Time
Tuesday, July 19: Not my birthday, but still a good day. Paul found a birthday card from my mom that had escaped the rest of the bunch and I continued to get some well wishes. I sat in the hammock for a while and read A Prayer for Owen Meany for a while. It was a nice sunny day. Cecilia offered us chocolate cake for breakfast and although it contains proper breakfast foods (eggs, milk, and wheat! como Bill Cosby standup…) we declined and just had cake at lunch and at dinner instead. I had been worried about Brian because I wasn’t sure when he would return from his weekend playing ultimate at the Sandblast tournament in Chicago. Fortunately, he called this afternoon and my fears were put to rest. He had missed his train back to St. Louis because there had been an unattended bag-style bomb scare on the Chicago metro system, so he had to stay an extra night. The phone card he used to call me was a birthday present from my mom. Gosh, she is a clever woman, I hope that I am just like my mom when I grow up but maybe taller—ha. At the high school we played Old Maid and Crazy Eights. First it was just Manuel, and later Kathy joined us. We had fun, but we left a little early because Paul wasn’t feeling well. He freely admitted that it was probably dehydration that kept him feeling so crappy all day. Perhaps now he will understand why I so frequently suggest that he drink more water...perhaps not. In the evening I watched lightning from the balcony of the sewing room, above the chapel. It was really beautiful.
Wednesday, July 20: Took a shower and did some laundry (all by myself!) Milagro invited me to join the team on an afternoon trip to a meeting with some members of the community in the canton Talpetates. That made my morning go quickly! At lunch Alejandro and Balmore encouraged Paul to try some hot sauce on his chicken. Paul—being the macho man that he is—agreed and piled it on. Consequently, he coughed and choked a little before adding an even hotter version to his next piece. I for one, was almost as impressed by his amazing feat as this sentence is sarcastic (Teasing Paul has become one of my favorite leisure activities, as I am sure teasing Ashley is one of his). I offered my cake to everyone at lunch. It was nice to share with the gang. I spent most of the afternoon with the team. On the way, Alejandro and I had fun keeping each other awake and comparing skin tone. He asked me who I thought was browner, him or me. It was a tough call, but I went with Alejandro. The meeting in Talpetates was the beginning of a relationship between the community and the Pastoral Team. The five representatives of Talpetates—three women and two men—introduced themselves and told some stories about the community and stories about their families struggling through the war and through the results of the war, even 15 years since the war “ended.” Then the members of the Pastoral Team introduced themselves and told a little about what the team does. I even got to introduce myself. The meeting was a great way for me to be immersed in the language; the only English being spoken was my name. Sometimes I really wish I had a name that was easier to say in other languages. We had a chat with Alejandro about the necessity of Paul having a Salvadoran girlfriend. He advised finding someone from the high school. Alejandro also convinced Paul and I that it was a good idea to get up at 5:30 the next morning in order to hike up a mountain nearby. After dinner Paul, Alejandro and I hiked up to Western Union to use the internet as surprise! the internet at the house is once again non-functioning. I treated Alejandro to an ice cream cone at la Nevaria with the gift certificate Lynn gave me. He then informed me that we weren’t actually going on this big hike in the morning because he didn’t have the proper shoes. Apparently Paul missed that important bit of information because…
Thursday, July 21: Paul woke up at 5:45 to get ready for the hike…ha ha! The day started out sunny. I noticed halfway through the morning that there was a chicken tethered to one of the trees in the backyard. Blanca gave it some water and threw some corn at it every once in a while. It was nice having another captive animal in the yard to watch, but it made me miss that sweet, sneaky turtle (which I have found out, has escaped from Marta’s). The day didn’t stay sunny, it rained a little in the late morning and for most of the afternoon. At school there was a championship game of a women’s soccer tournament being played in the rain (on the cement “field”). It looked scary and dangerous to me, but I had fun watching with the others for a while before starting our lessons. There were a lot of students huddled under awnings and trees, cheering for their favorite team. Every few minutes a small explosion blasted through the school yard as students lit firework type devices extremely close to their peers (again, a little too dangerous for my taste). After a little while we started our class. Manuel had to leave but Nahum and Kathy stayed and Juan Carlos came a little late. We listened to the song “Only You” from one of the DDR games. It is pretty easy to understand the words and they aren’t incredibly idiomatic, so we decided it was a decent song for filling in the blanks. They had fun listening to the song, singing along, translating, etc. I took a lot of pictures of the class. They thought that was funny. We also mentioned Alejandro’s suggestion that Paul find a Salvadoran girlfriend at the high school. They agreed that it was the best way to make the most of his experience here. After dinner we stopped by the internet café again. On our way out I noticed that the chicken was perched in a low branch of the tree. I asked Milagro about the chicken and she said it was a gift from a woman and that since there was no place to keep it alive at Casa Pastoral… that it would go live at Blanca and Balmore’s. I finished A Prayer for Owen Meany this evening before bed.
Friday, July 22: Happy Birthday Lynn! She is in Iowa because I suppose that is the best place to celebrate a birthday if you aren’t in El Salvador. The chicken got a longer rope today, so it is exploring about a foot farther than it could yesterday. I attempted to do some academic work this morning by translating some of my interview questions into Spanish so Paul and I can attempt to do the interviews without finding a new translator. I think we will be fine. Then I typed up the responses from my interviews with Milagro and Jesus. I was curious to see how much I had written for my blog so far. So I pasted all my entries into one Word document and discovered it to be 18.5 pages. I wish I could write papers at Knox so easily! It rained really hard for most of the day. When we went to the high school we discovered that all of our pupils had gone home because of the rain. We did meet one man who spoke excellent English. He said that he had wanted to join the class when we started but had been too busy, but that he would try and come when he could. With no high school to keep us occupied until dinner we had to find ways to keep ourselves busy. I started reading The Hours, but unfortunately it only took about 24 of them to finish it (get it?). We went to the internet café after dinner but Paul didn’t have much luck getting his email to open so we had to go to La Nevaria to cheer him up. That was ok by me.
Saturday, July 23: I finished The Hours before lunch. The sun came out today and stayed until about 4 pm. It was glorious! I had been missing good old summer heat, although I know the heat and sun here are nothing compared to what I would have in Iowa this summer. I received a letter from my Aunt Dawn today. It is always nice to hear the news from back home. I started reading Hideous Kinky. It’s a novel that was made into a movie starring Kate Winslet. I’ve never seen the movie. But I would consider it now. It was nice to get a little suntan sitting on the porch and in the hammock, while reading and writing letters. Still no internet at the house. We found a copy of the movie The Pianist in Bob’s office, among his multitude of CD cases. We decided that was a good way to spend the evening. A big storm rolled in a little before dinner but we camped out in the office with the movie, and the power didn’t even die (although there was a flicker or two perhaps).
Sunday, July 24: The day started cloudy but turned out to be another warm, sunny day. I finished reading Hideous Kinky, only to find that it was neither hideous, nor—unfortunately—kinky. Oh well, it was a nice read. We walked up to the internet café only to find that it is closed today. I guess the woman there needs a day off every once in a while too. We were harassed by some guy who has a habit of harassing Paul and other gringos. He speaks perfect English—especially the obscenities—and makes ample use of this skill when we pass. Paul has a hard time ignoring him when we pass through his haze of harassment. I guess he hasn’t been trained as a woman to ignore and keep walking. I am rather good at that skill. I even use it on Paul sometimes! I spent a little while today reading through my hand-written journal entries from the duration of my stay. It was very interesting. I found myself recalling minor details that I had left out, and often remembering how I felt as I did each activity I had recorded. Some of those activities seem to have happened such a long time ago. Really? it’s only been 6 weeks in total? And some of those activities seem to have happened just yesterday. Really! It’s only been 6 weeks. It is amazing to think of the time that we have left. Paul is certainly starting to miss it already, I can tell. He is really looking forward to coming back to do this all again. I am just thinking that a normal week goes by so quickly. In one week we will only have 2 weeks left. And 5 days from one week from now we are off to pick up the delegation that we will be with until we leave 10 days later. Time is a funny thing. It was a long afternoon. I started reading A Farewell to Arms. That kept me busy for most of the evening.
Monday, July 25: Paul decided to sleep in this morning because it is a holiday—the day of the student—and his school was not having classes today. So I ate breakfast alone. It was another warm sunny day so I decided to get some laundry done. I did a lot! Underwear, socks, 4 shirts, and even a pair of jeans. I’ve never hand-washed a pair of jeans, it was hard work. The sun was so fierce that only one shirt that had been partially in the shade dried today. Even the jeans dried! I love the sun. After lunch we visited the post office to mail the letters I had written over the weekend to keep myself busy. Then we spent an hour at the internet café, catching up on our email, etc. It was such a hot day that a trip to La Nevaria was imperative. At school we played some games while waiting for more students to arrive. It was another boys club day… they giggled like high school boys do about learning new “vocabulary.” I shook my head and silently wished there were more women in the class. I certainly missed Kathy (either Kathy!). The big thrill of the day was being passed some notes by one of our students. In broken English he wrote that if he had a girlfriend from the United States it would be me. I was a little shocked by the forwardness but then I remembered that this is El Salvador. Then I remembered my male friends from high school. And it all made sense again. Bob returned after dinner and presented Paul and I with gifts from our mommies. Mommies are great! We then spent the stormy evening watching The Incredibles. Thanks Mommy! I listened to a CD from my mom before falling asleep.
Tuesday, July 26: The fourth sunny day in a row! I read a newly acquired TIME magazine this morning, and then finished A Farewell to Arms. Hemingway certainly is a tease. Perhaps I am just too easily seduced by the “romantic” exploits of his couples and then I forget that someone has to die and his relationships always end. Oh well. Now I just have to figure out how to make my 3 new books last for 3 whole weeks! I started reading the longest one, Thomas Pynchon’s V. The hot afternoon sun made me a little sleepy so I decided to take a little nap. However, once I got into my bed I was wide awake. So I just listened to music, ate some goldfish crackers and thought about “stuff.” We visited the internet café after dinner. Brian was online but away. Fortunately my loving mother was also online and volunteered to call him and let him know I was online. I suppose that is kind of silly, but I got to chat with both Brian and my mom for a little while, so it was definitely worth the ridiculousness. On our way home Paul and I walked to this little cliff edge thingy and looked at the stars. It was one of the first really clear starry nights in a long time. We could even see the milky way pretty clearly. When we got home we decided that watching Napoleon Dynamite was the best use of our evening. And it was.
Wednesday, July 20: Took a shower and did some laundry (all by myself!) Milagro invited me to join the team on an afternoon trip to a meeting with some members of the community in the canton Talpetates. That made my morning go quickly! At lunch Alejandro and Balmore encouraged Paul to try some hot sauce on his chicken. Paul—being the macho man that he is—agreed and piled it on. Consequently, he coughed and choked a little before adding an even hotter version to his next piece. I for one, was almost as impressed by his amazing feat as this sentence is sarcastic (Teasing Paul has become one of my favorite leisure activities, as I am sure teasing Ashley is one of his). I offered my cake to everyone at lunch. It was nice to share with the gang. I spent most of the afternoon with the team. On the way, Alejandro and I had fun keeping each other awake and comparing skin tone. He asked me who I thought was browner, him or me. It was a tough call, but I went with Alejandro. The meeting in Talpetates was the beginning of a relationship between the community and the Pastoral Team. The five representatives of Talpetates—three women and two men—introduced themselves and told some stories about the community and stories about their families struggling through the war and through the results of the war, even 15 years since the war “ended.” Then the members of the Pastoral Team introduced themselves and told a little about what the team does. I even got to introduce myself. The meeting was a great way for me to be immersed in the language; the only English being spoken was my name. Sometimes I really wish I had a name that was easier to say in other languages. We had a chat with Alejandro about the necessity of Paul having a Salvadoran girlfriend. He advised finding someone from the high school. Alejandro also convinced Paul and I that it was a good idea to get up at 5:30 the next morning in order to hike up a mountain nearby. After dinner Paul, Alejandro and I hiked up to Western Union to use the internet as surprise! the internet at the house is once again non-functioning. I treated Alejandro to an ice cream cone at la Nevaria with the gift certificate Lynn gave me. He then informed me that we weren’t actually going on this big hike in the morning because he didn’t have the proper shoes. Apparently Paul missed that important bit of information because…
Thursday, July 21: Paul woke up at 5:45 to get ready for the hike…ha ha! The day started out sunny. I noticed halfway through the morning that there was a chicken tethered to one of the trees in the backyard. Blanca gave it some water and threw some corn at it every once in a while. It was nice having another captive animal in the yard to watch, but it made me miss that sweet, sneaky turtle (which I have found out, has escaped from Marta’s). The day didn’t stay sunny, it rained a little in the late morning and for most of the afternoon. At school there was a championship game of a women’s soccer tournament being played in the rain (on the cement “field”). It looked scary and dangerous to me, but I had fun watching with the others for a while before starting our lessons. There were a lot of students huddled under awnings and trees, cheering for their favorite team. Every few minutes a small explosion blasted through the school yard as students lit firework type devices extremely close to their peers (again, a little too dangerous for my taste). After a little while we started our class. Manuel had to leave but Nahum and Kathy stayed and Juan Carlos came a little late. We listened to the song “Only You” from one of the DDR games. It is pretty easy to understand the words and they aren’t incredibly idiomatic, so we decided it was a decent song for filling in the blanks. They had fun listening to the song, singing along, translating, etc. I took a lot of pictures of the class. They thought that was funny. We also mentioned Alejandro’s suggestion that Paul find a Salvadoran girlfriend at the high school. They agreed that it was the best way to make the most of his experience here. After dinner we stopped by the internet café again. On our way out I noticed that the chicken was perched in a low branch of the tree. I asked Milagro about the chicken and she said it was a gift from a woman and that since there was no place to keep it alive at Casa Pastoral… that it would go live at Blanca and Balmore’s. I finished A Prayer for Owen Meany this evening before bed.
Friday, July 22: Happy Birthday Lynn! She is in Iowa because I suppose that is the best place to celebrate a birthday if you aren’t in El Salvador. The chicken got a longer rope today, so it is exploring about a foot farther than it could yesterday. I attempted to do some academic work this morning by translating some of my interview questions into Spanish so Paul and I can attempt to do the interviews without finding a new translator. I think we will be fine. Then I typed up the responses from my interviews with Milagro and Jesus. I was curious to see how much I had written for my blog so far. So I pasted all my entries into one Word document and discovered it to be 18.5 pages. I wish I could write papers at Knox so easily! It rained really hard for most of the day. When we went to the high school we discovered that all of our pupils had gone home because of the rain. We did meet one man who spoke excellent English. He said that he had wanted to join the class when we started but had been too busy, but that he would try and come when he could. With no high school to keep us occupied until dinner we had to find ways to keep ourselves busy. I started reading The Hours, but unfortunately it only took about 24 of them to finish it (get it?). We went to the internet café after dinner but Paul didn’t have much luck getting his email to open so we had to go to La Nevaria to cheer him up. That was ok by me.
Saturday, July 23: I finished The Hours before lunch. The sun came out today and stayed until about 4 pm. It was glorious! I had been missing good old summer heat, although I know the heat and sun here are nothing compared to what I would have in Iowa this summer. I received a letter from my Aunt Dawn today. It is always nice to hear the news from back home. I started reading Hideous Kinky. It’s a novel that was made into a movie starring Kate Winslet. I’ve never seen the movie. But I would consider it now. It was nice to get a little suntan sitting on the porch and in the hammock, while reading and writing letters. Still no internet at the house. We found a copy of the movie The Pianist in Bob’s office, among his multitude of CD cases. We decided that was a good way to spend the evening. A big storm rolled in a little before dinner but we camped out in the office with the movie, and the power didn’t even die (although there was a flicker or two perhaps).
Sunday, July 24: The day started cloudy but turned out to be another warm, sunny day. I finished reading Hideous Kinky, only to find that it was neither hideous, nor—unfortunately—kinky. Oh well, it was a nice read. We walked up to the internet café only to find that it is closed today. I guess the woman there needs a day off every once in a while too. We were harassed by some guy who has a habit of harassing Paul and other gringos. He speaks perfect English—especially the obscenities—and makes ample use of this skill when we pass. Paul has a hard time ignoring him when we pass through his haze of harassment. I guess he hasn’t been trained as a woman to ignore and keep walking. I am rather good at that skill. I even use it on Paul sometimes! I spent a little while today reading through my hand-written journal entries from the duration of my stay. It was very interesting. I found myself recalling minor details that I had left out, and often remembering how I felt as I did each activity I had recorded. Some of those activities seem to have happened such a long time ago. Really? it’s only been 6 weeks in total? And some of those activities seem to have happened just yesterday. Really! It’s only been 6 weeks. It is amazing to think of the time that we have left. Paul is certainly starting to miss it already, I can tell. He is really looking forward to coming back to do this all again. I am just thinking that a normal week goes by so quickly. In one week we will only have 2 weeks left. And 5 days from one week from now we are off to pick up the delegation that we will be with until we leave 10 days later. Time is a funny thing. It was a long afternoon. I started reading A Farewell to Arms. That kept me busy for most of the evening.
Monday, July 25: Paul decided to sleep in this morning because it is a holiday—the day of the student—and his school was not having classes today. So I ate breakfast alone. It was another warm sunny day so I decided to get some laundry done. I did a lot! Underwear, socks, 4 shirts, and even a pair of jeans. I’ve never hand-washed a pair of jeans, it was hard work. The sun was so fierce that only one shirt that had been partially in the shade dried today. Even the jeans dried! I love the sun. After lunch we visited the post office to mail the letters I had written over the weekend to keep myself busy. Then we spent an hour at the internet café, catching up on our email, etc. It was such a hot day that a trip to La Nevaria was imperative. At school we played some games while waiting for more students to arrive. It was another boys club day… they giggled like high school boys do about learning new “vocabulary.” I shook my head and silently wished there were more women in the class. I certainly missed Kathy (either Kathy!). The big thrill of the day was being passed some notes by one of our students. In broken English he wrote that if he had a girlfriend from the United States it would be me. I was a little shocked by the forwardness but then I remembered that this is El Salvador. Then I remembered my male friends from high school. And it all made sense again. Bob returned after dinner and presented Paul and I with gifts from our mommies. Mommies are great! We then spent the stormy evening watching The Incredibles. Thanks Mommy! I listened to a CD from my mom before falling asleep.
Tuesday, July 26: The fourth sunny day in a row! I read a newly acquired TIME magazine this morning, and then finished A Farewell to Arms. Hemingway certainly is a tease. Perhaps I am just too easily seduced by the “romantic” exploits of his couples and then I forget that someone has to die and his relationships always end. Oh well. Now I just have to figure out how to make my 3 new books last for 3 whole weeks! I started reading the longest one, Thomas Pynchon’s V. The hot afternoon sun made me a little sleepy so I decided to take a little nap. However, once I got into my bed I was wide awake. So I just listened to music, ate some goldfish crackers and thought about “stuff.” We visited the internet café after dinner. Brian was online but away. Fortunately my loving mother was also online and volunteered to call him and let him know I was online. I suppose that is kind of silly, but I got to chat with both Brian and my mom for a little while, so it was definitely worth the ridiculousness. On our way home Paul and I walked to this little cliff edge thingy and looked at the stars. It was one of the first really clear starry nights in a long time. We could even see the milky way pretty clearly. When we got home we decided that watching Napoleon Dynamite was the best use of our evening. And it was.
posted by Ashley at 1:40 PM
1 Comments:
Hello Ashley!
Fun as always to read up on the news! I'm glad the chicken had a happy ending...I was expecting something awful to happen...like what happened to those lovely little shrimp on the pila!!
eat them up, yum!
Enjoy every minute of your time remaining!
My love to you all!
mama kathy
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