10 Days of Rain

I never thought it could actually rain for ten days straight. So the rainy season here is…well…rainy. It lasts about six months. Since I have been here since July it has pretty much rained almost every day. It usually lasts anywhere from an hour to 4 hours, usually in the afternoon or at night. But starting on Tuesday, October 11th, it started pouring rain. Maybe it was Monday night, well, whatever. I mean, the strongest rain I have ever seen come from the sky. Fortunately it stopped for an hour here or there where I could leave my house for a little while. But otherwise the rain was very strong and it was cold, so it made more sense to stay inside, huddle up, and drink massive amounts of hot coffee than get drenched. There have actually been thousands of people in shelters since it started, several homes washed away, mudslides, flash floods and other disasters all over Central America. Fortunately my community is in the mountains, so we only had some road problems with trees falling…and a lot of mud.

got two kitties for my birthday!! One is Tigre (Tiger is Spanish and is orange and white) and one is Cleo.

A person could easily go crazy with that many days basically trapped inside. I finished Atlas Shrugged during this time, for those of you who do not know Aryn Rand, it is a VERY large (over 1,000 pages), very intense and dense book. I also finished two other books. I cooked, prepared for my Assemblea General. I basically took it easy and stayed warm. Finally…yesterday (October 20th) the sun came out around 6 am. It did not rain at all through the night and I literally ran outside and took a photo in excitement. I have never been so happy to see the sun. After living in Colorado where you get 300 days of sunshine, even in the winter, and living in Arizona…where we literally get maybe two weeks of rain a year (or something like that, do not quote me on it). I was SO SO SO SO SO HAPPY TO SEE THE SUN. It lasted till about 9 am. Amazingly the rain did not come ALL DAY. I was in shock.

photo of the sun!
There were moments all day where it suddenly became overcast and I feared that all of my dirty laundry I had just washed in for over two hours in the morning by hand (yes, appreciate your washers and dryers), would be soaked. But surprisingly it was not. I am so happy I bought quick dry clothing as besides some of my underwear; was the only thing that dried completely.

On my birthday it actually did not rain all morning (just in the afternoon) and I visited one of my favorite families, Nina Mercedes who invited me for lunch for my birthday. If it was not for this woman, my birthday would have been nothing special. She made a delicious lunch with steak (rarity in the campo and expensive), we took a bunch of photos together. Her husband was not at the house when I first arrived, which was odd as he is always there. When I asked where he was, she said, “Oh he went to Sonsonate, to buy some things”. Sonsonate is the largest city near me and is an hour bus ride plus hiking out of my community to get there, plus in the pouring rain, I was surprised the buses were running. I did not think much of it after he returned and we finished lunch. Mercedes told me to get the neighbors (also my friends) for us to all sing. I told her that was totally not necessary and she said “Just go!” When I returned, she made me close my eyes and walk back into the house and when I opened them there was a beautiful huge cake with pink frosting.

My birthday cake!
I was in shock and full of happiness. I never thought after all the rain and everything I would get cake on my birthday. I could not stop hugging everyone. I have known these people only a month and I felt so thankful to have them. Minus the rain, STILL not having electricity…It was a great Salvadoran birthday. :-)

one more photo of tigre.