Random Update: El Salvador (7.3.15)

Final roundup. We spent all of Friday visiting the piñero (pineapple grower) and sugar cane spots, then had a lecture in the evening with the head of the masters in finance program at UCA. It was a bit of a more relaxing day. We ambled along at the pineapple place, at one point taking a midday break to have fresh fruit and play some soccer (!). The sugar cane processing place was a bit relaxing too, but in less interesting ways. The lecture at night was my last stint at translator, which was good and bad. Good because I'm mentally exhausted, bad because I love Spanish oh so very much.  Thankfully, Henry, another BC student, helped me out. 

Today, Saturday, we spent the day at the beach. So we did technically get one day of vacation! I had an awesome snooze in my hamaca after playing soccer (!) on black volcanic sand. Followed Javier's example and bought some ceviche de camarones for lunch. It's a tasty cold raw shrimp gumbo of sorts. Very spot-hitting on a hot day. They soak shrimp in lime/lemon juice, which cooks the meat via acidity, then mix it all up with some veggies. 

Those are all the main movements. Here are some more specific thoughts, in lieu of leaving tomorrow morning:

Talking with Javier, the local college student who has joined us this whole week, has been so moving. I sat next to him in the van to the beach, and we talked about a lot of stuff: favorite music, favorite books, growing up in El Salvador, high school, and the Salvadoran social scene of young people here. Turns out that his first favorite book, La Sombra del Viento, I am currently reading! Funny coincidence. It's set in Barcelona though, so not too big of a surprise. I tend to find all things Barcelona and surround myself with them.

On a less frivolous level, some of the things we talked about on the van, and later at lunch along with a few other BC students, were extremely powerful. Growing up, Javier and his friends usually would have to choose between buying a bus ticket home, or buying lunch. This almost always meant a two hour walk home, but he remembered those times so fondly! He told me about how he and his friends would do somersaults across streets and push-ups in the middle of them when no cars were coming... All sorts of silly, crazy things friends do together. It was comforting to know that despite how often people think "far away" means "far different," people truly have more in common than they can ever imagine. 

However, it was discomforting to hear what my new friend, and his family, had gone through. Two-hour walks are trivial compared to some of the things Javier's parents and grandparents suffered. His mother was one of nine children, living out of a collection of cardboard boxes in the backyard of someone else's property. She was bright, did well on a standardized test, and miraculously got a scholarship to go to private school all the way through high school, eventually going on to college. After working full-time and studying part-time for 10 years, she got her law degree. Around that same time, their family moved from one neighborhood to another within San Salvador. The reason? A young bread delivery guy was shot and killed in a drive-by right in front of Javier and his brother while they waited for their mom to get home from work and open the front door. Mom immediately made plans to move after that. 

It is impossible to fathom, but we were fortunate enough to be given a tiny glimpse, thanks to Javier's openness and willingness to share his story with us. Not only was it in many ways awful to hear, but it was also awful to know that his childhood experience was not uncommon. College students grew up (and future ones are growing up) this way here. 

There are many more things to say, but I will end with the following thoughts. 

The world should not only be talking about the problems people in this world face, because as important as that discussion is, by itself it only draws a contrast. When we contrast, we separate our humanity from the humanity of others. The world needs to find a way to talk about how similar the people "far away" can be. Perhaps if we were also able to talk about the parts of our humanity that overlap, we would more easily find the courage to fight for the parts that don't. 

Random Update: El Salvador (5.3.15)

7:51am - The sun is already higher in the sky than in Boston at noon. 

8:37am - We pass another elementary school with barbed wire. Reminds me of the one I saw yesterday called Happy Days Kindergarden! that was surrounded by high walls, barbed wire, and iron gates. Good walls might make good neighbors, but great walls mean terrible ones. 

We arrived in another small town in the eastern part of the country. The main organization we visited is called COMUS and organizes local corn, bean, and coffee producers in seven of the surrounding towns. We got to see all aspects of the coffee production, and the end production of the beans and corn (the beans and corn quality control and distribution are funded by the U.N.'s World Food Program). We stopped at five different sites to hear from the executive members. Javier and I were translators again for the course of 5 or 6 hours straight—I'm pretty exhausted from all that mental activity, but it was still so fascinating. 

The coffee producers are doing the best they can, but a blight is spreading rapidly through Central America (la roya). This does give incentives to try to grow coffee, since it's just becoming more and more a cash crop from decreased supply and worldwide increase in demand. But between blight, drought, and flooding, there are so many forces out of the farmers' control. When everything goes well, though, the process is like organic clockwork. This is what we caught a glimpse of today. The hard and soft outer shells from the coffee beans are mulched into organic fertilizer which is used to grow more beans. The finished ground coffee is sold locally. There's essentially no waste in the coffee production cycle. 

The main organization, COMUS, was started in 1990 during the civil war. Originally a group focused on human rights and private property for rural communities who had no one to turn to, after the war it reorganized itself around economic development and social change. Its founder was killed in a car accident in '97, and his son is continuing his father's work. After 25 years, COMUS now deals with 2,000+ local food producers. They are in the process of marketing their products both nationally and internationally to individuals and public institutions alike. It is a long road. 

I got to talk with Javier, Rutilio (our microfinance guide and ridiculous photographer), and Oscar (van driver) at lunch. They taught me a bunch of Salvadoran Spanish. My favorite is definitely "echar la araña" which literally means "to throw the spider". However, this phrase metaphorically means "to go pee". How this metaphor works, we'll never know. Took me a while to figure out they weren't pulling my leg. 

A poster in the COMUS office... In Catalan! Apparently a group from Barcelona comes in August. 

Photo of the organization's founder during the civil war. He's the grizzled man on the right. I'm not sure if the child is his son. 

Here's a song by a band called Bacilos that I've really been jamming out to down here:

Random Update: El Salvador (4.3.15)

Today was translation day. Lots and lots of translation. We went around the western parts of the country and talked to a variety of small cooperative/community businesses: a carpentry, two homemade organic/ecological jewelry spots (made from seeds or plastic (the jewelry, not the spots)), and a cacao farmer training outpost. Javier, an engineering student at UCA who is traveling with us, and I served as translators for these interactions. It was a bit exhausting, but so amazing to be immersed so fully in Spanish once again. I have been so busy re-absorbing English (re-learning, some of my friends at BC would say...) and Boston College that I kinda let that passion burn down to flameless coals. Here it's come back full-fire. If I am speaking Spanish every day in life, I will be a happy camper. 

Random thoughts:

As we drive through the country, we pass many trees. I love driving through forests anyways, but here there is a special treat: every kilometer or so, one tree rise above the others in a brilliant burst of yellow. These are called cortés trees. One of the carpenters told me about the types of wood they use, and this little enjoyment of mine was given its proper name when he asked, "You know the cortés? The yellow ones?" I just smiled and said yes, yes I do know the yellow ones. 

City folks make fun of country folks everywhere. I asked Javier if he knew any Salvadoran expression for saying "It's damn hot!" since it was, and generally is, damn hot. He thought a little while and told me a few curse-word-filled phrases. But he also told me about another one: Está juerte la calor. The proper way to say this is está fuerte el calor, but people from San Salvador make fun of the mispronounciation of fuerte and the incorrect gender of the article la that the country people say. So, in reality, everyone says está juerte la calor, but some say it sarcastically.

We went to a pupusería for dinner, where we ate pupusas, a delicious stuffed tortilla that's pan fried and served with cold rice salad and tomato salsa. While we ate I asked Estrella, one of the various program coordinators who Father McGowan knows, what some of the other traditional Salvadoran dishes were. She answered with a few varieties of hot corn soup, one typically eaten in the mornings, one in the afternoon. My follow up question was "why in the world do Salvadorans eat hot dishes when it's always so hot outside?" She and Oscar, our van driver who also speaks Spanish, got a kick out of that. But apparently eating and drinking hot things actually make the relative sensation of heat more bearable by reducing the difference in temperature between the body and the air. British troops were cited as another example of this, since they used to drink hot tea in the dog days of summer on campaigns... But I'm guessing that's just because the British are obstinately proud of drinking tea. 

A tiny little flower, no bigger than my pinky finger's nail. 

Random Update: El Salvador (3.3.15)

Another jam-packed day. Here's a brief recap of our physical movements. Started the morning with a trip to a building in the north being used for a small business training program. The center helps folks learn technical skills: how to make shoes, sew shirts, and print custom designs on coffee cups, pottery, and clothing. After that, we vanned over to another church where yet another priest was murdered by the same militia government. This priest, Father Rutilio Grande García, was Óscar Romero's close friend and was the reason he spoke out against the violent crimes being committed without investigation. Romero's speaking out would cost him his life, too, as we learned yesterday. Lunch time came next, we stopped at a place called Pollo Campero, literally "Country Chicken." This chain is the Salvadoran equivalent of KFC. It was unsurprisingly tasty (hard to mess up fried chicken) and there was AC inside, which was a welcome relief. We stopped by a microfinance company after lunch and talked with a group of women who receive loans from them (company is called Enlace, literally "Link"). Finally, we vanned back home and listened to another talk, this time from a BC alumn and native Salvadoran named Gerardo. 

There is just so much on my mind, it's a bit annoying how tired I am and how tiny my iPhone's screen is. I guess I'll start from the beginning anyways. Memories are a dish best served fresh. 

(I) Self-employment training program up north: ADEPROCCA 

These folks get their funding from the good ol' gobierno, the government. They are contracted to produce a few thousand school uniforms and shoes which the government buys and distributes to public school children. The folks who work there spend around three to six months learning the trade, and then leave the organization having produced 100 pairs of their own type of shoe, designed by themselves. The idea is for these lower income folks to leave with the sense of pride of knowing how to do something as well as the basic business concepts to squeak by. Such a program undeniably helps, but it is such an uphill struggle to break the cycles of poverty. It is often hard to imagine that the economic benefits of such a program are terribly widespread and meaningful, but it is certain that the personal benefits of dignity and pride are priceless. Having walked with these people in the streets, it is hard to imagine a more meaningful goal than the gift of simple human dignity.

(II) Burial site of Father Rutilio Grande García

The words of Mr. Rick from last night are more fitting for El Salvador's depressing history and how they move on: "Time does not heal all wounds; things just get worked out in different ways."

(III) Microfinace Site: Enlace

We sat in a jumbled circle upstairs in a room not exactly designed for large meetings. The group of BC students and Father McGowan had an opportunity to talk to one of the collective lending groups within Enlace. It was a group of 10 women who all more or less worked in the cosmetics and jewelry industry. Industry is a strong term. They basically sell a few products from their homes, and used these small, short-term loans to cover stocking costs. Their stories were sad, but their willingness to participate and try to change and improve their lives was nothing but inspiring. Unfortunately, I was left with a similar feeling to what I had after the small business training program: this can never be enough.

(IV) Gerardo's Talk on UCA's Campus

This guy graduated from BC in 2011 and is a very amicable people-person. He grew up in a well-off family in a town outside San Salvador, went to the private British high school, studied at BC, worked at UBS for a few years, and then returned home to work in his family's pharmaceutical business. He talked a lot about El Salvador's problems. He was inspiringly and perhaps naively optimistic, despite all the problems his country has. I won't bore into details, but his ultimate vision for change is education coupled with jobs. Unfortunately, these wonderful goals are disillusioning in practice. Gerardo talked about the experience of a recent BC graduate who went on a Fulbright scholarship to San Salvador and how he underwent a visible transformation during his year there: " His face was not the same. His optimism was not the same. He had really felt something. He had seen something. The hard thing is keeping your hopes up, working hard, and doing something for change." 

The problems here revolve around drug violence and inequality. Every second here is a grim reminder of the El Salvadoran citizens' inability to overcome these two superhuman forces. Violence and poverty strip away dignity and hope and priests and fathers and children and futures and safety and livelihoods from the people who have no opportunity to help themselves. Not only do they have no opportunity, but they have little concept of what opportunity even is. The propinquity of the civil war that ended in 1992 and left 80,000 dead is impossible to ignore. There is a stigma here that runs deep. I'll end with Gerardo's take on it: "Changing a policy or a politician is easy. Changing the hearts of a people is very, very hard."

First site we went to

Production tally (raw economics)

Father García's church

Random Update: El Salvador (2.3.15)

We made it. After unexpectedly getting stuck in Houston for a night (got to try Shiner beer though... yum...), we arose bright and early from our United-Airlines-discount rooms at Holiday Inn and bused to the airport again for a 6:30AM flight to San Salvador, capital and largest city of El Salvador. 

Some basic info about the country: El Salvador is the size of Masschusetts. It is bordered by Honduras and Guatemala. It only has coastline on the Pacific. The US dollar is their official currency. 

Some basic info about why I'm there: I got into a class called "Economic Development in El Salvador", an economics elective taught by Father McGowan. For spring break we have come to El Salvador to listen to colleagues and friends of Fr. McGowan talk about various topics like microfinance, remittances, and government policy. We also get a hefty dose of Salvadoran culture. 

Back to the recap: We each had to pay $10 for a tourist visa at El Salvador's customs. After a five minute drive from the airport in our 15 person van, two  things became very clear. First, Coca-Cola is ubiquitous, all-powerful, and profoundly linked to all things marketing here. Even the street (read: highway) vendors had Coca-Cola banners lining their summer-camp-fort boutiques made of fallen trees and large branches tied together. These vendors populated the hot, dusty highway to San Salvador, mostly selling mangos. Second, English is gross and everywhere. Ok, "gross" is just my opinion, but here's why it is gross to me: I saw a huge Corona beer billboard that read "Find Your Beach" in English. When a Mexican beer company advertises in English in El Salvador, something strange is afoot. Maybe English is just a cool language these days. Nonetheless, the astounding penetration of foreign consumerism and marketing here is certainly something concerning.

So those were my first impressions. Here's some more of what we actually did today...

After arriving at the UCA (University of Central America) on-campus residency and decompressing for an hour, we got a tour of campus and went to the nearby grocery store. Most of the $ prices are comparable, but the ratio of prices to average income is certainly not. I got a pack of Salvadoran wafer crackers for $1.35. After a logistically staggered lunch, Father McGowan (who was leading all of our travels, if I failed to make that clear) rounded us up and took us to four important sites and events. 

(1) The church where Óscar Romero was killed in 1979. The powers that be (or rather, were) didn't like what Father Romero said one day about violence and how it should be stopped. They killed him the next day as he stood at the front of his church. 

(2) The rose gardens where the six priests, a woman, and child were killed in 1989. Similar story, different year, more victims, more martyrs. 

[Note: these blurbs don't even begin to capture these two events and their myriad meanings to Salvadorans and the world—they're not trying to; I'm just recounting where we went]

(3) Downtown. The main church in the city and the street markets. Church was quite traditionally pretty, but I'm not really one for traditional churches. Barcelona can do that to you. The market around the corner was a wild mess of gasoline, fresh fruit, Coldplay, smells of baked sweets, The Beatles, mild and constant sweating; pigeons unabashedly washing themselves in dirty gutter water; a two-year-old smiling and playing with her brother while she sat leashed to a sideways cardboard box under her family's table on a street corner; a Salvadoran woman's eerily warning us to "be careful," probably nearly exhausting her English vocabulary in doing so; a brief negotiation for an El Salvador soccer jersey (settled for $12). Overshadowing it all was my interminable fear of all things having to do with questionable street markets in Spanish speaking countries. Looking at you, Argentina. Being anywhere near there at night would be my nightmare. Later that night, I would learn why (calm down parental units, nothing happened)...

(4) ...because later that night we had our first lecture back on UCA's campus with a man named Richard. He talked about an astounding amount of topics. I furiously typed notes on my iPhone. Most immediately striking was our collective disillusionment of the seemingly innocent street market where I had just purchased a jersey. He said plainly that that market is run by the enormous Salvadoran mafia. Vendors pay upward of $600 for two meters of floor space, a result of price usurping from the mafia's monopoly. Suddenly that woman's warning became more than a thoughtful utterance: it was a very real warning, whispered to us in English to avoid detection by evil ears. Over 70% of the Salvadoran economy is in this "informal" sector. Most of this "informal" sector does not deal in soccer jerseys, cookies, and fruit. Most of this "informal" sector is the drug trade, clandestine enough not to be glaringly obvious to us gringos in passing through downtown. Sitting between Colombia and Mexico, El Salvador is one of many gatekeepers along the cocaine road north. Cartels outsource supply line responsibility to locals in Central America. It's all frightening, but mostly sad. It is frightening because of how sophisticated the cartels have become: they have even started taking over public schools in El Salvador in hopes of boosting their future ranks with loyal businessmen and lawyers who study in Mexico or the United States and then return to the clandestine family business. It is sad because it is a cannibalistic social machine that preys on good people by giving them no other option but to follow la coca or la piedra.

The rose garden.