smattering

today at the grocery store there were free samples of vodka and tonics. pretty ample as well. but there were also samples of butter cookies. i had 3 kinds of butter cookies and zero vodka and tonics but i appreciated the offer nonetheless.

the grocery store was also offering an interesting sale combo: some kind of lysol spray taped together with...pantiliners. how is that for gendered marketing. there are also some really irritating new fashion billboards up that say "buy something just because you are depressed!" or "feel like a goddess when you put on high heels!" or feel like a cripple. just saying.

whilst frolicking at the clinic, carolina, who you may remember from before, asked me "what is that on your face?" hm, i thought, i must have smeared a something on my face. here? i asked. no, there. oh right, there is a zit on my forehead that i had considered barely noticeable really, but carolina has eagle eyes apparently. i told her, oh, that is a zit. what is a zit? she asked. ummmm. ehhh searching for culturally appropriate answer that will make sense to a 4 year old "it is like a volcano," i explained. she made a weird face. i did not elaborate.

apparently the guys at basketball were asking where i was the last two weeks because they want to bring their female friends too. ballller.

no fly zone

so i went home for thanksgiving. i flew out of guatemala, not el salvador, because the airfare is roughly twice as expensive from el salvador. on my way back to the states, the bus stopped at the border in el salvador and an immigration official came aboard and looked at passports. it seemed he didn't like mine when he looked at it. then he took it and reassured me "i'll be right back." yeah take your time WHAT ARE YOU DOING OH NO AHHH. then he came back and said "can you please get off the bus." no i won't get off FLOOR IT AHH. as it turns out, my completely faulty assumption that aug 20 - nov 19 was fewer than 90 days slapped me real hard. $114.85. why the 85 cents? really? i was two days over my tourist visa. i was very angry but i really could only be angry at me, and that made it worse. plus, the whole bus had to wait for me. it took a shockingly long amount of time. they stamped my passport with a very unfriendly stamp that said "you have 5 days to get out of the 4-country zone." then they released me and we drove across the bridge into guatemala and they stamped my passport "you have 4 days to get out" and the official asked "when are you leaving the country" and i said "today" and she said "good." thank you for your hospitality, central america.

it was chilly in america, and sometimes even cold. i did not appreciate that. i did, however, enjoy casually tossing toilet paper into the toilet, slurping greedily at public water fountains, ordering tap water at eating establishments, and pie for breakfast and lunch and later. i liked that there were no flies. i accomplished little and didn't see all of the people i meant to or do all of the tiny errands and collect all the small things i yearned for. i distributed the horchata i made with vilma, and people liked it or did not like it.

but most importantly, i learned how to change a tire. i heard a loud bang while driving in dc, the car got clunkety and made sounds of stress, and the tire deflated. i pulled over safely and all that and stared at it for a few minutes, seeing if perhaps it would transmogrify. nothing. i called roadside assistance and they estimated 50 minutes. while waiting, i decided to fiddle about with the tire, because i had that one experience where creepy whatshisface private investigator kinda taught me how to do it but wouldn't let me actually do it ("id hate to see a woman changing a tire by herself") yeah, well id hate to see a man get punched in the face. the tirechanging in dc went swimmingly. various dudes on bikes and in pickup trucks approached to rescue me but mumbled "oh you seem to have it under control" and shuffled off. when the geico dude got there, he said, i just want to shake your hand, you are the first woman i've ever seen take the initiative to change it yourself. well, i'm glad he'll never be able to say that to any women changing tires from now on. all he did was screw the lug nuts on tighter, probably because my fragile lady hands were too slippery what with all the scented lotions. i admit that he tightened them much more thoroughly, but he also used a drill, and that is cheating.

now i am back in el salvador. i am wearing a purple dress and flip flops and i sweated a little bit on my way back from getting groceries. the guardians on my street were extra enthusiastic today. however, i am probably moving soon. anyway, blogging hiatus is OVER. oh, an update in the spending money on good food campaign: today i spent $19 on groceries and $11 of that was a 2.5 pound bag of prunes. yayyy!! next time, almonds.

this is what i did at home!
i broke the cork and almost totally ruined this bottle of wine which had been brought from spain by my family's spanish exchange students
but it turned out fine

i wasn't even hungry in this picture

let me see you waltz, child

as the school year here starts in january, november means graduation season. right now we are entering "summer," even though we are above the equator. curious. the point is, this is a great country because they make their children waltz. the school in las delicias goes from kindergarten to 9th grade, and at the ceremony only the kindergarteners and 9th graders dress up fancy and are made to waltz and sing. and oh yes did they dress up fancy. here is the kindergarten:

behind them in that photo is the stage where there is a "table of honor" where the teachers and the "queen" were seated. the queen was a kindergarten girl in a red gown with a crown and a wand and a sash, of course. the criteria for election to such a post are not clear to me. all of the kids were made to dress identically, except for a few who did not. many kindergarten girls wore high heels. ehhh.

and then they waltzed!

vilma's daughter gets her waltz on!

the waltz was mostly a fervent rocking back and forth with a forcefully executed spin every few measures. also, no smiling.

recovering from aforementioned spin

vilma's daughter woke up at 5am to have her hair done. just like my kindergarten days!

then, obviously, the 9th graders waltzed too. no pictures of that - it is not cute awkward like with small children who are concentrating very hard and wearing stiff fabrics.

there were of course normal graduation exercises - the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place students in each grade had to come up to the stage and receive certificates. then they had to come back to receive medals. rather inefficent. only one song played repeatedly for three hours, except for the brief intermission where the principal presented a brief budget report. now that is admirably efficient use of time. this is not all pomp and circumstance, it's also how many toilet paper rolls were purchased in the last year. actually i think that'd be zero, i don't think the school provides that. BYO, even you, "queen."

everything i know about basketball i learned from space jam

first of all, i'd like to announce that i just made some highly delicious curry squash fritters. i am announcing this to balance the recent sardine tragedy. i am indeed quite skilled and creative in arranging and heating and mixing foodstuffs most of the time.

i have actually been doing a lot of asserting my skills and abilities here, obviously in work, but also in leisure. probably because of machismo here, i've noticed that women tend to spectate instead of participate. certainly this happens in the states too. the guys i've been hanging out with aren't saying things like "you can't do that," nothing of the sort. they are just a bit surprised when i am good at something it seems. we went bowling a bit ago and the other girls kept saying "i'm so bad at this." who cares. is bowling really about being good at bowling? there are a whole slew of activities of this ilk - recreational things that you never really practice often, so no one is skilled at them particularly. later i played pool with two male friends and one of their girlfriends. she wanted to just watch. i let her for the first game and then i forced her to play (in a friendly, new friend way). she was my partner. she got one ball in and i got the rest in and we won and it was glorious in all ways.

it is important to me to be able to hold my own in such activities, especially playing against males. you might be saying, oh, it's because i grew up with 4 brothers. not really. we were not competitive, we were quite harmonious, right, brothers? i'm not particularly competitive, but when it comes to these activities where i see a lot of women apologizing for being bad, or not wanting to participate, i feel i have to demonstrate that yes, i am quite good at this and i enjoy playing and i will crush you without mercy. especially here in el salvador where gender divisions are more stark, i have something to prove. yeah - i just beat you at ping pong - don't look surprised. after twiddling around on the guitar in my house for the last three months, i can play some songs. this has been useful at parties where a guitar comes out. i am not watching the whole time, i am playing too, i am improving my skill.

yesterday i even accepted an invitation to play basketball. it's true. i played in a four on four game. i was marking an old man who was wearing blue armwarmers or whatever those are. at one point he was smoking a cigarette while playing, but he was nimble. i took shots, maybe a dozen of them, and got zero in, but many hit the rim, so that's close at least. i made sure i did not apologize or make apologetic faces. no apologies. the guys i were playing with were about as welcoming as i could expect, and only occasionally did not pass to me when they should have. but mostly good, fun, highly participatory, and a bunch of little girls in the park cheered for me. next time no cheering from the sidelines, niñas. get out there and block that old man's sneaky loop shot, even if he smells kinda weird.

most of the women i'm talking about are from the city, went to good schools, middle class families, etc. i was out with two guy friends last night and one said, i like going out with you because i don't need to watch you or take care of you. um, of course not. who do you need to watch, i asked? he said, well a lot of the girls i go out with are shy or wouldn't know how to deal with it if, for example, some guy was bothering them, but i know you would handle whatever on your own. uhhhh yes, i am fierce obviously, but i am concerned that you think the rest of your female friends can't handle it. i find the idea that women need to be protected or supervised hidden in many other attitudes. and i bring them out and challenge them, to women and men alike. in many of these sporting activities, i find men telling me encouragingly "don't be afraid" and i quite emphatically say, i am not afraid. there's nothing to fear here except fireballs in my oven, electrocution in my shower, earthquakes, and hurricanes. ping pong? no problem.

dispelling debunking dissecting delighting

i've had some good discussions in the community this past week. a talk i gave about male reproductive health (to the micro health insurance women) first became a praisefest for vasectomies and then became a very active discussion about homosexuality. the older, more strictly religious women kind of tuned out and looked a little offended. the younger women started throwing out lots of "but isn't homosexuality caused by..." ideas. many different ideas floating out there. "isn't homosexuality caused by getting raped as a child?" one asked. another responded, "no, i have a nephew who was raped as a child and he's pretty macho now." oh...good response i guess? mostly the beliefs were that homosexuality was a result of an event, accident, or habit formed in childhood, or that people decide to be gay or lesbian all of a sudden. i didn't have to do much talking - the women were very animated and many of them defended the fact that you are born gay or lesbian and that there's nothing wrong with that. i was pretty impressed and delighted. but again - the older generation was not participating.

we've also been doing a series of talks/activities about budgeting with the micro health insurance women. this week we talked about buying on installment plans versus saving up and paying everything up front. one woman had paid for a $500 refrigerator on the installment plan and the total was $800. whoaaa. a lot of goods that are very cheap in the US are expensive here. this rack, for example, might be $50 here. there's no target or ikea here to go pick up your plastics for $5.99. i guess it costs a lot to ship large empty plastic containers that are not stackable. after this discussion, i gave out newspaper advertisements and each pair of women analyzed their ad - at what gender/age is this directed, what is the message, what are they selling, is there a clear price, what does the small print say, etc. they were really into it. "this ad is full of lies!" yes.

i don't remember whether i ever had any kind of "anti-advertising education" or whether i just developed my own bitterness towards ads of all sorts. cell phone companies here, as in the states, are brutal with surprise fees and restrictions and nothing is ever clear. sometimes ads appear here in places that i am not accustomed to - an extra panel above a street sign pointing you towards a kfc, a giant floor-to-ceiling sign in the class room at the gym sponsored by dove that warns that "communal soaps leave residue on your skin." rut roh! the newspaper also runs what i believe are supposed to be sincere articles about things like "chili's adds new menu items." sorry- that is not news. both here and in the US, i think there should be more consumer education and many more restrictions on ads. but you all knew that already.

just call me rachael ray

i just did something i may never forgive myself for. so don tito, one of the guardians of the clinic, gave me 6 very cute eggplants today, so i says to myself, i will eat some. i cut up 3 of them all nice, throw out one when i find a wriggly maggot in it, fair enough right. get out the ol fryin pan and throw it some olive oil and garlic and red pepper flakes whabam eggplant. cookin. throw in some scallions. cookin. throw in a whole lot of hummus - rather edgy perhaps. oh yeah and cumin. i go to get the pasta to start that up and next to it i find that tin of sardines in spicy oil that i bought on a strange whim a few weeks ago. i suppose my thinking was, i need protein, i like spicy oil and this tin looks fun to open.
i guess i didn't consider the consequences. the tin was in fact fun to open, but in doing so i sprayed spicy red oil all over my khakis. i was inexplicably dismayed to discover that the tin was actually full of tiny fish. but i had no choice now, i thought. i poked at the little fish and found out that they had spines, and then i went through and poked all the spines out while the eggplant-hummus was getting a little fried. then i put the sardines in with the eggplant hummus. what the hell was i thinking? hindsight is 20/20, as they say. but i knew it was a terrible idea even as i was letting the little fishy parts rain down on the eggplant chunks. i was looking hopefully towards the spicy oil as the rug that ties the room together, you know.
with great skepticism i scooped a whole bunch of the mixture over the pasta and mixed it all around. it looked kind of, um, sinewy. look i'm sorry you have to read this. but you have to. it didn't taste as weird as i expected, nor as fishy. while i was eating it, i was thinking, this is not so bad. towards the end my opinion was transforming. my eyes were tearing a little bit from the spicy oil. the hummus, because it is not translucent, masked the eggplant and the sardines, so when i picked up a chunk with my spoon and bit in it was sort of an awful surprise. juicy or fleshy?
i ate it all. then i went back to the kitchen and gazed upon the large remaining portion of the hummus eggplant sardine paste. it had gained a crustular appearance in the pan while i was away. i stared. do i...containerize this...to eat...again...later? do i have to? i can't eat this later i shall not. but to just throw it out? rather harsh. OH perfect! i will feed it to the clinic dog tomorrow, i thought, as i scooped it into a black plastic bag. i am teaching her to play fetch - what a delightful reward. OH wait. i am taking the bus tomorrow morning - no one likes to sit near that person on the bus with a bagfull of yesterday's sardine hummus baba ghanoush paste for an hour and a half. i twisted the bag closed and held it in my hand. it was warm and squishy and lumpy and i threw it in the trash and went to wash the spicy oil off my pants.

horchata!

so i'm coming home to visit for thanksgiving starting next thursday. yayyy hello everyone! i bought bags of horchata mix in the market to bring home. horchata is a rice drink. the bags look like this:

i told vilma, a member of the micro health insurance program, about my plan to bring horchata mix home and make horchata for everyone to try. she informed me that i would need a mill to grind up the ingredients, and suggested making the horchata powder in her house. ah ok yes let's do that! i bought 4 pounds of rice and giant cinnamon and the 2 pounds of horchata ingredients. vilma had the fire going when i got there.

first we toast the rice

until it is toastylike

meanwhile i hang out with some of vilma's kids

and they play with my camera

anderson making his angry face

next we toast peanuts, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, and some little black seeds

mmm we ate some of the peanuts

then we break up the cinnamon and toast that too

everything is toasted. to the mill!

the mill! i think that is a leafblower motor?
you pour in the stuff in that gray cone and it comes flying out into the tray all ground up

scooping out the powder
vilma made the miller put it through twice so it would be finer and less chunky

the mill looks good in profile

powder is ready and delicious smelling!

kickin it back at vilma's
the whole process took about 3 hours

so get ready america - if customs/security allows, here comes 6 pounds of unlabeled brown powder in my carry-on!