Rain on My Parade

Well, as usual things have been just insane here in The Little Coconut.

I have been amping up my community time since I moved into my new pad. My Spanish is getting better - except for a disastrous comedor experience with Danny Clarahan in Sonsonate - people are finally "tu-ing" me, and my house is full of watermelons that my neighbors and friends have gifted to me. I've been doing house visits here and there, and despite the initial awkwardness, they feel good.
The other day I had about 7 visitors over throughout the day. If I could just get those jovenes on the corner to not make kissy sounds at me when I pass, life would be 100 percent.

And then it happened.

"Your 'tio' (the codename my host family and I have for my devilish counterpart) was over yesterday. And he was talking about you." My Tio was talking mad smack, turns out. "Los de Cuerpo de Paz... He said, do nothing. The guy that was up in Jujutla or Juayua, he just wandered around, gallavanting, never worked... Looks like we have the same problem on our hands." Ben and milena defended me, saying that I go to everything, that I participate and talk to everyone.

"Naaaaahh," he said, "you're just defending her because you consider her family."

So, I HAD been having a great morning - the details of which I shall get to shortly - and then I heard all this, and I wanted to cry for the first time since I've been here. How dare that so and so say those things, he just wants me to throw money into his pockets and give things to the people he finds worthy.

I got home, heated up my tortilla, fed my one remaining bird, and decided thoroughly that my tio can lump it. I'll show him. I made a mental list of all the things I had done that day and I have to say, I'm not doing nothing. I decided to address the expectations and role of Cuerpo de Paz at the next ADESCO meeting. That jerk.

Va.

Home Sweet Home, or Making a Nest

The Kids playing with the glow sticks (sent by mom back home)

Part two

Casi Angeles

My Spare room

My Kitchen, messy

My Bedroom, Messy

My Living Room

From the "yard"

The View from the Ground

The View from the Porch

I've got a bunch of Bananas!

This is what they look like...

My lime tree bears fruit

Well, thats the tour of my new house. It's really big, but I dig it, big time. Fifty dollars a month in rent, and today I got my first electricity bill, $2.95. Killer.

Living alone has changed the experience here pretty thoroughly. Parts I like - cooking my own food, having electricity, privacy, drop-in visits from neighbors, living in the calle principal, and parts I don't like - too much alone time, not having the pots and pans to cook my own beans still, and having the occasional day where I spend my hours just trying to kill time before I can justify going to bed.

Such is life.

But the good news is I have made some new friends on this end of town, and my friend Milena has broken her promise of "never coming to visit me" and has been by many times.

The other day I heard the sad news that one of my first amigos here in El Cocalito jumped ship and is on his way for the USA. I hardly could believe it, as he had a steady income, a family of three young kids and a loving wife. It came out of nowhere. "He had some troubles," my friends say. I got a text message from him the other night from Guatemala. He really is going. I wished him well, and warned him that the USA is full of Gringas Pasmadas, a claim he negated, saying that all the Gringas Pasmadas went to El Salvador. I am really going to miss having him around to joke and shoot the shit with, but I hope that his trip goes smoothly.

In other news, I had a date with a Salvadoran this morning. It started an hour late, and more or less was successful. I will write a whole blog entry on these developments just as soon as I can stop laughing.

Ooohh La La!

Things finally got BETTER!

After about a week long bummer fest, things in El Salvador have finally, finally, fallen into place.

Some frustrations came up with my ADESCO members. They're really protective over me, to a fault, and were trying to take the lead on getting me a house. They had chosen a little, dark, no electricity, no water craphole. (Literally, the latrine was a nearly full craphole in the ground).

I vetoed, and found myself a spacious, electroded, superpad (photos to come once I have it looking better). So far, all but one of the bats have moved out, and I've patched the roof up nicely.

My friend Nancy came over to help me hacer limpieza, and she we shared some hot toast and jelly with icy Salva cola on the front porch. She informed me of the tasty treasure trove in my yard. Cocos, limes, jocotes, chiles, mangos and bananas (which are about a week or two from being ready to pick and eat)

That, plus the garden beds I plan on putting in once I'm a little more settled will make for some good eating.

My host family has been really moody about my leaving. Despite my insistance that it is just as far from my house to theirs as it is from theirs to mine, they say it is just way too far for them, but not so far for me. Pish Posh. I guess I am being a little moody too.

There has been some chambre concerning the love life of yours truly here in both El Cocalito and all interested parties of La Barra de Santiago. My salvadoran friends and family want so badly for my life to be like a telenovela (as do I, on occasion) that they really like to embellish the littlest things. But that is a story I will save for another post.

With that, here is wishing a happy retirement to my Aunt Kathleen, and speedy recovery to Aunt Judy.

With Love.

A Milestone.

Things in El Salvador have been pissing me off for the last week or so.

Instead of dwelling on cheats, scandals, chambre, and my stint wading through thigh high flood water in the streets of El Cocalito, I decided to pay tribute to the fact that a few weeks ago, I filled my first journal, ever. I'll for sure go into greater detail on all the crummy bits later, when they've -hopefully- come to a happy conclusion.

But for now, a recap on ¨Journal June 2009 to June 2010.¨
(which was gifted to me by Amanda Patt at our graduation.)

December 20, 2009

"I can't beliveve my life right now. I love so much of it....
It kills me when my warmest, funniest, most loving moments with people now are punctuated by phrases life 'I can't believe you're leaving,' 'I'll really miss you,' and 'Will I ever laugh this hard again for two years?'"

Jan 19, 2010

How long will it take for a snail to get to the East coast?

Jan 20, 2010

It's good to know that I still find him as bland and intellectually uninteresting as I did when we finally broke up...

Jan 21, 2010

I'm paraphrasing here, but he said something like, "Well, Jessica, We'll just have to get together soon, so we can end out friendship." Alex Leffler, you put it so well.

Feb 4, 2010 (El Salvador)

I'm already tired of being in this big group. Chatter-Chatter....

Feb 6 2010

Started the day with the worlds most gigantic breakfast of all time.
Recap: Coffee, scrambled eggs, cheese, beans, 1 tortilla, and a plate of fried bananas.

Feb 12, 2010

I ate a whole fried fish, with a face.

Feb 21, 2010

Got on the 161, started to go, bus runs over the cobrador.

***

The Communal Kids swarmed us with grimey, sticky, cheesy hugs.

***

Friday, nothing happened. Oh, except Queso nailed Dan C. in the junk. Hilarious. Crazy lil Queso.

March 7, 2010

The sun is an agressive force.

March 14, 2010

I made a mountain of popcorn and some serious faux pas with plastic bags.

March 30

Rough one. Grandpa passed away this morning in his house. The service is on Friday and I feel bad about missing it... I feel bad that I won't be there, or that I wasn't there.

April 3
My host grandpa brought me some cough syrup he made out of some plant. It is the exact color and temperature as pee.

May 7, 2010

... and then I have to pretend to laugh, over and over again.

June 20, 2010

Oh shit, June's "over," it's almost Christmas.

El Salvador Can Be Beautiful

Leashed.. because turtles... are... fast?

That turtle, from the river by my house, is not long for this world.
Brian is not the nicest of pet owners.

La Barra de Santiago. Which I live 10 minutes from.

Fly Hat

Happy Birthday, dutch yodler.

Thats neato.

Dan Hinkle... the morning after two bottles of tinto and
what must have been some hearty giggling

The view from Vista del Lago, in Suchitoto.

Beauty. Mercury, poo, and chemical invested beauty.


I hit my breaking point this last week... It is still lingering, but I took a walk down photo memory lane and that made me feel better. I can't hate a place where such great people and such potentially great adventures are just around the corner. I hope.

PS,

ahem... also, I know that not every one of my lovely friends and family members reads every one of my blog entries... but if you do, don't hesitate to comment.
Like the letters, packages, emails and fb messages, your comments are like... pennies... from heaven? Or maybe like little arrows of support? Positive vibes? Whichever term you prefer, they mean a lot. :) So thanks for all of it already.

Love you!

Maybe we should sing Skinny Love again....

Training is over.

Three weeks of tech training and spanish reconnect... Really wonderful, energizing, and insightful.

Coming down from that, we made the disastrous mistake of going to Playa El Espino, El Salvador's best beach. Bullshit. They're all liars.

El Espino Recap:

Dead puppy

Fishy beer bottles

No beach

No tiendas

No transportation

I drank too much two nights in a row and regret it, as I always do. I wanted to have fun, I wanted to boot off the feeling of panicky blues I had. Didn't work.

I still feel bummed, and I'm stuck in San Sal for the night, because I couldn't get out of that terrible beach town in time to make it back to site. I could go on and on about my frustration, but I won't. Instead.... here is a better memory....

Suchitoto, boyyeeeee The city of birds and flowers.

Suchitoto recap:

Has a PLAZA,

Affordable drinks

backpacker hunting

immobile marching band

dirty, cheap hostels

Crepes with Nutella

Ferries across the lake

Danny Hinks and I took a weekend to get away from the madness. Two hours by bus, we found ourselves in a rainy, rainy little town. Vista al Lago offered an incredible view of the lake (best enjoyed with two bottles of tinto) and a mosquitero... Only 8 dollars a night, but the walls were fake, and we wanted to keep searching.

Night Two brought us to Luna Blanca, where the dueno sat down for a 10 am beer with us.

Unfortunately... I lost all my self esteem in Suchitoto.

We need to learn to say "no" in a way that caring Salvadorans will understand. Por Ejemplo...

If a Salvadoran man insists that you relax in a hammock, and you say no, and he puts it up and stands there waiting for you to get in... just DON'T.

The truth of the matter is that when he says it's old, but still works, it DOESN'T and you will sit in it for thirty seconds before one of the little ropes breaks and you're hanging by your pinky toe and laughing so hard that you can't move.

The next step is to not allow the man to insist that your friend Dan Hinks then tries the same freakin hammock. But he will, and another little rope will break, leaving him on his ass too.

Why do we let ourselves be put into these situations? For god's sake.

All in All, Suchitoto won, big time. I can't wait to go back, and it was pretty much perfect, while it lasted.

Back in da 'peque

Well, things have been a little kookie around the Salv this last week.

I celebrated my 23rd birthday on Sunday (mi año de oro, by the way) and had the lovely pleasure of attending a birthday dinner that my ADESCO friends threw in my honor. What sweet people! We chowed down pretty seriously, and just as we were finishing up, the rain started coming down.

It didn't really stop for a few days. El Cocalito was a muddy, wet mess. Kind of a bummer.

However, I had things to look forward to.

As a belated 23rd birthday celebration my favorite PCVs and I went to Playa Tunco for two nights to pre-game our two week training in San Vicente. I set of Friday morning, and got to the beach about two hours before Agatha brought in a steady stream of rainfall. Lo que sea. The beach was relaxing, cool, and still just as chock full of beautiful international surfer guys as I hoped it would be.

On the downside, some time earier in the week, I ate something that gave me a bacterial infection in my guts. The mix of alcohol and food that wasn't beans and tortillas exacerbated the problem and gave me a fever and some pretty unfortunate digestive issues. Not cool. Oh well, I can enjoy both the beach and the company of such delightful friends without the booze.

Sunday morning we were scheduled to head out... But Agatha, that jerk, decided to create some minor landslides on the highways all around the department of La Libertad. The bus options were limited, but we got out of Tunco and made it to the city of La Libertad. Most of us had no cash left. The ATMS were all down, and there was no bus service out of the city, due to the condition of the streets. We were a little stuck.

One of the PC staff suggested we take a taxi as far as we could go up the highway before we get to the landside.... then to get out and walk across... he would be waiting on the other side with the Prado. No...

Thankfully the ever resourceful and charming Jon-Michael found a little old lady who hustled and found us a microbus that would bring us into San Salvador. So a few salvi ladies, a stranded traveler from the UK, a mountain of wet, dank luggage and equally wet and smelly PCVs