Sunday, December 16, 2007

La Mala Urina

What have I been upto lately? Work, work and more work. The volunteer who preceded me at my site had started a project to build a basketball court for the local school. And when I arrived I jumped right in on the project with him. I have spent a large part of my first two weeks doing construction work. Mixing cement, hauling grava, arena, and bags of cement. It has actually been pretty cool, it has given me something to do and I meet a new group of people from the community every day. Plus I don't mind a little hard work every now and then. But let me set the scene of our construction site, an exposed elevated surface that gets blasted by the sun, it is an average of about 90 degrees a day with 90% humidity, we have the cement mixer working the whole day, while we refill it with barrels of sand, gravel and bags of cement. There is dust, cement, sand and Tierra Blanca flying everywhere. All of these factors combined with the endless stream of sweat that seeps from our pores throughout the day and you are left with 5 living statues by the end of the work day. But I'll tell you what, being a human statue is preferable to what happens if you don't drink enough water and you aren't sweating. Lack of hydration, humidity and heat all add up to one thing (other than dehydration and heat stroke) and that one thing is what is known down here as "La Mala Urina". For those of you who are bilingually impaired, it tranlslates as "The Bad Urine". I first learned of the bad urine through one of our construction supervisors, Michale. One hot afternoon he comes out from around a corner of the school with a grimace on his face; I asked him what was up. He answers in spanish, "I have the bad urine, it feels like I'm pissing razor blades." Now at this time I'm thinking, well probably what you're thinking, that sounds like some type of STD. He then walks over to a barrel we have that is full of water to wet the fresh cement that is being laid. He then proceeds to pull up his shirt and start splashing the water onto his belly button. I look at him and ask what he is doing, and he says this helps the bad urine. I then start dying laughing, while watching him splash this water on his belly button while his grimace slowly morphs into a look of relief. The moral of the story, drink water and stay hydrated! And if you ever happen to fall victim to "La Mala Urina" splash water on your belly button!

New update: I am finally officially in El Salvador, why do I say that you ask?

Just last night I found not one, but two scorpions in my room! One was hiding in one of my shoes and the other one was lounging right by the head of my bed. Excited to visit yet?

So as it stands now, we have finished laying all of the cement and one basket it up and in service. It's an awesome sight after all of the hard work that has been put into this project. I have more to tell, but it'll have to wait til another time, I have to get to a community soccer game and buy some bolts for the other backboard and basket. Buena Onda...

Sunday, December 2, 2007

The Journey Begins...

Alright... Alright... Alright... It is now official, after swearing in this past Thursday; I am no longer a "trainee" I am now a "Volunteer". I am finally in my site and things are going well so far. But we'll get to that a little bit later, because once again a ton of new things have happened since my last entry and for the sake of time I will not be able to write them all, but I will try to communicate to you the most interesting. We'll start ofcourse with the Thanksgiving Party at the Training Center. For those of you who havnt heard I was involved in an act in the talent show in which I was asked to remove my shirt, dance and allow myself to be covered in baby oil. I'll spare you the details, but it was intersting. Alright... moving on, we finished our world map project in Cruz Verde and it turned out great. The kids were a tremendous help, and the community was really supporting us throughout the whole project. I need to give a shout out to Liliana and Nick, the other volunteers in my area, we rocked it... Wow time has moved by so fast; my life in the states already feels like a distant memory. Things that I thought of as unusual in this country at one point have become a part of my every day experience and it is really interesting to see. Among these things are bucket baths at at 6:30 in the morning with cold water, riding souped up school buses, shewing cows, sleeping in a musquito net, my problems speaking ENGLISH and many other things that I cant really think of because they are no longer out of the ordinary for me anymore... An here I am after having thought of so many things throughout the month to write and put in this blog for you guys to read about, I find my mind blank. Let me just scrawl down some random thoughts and hopefully those will lead to some stories... I am doing pretty well right now, I am doing a good job of staying in the moment and taking things as they come. I have big ideas and big plans churning throughout my mind right now I am psyched to get started. My first day in site I was able to go on some house visits throughout the canton. Now let me tell you about house visits. Basically, you walk up to a stranger's house and say "Buenas" they answer "Buenas Tardes" and you start to talk and eventually they invite you onto the patio and bring out seats for you and you sit down and just talk and get to know them. Throughout the conversation they will often bring out freshly squeezed juices of every fruit you can imagine and if it is during lunch hour, they will often feed you lunch. It is like nothing I have ever experienced inthe states, all the people are so 'amable' and kind hearted and genuine. It is an awesome experience, then they all invite you to come back and hang out at some other time in the week for some lunch or dinner or something. It is awesome... Forgive me for jumping all over the place, but my thoughts just arent well organized right now. This morning I played in a basketball tournament in San V and I met a couple of cool Salvadorans that grew up in the states. One grew up in LA and everyone calls him "Homeboy" the other grew up in Boston, we'll call him "Boston". This afternoon Im gonna play in my first came for my community soccer team. It should be interesting, pero vamose a ver. Alright then, I guess thats about all I want to write for now. Buena Onda...