http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12680172/


Once-vibrant village in El Salvador now quiet
Immigration to U.S. empties area of all but children and grandparents


By N.C. Aizenman

Updated: 2:23 a.m. ET May 8, 2006
PIEDRAS BLANCAS, El Salvador - It was just past noon, yet the only sign of life in the main square of this remote eastern village was an elderly man swinging in a hammock on his porch.

There was a time, Jose Nieve-Reyes Rubio, 70, explained in a gravelly voice, when the plaza would have been packed with vendors and customers by this hour; their shouts ringing through the air as they bought and sold food, clothing and every imaginable kind of trinket.

"But that was more than 10 years ago," he said as he settled back into his hammock. "Before everyone left for the States."

Today, like villages across El Salvador, Piedras Blancas has been nearly emptied of its working-age inhabitants. Left behind are children and grandparents who live on money that relatives send from such previously unheard of places as "Manassas, Virginia," "Houston, Texas," and simply "Maryland" -- the catchall term by which people here refer to a host of Washington-area suburbs.

Although exact figures are difficult to determine, the director of the village school, who has tracked the student population for two decades, estimates that more than 3,500 Piedras Blancas natives, or about 40 percent of the population, live in the United States.

Even kids plan to leave
In the fourth-grade class, where teacher Roney Ramirez was giving a social studies lesson on a recent afternoon, 17 of the 21 students have at least one parent abroad.

"What does the agricultural sector in our area consist of?" Ramirez, 26, said to the children.

"Farming and cattle raising!" they shouted back with the certainty born of growing up where families have lived off the land for generations.

"How many of you plan to remain here and become farmers when you grow up?" Ramirez said.

No one raised a hand.

"Well, who is going to cultivate the land then?" Ramirez said with a chuckle.

"Um, our grandparents?" said one student to an eruption of giggles.

A plump girl with long, curly hair who was sitting nearby grinned and jumped out of her seat for the umpteenth time that day.

Ramirez shot her a warning look. Josselin Mendez, 10, is one of four students whose parents are both in the United States. Lately, she has become so convinced that she will be joining them soon that she can't seem to concentrate on school.

"I try to tell her that what she learns here can serve her over there," Ramirez said afterward. "But she doesn't really take it in. Her mind is so focused on over there that it's as though she's left already."

Asked during recess whether this was the case, Mendez gave a sheepish smile and nodded. Then, as her classmates pressed around, she launched into an excited description of Manassas, where her father has worked as a construction worker for the past 9 1/2 years.

"My parents say it's cold," she said, "and the houses are built a totally different way than here."