The Down Side of Silver Lining

This last weekend I and three other volunteers were invited to attend the wedding of Alfredo, the Honduran music teacher at the school. It was to take place at Alfredo’s prospective parent-in-law’s farm high in the Honduran mountains. Apparently it was a two hour drive from Juticalpa, so Friday afternoon found me riding in the back of a truck with three other guys, two VERY large speakers for the wedding, as well as the groom himself. The vistas which spread out before us as we climbed higher and higher up the red dirt road were breathtaking.

We continued to drive deeper into the mountains as the daylight faded. The gray, heavy clouds came closer, enveloping the looming mountain tops in the twilight.

Soon after, it started to rain.

Now, bear in mind that I was sitting in the back of a pick-up truck, high in the mountains, in December. In no time at all I was soaked to the bone and shivering. As we went higher the rain eased up…not because it was raining any less but because it has less distance to fall. In fact pretty soon we were IN the clouds. As I said in the title of this blog, there is a problem with cloud “silver lining”, and that problem is that it’s very WET and very COLD. I couldn’t believe that there was any higher to go, but every bend in the road revealed another peak to climb.

About an hour and half into the ride we could no longer see the mountains around us. We could barely see 30 feet from the truck for that matter.

Then I looked up from our huddle in the truck bed and saw…nothing. Literally there was NOTHING beyond two feet from the truck. Daring to peer over the edge I realized that we were now driving along the ridge of the mountain (which also explained why the wind had picked up), and there was nothing but a sheer slope on either side of the truck. If it had been a clear day the view would have been phenomenal.

Eventually we arrived at the farm and disembarked. Wishing for nothing more than a hot meal and a bed, I was not overly thrilled to discover that Alfredo had had an ulterior motive for inviting me. He wanted me to utilize my artistic talents to arrange flowers for the table centerpieces.

Thankfully we did get something to warm us up. Two things actually. First was a hot plate of tortillas, beans, and MEAT! Turns out that in preparation for the impending nuptials that in-laws had, quite literally, slaughtered the fatted calf. And man was the fatted calf tasty! We washed the beefy goodness down with another warming substance, Plata. These two things cheered my up enough that I didn’t mind arranging flowers for the next few hours.

 The wedding the next day was fun. Full Catholic service plus the ceremony, followed by more beef, and loud music. Sadly, I could not enjoy the festivities, what with suddenly coming down with a nasty case of stomach flu. Needless to say, the ride home was not fun (although we did get to see the great views by daylight).

It’s now Thursday and I’m only just over the flu. We had Wednesday off for some local festival which takes place this time of year. I was just glad to have a day to sleep in. The countdown to Christmas break is now in full swing, and I cannot WAIT to go home. But before that we have a big Christmas community service project and some major presentations due in World History, so I’m not allowed to tune out yet.

Anyone who wants to come see me in at the airport, I’ll be flying in at 9:30 on the 18^th to Dulles, DC. Let’s re-enact the end of Love Actually!

Bitter Ends and New Beginnings

It’s barely a week into the second quarter, and I can already feel some major changes setting in. We have a new schedule (I now have World History three times a week for 40 minutes) which is proving to be a MUCH better arrangement. The weather has been beautiful, I have some great ideas for my classes, and La Colonia (the fancy grocery store in town) has frozen turkeys! This means we don’t have to go all the way to the capital city (a three hour ride by bus) to get our Thanksgiving meal (which we are having on Sunday for some reason).

 I must admit to being a little put out about having Thanksgiving on a Sunday. It means that I have to worry about being ready to get up early and tech the next day, which I feel will severely detract from the whole food-coma experience. There seems to have been some sort of dispute about when and where the great feeding was to take place, so I can only assume that this is the best arrangement for all concerned, and be content with getting a Thanksgiving at all. Goodness knows there are bigger things to worry about…

…for instance the imminent departure of our dear Megan, a fellow volunteer who works in the organizations office. She is heading home for a shoulder operation, and makes her the second volunteer to leave us (the first I have not blogged about due to the private nature of their departure, which I have no intension of blaring out all over the internet.) Tonight we are getting together to say goodbye, which is a great excuse to eat at the taco stand near Megan’s house (which is delicious…the tacos, not her house.)

On the matter of school things are getting…interesting. The parent teacher conferences last weekend went pretty well all things considered (exactly 50% of the kids parents showed up, which is a marked improvement over the beginning of the year.) Most of them were really concerned about their kid’s performances, many of which were abysmal. I am fairly certain that most of the parents had no idea how their children were doing, due almost entirely to the fact that the kids are in the habit of lying through their teeth about their homework (that will soon be changing as we are implementing school wide homework journals, which have to be signed by both the teachers and the parents.)

Meanwhile, in the classrooms, the battle between good and evil is reaching high school soap-opera levels of intensity! We have our hopefuls and near hopeless causes, good girls gone bad, bad boys making a turn around, bullies, budding artists, and enough drama to choke a Honduran street dog (which can, and will, eat ANYTHING!)! A few kids may soon be leaving the cast of our little theatre, while at the same time we are greeting a few new faces.

The biggest change though, for me at least, has been in me. Today on the bus ride to school, I looked up from my morning reading (“Brimstone” by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child) and saw the mountains basking in the sun, draped in the last vestiges of mist. It was truly breathtaking, and I thought “that is what I came down here to see.” But as soon as I thought this, another image popped into my head. The day before, seeing my students in 8A actually getting excited about their research topics in World History. And the way their faces lit up when I showed them how to draw a cube in perspective, and they felt that amazing sense of accomplishment when the little box took shape on the page as if by magic. I remember that feeling back when I was first learning how to draw. And those feelings, that excitement for learning something new; it was MY ideas that gave it to them, my teaching that helped them to achieve that goal.

The mountains didn’t seem quite so spectacular anymore.

Making (Up) the Grade

What is with the school system down here? I spent three hours this morning putting my final grades for the first quarter together in nice neat Excel spreadsheets, only to discover that there is some special “official” spreadsheet that I have to use! This one is for the Department of Olancho (a Honduran department is the rough equivalent of a US state, in case you’d forgotten.)

Now, one would think that all I would have to do is copy and paste all the grades into the appropriate cells and be done with it. Any REASONABLE person would expect to have to report their student’s final PERCENTAGE grade. But no, in Olancho the powers that be think that it’s best for grades to be submitted with their point value. Oh, and the total number of point MUST be out of 100. This means scaling all of my World History grades down to the appropriate levels, as the final point count in that class was out of 114.

And of course, because that was just not simple enough, the final exam grade had to be included in the point count…and EVERY class is required to have an exam grade, including my Art and Activities classes which, guess what, didn’t have an exam.

And so it was with a malicious glee and resounding resentment that I spent the afternoon re-calculating my grade book to fit the Honduran system of measurement. Oh the final grades came out the same for both our school (which, sensibly, uses percentages) and the Department forms in the end, but I did have to make up imaginary test grades for over 60 children.

Long Daze, Long Nights

                Where am I? What’s going on? As predicted the time has flown by and I can’t believe that it is already the end of the first quarter. Last week was exams, of which I only had to give one (World History), which I got out of the way on Monday. After that I made my escape and fled the country for a few days. Two close friends of mine were considerate enough to get married last weekend, giving me a perfect excuse to go home (thanks Kasey and Alex, and congrats to you both!)

Upon arriving home at 1:30am my first order of business was to stand in a hot shower for at least an hour. Afterwards I collapsed into my own bed for the first time in MONTHS. I swear I almost cried I was so happy.

Waking up the next morning was the weirdest feeling. Where had I been for the last three months? Was I really in Honduras? It all seemed like a dream (probably induced by the anti-malaria drugs I had been taking). I felt like no time had gone by at all. Except that is had, and it was now late autumn instead of late summer.

I spent the following days pretending that Honduras didn’t exist, and eating every burger I could lay my hands on (may I recommend the smokehouse burger at Bob Evans with a side of sweet potato fries. Yum!) The wedding was a great fun (I got the best seat in the house…behind the podium so I could see the bride walk down the aisle. I was the efficient btw.) I relished the food and drink at the reception, and made a complete fool of myself on the dance floor.

But Sunday found me back in Honduras, which was as dusty and full of loud noises as ever. I have decided that there is some kind of break in the flow of time between here and in the US. It feels like I have been away from Honduras for ages (which is good cuz’ if my time home had felt like a dream I may have just turned around and got back on the plane.) It’s sort of like going to Narnia, except it’s eternally summer instead of winter and there aren’t any talking animals…unless you count the occasional parrot.

The school is undergoing some MAJOR changes. We re-organized the classes (8B is now pretty awesome to teach, and 8A has grown in its ability to drive me insane), and we changed the schedule to have shorter classes more often during the week. I now teach World History for 40 minutes three times a week, which is already proving to be a better layout for the kids. Honestly they can’t focus for much more than 40 minutes on anything other than talking or soccer.

We also welcome Michael back to school. He had left the school over a month ago due to a problem with a tube in the back of his head. It helps to drain fluid from his brain and it had become blocked up. As scary as it was, it would have been simpler if Michael had stayed at home. He is WAY behind everyone else now, and I have no idea what to do with him in Art and Activities. His mom is actually looking at sending him to another school (all Spanish speaking, which is great because I don’t think that Michael understands much English), but some nosey busybody decided to stick their nose where it didn’t belong.

This particular olfactory intrusion is some woman that apparently has some kind of vendetta against our organization. I don’t know much, but I gather that she has tried to sue is on multiple occasions, and that she saw Michael as just one more of those opportunities. And so, Michael is back with us, at least for the time being.

It’s only Tuesday, but it feels like Friday I’m so exhausted. From the moment I left home to return to Honduras I was traveling for 16 hours. Then I had to teach the next morning, AND try and do all the lesson planning for the new quarter that I should have done last week. And the grading system on the computer still isn't working and grade are due by Thursday. And we have parent teacher conferences on Saturday, of which I have heard nothing but horror stories. Oh, and the maintenance guys are re-painting the teacher’s lounge and the paint fumes are not helping matters.

At least the weather is nice so I can sit outside.

Urgent Message

We interupt my previously planned blog post for this urgent announcment reguarding another person at the Olancho Aid Foundation Silvia Sanchez, a janitor at Escuela Nazareth, our school for the handicapped:

"On Saturday her 21 year old son was run over by an automobile leaving his legs in a very critical state with more than two fractures in each leg.  He was transferred early Sunday morning to Tegucigalpa.  The doctors are asking that Silvia and her family parchase the pins he needs to have implanted in an attempt to save his legs; it will cost Lps. 10,800.00 each legs including other costs that his recuperation may incur."

To trans;ate the gravity of the situation, there are about 18 lempiras to every US dollar. This means that each of the pins is going to run about $600, which is about how much I currently make in three months! Any help that can be given would be wonderful (and completely voluntary as I have no idea of the rules reguarding talking about this on the internet).

So lets just say that you are aware of the situation, that Silvia is in need of assistancce, and that you know my parents who have the ability to wire me any charity which is given in the spirit of generosity (and in no way petitioned from yours truly)  ;)

Barking Mad

It’s  4:30 am on a Sunday and I can’t sleep because the neighbor’s dog won’t shut up. I swear I am going to make myself a new fur rug for my room (once I’ve bleached it of course).

I don’t know where the time is going. The weeks are just going by in a blur of insanity and screaming children. Actually it’s not the kids screaming, it’s me. Tuesday night (I think it was Tuesday) a bunch of kids were throwing rocks at our house and I just lost it. I have to deal with disrespectful snotty kids all day, I was tired, and I was not going to take it in my own home. I charged out the front door, red in the face, screaming at the little monsters at the top of my lungs. The result was the kids vanishing in a VERY satisfying and somewhat comical dust cloud. Turns out that one of the kids is in Jeff’s class, and I seem to have made quite an impression on them.

Of course Wednesday night they were back, but by then I was feeling much more rational. I knew screaming at them again would just be what they wanted this time, and I had no intention of humoring them. I was about to go out and talk to them, but Jeff beat me to the punch. He thought that the “good cop, bad cop” routine would be a good thing to try. He was right, we haven’t had a problem since.

Well, I should say we haven’t had a problem since at the house. My students reached yet another all-time low this week, with at least three of the teachers at the school almost losing it with the students (myself included). After the little beasts have gone home, the general sentiment is “what’s the point in lesson planning when I spend 95% of the class just trying to get the kids to sit down and listen.”

Our mood was not improved by the week before last when we had a “teaching development” program, where a bunch of teachers from California came down to teach us about teaching. This was a waste of time on two fronts. First, we ended the school day early for us to go to the class, and the kids, who are rowdy under normal conditions, became uncontrollable when they found out that they were getting an early release. It would have been more productive to just cancel school for the week. Second, the teachers had NO IDEA what we needed. Oh I’m sure that all the stuff about lesson planning and group learning would be very useful in an American classroom, but here it was about as useful to us as a cleaning the kitchen with sugar (imagine the size of THOSE cockroaches!) Honestly, most of what they talked about I was already from the orientation at the beginning of the school year, and I don’t have a degree in this. The volunteers with actual teaching experience had it even worse.

TO top it off, the head of the CA group was abrasive, rude, demeaning, and had NO sense of humor. Apparently the dislike was mutual, as she thought we were inconsiderate and racist (honestly, you say “meester” once in class, and you’re pegged as a white supremacist.)

I could go on, but if I do this post will be ten pages long. I’ll spare the gory details for any who care to listen when I get back.

On a lighter note, I faced up to my childhood fear of beng hit in the head with fast moving objects on Thursday! We had our Friday futbol (soccer) game a day early as Friday was a national holiday (yes, another one). At one point the ball flew high into the air and started coming down strait at me. Time suddenly slowed down as I watched that black and white sphere slowly grow larger in my field of vision. “This is it” I thought “time to man up, face the music, take one for the team. You can do Andrew, you can OW!” One concussion later I was wearing a very goofy grin and having a trouble walking strait, but at least I headed the ball in the right direction!

I shall end this post with another installment of “Iron Chef: Honduras”. Today’s secret ingredient, frijoles!

Re-fried red beans are a staple protein in Honduras, and are much tastier than the yellow-brown ones we get in the states. I don’t know if it’s the different bacteria down here or what, but they also don’t have quite the same…um…“effect” as re-fried beans in the US.

Frijoles are an essential ingredient in baleadas, a popular dish in Honduras (it may be the national dish for all I know). You wrap a tortilla with frijoles, scrambled egg, sliced avocado, cheese, and mantequilla (I think that’s how you spell it) which is a sort of cross between cheese and sour cream. The best baleadas are the ones where the tortillas and frijoles are home-made. I intend to track down the recipe for both before I leave.

Well, the dog seems to FINALLY shut up, so I’m gonna crash. Let’s hope this week proves better than the last two…an unlikely even what with a rather sore topic rapidly approaching. Halloween.

More on that later.

Iron Chef Honduras: Grittin' your teeth

So I survived the week, and the weekend for that matter. Some of the other volunteers and I hiked up a nearby mountain called Boqueron. Beautiful views, but I am a bit sore today. We have Monday off on account of it being Columbus Day (a Honduran national holiday) so I got to sleep in. Thankfully no one set off fireworks at 3 am to celebrate this time.

The week to come should be relatively uneventful as we have half days in order to receive training from a group of teachers coming in from California. I hope they know something about uphill battles and how to avoid total mental breakdown in the classroom.

Anyhow, I thought I would take this opportunity to bring you a few posts I would like to call “Iron Chef: Honduras”. Here I will attempt to take you through the gastronomical side of my adventures, and the colorful local cuisine! I may even finally stop being lazy and try to post a few photos (this entails using another computer, as mine apparently can’t handle the resolution on my new camera), and maybe use it as an excuse to eat out a bit.

Today’s special ingredient is…DIRT!

That’s right. A major part of every diet down here, either from lack of running water or not-entirely-clean cooking surfaces (you try to keep all the dust out of the kitchen!) you are guaranteed to have your daily mineral requirement with every meal. Currently you will receive all the minerals you need with each breath, as we have not had rain in over a week and most of the nearby roads are not paved. You literally leave your house in the morning, and by the time you get home anything left in the common room is covered in a fine layer of brown dust. As several of our window slats (glass panes which open in the same way as wooden shutters) we cannot actually stop the constant insurgence of grime. I swear I washed the table on Saturday and already you can draw a smiley face on it with your finger.

I find that dust pairs best with Plata, a brand of cheap rum you can buy in most places in Honduras. The Plata masks the flavor of the dust, and with enough of it you forget that all the dust in your mouth makes it feel like you haven’t brushed your teeth in three days.

Explosions!!!

This has been a VERY strange week…and its only Wednesday!

I started off the week thinking I was going to die, generally not the best foot to start out the week on. At 3:30am I was awakened by the sound of distant gunfire. This in and of itself is not so strange, in fact it’s a common occurrence, but this one was quickly followed by a very loud BANG. This sounded more like an explosion than gunfire, and was much closer to the house than the gunfire. The explosions and gunfire continued intermittently for the next three hours, sometimes closer, sometimes further away. Needless to say I was terrified. I lay in bed, certain that at any moment I would here the whistle of an incoming mortar before abruptly exploding. It really sounded like The Revolution was here.

Around 5, spurred on by a particularly close and violent bang, Jeff, Lacey, and myself emerged from our respective rooms simultaneously, all of us looking quite disheveled. It seemed we had all had similar mornings, and as another burst of something sounded (we all thought it was automatic gunfire), we all crouched down to duck and cover.

We finally found out that all the noise was in fact fireworks and celebratory gunfire, being let off at the hospital which is at the end of our street. Apparently it was Dia de San Francisco (the Day of Saint Francis) after whom the hospital is named, and thus a special day for them to recognize. Ironically, San Francisco is the patron saint of living things, peace, harmony, and cute little fuzzy creatures. So why on earth did they celebrate by making loud explosions and firing guns at THREE IN THE MORNING?!?

Tuesday found my blood pressure rising for another reason. After completely failing to clean the activities room on Monday, class 8A were to be punished during my Art class by having to clean all the school hallways. Not only did they take this to be an opportunity to visit their friends in other classes, but also to join the groundskeeper in chopping down trees with a machete. As I ran back and forth trying to make them work, three of the boys found their way onto the school roof. I even found several students who had helped to clean the previous day and were thus exempt from cleaning, helping to sweep the halls. When questioned as to why they were out here sweeping rather than in the classroom working on their art project, they responded that they would rather sweep than be in my art class.

To round out the day, two of the girls in my next class asked me if I was on a diet because I was fat.

I wish I HAD been blown up on Monday morning.

So Wednesday is finally here, and I have made it over the crest of the mountain that is my week. It can only go downhill from here. I think the apocalypse may be upon us because 7A, my little “angels”, decided to get out their pitchforks and horns today, while the dreaded 8B got through my activities class, not just working, but WANTING to work!

7A decided that today was not a good day for science, despite the fact that I actually had a lesson plan this time. They were just as monstrous in activities, and even Nemesis was giving me attitude. Talk in the teacher’s lounge has it that Nemesis has a new boyfriend, and he is being a bad influenced on her. I know this boy. He is in 8B. I hate him. He is that terrifying and infuriating combination of very smart, doesn’t care about school, and MAJOR attitude. Why do girls always go for he bad boys?

Meanwhile I am now afraid to turn my back on 8B in activities. Not because of what they might do to each other with the hot glue gun, but what they might create while using it. We are doing re-cycled material projects (a.k.a. cheap materials projects), and I swear every time I look the other way some random collection of bottles and cans is transformed into a new, imaginative sculpture or device. Even Dunia was working! The kids were so into their work the classroom was almost quiet; an eerie, unnatural sound in that class. One kid made a helicopter, another a sort of air cannon our of half a bottle and a balloon. A group of three girls are building a small floating island (no, I am not joking, they really are building a model island), and Dunia came up to me at the end of class wielding a Dalek! I didn’t even know they got Dr. Who down here.

Cleanup was a problem, not because they wanted to just leave, but because they wouldn’t STOP working! I had to chase students out of the classroom after the bell had rung. I’m afraid of what they’ll produce when we have a full 80 minutes instead of the 40 we had today.

Maybe I will get blown up this week after all?

Join in the adventure!

So for all of you interested in coming down to visit the beautiful country of Honduras, here are some dates that would be good. Although I do not have many three day weekends (unless you want to make a last minute trip at the end of the month…I have the 22^nd off) there are a few weeks where I don’t have classes. These are the weeks at the end of each quarter, during which we have half-days for the kids to take exams. Give me enough for warning, and I should be able to ask for my History and Science Exams to be early (or late) in the week, leaving me with free time to show you around (also, Maki is interviewing a potential science teacher on Monday, so let’s keep our fingers crossed that I don’t have to teach it for much longer!) These weeks are as follows:

January 17-21

March 21-25

June 6-10

June is of course our final exams. I’m thinking (time and money permitting) of going back to Utila after the school year ends, and then flying home from La Ceiba (for more on these places see earlier posts). Once you get to Utila, things are pretty inexpensive (by US standards), so if anyone wants to come down, scuba dive, or just listen to Evelyn’s stories let me know!

There is also a long break around Easter starting April 16^th. There won’t be classes again until the 26^th or 27^th, so this is an excellent time to come down to Central America. I say Central America and not Honduras because I have to leave the country for at least four days due to my visa being renewed. Many of the volunteers are going to Costa Rica, and I myself am thinking of seeing a bit more of down here rather than returning to the US for the week. This would be a fantastic time to have an adventure/vacation (hint hint Mum and Dad).

You might be in Honduras if...

1) When asking where something is, people respond by making kissy faces at you.
     Well, not AT you exactly. When pointing at something, it is customary down here to point with your lips rather than your finger. This is VERY disconcerting if you are not from around here. Especially when your students do it to point at the chalkboard behind you.

2) Clothes hung on the line to dry, when left out in the rain, are considered to have an extra rinse.
     Because honestly, it's just too much work to wash them again. They'll be a bit stiff, but at least they don't smell bad anymore.

3) When looking at a dog in the street, you wonder what that growth is between its legs.
     Nobody spays or neuters dogs down here. Being a spoiled gringo, I'm used to pedigree, clean cut (in more ways than one) canines kept on leashes. Here they wander free, keep their own packs and territories, and scare the living daylights out of anyone who walks past their house at night. The blind corners on the doorways get you every time. Thank goodness most doors have fly screens and wrought iron gates.

4) The sound of distant gunfire late at night seems normal to you.
     What is this, downtown Baltimore city? Apparently two major families in the city are feuding and things have become a bit edgy of late. They aren’t looking for gringos, but it’s still best to keep indoors after 9 in the evening.

5) You have a high speed internet connection and no running water.
     I think I’m down to only three or four showers a week, depending on how much work I have in the evening. Honestly you sweat so much at night there almost isn’t any point in showering in the evening, you just end up waking up as filthy as you were when you got home. I would make an effort to shower more, but we just cleaned out the pila two days ago, and the water stopped running just as we started to refill it. If we want to be able to flush the toilet and do the dishes until we get water again, sacrifices must be made. On the plus side, all the dirt helps to keep the sun off.

Making Stories

So we pick up with our intrepid adventurer getting over the flu on a pleasant Monday afternoon. At least it was pleasant for me, because I got to sit inside working on lesson plans while me fellow teachers had to be outside in the hot sun marching.

Why marching? Well as stated before we only had two days of school that week because of Dia del Niños, which is like Mothers Day but for students. At the start of this weekend is a big parade where all the schools march through the city to show their patriotic spirit. Despite the fact that we are not an officially registered school, we somehow got roped into marching anyway. So Monday and Tuesday afternoon found my fellow teachers marching on the soccer field while I sat in the office, recovering from the flu. Thank you flu.

Sadly this was not enough to get me out of the actual parade, which was more like a forced death trudge than a festive march. From start to finish we were marching for FIVE HOURS without a break in the Honduran sun. I’m just glad I remembered to put on sunscreen…mostly. I neglected to put any on my chest, thinking it wouldn’t be necessary as I had every intention of keeping my shirt on during our trudge through town. However about an hour in I undid the top button of my shirt in an attempt not to pass out from heat exhaustion. I now sport a bright red arrow just below my neck pointing toward my navel.

Thursday we finally began our vacation. Myself, Jeff, Lacey, and Maki had decided to head to the North coast of Honduras to spend a long weekend in the Bay Islands drinking, eating, and scuba diving. But getting to our island paradise was going to prove challenging. You see there are two ways to get to the coast from Juticalpa. One is to get a nice Greyhound style coach to Tegucigalpa and from there another one up to La Ceiba, the main city on the North coast. This is rather expensive though (all be it comfortable). The other, much cheaper option, is to take what is commonly referred to as a “chicken bus” direct from Juticalpa to La Ceiba. The rout is much shorter, and goes right through the heart of the rural Honduran mountains.

We opted to be cheap, and got what we paid for.

There were some spectacular scenes along the way, but these were detracted from by the sheer agony of riding an old rejected US school bus for twelve hours on a winding mountain road full of holes (the road, not the bus…for the most part). Have I mentioned that potholes are a national pastime in Honduras? The journey would have been cut in half if we didn’t have to spend so much time weaving from side to side dodging holes and other vehicles. The only escape from the heat is to open the windows, and the only escape from the clouds of dust is to close them. How is a rainy season so dusty? The icing on the proverbial cake was the crazy Honduran preacher who got up and began ranting in Spanish at us for an hour (I timed it). Initially I didn’t mind, but the more he went on the more I was reminded of the guest speakers at KKK rallies on TV. My mind was quickly filled with horrifying scenarios in which I and my compatriots were lynched in the backwoods of Honduras by a mob of crazed, machete wielding locals.

Later, Maki informed me that this chap was making about as good an impression on the other passengers as he was on me. Apparently it was blatantly obvious that he couldn’t read, and that he did not know the Bible very well. He confessed to being in Honduran prison for 7 years, and US prison for 10. This was before God cured him of both a drug addiction, cancer, and AIDS, and then sent him forth to preach the good word. He also claimed to speak English and that he was going to preach to the gringos what he spoke to the Hondurans. If what he said to us was anything like what he said to the Hondurans, I am amazed they didn’t throw him from the moving bus. He knew two lines in English, which he shouted at as even though we were only two seats in front of him. The first was “dis is di Bibblé” and the other “Jisus lub yu” (I have made an attempt to represent the words phonetically). He repeated both sentences ad nauseum  until there was nothing left to add, and I was feeling the nauseum.

We made it to the ferry in the nick of time, and we finally reached the beautiful island of Utila. Utila caters to scuba divers like myself, and I managed to get in four amazing dives on the coral reefs. My fellow tourists did not dive, but did manage to find a beach with white sands and palm trees. We got to eat meat (I miss you meat), sleep in air conditioning (the bus ride was worth it just to wake up NOT covered in sweat), and have a drink in a bar without fear of being mugged or spotted by our students. Friday night we finished our stay on the island with a bar crawl in which we had an amazing talk with a native islander called Evelyn, the owner of Evelyn’s Barbeque, and make of the best cocktails on the island. She is not lying on this point. If you ever go to Utila you must go have a piña colada with Evelyn and have her tell you about the islands. Her grandmother lived on the island before it even had power or pluming, and the way she talks you would think she had been there herself. History, legend, and tall tale all blend together in the most dazzling stories you have ever heard! There are pirates, ghosts, wars, romances, voodoo and intrigue. I want to go back to Utila at the end of my stay in Honduras just to listen to more of Evelyn’s stories.

All too soon we were back on the chicken bus and back in Juticalpa (no crazy preacher this time, but Jeff and I did get checked for guns at a military check point!). The week flew by in a daze, with me melting down again on Wednesday and giving myself a massive migraine. Really it was the kids that gave me the migraine…and the kids outside playing in the street that perpetuated it after I got home. But somehow everything felt better by Friday. I think it’s because this was the first real week of school we have had, and now we really seem to be in the rhythm of things. I’m settled in at the house, I actually have lesson plans now, and my friends here are now family.

Looks like I really did get the adventure I wanted.

Getting Schooled

Oh man what a couple of weeks it has been. I’ll do my best to catch you all up to speed, starting with this post which I wrote last week about the week before that. Actually, I’m not entirely sure when I wrote this…it’s just been that sort of month, but regardless it is about two weeks ago, just as school was starting up (cue segue music into flashback)…

Monday:  Don’t Panic

So last Monday was the first day of school. There weren’t any actual classes, the day was meant as a sort of orientation for the students to the new school. I was assured that it was going to be an easy day; that I would most likely spend it sitting in the back of the classroom listening to one of the Honduran teachers speaking Spanish to the kids, explaining the rules and expectations for the school year.

Boy was I wrong.

He first thing we did was split up into pairs with each volunteer going with one of the Honduran teachers. This immediately became a problem, as my partner only spoke very rudimentary English, which was about as bad as my Spanish. Next we mixed each of our classes with one of the Cardinal classes. I should explain that we share a building with a second school…none of whom speak any English.

I consoled myself with the fact that the Honduran teacher was doing all the work, going through the school handbook with the students, while I sat there trying to look like I knew what they were saying. This was all fine until some random person came into the classroom, and said something in Spanish to my counterpart, who promptly left the room.

So there I was, staring down about thirty students, none of whom were inclined (or capable) of conversing in English. Some order was maintained by the student aid who continued to go through the handbook, but as the hour ticked by both she and I became rather worried. Neither of us had even the slightest idea as to what we were supposed to do once we finished the handbook (which we inevitably did) and were quite at a loss as to when the Honduran teacher would be getting back.

Desperation finally drove me to seek out Maki, who was just as surprised as I was at my counterpart’s sudden departure. Maki was having an equally stressful time trying to control the mixed classes, so we decided to split them up. “Finally,” I thought, “now they’ll HAVE to listen to my English”.

Yeah right. They barely listened to me at all. I was assigned class 8B, which I soon found out was composed of the most difficult children in the school. The kids had absolutely no interest in playing the “get to know you” game that the other volunteers had recommended and it was all I could do to keep them in their seats. Eventually Maki once again came to my rescue, bringing in a bundle of papers the kids needed to fill out.

Just when we thought the worst was over a tree frog, who had apparently been stuck to the roof of the classroom watching me flounder, decided that things were going a little too well and promptly dropped from his perch onto the floor in the dead center of the classroom. There was a wet “smack”, a moment of silence, and then pandemonium broke loose. Girls screamed and jumped up on their chairs. Boys began laughing hysterically. I swear it could not have been anymore cliché unless the accursed amphibian had landed on my head, as I stood there telling the kids to quiet down and fill out their paperwork.

The rest of the day is a bit of a blur. The only other thing I can remember is collapsing into bed that night thinking “at least tomorrow will be calmer. I’m sure the students will be under control once they start their regular classes.”

You would think I would know better than that.

Tuesday: Meeting my Nemesis

I like my weekly class schedule. Monday mornings are completely free, so I can spend all the way till lunchtime planning my classes for the week. The problem is, I didn’t have Monday classes this week, and thus, I didn’t really have anything planned. To make matters worse, Tuesdays are my crazy days, in which I have all four of my subjects as well as all four of the classes. And to complete my morning of nightmares my first class was World History with 8B, the little monsters I had rescued from the suicidal tree frog the day before. “It’s ok”, I once again lied to myself “they’re pretty badly behaved. I’ll just spend most of the class time explaining the rules and expectations in my class.” On the bus ride to school I even came up with a writing assignment for them. We could discuss why we study history, and I could ask them to tell me about their favorite parts of history.

Rule one of teaching in another country: Learn what the students are like BEFORE you get to the classroom.

As I quickly discovered, Honduran students don’t like to discuss things. The mentality is “get the answer and move on”.  Why write three sentences when you could write one. Why write even one for that matter, when a few summery words on the page will suffice. Honduran students (and many Hondurans for that matter) are like type writers: great at regurgitating what you tell them, but without an original bone in their body. Don’t even TRY to ask them to see something from another perspective. Maki tried that in her Religion class later in the week. When one kid said that the Bible was the most important book in the world Maki, in a fit of academic fervor, suggested that were she a Muslim she wouldn’t think that. The kid looked at her like she had just suggested that the world was square and said “so you hate Jesus then?”

But I digress.

So there I was, halfway through my first ever class period, and already I was cowering in a corner frantically trying to come up with something to do. I tried to look busy and ignore the ever increasingly frequent question of “meester, what do we do now?”

Rule two of teaching in a foreign country: overplan.

Finally I had an idea. I practically ran to the teacher’s supply closet and grabbed a stack of paper and colored pencils. “We’re going to make timelines” I announced. And so we did. Looking at the brightly colored pages I eventually collected, I think our first real class is going to be on how to make a proper timeline. You’re adults now, time to draw like it.

Anyway, so first period came and went. Eighty minutes has never been so long. Walking down the hall to my next class felt like a death march. My next class was 7A Science, and I only had slightly more planned for that than I did for World History. Did I mention I’m teaching science now too? I found out last Sunday, when the Honduran who was supposed to be teaching it left to go back to her old job…the day before classes were due to start.

Much to my surprise, and great elation, class 7A are almost the exact opposite of 8B. They raised their hands and asked relevant questions. Still not the greatest at actual discussion, but I can work on that. Most thrilling of all, class 7A has Nemesis. Nemesis is a Honduran Hermione Granger (if you don’t get the reference where have you been for the last decade?) Her hand is up two seconds after you ask a question, her English is wonderful, she listens to ALL your directions, and she actually writes proper sentences! Along with Nemesis, class 7A is blessed with Tony, Alex, and Fransisco, all of whom are willing participants. There are only two bad eggs in the class, and generally the worst they do is put their heads down and sleep. I can handle that kind of misbehavior.

Bolstered by a successful science class, I went on to have 8A Art (with Michael, the blind kid) which went surprisingly smoothly, back to 7A for Activities (I really do LOVE that class), and wrapped up the day with 7B Art. I went home feeling pretty good about myself.

It had been a rough start, but I had made it.

Wednesday: And things had been going so well

Wednesday started out ok. My first period was free so I had breakfast in the cafeteria. The breakfast baleadas they make are fantastic! Then I had 8B Art, which went surprisingly well. But later in the day was a second Activities in 7A, and something (I really am not sure what) went very wrong. Maybe the kids were just feeling all riled up because we were playing a game. The goal was to walk through  a maze of desks blindfolded, being guided verbally by another student. This was meant to be an exercise on following directions, which is ironic seeing as how they didn’t listen to a word I said. Things just kept getting more and more out of control, and the more they ignored me, the angrier I became. I know that this is probably not the healthiest response to dealing with problem children, but it’s not as if I was speaking Greek. I made the directions clear; I gave them second and third chances to behave. It was meant to be a fun exercise, but at every turn they flung my kindness back in my face.

Finally I had had enough. We put the desks back, and I had them spend the rest of the class period writing in silence a full page about why it is important to follow directions and listen to the teacher. If I heard so much as a whisper from someone I wrote their name on the board. If they acted up again, they went to the Consejera! The Consejera is a cross between a guidance counselor and a Catholic school disciplinary nun. Needless to say, you DO NOT want to get sent to her.

It killed me to have to do that to 7A, but I am not about to spend the rest of the year letting them get away with murder in my class. Never the less, reading Nemesis’s beautifully written letter about how the teacher is like the captain of a ship, and must be listened to in order to ensure learning and fun, I almost cried.

I drew some comfort from the fact that I was not alone in my tribulations. In fact it turned out that almost every single teacher had similar problems. I was starting to realize that Honduran children are not used to structure. In actuality, the country seemed to be the perfect breeding ground for middle-school hellions. We ended all the classes 20 minutes early to have an impromptu school meeting in the cafeteria to go over the rules again and to lay down the law.

Wednesday may have been over, but Friday had never looked so far away.

Thursday: Broken In and Starting Over

Thursday I only had 2 classes, one first thing, and another at the end of the day. First was Art with 8B. By this time I had found my rhythm with the Art classes, and everything went swimmingly. I might actually have some good artists come out of that class! However the day ended in much the same fashion as Wednesday. We ended classes early AGAIN to have a talk with the kids, but not before I finally broke down in 7B Activities. Once again they just did not follow directions, no matter how often I repeated them. This time I had them write about what they would like to do in Activities class, and how they expected me to trust them with cooking or woodwork later in the year if they couldn’t follow the simple directions for a game now? This time I couldn’t get mad though. I was spent. I did end up sending a girl to the Consejera this time, and I hope it got the point across.

I went home and locked myself in my room. What was I doing wrong? I thought I had good lesson plans for Activities? Sure it was the first week, but we were playing games and learning about teamwork! After much introspection and internet searching, it finally dawned on me that I was spending too much time trying to be a teacher, and not enough time teaching. I was structuring my class like an after school special, practically spoon feeding the kids these goofy lines about cooperation and teamwork. No wonder they weren’t listening, I wouldn’t listen to this dribble! This was meant to be an activities class. What they learned wouldn’t be through reflection writings or discussion, but through hands on projects.

So I deleted my class planning folder for actividades and started over. I wanted the kids to think more creatively, but I had to keep them entertained. How was I going to do this? Puzzle games. I looked all over the web for puzzles to give them in class. During my search I also found a great idea for a science lesson plan!

I finally emerged from my room several hours later. My roommates must have thought I had lost it (and maybe I had), as I quickly disappeared out the front door, only to return with an egg shaped rock, giggling maniacally. I had a plan…

Friday: Crash and Burn-ing Trash

Friday I strode into my 7A Science class with confidence.

“Today”, I announced, “I am going to test your ability to listen and take notes. I will start by giving you a lecture on my favorite prehistoric creature, during which you will take notes. At the end there will be a pop quiz.”

Chorus of groans and “Nooo Meester!”

So I began my lecture about the now extinct Cattywampus. I began by saying how it went extinct during the last Ice Age, and no trace of it was ever found. I went on to describe its green scales and reed like mane, its huge nasal cavity and clawed feet (like a chicken). I told them how it made it’s home n a swamp in order to hide from its enemy the Bunyip, which looked like a huge saber-toothed badger. I finished up the lecture by showing them all the fossilized Cattywampus egg that I owned. The kids were really impressed with that, and it took all my willpower not to start laughing.

The kids studiously took notes, and then I gave them the quiz. I marked them then and there, and handed them all back. Every single one got a zero. Not because of any inferior quality of their notes either. Seeing as how the Cattywampus never existed, it couldn’t possibly have had green scales, or been hunted by saber-toothed badgers (which didn’t exist either…I hope). The expressions were priceless. I told the kids that they should have listened harder to my lecture. Didn’t I say that no trace of the Cattywampus was ever found? If so, then how could I possibly know all that information about it, let alone own a fossil egg?

“You have to listen” I told them, “but more than that, you have to question everything!”

It remains to be seen if the lesson actually hit home, but one thing is for certain, they are not going to forget the Cattywampus. I still hear the word uttered with horror in the hall sometimes.

The rest of the day was not so exhilarating. The stress of the week finally caught up to me, and it was soon apparent that I was coming down with something. The game of football (soccer) with the teachers after school only made things worse. Oh I didn’t play, but I did have to sit at the side of the field inhaling smoke for the whole game. You see there was a huge bonfire on the other side of the field, and the wind was blowing the smoke strait at us. No matter where I moved, the smoke followed in a huge noxious cloud. It was a big fire.

Why the big fire you ask? Well here in Honduras, that’s what we call recycling! That’s right. Most Hondurans dispose of their trash by burning it, plastic and all. I probably have lung cancer now.

Needless to say, I spent the rest of the weekend with a horrible case of the flu, aggravated by trash smoke inhalation.  

When it rains, it pours...and then it floods

It's early evening and the afternoon heat has finally broken. The sky just over the courtyard wall is beginning to glow orange, while still a pale blue directly overhead. Feeling the warm air against my skin, dip a bowl into the cool water of the pila and begin to wash away the grime and sweat which has accumulated over the past 24 hours. Man that water feels good.

It amazes me how my definition of things has changed since coming down here. Especially my idea of what it means to be "clean". For example, my idea of a shower is now dumping bowl fulls of water over my head from a concrete tub we keep behind the house. It really needs to be cleaned, but we can't until Sunday, which is the one day we have reliably running water.
Another trial of hygiene has been laundry. All laundry here must be washed by hand in a bucket of soapy water, rinsed out in another bucket, and then hung up to dry. Now, for the record, I do not have a problem with this, however my work schedule and the weather does. Washing by hand takes time, something I do not yet have as I am helping to set up a school by next Monday. It also requires nice weather in which to dry the laundry outside. I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but it is currently the rainy season in Honduras. This means that, surprise surprise, it rains a lot. Especially in the afternoon when one is hopping to do the laundry.

Lucky for me, this last Tuesday we had our teacher's planning day at one of the other volunteer houses. This particular house is in a gated community about 10 minutes drive outside of Juticalpa. The volunteers call this community "Florida", because of the very cushy conditions provided there (and it really does look like an old people's community from Florida!)

In Florida, they have reliably running water EVERY DAY. They have a covered patio to hang their washing up in on rainy days. Their pila is even inside in a utility room. But greatest of all these things is that they have a washing machine! True you have to fill the thing with water using a bucket, and then again for the rinse cycle, but you can wash a whole load of laundry at once! So in between lesson planning, I decided to avail myself of the amenities. I was even able to wash my bedsheets, which were beginning to smell like old cheese (and not the good kind you enjoy with a nice Merlot).

I didn't quite have time to finish drying everything, but as it was sunny out I just took them home in a plastic bag and hung them up on our own line. I was just happy that my sheets were clean, and promptly put them on my bed, dreaming of the blissfull sleep I would have that night.

In the meantime, I and a couple other volunteers had decided to have a good meal that evening of roast chicken and mashed potatoes. We needed a few more things though, so we headded off to the shops.

Then everything went wrong.

Just as we finnished our shopping, the monsoon hit. Most of the city is on an incline, and our house is at the top (or there about), so to get home we had to fight our way past raging torrents of filthy water. In some places you could litterally not see the road. Over the course of 20 minutes there had been enough rain that, looking down one of the sideroads two blocks from our house, we could see a car almost totally submerged!

The worst part though was my laundry. I could not have been wetter if I had dropped it in the pila. To make matters worse, I hade left my window open and now half my bed was soaked! I stripped the bed and set the sheets up on the backs of several chairs in the living room (I left the rest of the laundry on the line; a completely lost cause).

At least we still had a good meal to look forward to right? Wrong. No sooner was I about to set about peeling the potatoes when the power went out. Have I mentioned we have an electric stove? This is why I prefer gas.

So there we all were, sitting around a few candles (I came prepared!) in the common room, sharing a meal of soda and half a bag of chips. I sat under my sheets like a tent. We were going to try and make the best of a bad situation, and were just about to play a stiring round of apples to apples, when Maki got a phone call.

It seems the Santa Clara Elementary School dosn't have very good drainage...

So ten minuites late we were piling into the back of Carlos's truck to head down to the school. It was only lightly rainging at this point, so the ride was pretty bad (for more details on riding in trucks in Honduras, see my earlyer posts). I have said before that there is no more of a white-knuckle ride that riding in the back of a Honduran truck in the rain...I was wrong. Doing it at night is far worse. There are places where the road is washed out, or where you can see the slope below you is slowly washing away, and all you can think about is what if this is the rain that finally collapses it? The roaming mangy dogs are also quite unnerving on dark Honduran streets in the middle of the night. The word "chupacabra" was mentioned more than once...and to be honest, they really do look kinda demonic when they're wet and their eyes are glowing in the headlights.

The school had about and inch of water in it, including the library. So we set about sweeping. Yup, sweeping. Thankfully some extra help from the college arrived, and we soon became a well oiled, water moving machine. We even got to chase a few frogs out of the school...frogs the size of Honduran cockroaches (which is big)!

Wednesday was painful. Jeff had school, and I had to do more planning. Lacey, who was already getting sick finally sucummed and had to take the day off school. Wednesday evening though, we finally got our roast chiken and mashed potatoes. My bed and sheets were mercifully dry by the time we got back from de-swamping the school, and I hear they are putting in a better drainage system already!

By today the last of my clothes are dry. A bit stiff, but dry none the less. And they don't smell either! That makes them good enough to wear!

So like I said, you  really have to re-define things down here, especially what it means to be "clean".

The blind, lead by the blind, lead by the dosn't-quite-speak-English A.K.A. Oh what have I gotten myself into now?

Today was supposed to be fairly easy...well, for me at least. I would spend a quiet day at the school working on lesson plans, and then return home to do the dishes. All that did end up happening, but with a few unwelcome additions (as is the way of things).

First if all, it was anything but quiet. There is some sort of work being done on the soon-to-be teacher's office, and it involves a lot of power tools. We had to keep pausing the meeting to wait for them to finish drilling. However, this pales in comparison to the news we all received regarding a prospective student named Micheal. After meeting Micheal and his mother, Maki (the coordinator) showed them around the school and had a talk with Micheal's mother regarding our expectations. They are not high to say the least. Maki made it clear that there was very little chance that Micheal would pass, in fact we all rather expect him to fail.

Now I know that sounds horrible to cast judgement like that, but this is why. Micheal is blind. Not only that, but he also has some sort of mental disability. Sadly, this is not on paper, and Micheal's mother is in MAJOR denial about the whole thing. The fact remains that we are just not equipped (or trained) in how to handle this. Micheal needs special care and attention, which we cannot give him. Even Nazareth (the school for the mentally handicapped also run by the Olancho Aid Foundation), said that they did not have the training to take him. The only place that could is three hours drive from here in the capital city, Tegucigalpa!

Much to all our chagrin, Micheal's mother was absolutely determined to have him in the school...and Maki said ok. I'm not sure I would have had the heart to turn him down either. The issue is, that Micheal's parents recently got divorced. The father got all the money, and the mother got the blind, mentally handicapped child. Does that strike you as fair? Of course I don't know the whole story, but still. Micheal's mother just got a new job to try and support him, and had assumed that we were going to accept him into the school. It seems that his prior teachers have been pity passing him, so that he could get his 6th grade education (this is a HUGE deal in Honduras; they literally get more dressed up that we do in the states for most weddings!), so his doting mother thinks that he can do anything the other kids his age can. So we have taken him on, on the condition that he keeps his grades up and participates in class. There is pretty much no chance of this, since this is like asking a man with one leg and a heart murmur to run a marathon. Maki says that at least this way the mother will have a chance to find something else for Micheal, but this does mean that we are stuck babysitting for the next month or so. It sounds cold, but that is basically what we are doing.

In happier news, the afternoon commute home continues to be an adventure. Having been dropped off in the center of town twice now (once with a very large, very heavy box), I was not too surprised when it happened again. This time was in a slightly different place then before, but I was confidant that I could make it home. But then I was greeted by a friendly tap on the shoulder, and turned to see Hermando, the gardener at the high school! he asked me (in Spanish, with a sprinkling of English) if I knew my way home, and could he help me get there...at least I'm pretty sure that is what he said. I replied (in English with a scattering of very broken Spanish) that I would love some help getting home.

I should point out that I know Hermando from the first day of orientation at the high school, where he and I were partnered up to try and overcome the language barrier and to introduce one another to the group. He seemed like a friendly chap, at least from what I could understand, and it would seem that my trust was not misplaced, as here I am safe and sound.

Of course, halfway through the walk home, I was not so confident. We walked through a part of the city I had not been through before, and I was terrified for a moment that the reference to "casa" was for his home, rather than mine. The other volunteers did say that the Hondurans were friendly and would invite us over alot. "Oh good grief" I thought, "what happens when I get there? I'm going to have to have a conversation, and my Spanish can only improve so quickly! What if he wants to introduce me to his family? What if those guys on the corner want to beat us up and take our money? What if Hermando wants to beat me up and steal my money?" By this point I had lost my orientation, and no longer knew were I was. So it was with great relief that I recognized the health clinic at the corner of our street, and made a mental note that there were some very pretty vistas from down that road. Hermando is a pretty nice guy. He even tried to make a bit of conversation in broken English.

I shall wrap up this blog with something fun...geckos! They are everywhere, indoors and out, usually high on a wall, and today at lunch I got to watch them hunting bugs on the screen of one of the high windows in the school. They have this almost supernatural ability to jump off the wall as if their center of gravity had shifted 90 degrees. I even saw two of them play tug of war with a bug one of them had caught. It was one of the most adorable things I have ever seen!

Trouble in the back

It seems about time to talk about Honduran driving habits in a bit more detain. In particular the abundance of pick up trucks, and the even more abundant habit of riding in the back of them. You see it everywhere, and while this might not seem so odd, try to envision exactly what this for of transportation entails. You are sitting on the edge of the bed (nobody seems to sit IN the bed of the truck, and as a result you feel honor bound to follow suit, or else risk seeming like some cowardly gringo pansy), and you fly along a dirt road which is more pot holes than pavement...and by pavement I mean compacted dirt. The driver attempts to compensate for the Swiss cheesiness of the road by swerving suddenly to try and avoid them; a maneuver which often takes you into the path of on coming traffic!
Now, you want to try and look ahead, to try and prepare for the imminent swerving, bumping, and near-death experiences rapidly hurtling towards you, but whenever you look up you are blinded by all the grit and dust kicked up by the passing vehicles which the driver of this death ride has managed to avoid.
So now you are blind, hanging on for dear life, and wondering if it would have been a better idea to simply walk the five miles back home?
There are only two things which can make this ride worse. That's right, WORSE. One is if it is raining. While this does reduce the blinding dust, it also makes the truck slippery, at which point you are reduced to cowering in the bed of the truck, and hoping that none of the locals spot you for the nancy boy you invariably feel like.
The other is if during the prior night you were rudely awakened at 2am by a vicious call of nature. I'm not sure if it was the fruit I ate the previous day or simply the local bacteria finally having their way with me, but either way, I can now personally attest to just how swift and brutal Moctezuma's revenge can be.
To settle one's stomach after a ride of this sort, the returning volunteers swear by coke and alkaseltzer. The combination is very affective, but one must remember to put the tablet in a glass and then SLOWLY add the coke...not drop half the tablet into the coke bottle. There will follow a few moments of clarity in which you have to act, and if like me, you happen to be sitting in the office of the middle school director, there really isn't much you can do except put your mouth over the bottle and try to drink the ensuing eruption of effervescence. In this situation you are doomed to failure. Anyone else present will be rewarded by a few moments of your cheeks filling up with soda foam like a cartoon character sucking on an air pump, before the inevitable occurs. During this time you can think only one thing...

oh why didn't I pay more attention in chemistry?

Quite the event

So today a man held a razor to my throat! It's ok though, I paid him to do it. I finally went and got my hair cut at a local barber's shop, and man do these guys know how to cut hair! I have never seen someone cut hair with such pressision. They even trimmed my beard and finished everything off with a strait razor! I have never felt so well groomed in my life. If any guys come down to visit me, make sure to let your hair and beard grow out so you can go to a barbers while you are down here.

The best part...it only cost the equivalent of $2.50!

To war!

I firgit to mension that in the last couple days we have gone to war with the indiginouse insect population. Mosquitoe larva in the pila, which they have stuff for down here; fireants in the kitchen sink...yes that's right, FIRE ants. Turns out the dowsing the place with vinigar diswades the little blighters quite effectively. Last but cirtainly not least, we cannot forget the GIGANTIC cockroach  Jeff found in his closet. The beast was the size of a small car, and is probubly watching me type, right this moment, from under the refrigerator. We are looking up remedies to try and deal with him, and are feeling hopeful that the "backing soda and sugar" trick we found on the internet will work. We have the stuff but have hesitated in using it...we're conserned that the sugar will just attract more of them...

Settling in

Goodness me what a couple of days!

So sunday morning we all attended mass...all accept Lacey who was freaking out because she was convinced she had cotracted lice from the pillows and sheets she had been given. Not wanting to risk inflicting it on everyone else, she opted out of mass. This was completely unnesecery, as later we determined it was only bed bugs (because that's SOO much better).

Mass was an event, to say the least. Honduran Cathholic mass is alot more lively than American ones. There is alot of singing and tamberines; one guy I saw even had an old turtle shell (the size of my cat) and was beating it with a wooden stick like a drum! Of course I didn't understand a word of it (well maybe one word here and there), but it was enjoyable none the less. Afterwards one of the parishoners had us all over to her home for juice and cookies. It was a beautiful, but simple home. A town house with only a single level, tile floor, and open rafters over which you could see the terracotta tiles of the roof. There were a few paintings on the wall, a dining table, a sofa, a couple side tables, and a cabinet full of plates. Acording to Carlos, Hondurans take great pride in their homes, keeping them VERY tide and clean (which is a feat with all the dust that is kicked up fromt he dirt roads. I must admit, thinking of my room back home, full of stuff, made me feel a little disgusted with myself. I mean, what do I need it all for?

Anyway, while we were there, the other volunteers and I put our heads together on how to cheer up Lacey. You see it was her birthday on sunday, and waking up to find bugs in you bed is not a good way to start. Thankfully, Jeff and I had already planned to bake her a cake that afternoon, which the others said would be great with the dinner we were having that evening!

So, when we got back, Maki (one of the returning volunteer co-ordinators) gave Lacey a can of spray for her bed along woth some new sheets and pillows. Jeff meanwhile, got Lacey out of the house on the pretense of going shopping, giving me time to bake the cake.

I have to say, baking a cake with no way to measure the ingredients was a challenge, but I managed to pull it off in time to clean up so that Lacey thought I had spent the whole afternoon on the sofa reading (Jeff did an excellent job of stalling at one of the other volunteer houses)

That evening we had a great dinner of boliadas! It is baisically a soft taco, wrapped around refried beans, scambled egg, fresh avocado, and two types of Honduran cheese (one that is almost the same as feta cheese, and the other almost the same as sour cream, but thicker) I'll have to make them for you all when I get back.

We gave Lacey the cake and sang her happy birthday in English AND in Spanish, and she went to bed with a smile on her face...which is saying somthing considering that it was full of bugs that prior morning!

Today we met with the Honduran teachers at the school, and got into small groups to begin planning the school year. My group was particularly small, since most of the teachers are at the elementary school, and only a handful of us are all at the middle school. We brainstormed a bit, and I have to say I am excited! I have to plan for three classes: Art, Actividados (which is basically home economics...or as I'll be doing it, International Cooking 101!), and World History. I am also being threatend with having to teach sex ed...lets hope that dosn't happen.

Next Friday is the pre-school year open house for the parents, and apparently Honduran parents expect to see a decorated classroom. It indicates to them that the teacher is ready and prepared to educate the students. I am noticing that appearances are much more important down here than back home. For instance I am going to have to get a haircut, because long hair on guys is associated with gangs (which explains at least some of the funny looks I'v been getting in town). I have yet to cut my hair, but I think I should proubly do it soon...apparently a few years back some people in the capital got angry about local violence and whent out and mobbed anyone with tatoos (which are also connected to gangs). Like I said, I think I'll get it cut soon.

Thisafternoon I was very brave (or stupid depending on how you look at it), and ventured into town to buy groceries all on my own! I know I know, you're all thinking how could I do that, I could have been mugged, but honestly during the day their isn't any danger (so say all the returning volunteers). The real issue was my complete lack of decent language skills. Still, I did mange to find my way around, had a good walk, saw the city (which is actually really nice to be in, it feels like a community), and even fumbled my way through buying food for dinner.

That being said, I'm pretty sure the guy at the butcher's counter in the super market thinks I'm insane. I had no idea how to ask for a unit of weight, and ended up having to just tell him to stop when the desired amount of ground beef was in the bag. I did this by saying 'alto' to him, which means 'stop'...at least it does if you're driving. The word for 'stop' in reference to a person filling a container for you is, I am told, a completely different word. The only reason I knew 'alto' was because it is written on all the stop signs (of which I have seen three in the whole city).

It is now raining VERY hard, and there has even been some thunder and lightening. Now this is what I wanted from the rainy season! I should probubly crash though, as tomorrow is another long day of lesson planning and trying not to make too much of a stupid gringo of myself.

Missing you all

Andrew

Getting caught up and settled in

Ok, so I'm here. It took a while to get the internet working, and then we were all buisy getting settled in, so I appologise for not posting sooner.

The flight was fun. The flight to San Salvadore was uneventful (I slept through most of it), and the flight from there to Honduras was brief to say the least (it took lierally 20 minutes...we went up, and then came back down). I then flew through immigration (not many people fly in at 9:30 am on a thursday), and then spent an hour waiting in the terminal for someone to show up. During this time I tried vainly to find someone to change my US money so that I could FINALLY get somthing to eat. Saddly, my spanish sucks, and I eventually gave up.

At long last Peggy (the Olancho Aid volunteer co-ordinator) and Carlos (the Olancho Aid co-ordinator)showed up and came to my rescue. Gradually the rest of the volunteers flew in and we all pile onto the bus for a three hour ride out to Juticulpa. But first...

...we went to the mall! That's right, the very first thing we did on arriving in Honduras was go to the Tegucigalpa mall food court and eat at subway. Tegus (Tegucigalpa) is a pretty developed city, and there are US stores everywhere you look (including Little Ceasar's, Burger King, and Sherwin Williams).

That being said, the food court did have an amazing view of the mountains. We watched as a late afternoon rainstorm rolled in, the clouds cascating down the mountainside. It was a very strange feeling sitting there eating my meatball sub and watching somthing so beautiful at the same time.

The bus ride was equally jarring. Mostly due to the fact that roads here mostly consist of potholes, and the "rules of the road" are more like guidelines than laws. Still, he view's were amazing. The Olancho province is in central Honduras, which is mostly mountains. Despite the rain which hits most afternoons this time of year (as it is early in the rainy season) it is still fairly clear the rest of the day. You round a bend and all of a sudden you are looking across a mountain vally strewn with small clusters of houses dwarfed by a sea of green. My memory of the ride is a bit patchy, as I fell asleep a couple times, only to be awakened when my head got slammed against the window from hitting a particularly deep pothole.

We arrived in Juticalpa, ate pizza, found our houses, and promptly passed out. I'm sure we did some other stuff, but I really don't remember it.

Friday we got the grand tour. We saw the three schools Escuela Nazareth (the only school for handycapped children in all of Olancho), Santa Clara (the elementary school), and Cardenal (the high school where I will be teaching). We met Padre Ricardo, the founder of the Olancho Aid Foundation, and picked up the boxes we had sent ahead of ourselves...all accept mine. I'm sure it will arrive eventually, but until then I'm going to have to make do with a hand towl and the cloths I packed on the plane.

We got a tour of the city too. Its a lively place. Most of the roads are dirt, save the main boulavade and a few at the center of town. You are perfectly safe during the day and early evening, although I still don't think I'll be going out on my own for a while...many of the roads look the same to me, and I know I'll end up lost. On the bright side, the foundation gave us all cell phones so we can reach each other!

I have to say that the technology here feels very out of place. Almost everyone has cell phones, and yet only a few have constantly running water. I and my roommates still have yet to discover that supposedly magical hour when we get running water to our house.

Which brings me to the living arraingements! I'm sharing a house with two other volunteers, Jeff and Lacey. We each have our own rooms, and share a large common area and a kitchen. There are two bathrooms, which are almost useless to us. We have to use a buckt to flush the loo half the time, and the shower and sinks NEVER work. We have to wash using a bowl out by the pila, which is a large concrete tub in the back which you keep full of water for things like flushing the loo, washing, and doing dishes (we buy large jugs of water to drink, just like everyone else).

As soon as I figure out how, I'll start posting pictures. I found out AFTER I got here that my new laptop's maximum resolution is just 168 pixles short of the minimum requirement for my new digital camers...I hate technology. I'm going to try and get one of my roommates to let me use their laptop for picures.

Next week we have to plan our lessons. I actually get two, since the high school dosnt start classes till september 6th (somthing about testing). I am very glad to here this, as I have to make lesson plans for art class, cooking/life skills (more on that later), and world history. No, I am no longer teaching PE. Its already a joke here how I never seem to know what classes they are going to throw at me.

Anyway, I'm gonna go wash my hair out by the pila. Its raining and I don't want to miss the opportunity. It's actually a really nice temperature (around 70 during the day) and low humidity, but we did walk around alot and it is pretty dusty.

Oh, one last thing! There is a very nice hotel just around the corner. AC and a pool even, so you can all feel free to come down and visit! Once I get my school year schedule, I'll let you all know when my vacations are!

GO!!! (retroactive posting)

I’ll post this later since I can’t seem to get on the internet here, but it is currently 3:35 am, on Thursday August 19, 2010, and I am sitting in Dulles airport waiting for my flight. There’s no turning back now, and I have to say, I am very excited (either that or sleep deprived…I can’t quite tell…)

Get set...

Sunday night while I was saying goodbye to my friends it finally hit me...I'M GOING TO HONDURAS, AAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! I spent most of Monday panicking about it, and trying to figure out all the things I still needed to do before I left (like get my anti-malaria pills...those are important.)

Now the abject terror seems to have calmed down now a bit. There is stuff everywhere waiting to be put into the suitcase, and A LOT of important papers to keep track of (passport, traveler's insurance, etc...) but finally the fear is more of an anticipation.

I've said a lot of goodbyes, which makes me sad, but I don't have time to mope.

Now where did I put that pile of underwear?

On your marks...

Hello all! It's just over a week before I leave for Honduras and things are getting a little crazy. I have to pack, write a final paper for my associate degree, and wrap up all the final details before I head out.

Thanks to all of you who have leant your support and encouragement! Your donations are helping make this possible. If anyone would still like to help sponsor me on this trip, it's not too late! Just give me a call and I'll tell you how you can help.

For anyone interested in learning more about where I am going, here is the link to the Olancho Aid Foundation's website. This is the organization I am going down with:

http://www.olanchoaid.org/