El Salvador

Information Saturation

I’m reading a book about a boy whose Dad died in the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center. I remember parts of that day still today. I remember seeing the planes crash into the buildings on T.V. before going to school. I remember not fully understanding the extent of what was happening, but knowing that it was bad. I remember sitting in shop class and talking to my teacher about what was happening while kids around me played with scrap metal.

I still remember the look in his eyes. It wasn’t compassion, but it wasn’t indifference. Back then I couldn’t really place the look, but now I think it was tired. Tired of years of hearing about bad things happening everywhere else, tired of having to protect the people around him and hope that the bad things stayed on T.V. and in the newspapers far from home. Tired of trying to care for people whose faces he had never seen and voices he had never heard.

Sometimes I get tired and sometimes I don’t know for whom or what I care for anymore. And there are days when I feel all cared out, like I have no more caring left inside of me. Sometimes I get frustrated that it feels like I do all this caring for other people by myself. On days like this I wish that I could be an accountant or a statistician and care about numbers instead of people…because numbers can’t let you down or disappoint you, numbers can’t carry out genocides, numbers can’t hurt other people, numbers can’t have corrupt governments that prevent aid from getting to them and things from getting better. Numbers can’t be greedy, numbers can’t look someone in the face and hurt them and their families because they have different beliefs, numbers can’t be abused by their parents and then take that anger and pain out on other people.

But I don’t like numbers. I like people. And (most days) when I am not feeling so tired and exhausted I care about people (a great deal), and I want people (not numbers) to be happy and to succeed. Sometimes I wish I could be okay with taking care of the people surrounding just me—my little circle of family, friends, and maybe an acquaintance. But I don’t know if I could be. I don’t know that I could stop thinking about the faces I have never seen, and the voices I have never heard, with the hungry tummies and the cracked lips, with big dreams and tied hands. I might be able to for a while—if I kept really busy, but I think eventually I would begin to think and then I would not be happy within my little circle of security in my cozy house with my child(ren) and my partner. I guess I’ll never know if I don’t try—but I’d like to think I know myself pretty well by now, and I’m not sure I have time to stop caring while I figure out that not caring isn’t for me.

For that matter, I’m not sure the world (or certain places in the world at least—and the rest of the world indirectly) has time to stop thinking and stop caring. In five to ten years the forests of Honduras may be damaged beyond repair if things continue the way they are and do not change dramatically. Honduras will not be alone in their crisis. Will not be the only country facing the reality of exploitation and mismanagement of natural resources. With damage beyond repair and the loss of a million dollar industry the damage to the soils and water will intensify, and the people—of Honduras, of Central America, of the North America, of the European Union—will suffer, directly or indirectly. There is a timer tick tick ticking away and every moment we let go by without confronting these issues is another moment that we can never get back to help protect the places we live in as well as our way of life. Things are going to happen a lot faster than we’d like to think, and just like a week swimmer falling of an edge in the ocean, by the time we realize we are in over our heads it will be too late to call for help.

I think good intentions have unfortunately helped fuel people’s indifference. People are overwhelmed by the barrage of ‘issues’ they are asked to care about, to donate money towards, and to volunteer their time to. Put forth by ‘passionate’ people and spread by mass media we are introduced to exponentially increasing numbers of causes, campaigns, issues, and problems affecting every aspect of our societies. So many issues that peoples heads spin around causing them to get overwhelmed and choose not to focus on any of the issues at all, and rather on what to cook for dinner and what to do on the weekend.

Aids, cancer, poverty, clean water, conflict diamonds, floods in faraway lands, poor countries torn apart by earthquakes, dying children without mosquito nets, urban violence, police brutality, low voter turnout, municipal elections. What to care about? Where to spend (valuable) time? Who to give my money to? Saturated by causes, by information, by disasters, and sad news, people opt to block it out, to not think about it, and to do nothing rather than take advantage of the age of information, with everything at their fingertips…kind of reminds me of the bystander effect in psychology. With an increase of information, technology our interconnected world is causing people to withdraw into their secure, safe little circles of comfort and try to block out the bad news and bad thoughts.

We have time. Right? I don’t mean to be a downer, but I’m not so sure. ‘Bad’ and unavoidable things will start happening in our neighbourhoods in our backyards sooner than we would like to think. When these ‘things’ begin to happen we will not be able to ignore them. And by then it will be too late. The damage will be done, and there will be little to repair and we will have to suffer the consequences of denial, ignorance and indifference…but we also like to react to things we can’t ignore rather than acting proactively which is another rant just waiting to be unleashed.

Thinking about the Future (trying not to be entirely cynical),
Delaney C.


Never Forget

Before heading out to Santa Caterina we visited UNA (one of the main Universities in San Salvador). Coincidentally it was twenty first anniversary of the murders of the Jesuit Priests that took place on campus and there was a special exhibit. Its a pretty powerful and moving experience being in the same room(s) where the priests and female students were not murdered, violated, tortured and brutalized. For me it’s an uncomfortable feeling, but one that I cant end prematurely. Its an uncomfortable feeling I force myself to endure until my chest gets tight, I begin to feel claustrophobic and someone says its time to leave or move onto another section. I need to feel uncomfortable, I surround myself in heavy all encompassing feeling of the room in an attempt to make myself realize, truly realize, that people are horrible vicious monsters and just what they are capable of.

Part of the exhibit that is available to the public is photo albums with graphic pictures taken of the people who were murdered. Some people cannot look at them, the images are too graphic, too raw, and make the viewer feel something they can’t handle—too uncomfortable. I can’t take my eyes off of them. I remember the first time I saw them and not being able to look away, while at the same time being confused as to how I, as a compassionate human being could look at these images without becoming physically sick instantly (possibly some combination of desensitization and a biological protection mechanism), not to say that I wasn’t effected, I was, but I couldn’t help but thinking the images I was faced with were so disturbing I should be physically crippled and unable to go on with my day.

This time I looked at them, again unable to look away, wanting the understand how and why people [are able to] do such horrible things to each other; never wanting to forget what humans are capable of. It saddens and perplexes me how humans are able to do unimaginably atrocious things to each other, and how we continue to allow these tragedies to repeat themselves again, and again.

As individuals we may be able to learn from our mistakes, but as whole societies it seems that we are designed to continuously repeat the same tragedies time and time again not learning from past atrocities but rather introducing new techniques to inflict pain and suffering on others.

Like an Elephant,
Delaney C.



El Escalon

This school has a piece of my heart however I’m not sure even on my most articulate days I can express (with justice) how much this school, its teachers, and its students mean to me, but I hope that those of you who have been able to see me at the school have been able to see a glimmer of how important it is to me. The road to the bottom of the hill where El Escalon primary school is nestled is haphazard at best and becomes completely washed out in the rainy season making the walk (that the teachers and many of the students are subject to) illustrate their dedication and motivation to education. Kids play soccer in the dirt path in front of the chain link fence surrounding the entrance to the school that is pressed with curious and excited faces shouting both ‘Hello’, and ‘Hola’, and I feel like I have been welcomed home.

Being able to visit this school three times in the last three years makes me one of the luckiest people in the world. Being able to see these kids grow as our relationship grows has been a phenomenal experience that I won’t even try to explain. Admiration, respect, compassion, love and a plethora of other incredible feelings surge simultaneously through my body when I am around these teachers and children and every ounce of my being is elated and filled with an energy I have never experienced outside of El Escalon.

Due to the massive rains the schools kitchen, left vulnerable in the absence of a retention wall, was destroyed by a mudslide. Presently only two-thirds of the school is protected by a retention wall, and although the school itself remains intact thus far there is a chance that as the rainy seasons worsen one of the classrooms will follow the fate of the kitchen.

Regardless of my views on development, on the criticisms of the Alternative Spring Break Program, of all the nay-sayers, I would do anything for this school, its teachers, and its students, and without a doubt they deserve every good thing that comes there way (and a whole lot more). I hope that this was not my last time to visit El Escalon, and I know if I want to go back I will find a way (just like I have done). My pockets are full of cards written for ‘Trini’ and ‘Celini’ because Delaney is too tough for the Spanish tongues to pronounce, my camera is full of pictures of dancing butterflies and smiling faces of old friends, my cheeks are full of lingering kisses and my heart is full of new memories and lots and lots of love. That’s enough to make be feel (even if just for a moment) that the world is in fact a beautiful wonderful place and there is a little bit of hope left after all.

Full of Love,
Delaney C.