dancing men

I took my colleague Abdel downtown right at the time he was feeling a bit claustrofobic in safe/residential/walled/malled San Salvador. We walked down Paseo Escalón for about 40 minutes until we got to Café de Don Pedro, a 50´s style cafe where people hang out for a drink and a Ceviche while listening to 70 year old marimba performers. Two things I love about this place: the shoe shining service and Naomi the waitress.

The shoe shining service at Café de Don Pedro:
As you approach the patio a couple of shoe shiners greet you inviting your shoes for a shine. Men stop, take their shoes off, leave them there and sit bare foot. It is simply beautiful to see all these men having a beer on their white socks. Note: only men get their shoes shined

Naomi:
She simply greets me as if I were her niece. She hugs me, asks about my sister and my brother in law, tells me about her son. She literally makes me feel home...

So, Abdel loved the place. His sister and brother called while we were having lunch and got a bit of the marimba which probably calmed them from their fears for the country.

We headed downtown right after our lunch at Café de Don Pedro. We wandered around to the rhythm of nativity scene noices, vendors, kids cries, laughter, music, more music, religious speeches, political campaign jingles, narrated soccer, porn screams, made in china toys, fire works and cathedral bells. There was a wedding at the Cathedral which was fully decorated with plastic and paper flowers (gorgeous!).

After walking and walking through the strets and the open market we decided to go to a bar for a drink. Ok it is not a bar, it is a club and it opens 24 - 7 (at least that is what I think). We got in: Abdel´s cover was 2 dollars and mine 1. Beer: 1 dollar! yep...

We danced and we also did some people watching, or dance watching. Compared to other clubs uptown (which means west), men dance more than women. Everything moves bottom up: the way men move their feet determines the whole body movement to the rhythm of the music. A very samba-like style. But just for men... I wonder if it has something to do with men having their shoes shined (or shone?).

about war

Inside out

Photo taken by me

For some of us war is a narration, a story, a photography, a theory. It is an object for our eyes to imagine death through someone else´s experience. For some of us war is an object even though it has occurred close (and even closer) to our homes. Several essays have been written to closing the gap between war itself and the history of war. The one I have in mind is Sontag's "Regarding the Pain of Others" on war photography. Inspired by her, I´ve decided to write about Salvadorean's war from what I've heard. I am not going to narrate the history of war (I am sure wikipedia does a better job) but tell a couple of stories as they happened to found my ears. 

War in notes:

During the war, a friend's house was taken by the guerrilla hence she and her family had to seek shelter elsewhere. Right before leaving, my friend's younger sister wrote a note to the guerrilla saying: " Please take good care of my doll". A month later the family returned. The little girl rushed to her room to find a reply note saying: "your doll is a well behaved little girl, but she missed you"

My friend's mother read neighbours the note. As it happens, one of her neighbours whose house was also taken, received a note in response to one she was writing to her ex husband right before leaving. Her note said "You haven't taken full responsiblity over our child's expenses." On the same paper a guerrilla member wrote: "I fully support you. You should definitely sue your ex partner. It is your right". 

People in the neighbourhood reported no losses in their homes...

Would you give me a ride?

During the war my neighbour was driving her car to the university. Two guys stopped . They got into the car. One of them took the drivers seat, the other went to the back. She moved to the passenger's seat. "Where are you going" she asked. "Not of your business" they replied. "Would you take me to class?" she asked . "Just if it is on the way" they replied. Then silence... After 5 minutes of driving around they stopped the car, told her they couldn't take her and asked her to step out. They left. Two days later they called her to inform the car had been left at McDonalds (there was just one McDonalds in the 80's). She picked it up. And that is the end of the story. 

Good Times

A cab driver was telling me about war times. He said "Those were good times for me" "everyone needed a cab so I had tons of work " "Everyone was so afraid that nobody wanted to drive" Then he smiled. 

"We don't want to remember war" 

A woman: "Why remember? "Lets simply get over it!" 

Another woman: It is not trendy to talk about the war...It is over...BORING

A teenager: I have no idea of what Mozote means (Mozote: The biggest masacre during Salvadorean Civil War)

A politician: It is time for us to forget the past 

Another politician: Doing investigation on war crimes won't be of any good for Salvadoreans

Another woman: I won't take that course at the public university. The campus is all dirty. It reminds me of the war. And it scares me.

War is war

and for war

we are still human 

so human

Nothing else to say

highways are better in El Salvador ... probably that is why people walk in Honduras

Main Plaza

Copan - Honduras

Comparing Honduras and El Salvador:

Honduras pupusas (stuffed cornbread - kind off) are smaller.
There are more convenience stores or pulperas in Honduras.
Honduras has less imported stuff (american or chinese).
There is more choice in pirated music in El Salvador.
Jesus adds and Jesus-inspired radios are abundant in both countries.
Food is mainly the same: fried beans, tortillas, avocado, nicaraguan cheese however; there are less fast food chains in Honduras than in El Salvador.
Desserts look nicer than they taste in Honduras.
Men (young and elder) wear hats in Honduras, more so than in El Salvador.
Mountains and trees are more impressive in El Salvador.
Honduras is less americanized than in El Salvador.
There are more Mayan traces in Honduras than in El Salvador.
There is life, social life in the plazas and streets of Honduras towns.

Highways are better in El Salvador.

BUT WHAT ON EARTH DO I KNOW

just a joke... solo una broma

Here is a conversation I had today (it was actually the third time I had had it)

She:  Men do ease the struggles between women (2 women especially)

I: mmm I am unsure

She: Yes, it happens all the time. If there are two cranky women snapping at each other, a man usually eases the vibe (she adds examples...)

I: I don't like that. If it is true we should change it otherwise men become mediators... I don´t think someone (men or women) should have this role just because of his or her gender. (I actually didn´t say this. I just said the first four words.)

She: Well just accept it... It happens everywhere... 

I: What happens everywhere?

She: Men ease the tension between women

I: I resist

She: Gosh, I better leave ... we probably need a man in here hehe Just a joke

---------------

Esta es una charla que tuve hoy (y bueno la he tenido ya tres veces)

Ella: Viste, te lo dije: Los hombres apaciguan la mala vibra entre 2 mujeres

Yo: Si?

Ella: Seguro, pasa todo el tiempo. Si hay tensión entre dos mujeres, la presencia de un hombre cambia la energía

Yo: No me gusta mucho eso. Si eso es cierto, hay que cambiarlo porque sino el hombre pasa a ser el tercero que media...¡que mamera!... No creo que una persona deba tener ese rol solo por ser hombre o mujer. (la verdad es que no dije esto, sólo las primeras cinco palabras y el punto)

Ella: Sólo acéptalo. Pasa en todo lado y todos pasamos por eso. 

Yo: ¿Qué pasa en todo lado?

Ella: El que un hombre calme la tensión entre las mujeres

Yo: Me resisto!

Ella: Mejor me voy porque sino me pegas. Aquí hace falta un hombre..jejeje. Fue una broma

Lo escribí en mi piel / I chose to write it on my skin

Mi piel resiste todo y lo que resiste rechaza, borra, pela... Lo que me queda es lo que queda.
Lo que queda es lo que se puede decir, lo que hable sin voz.

Me llevo un pajarito salvadoreño conmigo

My skin resists everything and what is resisted is at the same time rejected, erased, shed. What remains is what stays.
What stays is what can be said, what speaks without a voice.

I am taking a salvadorean bird with me,

Zompopos

Following ants in my bathroom. The big ones that show up every hundred regular ones are called zompopos. Zompopos collect leaves and travel in long lines. I follow them at nights, before going to bed...

cloudy eyes

An undated photo of Rufina Amaya, a notorious survivor of the El Mozote 1981 massacre, at an undisclosed location El Salvador. www.daylife.com/ photo/0arXf5u3IQ35l

I had a meeting with several community based organizations reps currently involved in developing rural tourism capacity. Amongst these men and women was Pacita: a woman and survivor from El Mozote massacre (1981). She left when she was eleven and returned a 15 years later to find nothingness. She came back with her newborn and her parents and macheted her way back to settle, to make of El Mozote an inhabited place one more time. Due to the lack of resources and the roughness of the place, Pacita left her parents in El Mozote and returned to the city to make some money for her re-return. Three years after she returned for good. This time, she organized some women and formed a study group on the History of the War. Against all odds, she was determined to keep the story alive, to remember the death of 500 men, women and children, to always remember for memory to remain history and for history to remind us of war. These women are now local tour guides who share turns to tell the story. They also share child care. Pacita also works in the milpa (crop growing), sells crops at the closest market, takes care of her 85 year old father who has prostate cancer (just like mine) and knits.

Her daughter´s name means “cloudy eyes”. I thought it was a sad name until she said more about the name's origin: “...in a cloudy day everything feels fresh and crisp ....” I couldn't help but feeling the sense of relief hidden in her daughter's name. The idea of life (daughter) after death (war) followed immediately. Then I stopped my thoughts and returned to her, to her story, to her name.  

Pacita´s name means Peace.  In diminutive 

Buena Letra, mal gobierno, mala mujer... Perfect hand writing, bad government, bad bad woman

Ayer fui al aeropuerto a recoger a mi mamá en el carro de la oficina con Rafael. Rafael no es sólo mi amigo, es quien se encarga de ponerle ruedas a todas mis ideas para salir del aburrimiento. En el camino le pregunté de cómo aprendió a manejar. Me dijo que desde pequeño se subía a los buses y se sentaba en el asiento de adelante a observar. A los 14 años puso en práctica sus observaciones en un mini austin que tenía su papá. Así llegamos a hablar de su papá: Un señor que solo cursó hasta tercero de primaria y que trabajaba en una empresa de ingenieros como peón. Un buen día uno de los ingenieros se lastimó la mano y no pudo escribir así que les preguntó a los peones ´si alguno de ellos sabía escribir. El papá de Rafael fue el único que había aprendido y entonces fue elegido para ayudarle al ingeniero a redactar una carta. La letra del papá de Rafael es tan bonita que todos quedaron sorprendidos y el ingeniero le pidió que trabajara en la oficina. Asi fue como el papá de Rafael ayudó en varios trabajos de oficina incluido el apoyo a los contadores. Con ese trabajo pudo comprar el mini austin que Rafael manejó por primera vez a los 14 años. Y no sólo compró el carrito, también se hizo de su terreno y de un par de casas. Pero la bonanza llegó a su límite cuando la empresa de Ingenieros se retiró del país por el tema de la reforma agraria, la mamá de Rafael se fue a Estados Unidos y el señor de buena letra se quedó sólo. Cómo la soledad no le vino bien, se consiguió una cipota, es decir una jovencita que, según dice Rafael, sólo le interesaba el pisto (dinero). Es así como la cipotilla (o jovencita) se le llevó todo, hasta uno de los terrenos. El papá de Rafa vive sólo.

Para Rafael la culpa de todo la tiene la cipotilla. Para el papá de Rafael la culpa de todo la tiene la reforma agraria. Y yo me quedé pensando en a quién echarle la culpa.

Luego llegó mi mamá...


Yesterday Rafael took me to the airport to pick up my mom. Rafael is not just a friend, he basically puts wheels to my ideas to depart from the land of boredom. On our way to the airport I asked him what the biggest car he is licensed to drive is. This led us to the subject of how he learned to drive. When Rafael was a kid he used to take the public bus and sit right at the front to observe how the driver conducted it. When he turned 14 he put into practice his observations by driving his father´s Austin-mini. Thus, we got to speak about his father: A man who had only been in school until 3rd grade (elementary school) who worked for several years in a Civil Engineering Company as a “peon” (labourer). One day, one of the engineers hurt his right hand and needed someone to write a letter for him. He approached the “peones” (labourers) and asked for someone who knew how to write. Apparently, Rafael´s dad was the only one that knew how to read and write so he delivered the task. When he finished writing the letter, the engineer showed it to the rest of the office: he was astonished at this peon´s hand writing. Immediately, this man was given an office job where he helped everyone including the accounting people. This is how, he got the Austin – mini that was driven by Rafael when he was 14.Besides the car, his dad was able to buy land and build his own house. Things changed for bad when the company left the country due to the agrarian reform. Rafael´s dad lost his job. Then the war hit the country and Rafael´s mom immigrated to the US. Loneliness wasn´t something to look forward, so Rafael´s dad got involved in a relationship with a much younger woman who, according to Rafael, was only interested getting a sugar daddy. After a few years, the younger woman left taking a few things with her and leaving Rafael´s dad alone.

Rafael thinks the young woman is the one to blame for his father´s poverty and loneliness. His father thinks the agrarian reform is the one to blame. Who is the one to blame?
My mom arrived,
But that is a different story

fenceless doesn't mean free

In the early 80's, the Colonia Escalon (the neighbourhood where I live in San Salvador) was free from all those wired walls that cage the outside. 

In a  conversation about everything, a friend and neighbour told me her house didn't even have a fence. I tried to imagine the undivided landscape, and felt nostalgic for those times that I can only access through words (times that are a fiction to me). The images made me inquire to the rest of the MARA (mara doesn't only refer to the violent gangs but it is also a salvadorian slang for group) about their childhood. I'll try to reproduce the thread of the conversation. 

Me: In Cali and Quito, where I grew up, I used to play on the streets, hide and seek and all sorts of things. I remember climbing trees, playing football (ok soccer), playing hide and seek and biking with my friends. Boys and girls always out. When we played indoors, we span the bottle. I guess that is why, our parents preferred outdoor games for us. 

She 1:  No, no... I wasn't allowed to go out unless I had a chaperone. It wasn't because it was dangerous. I couldn't go out by myself cause I am a woman. What does spinning the bottle mean?... 

She 2: ...I only went out with my cousins when we visited them out of town. That was the only time where I actually went out to the movies with my peers. 

She 3: I was always home, helping my mother. I didn't go out very much, only to church or some school events  with my mother. 

She 4: Going out with boys was something I did after 18. University times. Well, sometimes with cousins we would do stuff. But not too much on the streets. Well my brother and cousins would play outside. But not the girls. 

Five women at the table, talking about pre-Salvadorian war times. Through their stories I learned that around the time the war started,  fences started to cage the  (until then) free houses.  Then fences were replaced by walls, then walls were topped by wires, then wires got electrified (sometimes they are not electrified but they have a that sign says so), then an armed guard or two were added to the entrance, then the sidewalk became a place to park cars. In a way, society is stratified by the level you reached in the process of walling houses. However, regardless of how electrified your wires are, the outside world is a forbidden place for girls. Even then...

She 3: I don't let my girls out. They help me home. They are 16, 18 and 21. The street is not a place for girls. 

She 2: I only let them go to the mall. But I drive my girls there and pick them up. 

She 3: Yes, it is a dangerous place. 

.....

So, what happens if you are out there? 

So far nothing has happened to me, except for having a bike accident and having to drag myself to the sidewalk to avoid two cars. None of them stopped. 

I've decided to take my cast to the mall today. 

Laguna de la Alegría - Usulután - El Salvador

This is Laguna de  Alegria or Laguna Verde 

Department of Usulutan

El Salvador

Dance Dense

As time walks Sunday to Sunday, this city changes its face. From a city left on its own to a sphere within a sphere, San Salvador keeps  multiplying leaving me with a chain of moment. A chain of pure presents: 

Pure present 1: Backpain, Japanese Rock and Jesus

My office life has given me some back pain which made me decide going to a  a chiropractor. My chiropractor happens to be my neighbour so, to save some cab money, I asked him to give me a ride to the clinic for my early appointments . This is how it goes three times a week:

• we meet at the entrance of our building at 6:50 am, 
  
• we get in the car, he turns on his cd player to japanese rock, 
  
• we talk about coffee, music, places, movies, etc, 
  
• we arrive to the clinic,
  
• I go to the waiting room while he parks the car 
  
• I go to the smaller waiting room where I change and insert my patient card through the door slot (a sign that I am ready for my session), 
  
• he opens de door and greets me as if I was a patient he hasn't seen since the last session
  
• session is over
  

I leave the clinic and walk towards the main road to grab a cab. The cab, whichever cab, listens to christian music followed by testimonials: "I used to be a libertine. I used to listen to pagan music. I used to wear heels and pants.  Yes I used to be a libertine woman.  Then my brother neighbour  told me about Jesus, and now my life..." Unfortunately I always get to work before the testimonial finishes. Then I work, I get my back pain back, and I do it all again (like a never ending story in a defined period of time, I mean the time of my treatment - 3 more weeks). 

Pure present 2: Pink Heresy

I went downtown with a friend and colleague to buy a piñata for another friend and colleague. We bought a Hello Kitty pinata, a pink rosary and a pink salvadorian waist apron. We walked the downtown streets with our gifts to the rhythm of christian music (mostly christian reggaeton and christian bachata). My friend told  me about 24 hour club she found the week before and we decided to go there for a quick dance. And so we did, we got in with our piñata and danced to heretic reggaeton, salsa and merengue  at 4pm. I felt we were defying the rules of the outside world by changing the notes and the lyrics. We left after a few songs, and took Hello Kitty bra-shopping outside the theatre. 

Pure present 3: The End of Hello Kitty

I went to my friend's surprise party (the one we bought the piñata for). After dinner with Peter Cetera and Chicago, we danced to the rhythm of the same music I used to dance 20 years ago. Yes, the same one, the eternal party music with instructions on how to move your arms and hips. As the tradition goes, at some point guests were encouraged to hit the piñata with a stick to get its inner candy. And that is how Hello Kitty got smashed. The End. 

El Salvador... El Salvador

I went home for a visit. A strange place to be when home is here, but is also there ((t)here). While I was there, I mean Toronto, I dreamed about here, San Salvador. Now that I am back, my dreams are in english and are performed between Queen and King Street (south of Bloor now).

It is not about my dreams I want to throw a few words for, it is about the experience of home both as a preconception (aprioristic experience) and as an expectation (aposterioristic experience). While in Toronto my discourse about El Salvador went from describing to storytelling to silence, (silence: the point when I realized I had nothing to say). I'll follow the same order now to narrate El Salvador both as a preconception and as an expectation.

DESCRIBING

Someone: How was Paraguay?

Me: El Salvador

Someone 2: Oh I've been to Brazil, isn't it wonderful?

Me: El Salvador

Someone 3: How is your family in Ecuador?

Me: El Salvador..My family is fine in Ecuador, Colombia, Canada and Argentina

Someone 4: How is your spanish?

Me: Good, considering it is my first language, my mother tongue, the language I use for feeling.

preconception: everything south of US is latin america. El Salvador: a place by comparison and contrast (as in, similar to Ecuador, Paraguay and Brasil). Please don't judge preconceptions, after all we, hispanics, struggle defining ourselves. We, hispanics, often see ourselves as what we are not.

STORYTELLING

I told the cow story (I was in a bus that hit a cow and killed it...to be continued), the right wing party rep and his analogy between where Jesus is with respect to God and where El Salvador should remain (for the non christians the answer is RIGHT SIDE), the perception of fear vs pure violence, yoga in San Salvador, biking in El Salvador, private vs. public, the malls, the birds, the monkey in my neighbourhood, the soap opera I watch, development, child labour, street fashion, graffiti activity, my office and its mango tree, the wired homes, the wired city and, Rafael the cab driver and my friend.

preconception: I tried my best to narrate a National Geographic experience but I couldn't. I could only talk for myself and from myself. I tried to be objective and in doing so the fragments of my experience created a place that doesn't exist. I tried to say.... but everything fell under the same discourse: an adventure narrated as anticipated by the listener. And so, with every word I said, I felt one step removed from El Salvador. To the point I missed it. To the point of its death. Silence now...

SILENCE

I said no more. I followed a script and kept going until getting to the point of: "So, enough about me, tell me about you". And I listened to the most wonderful stories coming out from the mouth of women and men I love. I saw kids, graffiti, the progress at the AGO, green trees, a lake as big as the ocean (to my eyes only). I saw him and him again. And then, and there, in the vastness of his arms, I saw home: a place that is here and is there.

expectation: I want to smell El Salvador, touch it, feel it. I want to be able to describe it with my eyes closed and my mouth shut. The way I can describe my love(r). In Silence.

I am back and saw green.

This episode is dedicated to (in no particular order except for the first):

John, Janene, Ethan, Sarah, Andrea, Ruth, Sylvia, Mike, Mina, Paul, Lisa, Rod, Laura (and tall poppy), Claudia, The Shniers and the Spevakows, The Greens, Shelagh, Carmen, Jose (who I loved running into), Paola (even from afar), Marty ,Dufflet, Betsy, Shane, Ellery, Peter and Carolyne...

Feminists and Womanists / feministas o mujeristas

Picture taken in a northern zone school: Director's Office

Foto tomada en una escuela de la zona norte: Oficina del Director

(English version follows)

Fui a visitar a la Coordinadora de Educación de Las Dignas, una ONG feminista de mujeres afectadas por la guerra. Tenía que visitarlas, especialmente porque en algunas escuelas e institutos que visité mencionaron su nombre (a veces con resistencia) al hablar del tema de educación sexual. 

Hago una pausa aquí para luego retomar el tema. Resulta que yo pensé que la abstinencia como método anticonceptivo era una cosa del pasado. Y si, claro que sé qu la iglesia católica se pone a otros métodos, pero como ex-católica siempre supe que esa regla tenía muchas excepciones. Luego cuando crecí un poco más Freud, Lacan y Marx reemplazaron a ese señor de barba blanca todopoderos y con ello asumí no sólo el tema de la anticoncepción sino la certeza de que las mujeres tenemos control sobre nuestro cuerpo. Más tarde en la vida el tema dejó de ser importante ya sea por edad o porque el tema en mí dejó de ser tabu. Y bueno, digo esto porque uno cree que los movimientos por el mundo de las ideas y principios son iguales para todos. En pocas palabras, uno cree que todos bailamos el mismo ritmo. A esto le llamaré Ideocentrismo. 

Bueno, volvamos al tema de la educación sexual y Las Dignas. Ocurre que la abstinencia sexual no funciona. En un instituto por ejemplo, han habido 75 embarazos en niñas de 12 a 16 años en los últimos 5 años. La situación difiera a la película Juno, acá las niñas desertan pese a que se les permite seguir atendiendo a clases (esto en el sistema público porque en los colegios privados no se les deja seguir). 

El problema del embarazo prematuro se soluciona con charlas de abstinencia. En algunos casos, invitan a Las Dignas para que den una charla, pero eso sí, se toman las debidas precauciones, no vaya a ser que digan algo que no es. Pero en la mayoría de ocasiones se invita a un cura o pastor, y en el mejor de los casos a un doctor. En la clase de psicología se enseña: Los riesgos del noviazgo. 

Desde afuera (me refiero a desde los organismos en su mayoria internacionales promotores del desarrollo) el problema del embarazo suele ser demográfico y económico. Desde cerca, es cuestión de ejercicio del derecho al control  sobre nuestro propio cuerpo. Es el ejercicio de la libertad como derecho inalienable. El ismo del feminismo está precisamente en esa lucha. Cómo dijo Mayra Scott, coordinadora de educacion de Las Dignas,  en la entrevista que le hice "No es una lucha en contra de los hombres. Es una lucha contra la sociedad patriarcal que nos despoja de nuestro derecho a controlar nuestro propio cuerpo y nuestra sexualidad". Lo que me parece interesante es que esta frase me haya sonado refrescante. Aunque el discurso sea setentero, es también dosmilero, dependiendo del lugar en el mundo en el que uno se encuentre. 

En el título de esta entrada mencioné otro ismo, el mujerismo. Es que creo que esta es la vertiente estética del feminismo. Aquí va una imagen mujerista:

Una vendedora de la calle se pinta las uñas de rojo sangre mientras espera a que el semáforo se pone en rojo para que algún conductor le compre un cigarrillo o un caramelo. 

 

Now in English...

I had a visit with the Education Coordinator at Las Dignas, a feminist NGO run by women that were directly affected by the war. I had to visit them, especially after hearing from a few high school teachers of their role in sexual education. 

I will rewind here: I thought that "abstinence" as a contraceptive method was a thing of the past. And yes, I know that the catholic church is against any other contraceptive method but I grew up knowing you can totally by-pass this rule and still be catholic. Then Freud, Lacan and Marx replaced my white bearded God and brought me a step further: Women have control of their bodies and their sexuality! Finally, time took me to a place where I stop thinking about it all together (at my age abstinence is not an issue I guess). As you move on in your own world of ideas and principles you think the world moves with you. I will call it Ideacentrism. 

Let's go back to Las Dignas and the schools and sexual education. As it happens, abstinence is not working and the pregnancy rate in young women in the northern zone of El Salvador is high. There is a high school for instance, where in the past 5 years they've had 75 pregnant girls. Unlike the June movie, pregnant girls (between 12 and 17) drop out even though the system allows them to continue (that is the public system cause private schools don't allow it). Las Dignas visit some schools and deliver some sexual education sessions to boys and girls, that is;  if the director allows it. In some schools for example, only priests and shepherds  are guest speakers. In some schools they invite a doctor and a priest and let students decide. Even when the schools are open to different voices on sexuality and reproduction, teachers and directors are judgemental of the use of contraceptives and the idea of women controlling their bodies is not even at the notion stage (given that notions precede ideas). They even teach (or preach): THE RISKS OF RELATIONSHIPS... (I want to attend that class).

From outside the problem relies on demographics and economic growth. From within the issue is about the human right to decide when to have kids even if that decision brings 15 new people to the world. The right to decide comes with freedom and this is not an ism (as in feminism) but becomes one if for some reason we are stripped from a inalienable right. 

I am not adding anything new to this matter, I am just pointing out that despite its lack of newness, it is still relevant:  the feminist struggle for equal access and control of our bodies, is still relevant (the seventies are not over). 

There is resistance to the word feminist. Some teachers think it means fighting against men. As Mayra Scott from Las Dignas put it: "It is not a fight against man, but a struggle against a patriarchal society where we cannot even control our bodies".  Isn't it interesting to find an old (meaning decades not centuries) discourse refreshing? I never thought I would become a feminist (blame it on Canada). 

My subject line includes the word: womanism. Here is what I think it means:

A woman, a street vendor. This woman/street vendor is having a manicure while waiting for the red light that would make cars stop. Luckily she'll sell  a cigarette, a candy or a lottery ticket and hopefully her red nails remain intact (now that is the challenge)

Womanism is an aesthetic ism

Acerca de perros - About dogs

Perra vida! Dice el viejo dicho. Pero hay perros de perros y vidas de vidas. 

Acá en San Salvador, los  perros runas o chandas son de todos y andan por todas partes. Los finos andan detrás de muros y no salen a pasear,  su jardín pareciera ser más que suficiente, cómo el paraiso que perdimos hace algunos años ya. 

La vida afuera del paraiso ocurre, y ocurre como narración. Afuera de mi barrio, saliendo de la encrucijada residencial que siempre va a parar al Paseo Escalon, los perros callejeros van haciendo momentáneas apariciones que poco a poco se convierten en  el hilo conductor de la escena urbana. Una vez allí se vuelven invisibles, tan invisibles como lo son en los pueblos y caseríos del país que voy conociendo y de los paises de los que soy. 

Life is a bitch! Or so they say. 

Here in San Salvador, mixed dogs belong to everyone, belong everywhere. Purebreds (a product of selective breeding) are behind bars or walls in beautiful gardens, just like paradise (the place we lost a while ago) 

Life out of paradise happens, and happens as a narrative. Out of my neighbourhood, I mean beyond the residential labyrinth surrounding Paseo Escalon, street dogs  randomly show up and continuously, as you move eastwards, join the down town scene until they become invisible. As invisible as the dogs in Salvadorian towns and villages and the dogs from home. 

It was on the computer!

Remember the days when people used to think that whatever was on TV was true? People used to say "I saw it on TV" and if the source was the news or the discovery channel the validity of the information was guaranteed and, by the same token, the person that quoted those channels differentiated from the majority who watches sports or soap operas (I belong to the latter majority). Well, I don´t think this social differentiation is over, but now the computer (meaning not only the internet) is the source of truth.

I´ve been working on a report on gender equity in education based on numerous visits to the northern zone institutes of El Salvador. What I hear is different from what I find in my computer (I mean reports that I´ve been provided with, raw data and the internet). It is different not in that it is opposite. It is different in that it has a voice. I sometimes question why do I have to validate that voice with a number or a source is the voice itself. But reports show that http://www/. is THE SOURCE. Andy Warhol predicted everyone´s 10 minutes of fame (I forgot the exact number of muinutes) and fame is now the norm. His next prediction would have been everyones voice preceded by http://www/. (you´ll probably have to pay to add this feature and maybe if you don't get it, you might loose connection). For the poor, the voice will be recorded in a pdf equivalent file that cannot be modified once recorded (after all adobe reader is free).

I´ll stop playing futurology and finish this entry referring to the power of the infamous FARC computer that was found in Ecuador and that has ALL the information about the "terrorist network" or the "lefty network" (depends which http://www/. is your source). As it happens, the FMLN (the alternative to ARENA, the Salvadorean official political party, in power for over 18 years - or the pre and post war party) is connected with FARC. I am not sure who is right, who is wrong, what the connection means, or where the truth lies. What I am simply questionning is the power of the computer or a computer as a source of truth. What if instead of focusing who is related to whom (which reminds me of my dad's fascination with genealogy) we focus on what truly is at stake. 

Meanwhile, outside the computer, reality happens. I think we still believe there is one and only one truth. But truth is multiple and sometimes minimal. Sometimes is as simple as watching a chicken walking through your urban neighbourhood reminding you that within the urban there is the rural (rurban).

In the beauty parlor - En la Peluqueria

I was invited to participate in a Hairstyle Course at Comunidad Quiñonez close to San Salvador´s downtown. I met the most beautiful women that taught me how to iron my hair even when it is short and what tricks there are to make it look longer. They actually saw potential with my short hair.

The improvised beauty parlor was crowded with models: mostly kids from the neighbourhood who wanted to look good or simply hang out and have a cup of coffee, gossip and get something out of it.



Here is the gossip:



One of the students missed class because she had to work until really late the day before.

The beauty parlor has ¨regulars¨ or, as I called them, full time models!

A woman named Patricia Colombia (we ended up calling each other cousins) needs glasses but thinks she wouldn´t look good on them. She also wants to go to Colombia.

Gloria has 5 kids and the oldest is pregnant.

There are MARAS in the neighbourhood, but it doesn´t matter to the universe anyway...



There is a tendency to believe that these type of courses are too traditional and do not add to the economic development of a country. If that is true, we need to redefine development!

......



Hoy estuve en la Comunidad o Colonia Quiñonez cerca del centro de la ciudad. Me invitaron a participar en un curso de estilismo en donde conocí a mujeres hermosas que me enseñaron los trucos de como hacer que el cabello (me corrigieron el uso de la palabra pelo) luzca brillante y sano. Hasta me dijeron que con algunos trucos mi pelo podrìa verse largo (creo que mi mamá se pondría feliz si les hiciera caso).



El salon de belleza improvisado reune a más gente que la misma tienda de la esquina. En un momento dado se hallaban un montón de mujeres y niños modelos que simplemente quieren verse bien un lunes por la tarde o a lo mejor sólo quieren charlar y enterarse de los últimos chismes.



Hoy me enteré que uno de las estudiantes faltó a clase porque tuvo que trabajar la noche anterior. También me contaron que hay gente que viene casi todos los días (haga de cuenta como los personajes del bar cheers). Conocí a una mujer llamada Patricia Colombia (al final nos decíamos primas) que necesita gafas pero que cree que no le quedarían bien. Y Gloria tiene 5 hijos y la mayor está embarazada. Alguien mencionó a las MARAS...todos saben que hay MARAS en el vecindario, pero al universo no creo que le importe.



Se dice (y me lo aclaran a cada rato) que este tipo de cursos (como el estilismo) en nada aportan al desarrollo económico del país. Si es así, pues cambiemos la definición de desarrollo


Aquí va un extra para los hispanohablantes:



CHIVO

GALAN

CABAL



Las tres palabras básicas para ser salvadoreño!

centro

EL CENTRO y MULTIPLAZA CENTRO COMERCIAL (by John Shnier)

The term "centro" (downtown) brings the idea of a city's core, the inner city, the space drawn by people's steps. The term "centro comercial" (meaning mall but literally a commercial centre ) is a confined, regulated, organized planned centre; in short, a formalized replication of the city core (sometimes a redundancy).

When you come to San Salvador the centros comerciales become your first point of reference by word of mouth. You have to try hard to go to the centre as not even cab drivers want to take you there. As it happens, buses and cars have to find their way through predictable streets narrowed by vendors (mostly black market vendors). There is no government presence in the centro, I mean a visible presence (police, government buildings, offices), which I believe contributes to the perception of fear. However people take care of each other, that is; if you blend in. On the other hand, the centros comerciales have an excess of security which might contribute to the perceptual analogy enclosed/safe.

My craving for intersections in this city makes me complain about not being able to hang out in the centro and propelled by this urban landscape to do so in the centro comercial. In my mind I have redesigned the centro streets as if it was a place- in- potency. Should its reality change for foreigners (extranjeros) to write nice things in their online journals? or, Should the extranjero blend until he or she becomes invisible? (another pirate dvd). John suggested selling pupusas in a corner and simply hang out. What do you think?