Although Mother's Day is May 10, it has been celebrated since practically the beginning of May! Folks here take holidays very seriously, as I've already talked about a bit during my 9 days off of work due to Easter Week. There was a Mother's Day party at the school on Friday afternoon, and then families celebrated their mothers on Saturday, and again on Sunday, and today most of the classes were cancelled at the school so that the teachers could take a trip to the beach in order to celebrate Mother's Day. Not all of the school's teachers went on the trip: Some had classes, but most just took a personal day. Still, a group of maybe 15 of us, including the principal and vice principal, met at 7:30 this morning to take a bus from Izalco to Playa Metalio. At the beach, we had a private club area all to ourselves. It was nowhere near as fancy as Club Playa in La Libertad, but we had tables, a grill, and two hammocks, plus beach and pool access. Before lunch, I chatted with don Jorge, the principal, for a little bit. He said that the ocean here was too dangerous to swim in, and I was crestfallen. Playing in the ocean was 95% of the reason I accepted a last-minute invitation to come. Even so, the other men agreed that although the ocean was dangerous and there were deadly undercurrents here, it was a good time to swim because the tide was out at the moment, so I got to dip in the warm ocean, after all!
I chatted a bit with Fabricio, a young man who teaches "information" classes; that is, he teaches computers. We talked about Spanish and my experience here. He said that I'll probably end up knowing more Spanish than most Salvadorans because I took classes on the grammar and such, while most people here just learn to speak Spanish and basic reading and writing skills. I have asked other teachers at the school about this, and it seems that Spanish grammar and literature is not taught in public schools the way that English is taught in the United States. Kids learn how to write in kindergarten, and they learn to speak at home. After that, they pretty much just learn math, science, some social studies, and English. A few schools have an art or music program, but not many from the sound of things. I digress.
I went to the beach. I played in the ocean. I dug a deep hole in the sand on the beach, and turned it into the dungeon of my giant sand castle, which the ocean later destroyed. I ate a lunch of carne asada, rice, pico de gallo (though it's not called that here; I've just forgotten the local term), and tortillas. We celebrated the mothers as the men gave gifts to all the mom-teachers. I napped in a gently-swaying hammock next to the beach. I chatted with the other teachers.
It was a good day!
I love how the communities here take so much time to celebrate things. I even saw pictures of the staff luncheon for Secretary's Day! The teachers took the secretary out to lunch and gave her gifts. Not just like cards and candy, but like T-shirts and coffee mugs and things! It was really nice.
I'll put pictures up later. I'm utterly exhausted; I haven't been sleeping well for several days.
P.S. I know I'm really bad at writing this whole blog. I don't update regularly. Truth is, every day, I think of how I can write that day's experience in my blog, but by the time I get home, I'm exhausted and I don't feel like writing or I'm not sure where to start.
P.P.S. I have been taking a lot of pictures and videos, but the videos take 3-6 hours to upload, and I only have about 4-6 hours of free time in my day, and there's no Internet access in my room, meaning that I have to take my laptop elsewhere in the house to be able to upload videos. I have uploaded a few already, but you can expect to see a backlog of videos and pictures after I get back home. My desktop computer is MUCH faster and better than my laptop, so I should have all the videos up in a jiffy!
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