Ay ay ay

It seems the time is going by so fast already. The days are beginning to blur together. I think I´ll pick up where I left off and try to share highlights. Following the water talk, we went to hear about the political and social situation in El Salvador. While there are no longer masacres and the people can walk through the streets and vote for who they want to without worrying, there´s still a lot of poverty and inequity and a feeling that the government is selling the country to foreigners through privatization, free trade zones/maquilas and dollarization. El Salvador no longer uses its own currency, Colones. Now El Salvador uses dollars. The only other two countries in Latin America that do this are Ecuador and Panama, which each have better reasons for being dollarized, as Ecuador has an oil based economy and Panama is an essential trading port w/ the canal. In Apparently there´s a new anti-terrorist law similar to the U.S. Patriot Act. It allows U.S. business person to come over with diplomatic liscences.
Last Wednesday for dinner we went to a pupusería. Pupusas supposedly originated in Honduras, according to Michael, but they´re very common in El Salvador, as well as Nicaragua. Like tortillas, pupusas are made with ground corn, and shaped into a small patty. To make this patty into a pupusa, one then adds cheese and/or beans or meat to the center and shapes the dough carefully around the cheese, etc. then pats it back out into a flat circles. The pupusería was in the gated front patio of a woman´s home. She was really sweet, and she let us each attempt to make a pupusa. Making pupusas is an art form, one that none of us had much talent for. Her pupusas looked beautiful, evenly distributed, round, flat. Ours were small and fat in the middle. They were all, however, absolutely delicious. All in all a delightful meal.
Thursday morning we went to a place that does popular education for a taller (workshop) on Salvadoran history. It reminded me a bit of being at one of our afternoon lectures during SST: five hundred years of history in an hour and a half :). They do some really awesome things @ the popular education center though. They had all sorts of books about free trade, globalization, Salvadoran history, etc. written in simple easy to understand terms with all sorts of illustrations. They also had pictures of Romero everywhere, as is common all over San Salvador. There are all sorts of murals and spray painted images of him everywhere. He´s still an example that brings everyone hope. When he was still alive he said that if he was killed, he would rise again in the Salvadoran people, and I really think he has.
Afterwards we went to a Christian Base Community on the outskirts of San Salvador, which was wonderful. They have a small building where they meet on Sundays for worship. A group prepares a creative liturgy for the service, which includes time for reflection and sharing. Everyone participates, from five year olds to the adult men. In their worship they always remember the martyrs and the massacres, remember the past and also the present situation and how they as Christians are living within this political and economic reality. They have all sorts of programs within the community, from guitar lessons, to making and selling artesanía, helping families with health care, education, and nutrition, participating in marches, and more. They´re open to everyone. They seemed really active and full of hope while constantly keeping in mind the past and present situation.
Bueno, escribiré más luego.