It's about time

I'm in New Jersey for 5 days this week, for a meeting of the editorial board of Living Peace, our Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace magazine, and I can't help noticing that everyone here is on the same time.  Check the clock in my room: 1:50.  And my cell phone: 1:50.  And the computer: 1:50.  And so on and on...we are always clear about what time it is in the United States.  You might say we're as obsessed by it.

It's not that way in El Salvador.  I don't quite understand it, because I always assumed that all the electronics set themselves automatically to some electronic beam of perfect timing sent out from Greenwich, but there if my cell phone shows 1:50, the computer is likely to say it's 1:58, while the clock on the wall says 1:49, the iPad claims 1:53, and the clock in the car pushes ahead to 2:03.  Every once in a while, I try to reset everything so it's all pointing to the same time (blindly choosing one of those possibilities as the correct, true, Greenwich, gringo time).  Works for a few days, and then they drift apart again. 

Time is just a more flexible concept in El Salvador.  The electronics know it.  After about a year in El Salvador, I stopped apologizing if I was 5 or 10 minutes late for a meeting, because I slowly realized that the meetings usually started about half an hour after the stated time.  Here, as in so much, for Salvadorans relationships matter more than efficiency.  It's hard for a gringa to accept, but I've come to like it that way.  Whatever time it may be in El Salvador, it's always time for a greeting, a conversation, a connection.  In the U.S., it's too often time to run off to the next urgent event.

New clothes for a hard day

Just before I flew north from San Salvador to spend 5 weeks in the U.S. I learned that the husband of a new friend had been picked up by the U.S. ICE Border Patrol and is being held in a Texas detention facility.  Last night she e-mailed to ask if I could buy and mail some clothing for him to wear on his flight back to El Salvador - apparently the clothes he'd been detained in were pretty awful, and the alternative is either to return home in a prison uniform or to have someone supply a going-home outfit. 

Juan had trusted himself, and no doubt his and his family's hard-won cash, to a coyote who said he was a trustworthy Evangelical.  Not so, apparently: the journey was brutal and he witnessed his "trustworthy" guide raping a woman.  He was picked up almost immediately on the U.S. side of the border and whisked off to detention, where at least he's safe and my friend has been able to talk to him a couple of times.  

I called the facility and found out that what I could send for a going-home outfit is quite specific: 1 pair pants, 1 shirt, 1 pair underpants, 1 pair socks.  Shoes could also be sent, but apparently Juan has those.  So today I went shopping for the clothing, which I'll send tomorrow.  Challenging to buy clothes for someone you've never met, especially when it comes down to figuring out whether you think the guy would prefer boxers or briefs.  An odd assignment for a nun, but I enjoyed it.  And I picked boxers, on the simple grounds that they were less expensive.

So Juan will be able to take the long flight home in new, clean clothes, a scrap of dignity for a hard day. 

A Success Story

Last fall we gave a beca - a scholarship - to Iris Hernandez, daughter of Gumersindo Hernandez, who had been one of our major volunteers in San Juan Opico.  A few days ago Iris called me to say that she needed to meet with me.  We set up a time and place, and I began to think of all the things that could have gone wrong - illness, trouble in school, family problems, etc.

But when we connected Iris was there with her Papi, Gumersindo, to give me the best news - she has just been chosen for a U.S. AID scholarship to study business psychology in Minneapolis, Minnesota for two years.  She was beaming with excitement and delight and Gumersindo, a quiet man, was visibly proud.  Iris is shy about speaking English now, and I imagine she will start off in an intensive class (her scholarship begins in August) and - since she's a very bright and joyful person - will soon be chatting happily.  May these two years be a blessing for her and for her family!

A delegation

Today I had the joy of meeting with a group of young people from St. Patrick Parish, Seattle - my church when I'm in the Northwest - who will be the delegation to St. Patrick's sister community, Nueva Trinidad in Chalatenango, this June. They range in age, I'd guess, from 13 to 18 - a few adults will be coming as well - and they had great questions about their journey, ranging from the prosaic worries about getting sick to those questions we all harbor - will people like me even if I can't speak Spanish? What if I do something offensive without meaning to?

I hope I was able to reassure them that the kids in Nueva Trinidad will be nervously asking themselves the same questions - will these cool kids from El Norte like me even if I forget all my English? I know that they will like each other and they will learn so much more than they expect.

I'm hoping to get the group to Suchitoto for a day, and maybe for them to have time to explore Guazapa Mountain on horseback. Mostly I know that whatever they see and do, their curiosity, intelligence, and commitment to justice will make this trip a memorable time in their lives.

Excess

The first day after coming home to Bellevue, I needed to make a trip to Bellevue Square, our local mall, to get a new battery compartment for my Macbook laptop. Now Bell Square is not just any mall - it's full of high-end luxury stores, and I've heard that it makes more money per square foot than any other mall in America. So you can imagine.

The first thing I saw as I walked in was a store called "Free People." "Free People" - I'm not even going to look up the URL - features fluffy dresses for teenage girls. The next thing I saw was a giant poster at a store called Oakley: "Join the Rebellion!" said the poster. "Join the Rebellion" was surrounded by photos of a guy in swim trunks and sunglasses (sunglasses being what they sell: Join the Rebellion, wear expensive sunglasses).

What would Libyans and Tunisians and Egyptians think of those notions of freedom and rebellion?

After I got my new battery, I walked over to the nearby QFC supermarket and marvelled at the sheer excess of offerings in any category. In El Salvador, I can find three kinds of flour in the supermarkets: white wheat flour, corn flour, rice flour. Period. In QFC, there must be 65 different kinds of flour - rye, barley, amaranth, quinoa, teff, red winter wheat, and so on and on. There was a display case with 23 different varieties of gourmet chocolate bars. Mind you, it's grand fun to shop there: you can find anything and everything. But for someone who's been living in Central America, it's beyond excessive.

I know I could find grocery stores in the Seattle area that would look a lot more like my Salvadoran supermarkets, and I'd feel more at home there. The flashy wealthiness of Bellevue, apparently untouched by three years of economic collapse, imagines a world full of people who think they should have anything they could possibly want. I hope and believe that is not the truth of my Bellevue neighbors - but it is the truth of the merchandizing that surrounds us.

Barack Obama in El Salvador

I'm sad not to be in El Salvador today while President Barack Obama visits - not that I'd have been asked to the state dinner, but the television channels will have been full of images of every moment. The moment that will mean the most to many Salvadorans is captured here: Obama paying his respects at the tomb of Monseñor Oscar Romero in the crypt of the Cathedral in San Salvador. La Prensa Grafica, source for this photo, noted that a few days ago Obama had said that Romero is a point of social reference not just for El Salvador, but for all the world.

I'm sad not to be there today, but I'm proud and happy to be a U.S. citizen who lives and works in El Salvador on this day.

The cost of being safe

Every time I come back to the U.S. I have a few days of being stunned by the differences - the empty streets with no food stands, impromptu markets, funerals or parades ! the smooth traffic moving along the loops and lanes of elegant highway with no cars ever parked on the side! the shops with no gun-toting guard posted outside! This time I started thinking about the cost of all those miles of carefully maintained roadways and highways, all the required parking lots in front of stores, all the elaborate security kept carefully out of sight to make you feel safer.

You see, in El Salvador and elsewhere in Central America, the kind of space and speed and convenience we take for granted in the U.S. is simply too expensive. For example, you consistently enter and exit U.S. highways via exit lanes that end in overpasses, underpasses, clover leaves, each one enormously expensive to build and maintain. They're very safe, because they allow drivers to change direction and exit rapidly (except at rush hours) without colliding with competing traffic. In El Salvador, on most highways you change direction by using a paved U-turn space in the center. You enter the highway by turning right and merging with the traffic flowing in that direction. If you want to go the other direction you wait for 500 meters or so for the next official turning space; you slow down to turn into this, wait for a clear space in traffic going the other direction, turn in that direction and speed up again. As you can imagine, this system means a frequent slowing down and turning from what should be the fast lane, so it's both dangerous and congestive. But it is light-years less expensive to construct than a system of underpasses, overpasses, and one-way exits.

Think about what those choices mean. The U.S. choice is to make speed, flow, and safety hugely important at a huge cost which most U.S. drivers never think about. The Central American choice is to spend a great deal less money for roads that are slower and not as safe, but pretty adequate to move a lot of vehicles and people from one point to another. Which is the saner choice?

Light footprints

I'm continuing to think about the difference in carbon footprints for people here vs. those who live in the U.S. Here are some of the reasons footprints are lighter here:

1. Houses aren't heated, for obvious reasons.
   
2. Very, very few people (only the rich) have air conditioning.
3. Washing machines are rare; dryers are rarer; sunshine is available almost every day.
4. Most people don't have computers, though everyone has a cell phone.
   
5. Most people don't drive a car, instead taking the bus or piling on to a pickup truck.
6. Most people have never been on an airplane.

The average Salvadoran, because of climate and because of poverty, is contributing far less to global warming than the average North American. Is this the way we should all be living?

And yes, I have the use of a car and a computer, and yes, I fly back to the U.S. a few times a year. It's hard to imagine doing without those comforts, but it's time to begin imagining how I and we might live differently, might leave lighter footprints.

Light and darkness

Thursday was a day of disappointment for a 37-year-old man, José Adán, who had received cataract surgeries during our May eye surgery mission. The day before he was scheduled for surgery, José Adán got a required blood glucose test, and discovered that he is a diabetic. The doctors chose to do the surgery anyway, in hopes that his vision could be restored. Because he had a young man's lens - it's gooier, I gather, not a medical term! - all of the clouded lens couldn't be removed, and he needed followup laser surgery. The surgeons thought his chances of having his vision restored by the laser surgery were very good. Meanwhile, José Adán got into treatment for his diabetes and got his blood sugar levels down to normal. Yesterday I gave José Adán and his faithful friend Carlos, who has been acting as his guide, a ride to an eye clinic for the laser surgery. I hoped to see him walking out without needing Carlos' guidance, but that did not happen. Because of the condition of his eyes, probably affected by the undiagnosed diabetes, the laser surgery will give him, at best, a minor improvement in vision.

José Adán is a true gentle man, and in spite of his great disappointment he had nothing but thanks to give the doctors who tried to save his sight.

I was primed for this technological miracle that was going to restore his sight. Like so many North Americans, I love those flashy solutions that have been my people's specialty for more than a century. Again, again, El Salvador is teaching me to put my faith in God, where it belongs, and not in "the work of our hands." It does matter that we tried to help José Adán, even if we were not successful. Success isn't what really counts.

All this was underscored for me when I read yesterday's gospel, from the 6th chapter of Matthew:

Jesus said to his disciples:

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth,

where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal.

But store up treasures in heaven,

where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal.

For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.

“The lamp of the body is the eye.

If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light;

but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be in darkness.

And if the light in you is darkness, how great will the darkness be.”

José Adán's eyes are not sound, but still he is filled with light. I ask your prayers for him, that he may get as much improvement of vision as possible, and that he may continue to walk in the light.

A day in the City

Yesterday Eleanor Gilmore and I took advantage being here before the meetings started to enjoy being tourist in New York in April sunshine. I'd never been to St. Patrick Cathedral, so we started there and had the bliss of wandering from altar to altar while a choir treated us to sacred music a capella - preceded and followed by the most glorious organ music from an organ big enough to fill and overflow that enormous space. We went on to ramble through Central Park and gawk at the Dakota, a grand apartment building that I've often read about - most notably in Jack Finney's wonderful Time and Again. We ate lunch in a Scottish pub and gelato in Central Park, and had a grand day. I'd love to spend years exploring New York City, but that time seems unlikely to come my way. Today, in breaks from our meeting, I contented myself with looking across the Hudson past the George Washington Bridge toward the towers of Manhattan, toward that great city that captures and humbles the imagination.

Leaving home and going home

Time to go home! I leave on the red-eye special tonight, get in to the Comalapa airport tomorrow morning, where Roberto will pick me up (he'll be holding a sign saying "Hermana Susana, Suchitoto"). Peggy, who usually gives me a ride home, is flying to the U.S. today for three weeks of talks and fundraising for the Centro Arte para la Paz. I'm looking forward to seeing Margaret Jane and Pat and Martha and Berty and Yanira, to the heat and the end of the rainy season, to the time when the toads go underground until next May when the rains begin again.

Time to leave home. It's raining furiously right now and the days are getting shorter and shorter. I won't miss the winter rains, but I'll miss my Sisters and my sister, my friends and family here. And Thai food, kale, red leaves, neighborhood coffee shops. And being able to open my mouth and talk without having to think about how to say what I want to say.

Time to go home and continue the Spanish studies!

Fortune

This has been an extra-beautiful fall in western Washington: something (a sharp cold spell? hot days in the summer? wind from the south?) has made the autumn colors more vivid than usual. I've walked around St. Mary's, happily taking photos.

I've been thinking today, while I took those photos and talked to friends - including Patti Moore, who visited me in El Salvador this summer - how undeservedly privileged I am, able to come up here a few times each year and return to El Salvador with no difficulties. I'm particularly aware of this because a good friend has been having a hard time getting her visa back to the United States from Kenya approved, though she thought all the paperwork was in order, and she has lived lawfully in the U.S. for the past many years. She's about to make her third visit to the embassy there.

Just before I left El Salvador, a new friend, Blanca, told me about the four trips she had made to the U.S. Embassy there to get a visa so she could attend a family wedding. Each time she had to pay a large sum of money, in Salvadoran terms, for her interview - I think about $190 - and each time she was told to bring additional information and come back again. After the fourth trip she was denied a visa, but none of her money was refunded.

By contrast, my paperwork to get a resident visa for El Salvador was reasonable and fairly minimal.

Why do we, as a country, believe that we have the right to treat people from other countries, particularly developing nations, so badly?

Lost in customs

On Monday night Kathy Garcia and Ken Henderson flew in from Seattle to the San Salvador airport. Kathy is our PazSalud program manager and Ken, a retired optometrist, passionate sailor and Lions Club member, has been the driving power behind our eye clinics. They're here for a week that will include selection of the site for our February, 2010 general medical mission and the presentation of an A-Scan machine to San Rafael Hospital by the Bellingham and Salvadoran Lions Clubs. At least we hope the week will include that presentation, but right now the A-Scan and other medical donations for our missions are stuck in customs, yet once again. The Salvadoran Lions are working hard to get the donations released in time for a Friday ceremony.

Meanwhile we have been sorting through the tubs of equipment for the medical mission and then, today, we heard of the death of Senator Edward Kennedy and followed the stories of his life on CNN-Español and through the NY Times on-line. It seems particularly sad that he will not be in the Senate to prod and cajole passage of the health care bills. I hope his death will give new urgency to the need for passing a good and durable health care bill.

A subject of some delicacy

...and the cause of a great deal of cultural misunderstanding:

What do you do with a used hunk of toilet paper?

If you're a U.S. or Canadian North American, you throw it in the toilet.

If you're a Mexican or Central American (or South American??), you throw it in the wastebasket that is carefully placed next to the toilet. If the wastebasket isn't there, you may throw it on the floor. Any place but the toilet.

Why? The drains here have much smaller dimensions than in the U.S./Canada, and toilet paper very quickly clogs them. [Later note: Sheila McShane, who runs a health clinic in Guatemala, reminded me that any drains at all are a bit of a luxury in Latin America - in the countryside toilets may flush, but the contents will end up in the river.] Latinos well understand how frustrating it is to deal with a clogged toilet, and considerately, carefully will place toilet paper elsewhere.

When Latinos follow their considerate and careful customs in the United States, North Americans are appalled at having to pick up the mess. When North Americans follow their healthful and hygienic customs and throw toilet paper in the toilet in Latin America, their hosts are appalled at having to pay for a plumber to get their drains working again.

And it all comes down to the practical necessities caused by drains of different sizes.

Home

My plane from El Salvador landed at the Houston airport where I stared wide-eyed at the astonishing variety of people who live in the United States. In Salvador, it's usually pretty clear at first glance who the Salvadorans are and who the foreigners are. It's rare to see someone with Asian or African features, uncommon to see a tall person (at 5' 4", I'm taller than most Salvadoran women and many Salvadoran men) or a blond. But in the Houston airport, what abundance: dark, light, tall, short, faces from all the corners of the earth - including, of course, a good many Salvadoran faces.

And then there's coming home: what a joy to go down for breakfast at St. Mary's this morning and be greeted with a full round of hugs, to catch up with news, to breathe cold air and to look out my window at the evergreens. It's been a long cold winter and a cold spring - everything is about a month later than it would usually be. Feels comforting, too, to know what usual looks like!

Sharing a great day

Yesterday was a once-in-a-lifetime day and I am so glad to have been alive in it, watching with Eleanor and our guests for the day - Dr. Ken Henderson, his wife Janet and friend Craig. We all watched CNN with joy and delight - the inauguration of Barack Obama, the speech, and parts of the parade and balls. In between we went to dinner with Salvadoran Lion's Club officials, with whom Ken, a Bellingham Lion, is working on plans for a program to check the vision and hearing of Salvadoran children under three. It felt just right to turn to this conversation after listening to President Obama say "To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it."
Our work in El Salvador is a small part of work that's being done all over the world to let farms flourish and waters flow and bodies heal; our collaboration with Ken and the Salvadoran Lion's Club is an opportunity to take that work just a little further. It's glorious to hear our President identify this as the work of our nation.

Thanks be to God for this great day!