Sportscenter: El Salvador

The last two months of my Peace Corps service has been a time full of feelings of transition and change. I wrapped up two of my largest agricultural projects yet, meaning my daily schedule took a dramatic shift away from having intimidating daily to-do lists to leaving quite a bit more time for relaxing in a hammock brainstorming new project ideas (think: daydreaming, napping, and reading). I also had my Dad visit me in El Salvador then went to Costa Rica with him for a week of bliss and relaxation.

Peace Corps begins preparing Volunteers early in the first month of training for the psychological changes Volunteers notoriously succumb too around the one-year mark—feelings of depression, homesickness, and lack of progress. Although I have yet to struggle with these feelings, it certainly has been an interesting period of reflection, more so as I am in between large projects and have more time than usual to spend merely “thinking” or “planning” instead of “doing.” I find myself satisfied with the amount of progress in my projects, language skills, and community immersion I’ve achieved, but also looking forward to my second year and the projects that loom on the horizon, especially a project, currently in its early phases, introducing small-scale fish farming (tilapia) to about ten families in San Luis.

There are also other reasons the last month or two have represented large changes in my life. I cut my hair for the first time since leaving the States in mid-July 2010 (about 14 months later), meaning I went from hair falling past my shoulders to a close buzz. The following morning I emerged from my house to questions from numerous community members about who exactly I was and what had happened to Max…they literally didn’t recognize me and only the fact that I was the sole white person for miles around was able to assure them it was in fact me, just with shorter hair. Additionally, the revelation that I had a “hair-cutting machine” has led to an almost daily parade of guys coming to my house acting like they are interested in talking about the weather or newest San Luis gossip but really just wanting free haircut.

Also, in the period of time since my last blog post, the sporting aspect of my life has been full of news, leading this blog post to feature a bit of an “ESPN Sportscenter” feel and focus almost solely on the sports happenings of my life San Luis:

- The primary soccer team I play with, C.D. San Luis (the sole team based in my own community), usually enters tournaments twice a year, then fills the rest of the annual schedule with random matches against other teams from all over Western El Salvador. We are currently starting our second tournament of the season, both of which take place on a soccer field just two communities (about a 30-minutes walk) from ours. They both have consisted of six teams with a 10-game regular season (2 games against each team) then a 4-team playoff with two semifinal games then a championship and third place game. Teams earn points (3 for a win, 1 for a tie, and 0 for a loss) during the 10 games comprising the regular season, then the top 4 advance to the playoffs.

We entered this year not only as defending champions but also as winners and owners of the trophies from the last three of these tournaments we had entered (I know, hard to believe, but they had in fact achieved much, even before I, and my unmatched height and equally unmatched lack of experience playing soccer, arrived). The first tournament we began (in early May) started as usual, with us in first place (with 11 points—3 wins, 0 losses, and 2 ties) after the first 5 games. We then began a collapse equaled only by the Dallas Mavericks in the 2006 NBA Finals, managing to lose every single one of our last 5 games, despite having a lead going into the second half of each of those same 5 games (hint: we had some big goalkeeper issues), and didn’t even manage to qualify for the playoffs. Man-talk in San Luis consisted of soccer, tears, shame, and more soccer up until 3 weeks ago when we started a second tournament with a shot at redemption.

So far, our form in this tournament has returned to normal. We are once again in a familiar position, first place, with wins in each of our first 3 games (even I got in on the scoring last Sunday, with my first goal in almost 2 months, netting a first-half goal in a 3-1 win).

- In addition to these adult soccer tournaments which I play in, I have kept myself busy in my time between larger, more intensive projects, in part by organizing youth soccer tournaments in San Luis. About three weeks ago, I had the first, featuring the team I coach from here in San Luis, two teams organized by other Volunteers near me, and a youth team from a neighboring community. While it was great fun organizing the tournament and working with so many young kids, soccer tournaments are definitely one of those things that you don’t realize how complicated and how much work they involve until you actually organize one yourself. Between spending 5 hours the afternoon before getting a mean sunburn and mowing the overgrown grass of the San Luis soccer field with two of the saddest lawn mowers I’ve ever met, waking up at 5 a.m. the day of the tournament to mark all the lines on the soccer field, and forgetting I had to find referees until two days before the tournament and frantically riding my bike to the home of everyone I know with 10 kilometers of San Luis who has experience refereeing trying to find someone with a bit of free time to offer, I certainly wore myself out, but was by no means deterred—I have a second tournament coming up the 17^th of this month and hope things will run a little more smoothly with the experience of a few past lessons learned (mainly, the usefulness of sunscreen).

Shockingly, the largest aspect of the whole soccer tournament experience for me was the amount of accolades and kudos I received for accomplishing something as small as finally getting the grass cut. Although there are rarely, if ever, actual soccer games on the soccer field in San Luis, we (the men’s team) do have soccer practice every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon not marred by rain. Due to the fact that no one in San Luis has a lawnmower, the grass never gets mowed, meaning by the second half of the rainy season, the soccer field can more often closely resemble a Nebraska prairie of knee-high grasses than anywhere a sane person would want to run around kicking a ball. This led to a quite ironic situation, where I literally got more pats on the back and thank-yous from the community (specifically, the men of the community) on cutting the grass (which consisted solely of writing a solicitude to borrow the lawnmowers of the nearby sugarcane processing plant one morning then cutting the grass that afternoon…something apparently no one in San Luis had ever thought to do, but easily accomplished in just one day) than any other project I have worked on, including many which consisted of over 6 months of hard work and perseverance. Great feeling.

- WARNING (especially to all those animal lovers out there): This blog post is about to take a turn from soccer, the national sport of El Salvador, to cock fighting, something maybe only loosely defined as a “sport,” but still, a Salvadoran hobby.

August marked the end of the 2-year commitment to Peace Corps of the group of Volunteers who arrived in El Salvador one year before mine, known as our “sister group,” and consisting of many good friends of mine. This meant despedida (Spanish for a sort of going-away party) season for about 30 Volunteers across the country, which usually mean a community dance or something equally civil. However, a good friend of mine requested a cock fight for his despedida, and I, out of curiousity, decided to make the trek across the country to visit him one last time and check out my first pelea de gallos.

While I went into the cock fight with high expectations (for both entertainment value and monetary gain—I had placed a $.50 bet on the “red one”), I came away a bit let down (on both fronts). While the first 30 seconds of the fight were pretty exciting, as both angry squawks and chopped up feathers were sent flying in a heated swirl of activity, the reality that one of these animals was going to die started to sadly sink in. My emotions hit another high a minute later as it appeared my gallo was poised to go for the knockout blow and win me two quarters (!!!), then he fell for a textbook juke of sorts, and had a major vein in his neck sliced and promptly keeled over a few seconds later. In all, the fight last about 2 or 3 minutes, sending me through a wide range of emotions, but ending with me decidedly against attending many more cock fights. While I remain glad I saw one, I’m not sure raising fighting hens is going to become a new hobby of mine or that I will be making the same request of my community that my friend made for his going-away party.

However, the cock fight was not the only big event of the day. Next, the community had organized another typical Salvadoran activity (which I had previously heard of, but never seen in action), where a tall, straight tree is cut down, cleaned of its bark, polished and greased with oil and butter, then planted in the ground, with sizable chunk of cash and bottle of alcohol strategically perched on top (again, though this type of thing may not make Sportscenter in the States, it can be loosely defined as a sport—I’m sure lumberjacks in Canada have some sort of sporting event resembling this). The idea is to watch members of the community make fools of themselves trying to get the booty at the top of the tree trunk, usually perched about 15 to 20 feet up there. The course of events that follows is pretty standard and certainly followed a typical course in this case: first, come the stray dogs, licking the grease and fat off the bottom of the tall pole while community members stand around, discussing strategy and pacing, too shy to be the first to give it a shot. Soon after, a group of brave young kids give it a try, but usually end up not even getting close, due to their small size, deficiency of strength, and lack of experience. Normally, they end up falling down in a heap, with at least one or two leaving with mild to serious injuries. Next come the drunks of the community, well liquored-up to celebrate the days festivities, and full of a large, but false, sense of ability. They inevitably fail, making even larger fools of themselves than the young kids, and often leaving even more seriously injured. About an hour later, come a group of young men, who form some sort of strategy, in this case, standing on each other shoulders 4-men high and praying not to fall, and eventually successfully reaching the top. While this event certainly lasted a little longer than the cock fight, it also took place as a punishing rain storm arrived, meaning I watched from the front porch of the nearest house, while most were only praying no one got too seriously hurt from a slippery fall or struck by lightning while cleverly attempting to climb a tall, bare tree trunk located in the middle of a soccer field high atop a volcano in the middle of a fierce lightning storm (talk about asking for it…).

- On the basketball front, sadly I have little to report, as the basketball league I play in, located in the nearest town, seems to be in the midst of a lockout, much like our counterparts in the NBA. Although the issues are a bit different, the date of the opening tip-off of the coming season is equally in doubt, as two groups within the league are angrily split on the importance of hiring out-of-town referees (from my experience in this league, very important—for the sake of both the safety of the referees and the validity of foul calls, which I’ve personally observed to be a bit suspicious at times).

- In the last update, and only one not related to sports, I’m proud to report my Salvadoran cultural transformation may finally be complete. Two days ago, while goofing around with the kids that live next door to me, a large rip opened up around the knee of my pants. That officially marked the moment when every single one of the five pairs of pants I originally arrived with in El Salvador has now been patched, sewn, and torn at least once (and in one case, 5 times). I consider this a badge of honor and am certain it makes me, or at least my pants, fit in much better with everyone else in San Luis and rural El Salvador as a whole. Also, two pairs of shoes I brought were tossed long ago due to never being able to dry out and basically being eaten alive by mold. Also, two others now have holes large enough to see quite a bit of light through in the soles. But don’t worry Mom: duct tape has dutifully repaired both pairs of shoes and (due, strictly, to my pants) I have outstanding debts to every old woman with a sewing machine in San Luis.