Hope

The wonderful thing about life--when so many things seem to be going poorly in the world, something happens to inspire and bring hope.

I spent Monday and Tuesday with an AMAZING group of teenagers from Houston, Texas. A Peace Corps Volunteer here in El Salvador worked with a teacher at an alternative school in the States to arrange a service learning trip to her village in El Salvador. The students that came down here were Hispanic (several of their parents were born in El Salvador), so all of them spoke Spanish and didn't seem quite as wide eyed as so many of us gringos! It was neat to see the cultural exchange between the kids and the people in the village here. It was also beautiful to see a REAL, human relationship between students and teachers, as well. The teachers shared with me that time is spent with both students and families--isn't that a novel idea?!

The most inspiring part for me, though, was seeing how hard these kids worked, how respectful they were to people, and how much they really seemed to care...So many times we hear about how children in the US don't have values anymore, are "me centered"--all of you know the rhetoric that I'm talking about! And I've experienced it, too...I get frustrated with the lack of knowledge and caring of so many people in the world, but this group of students and teachers brought hope back into my heart. So much of my experience here in El Salvador has been just that--learning how to hope again. Many, many people here (both Salvadoran and American) have given me the beautiful gift of hope.

While the students are here for 2 weeks they are building latrines, teaching English classes, life skills classes, and planting grass in an attempt to prevent further soil erosion.

If you want to find out more about the school, their website is:
http://www.yesprep.org