Helping Hands and First Year Medical Exams

November 22, 2008

Someone just sent this to me from our July 4th Soccer tourney.

First off, I want to send a happy birthday to Hagar from the 14th, if I’m not mistaken. Starting from where I left off last, the election went well in San Salvador. We were there at a TGIF in the capital and had the entire second floor to ourselves. They were ringing bells for every state that Obama won and booing for everything came out red. It was pretty funny. At the end of the night after both McCain and Obama’s speeches, I would say half of the people in that upper room were crying….sissies, hahahahaha. I will have to say though, it was quite impressive the celebrations that went on across the world after the news came out….I kind of don’t want to imagine what would have happened if McCain would have won. There seems to be a new promise of hope for the economy and foreign relations and the American image, but interestingly enough, what is hope for one, is often despair for others.

The two scholars, two of Don Raul's grandkids...graduating Kinder

The Kinder grads.

The Kinder dance.

I’ll explain, recently there has been a very interesting metaphor that has been cropping up here, from the Catholic Church of all places. Most recent was a preacher from New York from the Jesus Missionaries of New York who held a vigil in a stadium here in Zacatecoluca and talked about how that the latinos in the States had sold the economy of the Church for the economy of the country. By electing someone in the hopes of bettering the image of the country and its economy, they sold, he says, the soul of the country. It was an interesting take on things that now is showing up here and there as the same idea is popping up in the conference of US Bishops, as well as in some suburban locals… cough cough… Greenville, SC :)


The twins first steps!!!

Racing.

Anyways, for the most part, I’d say that Salvadorans are more or less excited about the Obama change and about him being a minority, but beyond that they don’t know much more. It has had the interesting effect of bolstering the Left here as well…the Salvadoran elections are in January and March of 2009. Both sides are using quotes from Obama and the detractors of the left here are using statements from Obama’s Latin America advisor against Hugo Chavez (whom they accuse of supporting the leftist party) against the candidates here. It’s in interesting politic. Fun times.

The goat, named Ash, that has replaced the cow Mauricio had.

In other news, my English classes continue to go well. I teach one in the morning to a women’s center for formation (can’t remember if I mentioned that previously) and one in the evening the Parish Hall that is open to everyone. Right now it’s about 10 in the morning and 20 in the evening. I am focusing on the pronunciation because it’s something that they lack here. Most schools outside the capital only have English class once a week and there is no way you learn enough material once a week to get where they want to go. I expect the classes to shrink the more they learn that learning a second language isn’t as easy as it seems.

Also, there was a little hoorah here for Juan, Don Raul’s youngest, for his First Communion. I actually had to leave right after it to go to run some important errands, but it was cool to see how all that stuff happens here….not too different. Except for in numbers, 168 kids had their first communion.

They are also having the 40 hours of devotion right now so the altar is all spiffy.

The baller himself.

A group of the kids.

Yumminess afterwards.

Also, there was another group that just swore-in as volunteers recently. The food was awesome in the embassy, we also planned a fun after-party.

The Swearing-In ceremony in the embassy of the most recent Peace Corps group.

Me with two of my bosses at the after party :)

I also took our high school scholarship students to Termos Del Rio (a water park on the other side of the country) out in Santa Ana, as well as a Mayan Ruins site San Andres on the way there. It all worked out well, and the water park was pretty nice too. I got stuck watching bags the majority of the time though because I was the only one that ended up going besides the students.

The water park.

About a week ago as well the yearly visit of the medical staff of Helping Hands, a Catholic medical missions group, came in and did consultations/medicines/surgeries etc for 2 days for 5 municipalities. I translated there for 2 days and got to meet a lot of interesting people. There was also a big group of Salvadoran medical students translating, there were about 15 of us in total. People were really interested in the Peace Corps after they realized that’s what I was. It’s funny to see people’s faces when they run into Americans in remote places. Although this time there were a few people that were more blunt, “why are you here?”….haha, with the implication of, why would you choose to do something like this for 2 years? Haha. There was also a group of young people who were in college and high school that were interested in Peace Corps and the Jesuit Volunteer Corps and had lots of questions.

The priest that came with Helping Hands playing soccer with the kids the whole time

All the docs and med volunteers

Nurse's station where I was translating

The doctor of the parish clinic here waiting for the other docs to arrive

The doors of the each doc station.

Hmmmm…..Also, I had my one year mid service medical exams for Peace Corps in the capital a few days ago. Apparently they say I’m healthy :)

So… more or less things are running smoothly, besides a few bumps that I’ve hit in my stove project, but hopefully that will all work out soon enough. For Thanksgiving we are going to be visiting with different embassy families to eat and all, so that should be fun.

"Wisdom is not just a gift, it is a habit formed by the will."

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