Walking With El Salvador

Today is Blog Action Day, and the topic of the day is food. Today has also brought more rain, more mud, more flood, more loss and more grief to the people of El Salvador. It has been hard to keep up with the news from all of the sister church communities with which we are connected. It's hard to think about our friends being wet and hungry and scared. It's hard not to think about what all of this rain will mean for the dry season ahead -- what the loss of corn and beans and fruits and vegetables will mean for families who are wet and hungry tonight, but face a long dry possibility of being very hungry in the months ahead. During the non-stormy times, we talk together about food sustainability and learn together about organic gardening and maximizing land use and fertility by growing companion crops and creating city gardens in pots and vertical spaces. During the stormy times, we give thanks for emergency foods which have been stored for a rainy day... "Today we went to ...

No hay agua. No hay agua. The phrase echos through one house, then another. There's no water. Our sister community was born in 1996 as a resettlement community of in-country war refugees. Back then, the water came from "the dirty river" - a stream of mostly run-off water that gathered at the bottom of the hill. Or, women could walk an hour to a spring-fed river - a lovely gushing water source during the rainy season, and a trickle through a dry ditch during the dry season. A great place to play and bathe and scrub laundry on the rocks along the stream. The first w ell was dug at the bottom of the hill near the dirty river. Women dipped their buckets into the well, filled their plastic jugs and carried water up the hill. The installation of a windlass was a good improvement. The installation of an electric pump was even better. A few more years passed, the community grew, and water sources were placed in the pathways. It didn't take long for the development of...