La Laguna Favorites

Favorite thing: One of my Peace Corps friends did me one better with the leadership training, organizing a three-day soccer and leadership camp for approximately fifty-five young women in Puerto El Triunfo, Usulután. Along with another volunteer and a Puerto El Triunfo local, I worked on the soccer side of things, serving as a coach for the first two days, and then as referee for the end-of-camp tournament. Great fun; even though the average temperature in Puerto El Triunfo must be around 110 (it felt that way, at least). After the camp ended, we were rewarded with a trip out to an isolated beach, courtesy of the Salvadoran Navy.

Favorite thing: During the time when I was active with the CIVI (the Comité Interinstitucional para la Prevención y Atención de la Violencia Intrafamiliar), I thought it might be a good idea to organize some short hikes so that children from the town of La Laguna would have the opportunity to get to know some of the neighboring villages. It seemed like a worthwhile thing to do because I had noticed that a number of the kids I got to know while working in the local high school (particularly the girls) had never been to many of the cantones and caseríos that are within walking distance of town. A few community members that were also active in the CIVI thought that an organized hike would allow us to talk to kids about domestic violence and related issues. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to convince enough kids to take part, so the CIVI hike never happened. However, I did participate in a similar activity organized by youth groups in the neighboring municipality of Comalapa, joining roughly forty people in a day long hike to La Montañona. And I took five high school students from La Laguna to Llano Grande (a cantón of Concepción Quezaltepeque) to go visit some newly constructed swimming pools. We got there by bus, though, so I suppose it doesn’t really count as a rural “walk.”

Favorite thing: One of the few specific requests that the La Laguna City Hall had when they asked the Peace Corps to send a volunteer to the municipality was that they needed help promoting their projects and activities to members of the surrounding communities. Towards that end, I worked with City Hall in 2001/2002 to promote “Cabildos Abiertos Informativos” that were held in La Laguna and in Concepción Quezaltepeque to inform the local population about the massive road paving project that had been organized by the Mancomunidad La Montañona (a regional governmental entity formed by the seven municipalities that surround the La Montañona forest). For the meeting held in La Laguna, I also organized the cultural activities that formed part of the meeting.

Favorite thing: For some reason, a wave of Brazilophilia swept through El Salvador during the time I lived in the country. One result of this sudden fondness for all things brasileiros was the decision to create the “Primer Gran Carnaval Chalateco do Brasil,” a celebration held in Chalatenango and sponsored by the Brazilian Embassy in San Salvador. Of course, there couldn’t be a celebration without a beauty pageant, so the various municipalities in the department were invited to send candidates. Somehow, it was decided by someone that I should work with La Laguna’s candidate to help her prepare for the interview part of the beauty contest. So I did. I also prepared two pages of information about La Laguna and another page about the candidate which then formed part of the event’s official webpage.

Favorite thing: After FODES and ISDEM (two government institutions that support the activities of El Salvador’s local governments) had prepared an enormous map of the urban center of La Laguna in anticipation of the City Hall’s efforts to collect a newly-minted property tax, I thought it might be a good idea – and something fun to do – to create a digital version of the map. Since simply scanning the original wasn’t an option, I had to draw a scale version by hand and then re-draw that on the computer, using some primitive drawing software. Surprisingly, the final version turned out pretty good, and the fellow in City Hall who was in charge of all matters related to the property tax did end up handing out at least a few copies of the map. Unfortunately, I seem to have lost mine, both the original drawing and the computerized version.

Favorite thing: For some reason, small towns in El Salvador tend to renovate their central plaza once every couple of years. My suspicion is that the reason for these frequent renovations and re-renovations is that, since most of the funds spent on these projects go to pay the salaries of local day laborers, these projects allow local politicians to reward their supporters (and gain new ones) by doling out fairly decent-paying jobs. During the 2002 renovation, I took two series of photos of the work in progress in order to help the supervising architect create a presentation of the project.

Favorite thing: For four months in 2003, the City Hall in La Laguna was abuzz with activity, trying to explain the various irregularities that El Salvador’s “Corte de Cuentas” (a government auditing mechanism) had uncovered during their examination of La Laguna’s paperwork. Since the City Hall staff always treated me well, I agreed to help them put their response together. In the end, working with the municipal secretary, the accountant, the UACI (the fellow responsible for contracting the execution of development projects approved by the city council), and a team of internal auditors, I helped prepare four reports and a total of 179 spreadsheets that were sent to the Corte de Cuentas to fulfill its demands.

Favorite thing: Truth be told, most of the time I spent in City Hall was spent chit-chatting with the rarely busy municipal employees, but I did make myself useful every now and then. One of my contributions was to teach three City Hall employees how to use the internet to download government documents and to access legal information. I also helped them establish an official email account, and later taught two employees how to use Microsoft Excel more efficiently.