1000+ RADISHES!

Have you ever seen 1000 radishes at the same time? Or have you ever eaten radish leaf cakes? (Not the sweet birthday cake kind of cake, but more the style of the potato cakes that we eat in the South) Or how about cilantro cakes? I can now say "yes" to all of the above... in El Salvador!

I guess it has been a long time since I have written anything and even longer since I have written about the beautiful garden we are working on! Most know that after several months of interviewing, visiting, observing, and more, we finally decided that a realistic 1-2 year project and real need and desire of the community was an organic community garden. In November, we started the planning and slowly clearing the space, but it wasn't until January that we really started moving. We hit the road running in January - decided we wanted to plant around half an acre because vegetables are labor intensive and water is scarce. In that first month of work, I can say I saw the power of community and the pure brute force of Salvadorans. 

 We worked 3-4 days a week, working 5 plus hours a day, and worked with everything in us (keep in mind this was all volunteer labor - everyone working had another job or their own land to be taking care of in addition).  We went into the mountains, hiking long distances, to find cut down trees to help form the planting beds and then hauled them back. I, of course, always accompanied and tried to help, but I learned fast that I don't last long in the Salvadoran heat and I haven't grown up doing manual labor... so when everyone else carried 6 or 7 posts (small trees) 

i would carry 2 or 3 and generally drop half on the way back!  Eventually we did completely terrace the whole hillside (the 1/2 acre we were planting happens to be on a fairly steep hillside!) and complete 12 beautiful beds ranging from 10 to 30 meters long. Everyone helped all the way through the process. To be a part of the work with everyone coming out, laughing, arguing, sweating and working together was an inspiring experience. 

On January 28, we had our first planting! We planted seeders of tomato, green pepper, onion, and cabbage, and then planted 2 beds of raddishes - the radishes would be ready to harvest by the time the others were ready to transplant. The plant list was short that first month because it turned out to be extremely difficult to find local, non-hybrid, non- genetically modified seeds! El Salvador has lost most of the farming tradition, and few people have seeds saved from years of cultivating. In fact, most big organizations that work with farming cooperatives go to Nicaragua or Guatemala to bring back seeds. 

At the end of February we had our first harvest - over 1100 radishes!! Everyone that comes to help work in the garden received a dece

nt pile of radishes to take home... of course I realize that radishes aren't everyone's favorite food, but we were pretty excited about our first harvest. PLUS, we got to eat radish leaf cakes! So...when we were harvesting the radishes, I started throwing all the ones that didn't have a bulb out, somebody saw me and stopped me, scolding me for wasting good stuff, saying they were going to use the leaves for something. I was surprised, but decided not to argue, better to just wait and see what the heck they were going to do. I doubt they even knew what they were going to use the leaves for at the time, but I have learned that necessity is the best creative force and there is a lot of that here!

Did you know that radish leaves have more nutrients than the actual radish? I knew it, but I still was never tempted to eat the leaves... until recently. The night of the first harvest, we had a soup with potatoes and radish leaves, which I thought was surprisingly good  - until the grandmother sent over these tortas (cakes) she invented (but I would still recommend trying soup with radish leaves). I was hooked immediately and we made radish cakes the next day! Grandmother made the cakes by finely chopping up the leaves, adding egg and a little bit of tomato and onion and then frying the mixture up in little cakes. Let me just say, you should try them because they are GOOD! Pretty soon everyone heard about these little bites of goodness and everyone was fighting over radish leaves!

So I will just end by saying we planted some more radishes and people are eating a few more greens in Los Naranjos!

A look at my life...

Domi, the youth coordinator, and I being cool...

Last weekend we had a campout with the youth and the morning after we made a pancake breakfast together. And because it happened to be March 8th (International Women's Day), we made the boys cook!

Of course the campout had to include a bonfire and SMORES!! They had never heard of or tried smores before so it was quite the experience

The Family...

Diego's (my little brother) birthday party. He recently turned 2!

I even made a cake (don't worry, I didn't burn it too bad)

The art classes with the youth

Nelson, one of the youth I work with.

The view from the dirt road that I walk whenever I go into or out of the community.

Another view... isn't it beautiful?

Some of the younger girls dancing for a presentation in the community

Returning to El Salvador (yes, this is 2 months late)

Even though it is now March and lots of things have happened in the past 3 months (which I will eventually write about!), I do want to share these thoughts that I wrote in early January, but haven't had time to put up until now... 

It was hard saying goodbye to may parents when they dropped me off around 5am at the Asheville airport. Once again I questioned whether I was doing the right thing... but within a few hours I was back, getting rid of my scarf and jacket (very necessary back in NC) as quickly as possible and welcoming the sticky Salvadoran sun and receiving welcome back hugs from my friends. And so I was able to push those doubts back. However, it was weird when when people back home (??) in NC asked what i was up to. At first I didn't know whether to say I was visiting El Salvador, working there for a while, living there, or something else! Eventually I did start to reply with some confidence and say I was living and working in El Salvador, even though I didn't really feel like I lived there. With this in mind, coming back after Christmas I realized  that I am living here and thus has started to feel more like home. 

My new year's welcome back was both joyful and tearful. The first night back some friends took me and my friend Julia out for some "pupusas," my favorite local dish, which are fried tortillas stuffed with beans and cheese. Then my first night back in the community, Marielos, my adopted little sister came and sat on my lap and sad, "Angel, I am very glad you are back." I almost cried. I too was glad to be back. Unfortunately, that was not the only time that tears came to my eyes in those first days back. Upon arriving in El Salvador, I was greeted with the news that my friend Francisco, a 29 year-old youth coordinator from Las Mesas (a community right next to Los Naranjos that I am involved with), had died on the 27th of December. When I heard the news, I thought about the last time I saw Francisco... I was in Las Mesas on Dec 17th for a youth meeting, and Francisco was there despite being very sick.  People told me that him coming to the meeting was the first time he had left his home in two weeks. While home in NC, I told my Mom about Francisco and that I didn't think he would live too much longer... but I was thinking more like 6 months or a year. Francisco was an inspiration. He had been the youth coordinator for close to 10 years and though he was strict, they loved him and he had truly created a beautiful group of active and aware kids ready to work for a more just and peaceful future. A few days before Christmas he had planned for all the youth to go and visit the sick and elderly in their community and other closeby communities. I wonder if they ever went since Francisco was so sick? 

What hurts the most is to think of how he died. He died from kidney failure, which from what I have heard is quite painful and slow. The doctors prescribed him medication to clean his kidneys, but it cost around $50/week. I doubt he made much more than $100/month, making it impossible to pay for the medication that may have saved his life. Friends have also told me that he is the 3rd or 4th in the community to die of kidney failure in the past few years. We are starting to wonder if the water is contaminated? But even if it is, there are few resources available to clean it up...

Close to two-thirds of the world's population lives without access to clean water. Before coming to live in El Salvador, I had no idea of what that truly meant.

The tradition here when someone dies is to do 9 days of prayers, with the 9th day being the biggest and almost a celebration. I went to the 9th day of prayers for Francisco, where I also had to bring some more bad news to the community. My close friend, Beatrice, who is the new youth coordinator, had applied for a scholarship from FUNDAHMER to help pay for her to go to college. She had been calling me every few days for the last month asking about the scholarship. Few (if any) kids from Las Mesas have gone on to college, and Beatrice's desire to study impressed and motivated me. But I know that in reality it is economically impossible for her to go to college without a lot of outside help.  I want so badly for her to be able to study, but I had to tell her that night, at the funeral, that there were no funds for her scholarship. It almost brought me to tears when she told me (after the news) that she was going to apply for a job at a nearby factory - a factory that we would call a sweatshop.

Despite the night being emotionally draining, it was a beautiful experience... from being there to share in the prayers, the songs, hearing how much Francisco meant to the youth, being able to just hug Beatrice to ending the night with a fun walk back to Los Naranjos at midnight under the moon and stars. And finally being able to share the night with my friend Julia, a close friend from the States that had come to visit me for a short time. 

To bring things to a close, I think I am realizing how much I took my education for granted. Just the opportunity to go to high school here (and in most of the world) is a huge opportunity. Only 1% of the world's population receives a college education. Just because I went to college I am automatically set apart from 99% of the world's population. When I think of this, I ask myself what am I going to give back? So much has been given to me. It is true that I have worked hard to go to school, but no harder than some of my friends here who will never see the inside of a college classroom. I owe it to the rest, to give back at least a little something.

I am convinced that those with an education must work for and be the voice for those who are ignored, oppressed, impoverished and unable to fight for themselves. 

 

Pictures

Even though I have a couple of albums on Picasa Web Albums, I wanted to share a few recent photos with you all...

A few weeks ago I went to another community's anniversary celebration, but unfortunately I went the day before to help prepare... we were frying chicken until 3am!! This picture is from around midnight when we are still semi awake. You can see the large bowl of chicken still to be cooked, and the fire that we are cooking over. The lady standing up was telling stories and making up poems right up until we finished! She loves to make up poems...and I will just say that you can make up a lot of poems about an "angel." :)

Corn. Something so simple but so beautiful.  In the mayan creation story, the Popol Vuh, the first real humans were made from corn... This small ear of corn represents so much to the people. 

A boy in the community helping the women's committee prepare for the chicken coop they will be constructing. 

This is a picture from one of the communal work days of the women's committee for the chicken coop . Obviously you can see there are men working as well, and so yes, some husbands come out to help. I really like the communal work days... 

A beautiful sunset I saw one evening while I was walking back from a youth meeting at a nearby community called Las Mesas. I made the youth hang out with me and watch the sunset for so long that the community thought something had happened to us and sent men with machetes to come look for me... they are a little protective of their gringa :)

When the Furman kids came to visit the youth did a little dance for them. This is a picture of a few of the girls dancing and the university students and a few community members sitting in the school watching. That was a special day for me.

Project Update (Part 2): What is the plan now...

The picture: A simple clay heart that my friend Laura (an Artcorps volunteer also working at FUNDAHMER) made. I thought it was a beautiful picture that I wanted to share... but I also liked how she just found some clay (which on first sight appeared to be mixed with dirt and rocks, but happens to be very good clay - Laura knows, she does a lot of clay artwork) on a trail we were exploring in a community in Morazan and within a few minutes she had turned it into something quite pretty. We left it in the stream, placed as it is in the photo. And Laura is working on a proposal to use clay in a community project next year... 

So now that I have filled everyone in on what I have been doing, I thought it was time to update on what I am doing now!

After being here for 3 months (I just got back from Mexico - my first trip out of the country to renew my Visa, which I must do every 90 days!), I still feel like I am figuring out what happens when I push one button instead of the other (if that analogy makes sense... to put it another way, I still feel like a pilot on his second or third day in the plane, looking at all those buttons and just going "what the heck do all these do??? I have the on/off and a few others figured out, but the rest...?") However, I do feel like I have learned A LOT. It has been really interesting visiting other projects, getting ideas, seeing things I don't like, talking with other producers and hearing their stories... 

One thing I have seen in a lot of projects is a lack of commercialization. Non-profits, cooperatives, women's groups, etc. can produce some really high quality goods, but the products are going to ruin and the projects falling apart because nothing is selling and the people aren't seeing any profits from their hundreds of hours of labor. Thus, I want to produce and sell. I want to have a plan for markets before we start producing things.

At the same time I have also realized it's ridiculous to plant some organic crop with the sole

 purpose of selling when the nutrition within the community itself is so poor. You wouldn't think the people are malnourished when you see them because most of the women are overweight. They aren't in lack of calories, but they are in need of nutrients. Sometimes for 2 or 3 days straight they won't eat anything but corn tortillas, rice and potatoes (and some random candy or potato chips!) - all starches with hardly any nutrients. Vegetables are not part of their diet and very few people know how to grow them. I think they crave nutrients and stuff themselves with tortillas and rice to try and satisfy their cravings...but i'm not a nutritionist!

Furthermore, even though I knew it beforehand, I am now realizing it more than ever that my original project idea/plan is more like a 5+ year plan. I still think that planting something in large quantities (basically planting a cash crop in addition to their basic corn and beans) as a cooperative and getting organic certification is a great idea, but I think that will take years and I think other things need to happen first. Hence, my new modified plan is a large community garden in the community. The plan has already been approved by Armando and Anita and we have presented it on two occasions to the community and are basically already starting!!

Within the cooperative (the community is actually already legally recognized as a cooperative!), there is communal land where the garden will be located, and it will focus primarily on vegetables, grains, and roots (based on nutritional content and caloric content). There will also be some fruit trees and a few other trees that can eventually be used for firewood, as well as a few herbs. The project/garden will consist of a series of workshops and technical visits where the community will be able to learn skills and techniques on the whole gardening and organic process! Workshops will include topics such as planning a garden (aka, looking at calories and nutrients and what crops grow well together...), natural insecticides, crop rotations, composts and fertilizers...etc., One part that I am also really excited about is that once the harvest starts we are going to bring in a nutritionist AND teach some cooking classes! The people can learn how to cook the new vegetables and flavor things with various herbs and spices instead of just oil and salt, as well as learn a little about the nutritional content of things and why nutrition is important! You think that people should already know this stuff, but we take a lot for granted...One example of what I want to do, a lot of the women are anemic and so we are going to plant spinach which has a lot of iron, but most people in the community have never eaten spinach - and they won't eat it unless they learn how to cook it and why they should eat it. There are several new types of vegetables that I want to plant for the community to try. 

The skills learned in the community garden will hopefully be put to use in everyone's individual gardens, and then the harvest from the community garden will eventually be only used to sell and take to market, allowing for some extra income for the involved families.

The 5 "objectives" we wrote for the Organic Community Garden include:

1: Improve agricultural skills and knowledge within the families

2: Improve family nutrition

3: Aid in alleviating some of the food security issues

4: Create extra family income

5: Improve environmental conditions in the community

(Hoped for) Results:

1: Families will be trained with appropriate technology in organic gardening 

2: Families will:

a) improve nutrition

b) improve income

c) reduce toxic chemical usage 

Ok, I think that is it for now. Of course I am involved in several other little projects in the community but more on that later! I hope I didn't bore you too much

Me and Noemi, one of the little girls who frequently runs around the community sitting in my lap or holding my hand...

Project Update: What exactly have I been doing for the past 2 1/2 months...

By now I am sure everybody is probably wondering about my "project"- what is up?? How is it progressing? What exactly do I do with my time?

So I wanted to prepare a brief summary of my activities thus far. In a second post, I will tell you in more detail about my future plans...

- Biointensive Sustainable Agriculture Organic Workshop:

During my first few weeks here I attended this intense workshop. At the time it was a bit overwhelming (I wrote about it in an earlier post), but it has proved very helpful and given me many ideas and resources for my project.

- Community Diagnostic

During my first month here, I completed a community diagnostic with detailed family, work and agricultural information. This really helped me to see what each family grows - which in reality is very little besides corn and beans - and what things grow naturally in the area. There are 18 different types of fruit trees that grow in the area! I also learned a lot about the economic status in the community, and honestly, I don't understand how some people live day to day. Granted most people grow enough corn and beans to live off, but they still buy a few things rice, sugar, coffee...soap, and many have very little income. This info helps me to better understand the reality of the community...  and is invaluable as we work together to create a project plan.

- Community Survey

You are probably thinking that is the same thing as a "diagnostic," and maybe you are right and I am just using the wrong words. However, for the diagnostic I visited every family and gathered very specific information with numbers, dates, and quantities. For the survey I met with community leaders, the women's group, the youth group, and the members of the cooperative. I learned about all the various organizations and groups within the community and gathered info on all current projects in the community. I documented the project's history, related challenges and successes, which community members are involved, project needs, and the amount (if any) of income generated with each project. This information has been extremely helpful to me and some of my bosses at FUNDAHMER. There are a lot of good things going on in the community, but very little is generating any $$ for the people. It is actually am

azing to see how hard the people work to see little benefits. From this survey, I also learned about 2 other organizations that are interested in promoting organic agriculture in the community that we may end up collaborating with!

- Visited other projects

Part of my plan from the beginning has been to spend time visiting other organic agriculture and cooperative projects to learn from some of their ideas, successes, and challenges.  From these visits I have gotten an idea for irrigation during the dry season, and learned a few things that I don't want to do. The problem has been that at every place I visit, I get ideas for other projects to visit! However, it has been good overall. I have learned a lot and made some good contacts.

- Visited Markets

One thing I have noticed in a lot of other development projects is that groups can be producing really great products, but the products are sitting in storage until they ruin and people are leaving the project because there is no market plan. People are producing but not selling. Thus, I want to have a plan for where to sell things before we start producing. We want to produce and sell. 

- Applied for space in an Alternative Community Market in San Salvador

I was pretty excited about this. It was my first formal document that I have written in Spanish that people outside of FUNDAHMER would see - but I have to admit that Anita helped me a lot. I sent in the application a few weeks ago, but we still haven't heard anything yet because we have to wait for the market committee to meet so we can make a presentation!

- Attended a Forum on the Food Security Crisis in El Salvador

Someone from another organization that sometimes works in my community invited me to attend this Forum with them, which I was a little nervous about, but I had a lot of fun and learned a lot of interesting stuff. It was good to see data backing up some of my own observations thus far. It was also good to be back in a semi-academic setting for once... this is the first time since I was 5 that I have been out of "academia" for more than 2 months, and I have to say I miss it a little. 

- Taught Computer Classes

The school in the community was donated 3 computers by a rotary club in El Salvador. However, of course no one at the school - including the teacher - knows how to use them! Thus, I have been attempting to help a few of the older kids learn computer skills in the little free time they and I have. But summer break will start next week and I am working on creating a formal "class" for those interested 2 days a week. Youth from a nearby community have already written me a letter asking if they can attend! I have never formally taught computer classes so anyone with experience or ideas, please contact me!

- Began working with the community youth

In my time here thus far, one of the things that has impacted me the most is the reality of the youth in the community. It is hard for them. I honestly can't even imagine living the life they live... and yet, it is they who make me laugh when I am having a hard day, and who give me hope when everything seems so overwhelming. It quickly become obvious that if I go somewhere all the youth in the community want to go, if I go to a meeting or an event, they all want to go. I have decided to take advantage of that and start working a little with the youth. Currently I just attend all their meetings and events and aid in the organizing part, but we are working to put together a project or try and raise some money for the kids to go to the beach one day or something else fun. After all...the youth are our future :)

- Hosted a group of 20 Furman University Students

Furman (the University I graduated from) has a Central America study abroad class and they are currently in El Salvador! Last week I was lucky enough to have them visit Los Naranjos for almost an entire day. It was really a beautiful day for me... two really important things in my life thus far came together for a short while. I think the students and the community both loved the day. I met the students on a Sunday, spent the afternoon/evening with them, sharing my experiences and then they came out to the community on Tuesday morning, getting to know the people I love so much for themselves.

- Revised my project plan and created modified more realistic proposal

My original project proposal was more like a 5 year plan, and so after my time here, visiting other projects and getting to know the community better, I have come up with a revised version that is both realistic for a year and will still make positive sustainable difference in the community (and don't worry I will tell you more about this plan in another post). What's even more exciting is that I presented the idea to the community 2 weeks ago and they liked it, and so Armando, the director of FUNDAHMER, and I had a meeting with the community a few days ago to formalize everything. So we are ready to start doing stuff!!

So, maybe it seems like I haven't been doing that much, but I feel like I have been running around like crazy attending meetings and such, as well as trying to spend as much time as possible in the community. I hope this helps all of you picture a little bit of the "work" I have been up to.

This is a picture of me working in the beehives in the cooperative - they have a beekeeping project and sell the honey! I am one of the few women who will actually go in with the bees :)

Analyzing Reality

Poverty... will I ever understand it...???

The poverty here in the community is a lot worse than I first realized... or maybe it is just that I am getting to know the life and the people a lot better.

On one side I am feeling way more secure, happy, and comfortable in the community and where I am right now. I am getting more used to the daily life, learning bus routes, my spanish is improving, I am making friends, I can now get to everyone's house in the community without getting lost, the cold rainwater showers in the morning are now refreshing rather than dreadful...I am getting to know both the community and office dynamics better (but I still have a long ways to go!). I think a big part of my contentment and joy is that I know I am exactly where I am supposed to be right now and that is a truly good feeling. 

However, on the other side of things, there is a deep sadness that I am experiencing... I am not sure exactly how to describe it, but it is like I am grieving for the people, my friends, and the deep injustice they suffer everyday... something I had no idea about for most of my life... a suffering and reality that most of my friends and family back home in the US know very little about. Even though this grieving or sadness hurts, I think it is good. I am learning from it. I think it is the only way to experience true compassion for the people...

Recently I have come to notice a sadness that has settled in the air over the community. Even if I get fully wrapped up in the children's laughter during a dance or a game of duck-duck-goose, I feel it again when I walk by Daisy's house on my way home and Abel isn't there to tell me a joke, or when I get to my house and Ricardo isn't there playing with Diego... most of the men in the community are gone now. Two weeks ago almost every man in the community left for Honduras to get jobs working on cell phone towers there. The work is extremely dangerous and difficult, but of course it pays well - about $250 a month. The men will hopefully come home one or two days a month. 

Before leaving, Ricardo (my host dad) had a job working for the cooperative earning about $125 a month or $4/day for 8 hours of work per day. When he left, Alicia (my host mom) asked him if the job in Honduras was worth sacrificing his family. He said, "no it's not, but I don't have a choice... I have to support my family." The economic situation in the community is very difficult right now.

Everyone feels there absence. Not only emotionally, but physically. Women with little babies now have to out and work in the cornfields, and chop wood - among all their other daily chores.

The effect of poverty on the youth is something else that has been hitting me hard and has been contributing to the recent sadness in the community. In the past month, 3 girls from the community have moved in with their boyfriends (with or without their parents' permission).Of course the parents want more for their kids, but they cannot change the situation they are living in... Two of the girls are 13 and one is 16. The 16 year old actually surprised me the more than the two 13 year old's because I did not see it coming (and neither did anyone else in the community). Her parents had no idea it would happen until she was already gone. The girl was a close friend of mine and had a scholarship to study in the city for high school. She only lacked 3 weeks to finish 9th grade...but in that one night where she sneaked out of her house her entire life changes. When she decided to leave her family and move in with her boyfriend, everything changes. She stops going to school, stops participating in the youth activities, and mostly stays at home cooking and cleaning - only leaving to participate in things that her husband allows. It is a difficult thing to understand, and I can't say that I will ever understand it... the reality of the lives of these kids is so far from the life I lived and the reality I know that it is hard to even imagine their thoughts and feelings. 

I was talking to my boss, Anita, about it and she said something that hit me hard but helped me to understand a little. She basically said the kids and the youth have no hopes, dreams, or plans for their future.

For as long as I can remember I have had plans or dreams... when I was little I wanted to be a horse trainer, then a firefighter, then a teacher...and I have always wanted to travel - to El Salvador, Africa, Cuba... and I had plans to go to college and now I have plans to continue studying... but it is true that in the 2+ months I have been here I have never once heard the youth talk about their future or any sort of plans or dreams they might have.

I have been thinking about that a lot lately. I am going to find a way to start including the youth into my project. I want to find something that excites them or motivates them... but I must admit that I can't guarantee that I will find that "something" so more than anything I want to accompany them in their search for hope and for a better future.