Victoria and Francisco

Last week, from February 3 to 10, I had a visit from some very special people: my parents, Francis and Vickie (Francisco and Victoria, as they were known during their time here)! It was one of the most special weeks of my life because my family of origin shared the lives of my Salvadoran “family,” that is, the communities, families, and friends who have shared life with me for the past year and a half. I had several hopes for my parents’ time here in El Salvador: share quality time with them, provide them a realistic perspective of life in El Salvador, share about the work and life of the ecclesial base communities through visits and interactions with the communities, meet the people, families, and communities special to my life here, and have an enjoyable time.

We spent the first day of their one-week stay in San Salvador. I introduced them to all my co-workers (and friends) here at FUNDAHMER who have made my work into an enjoyable life experience. Over breakfast, the director of FUNDAHMER Anita shared with my parents about the history and work of the organization. I remember she said: “throughout its history, FUNDAHMER has worked to support communities that assume a manner of living more committed to the Gospel. This implies favoring the rights of the poor, demanding justice, and working for transformation.”

We also visited various sites in the city that are important to the theologically-inspired effort to improve life for the poor and oppressed, including the crypt of Monsignor Oscar Romero, the “people’s pastor” who was assassinated in 1980 for his work on behalf of the poor and oppressed people. We visited the downtown area of San Salvador, always a bit crazy with vendors, buses, and people at every angle. I also tried to show them perspectives of varying realities of different parts of the city. They had arrived to San Salvador after dark, and I remember that my dad told me that first night that he knew that there was more to see that laid under the cover of the darkness. And that there was a part of him that didn’t want to face what laid under the covers. In the same 24-hours we both ate gourmet pizza at Pizza Hut and traveled via train through marginalized communities that literally have the front-doors of their aluminum-, cardboard-, and plastic-built homes a foot from the tracks. The train trip was a “reality shock” as my parents said—raising such questions for them as: What conditions brought these families to live here in marginalization near the tracts?, What options and opportunities exist for these people?, How can the families themselves and the government improve this situation? What structural problems have caused this crisis and this desperation? I know that after living in El Salvador, where the contrasts between the haves and the have-nots are so stark, makes me re-evaluate with a critical eye the demographic, social, and economic landscape of cities and states in the United States where I have lived or visited. In the States as well, there is an appalling range of living conditions that reveal over-abundance for some and near-death (or at least undignified life) conditions for others.

It was very important to take my parents where I andar (live and work) usually, so we spent three days and two nights visiting with the rural communities in Morazán. We visited the community of Yancolo, where I live the majority of the time. My parents met the family with whom I live: Juan, Reina, Viviana, Rita, and Adrian, with whom I have been talking about the visit of my parents for months. The community at-large received us with a get-together comprised of presentations of music, folkloric dance, and community’s history and organization. The teachers from the school in Yancolo stayed over late in the evening to coordinate the event and meet my parents, a big deal considering the walk into and out of the community is about an hour. The idea in all of the get-togethers with the communities was to share. The community leader, Crecencio, from one of 2 founding families of Yancolo who also endured the war in Yancolo, took particular delight in sharing how the community has changed over the years and answering my parents’ questions. I was amazed and honored by the turn-out of the community to share with my parents; there were over a hundred people. Late in the evening, as my parents settled into the 2 beds in the house (maybe the only 2 in the community) and the rest of us into our hammocks, Reina and Viviana (the grand-mother) shared how their family had been one of the brave ones to return first from the refugee camps in Honduras to make a statement that the killing and destruction of the war should stop.

We visited the youth group in Junquillo, who engaged my parents in an exchange about the lives and collective work of youth in the communities. In these and other communities where we visited, the communities were honored to receive my parents and curious to get to know the parents of this muchacha (young woman) who has been a part of their lives for the past year. My parents as well were interested and happy to be sharing the lives of the communities and to be given the chance to hear about the histories and challenges of communities. They listened to the young adults talk about their hopes and dreams: to continue with their collective work and see the day when there are more opportunities and jobs. My two god-sons, named Nelson and Angel, live in Junquillo as well, so we visited with them and their family. It was hard to even drive out of the community that day because various community members kept walking up to our pick-up wanting to greet the senores (my parents) and see the photos that my mom had brought of my brother and I when we were young.

We capped off our time in Morazán with a visit to the Museum of the Civil War, which presents the history of the 1980’s deadly civil war from the perspective of the people living in the mountains of Morazán, an otherwise unavailable perspective, especially in English sources. The four salons of the museum explain in pictures, words, and some objects recuperated from the time of the war four different aspects of the civil war: the causes of the war, the solidarity of other countries with the revolutionary force, life for the people during the war, and the Peace Accords. Every time I visit, the room that shows the causes for the war always impacts me the most. Before the civil war, in the 1970s, students, labor unions and other organized workers, religious organizations, and rural farmers and landless people had organized to bring about changes in the country to benefit the workers, the poor, and the landless. A civil war occurred in El Salvador because of the on-going poverty, the great unjust division between the poor and the rich/powerful, and because the movement for change was suppressed by assassinations of its leaders. Assassinations of those speaking out and working for change was commonplace. In the world at the time, the US was worried about the spread of communism, and interpreted the revolutionary force as a threat to their interests, and thus financed the side of the Salvadoran army. The Commission of the Peace determined that 90% of the 100,000 murders during the war were attributed to this army force. At the museum my parents and I saw arms used by both sides during the war (a majority “Made in the USA”), scraps of planes and helicopters, bomb craters, and an example guerilla camp. A final building of the museum houses the no out-of-use radio station of the revolutionary force. During the 12 years of the war, the radio broadcasted from literally underground in trenches, its antennae painted green and hidden in the trees, and its generator buried deep in the ground to suppress the sound. The radio station broadcasted updates and commentaries on the war as well as programs inspiring the people in their struggle and reminding them of their goals of justice and peace. The radio had to be mobile so that when they suspected that the army was about to invade the area where it was buried, the operators could carry it to safety and set it up to broadcast again.

Both the museum and radio are important for me because I realize that a majority of time, all throughout history, the rich and powerful have been the “voices” that have told history and controlled the means of communication like radio and television. For so long, the perspectives and histories of people like the poor farmers in Morazán have not been told, but both the museum and the radio that existed during the war are examples of ways that the poor are having their voices heard, albeit in a small way. This same idea is one of the reason that I find liberation theologies so empowering to the people long left out of the telling of history and theology: for the first time in the last few decades, these people have begun to read the Bible and texts for themselves, reflect on them in the light of their own realities, and thus form a faith with a theologically grounded commitment to work in their realities as Jesus would have done had he lived in this day. The “empowering voices” motif in my experience here could be further extended to the work of the youth in Morazán to acquire a program on the radio that broadcasts in the area. The radio is the main means of communication in Morazán where there is no electricity (and thus no TV). The youth call their weekly program the “Youth Space” and they talk about different topics of relevance to the young people and about the commitment and work of the Youth Movement of Morazán.

Upon returning from Morazán, we spent an afternoon and evening in Jardines de Colón, a semi-urban ecclesial base community on the outreaches of San Salvador. Upon our arrival, the youth and pastoral leaders of this community shared with my parents about different pastoral initiatives, the scholarship program for students in elementary, middle, and high schools, and in university, and the violence that affects the community. The community was re-populated after the war by people coming from various parts of El Salvador, some with prior pastoral and organizational experience in other ecclesial base communities. Thus, from its beginning, the community organized itself with a strong faith commitment to follow the example of Christ to bring about the Kingdom of God here on earth. They have “built” the community two times already, once initially in 1992 and again in 2001 when part of it was destroyed by earthquake. As my dad said, whether it be ditches, the chapel, or school scholarships, the people “did it themselves” organized and inspired to work together. We visited the recently-constructed community center, right now with recently-installed windows and doors but still lacking floor, lights, bathroom. Avelino from the community, who oversaw the construction of the building by the people themselves, explained to us how they construct a project like the Center with limited resources. They have a plan (complete with the absolute needs and the dreams for later down the road) and step by step realize the work. With the Center, they first bought the land, then cleared the land, then found the construction materials, then started digging and building, and little by little the doors, roof, windows, and desks have come into place. But all resources (time, space, work, money) are those pooled together by the community members themselves.

In one of the most special evenings of my parents’ time in El Salvador, Jardines de Colón welcomed my parents to their community with a Celebration of the Word service. I have talked frequently about the ecclesial base communities’ Celebration of the Word services, which are their main moment of community worship and celebration for the work God is doing in their communities. In this service, my parents experienced a little of the spiritual life of the ecclesial base communities that inspires every part of their day-to-day work and struggle for a better life. My parents experienced the format of the services: songs from the book “The people sing”, three Bible readings corresponding to the day’s lectionary readings, reflection led by a lay leader of the community, and sharing of the peace. The service was extra-special because it was an “Act of Thanks” for those who leave what is familiar and comfortable to them to accompany processes of working for life and for bringing about the Kingdom of God in foreign places. The offering of the day was my parents’ sharing with the community. Up in front of the community’s chapel, with me translating, they shared about their experience of sending their daughter to be a missionary in El Salvador, about their experiences visiting in El Salvador, and their own faith experiences.

One of my favorite moments of the week occurred when, as the service was closing, the community sang a song “Vos sos el Dios de los Pobres” (“You are the God of the Poor”), a song extremely special to Salvadorans who receive hope from a God who they know to be like them and have a special care for them. Standing between my two parents, I was signing from a song book in my hands. At one point I recognized the voice of my mother, who had begun singing in a language unknown to her a song that expresses how I have come to experience God, the God that I see here in El Salvador and that has changed my life, my priorities, and what I care about, and guides me in the work I do as a missioner. I have translated the chorus for you here:
You are the God of the poor,
a humane and simple God,
a God that sweats in the street,
a God with a worn-out face.
For this is why I talk to you
as I talk to my people,
because you are a working-class God,
Christ with the workers.
This song speaks to me about 2 things: one, that the poor communities that sing this song realize that God is with them and cares especially for them and their lives as the poor, the simple and humane, and the tired and worn-out workers. That is how God is. Second, God is revealed here with us in the very people that work on the street, that you meet in the communities, and that live out their daily lives. They (or rather, we, that is, all of us working) are who and what God is.

My parents’ visit was meaningful for them, for the communities, and for me. I pray that as they have returned to North Carolina, their experience of life in another part of the world and of communities of faith committed, despite great difficulties, to work for more dignified lives, will continue to influence their own lives, decisions, and commitments and through sharing it, their experiences will influence the lives of others as well.

Ida y Vuelta (To Go and Return)

Just today, I said goodbye to a close friend Laura (another volunteer with FUNDAHMER) who is visiting her family and friends in the United States for a couple weeks. Her “despida” (good-bye) brought back a little nostalgia about my recent trip to visit many of you guys (my family and friends) in the States back in August. Then I realized that I hadn’t posted on my blog since I returned back here to El Salvador to update you about my great trip to the United States and my return here. For almost 4 weeks, I was able to spend a lot of time with those closest to me, see a lot of people, and do a lot of fun things. The time at home started out with an amazing week at the beach where my family has been going for 20+ years (a lot of sun and seafood and play on the beach with my little cousins). My mom had taken off work to “surprise” me at the airport at the beach and my dad and brother (and the newest member of the family, my brother’s dog Zoie) came to join us after a couple days. For the rest of my time at home, I spent significant time chilling out at my parents’ house catching up with them and doing some special things like cook-outs, fishing, biking, eating some good food (and ice cream), going around town with mom and dad, and trying to “squeeze” time with my brother out of him with his extra-tough work schedule. It was also great to be able to “branch out” and visit some others of you—Sarah and Joseph during a really fun camping trip (14 miles!), Chandler and Liz in Winston Salem, my “folks” at Wake Forest, Kaileigh and Lauren for a little art, and Steph at home. I spoke several times at Fletcher church, but I always felt like I wanted to say more to all there who have supported me throughout my year here in El Salvador. My time at home wrapped up with a super enjoyable weekend trip with my mom, dad, brother, aunt Bet, Uncle Dave, and cousins Carolyn, Keary, and Natalie to Dollywood in Tennessee. Seeing my parents on the water rides was a favorite moment. But even apart from what we did and where we went, it was just really nice to see everyone with whom my communication is usually limited to a phone call or email. My parents and others were really appreciative of me coming for a visit, but I am equally appreciative of all they did to make my time at home enjoyable, relaxing, and meaningful. Love you guys!!

I’ve been back here in El Salvador for about 2 weeks now—its always super hard to leave all those I love at home, but I am ready to get back to all that is going on here. I am at the mid-point of my 2 years here in El Salvador, and in these past weeks, my return to work has also turned out to be somewhat of a turning point in my work with youth here. The day after my return, all of us involved in youth work here had an important meeting that was inspired by an evaluation I wrote about the formation workshops and lessons that I have been designing and taking to the youth in the communities during this past year. A difficulty that I observed over the past year is that I was responsible for the formation of youth in too may communities—21 to be exact—for me to be able to plan and lead workshops and lessons sufficiently responsive to the needs and interests of the individual communities and youth. Just not enough hours in the day, nor days in the month. My “team” of youth workers listened to my, understood, and agreed that we should “reorganize” a bit. As a result, I will now concentrate on the youth in 8 communities, allowing me to spend more time in each one and more time working to plan an appropriate process for the youth in each one. My other 2 co-coordinators will be working in the remaining communities, allowing them also to have the opportunities to design and bring to the communities a specialized formation process. All involved will benefit; the 3 of us coordinators will have more time for getting to know the reality, needs, and interests of the youth in the communities we are responsible for to better able us to make our lessons relevant and of better quality. The youth will also benefit from being able to share more time with one of us and to have their specialized needs and interests met.

I am, over and over again, whether it be during a fun outing or in an important meeting like we had last week to make these coordinating changes, so grateful to work with the people I do in FUNDAHMER. There is a spirit of collaboration and a priority on what is best for the communities. I’ve done it all since I’ve been back, spent some time with Juan, Reina, and the family in Yancolo, attended a youth coordinators meeting and helped lead a workshop for these coordinators (a happy time seeing these kids for the first time in over a month), and spent some time in the office working on developing a formation process for each of my 8 communities. I have 2 new opportunities to do some learning myself. Last week, I began a school about Popular Education, which is the liberating method of facilitating I use in the work I do here. For an entire weekend once a month for the rest of the year, I and others who work in communities and other types of non-profit organizations and social ministries will learn techniques, processes, and educative material to improve the work we do. On Friday, I began auditing a theology class at the UCA (University of Central America). Wait until you hear its title: “Vivir en marginalidad: Lectura socio-historica de la obra lucana” (“Living in marginalization: socio-historical reading of Luke”)…..so incredibly related to my interests and call to ministry to work with marginalized people in the spirit of the example set by Christ. Not only will I be learning from the direct instruction available in both of these opportunities, but also I will share these classes with people who have years of experience in diverse communities, organizations, and ministries attempting to put into action the values of love, justice, and dignity. I expect to learn from my small group and more informal interactions with my fellow “students”. Moreover, importantly, both opportunities provide a context in which to reflect about what I am seeing, experiencing, and learning from my work in the Ecclesial base communities.

June brought 2 good changes

I am really happy to get to tell you all about 2 changes that happened in June. Both involve my work and life in Morazan, which, little by little has become all of the following: the place where I recognize the greatest need, the place where I spend the most time, and the place where I feel is “my community” (actually 13 communities). We have contracted for the rest of this year 2009 with a youth named Juan (pictured with me below) from the community of Yancolo in Morazan to be a "Promoter" of the youth work in Morazan. For the rest of the year, we will work together to coordinate, support, and strengthen the formation and work of the youth in the communities (where-as I was working for the first half of the year alone in coordination of Morazan). I am really excited about this--some of our goals are visiting each of the communities each month to support them, working to create and strengthen the vision and feeling of a Youth Association in Morazan, strengthening the process of formation (about themes of importance to youth and Biblical), giving extra support to the newly-organized communities, and generating new and fresh ideas and activities.

The other thing that happened in June was that we officially asked permission of one of the families in Morazan if I can live with them a little more and have their home as my "home base". Coincidentally, this is the home of Juan, the new Promotor, from Yancolo. Yancolo is located in more or less the center of all the 13 communities with whom I work. As I think I have expressed before, all of the communities are pretty removed as far as distance from the town and road, but this one is not too bad as far as that goes. Juan and his wife Reina have a house located at the center of Yancolo (by the soccer field, the chapel, the road) and live with their 2 children (Rita, age 5, and Adrian, age 2---pictured above), the mom of Reina (Vivianna), and the neice of Reina (Roxanna). And Now, Me! Throughout my initial 5 months of my work in Morazan (February through June) this was definitely one of the families with which I built a close relationship of confidence, sharing, and friendship. Thoughout the last 3 or 4 months, I had had a change of attitude about locating a place in Morazan. Instead of looking for the best location (as far as quality, availability, access--though these are really important too), I began to be conscious of where I had a really good connection, feeling, or "call" to live. In sharing life with people, that is the most important factor. That was a really good change of course, I think, because it has produced an arrangement that is and will be beautiful. we eat together "as a family" as opposed to them fixing my meal first and apart. There is a lot of "life" in the house with the 2 little kids, Rita and Adrian, whom I love having around. Also, Juan and Reina are relatively young (24 and 26, I think) so there are moments when I feel like I am living with 2 adults in charge of a household, but there are other moments when the 3 of us can hang out as friends.

Regarding about how frequently I will stay in the house of Juan and Reina in Yancolo: It is close enough to 2 other communities that when I am visiting them, I can walk back to the house. But still there are 9 other communities that are sufficiently far away that it is too far to walk and no buses pass after a certain hour. Thus, for example, when I have a meeting/workshop in one of those 9, I will continue to the pattern I have maintained until now of staying the night with a family in that community. Someone suggested that it might be "by design" that I hadn't found a very permanent place. I enjoy the experience of passing the nights in the communities with the families. I have returned 4 or 5 times to some of them (once a month), so I am building relationships, confidence, and friendships with them--so every month is even better and better. So, I will be staying with Juan and Reina a limited number of nights each month--when I am in Yancolo or the 2 closest communities, and also when I have a day or afternoon off. I have a box and a table the house where I can leave some of my stuff that I don't need to take with me when I travel to other communities or that I want to leave in Morazan when I come back to San Salvador. This is helpful because a lot of times I walk a lot and my backpack can get heavy between materials for the meetings and personal stuff like clothes and soap. Also, I have washed my clothes and let them dry at the house so that I don't have to bring 16 shirts when I am there for 16 days.

First 100 days.... of Mauricio Funes

For those of you wanting a little more info about Funes and the new FMLN government inaugurated on June 1, here is an article written by Danny Burridge. Danny is one of my friends here (a fellow VMMer), is the Field Coordinator for the Volunteer Missionary Movement (VMM), and has been living and working with organizations and parishes in El Salvador for 3 years. Enjoy! https://nacla.org/node/5892


(A view from the standing-room-only crowd at Funes' Inauguration on June 1. I had the opportunity to attend and be a part of the historic and important occasion.)

J-E-R-E-M-Y

I wanted to fill you guys in on an exciting thing that happened in my life in the last weeks. From Monday May 18 until Monday May 25, my brother, Jeremy visited me here in El Salvador. He took time out of his summer to endure a language barrier, the heat and humidity, inundation with unfamiliar things, and rigorous physical demands to share a little piece of himself with me (and also my friends and communities) here and to take a little bit of El Salvador home with him. For both of us, I think, the rewards were worth the extra effort. I’m proud to say that my brother likes pupusas (the food unique to El Salvador), liquados (fruit drinks that are a staple to my diet here), hammocks (both an important income-generating product and the “bed” of families in Morazan), and that his Spanish ability tripled, quadruped, maybe even more in his time here. Ever intelligent, intuitive, and inquisitive, he asked important questions that set us both on a path of greater consciousness and wanting to know more about the factors that influence the lives of our neighbors in other countries. We took some time to take trips to see parts of El Salvador that even I had never visited, including a beach for snorkeling, a museum about the ways that faithfulness to the cause of the poor, hope, and love triumphed despite the atrocities of the civil war in El Salvador, waterfalls, and an outdoor food festival. My brother is such a good person with whom to spend time relaxing, see and try new things, and have adventures, that it was a pleasure to spend some leisure time with him.

Apart from the adventures we had that were a good break from my normal schedule here in El Salvador, I also thought it highly important for him to join me in a couple days in what I do normally day to day here. For me, this was one of the most meaningful parts of his stay—the chance to “introduce him” to my life here, to the communities where I work, and to the young people with whom I work. Mid-week, we visited 2 communities in different parts of Morazan named Yancolo and Naranjera. He was patient during the long busrides you must take to get there, and walking alongside of me as we chatted with the youth, he endured the fairly long walks to the communities. We talked explicitly about, and he had the chance to see first-hand, how its one thing to talk in “big psychology or theology terms” like auto-esteem and liberation when your in the sanctity of a classroom at Furman or with people who think like you do and have relatively comfortable lives. It is a different animal to find creative means to help the young people in the communities realize that they have value as loved creations, the very essence of the good psychology and theology can offer to the world.

An image remains with me, one that typifies how my brother, despite all the difficulties, emerged from every experience with a great attitude and also typifies how I believe that this experience of sharing life with the people in the ecclesial base communities of El Salvador has the power of changing your way of being, thinking, and doing. In the heat of Friday afternoon, we had just arrived at the house of a family in Naranjera, after a substantial and steep walk from the main road to the community in the mountains. I had a couple of minutes to prepare for a workshop that began at 3 that afternoon, and he took the opportunity to rest for a few moments in one of the families hammocks. I had not adequately advised him about the difficulty of the walk we had just completed, and the combination of the heat, walking, the unknown, and not being able to communicated like he is accustomed to had been a lot to handle. I had stepped out of the house to wash my face and perhaps a mango for a snack. As I came back to enter the house, I noticed my somewhat frustrated and tired brother surrounded by 3 little kids—Judith, the daughter of the woman we were staying with, her brother, and a friend. I was caught between wanting to distract them to give my bro some space to relax and wanting to give him the opportunity to experience the beauty of sharing life in the communities. But the decision was not left to me because, already, Jeremy was summoning all his Spanish abilities to talk with them. I paused outside the door for a moment watching as he and the little Judith shared words in a book, and as he taught her to read and pronounce some English words from the book. They worked together, he lying in the hammock with his book and she looking inquisitively over his should for several minutes, even until it was time to leave for the workshop. This beautiful scene I had the privilege of sharing with Jeremy, with whom not even an hour before, with all the difficulties of the day, I had questioned my motives of doing what I do and bringing him with me.

As I reflect on the special little moments like this of my brother’s experience here in El Salvador, I am grateful for Jeremy’s willingness to share his life this week with all my friends, young people, and communities here, his patience, and his openness to adventures, asking important questions, and learning new things. I miss him already!

What makes me smile...

“Jeni, we met again as a group, and the young people are excited, and they want to form a group that meets, and we want you to come to support us, and when can we plan a day?!?!” I had reached my limit of in-the-office work today (I’ve been back in the city for a week after a long time in the communities where I work with the young people), so I made some phone calls to some coordinators in the communities to plan the meetings and workshops for this month. Before I could even tell this young woman who I was, she was already bursting at the seams to tell me about how the group of youth has been meeting and has had some good discussions and is ready to be more organized and have more activities…and so on and so on. I was recharged right away—a much-needed burst of energy to keep working on the material for the workshops we have planned, collaborating with some of the coordinators to form agendas for meetings, and finding some funds for some special events we want to do this month—all in order to get back to the communities next week.

I have to tell you a little more about the community and group of young people in the community of the girl with whom I talked. The community’s name is Copante and is the closest of 5 of our communities in the very rural area of Morazan to a bus stop. That means that every time I want to go to the other 4 communities, I walk first past this community. When I have time to stop, I do and chat with the ladies who run the little store located a stone’s throw from the school in the community or with the families working in the fields closest to the road. When I don’t have time to stop, nevertheless I know I walk by with a smile on my face remembering the special moments that I have already shared with that community, with the teeming interest of the youth in activities, discussions, and readings that will benefit them, how the women’s cooperative are working so hard to turn their 200+ chicken project into a success, and even how I ate 8 mangos in just one morning because I couldn’t say no to any of the kids who kept wrestling the mangos down from the trees to give to me.

I arrived in Copante for the first time in late February and I got the tour of the central houses and of the community’s prize project—the construction of the first church and meeting center that has ever been built in the community. When I first saw it in February, it was a heap of newly-dried adobe bricks and I remember thinking that it would be months before the project was completed, especially with the impending rains. When I returned to the community the Monday after Easter, the group of young people directed me to the new sight of the day’s activity—the new church that had been finished and inaugurated the previous day for the community’s first Easter celebration service. I could grasp a little bit of what the newly complete project meant for the community because I remembered how many times the young men had arrived at meetings with clay caked to their feet and pants up to their knees as they had spent the day making adobe bricks. I had visited house-to-house with the youth inviting new youth to the activities and answering parents’ questions and emphasizing that ALL were invited (its not important if your family is Catholic or Evangelical, FMLN or ARENA), and been able to say that our first meeting of the month would be in the newly-constructed place where ALL the community is invited.

Copante is a community of 80 homes, with between 2 and 3 families living each home. If you are standing on a nearby peak, you can seen that the expanse of the land that is Copante covers 2 and a half mountain peaks. I got to stand on that peak, because one morning last month we visited house to house half of the homes in the community and have planned to visit the other half the 15th of this month. Few of the youth there study, but the youth coordinator, a young lady named Idalia is one of the few who has continued in her studies. Each Saturday, she walks to the bus stop at 4:30am to attend school in the pueblo Caocaopera all day and returns in the night. She will finish high school in about 2 more years of this distance- Saturday-classes. Its very important that the youth meet with some consistency on there on, and have asked for some material to help them with themes for their meetings. Idalia will begin leading them through a text called “Accompanying the youth with values like Monsenor Romero” which has guides for leading reflections about themes like liberty, service, happiness, and perseverance. I just flipped to the contents page of the book sitting beside my computer here, and the first theme is “life”…a good starting point for any process of youth formation.

I want to end this reflection with an image, another one of those that makes me smile, both when I enter the community to stay a while and when I am passing by en route to another. An image that ties together my own childhood with the lives of the kids here. Its “Padre Abraham”—ring any bells? The young people of all ages LOVE the song “Padre Abraham” (“Father Abraham”) which I used to sing when I was a kid, and they think its hilarious when they sing in Spanish at the same time that I sing the song in English. Pumping our arms in the air, bobbing our heads, spinning around…all the motions “…right arm, left arm, right foot, left foot…” included.

Special Election Edition

My day began at 2:30 am on Sunday, March 15, 2009, when my alarm went off and to get myself up on my 2 feet, I had to remind myself how much I love the people of El Salvador and how much I want to witness a great change in the conditions of the country. The other observers in my group and I were dropped off in front of the polling center, a school building, where we were assigned, right into the midst of 2 waves of excited and energetic people (though it was still 4:00 in the morning)—one wave of red (the FMLN) and the other of red, white, and blue (ARENA). These 2 waves were composed of all the people who would work at the polling tables that day but were already chanting, an indication of the energy and the importance of the day. I didn’t talk to anyone who slept well the night before (including myself) with all the excitement, expectation, and hope. When the building opened up at 4:30, I entered the building firsts with the rest of the observers, and my first observation task was to watch as those same people who had been standing outside entered the building, one by one, to take their places to work at their polling tables. At my polling center, there were 30 polling tables, and at each of these tables worked 8 people: A President, Secretary, 2 Vocales 1, and 4 Vigilantes. Half of the people working at each table were from each political party. Between 5:00 and 7:00, the workers at each table set up their table—everything from constructing the cardboard ballot box to counting the ballots to verifying and collecting the ID documents of everyone working at the table. The polls opened on time at 7:00am, and for the subsequent 10 hours (OK, so I took some breaks—like breakfast, a doughnut and coffee, lunch, a fruit snack, and a walk to see the atmosphere outside) I would walk in between the 4 tables to which I was assigned to watch for irregularities that were preventing the fair execution of the voting process. There were several disputes about procedures, individual voters or ballots, though fewer than I remember occurring when I was an observer for the legislature and municipality elections in January. I believe I witnessed someone voting using fake identification documents, a friend supposedly took a picture of a bus full of Nicaraguans being brought to the center to vote, and I was always suspicious of those pesty (but ever so helpful to a potential voter search for his/her name in the voting center) ARENAeros directing the people to their correct table. I invite you to take a look at the new album of pictures I took on Sunday during the elections. There are more details about the El Salvador process in the captions. A summary of the activity and energy of the day is that I know that I have a certain dread of election days in the US—because I know it means waiting silently in a long line for hours to arrive at a machine to press some buttons. In the polling centers in El Salvador, the spread is much different. The colors are vibrant, the activity continuous, the variety of people in different roles astounding (table workers, observers, supervisors, votors, children, people bring refreshments to the table workers, police, etc).

The polls closed sharply at 5:00, at which time, the table workers began the process of verifying the votes and the work of the day, and eventually counting the votes. A tedious process because the number of unused ballots had to sum with the number of ballots in the box (and also the number of corners torn off the used ballots) to equal 450 at each table. The president unfolded each ballot, called out the party with its flag marked, showed it to the group, and handed it to the vigilante of the named party. More counting and double-checking. Then, one by one, shouts of the winning parties arose from the tables. Until the very end, I did not know which party won the voting center, because it seemed to me that one party would win a table and cheer, shortly to be followed by the cheers of the other party who had won at another table. Out of the 30 tables in my center, the FMLN candidate Mauricio Funes won 16 and ARENA 14. At some point, at the end of the process of counting and reporting the votes, neutrality went down the drain and when it was announced that the FMLN had won the voting center, had someone taken a picture, you would have seen a great big smile on this observer’s face. 20 years is enough of abandoning the poor majority of El Salvador! The celebrations began among the table workers of the FMLN in the center, but always with suspense about if things would turn out so well in the rest of the centers in the country.

Throughout the rest of the evening, whether it was cheering from the back of our pick-up, watching the election results come in on the TV where we ate pupusas together as the group of election observers, or poking each other to stay away back in the office to watch the succession and acceptance speeches of the 2 candidates, I knew with increasing certainty that a life-changing victory had been won by the FMLN and Mauricio Funes. And indeed, when the final results came out on Monday, the FMLN secured the presidency with 51.27% of the Salvadoran vote.

Sunday represented the first election of a left-wing party candidate to the presidency in El Salvador in the 20 years of post-war time. For the past 20 years of ARENA in power, the conditions of the poor majority (and by that I mean that the majority of people in El Salvador live below the poverty index line with limited opportunities for education, for improving their lives, adequate food and housing, much less health or comfort) have, if anything, worsened. Meanwhile, to sqeeze wealth out the country for the rich, the government has done such atrocities as neglect to tax sweat-shop industries, thereby encouraging their continued abuse of workers, make international agreements that exploit and deny opportunities to the everyday Juan of El Salvador, neglect improving schools and education in favor of encouragning the construction of huge shopping malls. Get the picture?

To help you understand a little more of why this was such an important day in El Salvador, I want to refer to some of the words shared by my co-workers on Monday morning when we had a celebration of the victory of Funes and the FMLN. First, FUNDAHMER (an acronym) is named for a man (Mercedes Ruiz) who during the 1980s worked in the communities destroyed by the 10-year civil war, accompanying the people and working in whatever way possible to improve their conditions, inspire hope for a better El Salvador, and provide relief for those in the most humble positions. I have written in this blog about the martyrs close to the hearts of the people of faith in El Salvador—in fact this Tuesday, March 24, we celebrate the 29th anniversary of the assassination of Monsignor Romero. Thus, Sunday was important because we have hope that it is a step along in the process towards liberation, justice, dignity, and opportunity for all people (including, and most especially, the most poor) that these martyrs would have loved to have seen in their day, but called for the rest of us to continue the struggle toward this better world. By taking to the ballot box, despite threats about their jobs, their families, etc, to vote for a needed change in El Salvador, the people of El Salvador have taken yet another step toward creating their own reality that is more just. Then there are people, like the founders of FUNDAHMER—Armando, Anita, and the generation of older adults in our communities who have worked and waited, enduring terrible conditions that I can’t even imagine over the past 20, 30, 40, 50 years: for them, Sunday is a step in the right direction toward a national environment where their hard, hard, hard work can finally earn them something with which to put an end to the vicious cycle of poverty, hopelessness, and lack of opportunity. I work with and for the youth of the Christian base communities, and so I wasn’t surprised by the amount of youth active in the political process this year—what a great experience for the youth to seen this first exchange of power from a government that has largely abandoned their interests to one that recognizes the crises among the youth and promises to work to resolve and improve them. I share all this hopefulness at the risk of sounding overly optimistic, knowing that only time will tell—-if there is to be improvement, it will come slow. The men and women who will take office with this new government are after all just men and women, but my hope is that they are men and women inspired by the same values that I know inspire my communities: special care for the most vulnerable, equality, opportunity, and dignity.

Again, please check out my photos of the Election day to "observe" for yourself the Salvadoran Election process.