End of this Particular Adventure

To my intense astonishment, just after my gastroenterologist had given me a clean bill of health, Peace Corps medical people in Washington, D.C., decided I would not get well enough to return to El Salvador, and that I could not live there and get or remain healthy.

I found it hard to believe things had come to such an abrupt end, and felt, frankly, pretty angry. I had to admit, however, that my regular doctor had found an additional intestinal infection that it would take time to resolve, delaying me well beyond the original 45-day limit for me to return, healthy, to El Salvador.

At the end of December, I will learn whether the nasty antibiotic I took (my third one in this episode!) eliminated this latest infection. At that point, I can make some plans for the future. In the meantime, a lovely trip with my daughter will fill in the time with lots of pleasant distraction.

Before I left for El Salvador, friends at church gave me a book of poems, one of which struck me especially, with its insistence that we would do well to stop thinking of "the end of the road," and substitute "a bend in the road." I stand at one of those bends, eager to learn what comes next!

El Salvador War: 1980-1993

In most places I have lived, people do not have crowding into their memory visions of a war that took place before their eyes and involved them personally in one way or another. But in El Salvador, spontaneously, people seem to shift the conversation toward their experience of the civil war they experienced.

The first time I encountered this I was staying with a host couple, during my first weekend in the country. They witnessed what seemed like endless fierce fighting on the street right in front of their house. It became so dangerous that they dared not leave the house for any reason. When they ran out of food, they had no way of obtaining more, and wondered what would become of their children. They mentioned to me, without any fanfare, the fact that militants had killed the man's elderly father, apparently for no reason at all.

"Then," added the father of this family, we got the earthquake!" The family survived for weeks living in the small park across the street when their house (made of adobe, I think) collapsed, beyond repair. They have not yet finished rebuilding.

Several evenings lately, between dinner and bedtime, I have had a chance to listen to my elderly landlady tell tales about her life. Again, almost casually, she mentioned that the oldest of her five children lost his life when attacked while taking medical supplies to the capital from our town. She felt grateful that his body came back.

Then one of my several bosses mentioned yesterday that his family didn't suffer terribly during the war. Off and on, he said, rebels would arrive in the town where he, a small boy, lived with his family. At that point, all the inhabitants would quickly pack up and leave, since they knew that the army would soon arrive to provoke a deadly battle. Once the battle finished, the townsfolk would return, until the next time.

Perhaps when I have lived here for a while I will take such tales more in stride, but at this point I find it very moving to listen to people who have lived through such awful chaos and violence. I wonder if the very length of the war somehow anesthetized them to some of their suffering. How can they talk about it as if something common and more or less "normal" had taken place? I may misinterpret their stoicism. No doubt they still feel very strongly about what happened to them, about the injustice of it all. But none of that comes through to me as they relate their terrible experiences. What changes in the psyche of a country of millions of people after they share such dreadful memories?

P.S. on 10 November 2011: I fell ill on my third day in El Salvador, and did not respond well to treatment. Finally the Peace Corps doctor decided to Medevac me to the U.S. so that I could recuperate. My treatment here has produced good results, so that I hope to return to El Salvador by my deadline, 9 December. Once I get back, you should find me blogging more regularly!

How to Close the Door: Three Creative Ways

I had spent less than 24 hours in El Salvador before I found myself whisked off to spend three nights with a host family in a village not too far from my eventual site. Absolutely wonderful people! "Salt of the earth" seems to describe them best. They had hosted 18 volunteers before I arrived, but all the others had stayed 10 weeks with them. I insisted they consider me number 19 in spite of my very abbreviated stay. The household consisted of Alicia and Abel, their three-year-old great grandson, and his mother.

They gave me the royal treatment: At what time would you like to have breakfast? Cereal? We just happen to have that! What do you like to eat at lunchtime? What do you not like to eat? Come rest in the living room. And on and on. Every time Alicia announced that she planned to go have the corn turned into cornmeal, to get something to drink for lunch, or to go to church, I asked if I could go with her. The answer? Always a delighted "Sure!" We had a great time together. My first real taste of life in this country.

"Come see your room." "Abel will put up your mosquito net." The door to my room didn't close all the way, or latch, so Alicia showed me the system: at night, I could wedge a 2" by 2" length of wood (maybe 4 feet long) between the cement floor and the crosspiece of the door to close it tightly. I would not need to worry about intruders! Not that they had ever had any of those.

I decided to use this same system to close the bathroom door, since it didn't really close well at all. Then, near the end of my stay, I discovered the system for that door: the very long nail hanging on the door (probably 8" long) could fit into a metal ring on the door jamb. Then, extended across the edge of the door, it closed things up nicely. I guess I hadn't really needed to carry that 2 x 2 all over the place!

After our tearful farewells, on Monday morning, my Peace Corps boss drove me and all my baggage down the mountain to the town where I will live for the next 8 months. Before taking me to my house, however, he had a full day of orientation planned, to continue what we had begun the previous Friday in San Salvador. Half the day I spent with a language teacher, who taught me many of the gestures and Spanish expressions used in El Salvador that other countries do not use. I think it will take me a long time to learn them all! But I stole a few minutes to survey the many books in English that volunteers have left in the office, and picked up some I thought I would like to read.

At last, we drove to my new house. The landlady's name? Dolores! My Mother's name. I'll have no trouble remembering that, even if she does shorten it to "Lolita." This lady has an enormous house, with three or four rooms to rent, besides her own, and many large areas for reading, talking with friends, etc. For sleeping, I ended up downstairs, in the room that adjoins hers. Her chihuahua decided the first night that she wanted to spend the night under my bed, rather than in her own doggie bed. Since the partition between my room and the landlady's does not go all the way to the floor (or to the ceilling, for that matter), the dog can get under my bed even when I have closed the door.

Closed the door? How do you do that? Well, as it turns out, with ingenuity. All the other doors in the house, which has more inside doors than you would believe, latch and lock normally. But a former renter lost the key to my lock, so someone has fixed the latch so it cannot engage (to avoid ending up locked out of the room!). Then how do you keep the door closed? Easy! The landlady handed me three remnants of upholstery cloth, which she instructed me to insert between the latch and the door jamb. Most of the time, this works just fine, and the door stays closed. But sometimes I have not folded the cloth properly, and the door opens again. And once in a while I forget about the system, push the door open, and end up with the cloth on the floor. I'll learn, eventually.

So--do you get the impression that "making do" could become the national motto? I think so!

Do You Know the Way to Salvador?

If you do, try dropping by the national university. You should find me there, starting sometime early in October. Peace Corps training this time around should take only a couple of days (in Thailand, we trained for ten weeks!).

We can probably chalk up this difference in training time to a couple of factors: on a second Peace Corps tour, things go much faster (and perhaps more smoothly!). And this time I already know the language.

What a difference that will make! During teachers' meetings, instead of staring off into space (my usual behavior in Thailand), I will actually understand the matters under discussion. I may even manage to contribute my two-cents' worth sometimes.

In El Salvador, the Peace Corps plans to offer me a room in the house of a woman who rents to several people. No Thai house all to myself this time around! But I will have kitchen privileges, and people to talk to sometimes, which sounds like a great idea. And the university lies within walking distance, they say.

There the university has an office for me, and a computer with an internet connection. But since guidebooks stress that wireless in El Salvador comes and goes, do give me time to answer your e-mails.

Most of my 8 months I will spend helping a new English teacher develop courses and methods that can help students learn English. I may also get to offer English classes to some of the teachers, and perhaps even to people in the community. This last possibility I find truly intriguing--and somewhat daunting!

Do think of coming for a visit, especially if you can do that during Christmas week or Easter week. During those holiday periods, I should have time to show you around a bit. Otherwise, plan to help me teach English! I can almost guarantee that you will enjoy it.

More "I Won't Miss" and "I Expect to Miss"

I warned you I would come up with more of these!

I Don't Expect I Will Miss:

1. Getting up at 4-something on school days.

2. Having to consider tap water and fresh vegetables as poison, until boiled.

3. Breathing in huge ribbons of soot from the burning of sugar cane residue.

4. Figuring out what to do with gifts of very hot soy milk, sugared to beat the band.

5. Having to wear a skirt to school.

6. Scorpions

I Will Probably Miss:

1. Mangoes, pineapple, and papaya--surely the best anywhere in the world!

2. Witnessing children (and their teachers) gradually learn to pronounce English sounds, so that they become intelligible to the native English speaker's ear. You should see the facial contortions we go through to arrive at this!

3. Watching fishing boats in the river.

4. Standard classroom rituals, like the students' "Good morning, Teacher," in unison.

5. Rice porridge for breakfast.

6. Thailand's version of peanut "brittle"--soft, so you don't break your teeth!

7. Moments of breakthrough: easy give and take in Thai.

8. Winning village women over just by smiling and nodding to them as I walk to school.

9. Having medications mailed to me free of charge, courtesy of the Peace Corps.

10. Waving to friends and host family members as they drive away from my house. They find this ritual truly odd, but some have told me how much they will miss it.

Petchabun

Every time I have tried to find "Petchabun" in a guidebook for tourists to Thailand, I have come up with nothing at all. Usually it appears on the map, as one of our many provinces; otherwise, it might as well not exist.

But locals here call Petchabun "the Switzerland of Thailand," and I found that description not too far from the reality. My two primary school co-teachers had wanted to take me there for a long time, and finally found a weekend when we could all three go, and a van free to drive us there. Then nine other people decided to tag along, all primary school teachers!

Petchabun's mountains dominate the landscape, and between them, the valleys fill with fog in the early morning. When I mentioned how much I dislike fog, no one could understand why--"so beautiful," they said! "Yes, but just try to drive through the Pennsylvania version," I retorted. No one in the van had ever attempted such a thing, so they found my experience quite surprising. When my cohorts thought we had reached the fog, I explained that, no, we could still see things around us, so it had already lifted a bit. A good thing, since we needed to find a hidden turnoff.

This road led to a breathtaking resort, with chalets scattered over steep slopes. I assumed we would spend the night at this place, but, no, we would have lunch there, and then move on to a different tourist haven. Really different, as it turned out: small, not very clean, with the hardest bed I believe I have ever slept on! But, hey, we had plumbing, and we thoroughly enjoyed both dinner and breakfast. I found waking up with my colleagues and seeing them all prance around the breakfast buffet in their pajamas an unforgettable new Thai experience. Unlike me, they apparently usually shower after breakfast, rather than the night before.

I saw my first Thai conifers. But tropical trees had somehow managed to survive the cool temperatures, and blended in with the pines. This area grows the most famous strawberries in the country, but we had missed the harvest season somehow. No matter: I have found Thai food uniformly delicious, all over the country. Even I seem to manage to cook pretty tasty concoctions, using these incredibly fresh ingredients.

We made long stops at temples, one of which had a huge display of clocks (don't ask me why!), a shrine with a white female Buddha at its center, shopping spots, and several farms. I discovered that, like Costa Rica, Thailand grows huge crops of chayotes--a greenish squash-like vegetable I have eaten more times than I can count. I indulged in mulberry ice cream, but don't exactly recommend it. We strolled through the farms, marveling at the strange trees and the flowering plants. My colleagues all bought enormous quantities of plants and food--including worm-like things that still wiggled. Lots of people here eat them, but I will spare you the details, at least for now.

Our last stop: an ostrich farm, with thousands of them running around their enclosures. The males have red mouths, I learned, so you can distinguish them readily. The farm imports these creatures from South Africa and New Zealand, and sells their meat nationally. I had never seen large numbers of them before--just a few in one zoo or another.

Speaking of zoos, the ostrich farm also displayed the largest crocodiles I have ever seen anywhere (the walkway above them enables you to take a really good look!), white peacocks, deer, and on and on. And, yes, I remembered my camera, for once, but still can't get my card reader to work (something seems to have gotten bent in there somewhere--you know all those little round slots that little round poles fit into?).

I think the constant laughter constitutes my fondest and my most frustrating memory of our trip. This group of teachers has more fun together than anybody, I do believe. I love hearing them erupt in giggles every couple of minutes. But I get a bit worked up sometimes when I can't begin to figure out the joke!

To Thailand, to Thailand, to Teach and to Blog

Home again, home again, jiggety-jog!

I don't suppose a twenty-hour flight, mercifully broken up near the middle, will seem much like "jiggety-jog." But it should get me home again, in spite of a plane change in troubled Tokyo. I arrive in Scranton shortly before Easter, and hope to have a telephone number before too long. In the meantime, e-mail reaches me best, although my internet access here in Thailand keeps falling through.

What I don't think I will much miss:

1. Newly arrived bugs! Suddenly I have a house full of all sorts of creatures who stayed conveniently outside as long as they felt sure they would not get wet. Early rains must have given them ideas about finding a nice, dry place to live.

2. Daily struggles with the Thai language.

3. Based on #2, daily inability to find out what I think I need to know. Early on, I usually laughed this off, but lately it has begun to get to me!

4. Inability to plan almost anything, since people assume I can make myself available at almost any time. Those close to me know I retire early, thank goodness. Otherwise, I never know when I will suddenly hear that I should have dressed for this or that occasion, because I will need to attend X, in short order.

5. Trying to live on $250 a month. Most young volunteers have it much harder, since people assume that a senior citizen like me should receive lavish gifts of food all the time. The Thai government covers our rent, by the way, or we would never manage, and I should add that I have found prices of almost everything here quite low. Still . . .

6. Utter lack of privacy. People here live comunally (although not in big cities, I have found), so they know everything about people they feel close to. I guess they feel pretty close to me, too, judging from the way they poke around in my grocery bag ("Why did you buy this?"), ask my age, run their fingers through my hair, and insist on driving me to places I prefer to walk to. I had no idea how standoffish I had become, or how easily "offended," until I came here.

What I think I will miss the most:

1. My adorable Thai students, especially the third graders. I wish you could have seen the face of the one who seemed afraid to look me in the eye when school started last May (almost nobody in my village had ever spoken with a foreigner before I arrived). She smiled at me like crazy the other day, as she proudly came toward me with her talcum powder farewell gift, clearly wrapped by her own hand.

2. Leisure to cook, read, and walk almost everywhere I need to go.

3. Hearing "my" dog bark (actually my landlord's dog, but he adopted me a long time ago!) at anyone who approaches the house during the night, whether on foot or by motorcycle.

4. Listening to the large lizard's odd, sleepy noises (he seems to spend the night somewhere near the dog), and the mynah birds' echoes of each others' intricate calls.

5. Walking across the long, long bridge early in the morning, to get to school.

6. Enjoying more and more elaborate conversations with my landlady, who knows no English at all, but who has developed amazing patience as she tries to explain things to me. I will also miss her hugs!

7. Watching the river in front of my house.

8. Observing the progress of my co-teachers, especially as they eagerly absorb my English vocabulary suggestions, and my corrections of their attempts to speak English. They have come a long way, and so joyfully!

Well, at least for today, the "will misses" outnumber the "won't misses." A good sign! Tune in at a later date, for a planned update.