When The Rains Came...

June 11, 2007

Hi Everybody,

Hope this letter finds everyone happy and in the throes of summertime in the good ole U S of A. Here, we´re getting ready for the rainy season, which is a busy and exciting time in El Pital. On Friday, as Dany and I were giving our usual afternoon literacy/remedial math class, the skies opened up, sending us the year´s first real dousing of rain. The rain has been a long time coming, and has been the subject of much debate lately. People here wait for the first rains of the season to plant their corn and beans, which will sustain them for the rest of the year. However, if the rains don't come in May or early June, the crop won't be developed enough by the time the rains stop, usually in September or October. If there are no ears of corn on your maiz plants by the time the rains stop, you and your family are out of luck, and tortillas. And if you plant before the rains come, your seeds will obviously die for lack of water.

The planting itself is an intense, 6-10 day process of spraying pesticide, weeding, and finally planting the seeds. Once the earth is softened by the first rains, family groups head for the hills and stab the earth in neat rows, using a spiky tool called a chusa to dig a 1- 2 inch hole. Two seeds are then expertly tossed into the small hole, which is covered up with your foot as you take small, measured steps from one end of your field ("milpa") to the next. On Saturday, I saddled up the horses and set out with my four host brothers to our family milpa, and I sowed seeds with the best of them. And as it turns out, I´m not very good at it. Though, to be fair, I was only using one hand/arm, as the day before I sliced off part of my finger pad while peeling potatoes with the new peeler my mom sent me. That's a quality peeler.

As I lagged far behind the others while plodding slowly through the field, awkwardly sowing my seeds, I marveled at the concentration, coordination, and brute strength it requires to sow corn by hand. By the time the women arrived with lunch at noon, having carried our chicken-soup, tortillas, and tamarindo fresco up the hill on a half-hour hike, I was beat. Broken blisters lined my hands and sweat drenched my shirt as the sun beat down. This humbling experience not only made me more appreciative of the work these men and women do day in and day out, but also of the tortillas that I take for granted and so often cram down my throat with little pleasure. I´ve started to enjoy these little corn pancakes once again.

Ok, back to the damp literacy classroom. As the rain fell in giant drops, I stared up in awe, first at the intensity of the rain, and then at the fact that here I was in very rural El Salvador, in an open classroom (the walls are half cement, half chain-link fence) that felt more like an ocean-going vessel with the spray on my face and the water we were taking in. Moments like these, where I feel like I suddenly wake up from the dream my life seems to be here, aren't frequent. But when the do occur, they come with a startling clarity, like a sleeping foot being shaken awake, pins and needles. I thought of how very different my life is here, and then of how very different lives in general are here. How many kids in the states have to worry about their notebooks getting wet during class due to the wind blowing the rain through the chain-link? But I also thought about the strong connection with nature among the people here, and that having to deal with weather inside your classroom, as well as being able to marvel at it and watch it from your desk, though a bit distracting, can be a beautiful thing. As the winds were swirling around us in the classroom, flecks of rain hitting us now and then in the face, I took a quick look around the classroom and saw only excited eyes, all in awe of the power of the storm. A lesson in itself, maybe, and one that they receive every year, reminding them that nature is far bigger than they are, and that they and their crop-sowing parents depend on its whims for their survival.

Lately, I've been incredibly homesick for San Francisco. Suddenly or gradually, day-in and day-out, fragments of words, smells, sights and things still unknown to me conspire here to remind me of the places, sights, smells, restaurants, FOOD, and people that I left behind in San Francisco. Not to say that the rest of you aren't constantly on my mind, but the city by the bay seems to hold particular sway over me right now. I do miss that place. But I'm not sure I could trade the daily craziness, the humor and absurdity of everyday goings-on, laughing out loud with the 4 little girls next door, and the genuine warmth that people show me here to go back to San Francisco right now. Or maybe I could - my mind changes by the minute. I shared this thought with my Peace Corps friend Greg the other day: Having had this experience, are we forever doomed to straddle the divide between Latin America and the States? Will the grass always be greener where we are not? I´m not sure I will ever be in one place without intensely missing the other.

I promised you all awhile ago that I would tell you a little bit about what I'll be doing work-wise in the next few months to come. Sorry for the short form, but here´s the list:

· Teaching English classes to adults and high-school kids 2 nights a week

· Advising and teaching the teachers various participatory learning strategies in the English classes taught in the school

·Working with Dany, a local NGO worker and all-around community all-star, in the literacy/remedial math program

·Working with my Environmental Youth Group to give talks and demonstrations on organic fertilizer, preventing Dengue fever, reforestation, recycling and other environmental themes.

·Soliciting 3,000 trees from an NGO here to reforest our hillsides and protect our water resources.

·Continuing with the Jovenes En Accion (the card makers/small business youth group). In the future, I plan on giving the group a series of classes titled "Negocios Exitosos" (successful businesses), on the basics of starting and running small businesses. After these classes, the kids will choose a micro-business to start ( i.e. making and selling hand cremes, buying a blender and making smoothies) and then form groups based on their choices. Each group will receive $20 or $30 to start up (from the card profits), and we'll see how successful they can be.

·Working with friends in the states to get 30 or so computers donated to the school

·Building a computer center for the school

·Eventually revamping the water system here, with the help and sage advice of my dad

·Planning for my opus, which is to build a high-school to serve the students in the community and surrounding communities, who have proven themselves to be chomping at the bit for more education and more opportunities.

Also, since I last wrote, I took a vacation with my family to Costa Rica. It was an amazing trip, and I can´t really do it justice in an email. But I will say that Costa Rica was mind-bogglingly beautiful, and I was grateful for the chance to see where my sister had learned, lived and worked, and thought it incredible to see parts of the country through her eyes. After the trip, the whole group came back to El Salvador and holed up in my little corner of the country for three days. The experience was beyond intense, as my two worlds collided for the first time. Actually, it was more of a beautiful meshing than a collision, as the community rolled out the red carpet for my family, and my family dealt with everything new and unfamiliar with poise and fearlessness. I was so proud of everyone, and when they left, I felt that the goodbyes were much more difficult than those said when I left the US for El Salvador in September. To this day, every day, my family is talked about and asked about by everyone in the community.

Thanks for bearing with me on another long-winded email from The Savior. I don't get many opportunities to speak English, so when I get going, its hard to stop. I also apologize for not getting back to many of you who have responded to my emails. I love the responses, and laugh aloud and think about them (and you all) a lot. I promise to be better about replies in the future. Also, pictures will be forthcoming the next time I make it to the e-cafe. Until then, take care of yourselves, and enjoy the summatime!

--Benjamin