Así es la vida

I just got back to my cantón the other day after being out of town for 8 days. Above is a picture of Wilson, a kid from my village, at his sheet-metal house. This is about what the majority of the houses look like.

When I’m here, it can feel like nothing ever happens, and sometimes that really is the case, but I came back to a US Weekly sized update of gossip and news.

Anyways, I was gone for WYD Scholarship Committee Meetings (Donate pleeeease, we are ridiculously behind on our fundraising and even a $25 gift would really help) in the capital, then off to another city, San Miguel, for an HIV prevention and education workshop, and after that back to San Salvador to celebrate Thanksgiving gringo style, sort-of.

I’ll fill you in on the gossip first and then we’ll jump back and get to all the other stuff.

When I left El Palmital at the beginning of the trip, the mayor of our municipality’s daughter had recently been kidnapped and the kidnappers were demanding a $40 thousand ransom. She had been receiving threatening phone calls, according to her 6 year old daughter, and her family has an interesting history, to say the least. Her father was previously the mayor, but was kicked out of office for embezzling money. His wife was elected by the pueblo to fill his spot despite this, and is the mayor to this day.

Anyways, when I got into San Salvador I found out that the kidnapped daughter had been found alive in San Miguel (the city I would be headed to a couple days later) and that she had actually kidnapped herself to extort money from her mom.

(I'll tell you what I'm blathering about... I've got information man! New shit has come to light! And shit... man, she kidnapped herself. Well sure, man. Look at it... a young trophy wife, in the parlance of our times, you know, and she, uh, uh, owes money all over town, including to known pornographers, and that's cool... that's, that's cool, I'm, I'm saying, she needs money, man. And of course they're going to say that they didn't get it, because... she wants more, man! She's got to feed the monkey, I mean uh... hasn't that ever occurred to you, man? Sir?)

Anyways, here is the link to the story about her self-kidnapping.

So, more or less, she faked her own kidnapping with the help of some trusty MS gang members and is now in jail. The news story claims that she pulled this stunt because her mom had refused to buy her a car. Word on the street is her mom has also refused to visit her in jail.

After a couple days of working hard on WYD business in the capital, grading scholarship applications, working on fundraiser ideas, and a million other things, I headed to San Miguel for the HIV workshop. We worked with about 20 Salvadoran men, training them to inform their communities about HIV prevention and reduction of discrimination against people who are HIV positive through. The last day, they reproduced a chunk of the training they had received with local police and soldiers, and did a really good job. I can’t take a whole lot of credit; I was sort of in training myself. Some of the members of the Men’s Health Initiative are getting ready to finish their service and they invited me to the workshop to ease me into one of their roles for the next workshop. Anyways, the guys did really well and I made some new friends from different places in the country.

And while I was there, the crime news was just piling up in my home, sweet home of El Palmital. Overnight someone (or more likely, a few people) broke into the school I teach at and cut the locks on the door to the computer lab. All of the computers were stolen. A couple people have theories on who did it, but there really isn’t any good lead and the police haven’t done anything. (Imagine that.)

I was back in San Salvador again after the HIV workshop for Thanksgiving, which I spent with four other Peace Corps volunteers at the home of a US Embassy employee. The guy has a 14th floor penthouse apartment with an incredible view of the capital city, artwork from all over the world, and a well-stocked bar. The food was great, especially the stuffing, and he also invited about a dozen Salvadoran friends over. These were not the type of Salvadorans I am used hanging out with in the small town I live in. They travel the world, speak multiple languages, have high-paying jobs, etc. It was almost another culture shock hanging out with the upper class crowd of San Salvador, but they were friendly and outgoing, and it was a good time.

Being out of site for a while was a great re-charge. I'm bummed about the computers, but I'm not dwelling on it. There's not anything I can do about it but forget it anyways. My host brother's family is in town, and his high school graduation was yesterday, which was not too different from a graduation in the States (long and boring).