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Published: August 17th 2010
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St. Thomas-Phila based El Salvadore Team
When this photo was taken several members of the Philly team had left...Missing is Mia and Laura and the Engineers without Borders (there with us in spirit tho!) Entry #1 Post Trip Reflections
This summer I took my first foreign mission trip. On July 23, I departed with 14 others from St. Thomas of Villanova Parish and headed to San Salvador, El Salvador . We were part of project FIAT (Faith in Action Together, an outreach of the Handmaids of the Sacred Heart of Jesus). The sisters have a mission house there (Casa Voluntariado Santa Rafaela Maria), built for the express purpose of attracting and housing volunteers to come and help them with their work for the Salvadoran people. While there I had hoped to write a running blog describing each day, but unfortunately we learned, shortly after arrival, that the computer available for general use was malfunctioning, as were both the mission house phones! Although Sister Gloria (the leader of this week’s mission) invited us to use the office computer to let our families know of safe arrivals, the blog certainly wasn’t going to come off. So I kept a diary, and, with the perspective of a couple of weeks, I will attempt to put together some reflections about the experience. My hope is that these thoughts may serve a greater purpose than just simple journaling. Perhaps someone wrestling with the idea of trying this experience may find these entries helpful if considering a similar endeavor. Although this was a bucket list accomplishment for me, I found out very quickly that mission trips are not that rare of an occurrence for a good number of people and the folks you meet doing mission work just happen to be regular people who are pretty inspirational and a lot of fun.
PS I hope to add pictures to this journal, but not being the most technically savy, the words will most likely precede the pictures! But for now, allow me to refer you to
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This video was done by Graham Kuhn, a member of the St. Ann contingent. Graham is a music minister at St. Ann's. OnceI get the entire group picture up on this blog look for him in the back row in a white cowboy hat!
Entry #2: The People Living and Working out of Casa Voluntariado Santa Rafaela Maria
Wonderful people surround you on these types of trips, people who obviously care about others and the common good. Houston is one of the main entrance points into El Salvador…and there we saw quite a few different groups wearing colorful tee shirts proclaiming their project names and their missions. Our shirt was light blue and it identified us as a Project Fiat participant. In addition, we wore small wooden brightly painted crosses around our necks. We were asked to put our shirts on in Houston, so that when we entered El Salvador immigration could easily identify us as missionaries. The shirts also helped us identify others coming to do similar work. Quite a few Protestant communities were represented. The shirts also helped to provide an entree to easy conversation. It was not unusual for total strangers to come up to you and ask "What are you here to do?"( Or on the way home, "What did you folks do?") One group told us they were coming to help build a fish tank that would enable the Salvadoran people to farm tilapia as a source of income.
Upon our arrival at the airport we were met by a Fiat van and two representatives of the house (a man and a woman). He was a Canadian citizen whose child had suffered from cancer. In thanksgiving for a good treatment outcome, he came yearly as a way to say thanks. She was from Portugal, a college professor, married, a mother of grown children, affiliated with a lay religious community. She had been in San Salvador for three weeks. Upon arrival at the house we met a summer intern from Villanova University, a single woman who was a teacher with the Haitian community in Miami and Sr. Gloria, an extremely well educated lady, who had taught and run schools in various places in Europe and who found her way to the missions in her 60’s! Sr. Gloria spoke fluent Spanish and ran the place like clockwork. A cross between a drill sergeant and a cuddly teddy bear with a great sense of humor, she was loved and appreciated by all of us. We soon discovered she was extremely respected by the people in the community we were to serve. (Sr. Gloria provided daily wake up calls by blowing a rams horn up and down the corridors at 7am each morning. She warned us that she had a morning surprise and she wasn't kidding! By mid-week she allowed different missionaries to sub for her on the morning horn) We do have a recording of this and if I can figure out how to get it on this website, I will...words just cannot do justice to the sound!)
Allow me to share with you the make up of the group that formed the community staying at our house (there were 40-50 of of us in the house over the course of the weekl). The St. Thomas group consisted of teens through middle aged adults (at 58 can I still count as middle aged?) There were three sets of mothers and daughters (two moms came with their one daughter, one mom brought all three of her daughters,) one aunt-niece combo, one father-son combo, one husband-wife combo, four young professional women who found out about this project on the internet, and came as individuals from various parts of the country and several other “singles”. One single was a 77 year old gentleman who was returning for his 6th trip! Then there was the youth group from Atlanta. The “kids” were college aged and their leaders were the parish priest, Fr. Tom (60 ish) and youth ministers (mid to later twenties, maybe thirty-ish). Many of these kids had been on multiple mission trips starting in middle school. They had served the poor and underprivileged domestically and internationally..some having been to Jamaica, and Haiti .
Our two groups quickly bonded, especially the young people. We worked together as a team, we enjoyed each others antics, made each other laugh, relieved each other on the job when we perceived someone was tired, looked out for each other if it looked like someone was getting sick.
Never before did I see strangers bond so quickly, mingle so easily, and connect so completely (adults and young people) There were several mechanisms in place to help foster this bond, but no mechanism in the world can compensate for people not willing to open themselves up to the experience. Everyone did.
Along with our student intern and the two women who had been there for several weeks we also had three men from Engineers Without Borders with us. Most of us had never heard about Engineers Without Borders. They were there at the invitation of Sr. Gloria evaluating a water treatment system in one of the villages where we were working. Although they did their work independently of us for the most part, we were together in the house for activities, meals, and chores (no one could escape the chores, no one even tried!). All three of these men were from the Philadelphia area and were affiliated with Drexel University. The purpose of their trip was to gather data from the treatment plant and from the villagers (by interviewing them) and then to go home and analyze if the present water system could work with new adaptations or if something new was needed. They participated in most of our in-house activities and chores...all three were really nice guys and fun to be with.
Many of our numbers could speak Spanish, some fluently, so language was never an issue. At all our work sites the folks that spoke Spanish lead the way for most of our activities. However smiles typically spoke volumes. The people were happy and grateful to see us. The kids knew were were there to help them have a different and fun experience. The fact that we couldn't communicate verbally was never a problem. People just took you hand and led you.
I cannot speak Spanish. In many cases the Salvadorans knew some English, or we communicated thru my gestures. NEVER was I made fun of for my lack of verbal ability…folks would work with me to understand, say the correct word or phrase, repeat it for me so I got the pronunciation correct and then praise me for my effort. I shudder to think about how impatient I’ve been from time to time with folks for whom English is a 2nd language. Hopefully never again….it was humbling to be on the other side of things…Rosetta Stone, here I come!
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