1,000 Volunteer Hours and Counting

Written by Bessie about El Salvador. Feelin' excited
Bessie_excited
We’re celebrating a 1,000 volunteers hours since we hit the road.  Over 800 of those have been here in El Salvador.  You might be thinking something along these lines:
  • “What have you been doing in all that time?”
  • “Wow, that’s a lot of volunteering.  Is that what unemployed people do?
  • “Can you come volunteer to paint my house?”
So here’s the 411.  I LOVE volunteerism.  It’s right up there with my love for traveling, and that’s pretty high.  To me it’s the best way to get to know people, feel accomplished, and be leaving some place better than you came (that might be trademarked the Girl Scouts).  My last two jobs have been leading volunteer programs, and this time I took it a step further: volunteering to grow volunteer programs.  Getting a little trippy, huh.


Volunteers in Action
So here’s more concretely what we’ve been doing.  My expertise is in program management, and down here I’ve contributed to painting schools, improving a sports complex and beautifying the city.  This is what it looks like:

Crisalida Volunteers Painting in Soyapango, El SalvadorBessie painting a mural with Crisalida in Soyapango, El SalvadorCrisalida Volunteers Painting in Soyapango, El Salvador
Volunteers painting a school, Centro Escolar Dr. Orlando de Sola. Soyapango, El Salvador

little trees & big holes...Kyle & volunteers painting hopscotchnew gardens planted by volunters

Planting trees, vegetables, and painting line games at this sports complex/ community center, Fusalmo.  Soyapango, El Salvador  (zanahoria = carrots)

Before: El Salvador39 After: El Salvador49Post painted by Crisálida in Zona Rosa, El Salvador
Painting street posts from political colors (it’s a presidential election here too!) to reflect the community.  Zona Rosa in San Salvador, El Salvador (see more)


Sitios Web
I also helped create some of the content for the two awesome websites Kyle created.  Professional, well-maintained websites add so much credibility to whatever is on the page, and in the world of non-profits, where money can be tight, it can really make a difference.
Glasswing International Homepage Crisalida Homepage

Glasswing International is the half of the organization that has U.S. leadership and engages companies, Kyle rebuilt most of this site.  Crisálida is the volunteer half of the organization and appeals to local people and organizations.  Kyle built this from scratch.

A couple of the super schnazzy things the sites have is a super innovative donation page that I came really hoping to create; photo displays; and awesome behind the scenes stuff that you users can’t see, but make managing the site really easy.  Kyle has a lot to be proud of with these.


Ing-lis
We also taught English 3 days a week to teachers at a local elementary school.  Numbers, restaurant vocab, basic conversation – it was a ride.  Did you know we say dates using ordinal numbers (those took a few days to teach, let alone pronounce – th is rough on Spanish speakers)?  And that Do and Did in questions is really hard to explain?  Our last class we translated Celebration (celebrate good times – come on!) and Get Out of My Dreams & Get into My Car with them – that was awesome.


Hmmm...
So, that’s our last three months in a nutshell.  It’s a dream come true for me to finally have international work experience under my belt, and I don’t know about you, but I’m really looking forward to seeing where it takes me.  As for Kyle, I don’t think he misses the meetings & politics of Corporate America, but I know he misses the internet connection.

We’re gonna miss our co-workers – thanks for everything you guys – and of course the office sausages.
Glasswing staffWork Dogs

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