Hey guys,

I’m back from my El Salvador trip (but weren’t you suppose to come back late Wednesday night?, why yes, yes I was).  It’s strange to be back, especially since I’m suppose to be overlooking a volcano right now. And because I had a blast.  Anyways, I’ll start from the beginning.

Getting to El Salvador was a bit of a hassle because Houston had a huge thunderstorm and the airport was shut down. My flight from Boston to Houston was delayed over 5 hours! But so was my flight to El Salvador so it all worked out just fine.  Apparently about half the people from the trip got shifted into my flight so we all hung out at the airport which is when I lost my credit card. Anyway, we got into El Salvador after midnight without my bag.

On Sunday we woke up, ate some breakfast and got on a bus to San Vicente. Once everyone (with bags) unpacked, we headed out to some hot springs at the base of a ‘dormant’ volcano. There are a few pics on facebook. The steam coming out was a little intense. We then got dropped off at the grocery store where we bought enough beer for half the night (whoops).  This would be quickly and excessively  remedied the next evening. We also had an introductory dinner where we got to meet the families whose houses we would be building. I thankfully was with a family that spoke some English. And my bag showed up!

So when we showed up to the build site on Monday it was basically a very steep and rocky hill. There was not a lot of variety to the work. We were either pickaxing and clearing away earth to make level home sites, pick axing and digging trenches on the leveled home sites for footer placement, mixing concrete or hauling its components, or you were working on the rock retaining wall.  I think the first two days I just leveled sites out and then Wednesday I made concrete and moved rocks.  Thursday was a bit of everything and Friday was spent learning the zen art of moving rocks with little effort from Denis.  I was a little tired by then.  According to those crazy Canadians the temp was 39C+, which is over 100F for those who needed to look at a conversion chart or something (which of course was not me. Cough).

So the work was hot and hard. I’ve got some blisters that are healing. But the company was fantastic. I have new bffs that can’t be because they live far, far away.  And the youth group will be road tripping it this summer if we manage to actually plan anything. On breaks (and not on breaks) I threw rocks at things for target practice, tried to laso a tree with a rubber tube, hit coconuts off a hill with a bent metal bar, and had lots of fun, witty dialogue. It was fantastic.  I also tried and failed to ride a wave, wave crashed, goofed off in the pool at the R+R retreat and learned how to play Dutch Blitz, which will be coming in the mail from Amazon later in the week and which I will make people play with me. Fair warning.

And as with every trip, at the end I had to throw away my misconceptions and reevaluate how I see the world, the people around me and myself. Which is the best part of all these trips really.  May I never stop growing, never stop learning, never give up on a better tomorrow and learn to live in the moment as much as I can. Till next time! There are pics up on facebook!

As many of you have heard I’ll be going to El Salvador next Saturday for my second Habitat Global Village trip.  And I still haven’t learned any Spanish! Oh well. I’ll be in San Vincente for 10 days. So I’ll be blogging again. Hopefully.