Semana Santa

Happy Easter/Pascua. It was a good semana santa here in San Salvador and a little sad to see it end because it brought a lot of life to the community, oh and a little dengue. All of the relatives from the cities came to visit and transported the mosquitoes with them on the busses.

Wednesday the 31st of march started semana santa with the making of the chipa. There was a countdown for a least a week or more before. 3 weeks before I saw people buying their cheese and corn flour to make the chipa. People had been hording their eggs for months, and 2 days before there were no eggs in san salvador, and no one was nice enough to give me some. All I wanted was a fried egg, I wasn't going to make 10 kilos of chipa. Chipa, a traditional Paraguayan food. I think I've talked about it before, delicious.

Anyways....I was asked by every single woman, man and child if I was going to make chipa. No I said to all, but I was going to help someone. I was invited by my new friend Nancy to her house to make chipa. I arrived in the early morning and 5 hours later we had 11 kilos of chipa, 1 jakare, the chipa that looked like and alligator that I gave to david,and 3 birds, my wrists were killing me and I told myself, never ever will I make Chipa alone. I am willing to pay 2 mil when I want to eat chipa.

Thursday is the big food, feast, bbq day. David and I were invited to the same place for a sheep bbq. They had to kill their sheep because their house and yard were flooded with the rain and the sheep broke his leg so they killed it before it got a fever. I had told the family the day before how the tradition on Easter in the United States it to paint the Easter eggs and hide them, not chocolate eggs, but hard boiled eggs, and how my parents would forget where they hid them and 3 months later we would find rotten eggs. They thought it was hilarious. My job was to bring a potato salad to the feast and so I boiled some eggs and dyed them and took them to the house to make the salad. Well of course we all know that when you dye the eggs a lot of times the dye gets on the white part too, so the salad had a nice color of red and purple. After eating we drank wine with Nancy and her boyfriend, oscar. They are going to be good friends. We're going to go fishing together.

Friday... Good Friday. You can't eat, well you can eat chipa. The people think because you can't eat meat, you can't eat anything. I mean what else is there..? Its also the day where you do nothing. There was nothing open and noo movement in the town. I was really bored really quick. So after eating, well i was hungry, David and I went fishing down at the train station. Fishing...bamboo pole with a worm and a hook. Yea yea I know that’s how it was in the old days mom. We got some pescaditos, little fish, that i later fed to the cats. They were happy! David was hooked he made plans with the man who lives and cares for the station to go back later that night. He left at 7 and got home at 10:30 with a bag full of goodies. 2 big fish and 2 eels, i think, they looked like snakes. He was very happy.

Saturday... Things were open again and people were in the streets. After washing 50 pieces of clothing I went to go visit Cynthia and Juila. We talked, drank terere, painted nails, made empanandas de choclo, and drank more terere. They were all talking that the weather is finally going to change. It’s been hot for 5 months and that Sunday it was going to cool down. The mass was from 8 till 11. Then the Fiesta de Pascua started at 12 am. We went and danced until 4 am. Lots of fun! It has been awhile since I've danced. There really aren’t a lot of fiestas here in San Salvador.

Sunday...today. Its cold, the women were right. Good thing we washed all of the clothing yesterday when it was still really really hot. Today I woke up super early, couldn't sleep, I was itching. So sick of itching. Not sure what I am going to do today. I feel like making pancakes!