Killer Moths and Such. No Big Deal.

Although I generally do not support war, I have waged one of my own. Truthfully, I am not willing to lay down my life for my cause, but I am risking some pretty serious lung conditions. What ever are you talking about Lila? My war is against the bugs of the country, particularly those that inhabit my room. While the people here are lovely, gracious and welcoming, the bugs are anything but delightful, and are sort of the bane of my existence right now. I have risked near asphyxiation from the bug spray in order to eliminate the gargantuan cockroaches that were having a wild fiesta in my room.
I was basking in the glow of satisfaction about having spread to the Cockroach Nation that they face certain death if they enter my room, when I realized that my memorandum had not reached the Moth Nation. For a good hour, I was on a mission killing all the little moths in my room, and apparently they called the Lord Voldemort of the moth kingdom to come to instigate a battle with my broom and me. Never in my 22 years have I seen a moth of this magnitude, and I FREAKED OUT. It looked like an eerie, creepy bird with an eight-inch wingspan. So I was flailing around the room with a broom in one hand and my flip flop in the other, letting out little bewildered, anxious sounds as I tried to slap the moth out of the sky. Don’t worry. I won. Though, just to add insult to serious injury, the moth left a giant death mark on its way out the door that I had to mop (Bright Side, I did find Pine Sol here. Sweet smell of America). It is certainly an unwinnable war, nicely paralleling the one happening in our own country…hey, at least I realize it though.
This week was super busy, apart from my craziness happening with the bugs. I play B-ball at 5 am a few days a week with a few sweet kids from the town. If that sounds early, it is, but apparently the early bird gets the worm. This early bird just gets tired at 11am and wants to take a nap. Last Monday, I had to present myself in front of about 350 kids. I taught at 2 of the schools in the area, one public and one private. As well, I went with the public school director to an Environmental Presentation in a neighboring municipality. It really is great to know that there is a growing interest in the environment. However, it struck me that for breakfast and lunch, they used the most nonbiodegradable substance of Styrofoam. And threw it into the trash. And didn’t attempt to recycle it. Even a little bit. I don’t know how to say Styrofoam in Spanish, so I couldn’t point out the obvious contradictions. But, my mood is generally happy and hopeful. There are lots of good things to be done, and many frustrations that are already emerging. One of my great Randy-Mac professors told me not to adopt an “asi no mas” attitude, meaning something like “half assed is alright, we did something, sort of, right?”. This is definitely the attitude that many organizations take here, so I’m holding strong Professor. I continue to remain hopeful.
Although I know that frustrations will continue to rear their unsightly little heads (hopefully they won’t be in moth form), a great quotation comes to mind from Gabriel Garcia Marquez: “I have learned that everyone wants to live on the peak of the mountain, without knowing that real happiness is in how it is scaled”. I know that there are lots of problems, and lots of things to be done, but I will have to start little by little. I’m going to start scaling. Vamos a ver.

Miss you mi familia and mis amigas! I’m posting a Google image of the giant moths I found, as I was too terrified that it might come back to life by snapping a photo of it. As well as my favorite family photo. (It is on my computer background and everyone thinks we are crazy locos, which isn’t a far cry from the truth, except for you momma, you are the least crazy )

mi nueva vida

So I’ve made some power moves in a week here. I am now living in my very own room, with my very own bed, table and hammock. I bought a few things that got delivered to me and a few kids from the pueblo zoomed up to my room, took things out of the boxes and ran off with the trash. It was freaking unbelievable how helpful people are. (Sidebar: My dad grounded me in 7th grade for an unjust 2 week sentence for saying “freaking shoes”. Although I’ve graduated college, have an expansive vocabulary, and could’ve easily have chosen a variety of words to fill that slot, I feel like pops will appreciate that. Also, grounding me would be wonderful, at least I’d get hot showers).

But, I digress. OK, so another little example of how helpful people have been thus far (just over a week in my site)…I was chatting with a lady from town and mentioned to her how nice her table was and that I would love to find something similar for my room. Friday morning, 7 am, a carpenter shows up outside looking for the “gringa”, finds me, and by 4 pm I was the proud new owner of a beautiful wooden table. Also, the kid downstairs showed up at 7 am the same morning to help me hang my hammock. Good thing I’ve become an early riser. I’ll thank the combination of the Salvadoran culture, roosters, and the early morning dog fights for that.

Additionally, I had my first experience of washing laundry by hand in the “pila”, a concrete structure that people use to do dishes and clothes. How I’ve taken washing machines for granted. I used to complain when I had to do laundry in the states, a relatively quick and painless process by comparison. I got up at 5:30 am to start soaking my clothes and then for the next 3 hours, I washed all of my garments and hung them out to dry. I have lots of little cuts on my hands from rubbing them on the rocks. I was a MESS and all my neighbors and passersby were laughing at me because I was soaked from head to toe scrubbing my little heart out. WOOP WOOP, I did it though (however, a good majority of my underthings now have holes). Things I’ll never complain about again: lukewarm water (it’s better than freezing!) and doing my laundry.

It was a crazy week though, I feel like I’ve seen and done lots of things and met lots of people. Oh yes, and I’ve officially renounced my Christian name of Linsey for a simpler Hispanic-friendly one, Lila. No one can pronounce my name. I’ll still respond to “Linsey” in the states.



Also, I’ve just discovered that New Kids on the Block has come out with a new song. How come no one emailed me about that?

big changes

WOW. Lots of things have changed in a fewer than 2 weeks. I am no longer a Peace Corps trainee, but a full fledged Peace Corps Volunteer. For me, this means that I have arrived in my permanent site, where I will be living for 2 years. For my parents, this means that the 2-year countdown has begun.
The last two weeks in my training community were eventful. I had a nice bout of parasites, which is a pretty common issue and something that Peace Corps Volunteers chat about openly. One of the volunteers, on his blog, felt free to draft a letter to his stool sample… sexy things go on in this country. We had a goodbye fiesta for our families in the training community, and two of the kids there kept repeating “wassssuuuppppp” and “son of Michael Jackson” throughout the entire day. I reckon that it was the extent of their English, however, I have no idea where they got “son of Michael Jackson”.
After the party, I went with my family to the beach, and rode in the back of the pickup like a true Salvadoran. My face was numb for a really long time.
I said my goodbyes to my family in the training community and headed off to the capital for the swearing in ceremony, where I met the ambassador to El Salvador, which was pretty exciting. I first asked him if I could put his photo on my blog, he said of course…. Then when I was taking a photo of the ambassador and another volunteer, I said “hey boys, look over here”…I called the ambassador “boy”…he didn’t seem offended or he just didn’t notice, oops! A party followed the swearing in ceremony, where we got to meet other volunteers in the country. We also received superlatives from our fellow trainees (I´ve included a photo of me receiving my superlative)... I got ¨most likely to receive remittances from home¨...i.e. everyone thinks that I´m the most likely to get my parents to send me money... how I wish that was true...feel free to make that dream a reality though mom and dad...
I was more than bummed about leaving my casa in my training community, however, I am now in my own community! Saturday was Mother’s Day here, and the mayor’s office had an activity for the mamas in town. I arrived in the office to help prepare for the celebration and when the room was packed with about 200 people, my counterpart tells me that I will be making a little presentation in front of everyone, to get to know the community. EEEEEK! Sink or swim (in Spanish)…no complaints though, I’m really excited about getting to know the community and seeing where I can help, since I am an official volunteer and everything. Oh, side bar to my very unorganized entry this week, the first night I was here, there was a major downpour with thunder and lightning, and I was running to get back to where I was spending the night and I was sort of attacked by a dog, no blood though, I´m fine. I didn’t tell my parents about this on purpose, love you!