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Saturday, January 27, 2007
New Ambassador Arrives
Charles Glazer, new US ambassador to El Salvador, arrived at his new post on Thursday. In a short
presentation to the press at the airport he said that the US has a "clear committment" to long term aid to El Salvador.
He said he wanted to maintain relations between the two countries as strong as they are currently. Glazer, a strong
supporter of the Republican party, expects to spend three years as ambassador.
Ambassador Barclay and his wife, Dee Dee, wave adios to El Salvador at the airport on January 17.
Ambassador Galzer arrives at the airport with his pets.
Friday, January 26, 2007
Report from Isla de Mendez, El Salvador
(From the Wayne, PA, Suburban) At 25, cooped up in an office, I already felt like I was losing some of the
idealism, the fire to change the world, I had felt only a few years earlier when I graduated from George Washington University.
My priorities were shifting naturally towards finding a career and setting down roots.
Yet at the same time I also felt
a persistent nagging as I watched the news and read the newspapers - why is there so much poverty and violence in the world
and what, if anything, can I do about it? I joined the Peace Corps to explore these questions and get my stir-crazy legs out
from behind a desk.
I landed in a small rural fishing village called Isla de Mendez in the middle of a peninsula off the
coast of El Salvador. I felt too tall, too white and too English-speaking. It was hot and buggy, and I didn't know how to
wash my clothes by hand. My task was to teach life skills and English to teenagers. I doubted that the young people of this
village could ever take me seriously when on a regular basis I chased after them with panicked pleas to help me kill the rats
and snakes in my house. During those first three months, that cooped-up office started looking better and better.
Luckily,
after not too long, la familia Arevalo Claros, perhaps feeling embarrassed for me that the socks hanging on my drying line
looked as though they hadn't been washed, adopted me. Leila, my new host mother, taught me how to get my whites white. She
fed me well and boasted that she'd have me fat in no time. She succeeded. The three children Lucy, 15, Kenia, 9, and Edilson,
6, brought me into the social life of the community and made me laugh every day. My experience began to brighten.
Soon
after becoming an honorary member of this family, I realized I wasn't really an alien at all. I was caught off guard by how
much my host sister Lucy reminded me of myself. I noticed our personalities were remarkably similar. I don't remember the
exact moment when I first saw it-might have been during basketball practice where her work ethic surpasses any bit of athletic
talent or seeing her enthusiastically address the students at Centro Escolar Canton Isla de Mendez as student-council president.
She was all the things I had been at Conestoga, and, to be truthful, more.
Right after that realization, I felt a heavy
sadness. I thought about all the opportunities I'd had over the past 10 years, and felt sadder thinking that she might not
even graduate from high school. Sad, that merit alone doesn't determine opportunity.
Lucy will face obstacles. She lives
in an impoverished country whose stability is threatened by many factors, including what National Geographic magazine recently
called the most dangerous gang in the world - the Mara Salvatrucha. Many of these gang members, Salvadorans who grew up in
the United States, were cleaned off the streets of Los Angeles, Houston, and Washington D.C. and flown to El Salvador after
being convicted of crimes as young-adults. In 2006 the United States deported over 10,000 Salvadorans. No one wants gangs
in their city. But, unfortunately, the people who end up being terrorized are common folks in El Salvador, who are routinely
victims of extortion and robbery, and who are often killed.
This month El Salvador celebrates the 15th anniversary of
its peace accords, which ended a 12-year civil war. La Prensa Grafica, one of El Salvador's leading newspapers, reported that
78 percent of Salvadorans say they don't feel that they live in a peaceful country. Nearly 70 percent say they think the country
runs the risk of another civil war.
Apart from the risks of violence, poverty shapes life for many Salvadorans. This economic
need has forced a mass migration to the United States. Over 2 million Salvadorans, about a quarter of El Salvador's population,
live abroad and send money home to their families.
Their remittances make up the largest component of El Salvador´s economy.
In Isla de Mendez, the local economy failed and became dependent on remittances when fishing, once the staple of its economy,
stopped yielding enough profits to keep pace with the rise in the cost of living. Fishermen working in Isla de Mendez make
about $5 a day. It costs $2 just to get the bus to the closest market, post office or hospital.
As well as feeling sad
for the obstacles Lucy will face, I felt something else that surprised me. I found myself wishing, if only for a short while,
that my 15-year-old brother, Jordan, and my eight- year-old sister, Olivia, could live in Isla de Mendez. Life here seems
a little sweeter at times. When a child walks down the street, she is greeted by almost every neighbor. She runs into family
members, talks with teachers and plays with friends.
When one of my students' grandmothers died, school officials let
the entire 10th-grade class out of school early to go and visit her home. This is the kind of community warmth I was wishing
for my younger siblings.
The communities I've known in El Salvador are not only warm; they are strong. I'm not sure exactly
what my perception of poor Third World countries was before living in one, but it certainly was not of strong communities.
I will finish up my Peace Corps service confident that many communities in the developing world have their own powerful
internal resources. I feel that it is my responsibility now, and when I return to being cooped up in a cubicle, to collaborate
and support the efforts of these communities.
This sense of responsibility doesn't come from the idealistic "fire to change
the world" I was seeking to rediscover when I joined the Peace Corps. It comes from a more subtle understanding of how my
choices impact the world. For instance, if I finance a student's high-school education in El Salvador, I not only help put
her on the road to knowledge and self-esteem, but I also give the community a better-prepared leader. Before joining the Peace
Corps I may have viewed this as a tiny victory. I now see that these tiny victories, in addition to larger political and economic
policy decisions, are essential to securing a humane standard of living around the world.
Aid El Salvador is a non-profit
organization that provides high-school scholarships to students in rural communities. The selected students must maintain
a B average and complete community-service hours. They are provided a mentor. To help, go to www.aidelsalvador.org.
Sarah
Edelman graduated from Conestoga High School in 1998 and from George Washington University, Washington, D.C., Phi Beta Kappa,
with a major in history and a minor in sociology, in 2002.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Videos
You can find short videos of the January 2007 pilgrimage on YouTube.
... and for those with a strong stomach, the spider that Ellen evicted....
Residents Confront Government on Sewage Problem
A group of residents from El Tránsito and Concepción Batres, both of Usulután, met with government
officials in late October (OK, I'm behind) about a problem of sewage leaking into the water supply. They said 17,000
people are affected. The problem stems from the 1978 installation of a sewage system in the communities without any
plan for a treatment plant. The government says they have no money for such a plant.
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Medical Mission Fund Raiser
In September Flor returned to her home in San Juan de Letran, El Salvador, on new legs.
Claire and Rob Howard accompanied Flor and her mother, Rosa, on the trip. Rob is a professional photographer; this was
his first trip. He is reported to have taken some amazing pictures of the experience. Claire is a nurse practitioner
who was on last year's medical mission and will go again this month.
Please plan to attend a fund raiser for future medical missions at St. James', Skaneateles, on
Saturday, February 10, at 6:00 PM. We will be able to view Rob's pictures and enjoy a simple Salvadoran meal, including
tortillas and refried beans.
Please contact Chuck Stewart at cnstewart@verizon.net or (315) 395-0053 for reservations. Suggested minimum donation is $25 per person.
Elderly Suffer in El Salvador
According to FUSATE (Salvadoran Foundation of Older Adults) nearly 80% of people over 65 years old daily
face conditions difficult for their age. January is the month dedicated to older adults in El Salvador.
Monday, January 1, 2007
Cotton Production Falls 11.6%
(From La Prensa Gráfica) Huricane Stan in 2005 and insect infestation has resulted in a significant reduction
in the cotton harvest in El Salvador. The cotton harvest in 2006 was about fifteen million pounds (72,420 quintals).
It costs about $500 a year to tend and harvest an acre of cotton ($900/manzana). Eighty percent of this cost is hand
labor.
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