life’s not a paragraph

this past week we had a few meetings/classes for my el salvador trip. it was a little stressful to have to go to all the extra classes but it was worth it. we had some great discussions and i learned a lot about el salvador’s history and it’s current issues.

the best part of the week was when i got to listen to some of the life stories of charlie clements and sister peggy. they both were in el salvador during the salvadoran civil war. they both entered the country voluntarily and helped civilians. sister peggy as worked in the church in the town. charlie worked as a doctor and a surgeon in the mountains, helping the civilians and families of the guerillas.

this post can’t really describe the experience i had listening to these two amazing people talk. i don’t think i can really describe it. but i can say that these are the two most incredible people i have ever met. they have stories of climbing 50 miles hikes multiple times a week, sneaking medicine through check points, challenging border guards and digging up shallow graves to return the bodies to the families. insane stories that you want to think are just from movies, but they are just so hard to believe because they are so real.

i just spent two hours with them. that was just the tip of the iceberg. we are going to sister peggy’s centro del arte para la paz (center of art for peace). we are going to get to spend days hearing her stories and seeing what she has built for the people she has lived with for the past twenty years.

even though i knew this trip was going to be life changing, the talk we had this week convinced me completely. i’m  going in less than two months! life changing experience– here i come!