Day 2: Sunday in paradise

Sunday August 30, 2009

Vocabulario

culto: worship service
pupusa: traditional Salvadoran food--corn tortilla filled with cheese, vegetables, and/or meat
vos: you (used instead of "tu" in some countries, including El Salvador; verb conjugation is different as well, though I haven't figured out exactly how yet)

Photos

abuelo

rio

church

I've only been here really less than one day, but I feel like Manuel has already asked at least five times whether I've met his grandfather yet.  I should have met him last night, but he wasn't feeling up to having visitors.  This morning he was feeling better, so we walked all of the fifty feet across the dirt road that separates Manuel's parents' house from his grandfather's house and I met his grandfather.  We didn't talk much, but he seems like a cool guy.  He's 80 years old but is pretty healthy and sometimes even helps bring the cows in from the fields at night.  He has two pineapples growing on his property.  I've never had such a close view of pineapples growing.  It seems like an inefficient system--a whole big plant just for one fruit.

Right behind his house is a river.  I'm eager to swim in it at some point (did I mention it's stiflingly hot?), but today I just served as photographer for my photogenic nieces and stepdaughter.  They had a great time splashing around and jumping into the water from the banks.  When someone is going to swim in the river, they use the word "banarse" ("bathe") rather than "nadar" ("swim").  I thought this was mostly just a semantic difference, but as we were arriving Lisbeth said, "Oh, we forgot to bring soap!"  So I guess bathing in the river usually literally involves taking a bath, soap and all.

In the afternoon, we went to church.  When we talked on the phone before coming, I thought Manuel's father had said we would go to their church one week and mine the next, but it turns out he doesn't actually know where the LDS chapel is here, just that there is one (in Usulutan, the closest city).  So it doesn't look like I'll be attending an LDS service while I'm here.  The service was honestly pretty boring, very repetitive and very much focused on pure worship and not on learning anything or improving oneself.  I would have liked to join in with the singing, but there were no song books and the melodies were not familiar, so I had no chance.  The way the singing was organized was interesting.  Random people from the congregation would come to the front, suggest a song, and usually start singing it and kind of direct it.  However, there was also a leader of the meeting that was at the pulpit also trying to direct the singing.  So each song turned into something of a competition.  I also got the feeling there were many, many more songs than the leader was planning on.  Quite a contrast to our highly organized meetings.

For dinner, we bought pupusas from a neighbor in the village.  I've had pupusas in New York a number of times (and we always take visitors to a pupuseria--motivation to come visit us!), and also a couple times in Utah, and I really like them, but Manuel has always assured me that they are even better in El Salvador.  And he's right.  They were better.  I can't put my finger on why, but part of it may just have been being able to watch her make them right in front of me.  It was cool.

I continue to be impressed by the beauty of the countryside everywhere I go, and it's so green!  I can put up with heat for beauty like this.  These palm trees are across the street from the church.  I love palm trees.

(The formatting should be much improved this post, and I even learned how to use hyperlinks--thanks Matt!  Please let me know if the links are not working.)