembers from his "jerry curl mullet" and who Michelle remembers as the guy that wouldn`t stop hitting on her. But the view was nice. :) Then, it was back to the hotel, where dinner was eaten and cards were played.

Day 4:
Trip back to San Salvador. On bus #2, Jeff says, "Is that woman behind us carrying a live chicken on her lap?" Michelle answers yes. Jeff says, "Ok. Just checking. It`s the full experience, right?" :) Then, the bus has to stop for a moment to let some cows pass. Jeff says, "Hm. Cows just walking in the middle of the highway. That`s normal." Michelle says, "Hey. Full experience." :) 6 hours later, we get off the bus and take a taxi to the hotel. The whole bus thing...we`re done with that. Jeff isn`t feeling so well. We stay in the hotel room for the rest of the day.

Day 5:
Jeff continues to not feel well. He takes all kinds of medicine. Nothing is working. We end up going to the clinic to have his #2 bathroom stuff tested. He can`t go, so the trip was really more about the photo, which I love. :) We hang in San Sal some more.

Day 6:
Everyone gets off of work for Easter. This means that everyone in the country goes to the beach. Not good since that`s where we`re going too. We finally make it to the beach, to arrive close to sunset and just decide to eat at this restaurant with a good view. Because all the hotels are overbooked, we go back to San Salvador that night.

Day 7:
The celebration week continues. We go again to the beach and this time end up at a beach house where Adolfo`s friends are. They are all staying in hammocks and tents...that are full. We spend the day in a pool with a broken filter (so it had pretty green and brown water), the beach (with waves that were the size of buildings), and went to another house party at night where we danced the night away. Jeff did some "robot" dancing and won the Salvadoran love. That night, we slept on the sand.

Day 8:
And, as did my mom and Norm on their visit, Jeff requested the Sheraton for the last night...and loved it. :)

Ok, that`s it for me at the moment. More to come...
M

Click for MONEY!!

2006-04-05T11:36:00.000-05:00

This is going to be short and sweet. This guy named Mason Gentry in California was inspired by http://betterworldbooks.com/ and thus created a website with a Peace Corps twist. The idea is that Peace Corps volunteers around the world can post entries (like this blog) and earn money from the advertising $$ that Mason raises. So, everytime that someone visits my particular page, we (my community and I) will received X percentage of the advertising $$.

For example, if there are 3 PC volunteers writing, and I get 100 visits, PCV2 gets 200 visits, and PCV3 gets 300 visits, I will get 1/6 (100/600) of the advertising money, PCV2 will get 1/3 (200/600) of the advertising money, and PCV3 will get 1/2 (300/600) of the advertising money. Mason will get some too, but for explanation purposes, I left him out.

Anyway, so...I´m trying this out. I am the first author, so I don´t think there is much advertising out there at the moment, but we`ll see how it works over the next couple of months. PLEASE...click on this website from time to time http://www.developingwords.org/el_salvador/michelle/. (The link is located on the right-hand side of this blog) so I can see if it´s going to generate anything!!

Thanks, all!!
M

A wine purchase and a stress test...

2006-03-28T16:43:00.000-06:00

Because I continue to receive questions from people like, "What do you actually do from day to day down there?", I have decided that from now on, each update will contain 2 sections: (1) Project Updates and (2) Things That Have Cracked Me Up Recently. I think both are important: describing just what it is I'm working on with the community and still including all the crazy things that happen. So...here we go...

PROJECT UPDATES
----------------------------------------------------
Internet/Technology: Yeah. So after a couple of months of going around to every group I could think of in my community, spouting off about how important internet is, I finally was able to hold the 1st Comité de Tecnología de San Isidro meeting in my house. WOOOO-HOOO!! (Go ahead and yell it out; I know you want to!) :) March 14th, 7:00 P.M. I expected about 5 people to show up (1 from the city council, 1 youth, 1 teacher, 1 parent, 1 person from the association of farmers). 10 people showed up! Like, all of the city council plus those other people! And now even more people are showing interest! So, we've created a vision, mission statement, goals, and objectives for the committee and are in the process of developing sites for a CyberCafe in town. I know you're all dying to know what we're all about, so I'm going to include the info below (it's hard to make it sound good in English...direct translations don't always work):

Vision:
- To be the technology leader in the community, to provide access to and knowledge of technology to San Isidro.

Mission:
- To begin and to continue technological projects, to develop solutions with community service providers to improve community services, and to fortify the community through an improved knowledge of technology and the world.

Goals:
- Provide access to technology to the San Isidro population.
- Expand the career opportunities for community members (youth and adults) through education in software and hardware.
- Facilitate access to communication tools to encourage a cultural interchange between the people of San Isidro with people in other cities and countries around the world.
- Present and implement new software for service providers in the community (health, education, etc.) in order to improve community services.
- Obtain and maintain technology equipment and software within San Isidro and to provide support to institutions providing technology services.

Objectives:
- Develop and implement a plan to install Internet in San Isidro.
- Implement a computer lab in the elementary school.
- Present/display and obtain potential software packages to teachers to use in their classes.
- Provide technology classes to the community.
- Develop a constitution.

----------------------------------------------------
English Classes: This is a crowd-pleaser. We have 4 classes per week now, with 2 groups. The adults meet Monday and Wednesday nights and the kids on Saturday and Sunday. There are a couple of things that are really exciting with this project:

(1) every volunteer that talks about English classes talks about how depressing it is to teach English...the first class has 50 people, the next class has 40, the next class has 30, etc. and by the end you're left with like 10. The classes in San Isidro have been exactly opposite...each class is gaining more and more people!

(2) During class #5 with the adults, we gave out evaluation forms asking people specifically how things can be better in class, what they don't like, etc. We didn't get ANY negative comments! People are LOVING the class!!

(3) People are actually learning. It's definitely fun to watch. Each class, students can speak more and more!

----------------------------------------------------
Student Government
This one, I'm sad to say, is non-existent at the moment. It's IMPOSSIBLE to get these students to meet because of conflicting schedules, therefore, they NEVER meet. So...after 6 attempts at getting a meeting going to decide on a CONSISTENT meeting time with NO ONE showing up to the meetings, I decided I'm done with this project until they come ask me for help. There is more important stuff to do!

----------------------------------------------------
Band/Music Classes
SUPER EXCITING!! Yesterday, I met with the band members and introduced them to NOTES and rhythms....READING music. And they LOVED it!! I had my trusty little metronome/tuner that my awesome aunts/uncles/cousins gave to me for xmas so they could hear that tempo actually DOES exist! And I had some lines of music for us to practice with...we started clapping together, but then moved to individuals trying out different lines. Man. When someone clapped the line correctly and I said, "Yep! Good job!", all the other kids would hoot and yell in congrats. It was a fun class!! They have a homework assignment due tomorrow: everyone has to bring in 4 measures (4 counts per measure) worth of music and we're going to clap it out loud.

THINGS THAT HAVE CRACKED ME UP RECENTLY
----------------------------------------------------
The wine purchase:
So Adolfo was coming over to my house to cook dinner with me and among other things, decided to purchase some wine. Now, when you're working on a budget like us here in El Sal, you always go for the boxed wine when purchasing wine. It's cheap and SUPER enjoyable. Yes, that's what excites us here, boxed wine.

Anyway, when he got to my house, we started drinking this wine that I already had in the refrigerator, so I had one glass down when we opened the wine he bought. And then I actually took a look at it. The first thing I saw: the HUGE brand name across the front that read "GROSSO" (pronounced "gross-o" in Spanish).

And, due to the combination of my bluntness and one glass of wine already in me, I said, "GROSSO?? What brand manager would name a wine GROSSO?? I would FIRE someone if he/she named my product something like Grosso!" And, of course without thinking much about what I was actually saying at this point, I said, "And furthermore, what kind of IDIOT actually BUYS a wine named Grosso??!"

Well, needless to say, Adolfo just stared at me for a second in disbelief at what I had just said. Then he said, "Well, it was from Chile! I thought it would be good!"

And I said, "Wait! I didn't mean YOU were an idiot!!" And then added, "How do you know it's from Chile??"

He said, "Because it's on the box."

You know where it is? It's on the small side of the box, in like 2 point font with the Grosso in like 100 point font EVERYWHERE. I was like, "Oh yeah...that "Chile" really stands out on this box..."

And he was like, "Well, it was only $2.50!"

And I said, "Oh, yeah...I bet you thought it was going to be AWESOME then!"

Of course by this time, we were both laughing HYSTERICALLY. I had tears pouring down my face. And yet, he STILL attempted to defend his purchase of the nasty, oops...I forgot the name...Grosso wine. :)

He said, "Well, read the back! It talks about how good it is!"

So I started reading out loud. Let's just say it was JUST like a Saturday Night Live episode when they're SO making fun of something, or making something TERRIBLE sound SUPER good with all kinds of unneeded adjectives and adverbs...I so wish I had the box in front of me so I could share with you the humor that ensued during this part of our conversation. I started laughing even harder (if you can even imagine; I didn't think it was possible) and he just said, "Well, FINE. Then don't drink it!" And then started laughing with me. Good times, man. Grosso wine. A lifetime memory...

**Note: Adolfo was in between jobs during this purchase. Now that he is working for Dell, he promises to keep on buying the Grosso.

----------------------------------------------------

The Peace Corps Stress Test:
So apparently when you start getting older or have heart problems, the doctors put you on a treadmill and monitor your heart's performance, right?

Well, I have recently decided that I want to start getting out to other parts of the country to see how other volunteers live and work. So, this past week, I visited Mike Comstock, a Rural Health and Sanitation volunteer. He lives about 20-30 miles away from me, which translates into 3 buses from my community. Now, before the visit, he said, "When you get here, we can go swim in the river. I usually go everyday...blah blah blah...oh, and we have to hike about 2 KM outside of the city to my house on some hills, so be ready for that."

I said, "Great! We can get some exercise!"

Fast forward to the actual visit. I arrive in his city (which is smaller than my country town). We have lunch. We go to visit these women that he works with that now make and sell candy (small business development project) when we run into another volunteer in the area, Abby. Mike says, "Abby! You should come to my site with us. We can go swimming together." Abby says, "I'll go if someone takes us in a car. I don't want to get raped and robbed." I'm like, "What?? What are you talking about?" And she says, "There is someone that has been robbing people on the road you need to take to get to his site.

I just looked at Mike and said, "You didn't tell me that!" He said, "Well, you didn't ask." PUCHICA.

So, we started walking and ran into the family that lives next to Mike so we decided to walk together. More security. Ok...2 KM?? No. 2 miles. (Mike CLAIMS that he said miles...he didn't!) :) And there is NO flat surface on this walk. 45 degree+ inclines up or down on unpaved super dusty roads. Ok. I'm totally the girl that would work out for like 4-5 hours a day, swimming, lifting weights, doing dryland training and still DIE if I had to start running - especially if it was in a hilly area!! Mike tells me this 2 mile "walk" (I think it should be referred to as a "trek" myself) takes him about 20 minutes. Me? 1 HOUR. Minimum. I thought I was going to DIE going and coming back. I have the Donald Trump living situation compared to him! I told him on the way out, "Oh my goodness, Mike. If I had your site, I would NEVER leave. 2 years of solitude, man. That would be my life! How do you even look normal in the office??" (Because I, of course, am covered with dirt, mud, and sweat after like 10 minutes of this walking.)

I have to say though, we had a blast. (Oh, and no security incidents.) He's definitely OUT there - NO electricity, water, or bathroom facilities. It's definitely harder for a girl to deal with the no bathroom facilities. You guys can point wherever you want, but we girls must go straight down. It's not fun, but is quite memorable. :) His site is GORGEOUS though! (See photos above.) And we did go swimming in the river. It's where he and people in his community bathe. I seriously don't know how they stay clean.

So. Good experience. Good exercise (for me anyway...Mike was bored out of his mind going at my pace listening to me pant like I was ready to collapse at any moment). Good to do....let's say....once every year (while I'm here...then, never again, until I need to do the doctor-prescribed stress test.) :)

Ok, this has been quite long enough. FYI, I'm going to Columbus and Chicago in late May. Drop me a line if you're interested in hanging out! (I figure if you've made it to the end of this email, you probably are worthy enough to hang out with.) :)

Projects are going well...

2006-03-13T12:00:00.000-06:00

Immersion Day Return & Suchitoto Celebration
So, Leah, my mentee, returned to San Isidro (my site) on Saturday, the 4th and we had the BEST 2 days! We went to Sonsonate for lunch and met up with another volunteer, Lisa, and then all returned to San Isidro and enjoyed our own little Happy Hour in my house. That night, I took Leah to eat the world-famous pupusas in my site, and then we just talked late into the night. And the next morning, we headed off to San Salvador, where I gave her a tour of the places to be. We worked out at the Sheraton in the morning, then went to the office, then to a mall in the area, then we headed off to Suchitoto with Adolfo and his friend Jose to celebrate the 45th anniversary of Peace Corps with other volunteers and staff. For some reason, I thought the Suchitoto celebration would be...what's the word...well, I'm going to use fun because I can't think of anything else. Apparently, there was only going to be music in the beginning of it, which we missed, so it was just a whole bunch of volunteers in this empty building, with a few Salvadorans selling stuff. No music. No games. No speeches (or maybe we missed those). It was pretty lame, so we left pretty darn fast and returned to San Salvador.

English Classes
So, we FINALLY started the English classes in my site. There are 2 classes, an adult class and a youth class. The adult class started on Monday, the 6th. It meets twice a week, from 7-9 PM. And it is a HUGE hit!! The class (well, so far), has been SO fun and people are really learning the language! It's exciting to watch Salvadorans teaching other Salvadorans in an active learning environment, since normally, classes consist of the teacher dictating and students copying. Anyway, during the 2nd class, where we learned greetings, we did an activity where we made 2 circles, one inside of the other. And we played music. The inside circle people danced in place, while the outside circle people danced while walking to the right. When the music stopped, the outside circle would stop moving and face the inside circle. Then each person would introduce him/herself to the person across from them on the inside circle. It was SUPER fun! And we played "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" or whatever the name of that song is. So we were all going crazy dancing. Anyone want to come visit and help out during a class?? :)

Tourism Opportunities
On Thursday, the 9th, Will, a worker from the Cooperativa in my site, took Adolfo and I all around the area to scope out potential tourism sites. And, oh my goodness! We went to some BEAUTIFUL places!! We viewed the Izalco volcano from a couple of different angles. We walked over lava rocks from the last eruption of this volcano. We visited caves that are HUGE and FILLED with bats. We visited the land of the former owner of all of the land (after the civil war, the land owners were required to give away X% of their land to the people since so few people owned the majority of the land and resources) and saw the remnants of his mansion. We just went all over and it was all GORGEOUS. So now I'm all excited about working on some sort of tourism project. And Will said there were tons of other places that we could go, but couldn't due to time that day. But we're scheduling another outing soon...

Another Beach Visit...
Remember the amazing beach house that I talked about in my last update? On Friday, Adolfo took me to the neighbor's house. And this one had steps down to the beach, with a natural stone pool built into the beach. So, when the tide is high, the pool is filled with ocean water, and when the tide goes down, you have a pool right on the beach to swim in. It is AWESOME!! Anyway, we hung out in that pool all morning on Saturday. We played cards, drank, listened to music, talked...it was a BLAST!

Going Away Party...
On Sunday, the 12th, I attended a going away party for 2 volunteers that I've become REALLY good friends with. They served in Panama and Ecuador in the Peace Corps when it was first created, had their first child WHILE SERVING (now THAT takes some guts), returned to the states where they obtained their masters' degrees and worked in Education, then retired, joined the Peace Corps again, and served in the Dominican Republic and are now ending their service this Wednesday. They are SUPER fun and inspiring people and we had a great going away party for them. We met up at a staff member's house that located in a small community in the country, which allows them to have TONS of land, covered in gardens and guest houses. (They told us there are over 900 stairs within the property.) We ate a magnificent lunch, listened to an AMAZING mariachi band, talked, drank, and just laughed together. And we presented the leaving couple with a document created by a local artist, thanking them for their 30 years of service to Peace Corps. It was AMAZING!! And I cried like crazy. I'm going to miss them SO MUCH!! The only downside of the whole day was the effect of the dogs on me. We were outside the entire time, so I didn't think there would be a problem with my allergies and the dogs. I was wrong. I was wheezing and struggling to breathe ALL NIGHT. It was terrible, but totally worth it since I got the chance to say goodbye to some amazing volunteers here.

Memorable moments from the last 2 weeks...
And, I think the favorite part of each email...the crazy stuff that has happened to me recently. Here's the most recent list:

1) Adolfo has an open-air jeep. I'm talking no doors, no windows...just the base of a jeep and everything open. And this is AWESOME when you're driving through the country, because you feel so free and can really enjoy the beautiful scenery. However, while returning to San Isidro on Monday night (March 6th), we came across a fire that was burning RIGHT next to the highway. We just saw smoke and hot inders blowing all over the interstate. But there was no way around it, so we just had to drive straight through. Oh my goodness. I took the duck and cover option...it felt like we were driving THROUGH a fire!! But, luckily, no physical harm done. Just a good story for back home. :)

2) When I decided to join Peace Corps, my dad went crazy with things like, "Do you know you're going to have bugs a foot long crawling all over you at night?!" "Do you know you're not going to get to bathe?!" "Do you know you're going to be so sick that you're going to be laid out in your bed for 2 weeks thinking you're going to die??!" Stuff like that. And my response to all of that was, "Well, other people can live there for their entire lives and not have a problem. So what does that say about me if I can't handle it for 2 years?" Well, I had my first shivery icky bug experience...I was taking a shower in San Salvador (of course with cold water) and as I was rinsing the shampoo out of my hair, I felt something on my foot. I got the water out of my face, looked down, and saw this cockroach crawling all over me. I did the "oooOOOooo!!" sound and the body shiver thing. Ugh. I don't like that. :)

3) And this attached photo is attached especially for my baby bro. Bennigans is SO GOOD!! :)

Anyway, those are the updates for the moment...stay tuned for more fun stuff!! :)

Miss ya!

The last 2 weeks...

2006-03-03T10:01:00.000-06:00

2/17/06: BUS MEMORIES...GOOD FOR A LIFETIME...
I'm on a bus from San Salvador to San Vicente, coincidentally it's the same bus that my friend Jared is on and even more odd: there is an open seat for us to sit in. Because we're leaving for the weekend, to meet all the newbie volunteers, we have our huge backpacks. And, of course, we're on the kiddie size bus, with both of us not even coming close to fitting into the seat. Although the width of the seat is lacking, it's wide enough to comfortably (as comfortable as you can imagine) fit our backpacks next to us. We come to a stop on the outskirts of San Salvador where the cobrador (the guy that collects the money) informs us we have to move over for the people that just got onto the bus. I move close to the window and sit straight, causing me to lift and bend my legs up so I can fit and Jared says, "I can't fit in that seat! Why the heck do WE have to move??!" So he makes the new person sit between us. Sure enough, as we pull off, I look around the bus and EVERY OTHER seat that's the same as ours has 2 people. I vocalized this and Jared just went crazy again. "YEAH. Why did WE have to be the ones to move??!!" with much irritation. I start laughing uncontrollably...but that only lasts for about 30 seconds, until I realize that I'm going to be stuck in that position (basically my body in a ball, with my huge backpack on top) for the next hour and a half. THAT was a memory...

2/18/06: MINI-ME HAS ARRIVED...
Do you remember all of those emails that I sent right after I arrived here in country? All of those crazy experiences that I was priviledged to share with you? Well, I guess I've become the veteran because now I'm a mentor to a newbie, Leah, that is going through all those fun experiences. I met her for the first time on the 18th of this month and she's AWESOME! The first meeting should have been a sign of what was to come...we dressed exactly alike...black sleeveless shirt and jeans, and both had similar haircuts (although, after my haircut debacle in December, I have to say, her's is WAY cuter!). She's 22, recently graduated from Arizona State University, and is from Minnesota/Alaska. We met for the first time on Mentor Day in the training center. When we saw each other, we yelled, "Hey!!", ran up and hugged and one of the other trainees was like, "What the heck is this?? Look at you two...it's like you're sisters!"

Anyway, we (the oldies) talked about our day to day lives as volunteers with the newbies. And when we got to safety, I started talking about how I'm super careful with stuff, like how I carry my flash drives in my bra. And Bri, the trainer, said, "What do you mean?? You have stuff pointing out of your bra all the time??!" And I said, "NO!! Geez! I'm wearing them right now!" And Bri said, "Well, I guess you DO have some room to store them! You've got HUGE jugs!" Nice intro for the newbies...

Anyway, after the long discussion, we (the veterans) whipped out a pinata...a dilapidated/sketch-looking Spongebob Squarepants and I said, "OK. We got a pinata to welcome you all to the country. And we know that this Spongebob looks a little scary. But we just want to tell you that it's just like your experience here in El Salvador. It seems a little scary right now, but you just have to pound away for 2 years, and you'll get through it and maybe even find a few surprises in your experiences, just like you'll find some surprised inside this pinata." I think I was the only one that liked that comment, but I didn't care...they were going to hear it! :)

2/19/06: TOURIST ATTRACTION SUCHITOTO
During Mentor Day, one of the other volunteers found out where my site is and just went on and on and on about how lucky I am because it's so beautiful. Well, on the 19th, I had the opportunity to visit Tamar's site (another volunteer from my group) next to Suchitoto, one of the biggest tourist sites in the country. Oh my goodness. Her site is forested, overlooks this beautiful lake, and is super rural. I can't hold a candle to that! We took a ferry across the lake to her site, and besides being able to take in the breath-taking view, we had the pleasure of dancing with this drunk woman that just found us irrisistable when we just stood still taking in the view. Tamar is working on a rabbit project, which means they have 3 rabbits (one male and two females) and they breed them. When the baby rabbits are 4 weeks old, they become food. I found it to be very interesting, although I don't think I could be too involved with that project...seeing baby rabbits and then knowing they're getting killed for food. It's really helping out the community, though.

2/20/06: DON'T FORGET ABOUT US...
When I got back to San Salvador, I visited the Ministry of Education so I could visit with the National Director of Technology again. I gave him a solicitud about a month ago for a computer lab in the school in my community and hadn't heard anything. So I walked into his office and said, "Caaarrrllos! How's it going?" Yadda yadda yadda..."You haven't forgotten about San Isidro, have you?" "That would be impossible while you're there." Yadda yadda yadda. He's coming to visit soon. :)

2/21/06: TEACHING ENGLISH...
Remember crazy Mauricio from the English workshop on the beach? The one that started running around the room screaming at people to sing his song? Well, he has recently been hired to teach English in a school, so he invited me to sit in one day during his classes. I was welcomed SO warmly by ALL of the students. I got a letter from EVERY single grade, in English, welcoming me to their school, with all of their names on the welcome letter. Super fun. We start teaching Engligh in my community on Monday! The hardest thing is that I am not teaching. I won't do it for sustainability reasons. The people that I've met that I can converse with are teaching it. It should be interesting...wish us luck!

2/24/06: WHIPPING TALES...
In the morning, I met with a guy in San Salvador about the internet project. I'm getting super pumped about it, but it's going to be really expensive in the beginning I think. The first Technology Committee meeting (the group that I formed within my community) is March 14th. I'm making them make the plan for how this is going to happen (which is incredibly hard for me...I just want to DO it!). Anyway, in the afternoon, I went with Adolfo to meet his friend Bass and his girlfriend Brooke (both from New York) at Bass' godfather's beach house. OH MY GOODNESS! This place was AMAZING!! Imagine Pottery Barn catalogs, and you have an idea of what this house was like. About 7-8 rooms, all with bathrooms, the back all open, stairs down to a private pool which was on a cliff overlooking the ocean. That night and the next morning were SOOOO fun!!!! I was like, "HOW are we in El Salvador right now??!" And the next morning, when Adolfo and I were swimming, we watched whales playing in the ocean right in front of us! They were whipping their tales all around...for like 30 minutes! It was AWESOME!!

3/2/06: A VISIT TO MY SITE...
Leah (my awesome mentee) arrived at my site yesterday to have her immersion day experience. I was determined to make hers memorable because of all the fun she's going to have with the family I selected; I thought my "marriage proposal/guy getting into bed with me" experience was ok not to repeat with her. :) So she's up in Santo Tomas, the caserio (community even smaller than mine) up the hill from my community, right now spending 2 days in the country. She's coming back to my house tomorrow morning, and we're going to attend a youth camp, eat some lunch with 2 other volunteers, and then eat pupusas and talk!

Ok. This email is quite long enough, I think. If you want more details (I'm seriously trying to give highlights), let me know. :)

Hope you're all doing well!

Miss ya!

Getting older...

2006-02-16T10:34:00.000-06:00

I've had kind of a roller coaster week with emotions, so I'm not going to get into all that. But, I definitely want to get into the topic of getting older. That's the theme for this week. The thing that's made me laugh the most. 2 stories. Short update, but totally worth it.

Story 1: The dreaded letter...
This is am email that I received from my dad this past week...

I got some very disappointing mail over the weekend.

And I'm sure that you will also have this experience, and much sooner than you might think. I had a pretty big pile of mail after being gone for a week. As I got about halfway through it, there it was. I have heard about it, but you can never quite prepare for the shock. A personalized invitation to AARP, and at 49 yrs.

Holy cow.

On a bright note, your spouse is automatically included with full membership. So please everyone, help me welcome Liz as a full-fledged member of AARP!!

This coming from the guy that gave me a birthday card on my 21st birthday that said, [outside] "Eat healthy, exercise a lot, and take care of your body..." [inside] "...because the better you look, the better I look!"

HILARIOUS.

Story 2: Who is THAT?
Remember the story about the guy who asked me if my LITTLE BROTHER taught me how to shuffle cards (because obviously a girl has to learn it from a man)?? Well, that guy (Hugo) visited my house for the first time the other day. Here is what happened:

Hugo: I like your house.

Michelle: Thanks. Me too.

Hugo: [Looks at all the photos on the wall. Points to my best friend, Katie.] Is this your...............mom?

Michelle: [Erupts in laughter.] No!! That's my best friend!! Geez!!

Hugo: Well, I didn't know! She looks just like you!!

Michelle: Hold on. [Continues the laughter...tears start flowing...breathing is difficult. Calls Katie and puts her on speaker phone.]

Katie: Hello?

Michelle: [through bursts of air] Hey, Katie! Remember that guy that asked me if Jeff taught me how to shuffle because women can't learn that on their own?

Katie: [smiling] Yeah...

Michelle: Well, he's in my house right now for the first time. And he just said, 'Is this your......mom?'

Katie: WHAT??!! HOW OLD DOES HE THINK I AM??!!!

Michelle: [barely able to talk...translates question]

Hugo: [Stares at Michelle thinking, "Why is this gringa always laughing or yelling at me?]

Katie: IT BETTER NOT BE MORE THAN 27!! I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS!! You know, I am finding grey hairs all over the place. I can't take this right now!!

Michelle: [continues to die laughing...stomach pains...tears all over...]

Hugo: [staring at Michelle]

Katie: I MEAN, HOW OLD DOES HE THINK I AM??!!

Michelle: [again, barely able to translate]

Hugo: 27.

Michelle: He says 27.

Katie: Well, at least he knows how to answer!! Ok. I'm over it. But I'm kind of getting irritated at you for finding this so humorous!!

Michelle: [continues with the laughter and says goodbye]

Priceless stuff here. :)

Miss ya! More updates soon!!

Ok, I´m still alive!!

2006-02-09T15:35:00.000-06:00

Ok. I´m still alive. I just checked my email and realized that I´ve received a lot of questions relating to why I haven´t posted anything in a while. Sorry. I´ve been busy!! So...here are some of the highlights from the last 3 weeks!!

I´m not good enough??
2 married volunteers in Sonsonate (the big city in my state) needed to finish a world map mural in one of the schools where they worked. Carmen, the wife, found out that she had a meeting in the capitol, so Tom asked me if I would be willing to be the "writer" for the country names and oceans. I was like, "OK. I can do that." And he said, "Well, how is your writing? Is it good?" And I was like, "It´s...normal..." And he said, "Maybe we should look at a little sample." and handed me a pen and paper. Carmen was like, "You´re making her AUDITION for this job??" I was laughing so hard...someone just like me!! Anyway, I passed. So the next day, we spent about 5 hours adding another coat in some countries, outlining the countries, and writing in all of the country names. Tom told me what each country was (in Spanish), and I wrote the names in. And the most memorable moment was when Tom picked up the can of blue paint and started painting over the names of the oceans because my font wasn´t good enough!!!

Ok...I´m leaving part of the story out...When we got to the oceans, he said, "Ok. The font needs to be bigger for the oceans." So we used a bigger marker and I wrote each in all caps. I told him that I didn´t like how it looked as we took a break for lunch and that my writing was much better when it was smaller. As we ate lunch, he said, "You know, I think it would look better smaller too." Anyway, I like leaving that part out when I´m talking to people that know him. It´s way funnier when they think he just went off on my work. :)

Baptist Event
A couple of weeks ago, about 10 Americans visited my site with an organization called Compassion International. These people were making sure the the church they supported was using the funds correctly and were meeting new kids that were going to be "sponsored" (basically receive money for schooling, supplies, etc.). It was crazy to realize that all of those commercials that we see on television for helping out needy kids were for the kids that I work with everyday. Anyway...it was a big eye opener and something I´ve thought about a lot since.

Just TRY it!!
When I was growing up, my friends used to always make fun of my cooking. Now, I still will proclaim that I can cook. However, a recent event led me back into all of those fun childhood memories...I decided I was really missing deviled eggs. I never really loved them in the states, but one day I started thinking about them and decided I just had to make some. So, after contacting various people to find out how to actually MAKE them, I went to the grocery store and purchased the necessary ingredients. I was thinking, "This will be great! I´ll make deviled eggs for this upcoming party at my house with the leaders of the Ministry of Education!" For some reason, I decided I would try out the recipe with a small number of eggs before going big-time, so one random afternoon, I hard boiled six eggs. Long story short...oh man. They were TERRIBLE. The mixture of the insides of the eggs with the mayonnaise and mustard was...well...interesting. And none of the white parts would stand up the way they´re supposed to. It looked like a plate full of regurgitated something. I don´t even know what to call it. And my friend was visiting, who had never had deviled eggs, and I was like, "Hey, do you want to try these? I love them!" And he took one look at the plate and was like, "I like you and don´t want to offend you, but that plate is the most disgusting looking thing I´ve ever seen. There is NO way I´m eating ANYTHING off that plate!" I was like, "Come on...it looks worse than it is..." Anyway, THAT memory will stick with me for awhile...

Music Lessons
This is SUPER exciting. I am teaching the band director how to write music and relationships between notes, etc. and he is teaching me how to play the trumpet!! During our first class, I played a full scale and was SOOOOOOO excited!! I almost sent an update the next day to everyone about it, until I realized that that was all I had to say. But anyway, I´m PSYCHED about this!! When I go back to the states, I´ll play a little something for all of you. (Ok....it will probably be something like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star...but it´s SOMETHING!!) :)

A site visit...
After six months in my site, I finally decided to visit someone else in my group. I spent one night and the next day with fellow volunteer Rachel. We talked with people in her community, she gave me a tour, I sampled the pupusas in her site (I still contend my site has the best in the country), and we played cards. As we were waiting for the bus to take me away the next day, we had the following conversation:

Rachel: I think you should hang out with us when my family comes.

Michelle: Why?

Rachel: Because you remind me of my mom.

Michelle: Why?

Rachel: Because she LOVES playing cards and so do you and she´s really competitive. Competitive tot he point when we don´t want to play with her anymore. And then she lays this guilt trip on us about how she does all this stuff for us and how she only asks for one thing...for us to play cards with her...and then we play and have to deal again with how competitive she is.

Michelle: Yep. I think we would get along just fine. :)

Student Government
So, the director of the school told me that he thought it might be a good idea for me to work a bit with the student government. So I went to the first meeting. And OH MY GOODNESS. At the end of the meeting, I was like, "I´m the new advisor for this organization." I mean, I didn´t say that, but I was sure thinking it. Here is what happened:

President: Welcome. We need to do 2 things during this meeting. We need to elect representatives for the CDE and we need to elect the new directiva (leadership) of student government. Do you all want to have campaigns or do you want to decide here?

[They decided to decide in the meeting.]

President: Ok. We´ll start with the student government leadership. Raise your hand if you want to be on the leadership team.

[No one raises a hand.]

President: Ok. We´ll go around the room. [to person #1] Who do you think would be good?

[Person #1 chooses someone. Selected person declines. This continues for about 1/4 of the room.]

Michelle: Can you explain what student government is and what each position does?

President: Student government is the organization that represents students. The president runs the meetings. The vice president runs the meetings when the president isn´t available. The secretary records what happens at meetings. The treasurer keeps track of the money, because we have money. And the other person is an alternate.

["Nominations" continue...finally people start accepting. 5 people accept.]

President: Ok. We have 5 people. Nominations are closed.

Michelle: Why? We can write more names on the board if people have interest.

[No one else raises their hand for interest.]

President: Person #1, who do you want to vote for?

Person #1: Alex.

[President makes a mark next to Alex´s name.]

Michelle: What position are we voting for??

President: President. Person #2, who do you want to vote for?

Person #2: Alex.

[President makes a mark next to Alex´s name.]

Michelle: Let´s do a secret vote.

[Voting goes...blah blah blah...Alex wins...President writes "president" next to Alex´s name, "vice president next to the person´s name who received the 2nd highest number of votes, "secretary" next to 3rd, etc.]

Michelle: What happens if someone who gets secretary doesn´t want to be secretary?

President: Then that person can choose another person to replace him/her.

[And the meeting continues in this manner for about another hour.]

Let´s just say we have already had a meeting in my house with the leadership group and we are now in the process of writing a constitution. :)

Parent Meeting
About every 3 months, there is a parent meeting in the school when the director talks about stuff that´s going on. For the first meeting of the year, about 600 parents showed up. So the director reviewed the budget for the year, talked about projects, and elections were held for alternates on the school board. Then the director gave a brief overview of me and why I´m here again and asked me to explain what projects I´m working on. I talked about English and Internet. After about 5 minutes of explaining the English project, I said, "Do you understand what I´m saying?" And like 5 people shouted, "Yes!" with much energy. And I was like, "PUCHIKA!! I´ve been here for 6 months and 5 out of 600 of you understand me!! Well, after the meeting these 5 people can explain to the rest of you what I´m talking about!!" :) Everyone was DYING laughing. Guess I need my regular reminder of how far I have to go with the Spanish...

Ok. I think this has been quite long enough...I´m sure there will be plenty of new good stories soon... :)

Miss ya!!
M

WE´RE GOING TO SING A SONG!!!

2006-01-19T10:41:00.000-06:00

A seminar in English, the first day of school, and presentations to the community about my first 2 projects. That´s what has been going on this past week. Yes, I FINALLY have determined what I will be working on!! Oh, and my family took some good photos when they were here that illustrate some things they were wondering about. They´re on Snapfish. Click on "View Photos" on the right and then choose "12/05 Family Visit" to view them. They have captions.

Why this is the toughest job I´ll ever love...
Last week, I attended a 3 day workshop in English. Each of us (volunteers) were allowed to take 1-2 people from our community to learn about new creative ways to teach English. We met in the Peace Corps office in San Salvador and another volunteer, Jared, asked me, "So, who are you going to take to the workshop?" I said, "Well, I´m bringing 2 people that are REALLY energetic. I mean, REALLY..." We took a private bus to Playa Pimental, a beach in the state of La Paz, and arrived at this GORGEOUS hotel right on the beach. It had tons of greenery, animals, hammocks, pools, etc. We couldn´t believe how nice it was!

Anyway, we started the sessions, which were all very informative. But in the afternoon, there was one session that was incredibly boring. Anyway, people were falling asleep, drawing, text messaging, etc. So, one of the community members that I brought, Mauricio, stood up in the middle of the session and just started running around the room screaming, "WE´RE GOING TO SING A SONG!! WHEN I SAY YES, YOU SAY NO! YES!" Silence. With everyone in the room just staring at him. I mean, there was no warning. Nothing. Just standing up and screaming and running around the room. But my goodness. He had everyone in that room shouting by the end of it. He just kept running around, jumping, and yelling until everyone was responding. I was laughing SO hard; I had tears rolling down my face. And I looked over at Jared, the volunteer who had asked me who I was bringing, and he just looked at me and shook his head. Later he told me, "Michelle, I never thought I´d meet someone more energetic than you. But you´ve managed to find someone." And I said, "I´m not even in the same CATEGORY as Mauricio!!" Of course, each day after the sessions ended, there were bonfires, there was karaoke, dancing, lots of talking and laughing, etc. And, of course, Mauricio stealing the show with his one-man acts at every turn. At the beginning of the conference, everyone was saying, "Oh, and where are you from?...Oh, you´re with Michelle..." and by the end, I was asked, "Where is your site again?...Oh, you´re with MAURICIO." To which I was responding, "No...he´s with ME!!" :) Anyway, our group was definitely memorable for everyone. There is just a glimpse into the craziness that ensued for the 3 days. I woke up Friday, the day after the conference ended, and felt like CRAP. Nausea, diarrhea,...everything. So I just stayed inside all day. But around 7, Mauricio came to my house and told me that he had to talk, so I reluctantly listened.

He said:

I went to work today and everyone was saying, "We haven´t seen you in so long. You look tired. What´s going on?" And so I explained that we went to the English workshop and I was learning how to better teach English. And the director said, "Really? We´re looking for someone to teach English to the security workers and janitors at MetroCentro (the big mall) in Sonsonate. Are you interested?" I showed them my diploma and met with the MetroCentro director in Sonsonate and now I have another job!! I´m going to be teaching 2 hours a week, 2 days a week, for 2 months and they´re going to pay me $300 per month!! Michelle, can you believe that?? And I can keep my regular job, too! For the first time in my life, I feel like I´m going to be doing something that is EXACTLY what I want to be doing! And I have you to thank for it! You´ve changed my life and I just want to say thank you.

Wow. What do you say to THAT??!! It was amazing. The guy that is ALWAYS joking about stuff, always on stage. To hear him say that, in total seriousness, beaming at me because he was so excited. THAT is what Peace Corps is all about.

Inauguration...
For the first day of school here, which starts in January and runs through mid-November, they have "inauguration", where the director and some keynote speakers are heard and teachers are introduced. All of the students go to the high school and listen to all of this, and that is their first day. Not much to report on this...just interesting to attend.

My work plan...finally!
Ok. Everyone and their brother has been asking, "So what do you DO there??" So, now that I feel like I know the community and have been able to identify things that the community needs, I have decided that I´m going to start with 2 major projects: (1) a community effort to teach/learn English, and (2) creating a technology committee that will bring Internet to the community (with smaller projects that include getting a computer lab in the school, etc.).

So, this week, I´ve given presentations to various community groups about these 2 plans and how I came to decide on them, and why I think they´re important for the community, and what the heck they are. (Everyone has HEARD of Internet, but most people have NO idea what it is.) The most memorable presentation occurred at the ADESCO meeting (like a city council meeting). I had a PowerPoint presentation all ready to describe Internet and its benefits, etc. And, of course, the laptop decided that the monitor needed to stop working. So...after 30 minutes of messing around to try to fix it, I gave up. So much for the "computers are so easy to use" speech. Anyway, I ended up just talking about it, using my body as the visual aid to describe how it worked. And I was pretty nervous. I was thinking, "These people are going to say, ´We don´t need that here!´" So, at the end, I said, "So, I´ve started to develop a technology committee, and it´s pretty important that there is a representative from this group. So, does anyone have an interest in joining?" And EVERY SINGLE PERSON wanted to be on it!! I was like, "YES!!!" Just another example of how AWESOME my community is!! We´re going to receive a presentation in a couple of weeks with 3-5 options of how we can get Internet in San Isidro, and I´m going to ask this group to develop a plan to make it happen (select which option is best, figure out how to build an Internet cafe, etc.) Anyway, I´m PSYCHED about this project!! And yesterday, the director of the school and I went to the Ministry of Education to formally request a computer lab in the school. He wrote the formal request and I made some edits and added the Internet and how we wanted to use it as a second informational page. After the meeting, the director said, "Well, I can tell you that the decision is going to be made in the next couple of months as to which schools are going to receive these labs, and I´d say you have a 90-95% chance of getting one." AWESOME!! And if you want to know about the English project, let me know. I can talk about it in future postings. This one is getting pretty long...

And finally, the thing that has made me laugh the most this week
(well, besides Mauricio running around the room screaming at the English teachers)...
I received a Christmas card yesterday from the president of my old company. It took a month to get here, but I got it! Anyway, the letter inside started out, "Can you believe it? The last Christmas letter I sent out was in 1993..." Yeah. I don´t even want to think about what that means in terms of when I´ll receive the promised recommendation letter from him...or what it´s going to say!

Ok. That´s it for me right now...

Happy New Year!!!

2006-01-07T12:35:00.000-06:00

Wow! So we made it to 2006! I went to the beach on the 30th, then to San Salvador in clubs to celebrate my favorite holiday of the year. It was loads of fun! And the places we went were NICE! It seemed like I was right back in the states again (except, of course, that I couldn´t hang out with you!). Oh, and I got a bit of sun at the beach...so much that these random guys in the hotel where I was staying for New Year´s Eve were like, "Wow! What happened to you?? You look like a lobster!" So that was pretty...awkward. :) No, no, not really. I showed them the photos from the beach and we ended up going out to dinner together. 2 guys from Canada and 1 from Japan that just met each other in Guatemala during separate vacations and decided, "Let´s go to El Salvador!" They were pretty darn fun. So, that was my fun New Year´s stuff.

Then, on the fourth, I had a site visit from a guy that is helping me with our internet project (bringing internet to my site). He came to see how San Isidro is laid out, what the distances are between locations, etc. It was AWESOME and I feel like I'm actually making some progress on something!! But, I was waiting in a central location in the community, and one of the women said to me (right before he arrived), "Michelle, your forehead is peeling pretty badly." Remember that sunburn? Yeah, well it decided to start peeling right before one of my super important meetings! So I said, "Ok, I'll be back in about 5 minutes." I ran home, got out a pumice stone and scrubbed my face like mad! And it HURT, but I was like, "It's only going to hurt for a second, and it will get rid of all of this flaking skin." So I kept it up. Then I washed my face with soap, went into my room, and used my astringent. HUGE mistake! Even though some of you out there (Katie and Kathy Russell) think I ENJOY putting myself through pain, it's NOT TRUE!! And I thought it hurt when I was scrubbing like mad!! Normally, if I put alcohol on an open wound, I might tear up a bit. This caused severe uncontrollable crying! But I just kept thinking, "Ok. It's only going to hurt for a second, and then I'll be fine." Ok. Note to all of you thinking that this might be a good idea...you will feel like someone is stabbing you in the head (or whatever area you do this to) for the ENTIRE day!! Oh my goodness!!!! But, trust me, there was no more flaking, so I guess I completed what I set out to do. :) And that night, we had a going away party for one of the gals in my group that decided to leave early. It was really sad; I´m going to miss her a lot! But...we definitely had a good time saying goodbye (note the tango shot)... :)

The downside (beyond the stabbing pain throughout the day) is that 2 days later (as I found out yesterday), you will develop a huge brownish scar from the alcohol burn that you induced. Now, it won't seem THAT bad to you, but apparently to everyone else that you possibly run into, it will seem like you're on the edge of dying. So, the next day I got up and found that I didn't have a voice (guess we had a REALLY good time). And I needed to meet with one of my counterparts. During this meeting, my dad called and said when he heard my voice, "Man! You sound TERRIBLE!" and told me that he was having problems understanding me. Ok. That didn't bode well. People can't understand me in ENGLISH when I can't talk?? I can't even imagine how my counterpart possibly understood my gringa-spanish without a voice!!

So, skip to the next day. I wake up to find (1) I still don't have a voice, and (2) the huge dark brown scar across my forehead. And on this day, I had a meeting with my OTHER counterpart. :) Yeah. It just always is a good time down here. So I thought, "Ok. No big deal. I'm in a 3rd world country and I know these people. It won't be a problem." So I just threw on some clothes and walked the 0.25 mile to the school. I can't even BEGIN to tell you how many times people, as they passed, stopped and said, "Oh my goodness!! What HAPPENED to your head??" And then, just as I began to explain with my non-existent voice, I got to hear them interrupt me and say, "Oh my goodness!! What's wrong with your voice?? Do you have grepa (cold/flu)?!" Seriously. About 20 times of explaining all of this, each time wearing my non-existent voice down even more! Needless to say, I went STRAIGHT home after that meeting and didn't leave my house for the rest of the day.

And today, my voice seems to be back (sort of), the big brown scar seems to be gone (sort of), and I'm having a jolly 'ole time in the office working on my quarterly report and a presentation on what the heck the internet is. So...that's my drama for now. :)

That´s it for now...more to come...

** Oh, and I need to say that the photos on Snapfish are not all mine! I got in big trouble the other day from a friend that was like, "Hey! I notice that I received no credit for my photos!" So...in the New Year's photos...the ones with names, not numbers, as the titles were taken by my friend Feef. And soon, the same will be true with additional photos that are added in the Christmas albums...my parents took those.

5 Days of GREAT memories...

2005-12-29T10:37:00.000-06:00

So the family visited. And they lived through it. And they even LIKED it!! :) I just finishing downloading all of the photos that I took from the trip onto Snapfish, so you can click on "View Photos" on the right-hand bar and view all the fun memories. (But, FYI, the first day´s photos (from 12/22) are all listed with a date of 12/23/05.) Here is just a quick recap of some of the highlights...

12/22 (Thursday)

Family arrives in airport. 30 seconds after leaving airport, we arrive at Avis to pick up the rental car. The woman doesn´t speak in English, so I´m translating for everyone. The first word out of her mouth after locating our information is "fijateque". I stopped her before she could say ANYTHING else, and said to my family, "Did everyone hear that? She said ´fijateque´." My dad was like, "Oh, no, I didn´t hear that. I´m glad you pointed it out, but I don´t know if I want to hear the rest..." I turned back to the worker and said, "Ok. Continue." And what does she say? "Fijateque, we don´t have a rental for you." I could hardly translate what she said back to English because I was laughing so hard. 30 seconds out of the airport and that´s what we encounter. The first El Salvador experience for my family, and it begins with fijateque. So my dad says, somewhat irritated at this point, "I called yesterday and verified that they had it and they said everything was in order." Through my laughing (and crying and choking by this point - which I´m sure wasn´t helping the situation), I said, "Fijateque, we´re in El Salvador now." They all just looked at each other and my dad was like, "Ok. I need to call Avis in the US." So I gave him my cell phone and hooked him up with that, continuing to laugh hysterically. Long story short, 45-60 minutes later, we ended up getting a rental car. It was a 5 passenger car, not the SUV that we had reserved or the mini-van that they TOLD us we were getting inside after all the fijateques were done. During all of this drama, my baby bro and I were re-enacting the Seinfeld episode where Jerry is at the rental car counter to pick up his car and is told that they don´t have a car for him. The conversation proceeds like this:

Jerry: What? You don´t have a car? But I have a reservation!

Worker: I understand that you have a reservation.

Jerry: Do you know what a reservation IS?

Worker: (irritated) Yes, sir. I´m aware of what a reservation is.

Jerry: I don´t think you are. You see, a reservation has 2 parts. The first part is the TAKING of the reservation. You have that part down. You´re really good at that part. The second part, however, the HOLDING of the reservation, you just don´t seem to understand. And, that´s REALLY the most important part...the HOLDING (shaking fists to emphasize) of the reservation.

Anyway, all of this drama set the groundwork for some pretty good stories later in the trip...

So after working everything out, we made our way to the beach. It was SO nice and relaxing! We enjoyed the waves during the sunset, had dinner, then ate breakfast on the beach the next day. It was AWESOME!!

12/23 (Friday)
After having a lazy morning at the beach, we finally made it back to the car and drove to San Salvador, where we checked into the hotel, then visited MultiPlaza (a huge new mall) where we ate lunch. Baby bro and dad couldn´t stop talking about how nice the mall was, noting the waxed floors in the parking garage as evidence. Yeah, it definitely doesn´t fit into the normal El Salvador life, but it´s nice to get away sometimes by visiting.

After lunch, we left for "Centro", the area in the middle of San Salvador where all the vendors exist...the "market" as they refer to it here. However, as we were backing out of the parking spot, another car ran into us. It didn´t do much damage; just the bumper leaving some paint on our car, but it definitely took up some time to get all of the info that we needed, etc. (We ended up taking the car to a car wash and everything was taken car of, so no big deal.) Anyway, we finally got to centro, where we walked around a bit and bargained with the locals to purchase the tables and chairs that I wanted. Dad took a few photos here, which shocked me. This is an area in San Salvador where we are told to never go alone because it is so dangerous. And here my dad is taking photos with his nice camera. I was SHOCKED that nothing happened. When I told him that, he said, "What was going to happen?" I said, "Someone could have robbed us at gunpoint." He said, "What, in front of thousands of people?" I said, "Yes. It happens all the time." (although I´ve never witnessed this...just heard stories). But we managed to record some memories without problems. We tied 1 of the tables to the roof and put the other stuff into the back of the car. We were planning to visit my training community at that point, but dad didn´t think there was any way we could make it there without the table falling off. Actually, he didn´t think we´d make it out of the market without it falling off. Baby bro said that there was NO way it was going to fall off. We could drive where ever we wanted for as long as we wanted without problems. So that was an interesting discussion...dad and baby bro going back and forth. In the end, we decided to drive back to my community and drop everything off. After a 2 hour drive through terrible traffic (it normally takes 30-45 minutes on bus) with baby bro and Liz checking the status of the roof-side table every 5 minutes per dad´s constant requests, we finally got there (without problems with the table). (Baby bro didn´t let that drop for the rest of the trip.) And this is precisely when I realized that my keys were in the hotel room in San Salvador. ¡PUCHIKA! Thankfully, my neighbor was willing to hold the stuff until the next day when we arrived. So we dropped everything off and just went back to San Salvador, ate, and went to bed.

12/24 (Saturday)

We started the day by driving to my community, San Isidro, where we took a tour of the Beneficio, the factory where coffee beans are processed into the coffee that we all buy. Sonia, one of the women from my community gave the tour and I translated. At the end of the tour, she gave us 2 free bags of coffee from Cerro Verde (translates into Green Hill), where some of the best coffee in the world is grown. Or that´s what I hear anyway. Since I don´t drink coffee, I don´t really know. Anyway, then she and another person from my community drove us out to where workers were cutting down sugar cane. And we all got to try sugar cane for the first time. It definitely tastes like pure sugar!

For the rest of the afternoon, we just rested and visited with various families that I´ve lived with since arriving. And that night, we ate pupusas (good reviews from the fam), watched a Christmas presentation in the Catholic church by the kids, and attended a community dance. Now THAT was some good stuff!! Right when we walked in, this woman from my community practically grabbed my baby bro and dragged him out to the dance floor where she kept him right there. Now, this is a woman that I think will end up being some personal trainer for me based on her incredible energy level. This is the woman that said, "Let´s go running sometime." And I said, "Ok. When should we go and what will our route be?" And she said, "Ok. We can start at 5 AM and run up this HUGE hill/mountain to the next community (about 15 minutes in car), then run across to community number 2, then back to San Isidro...and then when we get back, we can lift weights and do aerobics..." This is where I stopped her and said, "Yeah....I was kind of thinking about starting out SLOWLY since I haven´t really done anything for awhile..." So she offered to cut it back to about 4 hours of working out instead of 8. Yeah....So, anyway, that´s who grabbed baby bro. And after about 30 minutes, he was like, "I HATE you!!" And after about an hour, he was like, "Tell her I HAVE to take a break!!" and he sat down. I was laughing SO hard!!

Oh, and this was the first night that dad experienced the bucket bath that I take each day. Sonia, the person that gave us the tours earlier in the day stopped by to chat, and dad went outside to take his bucket bath. In the middle of the conversation, we just heard a LOUD SCREAM from outside and then heard dad say, "That was just my LEGS!!" After that experience, he just had one thing to say: "I don´t think anyone can really fully appreciate what the bucket bath is until they´ve experienced it first-hand." :)

12/25 (Sunday)

Remember the first hour of the trip? The issues with the car? Well, we definitely had some fun on Christmas day with the outcome of that drama. We drove from my community to Juayua to go horseback riding through some mountains where coffee is grown. Getting to the actual town wasn´t so bad, but then we needed to drive 6 kilometers up into the hills to the ranch. No problem, right? I´ll just tell you when we asked a local where the road was that we needed to take, he replied, "You´re going to go up there in THAT car??" That should have been our first warning. The next 6 kilometers were, well, let´s just say quite memorable. Too many bottom-outs to count, baby bro, Liz, and I getting out to PUSH the car when we got stuck as dad put the pedal to the metal causing a foot´s worth of loose dirt to cover us, wondering whether we were going to actually make it UP to the ranch, etc. etc. etc. VERY humorous!! And, miraculously, we made it. Although, the car did sound a bit different after THAT trip...

But the horseback riding was SO beautiful. As is the case with all family vacations for some reason, I had issues actually STAYING on my house, which caused immense entertainment for baby bro. (I still stand by the fact that the problem was my crappy stirrups, which ceased to be a problem when I switched with our guide.) However entertaining I was to baby bro, he was 10X that for the rest of us. We had to go up some pretty steep inclines, and our horses were definitely feeling tired towards the top. And baby bro´s was so bad that it just resigned. He explained that he understood that horses ran until they died. And he knew that his was right there ready to collapse, carrying the 200+ pound load. He said it was panting so much that he thought the heart was going to explode and it was going to collapse right then and there. So they got to a point when the horse just stopped. Baby bro kicked it to get it moving, and it just wouldn´t move. At all. So baby bro had to WALK his horse up to where we were. No THAT´S bad. When your horse won´t even carry you anymore!! Oh my goodness. We could NOT stop laughing!!

The trip back DOWN the 6 kilometers, surprisingly, was pretty easy. We took a scenic route to visit Nauizalco, where they build beautiful furniture, then to Lago Coatepeque (right by my site), then attempted to go directly to Suchitoto, one of the most beautiful areas in El Salvador. Unfortunately, the people here don´t believe in marking roads with NUMBERS on maps or on the actual roads. They just believe in throwing up signs every once in a while directing you to CITIES. And sometimes, the signs don´t make any sense as to which way to go. So, needless to say, we had an interesting drive. When we finally got to Suchitoto, we ate dinner and just went to bed.

12/26 (Monday)

We woke up and realized that our room (and entire hotel) in Suchitoto overlooked this lake, so we enjoyed the gorgeous views and even ate breakfast overlooking it. Then, we were off to San Rafael Cedros, my training community, where I lived for the first 3 months. We visited with my host family there for about an hour, then decided to head back to San Salvador. Before leaving, I asked the fam if they wanted to drive up to an overlook of the city (San Rafael Cedros). They were up for it, so we drove up a HUGE hill that I used to walk. I mean, we didn´t even think the car was going to make it up the top. It was like riding the first hill UP of a roller coaster. But we managed to get to the top and I told everyone to get out. Dad said, "Well, let me move up a little more so we´re a little more level." Well, this meant that he had to put the pedal to the metal again, causing TONS of dust to be pushed down the hill, onto these people that were climbing the hill, causing them to lose all of their clean air shown by them choking. And we all JUMPED out of the car apologizing profusely and trying to make sure they were ok. Well, they sure didn´t seem to happy about it and just ignored us completely. So we walked back to the car and dad was like, "Oh, crap." Remember that nice car that we got from the rental place? Well, since there is so much crime in this country, the rental car places apparently have added security in their rentals. Yeah, approximately 30 seconds to 1 minute after shutting the doors, the car automatically locks. And guess where the keys were? You guessed it; right inside that car. So now we´re on the top of this roller coaster hill, in the middle of nowhere, with our keys locked inside the car. Fun times.

So I walk DOWN the huge hill to go to the internet cafe, where I plan to get the Avis number and find a phone and make some calls to figure out what to do. But in my walk, I come across my host mom´s daughter-in-law. And I explain what happened, and she says (after laughing hysterically) that she knows someone that can help. So this guy comes out and says he can open it for us. So we walk back UP the huge hill, he investigates (while I´m GASPING for air, attempting to translate for people again), then goes back DOWN the hill, and then comes back UP the hill with this contraption to open it. While waiting for him to return, my host family, who now has heard about what has happened, makes the trek up the hill and observes the drama unfolding. Also, dad and baby bro attempt to be MacGeyver by forming barbed wire into a door-opening contraption. So...about an hour later, the first guy, the local, manages to get the car open and we went on our way.

We made it back to San Salvador, visited the artisan market, ate dinner, went to bed, and ended the vacation. Amazingly, the return to the airport was VERY easy.

So, there you go. 5 days of fun. Who´s next? :)

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!

Miss you!!

10 little monkeys...

2005-12-17T11:43:00.000-06:00

You know the song, "10 Little Monkeys"...

10 little mon-keys
jumping on the bed
1 fell off and broke his head
mama called the doctor and the doctor said...
"NO MORE MONKEYS JUMPING ON THE BED!"

9 little mon-keys...etc.

Well...we need to make a version for my group here in El Salvador. 28 of us arrived in DC for staging (just getting us ready for what we were going to face here), and 27 of the 28 boarded the plane. One guy just decided Peace Corps was not for him.

Then we went through our 10 weeks of training with no problems. 100% of us swore in as volunteers. Everyone was so impressed that 27 of us stayed for the entire time. But...each month since swearing-in, we have had 1 volunteer ET (early terminate), be administratively separated (terminated as a volunteer), or be medically separated (terminated as a volunteer). It's pretty sad to see the people we've all grown to love, people that are in our support networks, leave.

More training...take it...pray...it´s a 10?

2005-12-15T14:42:00.000-06:00

So the photo above is going to replace the "crappy" photo of the San Rafael Cedros crew that I took when we arrived. Apparently no one likes it. This is what the group looks like... :)

Ah, the memories of training...
More training. That´s what I did last week. It was really nice for everyone in my group to come back together for a couple of days. We caught up (which included some pretty intimate conversations that I won´t go into here because I hear Peace Corps removes any filter you might have in the states and I can´t even imagine how many emails I would receive after mentioning those subjects...), learned some more Spanish and had some pretty valuable technical sessions. We all stayed in the same hotel that we stayed in when we arrived here on Day 1, June 8th, in San Vicente and that brought back all kinds of memories. Like...(from day 1) in the morning when I showered, my roommate started shouting, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING??!!" And I, of course, said, "Showering...what do you THINK I´m doing??!!" And, as it turned out, because the shower walls didn´t reach the ceiling and the water pressure was something that Kramer and Seinfeld only dream about, every time I turned my body at all, water would spray all over the room, and my roommate. Ah, anyway. This time there were no real surprises. We´re used to all the surprises now, I think. The last day of this training was the most helpful for me, however. Our coordinator talked to us about the stages of adaptation that volunteers go through. I told her the previous day that I felt like I was on a huge roller coaster, with HUGE highs and HUGE lows...like I wasn´t my normal level-headed self. And during her presentation, she said that I used, word for word, what this textbook explained as one of the phases. So that´s exciting. And it gets a lot better in the next stage. :) Towards the end of training, I was missing my community so much that I left a day early. And it was SO nice to return. I visited with the Barahonas, the family that took me in after the volcano eruption, and it was extremely comfortable and fun. And EVERYTIME that I visit this family, the 4 girls, all under 10, scream, "¡Señorita Michelle!" and run up and hug me. Talk about a pick-me-up! It´s AWESOME!

You like it...it´s yours...
Here is a lesson I learned this week. I will NEVER EVER say to someone, "I like your ...." I went to a community dance on Saturday and started talking to this woman and just said something like, "Your necklace is really pretty." An hour later, she walks up to me and hands it to me and I started shouting, "No, no no!! I¨m NOT taking your jewelry!" And she insisted. So now it´s in my room. Earlier that day, I was laying on a hammock at a community member´s house. And I was seriously in heaven. Mid-70´s, not a cloud in the sky, just swaying back and forth. And what does the father do? Walks up and says, "I bought 4. I want to give one to you." Oh my goodness. That´s just great. A Peace Corps volunteer taking stuff from her community. Anyway, that just shows you how amazing the people here are, I guess. They have nothing, but freely give away what they do have.

My church day...
In the AM? Catholic mass. In the PM? Baptist service. Sunday was my church day, I guess. I´ve been attending the Catholic church since I arrived in the community, but it was a first for the Baptist church and oh my goodness, people were excited. When I walked in, there were about 5 or 6 youth sitting in the front right side. I took a seat next to a window about halfway back on the left. And they all turned and looked at me with shocked looks on their faces for about 5 seconds. Then they looked at each other like, "Is she going to stay here?" It was pretty amusing to watch. Finally, one of them walked over and said, "Are you going to stay for the service?" I said, "Yes." He said, "Who invited you?" I said, "No one. I just want to come. Is there a problem?" And he was like, "No, no!! Welcome!" I guess it´s not too popular to just drop in. And after the service, people RAN up to me and started shaking my hand and saying, "Welcome! Welcome! Did you like it? Were you bored? We´re so glad you came! Are you coming back?" I didn´t really have chances to answer people because there were so many questions flying around and people asking them! But it was a good experience.

Un pocito, por favor...
So I got haircut #3 in country last week. My instructions? "I just want a little taken off." The result? 3-4 inches gone. Seriously. The woman was like, "It´s a 10!" My thoughts? Hate it. But...I am supporting the community and I suppose that´s more important than liking my hair. Should make for some interesting family photos when they come next week...:)

Ok. That´s about it for now. Many people have asked me, "Ok. What is it exactly that a Peace Corps volunteer DOES?" I will be talking about work that I´m doing soon. The first 3-6 months are reserved for getting to know organizations, people, and general info about the community. I´m getting there and you´ll hear about it!! :)

Miss ya!

Just my latest thoughts...

2005-12-06T12:38:00.000-06:00

Don´t go!
There are amazing people here that my program director refers to as "rockstars". They´re the people in each community that keep it going. They inspire their peers. They demonstrate leadership from day to day. And they get stuff done. They´re the people that support us day in and day out and make our experiences here so much better. I´ve identified a couple of rockstars in my community.

The other day, I visited one of them at home. And when I walked in, his wife said, "Michelle, I´m sad." I said, "Why?" She said, "Because Bill (I´m going to leave out actual names) is leaving on Tuesday." I said, "What do you mean, ´leaving´? Where is he going and for how long?" She said, "He´s looked everywhere for work here and can´t find anything. We need $80 a month to send the kids to school, eat, and keep the house. And we´re running out of money. So he´s leaving to get work somewhere else and is going to be gone 5 years." Then she just started bawling. I couldn´t believe it. This guy, her husband, is the president of the city council, active member on the school board, volunteered to (and did) help build the school for free when an outside contractor was hired, has helped me IMMENSELY by introducing me to people, helping me find a house, and helping me set up the house. His wife is a health promoter in the community. They don´t make much money, but work to improve the community constantly. And now he´s leaving. And I had his wife in my arms sobbing about it. I tried to console her and tell her everything would be ok. And she just said, "We have 3 kids. What if something happens to him?" This is a situation I´ll never forget. My mind was racing trying to figure out how we could get him to stay. But in El Salvador, there just aren´t jobs. People will college educations can´t find work. It´s a bad situation. And this man, who has a high school education, who has taken every possible further education that has been offered to him, who helps anyone and everyone that needs it, is leaving to support his family. This is a problem.

What happened to spanish?
This week I am in training again. They call it IST (in-service training). It´s a time for me to demonstrate the improvement in my non-existent spanish. Ok...actually I can talk to people now. But since I was in the states over Thanksgiving, spent the last week in the capitol welcoming the new group of volunteers, and now am spending this week with people from my group, I know my spanish is getting rusty. So that will make spanish class all the more fun, I suppose. :)

Revelations...
I´ve noticed recently that I get REALLY stressed, depressed, agitated, frustrated, or maybe a combination of those when I´m in the capitol. Last night, as I was going to sleep, I was trying to figure out why. And I decided that it´s because the capitol APPEARS to be just like life in the US. It appears that way until you actually visit a business. Customer service and problem-solving are pretty much non-existent here. And in the US, businesses would cease to exist if they acted in the way they do here. So I tend to get EXTREMELY irritated during these interactions. I´ll give you examples from yesterday (only ONE day!):

A) Bank visit:
Have to wait in line FOR-EVER because everything you could possibly need to do with your account (minus a withdrawl), requires you to visit a person, meaning that you need to plan an hour or more when you need information, need to make a deposit, have a question, etc. And if you want to make any changes, then you´d better have 50 forms of identification, your dead mother with you, and be ready to accept the 100 fijateques that you´re going to hear.

B) Food visit:
Fast food doesn´t mean fast food. It means, food from the US that will be given to you when we´re ready to give to you. And oh, if you want something different (in my life...cheeseburger, only tomato), that will involve the ENTIRE staff talking to each other to communicate what you want, you receiving a bun, cheese, and tomato and having to ask for meat, causing the entire staff to have another pow-wow, this time with yelling involved about how it wasn´t done the first time, and finally 10 minutes later, just what you ordered. Now, of course, this only occurs if they, in fact, have in stock what you´re ordering. It´s a lot to ask businesses to actually predict what they will need on hand for customers.

C) Grocery store water purchase:
Want to buy a quick bottle of water? Easy, right? Walk into the store, wait in line to leave any bag that you have with this guy in the front (kind of like a coat check in the states), walk to the water aisle and pick up what you want. Walk to the front and wait in line for about 10 minutes, get to the front to pay for your $0.50 water with a $5 and listen to the cashier say, "I don´t have change." So stay there, right, because obviously she´s going to get some. Wait. Stare at her. Watch her stare at you. Then hear her say to the boy who is bagging, "Can you take her to another aisle please?" Watch the bag boy pick up your water and $5 and walk away with it. So you follow and watch him take you to another aisle...to the END of the line...so you can wait another 10 minutes to purchase it, assuming that this cashier happens to have change. You either take exact change or plan not to purchase.

If the country was totally different than the US, I think it would make it easier to take. But because it APPEARS to be the same, it really makes me want to scream, "GET WITH THE PROGRAM; PEOPLE!!" But, then I have to remind myself, ok, I´m in another country. It´s different here. This isn´t so important. Breathe. (You can all see me doing this, right?) Anyway, my latest revelation.

Miss ya all!

Things that stood out...

2005-12-02T14:14:00.000-06:00

Hey all!! Ok...I know I haven't written for awhile. I'm sorry. And...some of you are going to get really mad at me for not writing sooner about what I've been up to. But...I had VERY limited time. That's what I'm going to say about it to try to stop you from getting upset. :)

During the last week, I've frozen my butt off (hard to believe, I know), eaten a boatload of AWESOME food, and had tons of fun catching up with friends and family. But all of this happened outside of my community...it happened in Columbus, Ohio. That's right! I took a quick trip back for Thanksgiving. Some friends of mine were AWESOME and got me an early Christmas present - the ticket back. I was SHOCKED that they would give me a present like that, but I was so appreciative and had so much fun. (Again, I'm REALLY sorry if we didn't get to hang out!! I really do miss you!!)

So, this is only going to be about my trip and the things that I noticed during it. So there isn't too much drama. Skip this one and read the next one if you enjoy the drama. :)

Getting to Columbus was craziness. I got up at 4 in the morning and took a FREEZING bucket bath, the rolled my suitcase down main street in town to the bus stop, where I heaved the thing up onto bus #1 and bus #2 with everyone I encountered on the way staring at me. I took the bus to the terminal in San Salvador, where I took a taxi to the airport. 1.5 hours and $21 later, I happily arrived at the airport with all of my belongings and started to walk through the doors to wait for my 2 PM flight. The guard (there is one stationed outside every entrance) stopped me and asked which airline I was flying. I told him and he said, "What time is your flight?" I told him and he said, "Well, you can't come in yet." I said, "What? Why not?" And he said, "Because your flight doesn't leave for 7 hours and there is no one at the counter." I said, "Well, can't I wait inside instead of on the curb?" He said, "No." (I, too, was amazed that there was no fijateque with that.) I said, "Why not?" He said, "Because it's full." So I looked through the windows at the empty waiting area. And I was just like, "Ok." So I talked to him for the next 2 hours. Nice guy. Then I said I had to go to the bathroom and was allowed in. I didn't go back outside. :)

When the airline personnel got to the counter, I checked in and found out that I had to pay some $30 tax for my ticket. I was like, "Wasn't that included in the price?" "Fijateque, no." So I paid it, leaving me with $5 for the rest of the trip. But, because I could speak spanish pretty well (at least the gate agent could understand me), I was able to score an exit row seat for the first flight!

So, on flight #1, they served us lunches. Oh my goodness!! You know the public transportation food system. It's definitely not 5-star quality food...but...I got chicken and mashed potatoes and I thought that I died and went to heaven. It was SOOOOO good! Every bite, I seriously was actually SAYING, "Oh my goodness....this is SOOOO good!" And the woman next to me, a women's studies professor in the US just looked at me for about 10 seconds and said, "Wow...you must have been down there a LONG time..." I guess it was a little obvious...

So I arrived into Atlanta and it was OBVIOUS I was in the US. Or maybe it was just obvious I was outside of El Salvador. I was actually thinking in spanish, which is amazing since my spanish isn't that good, and had the impulse to say "buenos" (hello, good afternoon/evening, etc.) to EVERYONE...airport security, random passengers, etc. It was VERY odd. And I was thinking, "OK...time to eat some good American food!!" So I visited a food court area and found that my $5 wasn't going to get me anything. So I bought a Reeses, which made me VERY happy. :)

Then I got on my last flight, from Atlanta to Columbus. I arrived at 11 at night and was picked up by my mom, step-dad, and baby bro. They said, "Where do you want to go to eat?" I was like, "I don't care!!" So we went to Friday's and found that the kitchen had just closed and wasn't able to re-open for a poor Peace Corps volunteer that had been living in a 3rd world country for 6 months. Yeah, I played that card...unsuccessfully I might add. :) But we did go to Steak n' Shake. And I got a cheeseburger, chicken fingers and fries, a bowl of chili, and a 50/50 milkshake with strawberry and cookies and cream topped with hot fudge. And I ate it all. Again. SO good.

The rest of the week was just so much fun. I got to spend time with family and friends and just was able to relax. And there were little things that were weird to me.

(1) Throwing toilet paper in the toilet. That's odd to me now.
(2) Walking outside without worrying that someone was going to rob me. Seriously, it was so awesome to just walk around and feel safe.
(3) Breathing. Ok...more the lack of. I live with LOTS of animals around me here in El Salvador. But everything is open so it's not a big deal. Going back to closed up houses with pets? I really don't breathe too well in that environment.
(4) Cold. Wow, it's cold up there! I couldn't feel my face on the first day! How do you live up there??

Ok...that's all I have for now. I'm back safely now. And I'm MUCH calmer than I was before I left...I feel like I'm back to myself. :)

And thank you to everyone that spent time with me (especially those of you that were involved in the ticket purchase)!! It was a BLAST! And everyone else...we'll catch up soon, I'm sure. :)

Miss you all!! I'm sure there will be more adventures to relay in the near future...

Another earthquake...

2005-11-17T21:51:00.000-06:00

We just had another earthquake! It looks like it registered 5.2 and was located off the coast of El Salvador. I was in the Peace Corps office when it happened and the other volunteer and I ran outside when we realized what was happening. But I don't think there was any (or at least just a little) damage. You can get more information at http://earthquake.usgs.gov/recenteqsww/Quakes/usfpab.htm.

Fellow PCV Tara sent me a text message that read, "I just felt my first earthquake!" So I responded, giving her all of the data I found online and telling her that it was pretty strong, when she replied to me, "I know. The dogs are going crazy. I heard the rats running above me and then felt my bed shaking and I thought the rats were on my bed! But then I realized it couldn't be rats causing all the commotion!" That made me laugh pretty hard; the image of Tara thinking rats were (A) in her bed with her and (B) causing the bed to shake uncontrollably.

Is this what people think of the Peace Corps??

2005-11-17T21:02:00.000-06:00

I was visiting some blogs of other peace corps volunteers, and came across this series of posts. Is this what people think about the Peace Corps??

http://livinguyana.blogspot.com/2005/11/peace-corps-propaganda.html
http://livinguyana.blogspot.com/2005/11/peace-attack.html
http://livinguyana.blogspot.com/2005/11/peace-attack2.html

Just interesting, I thought...

Do you remember...text me!!

2005-11-17T18:12:00.000-06:00

Do you remember...
Do you remember what it felt like to be a kid on a really windy day? When you could lay into the wind and it would hold you up because you were so light?

Well, apparently after the torrential downpours in October, we enter the "dry season" here in El Salvador, which means no rain. Ever. And LOTS of wind. Wind that is so strong, I swear it could hold up my 170 pounds (or 160, or whatever I am) with no problem. (I haven't had any work trips to hotels with scales recently, Jim.) As I was sitting on the corner waiting for my bus today, I watched people disappear. Or so it seemed. Because most of the streets are unpaved (i.e. dirt and rocks) here, when there is wind without rain, there is just a constant cloud of dirt that moves around. So you see people in the street, then a gust of wind that pulls a wave of dirt up into the air, hiding everything. And when you're walking, you need to either keep your eyes shut, or cover them up. It makes for interesting walks since it's necessary to pass over a variety of small boulders during the walk. There is so much wind that when I woke up today, there was a small layer of dirt covering my stuff in my room. And the windows are CLOSED!! I have NO idea how it managed to get in! So...that was the intro to my day today: lots of dirt to contend with.

And I thought when I left my canton, I had experienced the full breadth of the wind. Nope. On the bus, we entered a traffic jam. I thought, "Well, that's weird. There is never a lot of traffic here. There must have been some sort of accident." When we finally reached the problem area, do you know what it was that caused the problem?? One of the highway signs (and I'm talking sturdy signs...just like the ones over American highways) had been blown over by the wind! I mean, not just the green part. The ENTIRE structure had broken in half from the wind and was covering the highway. And this huge machine was moving it out of the way. I couldn't believe it!! And then, we reached the bus terminal and I was walking to my next bus when I noticed that there was a sprinkler on in the middle of this open area. And I thought, "What the heck are they doing?? Watering...dirt??" And that's EXACTLY what they were doing. I assume to stop the dessert-like dirt waves that I witnessed in my community. Something I never thought I would see...sophisticated watering systems for...dirt. :)

Fijateque...
I heard from current volunteers that the word "fijateque" was severely overused in this country. I didn't realize until today the significance of that. I don't think I mentioned this in my last entry, but I had the breakdown I discussed after realizing that someone from my community stole my bank book out of my backpack. I think it was just that I was placing everything on the fact that I had dedication and trust from the people in my community. I could deal with not having a place to live. Not having money. Not having friends here. All of that, because I knew I could count on the people in my community. And then finding that my bank book was missing after a meeting with the community leaders. I just couldn't take it. So anyway, when I realized this, I attempted to immediately close my account and open a new one. You think that's easy? Fijateque, no. Here is what has transpired:

In the bank, day 1:
Michelle: I need to close my account because I think someone has my account number.

Teller: Can I please have your identification?

Michelle: My identification is inside my bank account book that was stolen. I don't have it.

Teller: We need your identification to do anything with your account.

Michelle: If someone has my account number, can't they use my money?

Teller: Not unless they have your signature.

Michelle: But if they have my signature, they can use the money, right?

Teller: Yes.

Michelle: So what happens if I come back tomorrow and all of the money is gone?

Teller: Fijateque, you won't have money.

Michelle: And there is no way I can close the account without ID since it was stolen?

Teller: No.

Michelle exits very irritated and has her breakdown in the middle of the mall.

In the bank, day 2:
Michelle: I need to close my account because I think someone has my account number.

Teller: Can I please have your identification?

Michelle hands over her Salvadoran government-issued ID.

Teller: Do you have a passport?

Michelle: Yes, but my organization keeps it in San Salvador in a safe.

Teller: Fijateque, we can't do anything without your passport.

Michelle: When I opened this account, you made copies of my passport, NIT (another government ID), and drivers' license. Can't you just use those to identify me?

Teller: Fijateque, no.

Michelle: Why not?

Teller: We have to have the original.

Michelle: Then WHY did you have to make copies of them??

Teller: Because we have to in order to open an account.

....Michelle asking about other people using money again....
....same answers getting nowhere again....

Michelle: I need to talk to your boss.

....Michelle explaining situation to boss....

Boss: Fijateque, we need to have your passport.

Michelle: Don't you trust YOUR government??! This identification was issued by THEM for me to work here for 2 years!! You have to see something from ANOTHER government to be able to help me with my SALVADORAN bank account??

Boss: Fijateque, those are the rules.

Michelle leaves VERY irritated. Runs into new next door neighbor right outside the bank and just vents in spanglish to him for about 10 minutes. He listens, reassures her that everything will be ok and then buys her some lunch. Michelle feels better and leaves for San Salvador to get her passport because, fijateque, nothing can be done without it. Michelle arrives 2 hours later in San Salvador, picks up her passport, starts reading emails in the office, gets out her notebook to start making notes about stuff, and watches her stolen bankbook fall out onto the floor.

That's right. 1 breakdown, 4 bank trips, 6 bus trips, and thousands of fijateques later, the problem that started the chain, the "stolen" bankbook, was right inside the backpack all along. Hiding inside the notebook. And after I shook my backpack like crazy, thinking my bankbook was hiding inside somewhere while my notebook sat alone on the table in front of me. Well...PUCHIKA! :)

You wanna talk...
So, I've been meaning to tell you this. There is a website that you can visit to send me text messages for free. I will need to pay $0.10 to send you responses, but the responses will go to the website that you use to send me a message. Does that make sense? If I can't answer you though (like if I'm in a dangerous area and don't want to see what the message is at that moment), then I'll still get your message and will just have to email you or call you later. Here is what you need to do to do this:

Visit http://www.tigo.com.sv/mensajito_interactivo.php.
There is an area in the top middle of the page that says, "Cel" and then should have "503". Next to that, you need to type my phone number "79382980".
Type your name in the next box. So it will say "De" (already there) and your name. Example: De Michelle.
Click on the red button that says, "Invitar o Adicionar Numero".
You should now be able to type a message into the first big box and click on "Enviar Mensaje" when you're done typing.
If I can, I will respond and my response will appear on your screen.

Que chivo, huh? (Chivo=cool in english.) Oh, and I just tried this. The first time, I didn't get the message. But the second time I did. So I hope it was just a fluke the first time. It might be good to send me an email to tell me you tried it out if you don't hear back from me.

Well, that's about it for me!! I miss ya!

Cultural differences, my new friend, and a laugh...

2005-11-15T00:02:00.000-06:00

So...After having a complete breakdown in the middle of a mall in Sonsonate, the big city in my state, I decided to come directly to San Salvador for a break. Nothing huge happened to cause this complete breakdown; just small things adding up, I think. But now I'm sitting here at the computer surfing like mad. Something I haven't done in quite sometime. And it's very fun. And I'm eating chocolate and peanut butter. Nothing could be better.

But a friend signed onto instant messenger as I surfed and we started a conversation. He asked me to give him more information about the culture here, so I figure that I haven't done a good job of explaning differences. So, here is what I told him:

You can't wear shorts or flip flops here.
The girls can wear practically NOTHING for tops and it's acceptable but if your legs are showing...woah mama...you're a whore.
They clean everything everyday so they're used to just throwing stuff on the floors because they know it will be cleaned. But that flows into trash EVERYWHERE. Littering is OUT OF CONTROL! People on the bus will just throw their stuff out the windows; it's what they teach their kids. It irritates me to death!
Drinking and smoking are severly frowned upon. It's more acceptable for guys to drink, but still not like it is in the states. And women usually have to have a guy buy them drinks if they want them, and then drink in private. Basically, if you're drinking at all, you're considered a drunk and lose all respect in the community. (I think it's because there are so many alcoholics here that anyone drinking anything is linked to that.) But the smoking thing is AWESOME!
When you're eating, you always have to say "Buen provecho!" like...enjoy your food.
When leaving the table, or a meeting, or any type of gathering, you have to say "Con permiso".
When you walk into a meeting late, you HAVE to stop the meeting and greet everyone.
Of course, no meeting ever starts when it says it's going to start.
If you leave in the middle of a meeting, you have to stop the meeting again and say "con permiso".
You have to greet every single person that you see in a day and usually need to talk for quite sometime to each person.
Women are in supporting roles normally: secretaries, gofers, servers, etc.
You have to drink from cans and bottles using a straw. I'm not sure how sticking a foreign object into a plastic or glass bottle makes it more sanitary, but that's the thing to do here.
Many drinks are served in plastic baggies.
Beacuse the plumbing system is bad, you have to throw your toilet paper in a trashcan next to a toilet instead of inside the toilet.

That's about it. Oh...and I have a new friend in my house (my house that I own but have not yet moved into). During one of my fun-filled cleaning days this week, I noticed that a lizard was on one of the walls in the living room. So I got this big stick and prodded it's backside until it went outside. Well, it crawled up into this area between the ceiling and wall (there are openings between the ceilings and walls in all of the houses here) and just stared at me cleaning. It watched me for about an hour; its red head popping out above one of the bricks. Then, it attempted to crawl onto the wall again. I dropped the brush I was using to clean, got down from the ladder, and walked over to where it was on the wall. I stood about 3 feet away from it and we just stared at each other for about 10 seconds. Then, it scurried back up to its lookout for another hour. Then, it attempted to come down again, and I again walked over and stared at it. It became a little game between us. And the next day, when I walked into the house, it crawled right up to the lookout and watched me on and off during the entire day. It was pretty funny! But, I did see another lizard that was bigger outside later in the week, and this one scurried around FAST!! If that one gets in my house, I'm done. There is no way I'm going to be able to catch it! So I'm going to have to do some research on lizard control, I think. The only thing I've found so far is this website: http://www.bugspray.com/article/reptiles.html. So we'll see.

But don't worry if you're thinking about coming to visit...I have the mosquito net. It protects you from everything! :)

And...Jeff, my friend, sent me a website that cracked me up. I found some of it to be a bit offensive, but after bawling my eyes out, it was good to laugh a little. And even if you're somewhat offended, you will probably laugh a bit! Visit http://www.ebaumsworld.com/flash/endofworld.html.

It has EVERYTHING!!

2005-11-10T15:50:00.000-06:00

"I don´t want to sway your opinion or anything, but Columbus has EVERYTHING...including your awesome sister that can totally take you out!"

Those were the words that I uttered to my baby bro when he was trying to decide between attending the University of Iowa or Ohio State, my Alma Mater. Of course, he made the right decision and chose Ohio State!

When he arrived, I said, "Ok. I need to take you out to celebrate! Where do you want to go?" He said, "Bennigans!! It´s my favorite!"

I said, "Um...we don´t have a Bennigan´s."

He said, "WHAT?? I thought `Columbus has EVERYTHING`!"

I said, "Well...almost!! I´ve always been able to find what I wanted!"

Of course, I have NEVER heard the end of that, and probably never will for the rest of my life! So, imagine my surprise when today, as I was leaving our office in San Salvador, I saw a huge banner that read, "Coming soon...Bennigan´s!" Oh my goodness! My baby bro´s favorite restaurant. And you can´t go in Columbus, but you´ll be able to visit it in a third world country. Man. That´s some funny stuff...come visit, Pokey! El Salvador has eeevvvveerything!!! :)

And...I just went to this big event...an HIV awareness event for all of Central America and parts of South America that was held in the capitol. One of the guys from my community was acting in a theatre production for it. And, when I got there, he was all excited and said, "Ashley Judd was JUST here! She gave me a kiss on the cheek! She´s my good friend!" I guess I missed her by about 10 minutes. But everything there was SO excited that she stopped by and they all had her sign stuff...Mauricio, the guy from my community, told me she was signing a lot of condoms since they were giving them out for free. I was like, "That´s not cool! No one is going to want to open those!" Doesn´t that kind of defeat the purpose??

Anyway, two things from today that just made me laugh a little!! :)

Miss ya!

Just your average Peace Corps week...

2005-11-08T13:33:00.000-06:00

Lots of sleeping, a package of Sudafed, a package of throat lozenges, celebrating el Dia de los Muertos, multiple killings of wildlife, big purchases for my new house, massive cleaning efforts, 2 games of Spanish Monopoly, countless games of cards, and lots of coloring with the girls in my temporary house....another week has gone by.

Lots of sleeping, a package of Sudafed, a package of throat lozenges...
Yep. Grepa. Flu/cold. Whatever you want to call it. I´ve been feeling miserable. But that only means it gets better, I guess. :)

Celebrating el Dia de los Muertos...
Not as big as it is in Mexico, but still pretty darn cool. EVERYONE goes to a cemetery somewhere with TONS of flowers, paint, and decorations. I went to the one where most people from my community are buried. Most people take a pick-up since it´s about 5 kilometers away, but I walked it with some other people from the community. That gained me tons of respect from people I talked to. They were like, "You WALKED up here??" So this cemetery is at the top of a hill, and everyone decorates the headstone and burial area for their loved ones. So when you get up there, you just see THOUSANDS of flowers, families painting the tombstones (they usually just have crosses here) with bright colors, and families just hanging out in general. And I thought the kids would be irritated they had to go for this traditional event, but they were just as into it as the adults. Everyone really values the lives of people. I walked around and talked to numerous people about who was buried in the area(s) they were decorating, and it ranged from brothers/sisters, aunts/uncles, grandparents, mothers/fathers, children, cousins...just about everyone you can think of. It´s really important to them to recognize lives that have passed, regardless of time. Some people had been dead since the 50´s. It´s a REALLY cool thing here. You can view photos from one of the San Salvador cemetaries at http://www.laprensagrafica.com/multimedia/galerias/2005/11/20051102difuntos/20051002%20016.htm.

Multiple killings of wildlife...
Yeah. 2 in the last week. I was standing in my new house in an area that is open to the outside (and doesn´t have light) talking to my next door neighbor. And I saw something move in the shadows and said, "What is THAT?" He just backed me up and said, "Don´t walk over there. Wait here for a moment." And when he returned, he had a flashlight. We shined it in the area, and I saw, for the first time, a real live scorpion. Now, that´s my sign in the Zodiac, so I guess I should be a fan, right? Well, I´m not. I´ll be fine if I never see another one again! My neighbor, Carlos, grabbed a broom and cut it into 2 and I watched its little poisonous tail go crazy trying to sting the broom. Yes, I definitely don´t want to encounter another one of THOSE! #2...laying in bed listening to music when I looked up and saw a HUGE spider on the wall above me. That made me jump out of bed VERY quickly! I just stood in my room looking at it and then picked up one of my hiking shoes. And I looked at the sole of the shoe, then at the spider, then at the shoe and thought, "That thing is BIGGER than my shoe!!" And I´m a size 10! Of course it was late and everyone was in bed so I wasn´t about to go waking people up for a spider, so after 30 minutes of just staring at it, I decided I was tired and it was time to kill it. So the hiking shoe swung, and managed to hit it (even though it started scurrying like mad when it realized what was going to happen). I got a broom and swept the corpse outside immediately! When I told my family about it the next day, they were like, "You killed it yourself??" They were impressed.

Big purchases for the new house...
I have a refrigerator and a bed now! Super exciting...

Massive cleaning efforts...
No one has lived in my new house for about a year, and I don´t think it has been thoroughly cleaned for much longer than that. So I´m all about getting it spiffy. Which means...I have to clean all of the brick walls by hand. There are 12 walls, varying from 6´ to 12´ in height. So I´ve spent hours with a ladder (if that´s what you want to call it...more like part of a fence that I can climb), a bucket, and a brush, cleaning brick by brick each wall. My neighbor stopped by to talk to me and was like, "You´re going to clean ALL of your walls like that?" I said, "Yeah." She said, "You have A LOT of patience!" So...I´m getting some credit for a hard work ethic, I think. But it is VERY time consuming, and I can´t wait to be done with it! After cleaning part of one wall, however, it became apparent how important it is. I have to use about 4 buckets of water for each wall, and each time I dump out the used water, there is about an inch of dirt and mud on the bottom of the bucket!

Games, games, and more games...
Just what it sounds like...fun fun fun. :)

Oh, and I just read some of Tara´s recent blog entries. (We lived in the same training host community.) They cracked me up and summarize just how we´re all feeling down here. You can view these entries at:

http://tarasinelsalvador.blogspot.com/2005/10/things-i-will-be-happy-about-when-i.html

http://tarasinelsalvador.blogspot.com/2005/10/things-my-brother-tells-me-i-should.html

So...that´s about it for now. Nothing too exciting...just an average Peace Corps week! :)

Miss you all!!

Money, birthdays, houses, and crazy dancers...

2005-10-31T08:29:00.000-06:00

TONS has happened in the last week, including me turning a big 27! And oh it was memorable....

I got some great cards and packages from people - thank you!! But, I have to say the most memorable was definitely the one with used underwear. I know, you´re thinking, "WHAT?? Someone sent you USED underwear for your birthday??" And, no, it has nothing to do with the shopping drama that ensued a couple of weeks ago. :) Really, it was all in good faith. I heard from other people that if people wrote "used clothing" on the customs form, the package would most likely not get stopped in customs and I wouldn´t have to pay the $1.89 to get it out. So I passed this information onto someone that I knew would be mailing me a package. Well, she informed me that she "didn´t want to lie" so she included a pair of her used undies (clean of course). But she also listed everything else in the package, so it still got stopped. So...if you want to send a package...fyi...I don´t need your (or anyone else´s undies). :) This is totally something I would do to someone else, too, so I hope I´m not offending the person that did this...it just cracked me up.

And...I have money again and a house! The landlord and I are going on Tuesday to clean it, and then I can move in anytime after that. And when people found out that I finally found somewhere to live, people started volunteering like crazy to help me clean, move in, etc. I really do have such an awesome community!!

And lastly, on Saturday, I went to my first community dance. It was SOOOOOO fun!! And I learned how to dance salsa, merengue, and cumbia pretty well, thanks to awesome dance partners! Although, there was that one crazy person that you just stare at. You know, the one that says innocently enough, "Do you want to dance?" You say yes, and then it´s like you´re watching Kramer having one of his attacks in front of you. There is no partner dancing in this scenario...just a wild man acting like he´s dancing. I just stood there, sort of moving to the beat, while he flared around in front of me, then I just lost it...laughing so hard. I just kept imagining what my girlfriends´ reactions would be to this scene. Luckily, Isabel, the girl that I went with walked up to me and told me she had to leave for a minute. I started walking with her and she said, "No...you don´t have to come! Keep dancing!" And I gave her a pretty stern look and said, "Let´s go!!" And she realized what was going on and then she started laughing and couldn´t stop. Anyway, VERY memorable. So...when you come down, we´ll definitely have to go out dancing!

Oh, and I have grepa now (basically, a cold) and don´t want to do anything. I slept all day yesterday, so if it seems like I´ve been ignoring any of you, I haven´t! I just haven´t felt that well...

I miss ya! Talk to ya soon!

On the brink...

2005-10-23T11:48:00.000-05:00

Hey, everyone! So, I don't have a place to live, I'm penniless, and I TOTALLY went off on someone this past week. That about sums up my current situation. But, I am traveling around a lot, graciously staying with other volunteers and people here that are willing to house me.

I've come to the conclusion that the reason (or at least one of the reasons) that Peace Corps is touted as "the hardest job you'll ever love" is because there are times when you just have absolutely NO control over ANYTHING in your life. And it really does make you crazy. I definitely feel like I have no, or at least VERY little, control right now. And there is nothing I can do to remedy it. But the people that live here must go through this all the time. I mean, $0.25 is a lot of money to some people here. I can't even imagine living my entire life wondering if I'm going to get food or shelter from day to day.

So, about what I've been up to that's led me to this place...

I returned to my community on Monday, the 17th and had a GREAT homecoming. I got off the bus and started walking to my house, and all of these kids just came out of nowhere along the road and just started screaming, "MICHELLE!" and ran up and gave me hugs. Talk about making my day; it was such a nice surprise! And when I got home, I had a great talk with Monico, the dad in the house, about how things were going, etc.

After we talked for a few minutes, he let me know that I need to find a new place to live since they moved out. I think (although it's hard to see at the moment) that this could actually be a good thing. I can look for a place by myself, and the family doesn't think I'm moving out because I don't like them.

After this conversation, I went around visiting a couple of places, but wasn't able to find a permanent place. There were a couple of possibilities, but I'm a little concerned about safety, so I'm going to keep looking. This week, community leaders scoped out some places that I'm going to look at on Monday with them. As of right now, I have no idea where I'll be sleeping tomorrow night which means there will probably be a good story in the next week or so. :)

Penniless. Uh huh. Because I was evacuated (and there WAS a volcano, contrary to my baby bro's belief that people are "faking it to keep me out of the community"), I had to stay in the capitol for half of the month. And since living in the capitol is pretty much like living in the states, it gets pretty costly. But Peace Corps pays volunteers more when events like this happen to make up the difference. I figured that I would just wait to fill out the paperwork until I was ready to leave, since I wasn't sure how long I would actually be there. So I filled out the paperwork 2 Thursdays ago. But I didn't get any money deposited, so I ended up calling the cashier at the Peace Corps office to find out what the status was. And she said, "Oh. I have your form right here and it's approved and everything. But...I don't really have money right now." I said, "O...K...when will you have money?" She said, "I think by next Thursday." Great. So I MIGHT have money again then.

So I resorted to my emergency ATM card from the states. I mean, I don't want to be using money from the states, but in situations like this, it's necessary, right? Well, I went to the Taj Mahal of ATM machines. Every bank in El Salvador has an ATM machine here, and put my card into one. No dice. Another. No dice. Yeah. My little emergency card is in a network that does not exist in this country. That was just GREAT to find out! Anyway...no fears if you're reading this. I talked to my program director about the situation, and she told me that she would lend me money if she couldn't get money to be approved anytime soon. So...everything is under control. :)

Oh, and the going off on the salesperson? Yeah. During my evacuation time, I had to buy a charger to continue using my phone. And it was expensive - $20! I know that's nothing in the states, but it's definitely something here! The woman said, "Well your phone is expensive, so the charger for it is too." I tried to tell her that I didn't buy my phone here, but it didn't matter. So I bought it. I mean, what was I going to do? So, I used it once. ONCE. And the next time I tried to use it, it wouldn't work. It kept saying, "Unable to charge". I tried it in several outlets. I tried moving it around, thinking the connection just wasn't right. I tried it in someone else's phone. Nothing worked. It just kept saying, "Unable to charge." I was like, "AAAHH!" So, needless to say (like that, Katie?), my phone died and was unusable for about a day until I could return to my community. So I returned to the kiosk where I bought it and talked to the woman there, explaining the situation. She told me that I needed to return the following day because the woman that sold it to me would be working that day and she could exchange it for me. I wasn't too happy about having to come back, but I thought, ok, this is how it works in 3rd world countries. Fine. So the next day (which happened to be the day I found out I was penniless and couldn't use my emergency ATM card from the states), I returned to the store and talked to the woman that sold me the charger. When I explained to her what had happened, she took the charger, plugged it into this outlet and then plugged it into my phone. My phone said, "Unable to charge." So she started moving the connector all around in the phone...for about 2 minutes. Finally, it said, "Charging". And here is the conversation that followed:

Worker: Oh, it's ok. See... it's working.

Me: Well, it didn't work when you plugged it in. It's only working part of the time. I want a charger that always works.

Worker: Well, if it's only working sometimes, it's because the connection on your phone is bad.

Me: I don't think so, because another person with a phone tried to use the charger and she got the same message...unable to charge.

Worker: Well, it's working.

Me: [lots and lots of breathing to keep from going off]

Me: Is it important to you that your customers are happy?

Worker: Yes, of course.

Me: Well I'm NOT happy right now...I'm ANGRY!

Worker: There is no reason to be because your charger is working.

Me: If there is no problem, then I can take a new one and you can sell this to another person.

Worker: No, you bought this one so you need to keep it.

Me: [losing it...in English...] FINE!!! OBVIOUSLY, YOU DON'T CARE AT ALL ABOUT CUSTOMER SERVICE!! [Yanks charger out of outlet and stomps off seriously on the brink of emotional instability.]

So that's my craziness for the moment. How are all of you doing??

Miss ya!!

Research and humor...

2005-10-12T16:37:00.000-05:00

So, today I've been busy researching average salaries, types of work, gangs, immigrant statistics, blah blah blah. I want to put together a presentation to illustrate the America that people here DON'T see. Anyway, I've gotten a lot of good information, but while I was working, I had a short conversation with my baby bro. I tell ya...always some good entertainment when he's around. Here is just a snippet of our conversation...
-------------------------------------------
BabyBro: Speaking of keeping people away, is your village still faking the volcano eruption to keep you out of town?

Me: My village is housing all the refugees, but all the people that live in my village have left. So what does that tell you?

BabyBro: That everyone is moving further away than where they currently lived so everyone reduces their risk of excruciating death by the same percentage.

Me: I guess that's one way to look at it...

BabyBro: How are the landslides treating you?

Me: Well. It FINALLY stopped raining, so we haven't had many problems...recently. I think things are calming down. You know...for your visit and all.

BabyBro: Yeah, things always seem to work out for the favorite child.

Me: You're so slow [at typing]

BabyBro: I send complete thoughts in packets of information, as opposed to a fragmented thought process that lacks logic and foresight. "How do you represent women so realistically?" "I think of a man, and take away all reason and accountability."

Me: You're in BIG TROUBLE, buddy!! I think this conversation might be worthy enough to post on my blog.

BabyBro: I made the cut!
-------------------------------------------
So, I guess I've had my humor for the day. It's possible that you need to know my brother to find this humorous; I don't know. But it's still highly entertaining for me.

Also, I received some pretty funny responses from friends and family regarding the whole underwear search. Some of the comments are below:

From friend Matt:
Wow. And I am only going to say this once, but the whole underwear thing: You were the POSTER CHILD for why you CAN'T try on panties before you buy them.

You have inadvertently led me to the SINGLE example in the history of mankind of "why guys are cleaner than women." Trying on undies, then not buying them is like wiping someone else's butt! No way dude! Buy them in a sterile package, know that no one has intentionally or inadvertently . . . dirtied them (especially important for men with the hygiene skills of a three year old), then put them back for an unsuspecting customer to buy and wear! Nope, I want to know that no one else's body odor, body hair, PAD!!!, or body ANYTHING has ever touched my undies.

Just one man's opinion. By the way, I do hope you are enjoying your new skivvies!

From friend and former PCV Karen:
Funny thing about Peace Corps, it makes you forget exactly what "too much information" is.

The trying on of underwear is a squeamish enough thing, but I'm sure you lost half of the audience at the pads (the male half). Lots of underwear stories in Peace Corps.

My two favorite:

On our 101 Uses for Duct Tape list: "Line your underwear with duct tape. Then, just wipe it off when needed."
One time I was line-drying my underwear and excused myself from a group by saying "I've got to go flip my underwear." They thought I was turning the pair I was wearing inside out! I got a bad reputation after that.....

That's my life right now. Research and humor from friends and family. :)

Miss you all! I love all of your funny emails!

A little update...

2005-10-11T13:04:00.000-05:00

Ok...just a little update:

1) The rain has stopped. Yeah!!
2) There have been no major earthquakes. We´re a lot luckier than the people in India!!
3) The volcano is going to erupt again, this time bigger than before, so I`m staying right here in the capitol. This caused me to dream all night that it actually WAS erupting and I was in the middle of it. But no worries...I`m far far away.

I´m adding a link in "other links" that goes to SNET, a government agency here that is monitoring the volcanic activity. It`s in spanish, but I think you can get the just of the site. It has maps and stuff with info.

So...give me a call if you feel like chatting. I can let you know all the fun stuff going on here! :)

Talk to ya soon!

Earthquake...

2005-10-07T13:29:00.000-05:00

12:15 PM
We just had an earthquake. I´m fine. I don´t know how bad it was. My phone doesn´t work. I´ll write more later.

1:15 PM
I just got more info...

"We had a 6.2 "temblor" (not an earthquake which is known as a "terremoto"). It's was off the coast of Sonsonate in the same area as last weeks. Cell phones are jammed (as usual) after one of these as everyone immediately calls home to check on houses, kids, etc. It will clear in a bit."

2:45 PM
They're reporting here that it was a 6.2 and the states are reporting 5.8. Here are 2 links about what's going on:

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/recenteqsww/Quakes/usdxba.htm
http://www.snet.gob.sv/Geologia/ultsent.php

My family just called me and informed me that everyone is evacuating from our community. I don't know what that means about all the people who are there from other communities. I will continue updating this site as I find out more information.

3:00 PM
Tim (the author of the blog I mentioned the other day) has some good information on his blog about this whole incident. Click on "El Salvador News" on the right side of this screen to get more information on what is going on.

Well...there is always some drama I guess...

2005-10-06T16:58:00.000-05:00

So...today I woke up to silence! No rain. That's the first time that has happened in about 3 weeks! Marie and I decided to go to "the market" in San Salvador to look for some furniture for her apartment and underwear for me.

I'm telling ya. This country is crazy when it comes to underwear sales. I mean, seriously. Does anyone really buy underwear without trying it on first?? I guess I'm sending this questions to all the girls on the list, because you guys probably settle for the fruit of the loom package stuff. But girls buy underwear separately. And we look for lots of things. Comfort. Color. Fit. Style. Style is very important. Although I guess it is tied to comfort...for me at least. Anyway, I don't want to be spending money on stuff like that without trying it on first. And that's totally normal! I'm not talking trying on stuff totally naked. Seriously. That's disgusting. But trying on stuff OVER the underwear for the day? Completely normal. Well...in El Salvador...apparently, it's not so normal. During the last 5 days, I've visited every major mall in the city, every store I could find that sells underwear, selected a few pairs to try on, and watched EVERY salesperson look at me like I'm crazy and respond, "You want to TRY THESE ON? No. You're only allowed to try on bras." WHAT is that all about?? Maybe if I was like a size 4 or something, I would be fine with that. But since I'm already a giant here, I think I want to make sure stuff fits! Who wants to go home and find out that their new purchase acts more like a thong than the comfortable coverage they were looking for?? Not me. So I've been working off the pair I wore in on Saturday. I'm sure that sounds terrible to some of you clean freaks, but it wasn't so bad. I mean, I was having my period and all, so it's not like anything was actually TOUCHING the underwear I was wearing...just the pad was touching it. So I was using more of like....an underwear "holder" and the pads changed frequently. Anyway, today I decided, that's it. I've come to the limit of how long I can wear one pair of underwear. So Marie and I visited quite a number of stands in the market. And I ended up buying a package of 12 pairs varying from medium to extra large. It was $5 for the package, so I guess when you get to the point of being sick of wearing something, you're willing to buy what you haven't tried on. Anyway. I guess you know enough about my underwear situation now.

Anyway, we also found some great cheap tables for Marie's apartment, so we were happy. Everything was great. I got underwear. She got tables. We had a great lunch. And then we came to the office, where we were checking email. And I thought, "I haven't checked my hotmail account for awhile. I think I'll see if there is anything worthwhile in there." So I went through the 200 messages, mostly junk, and noticed this one that said something about unauthorized usage and thought, "Well, maybe I should open that one up." It was from PayPal and it said that I had added another email user to my account. I used PayPal ONCE like 4 years ago so I was like, "That doesn't sound too good." So I visited their website to remove this so-called user, and was told when trying to log-in that they didn't have a michellegullett@hotmail.com. Funny, since that's the address they sent the notice to. So I went to my US online banking site and saw a charge from yesterday for approximately $200. Again, funny, since I don't have any cards or checks down here. So I called the bank and found out that during the last week, about $1200 has been spent from my account on the internet and $500 more was attempted to be spent, but K-Mart declined the charge since they didn't have the 3 digit code on the back of my card. So...that's going to be fun to fix. If it's any of you, sorry to say the card won't work anymore. :)

So...the drama continues here in El Salvador. It's not so much with the rain and volcano (although the volcano appears to be acting up again), but with my US finances. I never seem to be short on the stories, do I?

Hope you're all doing well! I think hearing about the underwear and money situation probably are enough for you right now....

One more thing...I keep forgetting to tell you this!! If you want to ever read about news in El Salvador in English, you should visit http://luterano.blogspot.com/. It's a blog from this guy named Tim that lives in Wisconsin and he updates it regularly. You can also view it from this blog by clicking on "Other links", then "El Salvador News" (right side of page).

I'll write more later!

Miss ya! :)

If it´s not earthquakes and hurricanes...

2005-10-05T11:15:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone! So I´m still in the capital. I guess if it´s not earthquakes or hurricanes, it´s volcanoes and flooding. At least there is always stuff to talk about here! :)

So in the last four days, I´ve lived through 2 volcano eruptions, massive flooding, and mudslides. I´m now staying in the capital for 2 emergencies. It has been raining straight for the past 2 weeks so now roads are collapsing and there are major mudslides throughout the country. All volunteers have been instructed not to travel. That´s my current state, anyway, due to the volcanic activity, so it´s just more stuff to write about for me. :)

I did break down and buy more clothes. Wearing the same exact clothes everyday was starting to get a little boring (and I´m sure was starting to bother the people around me). So that´s exciting, huh? At least with these fun emergencies, I am getting some new stuff!

So...I don´t really have any crazy stories right now. Although, in my first night in the capital, I did go to a "game night" with Peace Corps staff. And they brought Cranium to play. Unfortunately, it was just a pretty fun game. No outbursts. No good stories like there have been in the past. But we did win. :) And I was going crazy with how we needed to strategize.

So that´s about it. The country is falling apart, but I´m safe. And my host family is safe. We´ve talked about 5 times now since I´ve left.

So...when you get a moment, let me know what´s going on with you! I miss you all!!

Oh, and visit my blog! I added a counter and a location tracker. :)

Talk to ya soon!

It's a little hotter here...

2005-10-02T19:03:00.000-05:00

"Ok, take care." That was the message that I received from our security officer after I let her know I was ok.

As many of you know by now, the volcano did have a little explosion yesterday. I have been evacuated to the capital indefinitely for the moment. There were lava rocks ranging in size from pebbles to the size of cars that were thrown from the volcano into a 10 mile radius, some of them hitting around my canton. I, during all of this, was on a bus on my way to Santa Ana, the 2nd largest city in the country. Our bus stopped along the road by an overlook area, and one of the bus employees got off and just stood outside. We were all like, "Geez. What's going on with this guy??" So we looked out the windows and saw this HUGE cloud that was pouring out of the volcano. So we all ran to that side of the bus and watched in disbelief for about a minute, and then climbed out to watch and witnessed this cloud getting bigger and bigger above our heads. I was like, "Oh CRAP!!"

I didn't have my camera, but did have my cell phone, so I got a quick phone photo of all of this. So we all boarded the bus again, and the driver drove like a madman to get us out of there.

FYI, the Peace Corps did call me right away (I mean minutes after it started erupting), but we were having problems with the connection. So when we arrived to the Congo, an area outside of Santa Ana, I called the Peace Corps and they told me that I needed to go to the capital immediately.

So now I'm here in the capital, with the clothes on my back and the notebooks I needed for my meeting yesterday. But I'm safe, and very happy for that.

There is one other volunteer that has been evacuated. He actually had to run from his house carrying 2 kids to safety because rocks were falling all around him. I'm so glad I wasn't in my site when it started going off!!

Anyway, I'm including some stories and photos that I found in case you don't know about this.

http://www.laprensagrafica.com/especiales/2005/erupcion/

I'll write more soon. We're going to get some dinner now. :)

Miss you all!!
M
------------------------------
CNN News

lamatepec volcano erupts
Ash shoots 50,000 feet high

Saturday, October 1, 2005 Posted: 2325 GMT (0725 HKT)

Rescue volunteers search for victims near Ilamatepec volcano on Saturday.

PALO CAMPANA, El Salvador (AP) -- A volcano in western El Salvador erupted on Saturday, sending a column of ash 50,000 feet into the air and killing two farmers buried by chunks of earth and boiling water that tumbled down the slopes.

Authorities ordered the evacuation of three communities in the shadow of the Ilamatepec volcano, which towers near Santa Ana, the country's second largest city, 40 miles from San Salvador, the capital.

"The volcano has entered an eruptive phase that consists of ashes and gases," Interior Secretary Rene Figueroa said.

It was unclear how many people had been ordered to leave their homes. Figueroa said as many as 10,000 residents live close to the volcano, but that most areas were not evacuated.

Emergency response officials said two farmers died and two other residents of the coffee-growing town of Palo Campana were missing.

The ground was smoldering when soldiers arrived to assist in the evacuations. Falling ash had destroyed coffee crops and damaged trees in surrounding forests.

Small bodies of water were steaming and bubbling from the heat and ash covered the ground as far as the eye could see. Problems with landslides worsened as afternoon rains pelted the area.

"We have had an eruption of moderate magnitude," President Tony Saca said during a visit to the country's national emergency response headquarters. But he added that "there was no lava."

"Everyone is helping, first to save lives and get people out, because we don't know what is going to happen," he said.

Figueroa said air force flights over Ilamatepec "confirmed that it emitted a column of ash that reached 50,000 feet high."

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

At least I´m memorable...

2005-09-23T11:36:00.000-05:00

Hey, everyone!! Ok. So I kind of feel like the last few weeks have been pretty boring. I mean, really, I usually have at least one Seinfeld-like story a couple of times per week. And for the last couple of emails, I just haven´t had ANY. But...that all changed this week. I´m back to normal!! :)

So...in the last week, I´ve spent the night outside the church with refugees from around the volcano, learned how to get to Sonsonate (the city) in buses, memorably introduced myself to hundreds of people in Izalco (my municipality...the town for the country area that I live in), made a fool of myself in the local pupuseria and with one of the high school english classes, and enjoyed (for awhile anyway) some alcoholic beverages and fun with volunteers in the western side of the country. There is other stuff, but this stuff is definitely the most fun to talk about. So....

SPENT THE NIGHT WITH REFUGEES
I´m not really sure if refugees is the right word here, but they´re the people that have been evacuated due to the volcanic activity. They´re staying in my town, outside the church. So we basically played cards all night and talked. Pretty fun stuff. Nothing really crazy happened...just letting you know that the drama continues. :)
TRAVELS TO SONSONATE IN BUSES
I bet you thought you were going to get another crazy bus story, huh? Nope! Perfectly traveled...sin problemas. :) It makes the highlights because it´s so uncommon for something like that.

INTRODUCTION TO IZALCO
So, during one of my visits to the ice cream shop in Izalco (my municipality), I met about 10 students from one of the schools. We all got along really well, so they invited me to a presentation the following Saturday in the center of town (right in front of the mayor´s office), where they were going to perform a dance. I guess every Saturday this month, they´re having presentations by 2 schools in the center of town, to celebrate their Independence. So I went. And the presentation was pretty cool because they had matching bands, dancers, and speakers. So, after the bands marched in and a couple of people spoke, it started raining. So HUNDREDS of onlookers ran for cover. Half ended up under one of two tents and the other half went under the overhang of the mayor´s office. The presentation was suspended for about 5 minutes while volunteers moved the two tents together in front of the stage (the front of the mayor´s office). So I moved to be under the tent with the other community members so we could watch the presentations. I was thinking, "Well, I did bring my umbrella in case this happened...too bad it´s in my backpack in my host family´s car!" Anyway, the tent offered enough cover for us. But about halfway through the event, I noticed that people were moving away from the front so I looked up and saw that all of this water was gathering in the fabric, causing a big bulge to form and water to come in to where we were standing. I was fine where I was standing, but it was causing people on the perimeter to be pushed into the rain. I looked around and realized that I was at least a foot to a foot and a half taller than most of the people there and I could probably reach the top of the tent. So I decided to help out. At the same moment I decided to fix this, another guy, close to my height, got the same idea and stood right where I was going to stand. He wasn´t quite tall enough, though, to reach the top of the tent, so he just tried pushing on the big bulge, which did absolutely nothing to fix the problem. So I walked over to the area, faced him, reached up to the top of the tent and started pulling while he pushed on the big bulge. At this point, everyone was really happy we were fixing this, so we were the center of attention for these hundreds of people. (Again, there was a slight pause in the program so people could resume standing under the tent.) I tried pulling lightly at first, but I couldn´t move anything, so I just yanked the fabric with all of my force and ...WHOOSH! Like FIVE TO TEN GALLONS of water just gets DUMPED on me!! And the crowd goes CRAZY!! Screaming, yelling, clapping, laughing, pointing, etc. Everything you can possibly imagine when a crowd goes crazy. And I just start laughing (I mean, after the total shock wore off!). And I couldn´t stop. And the crowd was right there with me - laughing their butts off. So I just shrugged my shoulders and said, "Well, it´s fixed! And by the way...I´ll be living here for 2 years. My name is Michelle." Nice intro. So now I´m the giant gringa with a few water problems. Buy hey...at least I know they´ll remember me, right?

FUN AT THE PUPUSERIA
So I´m at the pupuseria, my regular Sunday night hang-out now, talking with Gloria, the cook, and one of the patrons RUNS into the kitchen and shouts out, "Michelle!! You´re song it on!!" I had no idea what was going on, so I walked into the next room to try to figure out what was going on. There was a tv in there, with all of the people eating pupusas, and they had a popular dance show on. And the dancers were dancing to "I Will Survive". And I was like, "I LOVE this song!!" So I just went CRAZY and started belting out the words and dancing. All of the people eating their pupusas stopped and just stared at me with looks like, "What is the crazy gringa doing now??" It was AWESOME!! I had so much fun! And I called my friend Jen who is notorious for dancing with me in times like that, and she just had one question about the whole thing. "So how do they know that is `your` song??" :)

FUN WITH ENGLISH
Yesterday, I taught 3 english classes, or at least part of them. The teacher wasn´t there for 1, so I taught it. And the other 2 were just parts of class. But the last one, in the high school, I came upon because I was making copies in the computer lab, where class was. They were learning a song, "Truly, Madly, Deeply" (http://www.seeklyrics.com/lyrics/SAVAGE-GARDEN/Truly-Madly-Deeply.html), in English. So I was helping them with some of the sounds that are difficult to pronounce here. Like "th" or words that begin or end with "t". They said, "How about if you sing this for an example for us?" I was like, "You mean, by myself??" They all yelled, "Yeah!!" So, after making them promise that they would sing loudly afterwards, I did. I sang an entire song in front of 40 kids, by myself. Memorable, I´m sure. :) Afterwards, they were still having lots of problems with the "t" sound, so I was like, "Ok. I´m going to draw for you." So I drew a cross-section of a mouth on the board to attempt to demonstrate where the tongue should be with the sound. But I didn´t tell them it was a cross-section. I just said, "Ok. This is a mouth." And they just LOST it laughing. They were all like, "You can´t draw at all!!" And I was like, "No, no! This is the side! Here are the teeth..." Anyway. I don´t think they´ll be asking me to play Pictionary with them anytime soon. :)

A NIGHT OUT WITH THE GRINGOS
And lastly, we recently had a western conference where all of the volunteers in the western part of the country got together to talk about projects and stuff like that. All I have to say about this is...good conference and don´t drink more than one drink if you haven´t drank in 3 months.

Oh, and one final thing. I received an email from someone last time asking me not to use the lord´s name in vein. Sorry if I offended people...just recounting a story.

Well, that´s about it for me! I hope you´re all doing well!!

Miss ya tons!