Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...

No, not your immigrants. I'm talking about your baseball equipment! The picture above is of my community's pickup softball team. We play every other night, and for many of the women who play, it's their only time to have fun out of the kitchen.

As you can see, there is only one glove in the photo. And even in the week that's passed since I took this photo, it's disintegrated even more. Pretty much just a heap of cheap leather and plastic. The rest of the girls play barehanded and believe me, it hurts. They're so much tougher than me it's crazy.

So, with that in mind, please do me a huge favor and search your basements, attics, garages, yard sales, whatever!, for any kind of softball equipment and donate what you can. If something ends up costing 5 bucks, don't worry, I'll pay you back or buy it off you. I'll be back in Boston in a week (woo hoo!) and am leaving a ton of space in my pack for mitts, softballs, anything you guys might not be using that, TRUST ME, we will put to good use down here.

Lastly, just to review the basics of El Salvador's economy...

The average pay for a day's labor = $6
The average cost of a meal = $1.50
The average cost of a cup of coffee = 25 cents

The average cost of a softball = $5
The average cost of a mitt = $40

Think about it...

Coffee coffee buzz buzz buzz

Lousy picture of my host mom's kitchen, but at least you can get a sense of how smoky a salvadoran kitchen gets...


Step 1. Buy a pound of coffee. 80 cents here. No idea what raw coffee beans cost in the states.
Step 2. Toast it in a comal for about an hour.
Step 3. Grind that shit up!

But, um, yeah, the whole "growing it yourself in a shady high-altitude cloud forest" thing... you’re on your own.

This is our new dog. I know, she’s adorable! She even winks! No, wait, that’s a severe eye infection from a recent bite wound. Well, at least we’re gonna nurse her back to health. No, wait, in the short time she’s been living with us, she’s actually lost weight and acquired a decent amount of puncture wounds (our yellow lab is literally tearing her to pieces whenever it’s feedin time). Great.

See? Sweet wound, huh?

You can't really see it here, but the bite wound is huge and nasty, with this big white thing in the middle. My buddy Salva said it was actually part of a bone sticking out and he dared me to touch it (I didn’t, but it wasn’t). Side note: I’m not one to back down from a bet, but in the two weeks we’ve had this mutt, it’s already managed to bite pretty much every member of our family, including our 3 year old and 5 year old. Nice! Great for a family with little girls. Rest assured that, at least as of this morning, I’ve managed to remain ten fingered.

Also, a handful of you keep reminding me that I’m not really doing a good job blogging. Thanks for keeping me on my toes. Also, you’re all pricks. But despite your prickishness, you’re right! So in-between reading my dilapidated (but loved) copy of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues and listening to an unhealthy amount of Kings of Leon, this is how I spend my time:

Sports

When I’m not nursing a leg injury (Nomar Garciaparra, I’m sorry I ever doubted you), I play pickup softball and soccer every afternoon. Side note: being injured sucks. Especially when it’s your kicking foot in a country whose national sport is soccer. Anyway, being out there every afternoon has been awesome. And nothing builds confianza better than getting cleated in the knees and getting right up to knock the guy down the next time he tries to come near you. The rest of the guys love it.

Reforming my ADESCO

An ADESCO (more or less Association for Community Development) is a group of people elected by the people of the community to work on community projects and make community-wide decisions. Did I mention community? Because that part’s pretty important. ADESCOs are a link between the people in rural communities and the mayor’s office in town. And they’re sort of like student council for grown ups, ie, with the power to impose taxes and/or solicit the American government for gringos. I find them actually kind of fascinating. They came about after the civil war ended in the 90s as a compromise between the two sides (leftist peoples party and the right wing govt). They were a way for communities to have more say in how their government was run. At least I think that’s why they were formed. I might have been dozing off during that part of training. Anyway, they work on infrastructure projects, raise money for families in need, and in general, have their finger on the pulse of the community. I actually live with my ADESCO president, which is sort of an added bonus, as I'm in a position to hear insider info and (gently) influence the way we handle certain issues. Anyway, our ADESCO isn't exactly firing on all cylinders so I'm working on getting us to meet more regularly, set agendas, review member roles, and fill vacant spots for people who no longer participate. Very time consuming!

Coordinating stove projects

As you guys know, these stoves are pretty amazing. And the people in the community are really buzzing over them. Right now I'm in discussions with the NGO that makes the fancy stoves (not the homemade ones) to come and give a demonstration. If you're interested in more info, here's a link to their webpage <<<www.stoveteam.org>>> Anyway, they're throwing our community into a current grant ensuring us 20 stoves at $20 each. The catch: I have to buy at least two stoves at full price to cover their transportation costs from the coast. Damn, I hate losing arguments. But they got me over a barrel. Or a stove. You decide.

Cooking group Thursdays

Like I said, starting to slip. The good news is, I just got a copy of Cooking in the Campo, PC/El Sal's unofficial cookbook. 80 pages of campo recipes. Should help a ton.

Killing time in town

Basically, I make the same list every visit. Post office - internet - picture frames - supermarket - licuado. A licuado fyi is a fruit smoothie. Okay, stop laughing. I freely admit to loving fruit smoothies. They’re like mandatory here. Probably the most nutritious thing in my diet. Milk from a gallon jug the licuado lady buys across the street at the supermarket (not local milk from a plastic bag), clean blenders you can watch her clean with soapy water, papaya, bananas and pineapples she washes and cuts up right there for you with a clean knife. Ah, what am I talking about? You guys won’t understand until you’re here and can see what every other place is like!

Working on my house

Latest projects. I cut 2 liter plastic bottles in half and swapped them for tiles in my roof. Now, my kitchen and bedroom are a ton brighter. For free. Well, the money thing isn't really an issue, as my monthly electric bill is sub 4 dollars, with a fridge. Also, building a set of stairs for my side entrance and planting a vegetable garden (more on this last one later).

Watch movies with Salva

Poco a poco I’m introducing my counterpart to the greats of american cinema. It started with 300. A classic. No, really. If Homer were still alive, he’d give it two thumbs up. Then the Spartans would probably have him killed for being a pansy poet and not a soldier. But I digress. The next movie: Kill Bill V.1. For some reason, he didn’t want to see the sequel. A shame. Way better than the first one. And last week Juno. Side note: don’t watch Juno with your salvadoran counterpart. Ever. The hipster humor just doesn’t translate.

Also, last week Salva and I threw a fiesta for the kids in our school to celebrate how much trash we collected during our recycling day. (Over 140 lbs!) Which ended up being a ton of cash. In the future, this money will go towards school supplies. But just to get them excited on the whole idea, this time around we blew most of the money on pinatas, jello and 14 loaves of banana bread. Well, that last part I contributed. We ate, played a trash pickup relay race, and afterwards I gave a short charla on the importance of recycling. It was great.

Joyful onlookers. Hey, wait! Get the hell off my truck, you punks!

Lastly, just a quick recap of a mini adventure from a week ago. Last Friday, my host dad took me up into the mountains to visit a few of his cousins who live in the pine forests. He mentioned that it was far. I had no idea it would be two hours far... in the back of a pickup. But it was amazing. You guys ever heard of microclimates? It’s when, for example, you're sitting in the back of a pickup truck slipping it’s way up into the mountains passing through clouds on a muddy road 4000 ft. up when the rain just opens up out of nowhere and you're nearly washed away off the side of a cliff, but then you come up over a hill and 30 seconds later you're drenched in total sunshine. Only to repeat the process ten more times. So cool.

Anyway, we eventually got to our faroff destination and arrived at the party only to see... drumroll please... everyone hammered off their asses on guaro, aka backcountry hooch, aka moonshine. Pretty funny. Especially the guy who fell asleep inside a barrel. Well, partially inside a barrel.

They served us bbq'd deer, goat and beef. And all with insanely hot chiles. Then we put on sweaters, drank coffee they grew themselves, talked about hunting, and enjoyed the view. Good times.

I suck at blogging

Apparently, some people do this everyday. And they’re good at it. I can’t imagine how. I mean, there are actually people out there who sit down everyday to type up crap that others, supposedly, will read and care about. Everyday. Man, that sounds tough. I’m having a hard time writing once a month. But no, they sit down, write something up, hit enter, and get like a million hits or whatever. Wow.

I think in the end, I don’t want to be good at something as ugly sounding as blogging. It just sounds lame and techy. So that’s my rationale; there are better things to do in life than type up what I ate for breakfast (incidentally, choco flakes, coffee, and pb&j on toast) and how many times my weak little stomach has gotten sick (246 if anyone’s keeping count). Anyway, here’s a giant entry that I’ve been meaning to type up for a long time. Sit back and relax. It’s gonna be a long one.

San V

So as some of you may know, I just got back from two weeks of "technical" training. Supposedly, now I’m equipped to literally fix every problem that might ever come up in my community. Basically, I’m awesome. I achieved this awesome status by going on a field trip, sitting through an impressive amount of charlas on environmental topics, community gardening, dental hygiene, and sex education, to name a few. And that's kinda it. Hmm, trying to stay positive about technical training is proving harder than I thought. Let’s just say it was great to see all my buddies again, and also to enjoy every outlet of fun and diversion San V has to offer. Like this for example.





But I don’t want to sound entirely negative. There were some good points to the two weeks. And here they are, in no particular order:

Peace Corps + Habitat for Humanity = Super Volunteerism

Somebody that day actually pointed out how funny it was we were doing Habitat as PC volunteers. Kind of like Adam donating blood the same day he had jury duty. (Speaking of which, Uncle Sam salutes you, kid brother.) Anyway, it was only for a day, but it was an awesome experience working on a Habitat house. Very fun and very tiring. Everyone likes to get their hands dirty and we frickin got em dirty. Mixed concrete, laid down cinderblocks, and set up the rebar supports. Good times. I threw on some photos to prove that we didn't just sit on our asses.



Jimbo enjoying this pose entirely too much...



Super efficient stoves. It’s science.

We also visited a few volunteers’ sites to check out their communities' stove projects. Basically, your average salvadoran woman cooks using an open flame in her house. This is bad. Very bad. When I visit houses doing my census, I'm always amazed at the burnt adobe walls and stalagtites of ash coming down from their tile roofs. I make a point of talking with them for a sec about the walls and how they aren't the only things getting turned into jerky. Hint, it's your lungs!

But there's an easy solution. More efficient stoves. The ones we saw and later constructed burn up to 80 percent better than an open flame and don’t give off smoke, so you can use them right in your kitchen during the rainy season and won't fill the whole house with smoke. Pretty cool. Anyway, here's a photo of one of the stoves.



They cost 50 bucks (ouch!), but a rotary club in Oregon pays 30 bucks for each stove so the family only has to pay $20. And if that's too much, they can pay in installments so they only have to raise 5 bucks a month. It's like the definition of a win-win situation.

We also went to a muni volunteer's community to learn how to make similar stoves but out of cheap materials people can find in their communities. They're essentially the same design as the fancy-pants one designed by an oregon professor, but they're made out of woodchips, dirt, tiles, and molasses. Yep, molasses!











Lastly, we found all this work to be extremely tiring. So a few of us took part in some alternative workshops being held at the local beaches. These included surfing, 4 am pool hopping, and my personal favorite, the how many people can you cram in a hotel room workshop. Very educational.











The photos below are from Playa El Espino. A very cool beach. Not really anything to do besides collect seashells and walk endlessly for miles in either direction with a beer in your hand. Wait a sec. That’s the whole point of going to the beach!



Also, beach cows? Okay.



There was something beautiful about a cow enjoying the sunset as much as I was. For a brief moment, I thought about being a vegetarian.