12/14/2014 Coban Guatemala

Yesterday I had lunch with Mauricio. I met Mauricio on Friday when he came over to Fresh for a drink and he invited me to lunch. He’s gregarious and we chatted a while. He owns a restaurant a block from Fresh where he works 14 hour days 6 days a week. He only serves Pupusas. Pupusas are patties of corn tortilla dough with some Mozzarella cheese in the center. It’s like a Juicy Lucy where the hamburger is replaced with corn dough. But unlike a Juicy Lucy, to eat it one grabs it on the edge and splits it apart. I’d like to try doing that to a Juicy Lucy someday. The pupusa becomes two tortillas with melted cheese all over one side. Then we put tomato sauce and spicy cabbage salad in it and eat it like a taco. They were good so I ate 5.

Mauricio is Salvadoran. If Jill and I go through El Salvador he offered to accompany us and show us his country. He says he will show us the whole country because its small. We can also stay at his brother’s house there, who happens to be a tour bus driver. It is super kind of him and we may or may not end up doing it.  Later, Anne told me treating visitors, especially gringos, to things makes latin americans happy. She told me a Spanish term for it but I only remember that it meant My Treat. Mauricio has family in the USA and in El Salvador whom he helps support from his business. He also told me he will help the woman who works for him go to school to learn English, and learn about computers. Mauricio is a nice guy.

In the USA this type of generosity may be around but we have institutionalized almost all of our giving. In the USA we don’t give money to the poor on the street, we give money to charities in the name of the poor on the street. It’s a more efficient way for assistance to be distributed but the human interaction is veiled from the giver. Does a direct debit transaction to the United Way feel as good as handing someone bus fair or grocery money? The giver’s satisfaction comes from the gratitude of the receiver in my experience. That’s the reason Couchsurfing is so fun, it’s a direct exchange of a necessity where both parties are honest with each other. There are a lot of interesting ways to be charitable and I like discovering them. On my way back from Mauricio’s I bought Jill some Calalilies.