March 26
Earthquakes! I can’t remember ever feeling any earthquakes in my 10 years in California, but here they having been averaging about one a month. Yesterday was the biggest yet, a series of five medium size tremors in the morning and a sixth in the afternoon. In the morning I was helping run P.E. classes with the younger kids when the field started shaking. It was interesting to actually hear them coming and be able to tell what direction they came from. I realized that we were in the safest place in the community, as nothing could fall on us and a landslide was unlikely. The soccer games stopped and everyone gathered together as four more tremors arrived. Some of the kids started crying and the school director explained to them that the quakes were caused by the “moon changing”. I tried to explain the tectonic plates theory, but no one really understood. School was dismissed early and everyone went home. I don’t think where I live is too dangerous in regard to earthquakes since the roof is tin and the walls are brick, which I think can withstand most earthquakes. The whole community is built on the side of a mountain, so a landslide may be possible. I wonder if there will be any bigger ones while I am here.
March 27 update: Channel four news came up here to interview people about the quakes, since the epicenter was here in the community. I showed my smiling gringo face and was interviewed, I think I managed to state that I felt them and that earthquakes can be dangers (thanks for that valuable information). I’m going to try to catch myself on the news tomorrow. TV interviews in Spanish are not easy.
Lately I have gotten back into coaching kids soccer after a few of the kids begged me to do it again. I had gotten mad at the last practice back in November since the kids were disrespecting me and being lazy about playing and generally being little punks. It is going better now since I made it clear that is they don’t respect me then we won’t practice. We have a girls team and two boys teams, 4-6 grade and 6-9th grade. They basically just scrimmage while I referee. Hopefully in a few weeks I can organize some away games against neighboring schools.

Here is what the stoves looks like, complete with Salvadoran tortillas!


Here is me and my buddy Facho loading stoves into his pickup to bring to Laguna Verde

March 4
Alright, its been almost a month so its definitely high time for another post. I have been dabbling in a few different projects lately, here is the round-up-
Trash collection service – So I was getting increasingly fed up with smelling burning plastic and seeing ditches and gullies filled with trash, so I charged into the mayors office (which is in the nearest town, Apaneca, about a 45 minute walk from Laguna Verde, my village). He was surprisingly compliant and understanding, and sat through my speech in particularly bad Spanish (some days my brain and mouth just will not cooperate). Laguna Verde had a trash service in the past, but people filled trash bags with dirt, sand, rocks, dead animals, and other ridiculous things which angered the mayor’s office since they pay by the pound to put the trash in a landfill. This is where I come in, I plan to visit everyone I can with a picture-laden brochures (not everyone can read) and explain why and how to use the trash pick-up service. We are now trying to agree upon a time and day for the truck to come, so hopefully this whole operation will start soon.
Recycling- A freelance pickup has been making the rounds in the community to buy recycling such as metal, plastic and paper from people, haul it to the city and sell it for a profit. Gotta love entrepreneurs! I sold them 53 pounds of plastic that I had inherited from the previous volunteer for a cool $3.75. Not a lot, but a good start. They also let me know that they pay well for paper, so I got motivated to try to start a program in the school. I’m starting small, a box in each room to collect cans, bottles and paper that I store in my house until I can sell it. The money will go to painting a mural of a world map on the side of the school. I briefly explained it to all the classes but output has been slow, a couple of cans and pieces of paper in the first week. I need to go back and do some more motivational speaking to get the kids into it. There is a lot of motivational speaking involved in being a PCV, which is something I previously did not have much experience in. I believed that if what you are talking about is important and compelling enough to warrant enthusiasm, you shouldn’t have to trick people with fancy speeches, it should speak for itself. I now understand the importance of speech and in setting a positive attitude in your audience. Enthusiasm and motivation are critical to start new enterprises, and both are highly contagious.
Outdoor classroom- My school director approached me and proposed building a reading area behind the school over some old latrines. Basically he wants a foundation, floor and roof, but no walls. This would serve as a place for reading, meetings, music practice, and other uses. This would be nice since there are not always classrooms available for these things and would be much nicer to be outside in the beautiful weather. We only need $225 to build this thing, so I will be writing some grants to try to get us the funds.
Environmental Lessons. PCVs have compiled a book of these in Spanish that are to be given to various grade levels in a participatory way that promotes learning through doing. I have been preparing and assisting in giving these lessons. First we made a worm compost bin with the 5th grade and then did an activity to learn about how water cycles through the environment with the 6th grade. The kids really like these and it is nice to have a written plan to follow. I will continue to do a couple of these per month throughout the school year.
Also, Obama is coming to El Salvador! He is visiting a few Latin American counties and is going to stop here for a day to talk to the Salvadoran president. Get ready for broad, positive, nonspecific heart-warming messages like : “The US is determined to fight poverty alongside allies like El Salvador” ect. Although good for general propaganda purposes, nothing much seems to come of visits like these. However, I may journey to the capitol to see the man and hear a speech.
Other than that, I’m just living life in a bizarre parallel universe. Staying healthy and happy are full time jobs here, but I have been blessed with both lately. Please leave a comment with questions or, well, comments. Sometimes I wonder who is out there reading on the other side…

Coffee tasting


Drying coffee at the factory, some of which was grown on the volcano in the background.


Murals for development project in the next town over, Ataco.

2/9/11
Hallelujah! The stove project has been financed in full. A generous local donation finally came through; effectively subsidizing the 45 orders I have for stoves. (In case you forgot, these are concrete cooking stoves that use wood and are superior to traditional open fires because they use less wood and produce less smoke. Google Stove Team International for more info) This alleviated much of my worries about having to use a huge chunk of my own savings and/or sending out an embarrassing mass email to friends and family. Thanks to those who offered to donate, your support means a lot. On Saturday we are going to collect the stove from the factory and bring them to the community, and I will try to track down everyone who ordered a stove. Hopefully the ten dollar down payment they paid will bring them to me. Peace Corps project number one nearly complete!
Next? I’m thinking of trying to talk to the mayor about a regular trash pick-up service. This may not be hard, the hard part is to get people to bag up their garbage and bring it to the street at the appointed time. This will probably involve me going door to door with pamphlets and explaining why it’s bad to burn plastic and throw trash down the mountain. Could be a smashing success or a hilarious failure, but there is only one way to find out.
Also, the school environmental club. I can’t decide if I should start it now or wait until I can spend more time in the classroom with the kids to build trust. I’ve been helping out with small tasks in the school (the custodial arts) to build my relationship with the teachers and students. I also taught an improvised math lesson, which went fairly well. Actually making kids learn and knowing for sure that everyone understands is a lot harder than it looks.
Skateboarding did not last long around here. The kids loved it and I was having fun teaching them, but some people got worried about the kids getting hurt. I personally think the soccer kids play here is more dangerous, but people fear the unknown. The boards are now enjoying retirement in my room.
I got to visit two coffee factories recently to see how coffee is washed, shelled, fermented, dried, ground and roasted. One of the tours ended with a coffee tasting, which was fun. It´s amazing how many different tastes coffee can have.

Multicolored chickens. Not sure why.










This is what happens when you bomb hills on a cheap bike when the road is covered with an inch of dust. Dont worry, it will heal.










Skateboarding hits Laguna Verde











1/27/10
I’m back! (in El Salvador) I spent a week back in Arcata with my friends and family. It was the best vacation I could ask for. I got to see my mom and sister, play ultimate and disc golf, hiked in the redwoods, went to the beach, went biking and skating and even sledding, pretty much covering everything I wanted to do. I also got to bring back some goodies, such as energy bars, chocolate, waterproof shoes, a solar shower, my ukulele and three skateboards. The trip back was 26 hours of attempted sleep in terrible seats, so it feels nice to be back here to my second home. I took a nap as soon as I arrived, and opened my eyes to see that a mouse had made a nest in some pants I had left on the bed. I threw the pants on the floor and went right back to sleep. This kind of stuff doesn’t faze me anymore.
I officially introduced skateboarding here; everyone wanted a turn, which resulted in much falling and hilarity. The younger kids learned pretty fast, while the older ones seemed to fall more. I don’t really have a good reason for bringing skateboards, besides giving the kids something new to try and to share one of my passions with them. I’ll keep everyone posted on their progress.
School starts on Monday, and I am going to help the teachers out wherever I can and give some environmental lessons. I hope to start the environmental club within the first month, although I am worried about if I will be able to make it interesting and fun enough to draw interest and continued attendance.

Some friends after a late night soccr game











Friendly PCV basketball game. The guy with his arm around me is my boss, Rolando











My host brother and new best friend, Edwardo, and his little sister mary

Jan 5.
Happy New Year to everyone, 2011 arrived here in the midst of dangerous fireworks, tamales and drunks. Everyone lit off the dynamite sticks all day and night. These things are just a bunch of black powder and newspaper packed together and sold to eight year olds for a quarter. This leads to an entire country covered in newspaper and a ringing in my ears. At midnight I went to a spot on the mountain that overlooks the nearby midsize city of Ahuachapán, where the city was boiling over with fireworks. There were about 5 explosions per second coming from all over the city in different colors. All the country side all the way into Guatemala was also shooting them off, making an incredible exploding panorama.
I have confession to make. The title of this blog has proven very inaccurate. The one piece of mango I have tried here was absolutely terrible and I probably done a total of one hour of teaching because school has been out since November. So a much more accurate title would be eatin’ tortillas and sittin’ on my ass, but that just doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Lately I’ve been continuing to sell the fuel efficient stoves, I’m up to 23, but coming up with the money to subsidize the price is not looking good, so I may have to pass the hat so to speak here in a few weeks to see if we can raise this money to get the stoves to the community. More info to follow. I have also been teaming up with the local health promoter to help him with his job and do house visits. Most communities here have a health promoter who does house visits to give vaccines, medicine, advice, chlorine to purify water, and other general health work. The guy we have here is around 30 and is becoming a good friend of mine. His Spanish is much clearer than most people’s too, which really helps us get along. I go to people’s houses and just kind of hang around while he does his job, but it is a good way for me to visit with people and learn more about the community.


1/9/10
I just finished reading Salem’s Lot by Stephen king, and today something happened that is straight out of a Stephen King novel. The family I live with, the Garcias, had three dogs up until about a month ago. One mama dog and her two male offspring, named tigre uno, tigre dos, and tigre tres, with the mother inexplicably being tigre tres. About a month ago I left for a couple days and when I got back the family told me that someone had fed the mama dog poison through the front gate and killed her. Actually, I found out that she was only missing, and this was their leading theory about what happened. No one had seen or heard from the dog in a month until someone found her head in a nearby grove of trees. We all went to verify this, and sure enough, the head of tigre tres. I can’t imagine who would cut off a dogs head, especially around here. It was a spooky sight, and got me thinking about the dark side of El Salvador that I have heard much about and felt its presence since I got here. Here is a list of reasons why I think this place has a dark side:
1. El Salvador has one of the highest homicide rates in the world.
2. Of the three people I have heard of dying since I’ve been here, all three were murders.
3. People are generally paranoid of bad people lurking about.
4. People are quick to blame any strange noises or occurrences on anonymous evildoers.
5. Ghosts and spirits are widely believed in.
This is all made doubly strange since on the surface everyone seems so friendly and generally happy. I guess I’m starting to see deeper into the culture, below the superficial appearance.

Salvy wedding







Better than beans








christmas feast