Day 2: Gratitude, and dark chocolate

The kids and I just returned from an incredible trip. We were in northern Morazan, in El Salvador -- the poorest region of the country and the epicenter of the civil war --  volunteering at a maternity center and an elementary school.  An eclectic group of 14 suburban DC moms and kids wandered out of our comfort zone, to return forever changed.  We shared what we could -- recipes and cooking lessons, breathing exercises and yoga, pottery and crafts with the lovely pregnant women at the Casa Materna.  From them we learned things far more valuable -- grace and strength and a quiet calm, no doubt under intense pressures. One woman was preparing for her 14th child.  At Amun Shea, the school next door, our kids shared what they love -- making paper airplanes, doing crafts and making cards, teaching gimp and dance, playing jump rope and basketball.  Together with their new found friends, they played games in fields of banana and coffee trees, hiked holding hands, swam and splashed in waterfalls (even crossing into Honduras!), and figured out  just how far a smile can go.   And perhaps they learned the most valuable lesson of all:  how fortunate they are -- we are -- and how important it is to know and care about how the majority of the world lives.   In our house now, I simply say "Irvin", and the kids straighten up a bit.  Irvin is a sweet, quiet boy, about 10, whose family we visited.  He gets up at 4:30 every morning, has a cold bucket bath outside his two room adobe house, walks an hour to catch a bus to reach school by 7:30am; and does it all over again, and again.

This was the first international service trip organized by MoverMoms, and it wouldn't have been possible without the extraordinary leadership and hard work of two people: MoverMoms founder and my dearest friend Rebecca Kahlenberg, and local Peace Corps volunteer and all around good guy Daniel Hinkle.   To both, a sincere and humble thank you.  Today, Saanya, Zayd and I put together a care package to send to Daniel.  We filled it with craft supplies for Casa Materna and Amun Shea, and a few treats that Daniel and the other peace corps volunteers miss most about home: almond butter and dark chocolate!   Day 2: Deed 2: a tiny package of gratitude for an experience never to be forgotten.