feb 8th

Monday February 8th 2010.
The days and nights have been getting better. Today was our first day of Spanish class. There are 5 of us in the class and its held at the house next door. The madre there listens in on our classes and chimes in from time to time and giggles a lot when we talk about culture issues. She is in her 50’s and looks like she is in her late 80’s. she has 4 teeth. Although it was the first day, I think I’m going to enjoy the class. We don’t do much writing we just talk and we learn the Spanish that we are really going to use and need. Today we had to give a 5 minute presentation in Spanish and I was nervous… by the end of the class we will have to give a 1 hour presentation. On Wednesday we go to the local school and I will have to give a presentation by myself on what exactly the peace corps is.
My family seems to be different from other peoples. But I’m just going with the flow. I really only talk to my madre and sister who is 18. She loves rolling her eyes at me when I ask her to slow down. the el Salvadorians have a realllllly tough accent to understand. They all drop the letter “S” from their words and it makes it tough to understand. They also have a large vocabulary of slang. We are learning a lot of that in class.
I am getting more used to the daily life here. The bucket showers are getting easier and waking up at 6 am is not that bad. The cold bucket of water being dumped over your body is still kind of rough, as it puts your body into shock for a second. But I’ll survive.. I really seceretly hope I have a normal shower in my permanent site. Our house does not have a constant flow of running water and right now we are running low. Usually ever couple of days the water flow starts and they store it in a “pila”. It looks like a large cement bath tub. My house has two of them. One for dishes and one for bathing. Both are low right now. My madre is hoping that water will come soon.
We have been learning a lot of about safety here in el Salvador. It is quite a dangerous place. We are not allowed to go out after dark and most busses stop running around 5 or 6. They have a huge gang problem here. What we have been warned numerous times is that its not “if” we are robbed but “when”. What the Mara’s (gang thugs) do is come on a bus and more or less demand money from each person on the bus. Usually if you are a gringo they will also demand your cell phone. Most times they have knives, but sometimes they have guns as well. They typically come up and put it to your neck until you hand over it is they are asking for. So every time you board a bus it is on your mind. Will this be the time?