Blogs from Central, El Salvador, Central America Caribbean - page 7

Sunday, July was a full day, and it was the first time the entire group worked as a team and found ourselves experiencing many of the same emotions as a result. We began with breakfast and then gathered out front in the courtyard for morning prayer. I kept copies of all our reflections and prayers but neglected to date them. As I look back now my sense is that today we used the one attributed to Oscar Romero where he reminds the reader that " We accomplish in our lifetime only a fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God's Work". I'd have to call this one of "our Oscar Romero days" (we had others) in that much of what we were exposed to today reflected upon him, his ministry in El Salvador and his messages. ... read more

Cinquera The village of Cinquera is about an hour's drive from Suchitoto. The village was a stronghold for the guerillas during the civil and all the houses in the village were at some point destroyed by the army. The village is now being rebuilt but there are lots of reminders of the civil war deliberately left in place and a museum is meant to be opening there quite soon. In the morning we go to Cinquera Park, an area of forest in the hills around Cinquera. Some of this area had originally been farmland but it was abandoned when the army destroyed the crops and has since returned to forest. Further into the hills is the area where the population of Cinquera fled to when the army arrived and eventually formed themselves into guerilla bands. We ... read more

On The Buses Wednesday 18th August Today is another long day of travelling as we leave Honduras and head towards El Salvador. Our ultimate destination is the town of Suchitoto which is going to be four or maybe five bus rides and a border crossing away. The first panic of the day is caused by me. The driver of the eight o’clock bus decides to leave half an hour early and I’m the only one of the group who can’t be found. {Whoever heard of a bus in a third world country leaving early??} They manage to find me though and the bus waits and we get underway OK. We are travelling by a public minibus which goes through lots of small towns on the way to Santa Rosa as the crew of the bus seem ... read more

We leave at 3:45AM from Phillie on Friday, July 23, so I am starting to gather what I need to take. The Project FIAT website is very helpful in providing lists of suggested clothes and supplies to pack. Our team leader, Anne has suggested we plan to leave behind whaever clothes we can upon our departure. They will go to the people we are serving, so I'm trying to pack some "extras" to leave on my bunk. We are also packing arts and craft supplies, games, cards, and balls to use with the children. I plan to hit up Joanne's Craft store and the dollar store this week. Tonight, I went looking for all the colored pencils and markers in the house left over from our kids. I know I could buy new ones but once ... read more

Well, all went well with our flight this morning. We actually took a bus to the airport instead of a taxi. This way we paid about 50 cents each compared to about $6 each. Our flight was about 30 minutes late but arrived on time in San Salvador. We checked with Taca Airlines of the cost of a plane ticket from San Salvador to Tegucigalpa... just in case. They were $422 each and we decided as nice as it would be to be back a night earlier, we'd stick with our $35 bus. We then decided to do a bus from the airport to the center of town instead of a taxi. What would have cost us each about $14 cost us a 60 cent bus ride and then splitting a $3 taxi. NICE! We checked ... read more