A Day in Our Life

Written by Bessie about El Salvador. Feelin' normal

So nowadays we're living in San Salvador, El Salvador. Translation: Saint Savior, The Savior. Yes, they like Jesus here. A lot. (Statue is Salvador del Mundo = World Savior in our fair city; photo courtesy of Walkyman on Flickr.com)

Anyways, we've set up a life for ourselves here in Savior-town. We have an apartment. Rented a car for 2 months. And although it's usually not amazing, we cook for ourselves everyday. We have our own 5 gallon water dispenser, wine bottle opener, and well, a plunger. Yep, we live here all right.

A typical day in our life goes something like this:

7:45 wake up turn on CNN or MTV (uh, yep, 50 channels of spanish programming to choose from, but in the morning it's American culture goodness all the way. MTV ExFactor & Made are our favorites. I don't think I've ever had favorite shows let alone knew what was on MTV before living out of the states. Culture shock does funny things.

8 am take a shower in our funny shower hose style shower. Doesn't get a lot warmer than a hose either. Our Apartment - 2nd Floor

8:30 Cheerios or Raisin Bran for breakfast.

9 am Drive to work and share the largest office at work - ok fine, it's the kitchen table. We "work"/volunteer M-F 9-5 at Glasswing International - a non-profit based out of El Salvador that works with businesses and individuals to volunteer and give back to the community. It's basically like where I used to work, Chicago Cares, and they're working to become part of the same international network of 40+ affiliates.

All morning - Kyle's the code-a-riffic extraordinaire in the office and is programming 2 websites for them. I'm sort of a share my volunteer management experience/ manage website content/ can you help with this? role.

(entrance to our office; Kyle and Lupe working at our "desk"; 2 of the office dogs)

12-1:30 pm 3 days a week we teach English as a Second Language (ESL) to a group of about 8-15 teachers at a local elementray school, Concha Viuda. They're super sweet and excited to learn from us. Some had the basics down (Halo, nice tu met you.), others only knew things like Saturday Night Fever and We Are the Champions. A recent class we taught them about ordinal numbers for dates and used a Washington DC map to practice things like 14th and N. They loved it.

mid-afternoon break Pet the dogs! The founders here are uber cool and have not 1, not 2, but 3 wiener dogs. Currently they're pet sitting a 4th one. Needless to say they LOVE dachshunds. I can't say enough how awsome it is having dogs in the office. Everyone should do it. They're wonderful. AND, lucky me (a dog fan), Kyle's former cat preference has now been turned upside-down. We'll be dogs all the way when we get back stateside. Right hubby dearest??

(Bessie & Monster; Lupe, Jackpot & Monster)

5-ish Ok, so yeah, not only do we have cable, a maid, and a car, we got 2 for 1 gym memberships at the Radisson. Yep, our life's real tough here in San Salvador. The hotel gym has your essential: some weights, tredmill, and an outdoor pool with a view of the nearby volcano.

(image courtesy of truepanther on flickr.com)

Din-Din Time - A touch challenging with the low power electric burners we have, but we make due. Our typical is spaghetti wheat pasta or chicken nuggets, can veggies & Mac n Cheese. With burners that take 20 minutes to get water to a boil, we haven't really been cooking to impress.

Nights vary from listening to This American Life podcasts, to happy hours with our co-workers, to defeating the army of ants that have entered our world.

Not bad, not too bad at all. Definitely suits us for 3 months.

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June 20, 2008 DADDIO: It all sounds very mellow! The doggies are beautiful! All the BEST to both of you...

June 23, 2008 Bessie: 4 doggies somedays = anything but mellow, but they're great fun in an office!

June 23, 2008 Anne: Ah yes, when I first moved to Vienna, I watched CNN and MTV too! It felt good to hear....English.

Your love nest in San Salvador sounds great. Enjoy!

Oh! And thanks for the postcard!!!!!!!!
Love you two. Mwah.

June 23, 2008 Kyle: Ya, I feel way more up on American culture here than in the states. I'm glad we're not alone in our ways...

June 23, 2008 Kelvin: Hey!

I wanted to say hello, I live in El Salvador:) I found your blog while I was watching a video of the game El Salvador and Panama and it was your youtube username. Curiosity got the best of me and here I am commenting your blog.

If you were wondering why my english is okay, I also lived up in the states, to be exact California!
May I say your blog and entries are very interesting too read, very creative and I like the pictures, they add an extra bonus.

June 23, 2008 Bessie: glad you like our site & go El Salvador!!! Si, se puede!!!

July 01, 2008 Carrie Lynn: Hey!

Dogs are way better than cats! Way to change your mind, Kyle! By the way, isn't teaching a lot of fun?

July 02, 2008 Kyle: Teaching adults is fun...if there were like 30 kids, it might drive me batty.

July 02, 2008 Karla Sanchez: Hey Kyle and Bessie I was browsing on youtube for some El Salvador clips and I saw the video of El Salvador vs Panama and it had your website so here I am... I was born in El Salvador came to Los Angeles when I was 5 and I've been back to visit about 4 times but the last time i visited was back in Nov. 2000, so it's been a while :-( ... Anyway I just wanted to commend you both for the great work you are doing over there and for this great website you have created ! I love the video clips I feel like I am there! And another thing your spanish is soooo good muy muy bueno. Also make sure to try the pupusa's, pastelitos, empanadas, and the fresco's they're delicious!! Have fun and thanks for this cool website.

July 02, 2008 Bessie: I'm glad you found our site and like it! Our idea is that people feel like their traveling with us. :)

Thanks for the spanish compliments & food recommendations. I actually just has my first pastelito the other day, and it was pretty yummy!

July 11, 2008 Linda: No matter how fluent you are in another language, when traveling and you come across an English speaking TV station, it is like finding a friend in the wilderness. Can't tell you how many times we watched the same CNN or BBC news stories, over and over again, when we were in Paris even though we were getting pretty good at instantly translating some verrrrrrry interesting French films! Sometimes actions speak much louder than words...... :)!

July 11, 2008 Bessie: haa haa - like a friend in the wilderness is right! I've never been a big tv watcher, but man, now, tv's like a new friend in our lives...