Hello from EL Salvador. I am currently in the school where I am trying to teach English to the children. It is far more difficult than I thought it would me. The best thing that happened was that the Padre had hired an English teacher. I am therefore the person that is supposed to help her in the ways to each the students. Her name is Fatima. She graduated in El Salvador with a degree in English. Her English is quite good. She is about 25 and very nice. She really wants to do a good job. She is being paid about $400.00 a month. That is a pretty good salary here. She lives in Aqua Caliente where she was born. She lives with her father. The two of them run a little dry goods store. This is just one of many kinds of stores in town. It seems to be the major way people survive there. There are 7 grades at the school which has about 150 students now and growing. She is responsible for teaching each grade 3 times a week for about an hour. I think this would be hard for any teacher to have seven different levels to prepare for. Fatima is trying very hard. The critical need for her is an understanding of how to teach and how to put a curriculum together. I so wish I was a trained teacher now. That would be my most important goal and that is to train her on how to teach. It is one thing to teach the kids English and still another for someone to come down here and teach the teachers. I really do not know much about the methods used by the other teachers but if if is like Fatima they are one their own . Some appear to be good but I do not know for sure since my Spanish is still lousy. If anyone said you can learn a language by just listening to it is crazy. I have been here about one and one-half weeks and I do not think I have improved much Also the spoken word is so much harder than the written one since you can see and take your time reading a sentence.
Friday, February 24, 2012
It is now February 24 2012. I am back from El Salvador. I cut the trip a little short but felt that I accomplish most of the goals I wanted to achieve on this trip. I thought I would just summarize the the trip at this point since I was not able to keep up with my blog while down there for a variety of reasons.
First I will summarize Fr Fuentes. I got to know him a lot better during the time I was there. This man is on a mission. A mission to educate as many of the less fortunate children of El Salvador as he can. In the meantime he his there to be a priest and say Mass on a regular basis in several little churches particularly around LaLaguna. I guess what I noticed most was how the mass was always a happy place when he was there. His homilies were long but all were listening. I of course could not understand them but he would say they he of course talked about the gospel and always about the importance to getting their children educated and helping them understand what the government was doing to help them.
He of course was one of them and would sing and play his guitar before Mass at times with them. He would talk to all of them after Mass and made a point to talk to the older people that attended Mass. Of course every chance he got with the young people he would tell them to stay in school and encourage them to finish high school even if it meant that they had to go to another town to do that since their village had only 9 grades in it
We never went hungry as he was always asked to come to dinner at one of parishioners homes after Mass. It was always a great honor to have him and he would make them all feel so grateful that they would have him for dinner.
His days were long. On the weekends he would say Mass at 3 different churches going to these little towns on roads that were barely passible and this is the dry season. Of course on the way up or down from these towns he would pick up people that were walking along the sides of the roads. Some may be going to the church, some where going to sell something in a larger town. It was one of the ways that he would get to be known and loved by all. It was a way to start a dialogue with them to see if there are needs that he could meet. During the week there were trips to San Salvador, then to Aqua Caliente and the school, and of course Mass every Thursday at the school. In San Salvador there were meetings with people that he was trying to set up to help in fund raising for the school. There were groceries to buy and kids to pick up from school. There were supplies for the school that he would need to purchase as well. There was also the time needed to work on the issues covering the clinic in Chalatanago which it appears to me he ran as well. At the clinic he had specialist come in on different Saturdays to see people that had some special needs as well as dental work. He did this and asked very little in pay from these people for the services of these doctors mostly from San Salvador. There was also the pharmacy, that is just down the street from the clinic. This was a pharmacy that the people could get prescriptions at a less expensive cost then the other ones in the town. Again all of this appeared to be organized and financed through him as opposed to the Diosese of Chalatenago. In the meantime the mind of this priest never stops. He continues to what to add two more grades at Aqua Caliente and he wants to build a school in Chaltenango .He has the land already and there are two building there that are partially finished.
First I will summarize Fr Fuentes. I got to know him a lot better during the time I was there. This man is on a mission. A mission to educate as many of the less fortunate children of El Salvador as he can. In the meantime he his there to be a priest and say Mass on a regular basis in several little churches particularly around LaLaguna. I guess what I noticed most was how the mass was always a happy place when he was there. His homilies were long but all were listening. I of course could not understand them but he would say they he of course talked about the gospel and always about the importance to getting their children educated and helping them understand what the government was doing to help them.
He of course was one of them and would sing and play his guitar before Mass at times with them. He would talk to all of them after Mass and made a point to talk to the older people that attended Mass. Of course every chance he got with the young people he would tell them to stay in school and encourage them to finish high school even if it meant that they had to go to another town to do that since their village had only 9 grades in it
We never went hungry as he was always asked to come to dinner at one of parishioners homes after Mass. It was always a great honor to have him and he would make them all feel so grateful that they would have him for dinner.
His days were long. On the weekends he would say Mass at 3 different churches going to these little towns on roads that were barely passible and this is the dry season. Of course on the way up or down from these towns he would pick up people that were walking along the sides of the roads. Some may be going to the church, some where going to sell something in a larger town. It was one of the ways that he would get to be known and loved by all. It was a way to start a dialogue with them to see if there are needs that he could meet. During the week there were trips to San Salvador, then to Aqua Caliente and the school, and of course Mass every Thursday at the school. In San Salvador there were meetings with people that he was trying to set up to help in fund raising for the school. There were groceries to buy and kids to pick up from school. There were supplies for the school that he would need to purchase as well. There was also the time needed to work on the issues covering the clinic in Chalatanago which it appears to me he ran as well. At the clinic he had specialist come in on different Saturdays to see people that had some special needs as well as dental work. He did this and asked very little in pay from these people for the services of these doctors mostly from San Salvador. There was also the pharmacy, that is just down the street from the clinic. This was a pharmacy that the people could get prescriptions at a less expensive cost then the other ones in the town. Again all of this appeared to be organized and financed through him as opposed to the Diosese of Chalatenago. In the meantime the mind of this priest never stops. He continues to what to add two more grades at Aqua Caliente and he wants to build a school in Chaltenango .He has the land already and there are two building there that are partially finished.
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