Today’s excitement was the marketplace. Gary Richards, Canaan, JM, Luis, Gissela, and I knocked on doors on the half mile walk to the marketplace. This was downtown Usulutan. Everything from soccer balls to live crabs were sold there. I wanted to buy a soccer uniform, but was persuaded to wait. The marketplace was similar to China, except the local paid less attention to us. It was as if they expected us or that we were an everyday occurrence.
We almost went into an air conditioned grocery store, but decided to head back. We met a lady from California. On the way back we met a couple of peace corp volunteers who had stayed 2 years in El Salvador.
Let’s talk about Oscar. Oscar is this 8 year old kid who seems to hand around all of us “young guys.” He started off as Phil’s shadow. But later on as Canaan and I waited outisde the gates, he started giving us bear hugs. A very clingy kid. Still I wonder what kind of future Oscar has. Such a cute kid – probably 10 years down the road, he’ll be a father himself with his own family. Stuck in the same place as before. Have we made a difference in Oscar’s life? I hope so. May he is very interested in Sunday school VBS that he’ll come to church services. But somehow I think it might just be the grengos around that keep him excited.
Phil has been leading evening singing. The past 2 nights it has bee pretty loud. You could hear it pretty clearly from where we are staying.
Some kid – about 10 years old – cut his hand and came to our clinic after closing time. We sedated him and gave him 12 stitches. Maybe he was playing with his machete.
There is some debate tonight about going back early. We’ve given out alot of medicine and are almost running out. We have enough left for 300 patients. There is talk about going to the hotel Wednesday night instead of Thursday night. It would mean an extra night in the hotel. I don’t care either way.
Well, I’ve run out of things to write. I really need to get out the video camera tomorrow.