August 7, 2010 (referring back to journal notes from June 24, 2010)
Today, as I write and reflect on my time in El Salvador, friends and loved ones are celebrating the memorial to the life of Art Gish on this earth - which ended tragically in a recent tractor accident on his farm in Ohio. His words about the influence international observers can have during a conflict recalled to mind the words of Ivonne Dilling as she described the strategic way in which they would visibly host internationals in the Honduran refugee camps - helping to keep the harassment of refugees by the soldiers at bay.
...o.k. the events of each day in Valle Nuevo, especially when which interviews occurred, is getting fuzzier in my mind. Recently reading over Tessa's notes on some of the interviews reminded me of what I wanted to comment on specifically from the interviews of Pedro and Angelina. They were my hosts last year on my first trip to El Salvador. I knew that they had been a part of the guerilla movement. This time, we were supplied with more detail. Pedro's point that they wouldn't be where they are today without the struggle in the war - is hard to process for us peace loving SMC folk. Would there have been a way forward without the taking up of arms in the face of such violence? It is hard to say. I learned a new word, that I didn't know how to translate. As Angelina described the way her uncle was killed - just near to where the school now stands - she said he died "a puras pulgaradas". I knew the word had something to do with thumbs...and then it was mentioned that it was a method of torture. I was spared an exact description of what this thumb torture entails - but that it led to this man's death is enough for me to draw the conclusion that it is probably more horrible than the images I can conjure.
By the end of the day on Thursday - after having led the second children's group in playdough activities, which is the only thing I have clearly placed on my recorded schedule - I wrote the following: "The feeling is so strange. I am enjoing being here - and all that I am doing - immensely beyond all that I felt last year - and yet today I am missing home. Missing getting back to defining my life. Sure, I could make a place for myself anywhere I choose - but I want to be back home...The partnerships between spouses that have formed out of this tragedy are so beautiful...I am fulfilling a very specific role here for a short time - but this is not my place. My place is with my people. God, give me the clarity to express what you would have me tell of the story here to my people at Sojourners. This is the second night I have written, rather than read, myself to sleep."
Today, as I write and reflect on my time in El Salvador, friends and loved ones are celebrating the memorial to the life of Art Gish on this earth - which ended tragically in a recent tractor accident on his farm in Ohio. His words about the influence international observers can have during a conflict recalled to mind the words of Ivonne Dilling as she described the strategic way in which they would visibly host internationals in the Honduran refugee camps - helping to keep the harassment of refugees by the soldiers at bay.
...o.k. the events of each day in Valle Nuevo, especially when which interviews occurred, is getting fuzzier in my mind. Recently reading over Tessa's notes on some of the interviews reminded me of what I wanted to comment on specifically from the interviews of Pedro and Angelina. They were my hosts last year on my first trip to El Salvador. I knew that they had been a part of the guerilla movement. This time, we were supplied with more detail. Pedro's point that they wouldn't be where they are today without the struggle in the war - is hard to process for us peace loving SMC folk. Would there have been a way forward without the taking up of arms in the face of such violence? It is hard to say. I learned a new word, that I didn't know how to translate. As Angelina described the way her uncle was killed - just near to where the school now stands - she said he died "a puras pulgaradas". I knew the word had something to do with thumbs...and then it was mentioned that it was a method of torture. I was spared an exact description of what this thumb torture entails - but that it led to this man's death is enough for me to draw the conclusion that it is probably more horrible than the images I can conjure.
By the end of the day on Thursday - after having led the second children's group in playdough activities, which is the only thing I have clearly placed on my recorded schedule - I wrote the following: "The feeling is so strange. I am enjoing being here - and all that I am doing - immensely beyond all that I felt last year - and yet today I am missing home. Missing getting back to defining my life. Sure, I could make a place for myself anywhere I choose - but I want to be back home...The partnerships between spouses that have formed out of this tragedy are so beautiful...I am fulfilling a very specific role here for a short time - but this is not my place. My place is with my people. God, give me the clarity to express what you would have me tell of the story here to my people at Sojourners. This is the second night I have written, rather than read, myself to sleep."
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