Volunteer Testimony: Working in El Salvador

It’s hard to find the words to articulate a week-long Habitat trip. I just finished my fourth a couple weeks ago and still have so many fond memories of the lifelong friends and not-so-lifelong boyfriends I made during the three spring break collegiate challenges I went on almost a decade ago. This time, I went solo on a Global Village trip to El Salvador on November 10-18 of this year. There were 12 of us – ten Americans and two Canadians – some of whom were traveling with a friend but most of whom didn’t know another person in the group.

My friends and family asked me before I left if I was nervous about whether or not I’d get along with these strangers. I always replied with the same thing: if someone is willing to give up their vacation time and money to go do hard labor in another country, you know that person is going to be pretty amazing. I’m more than happy to say that I was completely correct in my judgment. I fell in love with each of the eleven other people who trekked down to El Salvador to give (a lot) of themselves to help create affordable housing.

Most of the group met at the airport in San Salvador and spent the day exploring and learning about the capital city. We also ate our first Pupusas (a traditional El Salvadoran dish of stuffed tortillas—delicious!). The next day we traveled by bus several hours to San Miguel, a large city not far from the village of Gualuca in which we’d be working. We had lunch with several of the homeowners and their children/grandchildren, as well as the masons in charge of the construction.

When we got to the site on Monday morning, we drove up dirt roads that seemed narrower than our bus, next to cows, chickens, past smiling and waving people who were obviously happy to see us there. We were the first crew to work on the two side-by-side houses, and our first work was to finish digging the foundations. The rest of the week’s work was spent tying rebar, shoveling rocks and sand to mix concrete (there was no way that a cement truck would make it to the sites), hauling water up the hill, passing concrete blocks up the hill, and mortaring the bricks in place. It was hard, physically demanding work. But I’d be lying if I said I was happy to be done and go home.

The current homes of the home owners (who will be moving into their new homes any day) have dirt floors, no electricity, doors made out of branches, and tin walls. Their new homes are built to protect them from the daily earthquakes, with doors and windows, tile floors, running water, and electrical hook-ups. And each house has a brick with greetings, warm wishes, and the names of the 12 of us.

Jenna Hanson, Twin Cities Habitat YPN Member