Hamburgesas y Energia Electrica, what more could a girl want for Halloween?

(Grandpa and Kitty Cat)
This weekend was amazing; I traveled to San Salvador (the capital down here in El Sal) for a fundraiser/Halloween Peace Corps party. It was a lot fun! It was great to see a bunch of volunteers, eat some good ol’ American candy and yada yada. There were some amazing costumes, people even had custom made (which here is like $5-10 if you bring the material); there was a chicken/egg combination, John Smith and Pocahontas, as well as several El Salvadoran characters which were entertaining. I went as a gypsy, mostly because I did not have to buy anything, which everyone guessed pretty much correctly and asked if I already owned everything I was wearing. I was totally fine with that, I still had a blast letting loose and hanging out.

Being PC volunteers, we get free access to the Sheraton Hotel here, such a nice perk. Supposedly hot showers (though mine was cold for some reason), lockers, the gym, and the pool are all ours free to use whenever we want or are in the capital. Minus the pool being FREEZING COLD, it was nice to relax by the pool, in a nice a hotel and chill. After heading to the hostel where the party was, I met up with my friend Zaks, who works for USAID and hosted myself and two other volunteers over Rosh Hashanah. It was great to catch up with him and his friend, who I had met before as well. We went to the InterContinental Hotel (even nicer than the Sheraton) and had delicious sushi. He treated me, which was very sweet.
It was lovely to escape for awhile and enjoy delicious spicy tuna rolls and tempura. :-)
Once Sunday rolled around, I visited the ‘cream of the crop’ of Super Selectos (the grocery store chain here) just to see what they had, I found…Root Beer. It was succulently delicious. They had all kinds of other amazing things like red curry paste to hummus and other international imports. It was fun to explore, but I came to a point where I thought it was getting late and time to head home. I have heard several things from volunteers, some rarely leave their site or the other extreme where they do not always report they are leaving (we have to notify PC every time we travel), because they travel a tad too much than we are allotted. A lot of volunteers say it’s tough to return to your life in the Campo after being in the capital for a weekend, just because it’s two different extremes.
But, when I returned to my site (after the 45 minute hike up hill), I could not have been happier to be…HOME. First, my mom surprised me and moved a bed (instead of the wood framed thin mattress pad type thing I was sleeping on for a month) into my room, that a family nearby had offered me to take for free but I kept forgetting to get around to move it down my hill (these usually cost anywhere from $100-200, that’s 2/3 of my monthly salary).

(check out 1. the light bulb is one 2. my new bed)
THEN, the other great surprise is…drum roll…..WE HAVE ELECTRICTY!!!
This means I can charge my laptop after I write this post and finish watching the rest of Modern Family Season 2 which I stole from someone in my group. I was so so so happy. I have never been so happy to have electricity before in my life. The second part is that I was invited that night for dinner with the same family that gave me the bed and when I walked over they were cooking hamburgers AND French fries with KETCHUP for me. They DO NOT eat hamburgers here, I have never seen it. They had to go to the two larger cities near me to buy the buns, plus the meat (the meat they sell in the markets is SUPER tough, like beef jerky), so this was huge. I told them they did not have to make American food for me and that I love Salvadoran food (fact). But, they said that they wanted to bring part of my home here and they thought I would enjoy a treat. Thank goodness I am NOT a vegetarian was all I kept thinking. Can you imagine having a family make you a special meal from the states and then NOT be able to eat it? I was so SO happy though. I ran (more like hobbled down the very steep hill) to my house and grabbed my camera, hobbled back and took photos for all of you to see.

Preparing the Hamburgers...

French Fries over a wood fire pit...
Hence why electricity and hamburgers is the title of this post, I could not have been happier. Who has a better home coming than that? I love my community and I have feeling I will be opting out for trips to the capital and more time in my community over the next two years, which in my option is the whole point of Peace Corps, it’s starting to feel that this is where I belong.

Smiles after a delicious meal! :-)