a little sick, a life a bit slower

It's been quite awhile since I last wrote a blog post. Life has been both under and overwhelming. The majority of the time, I have been sick. In reality, most of this year I have spent sick, or should I stay not fully operating at 100%. Having had two rounds of parasites and two stomach infections, it pretty much collapsed my digestive system. Don't worry, I'm okay, just have a harder time processing foods. This has led me to feel bloated, heavy, and drastic changes in weight loss.

Upon dealing with restoring my digestive system, I got an ear infection. This took some time to figure out and even with starting medication I had a difficult time fully eliminating pain and discomfort. Last week was my first week back to work and normal day to day activities. I think I was out for at least two weeks….

I realized that I started off on kind of a negative note, but it is a glimpse at the day to day and even month to month life of living in El Salvador. Many tourists that come through the center I work at ask me if I like it here. It's hard to answer this, but I give them a cryptic, some days I love it other days I hate it. I think I have said this in previous blogs, but truly, I didn't realize that one of the hardest parts of living in El Salv would be the physical challenges. The whole, I am invincible thing, has definitely been eliminated from my understanding of life and my limited abilities as a human.

Anyways, for now I am stable and am doing well. I carefully watch what I eat, drink, and take more time to rest. In just a few weeks I get to go back home to Cape Girardeau for a visit. I couldn't be more excited and am awaiting all of the hugs, love, coffee dates, country music, and driving a car again. I have tried to paint an accurate picture of what Southeast Missouri is like, but I think he's really only grasped two things–you can't walk everywhere and pecans are really well loved.

El Salvador is far from being home, but nonetheless I always like to implement small things from MO here. For my English Conversation Classes on Friday afternoons, I always make some kind of dessert. I think so far I've made oreo cheesecake cookies, banana bread, pumpkin bread, and a honey chamomile cake. All of these things they have found are very exotic and it's a guaranteed conversation starter at the beginning of each class. This week is zucchini bread. I have made this one other time here. I went across to the house in front of mine to a lady that sells a variety of goods. I proceeded to ask for eggs, flour, etc and explained what kind of bread I was making. She looked at me like I had a third eye when I told her I was making it with zucchini. She didn't complain though when I brought her a piece afterwards. In fact, I think she was pleasantly surprised.

All of this to say, more days than not I have been sick. But, the days that I'm not, have been very fruitful. I spend time making “exotic” desserts, coffee dates with a lovely girl from Spain, afternoons in the hammock with Mauricio, walks with the dogs, my classes at the Center of course, photography, calls to friends-family, and watercolor painting. Life has forced me to slow down, and perhaps I am okay with that for now.

Lastly, before I was out for two weeks I did two exciting projects. The first one being my first “Green Thumb Workshops.” I went to two community schools and showed them how to upcycle cardboard. We made “vases” and foraged flowers and leaves from outside to place on the cardboard. I loved getting to see the kids' excitement over the project and will continue to do little workshops like these in the future. Secondly, my photography students put on their second exposition. The theme was Visual Narratives and they did such a good job!!!

Hope everyone is doing well and this your reminder to go create something!

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