Workshop hopping

I was moved to tears numerous times this weekend. My co-workers at CBC truly amaze me with their creativity, energy, and compassion in the groups they facilitate. On Thursday morning, Rutilio picked up Hector and I and we drove through the abandoned streets of San Salvador north to La Palma, the same Franciscan center in the mountains where the last workshop I went to took place. 19 male youth from all over the country arrived soon after for the last session of their Equinox Masculinities workshop. I mostly came to conduct interviews with 4 of the participants about their impressions of the methodologies used and how the program has impacted them. Because the group is all men and they have already established trust with each other, I did't participate in most of the activities, but I did have a chance to observe a few. What I saw was really powerful...

The first day the youth spent the afternoon and evening in a process of Forum Theatre (a technique based on the work of Augusto Boal and Theater of the Oppressed). First they thought up situations in which violence occurs on a daily basis and acted them out, without words. Then, each group added words to their piece. After this second performance, the actors froze at the point at which the conflict was about to break out and audience members had the chance to ask questions of each of the characters. One of the scenes involved a man looking for sex workers. He ended up with 2 female prostitutes and a transvestite. When he realized the transvestite wasn't a woman, he began to beat her up and the police came to break up the fight. After the question and answer session, one of the audience members took the place of one of the sex workers to act out a way of preventing the conflict from happening. This tool of Forum Theater seemed to work really well and I was really impressed by how Rutilio and Hector facilitated the process.

The next day, while I escaped to climb the tallest peak in El Salvador, the youth worked on a process of representing their "Corner," or their space. The idea was for them to think about the spaces they occupy or share with others and what kind of emotions they have while in these spaces. Each of the participants then presented their corner to the rest of the group by candlelight. I peeked in for part of this process and was incredibly moved. The youth all quietly listened to each of their compañeros as they talked about their feelings about family members and relationships. One of the youth broke down while talking about his father and his brother who has Downs' Syndrome. At the end of each presentation, they all surrounded the presenter and hugged him as a group. They shared things with each other that they hadn't shared with anyone else, and some of the youth were completely overwhelmed by emotion during the process. But in this space, they had the support of their friends and the staff of the Centro who helped them learn how to express their emotions in healthy ways.

After this workshop, I took off again for Arcatao, but I'll write more about that tomorrow...