Now the theme of this post is going to appear to be beer, but beer, or the lack thereof, consumes my life right now and thus overshadows my true message, which I hope I will still make clear.
Drinking isn’t really done in Honduras because there is such a problem here with bolos (drunks). Honduras is a really conservative country, and therefore people don’t really drink because you can get a bad reputation. Also, they have bolos. I have yet to encounter a bolo, but I hear they’re pretty ridiculous. These men drink to the point that they pass out EVERY NIGHT on the street. They eat, sleep, defecate, and most importantly drink in the same vicinity all the time. This level of alcoholism is unheard of in the U.S.
Anyways, considering the stigma alcohol has and the crime situation, Peace Corps most certainly discourages drinking, especially in large amounts. Women especially are not encouraged to ever drink in public because our communities will then consider us to be “loose women.” Women don’t drink in public and they don’t go to bars. When I leave my site, I can drink, but then I have to be conscious of the reputation of the person I would be visiting. Bummer.
So, most of us being in our twenties and still in the alcohol consumption stage in life, are going NUTS. I think all we talk about is beer. We had a field trip last Friday to the local water system in Valle de Angeles and all we talked about on the car ride back was what beers we would love to be drinking that moment. One of the guys, Juan, moans and says, simply, “Guinness and fish and chips,” before someone smacked him in the back of the head; he’d hit too close to home with that one. Heh.
So, basically the only time I can consume an alcoholic beverage without making my community hate me is by being in a restaurant outside of my immediate community. Therefore, last Saturday, after Matt and I used the internet, we met up with the rest of the crew and got a couple of beers. I had Imperial, which isn’t a bad beer, and definitely was satisfying, but is basically the Stella of Latin America. Light. Basic.
Now here’s what I should really be talking about: Sunday I have the joy of navigating myself four hours West to visit a Wat/San Volunteer to shadow until Wednesday morning. Volunteer Visits are the beginning step to helping us decide what we want to do in our projects. Our Volunteers are picked according to our similar backgrounds. They’re supposed to be really fun. They used to happen on the weekends, but people just screwed around, so now we go during the working week to make sure we actually learn stuff. It seems as though Peace Corps has gotten wise to many opportunities in which Volunteers/Trainees chose to have fun rather than completely focus on work, and they seemed to have changed these opportunities with our training group. That’s fine with me.
Anyways, we’d heard that there was an ex-pat in Honduras that started a pizzeria/micro-brewery. Now, take a wild guess who is going to be close to said brewery…
ME! I win the Volunteer Visit lottery!! Pshaw to all those people bragging about being close to the beach! I have beer. I think about 5 people are approached me asking me to bring back some good ‘ole dark beer for them.
That ends my beer rant. The Volunteer Visit will be interesting considering last week Juan Carlos just scared us about buses getting robbed and the bandits taking women. Also, my Spanish isn’t quite at the level of me feeling comfortable venturing out on my own, but it will be a great experience.
Projects
Our Wat/San group has 18 trainees. Half are engineers with degrees, the other half are currently feeling like Peace Corps made a big mistake putting us in Wat/San. Wat/San Volunteers are in almost every department in Honduras. We are clustered, which means one engineer “supports” the technicians in the department.
Now being one of those unfortunate people without an engineering degree, I can most certainly train to become an engineer if I’m interested. Thing is, we did basic math (basic being trig) last week and I just about died. I hate math. I’m kind of freaking out, thinking that I won’t finding my niche in the Wat/San life. At least I have about nine other people just as frustrated with finding the cosine of some darn triangle. I mean, the stuff we’re doing right now were entry level classes for the engineers…
Wednesday was fun though because we got to play and construct a hand pump. Each group had about three people and we got just a diagram and had to improvise and construct these pumps with the materials Carlos (project manager) gave us. He’s so funny, being a Honduran man, was amazed when my group of all females successfully hammered a nail through PVC. Every time we have an activity he comes up to me and says, “Hannah, esta bien? Do you like this, what do you think?” Did I inadvertently tell them I hated water and sanitation during my technical interview? I don’t understand why he seems to think I’m a fish out of water. I mean, I think I’m a fish out of water, but I thought I was hiding it really well. Hah.
Today each of the programs in Honduras presented on how the sectors overlap. Honduras has: business, health, youth development, protected areas management (PAMers), and the best WAT/SAN! So we basically heard how Volunteers in Wat/San collaborate with health Volunteers on projects; sharing expertise to optimize the impact on the community. I should have been a health Volunteer. Nah, I mean I’m not regretting my decision, but I doubt I will go the engineer route and I’m going to have to get more comfortable. It’s intimidating working with people who have worked for several years as civil engineers or have their master’s degree in engineering.
But, the Volunteer Visits are meant to help us find out place in our projects. Andrea, my Volunteer, supposedly has a similar background and talking to her will help direct me.
Here’s to not getting stuck in a roadblock and to finding a micro-brewery!
Chequeleque (ok, got it.)
Cheque.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Crime in Honduras
Ok, so I know last week I alluded, or out-rightly talked about Honduras’ crime problem. There are several factors that contribute to this problem, but mostly it has to do with drugs. Because of the U.S. war on drugs in Colombia, a lot of the operations have moved to countries with less oversight, and that place just happens to be Honduras. This oversight allows drug dealers to basically pass whatever they want in and out of the country without really much of a problem.
A lot of the violence in Honduras is a result of the growing drug culture here. As usual, the biggest problem areas and the big cities: Teguz and San Pedro Sula. But, alas, as Honduras is such a small country, you can pretty much count on being robbed by someone just about anywhere. The big cities deal with kidnapping and murder; it’s the smaller towns that you have to worry about perverts and robberies.
Being that poor Peace Corps Volunteers/Trainees and other gringos are perceived to be innately wealthy, and we tend to stand out a bit here, we’re a constant target. Someone sees me walking down the street and automatically assumes I have a nice cell-phone and an MP3 player. As such, it’s hard to really get through your service without being robbed, and in Honduras you can pretty much count on being held up by a gun/knife.
On the extreme end our Safety and Security office, Juan Carlos, has warned us how to handle ourselves in case a bus we’re traveling on faces a roadblock and bandits (rarely happens). Juan Carlos used to be the deputy director for like the whole of Honduras before he “retired” (he can’t be more than 40 years old), and as such whenever a Volunteer has a problem they can count on him. Apparently, after an incident is reported to Juan Carlos, the local police are suddenly motivated and become the personal guards of said Volunteer until the situation has been resolved.
I know this is a shoddy explanation of the situation here, but I figure it’s best not to include all the scary statistics to upset people. Typically, Volunteers are guaranteed to get robbed at some point during their two years. Do some Volunteers, especially women, encounter more violent crimes? Yes.
Honduras doesn’t have this problem because people here are terrible people, it’s because people are so poor that they are constantly tempted by other people’s nicer possessions. Grass is always greener. The thing is Peace Corps has done a great job scaring us into not being careless. As in the States, you can protect yourself just by being smart and aware of the situation. Two times a week Juan Carlos drives out to our training center to tell us how to handle ourselves in different situations. I know not to carry my cell-phone unless I absolutely need it and to hide money in different pockets. If someone asks for all my stuff I most definitely give it to them. No more walking down the street with my IPod in, but alas, such is life in the Peace Corps!
A lot of the violence in Honduras is a result of the growing drug culture here. As usual, the biggest problem areas and the big cities: Teguz and San Pedro Sula. But, alas, as Honduras is such a small country, you can pretty much count on being robbed by someone just about anywhere. The big cities deal with kidnapping and murder; it’s the smaller towns that you have to worry about perverts and robberies.
Being that poor Peace Corps Volunteers/Trainees and other gringos are perceived to be innately wealthy, and we tend to stand out a bit here, we’re a constant target. Someone sees me walking down the street and automatically assumes I have a nice cell-phone and an MP3 player. As such, it’s hard to really get through your service without being robbed, and in Honduras you can pretty much count on being held up by a gun/knife.
On the extreme end our Safety and Security office, Juan Carlos, has warned us how to handle ourselves in case a bus we’re traveling on faces a roadblock and bandits (rarely happens). Juan Carlos used to be the deputy director for like the whole of Honduras before he “retired” (he can’t be more than 40 years old), and as such whenever a Volunteer has a problem they can count on him. Apparently, after an incident is reported to Juan Carlos, the local police are suddenly motivated and become the personal guards of said Volunteer until the situation has been resolved.
I know this is a shoddy explanation of the situation here, but I figure it’s best not to include all the scary statistics to upset people. Typically, Volunteers are guaranteed to get robbed at some point during their two years. Do some Volunteers, especially women, encounter more violent crimes? Yes.
Honduras doesn’t have this problem because people here are terrible people, it’s because people are so poor that they are constantly tempted by other people’s nicer possessions. Grass is always greener. The thing is Peace Corps has done a great job scaring us into not being careless. As in the States, you can protect yourself just by being smart and aware of the situation. Two times a week Juan Carlos drives out to our training center to tell us how to handle ourselves in different situations. I know not to carry my cell-phone unless I absolutely need it and to hide money in different pockets. If someone asks for all my stuff I most definitely give it to them. No more walking down the street with my IPod in, but alas, such is life in the Peace Corps!
Honduras Parties
So last Saturday night the Santa Rita barrio threw the nine of us a little party. Husbands around here don’t really participate in much, so it was mostly women and children. There’s a little open space near some of the houses so the families pulled out their kitchen table, a stereo system and some Christmas lights. It was a nice little set-up.
We played some musical chairs, and of course ATE. The moms spontaneously started bringing out plates burdened with rice, chicken, broccoli, and of course tortillas! Darren, sitting next to me, groans, “Oh my god, I see a tortilla and my mouth just goes dry!” Perfectly put Darren. After we forced fed ourselves yet again (thank god the food tastes fantastic here!), we started the dancing portion of the night.
The stereo system was moved into Darren’s house where couches were cleared and the reggae ton was turned up so all the neighborhood could hear. Luis, Darren’s brother (host brother), was quite the dancer and started the dance party. Some of us, who don’t really dance without some liquid courage, grabbed nearby children and used them to shield our shoddy dancing skills (yes, me). We danced until about 10:30, which around here is pretty late. The moms tried to teach us the punta, a traditional Honduran dance. The punta basically consists of women shaking their “booties” all over the place. Awkward.
By the end of the night a couple of the teenage boys gathered up the courage to dance with the “gringitas.” Every time another song started the crowd would shout, “La ultima (last one)!,” and then that song would end and the crowd would shout, “MAS, MAS!” and yet another song would be blasted before enough people finally left before they started to break down the party. It was great fun and a different view of the Honduran culture.
We also had some birthdays this week, which was incredibly exciting. A little while ago a Wat/San Volunteer came to teach us about designing water systems and she brought brownies. She warned us that we would begin to understand how precious treats like brownies were, and I didn’t really understand what she meant. Well, Honduras treats are pretty different. The cookies and chocolate just taste weird and they never quite satisfy those crazy cravings you randomly get during Spanish class.
So, in honor of the two Katie’s birthdays on Thursday and Friday, we brought cakes each day (not exactly planned). Groups of friends right now are pretty much divided up according to who you live close to because they are the only people you really have access to outside of class. So Katie One’s friends brought ice cream cake for her, which was purely heaven. If you have never eaten an entire slice of ice cream cake with your fingers you are really missing out! It makes the treat that much more delightful. I’m doing that from now on.
Also, Katie One not knowing that people were going to do something for her birthday baked a cake with her Spanish class, which we all ate too. Thursday: 2 cakes.
Now, Katie Two, who lives in my neighborhood, had a birthday today (Friday 3/13). Some people, not knowing that our barrio was having an exclusive party tonight, asked one of our facilitators to pick up a cake on her way to work. Thus, during training we had cake for Katie Two. Then promptly, went home, where we successfully surprised Katie Two with a great spread including: pizza, supposedly spiked punch, and CAKE!
I think one of the highlights of tonight (Friday nights in Honduras are definitely different) was when Brent, a very quiet and nice friend, walks out of the bathroom and asks Theresa (whose house the party was at) if she had a towel. It appeared as though he wanted to dry his hands, but it turns out that Theresa’s bathroom sink doesn’t actually have any plumbing, therefore when Brent, God forbid want to wash his hands, poured water into the sink, created a lake on the bathroom floor. Now maybe, had this been your friend’s house in the States, you would have laughed and moved on. In Honduras, when you awkwardly live with a family nice enough to host you for a few weeks and put up with your crazy American habits with very minor communication, it’s incredibly awkward and just one more moment that makes you want to crawl in a hole and die. HILARIOUS (guess you had to be there). Only Brent.
Friday: 2 cakes.
All my sweets cravings have been satisfied for a time. BEST. WEEK. EVER.
We played some musical chairs, and of course ATE. The moms spontaneously started bringing out plates burdened with rice, chicken, broccoli, and of course tortillas! Darren, sitting next to me, groans, “Oh my god, I see a tortilla and my mouth just goes dry!” Perfectly put Darren. After we forced fed ourselves yet again (thank god the food tastes fantastic here!), we started the dancing portion of the night.
The stereo system was moved into Darren’s house where couches were cleared and the reggae ton was turned up so all the neighborhood could hear. Luis, Darren’s brother (host brother), was quite the dancer and started the dance party. Some of us, who don’t really dance without some liquid courage, grabbed nearby children and used them to shield our shoddy dancing skills (yes, me). We danced until about 10:30, which around here is pretty late. The moms tried to teach us the punta, a traditional Honduran dance. The punta basically consists of women shaking their “booties” all over the place. Awkward.
By the end of the night a couple of the teenage boys gathered up the courage to dance with the “gringitas.” Every time another song started the crowd would shout, “La ultima (last one)!,” and then that song would end and the crowd would shout, “MAS, MAS!” and yet another song would be blasted before enough people finally left before they started to break down the party. It was great fun and a different view of the Honduran culture.
We also had some birthdays this week, which was incredibly exciting. A little while ago a Wat/San Volunteer came to teach us about designing water systems and she brought brownies. She warned us that we would begin to understand how precious treats like brownies were, and I didn’t really understand what she meant. Well, Honduras treats are pretty different. The cookies and chocolate just taste weird and they never quite satisfy those crazy cravings you randomly get during Spanish class.
So, in honor of the two Katie’s birthdays on Thursday and Friday, we brought cakes each day (not exactly planned). Groups of friends right now are pretty much divided up according to who you live close to because they are the only people you really have access to outside of class. So Katie One’s friends brought ice cream cake for her, which was purely heaven. If you have never eaten an entire slice of ice cream cake with your fingers you are really missing out! It makes the treat that much more delightful. I’m doing that from now on.
Also, Katie One not knowing that people were going to do something for her birthday baked a cake with her Spanish class, which we all ate too. Thursday: 2 cakes.
Now, Katie Two, who lives in my neighborhood, had a birthday today (Friday 3/13). Some people, not knowing that our barrio was having an exclusive party tonight, asked one of our facilitators to pick up a cake on her way to work. Thus, during training we had cake for Katie Two. Then promptly, went home, where we successfully surprised Katie Two with a great spread including: pizza, supposedly spiked punch, and CAKE!
I think one of the highlights of tonight (Friday nights in Honduras are definitely different) was when Brent, a very quiet and nice friend, walks out of the bathroom and asks Theresa (whose house the party was at) if she had a towel. It appeared as though he wanted to dry his hands, but it turns out that Theresa’s bathroom sink doesn’t actually have any plumbing, therefore when Brent, God forbid want to wash his hands, poured water into the sink, created a lake on the bathroom floor. Now maybe, had this been your friend’s house in the States, you would have laughed and moved on. In Honduras, when you awkwardly live with a family nice enough to host you for a few weeks and put up with your crazy American habits with very minor communication, it’s incredibly awkward and just one more moment that makes you want to crawl in a hole and die. HILARIOUS (guess you had to be there). Only Brent.
Friday: 2 cakes.
All my sweets cravings have been satisfied for a time. BEST. WEEK. EVER.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
The Daily Grind
Ok so I´m doing these all at once...
I wake up at 5:30 am, make my bed, and then go to the kitchen/family room where I awkwardly watch Suyapa make my breakfast and lunch. Our families provide us with all of our meals. They receive a daily allowance for us, that is supposed to cover these types of costs. Suyapa hasn´t really let me participate in the kitchen much beyond stirring some vegetables.
So breakfast has pretty much become cereal with milk and bananas. They like to heat up their milk, but Suyapa knows that the gringa likes her milk cold. This morning I had pink (supposedly strawberry flavored) oatmeal, fried tortillas with quesio (strong cheese). FRIED FRIED FRIED. GREASE GREASE GREASE. Now that pretty much all of the trainees are having stomach problems the doctors always say "´Don´t eat too much grease. Try to stay away from fried food." Trying to explain that to Suyapa is like asking her to stop living!
So after I eat my breakfast the hot water is ready. Suyapa takes the boiling water into the bathroom, puts it in the bucket and then combines it with cold water from outside. I stand there, shaking, attempting to rinse all the soap out of my hair and my body all in one go. I think my showers last less than 5 minutes now because it´s so cold.
After that I get dressed, finish getting ready for training and then walk to meet the 10 other people who live in my vecino. We then walk about 15 minutes up to the bus stop, where the bus Peace Corps hired to take us all to training, picks us up. There are three stops and we then arrive at the training center at 7:30 am. We have language classes for four hours, where we are separated into levels of experience/fluency. I´m in intermediate low. My language teachers should be ashamed! Hah just kidding.
After language we have lunch for an hour. Now lunch is a topic that needs to be discussed. In Honduras, it is extremely rude not to eat ALL of the food provided for you. There are a lot of stray dogs running around our site, but it´s poor manners to feed the dogs anything more than bones. Therefore, we are all forced to eat everything that is provided for us! That´s a lot. For instance, the girls get portions most men would be satisfied with, and the men get 2x what they need to eat. So if I have spaghetti for lunch, I also get fruit, vegetables, beans and inevitably tortillas, with which I am intended to use as a utensil for to eat my spaghetti. Yes, you eat carbs with carbs. Yum. I´ve been having stomach problems and I seriously can say it´s because I´ve been eating too much.
By the end of lunch we´re all groaning because the though of another bite makes us all want to be sick. More than we already are. One kid, Matt, seems to be the garbage disposal for the group because he is forever hungry. I haven´t gained weight, amazingly, but I had to have a serious talk with Suyapa BEGGING her to give me less food. I told her it was making me sick and she finally cut back A LITTLE. Last Saturday, I woke up at 7:30 and ate cereal with the kids. Then, when Francis woke up at 10 am we had to eat again! I protested, but the food was already made and served, so I had to partake of it.
Anyways, lunch is our social hour when the entire training group gets together and finally gets to speak some Spanish and relax. We have a great group and everyone is really fun. We laugh a lot and it seems like we´ve known each other for much longer than one week. It seems like I´ve been here longer than one week. Time flies when you´re having fun.
So after lunch we divide up to have security training (whoa man Honduras is dangerous. Sorry guys it´s true.), culture lessons or divide into our sectors and do job related funness. We have three sectors in this training class: health, business and water and sanitation (the best ever!)
At 4:30 we hop back on the bus and head home. We eat at 5:30, and now that I finally have homework I do that and then generally go to bed around 8 pm. These are the joys of living in the campo (country).
That´s my daily schedule thus far guys. We are in Zarabanda for three weeks before the move (by sector) to our Field Based Training. Here we will continue our language training while working more specifically on our job stuff. We´re in Pespire, where it will be very hot. Yuck. Right now, in Valle, it´s about 60-70º. The weather changes so fast here, it can get kind of annoying.
Next I´ll try to elaborate more on the security and my new friends! PS I´m not editing these. No time when you´re paying for every minute.
I wake up at 5:30 am, make my bed, and then go to the kitchen/family room where I awkwardly watch Suyapa make my breakfast and lunch. Our families provide us with all of our meals. They receive a daily allowance for us, that is supposed to cover these types of costs. Suyapa hasn´t really let me participate in the kitchen much beyond stirring some vegetables.
So breakfast has pretty much become cereal with milk and bananas. They like to heat up their milk, but Suyapa knows that the gringa likes her milk cold. This morning I had pink (supposedly strawberry flavored) oatmeal, fried tortillas with quesio (strong cheese). FRIED FRIED FRIED. GREASE GREASE GREASE. Now that pretty much all of the trainees are having stomach problems the doctors always say "´Don´t eat too much grease. Try to stay away from fried food." Trying to explain that to Suyapa is like asking her to stop living!
So after I eat my breakfast the hot water is ready. Suyapa takes the boiling water into the bathroom, puts it in the bucket and then combines it with cold water from outside. I stand there, shaking, attempting to rinse all the soap out of my hair and my body all in one go. I think my showers last less than 5 minutes now because it´s so cold.
After that I get dressed, finish getting ready for training and then walk to meet the 10 other people who live in my vecino. We then walk about 15 minutes up to the bus stop, where the bus Peace Corps hired to take us all to training, picks us up. There are three stops and we then arrive at the training center at 7:30 am. We have language classes for four hours, where we are separated into levels of experience/fluency. I´m in intermediate low. My language teachers should be ashamed! Hah just kidding.
After language we have lunch for an hour. Now lunch is a topic that needs to be discussed. In Honduras, it is extremely rude not to eat ALL of the food provided for you. There are a lot of stray dogs running around our site, but it´s poor manners to feed the dogs anything more than bones. Therefore, we are all forced to eat everything that is provided for us! That´s a lot. For instance, the girls get portions most men would be satisfied with, and the men get 2x what they need to eat. So if I have spaghetti for lunch, I also get fruit, vegetables, beans and inevitably tortillas, with which I am intended to use as a utensil for to eat my spaghetti. Yes, you eat carbs with carbs. Yum. I´ve been having stomach problems and I seriously can say it´s because I´ve been eating too much.
By the end of lunch we´re all groaning because the though of another bite makes us all want to be sick. More than we already are. One kid, Matt, seems to be the garbage disposal for the group because he is forever hungry. I haven´t gained weight, amazingly, but I had to have a serious talk with Suyapa BEGGING her to give me less food. I told her it was making me sick and she finally cut back A LITTLE. Last Saturday, I woke up at 7:30 and ate cereal with the kids. Then, when Francis woke up at 10 am we had to eat again! I protested, but the food was already made and served, so I had to partake of it.
Anyways, lunch is our social hour when the entire training group gets together and finally gets to speak some Spanish and relax. We have a great group and everyone is really fun. We laugh a lot and it seems like we´ve known each other for much longer than one week. It seems like I´ve been here longer than one week. Time flies when you´re having fun.
So after lunch we divide up to have security training (whoa man Honduras is dangerous. Sorry guys it´s true.), culture lessons or divide into our sectors and do job related funness. We have three sectors in this training class: health, business and water and sanitation (the best ever!)
At 4:30 we hop back on the bus and head home. We eat at 5:30, and now that I finally have homework I do that and then generally go to bed around 8 pm. These are the joys of living in the campo (country).
That´s my daily schedule thus far guys. We are in Zarabanda for three weeks before the move (by sector) to our Field Based Training. Here we will continue our language training while working more specifically on our job stuff. We´re in Pespire, where it will be very hot. Yuck. Right now, in Valle, it´s about 60-70º. The weather changes so fast here, it can get kind of annoying.
Next I´ll try to elaborate more on the security and my new friends! PS I´m not editing these. No time when you´re paying for every minute.
Welcome to Honduras
So I´ve drafted about three blog posts throughout my first week, and when I was finally satisfied with the latest version, I forgot to save it to my USB drive so now I am writing a whole new post. Gah.
Anyways, we arrived into Tegucigalpa about 11 am local time. Did you know that Tegucigalpa airport has one of the most dangerous runways in the world? They do! And we didn´t know either.
As we were landing the plane circled the runway about three time, each time getting closer and closer to the hills surrounding the airport. The last go round I swear we were no more than 100 feet from the nearest house. Pretty scary introduction to your new home. After that we waited in customs for a while and then we met our administrators! They shuttled us into the parking lot, loaded up our luggage to take directly to our host families and then took us to the training center.
At the training center they basically talked at us. I don´t remember what all they said because we were all so tired and too excited to sit through a lecture. After that we were taken out to meet our host families. Oh, this is about 3 pm local time (note that´s an hour after you East Coasters).
Now those of you who have heard me talk about my past roommates, those I was assigned to at least, know that I don´t have the best luck with living situations. I was TERRIFIED about meeting my host mother. On the bus to the training center we were finally given information on our host families. Suyapa (who until a couple of days ago I thought was called Norma) is my host mother. She´s basically in charge of the whole Peace Corps deal because her husband, Francis Javier, works all the time and then takes agriculture classes on the weekends. They have three children: Melanie (6), Meledine (4), and Javier (1). Great, kids! But, fortunately they are amazing! The girls are pretty crazy, always moving about, but they´re good kids and great to learn Spanish with. Javier is the cutest kid ever and has finally warmed up to me. We have established ¨confianza (trust),¨ which is big here is Honduras. The family is great and Suyapa and I have bonded over the telenovelas. My Spanish is much worse than I thought, but it´s coming along. I can understand more than I respond back.
The family lives in a very small house. We have a main room that is split between the kitchen and the living room. They basically only have 2 loveseats, a kitchen table, a small refrigerator, small stove, and a sink. Suyapa doesn´t even have cabinets for all of her dishes! (Pictures to come later). Outside we have our pilas, they are basically massive cement sinks that store the water for the family. Water here only comes on Sundays and Thursdays, so when it does come, they fill up the pilas. That water is then taken into the house in buckets to wash dishes and take showers. Yes, I take bucket showers now. I´m lucky that Suyapa heats up the water for me; other trainees are not so fortunate and mornings have been around 50º here recently.
Besides the main room there are two bedrooms and a small bathroom. The entire family sleeps in one room and I have the other. We´re required to have our own rooms, so that´s a good deal. It seems to be tradition in Honduras for families to sleep together in one bedroom. I´m not sure about their sleeping situation when a trainee isn´t around.
On that note, I´m also lucky because Suyapa has had a trainee before, so she knows the drill. She is a very nice woman and has been taking good care of me. She´s patient when I butcher her native language, and a great cook! Halley, her other Volunteer, still calls the house and was nice enough to call on my first night to help me get oriented.
Next post: the daily grind!
Anyways, we arrived into Tegucigalpa about 11 am local time. Did you know that Tegucigalpa airport has one of the most dangerous runways in the world? They do! And we didn´t know either.
As we were landing the plane circled the runway about three time, each time getting closer and closer to the hills surrounding the airport. The last go round I swear we were no more than 100 feet from the nearest house. Pretty scary introduction to your new home. After that we waited in customs for a while and then we met our administrators! They shuttled us into the parking lot, loaded up our luggage to take directly to our host families and then took us to the training center.
At the training center they basically talked at us. I don´t remember what all they said because we were all so tired and too excited to sit through a lecture. After that we were taken out to meet our host families. Oh, this is about 3 pm local time (note that´s an hour after you East Coasters).
Now those of you who have heard me talk about my past roommates, those I was assigned to at least, know that I don´t have the best luck with living situations. I was TERRIFIED about meeting my host mother. On the bus to the training center we were finally given information on our host families. Suyapa (who until a couple of days ago I thought was called Norma) is my host mother. She´s basically in charge of the whole Peace Corps deal because her husband, Francis Javier, works all the time and then takes agriculture classes on the weekends. They have three children: Melanie (6), Meledine (4), and Javier (1). Great, kids! But, fortunately they are amazing! The girls are pretty crazy, always moving about, but they´re good kids and great to learn Spanish with. Javier is the cutest kid ever and has finally warmed up to me. We have established ¨confianza (trust),¨ which is big here is Honduras. The family is great and Suyapa and I have bonded over the telenovelas. My Spanish is much worse than I thought, but it´s coming along. I can understand more than I respond back.
The family lives in a very small house. We have a main room that is split between the kitchen and the living room. They basically only have 2 loveseats, a kitchen table, a small refrigerator, small stove, and a sink. Suyapa doesn´t even have cabinets for all of her dishes! (Pictures to come later). Outside we have our pilas, they are basically massive cement sinks that store the water for the family. Water here only comes on Sundays and Thursdays, so when it does come, they fill up the pilas. That water is then taken into the house in buckets to wash dishes and take showers. Yes, I take bucket showers now. I´m lucky that Suyapa heats up the water for me; other trainees are not so fortunate and mornings have been around 50º here recently.
Besides the main room there are two bedrooms and a small bathroom. The entire family sleeps in one room and I have the other. We´re required to have our own rooms, so that´s a good deal. It seems to be tradition in Honduras for families to sleep together in one bedroom. I´m not sure about their sleeping situation when a trainee isn´t around.
On that note, I´m also lucky because Suyapa has had a trainee before, so she knows the drill. She is a very nice woman and has been taking good care of me. She´s patient when I butcher her native language, and a great cook! Halley, her other Volunteer, still calls the house and was nice enough to call on my first night to help me get oriented.
Next post: the daily grind!
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