Teniete Coronel

On February 8th Chris was promoted from a Major to a Lutenent Cornel in the US Air Force. Chris’s parents and sister made the trip down to El Salvador to be present for the ceremony. The promotion ceremony was attended by approximately 50-60 friends and presided over by the Cornel and Ambassador.

Chris’s commanding officer served as the MC and began the ceremony by telling a story about the first time she met Chris…. “I called up Chris while he was still in Nebraska to talk to him about the position. I remember thinking after I hung up the phone…What are we getting ourselves into…but we were desperate.”

After getting a few laughs from the crowd she went on to recount many of the accolades and accomplishments of Chris’s 20 years of service leading up to today. As Chris’s biggest fan, I was especially proud to hear all his praises sung in front of his friends, colleagues, family members and Embassy dignitaries.

She said that Chris was such a humble guy… (yes, I actually laughed out loud, but they were not joking). Chris’s easy going personality is not what you would expect from a decorated war veteran with 3 tours in Iraq and Afganistan. Many in attendance had no idea he was among one of the bravest, honorable and select few A-10 fighter pilots providing close, slow moving air support to the soldiers on the ground. Many in attendance had no idea that Chris’s father was a retired two-star General, or that the Nebraska Attorney General was a personal friend and traveled down to help pin on his oak leaf clusters. She made her point by saying that Chris was a good, God fearing, earnest man, raised in the heartland of America, who works his tail off without telling everyone how cool he is. The MC joked that she wouldn’t be surprised if President Bush was waiting in the next room.

After Chris’s father, the Ambassador, the Cornel, AG Brunning, and I pinned on his new rank he spoke to the crowd. He hadn’t been feeling well and I bet his dad that he couldn’t make it thru the speech without mentioning the bug. He didn’t say five words before the gig was up, “Thank you for coming… except the small paracite in my stomach…har har har”. Chris spoke about the one-man theory, his quest to be the same man regardless of the environment; work, home, pool, chuch, in the car…etc. It was very well received and our good friend commented that Chris Stokes is best unscripted. He cracked some (actually funny) jokes on the fly and won over the admiring crowd.

The second best event of the day was the party following the ceremony at pool. There were margaritas, mariachis, and a fabulous balloon arch. At the risk of being a corny cheese ball, I have to say that I am so honored to share my life with my unassuming husband. He is an inspiration to me and I look forward to the day when we pin on the star.

Chris's take on Antigua

I cannot recommend this place enough. Of all the places I have seen in the world, it is definitely in the top ten with Rome, Paris, NYC, Aspen, etc. I am writing this on a bus coming home from a visit with Alisha in Antigua Guatemala. Antigua is a great town of 60,000 people that is about 40 minutes from Guatemala City. By bus from San Salvador, it is about four hours. The bus is nice and comfortable, assuming you splurge and pay the extra $17 for a first class seat! The bus has big comfortable leather seats, food, drinks, and movies. If it were not for sitting in the same place for four hours, I would say it is downright comfortable.

Antigua was the capital of “the new world” when the Spanish conquered the region in the 1500s. The capital has moved a few times over the last 500 years due to earthquakes and floods, and eventually ended up in Guatemala City. The Spanish still have their embassy located in colonial Antigua, though. The architecture shows its history, with very Spanish style buildings, cathedrals (huge), and homes. There are no modern buildings anywhere in the city, and the city planners/government has done a great job of maintaining the colonial feel. There are many ruins of old churches, convents, monasteries, etc., all over the small city. Actually, probably the finest hotel in the city is called Santo Domingo and it a hotel made in the middle of the ruins of a 15th Century Convent. It is a 5-Star hotel and Alisha and I ate dinner at their great restaurant. When we were there, there were a number of different events, namely a gringo wedding, that was going on. If you know someone who wants an awesome destination wedding, this would be the place. It is one of the nicest, most peaceful hotels I have seen.

For the last three weeks, Alisha has been going to an accredited language school where the State Department sends many of its employees who are learning Spanish. It is called Escuela Proyecto Linguistico Francisco Marroquin and it is located in a beautiful part of Antigua, near the main Arch. The school’s courtyard is surrounded by an huge arched ancient convent wall made of a stone/brick combination. The individual classrooms line the walls (outside) and you sit in the box-like classroom with a table and two chairs with your teacher and learn. I actually went with Alisha this morning, since I had the day off (MLK Day) and spent my Monday morning in a grueling four-hour one-on-one session with a Spanish teacher. After the morning was over, I was so worn out I went home and slept for a half hour. I went to the bus and Alisha went back for another four-hour session in the afternoon. I really admire her for her perseverance and dedication in learning Spanish. She has another week and a half to go and she will take her exam that the school provides to give her an official rating as a Spanish speaker.

Guatemala is really a nice country. The place is beautiful, green, not full of trash (like El Salv), and the city seems to be tranquil and Europeanesque. Wide tree lined avenues, stores, reasonable traffic, etc. Of course it has its typical Central American issues like crime, corruption, disparity of wealth, poverty, etc. But from a gringo tourista’s point of view, it is a nice safe place to visit. I wouldn’t walk around at night or walk in an unlit (or lit) park at night, but I wouldn’t do that in many places in Kansas City either. The brand new president just fired 263 mid to high level police officers for corruption last week, and that is the big news. He also went to a local police station at 5am on a surprise visit, and woke up a bunch on “on duty” officers. I like his style.

Habla espanol?

The embassy community has welcomed us with open arms, bbq cookoffs at the pool, bible studies, adventure shopping, you name it - everything has been overwhelmingly accomodating. We have said that we wish that the didn't enjoy the company of the ex-pats so well, then we would reach out to our Salvadoran friends more often. Another down-side of surrounding ourselves with fellow Americans is that we are not using our Spanish as much as we should. I have been attending a language school in San Salvador for 4 hours every morning, and Chris has a daily class at the embassy. My school is named after a revolutionary El Salvadoran who was martred during the civil war. Chris calls it my "commie school". There have been a few political pitches made and he keeps joking that I am going to start wearing Che Guevera t-shirts.

After returning from the states for the holidays we decided the most effective way to learn spanish would be to go to Antigua Guatemala to study everyday at an official lanuguage school. I enrolled in Francisco Moroquin Proyecto Linguistico for four weeks of 7 hours a day of one-on-one instruction - ALL SPANISH.

The schedule was grueling, start at 8:00am sharp - study new material until 10am, break for 30 minutes to walk around town, grab something to eat, email - resume class from 10:30 to 12:00. Break for two hours - lunch and brain melt, then back from 2:00 to 5:00 to review material and participate in more interactive learning, i.e. shopping around town, playing soccer, or scrabble with the other students. Antigua is a hot spot for intensive language schools, over the past 50 years they have built a quiant little nitch in the middle of central america. There are well over 50 schools nestled into the tiny little town. My school was very nice and one of the oldest schools in Antigua. There were 52 classrooms, and each classroom consisted of a desk and two chairs. Some of the classrooms were in little wooden rooms and some were out in the garden or under the Church arc ruins among the avacado and orange trees..

I was fortunate enought to be able to stay at a near by Bed and Breakfast owned by Roberto and Beatriz Gonzales. There was only one room in the B&B and therefore it was much more like a home stay. We had breakfast every morning at 7am and occassionally lunch or dinner. Chris traveled up from San Salvador (5 to 7 hours) every weekend to visit. Let me know if you want more info on Antigua...

Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff

CJCS Admiral Mike Mullin giving me crap about this year's Nebraska football team...

On the 18th of January, the Embassy had a DV (distiguished visitor) come down to visit El Salvador to thank the Salvadorans for their participation in Iraq. With a visitor of this status, the visit is classified SECRET until he arrived in country. Of course at the embassy, all the MIL GROUP and DAO (Defense Attache Office) had known for a while about the visit, but couldn't discuss it with anyone. Most all the Embassy personnel knew something was up, due to their bosses hinting and watching the military absolutely freaking out all week! When the three UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters landed on our soccer field, the people really started to wonder!

Although the DAO was in charge of the visit for a change, it still was quite a stressful event for us in the MIL GROUP. As a military person, it is a very, very rare honor to get to meet and chat with the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Wow...This is one of tose reasons that this job has been an experience of a lifetime for me.

Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

Admiral Mullen was sworn in as the 17th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on October 1, 2007. He serves as the principal military advisor to the President, the Secretary of Defense, the National Security Council, and the Homeland Security Council.

A native of Los Angeles, he graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1968.

He commanded three ships: the gasoline tanker USS Noxubee (AOG 56), the guided missile destroyer USS Goldsborough (DDG 20), and the guided missile cruiser USS Yorktown (CG 48).
As a Flag Officer, Admiral Mullen commanded Cruiser-Destroyer Group 2, the George Washington Battle Group, and the U.S. 2nd Fleet/NATO Striking Fleet Atlantic.
Ashore he has served in leadership positions at the Naval Academy, in the Navy's Bureau of Personnel, in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and on the Navy Staff. He was the 32nd Vice Chief of Naval Operations from August 2003 to October 2004.

His last operational assignment was as Commander, NATO Joint Force Command Naples/Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe.

Admiral Mullen is a graduate of the Advanced Management Program at the Harvard Business School and earned a Master of Science degree in Operations Research from the Naval Postgraduate School.

Prior to becoming Chairman, Admiral Mullen served as the 28th Chief of Naval Operations.

Christmas in the Midwest

Chris and I returned to Lincoln for the Christmas holiday. It was a whirl wind of events, but very good to be home and see the girls. The temps were in the low 10 & 20s, but no new snow during our visit. We hear that it has been a heck of a winter in Nebraska and that we should be thankful to be in a warmer climate. Just in case anyone was wondering, we are, thankful that is...

Due to his limited vacation days, Chris was not able to return in time to celebrate with my families. My dad and step mom, Curt and Jill, were in Lincoln for a couple days. We were able to get our Indian "Oven" fix and celebrate with Keenan (with 4 adoring sets of grandparents he is definitely not in want of anything). And I must say it breaks my heart to hear him say, “LaLa I’m so glad you came back”. He thinks I’m living in the wild, which I’m sure grandma Marcia had something to do with :). He asked me, “you are living in the wild, but you do not take any pictures of the wild?. He has requested a picture of a giraffe…

The next night we had the Yost festivities, complete with Santa Claus, Moscow mules and a highly energized game of bunco. It’s a competitive group of 14 former high school and collegiate athletes, the little ones usually come down and tell us we are being too loud. I believe Justin or Stephanie outplayed the rest of the field, or maybe they were just the loudest, hard to say.

Those of you who know Chris, know that he loves to go caroling. He kept suggesting that we get a group of our friends down here together to go out. Thru quiet protest I managed to keep the El Sal caroling extravaganza at bay. Once back in Lincoln our good friends, Christa and Kevin Pope, had a big caroling party in Chris’s honor. It was a great time to catch up and tell some stories of our adventures. There were kids hanging from the rafters while the parents enjoyed each others company. The kids began entertaining themselves by lowering paper on a string from the 2nd floor landing down to the first floor. When the first piece of turkey descended we knew that we had pushed the limits of laise faire parenting and the troops headed home.

It was great to be able to attend Christmas Eve Candlelight service at Westminister in Lincoln. Chris is usually working over the holidays and rarely gets to participate in the beautiful service. Chris picked Summers and Mae up first thing Christmas morning and we headed southbound on I29. We arrived to a full house at Chris's parents house in Kansas City. Don and Judy hosted us for two days before heading back to Lincoln for a few more days. It was wonderful to catch up with our friends and hug our loved ones for one short week. We hope to have some visitors down in El Salvador over the next few months, it is sure to be a warm escape..

El Pacifico

The weekend before heading back to the frozen tundra, chris and I took a solo trip to the beach.
We stayed at a “quaint” little “boutique” hotel on Playa Tunco. Boutique and quaint translates into incense, Australian backpackers and the inability to flush toilet paper (you have to throw it away in the garbage can, I was sure I was going to flood the place. The drop is a hard habit to break). Our apartment is only 30 minutes from the beach. We went for one night. In the morning we walked the beach and ran into some friends from the Embassy, the Doc and his wife go to the beach nearly every week to surf. The playas in El Sal are famous for the surf and are therefore flush with gringos braving the crazy strong undertow and paddling for 200 yards out to the crashing waves.

We watched the surfers and don’t really have any interest in getting pummeled by the ondas. Although I like to walk the beaches, Chris has decided that he does not really enjoy it. Something to do with the questionable sewage/sanitation systems in El Sal… We enjoyed the peacefulness of the beach and watching the sun come up and go down. These two Midwest kids sure could get used to listening to the surf, even if it is the smelly Pacific.

Our First Visitor & Medredes

We had our first visitor the beginning of December, Chris’s dad Don. He flew down for a quick weekend and as you can expect, we kept him very busy. Back in the 80s Don was an instructor for TWA and trained a Taca pilot from El Salvador on the 767. For two months Nicho Lopez, the El Salvadoran pilot, was part of the Stokes family. When Chris told his dad that we were coming down to El Salvador Don went into his office and came back with a business card containing Nico’s contact information. It turns out that Nico is a local legend here in El Salvador, and one trip to the local airport was all Chris needed to find his dad’s long lost friend.
Nico was the first officer on Taca Flight 110 flight from Belize City to New Orleans in 1988. The 737 plane lost both jet engines in a thunderstorm right outside of New Orleans and had to perform an emergency landing just like in the movies… nose down, bank hard right 180 degree turn to land on a grass levy. One of the only successful manual landings in history.Chris and his dad spent the day at the EL Sal Military Museum representing the US at a ceremony and reminiscing with Nicho and his comrades at the officers club. On Saturday morning we all attended the graduation of the ES military academy. Each graduate received their orders and a sword from the President of El Salvador, Tony Saca.

I took a paparazzi shot of Chris with the President. Actually it’s a side shot of the pres. with the top of Chris’s hat in the background. Ambassador Frasier and his wife sat in front of Don and I and the ambassador joked with Don about making the retired Generals sit in the back. It was a great weekend.

Early on Monday morning, Chris, I and a driver left the city for the opening ceremonies of a medrede in La Union. La Union is a department on the far east side of the country, close to the Nicaraguan border. Four times a year the Military Group coordinates a medical readiness exercise (aka medrede) in El Salvador. A Medrede is a free medical clinic staffed by doctors, nurses, and technicians from the US military. The general purpose is to provide a basic health care blitz to several communities over a two week period.

This specific medrede traveled to 5 location over 10 days, spending anywhere from 1 to 3 days at each location depending on the need. In the end they served over 7 thousand patients. There were dermatologist, GPs, Ems, Pediatricians, Ophthalmologists, OBGYNs, dentists and a pharmacist all from Alabama, Mississippi, and Oklahoma.

Two of the 18 docs spoke Spanish. The US docs required translators in order to communicate with their patients. There were several groups who helped with the translation over the two week period: El Salvadoran Marinos, Cuerpo de Paz volunteers, Mormon missionaries, and a few embassy spouses. Funny story, after the opening ceremony Chris went straight to work finding more translators. One of the docs was Mormon and gave Chris the name of the guy in charge of missionaries in El Sal. He made a few phone calls in the car on our way back to San Sal and found the guy, remember…small country, small circles.

After hanging up the phone we stopped in San Vicente for our first fast food experience. (They have all the fast food restaurants down here: Wendy’s, Mc Ds, Burger King, Quiznos, KFC, etc. Chris and I can get Pizza Hut delivered to our door, third world hah!) Anyway, we stopped at a Wendy’s and in walk 40 Morona Brothers and Sisters, all dressed up in their Sunday best. It was as if God said Ha! I can do better than give you a name I can deliver them to you. We laughed and told them the story about just getting off the phone with their Jefe. The Mormons ended up helping everywhere except on the islands; turns out Mormons and water don’t mix (just a joke, they are not allowed to travel on boats). The medical evaluations were pretty basic: fever, rash, infection, tooth extraction, anti-parasite script, vitamins, anti-biotic, etc. I volunteered for three days with two other spouses. We were transported every morning out to a remote island by a marine cargo boat. And by cargo I mean livestock, goods for market and whatever else they needed to transport. I had always been told that the navy/marines first job is to ensure their craft is clean. So clean it four times right? Well the El Sal Navy/Marines have not adopted the same MO. They were pretty content to just hang out it cow poop. The Grandma Shirley in me wanted to start throwing garbage overboard and soak the thing in Clorox.
The clinic was held at a grammar school, their summer vacation is Oct-Jan. Each room housed a different doctor. All the meds were donated and brought down by the Military. The dentists were very busy and not very popular. After an extraction the patients would receive a little pack with 15-20 Motrin tablets. Buenos suerte mi amigo. The OBGYN was amazed at the number of female creams she had to prescribe one day after not prescribing any the day before. Turned out, the first day she had a male interpreter and the patients would not tell him what was wrong with them. It is still very taboo and unacceptable to talk about sex and birth control down here. In many places very young children are having babies because no one will talk to them about “the birds and the bees”. Very sad situation. The next medrede is the first week in March back down at the islands. IF you have any interest in participating send Chris an email and we can provide more information. It was an eye opening experience for me, the other volunteers and all the doctors. It definitely makes you think twice about becoming inpatient waiting 20 minutes at the doctor’s office back home. Many of these people walked, or rode in the back of a pickup, for 2 hours to sit in the sun for 4 hours waiting to see a doctor. The sick children break your heart and then melt it with their sweet little curious voices. We’d love to have you join us if you are able, no need to speak Spanish, they always need people to corral and carry stuff. Vale la pena, vale la pena.