April 28 –Building the Wall, and Searching for Pupusas in the Village
After breakfast, we discussed the day’s tasks as usual. I continued building the wall, and this time Ranulfo assigned the newly arrived volunteer, Karina, to work alongside me.
Despite her young age, Karina was remarkably capable and experienced. She had grown up in a village and had spent a lot of time working with livestock and plants, so manual labor was nothing new to her. She had no previous experience in construction, but I was happy to teach her.
Hagen and I had already laid one row of rocks and secured them with concrete, so on this day we continued with the same process. I showed Karina how to mix the concrete in the right proportions, what to pay attention to when positioning the rocks, and how to make sure the wall was stable.
She learned quickly, worked skillfully, and we soon developed a good rhythm together. We spoke exclusively in Spanish, which was an added pleasure for me.
By lunchtime, we had managed to put up and secure more than one row. We talked about all kinds of things while we worked. I liked that she enjoyed traveling, felt close to nature, and that, in the long run, she too dreamed of living as self-sufficiently as possible.
On top of that, she spoke the same foreign languages as I did, and she was also passionate about Latin culture.
After lunch, everyone went off to rest for a while. I continued reading my book in the hammock.
Even after two weeks, it still felt incredible to be living in this magical environment: birds singing, lush vegetation, and huge trees all around me. It felt as if I had stepped into a completely different world.
In the late afternoon, we discussed with the other volunteers that we would go into the village to eat pupusas. We went around to every possible place, but unfortunately none of them was still open.
In the end, we settled for buying a few beers and sitting out in the village square. We sat there together, having a few drinks, talking, and enjoying the simple, peaceful evening.
April 29 – Watering Plants, Building the Wall with Bottles, and Sunset in the Mountains
The end of April is the hottest time of the year in El Salvador. It is the final part of the hot, dry season, as the rainy season begins in May. Because of this, the garden flowers have to be watered every day if they are to survive this period.
These plants are mainly herbs and ornamental plants near the house that require more water. Ranulfo usually takes care of this himself, but since there were four of us volunteers, he assigned two people each day to start their daily tasks by watering the plants.
Today, Hagen and I did the watering while the dogs ran around us.
We needed a lot of sand to continue building the wall, but there was none down in the garden near the wall. There was a large pile of sand up by the entrance gate, and today we had to carry it down.
Just like carrying the rocks, this was not easy work, but fortunately we were both in good shape. We shoveled the sand into 100-liter sacks and then transported them by wheelbarrow to the other end of the garden, where we had to lift the sacks, weighing more than 30 kilos, onto our shoulders and carry them down the stepped section of the garden.
After just a few sacks, we were already dripping with sweat, but it did not bother me at all. Here, I simply enjoyed any kind of physical work. It was a pleasure to live here in this beautiful garden.
This work took about an hour, until we had collected enough sand to last a few days of concrete work.
After that, we joined Ruben, who was busy raking up the dry leaves and carrying them away. That did not take more than half an hour either.
We still had more than two hours before lunch, and on Ranulfo’s advice, we went down to the pool to continue building the wall with Karina.
Inspired by an earlier wall, we planned to incorporate empty beer bottles into ours. Ranulfo had been planning this for a long time: just like the old car tires, he wanted to recycle waste and give it a new purpose in the garden.
He had accumulated several sacks of bottles, which looked like they would be enough for quite a few rows.
We mixed a wheelbarrow full of concrete and started building the bottles into the wall. We placed the bottles in a row on an even concrete base, leaving about five centimeters between them, and then covered them with concrete.
We managed to build two and a half rows before lunch.
For lunch today, Doña Reina cooked chicken with rice and other vegetables for us.
After lunch and the usual afternoon rest, I started working out. For quite some time, I had been determined to incorporate daily exercise into my free time here.
The equipment available here was perfect for bodyweight training for my back, chest, and the other muscle groups as well. Besides pull-ups and dips, I also did push-ups and lifted weights.
I aimed for short, simple workouts so that they would be as easy as possible to fit into any day.
In the late afternoon, Ranulfo suggested a group activity: there was a café with a lookout point in the nearby mountains, and from its terrace we could admire the beautiful sunset.
Ruben volunteered to stay home and look after the garden, since he had already been there several times.
Four of us got into the car: Karina, Hagen, me, and Ranulfo.
After just 20 minutes of driving along the mountain dirt roads, we arrived at the café with the lookout point. We sat out on the terrace, ordered a cold drink, and gazed into the distance as we watched the sun disappear.
Meanwhile, Ranulfo told us about the area and about the old days.
When it got dark, we returned to Bambú, where the new volunteer, Nathan, was already waiting for us.
With Nathan, there were now three young German volunteers among us. Fortunately, Nathan also spoke surprisingly fluent Spanish.
Like the other two Germans, he was also taking a gap year and spending this period traveling around Latin America and volunteering.
April 30 – The Bottle Wall, Cooking, an Iguana, and a Mountain Pool
Today, Karina and I continued building the wall, and we managed to reach the end of the fourth row. The work was not easy, especially mixing the concrete in the scorching heat.
The finishing work required the most attention, though: in order for the bottles to remain clearly visible, after we finished working, once the concrete had dried slightly, I watered them several times so that the concrete would not set over them.
It was worth the extra effort because they sparkled beautifully in the light.
Now that there were four of us volunteers, we also divided up the household chores: each day, we assigned specific people to cooking and cleaning.
Today, Karina and I were on kitchen duty. We did not want to overcomplicate things, so we threw together a simple lunch – the important thing was to have something tasty and filling after working under the blazing sun.
Just before we sat down to eat, Ruben appeared in front of us from the garden with an almost half-meter-long iguana in his hands. We were surprised at first, but he was just grinning.
This large herbivorous lizard is native to Central America, and here in El Salvador it is so widespread that dishes made from it can even be found in restaurants.
Ruben asked us if we would like to try it.
However, seeing the helpless animal struggling in his hands, we felt sorry for it – so he shrugged and released it back into the wild.
In the afternoon, another group activity followed: we headed back to the mountain pool, this time with Karina as well.
We were smarter this time: we brought a ball and a deck of cards with us. We were lucky with the timing – since it was a weekday, there was hardly anyone else at the pool besides us.
We played ball in the pool for a while, then Ruben pulled out a deck of cards and taught us a few games.
Time passed so quickly that we did not even notice when it got dark – we laughed, played cards, and enjoyed how a day could feel so complete with so little.
May 1 – Finishing the Bottle Wall, Finally a Real Pupusa, and Some Music
Today, we finally finished the bottle wall!
Karina and I built five complete rows, so the wall eventually reached waist height – about one meter tall. It felt great to see it taking shape row by row, with the sunlight glinting off the bottles embedded in the wall.
The plan was to cover the top with flat stones later and also finish the inside of the wall.
While building, we were constantly thinking about exactly how we would finish it – that is what it is like when you start building something from scratch and the final result takes shape along the way.
At noon came the long-awaited surprise: Doña Reina, the local woman who helped out at the farm, finally kept her promise and made us some authentic Salvadoran pupusas.
I had already tasted pupusas in the village before, but the others had simply waved them off, saying they were nowhere near the real thing.
Well, they were right.
There was no comparison between the two. They were so delicious that before I knew it, I had already devoured at least five or six. I was full, but I still wanted to keep eating.
This was not simply food; it was a little piece of El Salvador – a corn tortilla, a filling, fresh salsa, and a flavor that only a local woman can get exactly right.
In the afternoon, Ranulfo brought a new element to the day: he invited Ricardo, a young local artist, to paint the wall of the communal bathroom.
Several of his works were already visible around the garden – the entrance door and the side of the main building also bore his handiwork, and they added a great deal to the atmosphere of the place.
Ricardo now planned to paint the interior wall black, and then add plants and animals to it.
To gather inspiration, he picked up his guitar and played a few songs for us.
We sat in the garden, listening to the music and waiting for the wall to come alive.
May 2 – Reinforcing the Hillside, Petanque, and Corn Liqueur
This morning, Ranulfo brought up an old plan of his: above the veranda entrance of the main building there was a roughly forty-centimeter-wide strip that he had wanted to put lettering on for a long time.
The idea was to put the words “Esquinita del Bambú” there, decorated in the background with typical Salvadoran patterns.
Karina immediately jumped at the opportunity, and she and Ranulfo started brainstorming ideas.
So today Ruben joined me to continue building the wall.
The next task was to “tile” the hillside above the wall with flat stones. But before we could do that, we first had to reinforce the top of the hillside, because if a heavy rain came down, it could wash away all our work.
The plan was to level out the surface at the top of the hill, then dig a little deeper and concrete huge rocks into the ground – these would hold back any potential landslide.
It was hard work, but Ruben and I worked together really well, and within a few hours we had managed to level the soil, dig the necessary holes, and concrete the ten- to twenty-kilogram rocks into place.
Later, Ruben had something else to do, so Nathan took over from him. Nathan was not yet very experienced in construction, but the next task was just right for him.
There were already piles of flat stones beside the pool, and we had to sort through them. We were looking for the thinnest but largest stone slabs possible – these would later become the perfect “tiles” for covering the hillside.
The sorting took up the rest of the working time, and before we knew it, it was noon.
In the afternoon, Ricardo, the local artist, appeared again and continued painting the bathroom wall.
There was also a petanque court in the garden, and since there were enough of us, we decided to play a game that afternoon. Including Ranulfo, there were six of us, so we split into teams of two and started playing.
Petanque is a French ball game: the aim is to throw your metal ball as close as possible to the small target ball. It is simple, but surprisingly exciting.
After every match, we formed new teams so that everyone could play with everyone – which made the whole thing even more varied and enjoyable.
When it got dark, we had to stop because we could no longer see the balls.
But the games did not stop there: we moved onto the veranda, and out came the darts.
And Ranulfo, to liven things up, pulled out a bottle of corn liqueur, something most of us had never tasted before.
