This is my El Salvadoran check-in. I am in El Salvador! I won't have much time to write a ton, because I've already had a ton of internet time, but I wanted to write a blog while I was HERE to remind myself of the need to write about this place.
Yesterday we woke up at 3:45 for the second time in a week to official, credentialed international election observers! It was a really incredible experience, to be given the chance to see a country speak it's voice from the inside out. Manny and I, along with a couple youth radio reporters we were teamed up with, drove down a mountain at 4 in the morning in the bed of a truck. I will miss things like this so much when I leave Central America. We were stationed in Sensuntepeque, the capital of Cabañas, a region on the Honduran coast.
It was unusual because we observed in a pretty conservative region, so I saw a lot more support for ARENA (the ruling right-wing party) than I did for the FMLN. This was after spending a week meeting people who spoke about their experiences and pain during the revolution and their hope that change was coming this Sunday. Before yesterday, I was really starting to wonder who the mysterious majority was who had kept ARENA in power for so long. Turns out they are kind of a mix of the very wealthy and the very poor.
The ballots for the election were incredibly simple - just a picture of each flag, with instructions to mark an X through the one you prefer. I get the sense the elections here are much more accessible than they are in the states - I wonder if we'd get the 80% turnout rate if it were that easy, instead of having the appearance of elitsm that I think all our debates and ammendments give off. Then again, this system makes it much easier for votes to be bought.
Although everyone was braced for tons of fraud, it seems like everything went pretty smoothly. There were some Hondurans and Nicaraguans nearby with fake DUIs (their voting ID) with the names and info of deceased, and I saw a few other fishy things going on, but overall it was a pretty peaceful day. Voting centers are like hometown fairs - everyone is decked out, there are street vendors, and there is just this sense of anticipation and excitement. Voting is definitely an all day event. I feel so grateful to have been able to share this experience with the Salvadoran people, even if only on a small scale. Especially with a victory! It really echoed Obama's from the fall.
I'm really anxious to see how this works out for El Salvador. Funez ran on a pretty moderate platform, and his victory is without a doubt a HUGE acheivement, if only because it means an overthrow of the exploitative government who has been using scare tactics to rule, riding on the tails of the US-funded massacres of the 80s. But now Reagan and Bush are not president, and the world isn't so terrified of communism to attack any country who decides of it's own accord that left-leaning politics might work for them. So maybe they've got a chance. Or maybe in 2 years they will be like Nicaragua, already jaded and suspicious of their leader. I don't know. (And I really don't mean to be making such broad generalizations. There are Nicaraguans who love Daniel, and there are Salvadorans who are displeased with the victory of the FMLN.)
Okay, I need to get off the computer. I really need to write more about this country later, because there is SO much to say, and I feel like I've learned so much only being here for a week.
BUt we will see when I have time... because I'm going to COLOMBIA on Friday! My mom will be there, and on a whim (a kind of reckless one) we decided I should miss a couple days of class and fly down. Which means this is my current life schedule: return to Managua on Wednesday, fly to Medellín on Friday, fly back to Managua on Wednesday, leave for the Coast on Thursday, come back to Managua on Wednesday, have one more week of class, and then return to the coast for ISP.
How is this possible?
More later.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
poetry assignment for class
two posts in one day! I have spent way too much time on computers today. but here are a couple poems I wrote for class here. another way to understand Nicaragua...
on street corners
it is like laughing:
like each car is exploding from it’s belly, bursting
forward proudly it’s uncomfortable truths
in an open-mouthed, unforgiving exultation of existence,
claiming life simply
because it can
and then it is like spilling,
as voices drift upward
bend outward
and bodies speak
the things I have always been taught to keep silent.
En un baño, a medionoche
Armadas con una escoba,
gritamos y saltamos.
Ella golpea la tierra
y yo río,
como matando cucarachas
se convierte en un baile.
on street corners
it is like laughing:
like each car is exploding from it’s belly, bursting
forward proudly it’s uncomfortable truths
in an open-mouthed, unforgiving exultation of existence,
claiming life simply
because it can
and then it is like spilling,
as voices drift upward
bend outward
and bodies speak
the things I have always been taught to keep silent.
En un baño, a medionoche
Armadas con una escoba,
gritamos y saltamos.
Ella golpea la tierra
y yo río,
como matando cucarachas
se convierte en un baile.
5 week (minus one day) anniversary!
I have been doing an absolutely terrible job of updating my blog with life here. I sincerely apologize, especially to the wonderful friends who "stalk my blog daily." Which is very sweet. I will try to be a more interesting target from now on.
I'm sitting in the student office, enjoying an afternoon off from class and killing time before I have a phone interview for a possible summer job, and there is really so much to life here that I don't even know where to begin with an update!
The past couple of weeks have passed ridiculously quickly. I wound up missing out completely on the campo trip due to my wonderful case of strep, that got worse and worse every day for about a week. I got to make a few trips out the the Vivian Pellas Hospital, which is the snazzy private place all the Nica Ricas and foreigners get to go to. It was bizarre - it looked as nice as UCLA Medical Center or Sedar Sinai. Luckily I was feeling well enough to head out to Matagalpa for the night when everyone else on the program was returning from their campo adventures. There I learned about the beauty of how good batidos really can be.
Since then, I've just been here in Managua, sinking in to some semblance of normal life. Nobody left town last weekend because we had tons of homework and everyone was tired, so that gave us a chance to feel out the weekend life here (and by that I mean we spent one night watching The Dark Knight in the office, and two long days working on homework, but also got to go out to this really awesome bar to see an afro-cubano band play with our conversation partners, which was one of my favorite things here yet).
Somehow, amazingly, tomorrow is our LAST DAY of spanish class. I honestly dont know if my spanish mastery has improved much, but I'd say what has improved is my fluidity, my willingness to take chances and sound ridiculous in order to communicate. Which, really, is essential when you're trying to survive in a foreign country and have some experience beyond simply being a tourist and a foreigner.
Next Tuesday we leave for El Salvador. El Salvador! AND - get this- we are going to be official election observers, complete with t-shirts and clipboards and probably an aire of foreign superiority, but it is so amazing to have a chance to be involved. These elections are really important. Basically, around the same time of the civil war here in the 80s there was a much bloodier, inhumane civil war in El Salvador. Since then, the same people have remained in power, and most agree that most of the elections have been frauds. This election is the first time that their revolutionary party is considered to have a viable chance of winning, especially because there has been SO much emphasis on the elections being clean. The FMLN it seems to me is more reliable and trustworthy than the FSLN here, and maybe it really is a chance for popular change in Latin America. We'll see! But this is exactly why I am so excited to be a part of it.
I'm starting to hone in on a topic for ISP, and it is TERRIFYING, but SO exciting and interesting. I think I'm headed to the RAAN, which is the northern autonomous atlantic coast, to research indigenous rights and autonomy. There has been a strong history here, like everywhere, of abuses to indigenous peoples and their land, and the whole concept of autonomy and political power is a little shaky here. I haven't really decided what my emphasis will be, and nobody from the program has gone there since 2000, so this really is kind of uncharted territory.
Tomorrow a friend and I are going to go to Granada for the weekend, the beautiful, colonial, tourist headquarters of Nicaragua, and we're going to do a boat tour of the Isletas! I will fill you all in on how it goes.
Okay, time for my interview! It's been so bizarre to be down here and have to think about summer and coming back... my mind keeps this world and the world of home very separate. Hopefully my English will hold up.
Love to everyone!
I'm sitting in the student office, enjoying an afternoon off from class and killing time before I have a phone interview for a possible summer job, and there is really so much to life here that I don't even know where to begin with an update!
The past couple of weeks have passed ridiculously quickly. I wound up missing out completely on the campo trip due to my wonderful case of strep, that got worse and worse every day for about a week. I got to make a few trips out the the Vivian Pellas Hospital, which is the snazzy private place all the Nica Ricas and foreigners get to go to. It was bizarre - it looked as nice as UCLA Medical Center or Sedar Sinai. Luckily I was feeling well enough to head out to Matagalpa for the night when everyone else on the program was returning from their campo adventures. There I learned about the beauty of how good batidos really can be.
Since then, I've just been here in Managua, sinking in to some semblance of normal life. Nobody left town last weekend because we had tons of homework and everyone was tired, so that gave us a chance to feel out the weekend life here (and by that I mean we spent one night watching The Dark Knight in the office, and two long days working on homework, but also got to go out to this really awesome bar to see an afro-cubano band play with our conversation partners, which was one of my favorite things here yet).
Somehow, amazingly, tomorrow is our LAST DAY of spanish class. I honestly dont know if my spanish mastery has improved much, but I'd say what has improved is my fluidity, my willingness to take chances and sound ridiculous in order to communicate. Which, really, is essential when you're trying to survive in a foreign country and have some experience beyond simply being a tourist and a foreigner.
Next Tuesday we leave for El Salvador. El Salvador! AND - get this- we are going to be official election observers, complete with t-shirts and clipboards and probably an aire of foreign superiority, but it is so amazing to have a chance to be involved. These elections are really important. Basically, around the same time of the civil war here in the 80s there was a much bloodier, inhumane civil war in El Salvador. Since then, the same people have remained in power, and most agree that most of the elections have been frauds. This election is the first time that their revolutionary party is considered to have a viable chance of winning, especially because there has been SO much emphasis on the elections being clean. The FMLN it seems to me is more reliable and trustworthy than the FSLN here, and maybe it really is a chance for popular change in Latin America. We'll see! But this is exactly why I am so excited to be a part of it.
I'm starting to hone in on a topic for ISP, and it is TERRIFYING, but SO exciting and interesting. I think I'm headed to the RAAN, which is the northern autonomous atlantic coast, to research indigenous rights and autonomy. There has been a strong history here, like everywhere, of abuses to indigenous peoples and their land, and the whole concept of autonomy and political power is a little shaky here. I haven't really decided what my emphasis will be, and nobody from the program has gone there since 2000, so this really is kind of uncharted territory.
Tomorrow a friend and I are going to go to Granada for the weekend, the beautiful, colonial, tourist headquarters of Nicaragua, and we're going to do a boat tour of the Isletas! I will fill you all in on how it goes.
Okay, time for my interview! It's been so bizarre to be down here and have to think about summer and coming back... my mind keeps this world and the world of home very separate. Hopefully my English will hold up.
Love to everyone!
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