Blast from the past

It seems people reminisce about the past and think of how much better things were. I sure feel that way about the 90's, and I'm sure that everyone else at one point or another hear from their parents or anyone else from older generations talking fondly of days of yesteryear. But people always tend to remember the positives and not the negatives of the time. I feel that way at times - that society is going to hell. I wasn't around for it but there was a time when men acted like gentlemen, women acted like ladies and chivalry still existed. The flip side of that coin however was this was before civil rights and the sexual revolution - when people were judged by the color of their skin and women were expected to take a backseat to men. However, I find that etiquette is timeless and something that should something everyone strives to maintain. I ran across this while browsing the web - it is unfortunate the most of these rules are disregarded nowadays by everyone (not just Hondurans). Obviously, I am not talking about you but here is just a little refresher just in case.

The Laws of Etiquette

• Never exagerate.
• Never point at another. (I would like to include the Honduran lip point to this)
• Never betray a confidence.
• Never leave home with unkind words.
• Never neglect to call upon your friends.
• Never laugh at the misfortunes of others.
• Never give a promise that you do not fulfill.
• Never send a present, hoping for one in return.
• Never speak much of your own performances.
• Never fail to be punctual at the time appointed. (if only meetings would start on time here)
• Never make yourself the hero of your own story.
• Never pick the teeth or clean the nails in company.
• Never fail to give a polite answer to a civil question.
• Never question a child about family matters.
• Never present a gift saying that it is of no use to yourself.
• Never read letters which you may find addressed to others.
• Never fail, if a gentleman, of being civil and polite to ladies.
• Never call attention to the features or form of anyone present.
• Never refer to a gift you have made, or favor you have rendered.
• Never associate with bad company. Have good company, or none.
• Never look over the shoulder of another who is reading or writing.
• Never appear to notice a scar, deformity, or defect of anyone present.
• Never arrest the attention of an acquaintance by touch. Speak to him.
• Never punish your child for a fault to which you are addicted yourself.
• Never answer questions in general company that have been put to others.
• Never, when traveling abroad, be over boastful in praise of your own country.
• Never call a new acquaintance by their first name unless requested.
• Never lend an article you have borrowed, unless you have permission to do so.
• Never attempt to draw the attention of the company constantly upon yourself.
• Never exhibit anger, impatience or excitement, when an accident happens.
• Never pass between two persons who are talking together, without an apology.
• Never enter a room noisily; never fail to close the door after you, and never slam it.
• Never forget that, if you are faithful in a few things, you may be ruler over many.
• Never exhibit too great familiarity with the new acquaintance, you may give offense.
• Never will a gentleman allude to conquests which he may have made with ladies.
• Never be guilty of the contemptible meanness of opening a private letter addressed to another.
• Never fail to offer the easiest and best seat in the room to an invalid, an elderly person, or a lady.
• Never neglect to perform the commission which the friend entrusted to you. You must not forget.
• Never send your guest, who is accustomed to a warm room, off into a cold, damp, spare bed, to sleep.
• Never enter a room filled with people, without a slight bow to the general company when first entering.
• Never fail to answer an invitation, either personally or by letter, within a week after the invitation is received.
• Never accept of favors and hospitality without rendering an exchange of civilities when opportunity offers.
• Never cross the leg and put one foot in the street-car, or places where it will trouble others when passing by.
• Never fail to tell the truth. If truthful, you get your reward. You will get your punishment if you deceive.
• Never borrow money and neglect to pay. If you do, you will soon be known as a person of no business integrity.
• Never write to another asking for information, or a favor of any kind, without enclosing a postage stamp for the reply.
• Never fail to say kind and encouraging words to those whom you meet in distress. Your kindness may lift them out of their despair.
• Never refuse to receive an apology. You may not receive friendship, but courtesy will require, when a apology is offered, that you accept it.
• Never examine the cards in the card-basket. While they may be exposed in the drawing room, you are not expected to turn them over unless invited to do so.
• Never, when walking arm in arm with a lady, be continually changing and going to the other side, because of change of corners. It shows too much attention to form.
• Never insult another with harsh words when applied to for a favor. Kind words do not cost much, and yet they may carry untold happiness to the one to whom they are spoken.
• Never fail to speak kindly. If a merchant, and you address your clerk; if an overseer, and you address your workman; if in any position where you exercise authority, you show yourself to be a gentleman by your pleasant mode of address.
• Never attempt to convey the impression that you are a genius, by imitating the faults of distinguished men. Because certain great men were poor penmen, wore long hair, or had other peculiarities, it does not follow that you will be great by imitating their eccentricities.
• Never give all your pleasant words and smile to strangers. The kindest words and the sweetest smiles should be reserved for home. Home should be our heaven.

Let's keep etiquette alive!

It ain't a good party if no one ends up in a Honduran jail

It all started out great. I arrived on Saturday, July 30^th to Santa Rosa for the H-15ers Despedida (going away party for people in the U.S. – they completed their service and were returning home). We went paintballing in the morning. It was a good time despite the fact that the paintballs would not explode on contact which was either due to really old paintballs or the tanks not being pressured enough. Essentially it was a painful imaginary gun fight with shouts of “I shot you! I shot you! You’re out!” It was a fun event that only a handful of us experienced and would unfortunately be likely forgotten and overshadowed by the events later at night.

Upon returning to Santa Rosa everyone did their own thing until the evening. With a big group of volunteers it was easier for everyone to figure out what they would do for dinner (rather than try to organize one place for everyone) and then meet up back at the hotel for drinks. We would then go out to the bars and nightclubs to top off the night.

As everyone began to head out for the Santa Rosa nightlife, about eight of us continued to stay and converse. I actually preferred to stay and play drinking games at the hotel but the group consensus was to head out to where the other volunteers were so I followed along. We went to a new bar where we encountered several volunteers – it was a very nice outdoor bar. After chatting with them for a little bit we headed out to another bar we heard the other volunteers were. Arriving there we found out it was a private party so we headed out to a nightclub to see if they were there. A street vendor was selling delicious smelling food so we stopped for a late night snack. Several other volunteers ended up there as well so we all sat happily eating our food. One of the volunteers wanted to head back to the hotel but did not know how to get there so I walked him back. We passed a big group of rowdy volunteers that were walking back to the hotel as well.

At the hotel while talking with the volunteer, everyone else came in. I noticed that the volunteers that I was with previously did not come with them so I headed back out to find them to make sure they were getting back ok. I ran into them at the Central Park – Amanda was walking in Danny’s sneakers while Danny was walking barefoot holding Amanda’s broken sandals. Lisa and Emina were walking arm in arm. I wasn’t sure how this came about but it was a nice image so I sat on the park steps and took it in. As they passed by I called out to them and we headed back to the hotel together.

To understand the layout of Santa Rosa (the part relevant to the story), the Police Station is across the street on the north side of the park. That street heads straight down west to the hotel we were staying at and the night life was on the south side of the park. The police commander’s office was on the northwest corner of the park across the street. We walked through Central park northwest to head to the hotel which passed by close to the Police Station. This was the same route I took to walk the other volunteer home and the same route the big group of volunteers took.

We passed the northwest corner and were about two blocks from the hotel when I noticed headlights from behind. I told everyone to get out of the road to let it pass – Amanda, Lisa and Danny were straggling behind a bit. However, it was a police truck and they pulled over right besides them. I went back for them to try to explain to the cops that we were close to the hotel when they started pushing me and telling me to get into the back. I told them to hold on, that I wanted to make sure everyone else was ok first but they got very aggressive and started shoving me with the point of their batons. It looked like everyone was staying calm about the matter so I got on first and helped everyone else on. I knew it was not to end well.

Once at booking I tried to find out why we were being arrested. I found it to be ridiculous so tried to make light of the whole situation. I was glad to find that Emina was doing the same. We called the Peace Corps Duty Officer (it was about 2 am) to let them know of the situation. When it turned out that we were going to the jail cells I called the Duty Officer again to let him know and that they were confiscating our cell phones, personal belongings and interestingly enough our belts (the guys only). They ripped the phone out of my hand (it took two of them to do it as I was resisting) mid conversation and put it away. With nothing else to do we were led to the holding cells. I was hoping that they would place us all together but they sent the girls to one cell and the guys to another. About ten feet from the cells I smelled the urine permeating from the guys’ cell and I knew it wouldn’t be a pleasant night.

As Danny and I went in (he was still barefoot) I noticed that it was already occupied by four Hondurans (presumably drunks). The stench was awesomely horrendous – there was a small partitioned area in the back corner for the toilet but apparently the entire back of the cell was used as an open toilet. As we sat down I began to talk with the other Hondurans – I thought it better to win them over as friends. I wasn’t sure what there disposition towards foreigners would have been as some Hondurans are hostile towards Americans (especially those that lived in the States illegally and ended up in jail there). Things went well and after a few laughs it appeared that they weren’t going to bother us. I was getting tired (the night before I only managed a few hours of sleep) so I tried to sleep on the cement bench. Danny claims I snored but I think he lies.

As the night wore on, more and more Hondurans guys were led into the cell. It got to the point where I had to sit up to allow the other Hondurans to sit. I was dead tired by then – I was trying to get some rest and at the same time kept a wary eye on the other Hondurans. A fat Honduran came in and he seemed to claim the king of the cell status. He was the guy that the other Hondurans differed to. He was the one as well that started to lay the smack down on the other Hondurans. I wasn’t sure how it happened – perhaps Danny knows, but this one guy in a white shirt apparently got on the nerves of the fat Honduran. The fat Honduran shoved the white shirt guy away from him and into Danny. Danny tried to placate the guy by telling him to calm down and I was trying to tell Danny to not get involved. The fat Honduran was apologized to Danny – it appeared his wrath extended only to the Hondurans and he was pretty cool to us. The white shirt guy became the cell “bitch.” It was interesting to see the jail cell dynamics. The fat Honduran was the head honcho and this other small Honduran in a cheap baggy blazer was his sidekick. After the smackdown the small Honduran would start hitting the white shirt guy and yelling at him. It was pretty funny because I’m sure he only did it because the thought the fat guy had his back.

At one point in the night a shirtless, shoeless Honduran was led in. He was shaking (with rage, drugs, I don’t know) and was cursing at the police and trying to strike at them the whole time. Interesting is that in the movies you see police confidently manhandling prisoners when they act up but in reality they seemed just as scared. When striking the shirtless Honduran he would do it quickly and then jump back – it was kind of like a middle school playground fight where both people are more afraid of getting hit than wanting to win.

The shirtless Honduran walked around muttering things. Not sure exactly what but it got to a point where he was annoying all the other Hondurans. The fat guy pushed him into the urine soaked area of the cell several times and started hitting him. After a while the other Hondurans would do the same thing as well – rushing him, kicking him and punching him. He got beat several times that night to the point of bleeding.

What really frustrated me aside from the stench and filth of the cell was that we didn’t know how long we were to stay in the cells. Our cellmates told us it is usually until 5pm or 24 hours. I was worried because all of our stuff was still at the hotel (check out was 12) and no other volunteer knew where we were. As daylight broke a Honduran lawyer came by to talk with everyone. The guys all crowded by the cell door but one of them actually tried to get the lawyer’s attention on our behalf. I told him to call the Peace Corps Duty Officer to update him on our status. The lawyer handed me the phone and I told the Duty Officer our current situation and that we would need volunteers to help get our stuff at the hotel. Afterwards a Honduran police officer came by with the Peace Corps Safety and Security Officer on the phone (as a former police officer he has connections). The Security Officer proceeded to tell us the situation – the head police officer of the western region of Honduras was the one who ordered the cops to go out and arrest us and for that reason the Security Officer was not able to pull any strings to get us out. I told him that I still was not sure why we were being held – we weren’t drunk or causing any disturbances and that we were just walking back to the hotel. He told us that he was doing whatever he could to get us out, but in the meantime we would have to wait. He also said that he would get in touch with the other volunteers to check up on us and to make sure our stuff at the hotel was taken care of.

A bit after some volunteer came by. It was bittersweet to say goodbye to the H15ers that were leaving that day through cell doors – I couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it. The two volunteers that lived in Santa Rosa (Slater and Elizabeth) stopped by as well to see if we needed anything while they tried to figure out what was going on and how to get us out. Brock and Leila (H15ers) came by and bought us water and food to share with the cellmates (to keep them amicable) and the Santa Rosa volunteers brought everyone pizza and water as well. What I was especially grateful for was the hand sanitizers – my jeans, sneakers and socks were soaked in urine (as well as my hands from trying to roll up my pants to keep them from getting drenched in the urine pools). That kept spirits up while we waited for the outcome.

I found the drink situation to be interesting in the jail cell. In the morning before the other volunteers showed up, a Honduran came to see who wanted to buy drinks. Some people pooled together money to buy drinks and they even offered to share with us. The shirtless Honduran asked if I wanted to pool with him to get a bag of water (I said no) and when the guy said they didn’t have bags of water, he started ripping his money. I’m still trying to understand that. Overall I found them to be very generous to us and with each other and I felt good when the volunteers brought us food and drinks to share with them. But I still found it funny that they always differed to the fat Honduran first since he was “alpha dog.”

Eventually someone pulled strings to get us out of the cell on the grounds that we were not feeling well (around 10 am). This was done without the head guy’s knowledge but the police officer that said to do it took the risk (the Safety Officer’s friend). We were told that we would be able to get out but the head officer wanted to talk/chastise us first. At first it was supposed to be at 11 and then it was after lunch. We had to wait in the station but it just felt great to be out of the cell. It was around 3 when he finally got to talk to us and we found out why we were held in jail. It appears that the big group of volunteers that I passed when walking back with the other volunteer were very loud and creating a ruckus to the point where the head of police heard it from his office. There were also people calling in to complain of the noise. He decided to send out a police car to arrest the people responsible. Coincidently those people got to the hotel before they were caught. I’m assuming that the police truck circled around the block and that was when they saw the five of us walking back to the hotel. Even though we weren’t the ones disturbing the peace, we were all part of the same gringo volunteer group and he had to make an example of us. Unjust? Yes. But at that point all I was looking forward to was to burn my socks and shoes (I would have done the same with my jeans if I weren’t so attached) and take a nice shower. I fortunately had the pants I used for paintballing to wear. I did not want to walk around in those nasty shoes so I bought a new pair and threw away the other pair. And I slept like a baby that night at Slater’s place – the only bus to my site had left and Slater was kind to let me and Danny crash at his house.

Looking back I think the five of us handled the situation very well. No one despaired and everyone kept their cool. Several times at night I heard Emina singing from the women’s cell. Danny kept calm during the whole ordeal as well – if I had to share a cell with anyone I’m glad it was Danny.

I have to thank to Brock and Leila for stopping by and getting us food and drinks, as well as Slater and Elizabeth. Dimitri, Kenyon, Justin and Eric for stopping by to see how we were doing. And we can’t thank Slater enough for being our intermediary between the police and the Peace Corps, keeping us updated on what was going on and trying to work behind the scenes to get us out. And a big thanks to our security officer for working hard on our behalf as well.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times

It all started Friday night when when I ambitiously made vegetable soup and added jalapenos as well as chili paste. My stomach must not have found that too agreeable (although my palate did enjoy it) as Saturday I had to wake up early to go to Santa Barbara to meet with an NGO in regards to Eco-Fogones (fuel efficient wood burning stoves). After a very tense 5 hour bus ride (3 buses, 2 transfers) we had a meeting with the organization and it was very successful. The are proyecto mirador (http://www.proyectomirador.org/) and they agreed to come to the west to work with the peace corps volunteers and their communities. What I found to be interesting is that they receive their funding from the carbon credits they would sell from the eco-fogones. This was an idea I came across independently - if a business could be created to use carbon credits to fund development projects. It seems that one already exists and this would be an awesome way to get Hondurans to be more ecologically responsible (and if not, it means less work for them to find firewood). They told us that they would start planning the projects on Monday to see where to start - who woulda thunk it was that easy? Kudos to Dimitri and Brock for finding this NGO.

Also, this past week, my women's group planned on showing a movie on Sunday - they would sell tickets as well as food to raise money for the bakery project. As the teacher is not coming until the 6th of July, we were planning on using this opportunity to raise money for the materials needed for classes (flour, sugar, eggs, etc.) . I was worried at first as all the participants were told to sell 10 tickets each (10 lemps, or about 50 cents) and anything not sold they would have to cover. A lot of them hemmed and hawed about being able to sell all those tickets - it made me worry because if they couldn't sell these tickets, how much harder would it be to sell bread on a regular basis? However, on the bus ride home today, I got a call from one of the women saying that they needed more tickets as they already sold out what they had! I was very excited - I thought I was going two for two this weekend. However, my bus arrived at 5 pm (the movie was scheduled to start at 7) so as soon as I got home I dropped off my bag (thanks to Michele for letting me crash at her place in S.B) and headed over to the salon (warehouse type building used to hold large meetings, parties, materials). The seats were all aranged but we needed the speakers and the projector. After retrieving those from the municipal building, when we started to put everything together we realized that we were missing one cable for one of the speakers as well as the cable to connect to the computer. By this time it was 6 so I had to run around to look for these parts - someone mentioned that the school borrowed them but upon arriving we only found the speaker cable. By then it was almost 7 so our makeshift solution was to put the microphone up against computer speakers. I ran to my house to pick up my speakers and then we started showing the movie at 7:30. No big deal, right? Heh... yeah right... and on that note why the ***k do these people not keep their equipment organized??? During my frantic calls to various people, trying to look for the missing parts, one person lamented how they used the church's cables because they couldn't find theirs. Are you friggin serious??? This is why wecan't have nice things. Because you aren't organized and keep losing stuff.

The movie I had picked out was Wall-E. Great movie and it would tie in with the trash management project I was trying to accomplish with one of the municipal workers. I worked hard to download the movie (dubbed in spanish) and was certain it would be enjoyed by both children and adults. Wrong!!!! People started to complain about the movie, saying it was boring and childish, so I ran back to my house to bring my external hard drive. They wanted something more adult oriented? Fine. I would show Pan's Labyrinth. Sure it may be a bit violent (some scenes) for the kids but it was a beautiful movie. My host mom in another site loved it. Strike 2. They got 10 minutes into it and wanted to watch something else. My frustration level was reaching its boiling point. My counterpart eventually brought a ranchero dvd saying that this was the type of movies they wanted to watch. Basically it was a cheesy action movie in Spanish - think of Steven Segal or Jean-Claude Van Damme, but with less martial arts and more cowboy action (but not Brokeback style). At that point just gave up and shrunk back to the food area where the women were hanging out. I just wanted the night to be over. But nope - someone forgot to tell me about the gratuitous nudity in the movie. I heard some catcalling and the women started to point at the screen - I turned and saw a man embracing a woman from behind and starting to undress her. In my mind I thought "No way. He's just gonna feel her up over her bra and then they'll cut to the next scene. This is Honduras, very conservative - they wouldn't show nudity. My female counterpart would not have given me a movie with nudity - she said there was singing and dancing." I was wrong. Horrified and stunned, I watched the man on screen took off her underwear piece by piece (there were lots of moms and children in the crowd). I ran to the computer and fast forwarded the scene (there ended up being several other). My reward for all this hard work? Laughter from my women's group. They thought it hilarious how my jaw started to drop more and more with each article the actress's clothing. So overall movie night was a disaster - during the movie switches some people wanted their money back. But from a financial standpoint it was pretty profitable. We're going to do it more often, but this time we will divide the movies into 2 categories - for children and for adults (and maybe one for these cheesy action movies for the teens). And we will screen the movies first. And we will improve the organization - especially the accounting. Running around everywhere trying to get things organized, I didn't have time to create a proper bookkeeping system for them. But all's well that ends well - the women got a valuable experience on organizing and running a project. And I'm just glad the weekend is over.

Finally a sense of accomplishment

Today I gave my first charla (presentation) on the benefits of starting a small business to the women's network in my site and with it came my first real sense of having done something here in Honduras. Despite heavy rain - generally things come to a stop on rainy days as people have to walk everywhere - 18 women showed up for the meeting and they decided to start a bakery (with training to come from the NGO Food for the Poor). It won't be easy, but the market is there as the pulperia owners (people who sell basic goods out of their houses) buy their bread from the big city Santa Rosa to sell here. By starting their own bakery they can ensure that money stays in San Agustin and provide jobs here. It will be an uphill battle as people fall into a trap of thinking that locally produced goods are inferior but we are determined to challenge that perception. The upside is that it will provide a source of income for people who need it and with that hey can then lift themselves and their families out of poverty. They will definitely have to create a superior product at reasonable prices and get the community involved (by getting them to support the local business). It won't be easy, but nothing worthwhile is. The work is pretty much cut out for them - all they need to do is work hard. Even that is not a guarantee of success but I am optimistic of what we can accomplish.

On a side note, I definitely feel that women are the key to development. They provide the most stability in the household - especially in a machismo country such as Honduras. A lot of men in my site don't really think of the future, preferring to live in the moment and squandering their hard earned cash on frivolities such as drinking (even though my site is a dry site) and womanizing. This has a negative impact as you see lots of unwed mothers struggling to provide for their children. This is compounded by the fact that the women are usually more educated. As the boys reach a working age they usually forgo education to work in the fields. At my school the higher grades have a higher ratio of girls to boys. When they become pregnant, they usually have to put their education and possible futures on hold to raise the children. Some of them do have families they go back to to help with child rearing but unless they want to leave their children to look for other employment opportunities outside the town what more can they do? Also, with limited education the jobs they encounter are limited to working at restaurants or as maids in other houses. Its not like in the movie 'Boyz n tha Hood' where Tre's mom leaves him with his father to pursue a successful career. And to have a father figure like Furious, someone who teaches Tre what it is to be a man? Almost non-existent here from what I have seen. The problems that I see here in the developing countries is the same that Americans see in tha hood. People see the glamorous life people are living on the telenovelas and want to live that life. The problem is that television never shows the hard work it takes to reach that point - it doesn't make for entertaining T.V. They go for the quick fix - drug trafficking is a big problem in Honduras. My host dad has a brother-in-law in prison in Nicaragua for transporting drugs. My host mom's take on it? "He was very ambitious." The people with the ambition to work hard are the ones that go to work illegally in other countries. The men leave their families behind to work several years in America. Minnesota seems to be a big place for people in my town and the neighboring towns - my house that I'm renting was built with the money the owner saved up in the states to come back to when he returns. This again goes back to the problem of the mother of bearing the sole responsibility of running the house and the lack of strong father figures.

Hopefully that is why I'm here and why I think women are the key to development - to help show them step by step how to develop their own businesses. Will they see themselves living the glamorous life in the big city? Unlikely. But hopefully with a steady job they can provide the opportunities for their children. It seems appropriate that Mother's day just passed. Here is to all the women that struggle in a man's world to survive - as Tupac best said, keep ya head up.

Quick updates

1) finally caved in and got the internet. nice to be connected once again. less leisure money for 4kb/s connect speed. definitely worth it.

2) camera was stolen while at a Peace Corps get together. It costs about $40 now, was insured for $200 with $100 deductible. I think it worked out in the end.

3) I finally got a bed (2 actually - one is a day bed that I will use as a sofa). Finally living like a human being. Got a blender, crockpot (!) and nice linens. All thanks to a volunteer that is returning to the states in 2 weeks (Thanks KP!)

special double post!

2/8/11

Why I miss the states #2348

In the States we have somewhat reliable public transportation (at least in New York). City Buses and subway comes regularly so it is more or less easy to plan out transportation. In Honduras the buses the Peace Corps volunteer rely on is more akin to Greyhound buses as the Peace Corps strongly urge us to take taxis when traveling in the cities (buses are major targets for armed robberies). Greyhounds, at least in my experience, usually left on time. And even at that, if you missed one, you could usually catch the next one.

Here in Honduras the buses are notorious for never leaving on time. The bus drivers try to wait until the bus is packed before leaving. With no higher power/corporate office to report to, they pretty much control the situation. Many times have passengers yelled "Vamanos! Vamanos!" to the driver when he waits around too long (and this is considering that Hondurans have a defeatest mentality and will endure just about anything silently). The luxurious lines are a bit better with keeping time tables, but pales with anything compared to the states.

I, on the other hand, have been unfortunate enough to land with the one bus that does the opposite - it leaves EARLY at times! I'm not talking about 5/10/15 minutes, but 30/45 minutes early. This only occurs on the bus back to my site. What makes it frustrating is that it occurs once in a blue moon and there never is any notice. So what usually happens is that I'll come to the bus terminal around 40 minutes early to find that the bus has already left. With that in itself it would not be too bad - I should just wait for the next bus right? However, that is the only bus that goes back to my site! This definitely is not an optimal situation for me as I would have to find a place to stay one night, waste another day in Santa Rosa (the big city) until it is time for the next bus and then take that one home. Considering that I go to Santa Rosa once every week or two, I've been fortunate enough that this problem has affected me only 5 times. Once I stayed with a volunteer that lives in Santa Rosa, once I had to stay at a hotel (the volunteers that live in Santa Rosa were all away), and twice I have gone to another site where a friend lives to stay with him (last night as of this writing). One time I was able to take a bus to Dulce Nombre (a small town between my town and the big city) to catch a ride with my host dad as he was on his way back home.

The only thing to do now is to handle taking the bus as I would on taking a plane in the states - to try and get there an hour and a half or two hours earlier to make sure I get on the bus. And 95% of the time I will be just wasting my sitting around on the bus and shortening my time in the city to run errands. And what makes it more maddening is that I usually try to get to the bus station around 50 minuts early, but all the times I haven't been able to get there that early the bus leaves before I get there (and I'm not talking about 15/20 minutes earlier). All the other times when I get there early? Bus always leaves at 3.

Journal 2/13/11 - Happy Valentines Day

It seems that no matter where you go, people are always reluctant to be the first ones on the dance floor. For Valentine's day (or the Saturday before) a dance was held by the municipality at the salon. Tickets were about 100 lempiras each (about five dollars).

**Side note - it appears that if you are a foreigner in Honduras, you are treated as VIP. When the President of Honduras was in the capital of Olancho (think of it as a state), security was very heavy: military, riot police, undercover cops - the whole works. Everyone was patted down to enter the building that President Pepe Lobo would enter except for us gringos. When we walked by, the security officers had a confused look on their faces, looked at each other, then just waved us through. I don't really think it was due to a lack of work ethic on their part. I like to think that they did not know if we were foreign dignetary and did not want to offend us by subjecting us to a 'pat down.' On the same note, on the night of the dance, I was told at the ticket booth by the muni workers that I did not need to pay. As I walked in, the ticket guy (not a muni worker) waved me through even before the muni worker got to him to let him know to wave me through. Everyone was also frisked by the cops but I was waved through as well. Good times.

A dj and crew were brought in with large stereo equipment to blast bacheta, punta, merengue, ranchera and reggaeton (look it up). Unfortunately it appeared that the dj only had a seven or eight songs - lots of them were on repeat. I arrived an hour after the party started to find that everyone was a wallflower, standing around on the sides. Everyone was looking forward to this dance, goading me that I would have to dance yet no one was dancing! I put my jacket down, grabbed a drink and then tried to enlist the vice-mayor to round up some people (or at least get a partner with me) so we could break the ice. He bashfully refused so I ended up grabbing a municipal coworker and we started dancing in the middle (reminds me of clubbing in college - when my friends and I would start the party in the dance floor... good times, but I'm getting kinda old for this). I was glad when soon after a handful of guys came up next to us and started dancing with their partners.... until I saw how they danced. I am not saying that I am 'Dancing with the Stars' material, but wow.... Imagine if a guy was holding/hugging (bear hugging?) a girl that didn't have the capability of standing on her own. Then imagine them stepping/swaying violenlty around in a big circle with no regard to the people around them. That was how the majority of them danced. I still do not know if the girls were enjoying it or not... but at least some of them were smiling...

Over all it was a good night. I believe the party went on until 2am. I ended up heading home around midnight after dancing with some of my municipal friends - 3 hours nonstop is pretty tiring. Overall it was a good night but there were about three guys to every one girl. The girls made out well, especially since there was no alcohol (I believe that would have loosened up the guys some more, but also may have prevented too much drama since no one was drunk).

Happy New Year, and congrats Green Bay

Hope everyone had a safe and memorable new year celebration - I was in Utila getting scuba certified. Scuba diving is awesome! I definitely would like to get my advanced certification soon as well. But we'll see when that happens...

Other than that it is currently coffee picking season so work has been very slow. School was out until today as well, but now that it is back on I hope to start English classes. It has been very slow work wise as there aren't too many people who are motivated to do anything. I'll try to write on this next time - right now I'm at a cafe using wifi so don't really have time to write everything out. Will need to start writing them before hand and copy/paste when I get here.

I am in the big city right now - yesterday there was a big get together to watch the superbowl. The game was good (that interception was killer!) but I do have to say that without the commercials, it just wasn't the same. At a bar we commandeered the top floor and had massive amounts of beer and food. Good times!!

I'll try to come back next week and post something on my thoughts on development in a third world country.

So what is $25....

I'm at an American style bar drinking a beer, connected to free wi-fi, and ordered a burger. Sometimes you have to try and be normal again... right? Especially now that it is Christmas. I thought I would be spending it alone holed up in my house - I'm going to the Islands to get scuba certified on the 29th and didn't want to spend too much time on the road. But fortunately I got an invite from my host family so it looks like I'll enjoy dinner with them. But still it isn't the same, so this burger and beer(s) is my Christmas party for myself.

It's strange how my perception of money has changed since I got here. Now I'm thinking in terms of Lempiras (the Honduran national currency) and I was debating whether to buy a blender as well as a toaster oven. Blender to make refried beans, hummus, etc. and toaster oven just to make things other than stove top foods. But a blender costs 450 lempiras, a toaster oven about 750 lempiras. That seems so expensive! And who knows of the quality? I hemmed and hawed all morning. Should I or should I not buy? Should I wait until a volunteer leaves and then try to buy something off of them cheap? Or should I splurge right now?

To put things in perspective, the exchange rate is about 18 lempiras to the dollar. I usually round up to 20 lemps to keep things easier. So I'm torn about a $22 blender and a $36 toaster oven. hmm.....

well i decided to spend the money on buying monopoly instead (495 lemps). At least I can use that for game nights with the local hondurans... and until I get the tahini that sungnam mailed me I won't really need it as I can still mash my beans by hand.

I would also like to take this moment to share my adventures with my bus.

Two weeks ago I was on my way to the big city to pick up a package my sister mailed me. As usual, I closed my eyes to take a nap for the duration of the trip... but this time the bus stopped just before the main highway. We all had to get out the bus and what I saw was hundred of cars parked on the side of the dirt road and eventually a bit mob of Hondurans. Some had sticks, others were stranded travelers like us and there were lots of cops in riot gear. We had to walk across this stand off to get to the main highway (they call it a highway but its actually a 2-way road that travels all through Honduras) where we saw cars blocked off by boulders and demonstrators. We also passed by military armed with big wooden sticks. The protesters were choking off travel between Santa Rosa (the close big city to me where I buy groceries/pick up mail, and the transportation hub for the west of Honduras) and the rest of Honduras. The protesters were from the town of Dulce Nombre (along with the sister towns of Concepcion and San Agustin, my town) upset because the national government had been saying that they would pave the road from the main highway that leads to Dulce Nombre for the past several years but, surprise surprise, have not yet done so. The other towns were involved as they would benefit from the paving of the road as well - this road through Dulce Nombre leads to those towns as well.

So after picking up my sister's package, I couldn't get back to my site as no buses would be able to go through the area and even if I tried to walk past the protest area there would've been no guarantee of a bus from the protest area back to Dulce Nombre (and not to mention my site). I walked that stretch before and it takes a good 2 hours. I was stranded out of my site, but luckily I was able to take a bus the other way of the protest to another site where a volunteer lived to spend the night and not spend money on a costly hotel. I was eventually able to make it home safely the next day as the government negotiated with the protesters and stated that equipment to pave the road would be sent in. Not sure how that is working out...

Here is to hoping that the holiday travels will not be disrupted, for me here as well as everyone back home. Hope you guys have a happy holiday and a happy new year!!

Happy Holidays

Thanksgiving - good food and goof friends. What could be better?

This year we had a small get together in Salama, Olancho at Mark and TJ's site. We had about 8 people and I was a bit worried how we would cook the turkey as TJ only had a toaster oven (yes, it is possible to buy turkey here in Honduras if you go to the big city), but Mark's host family was kind enough to let us use their oven. Of course we provided them with some food as well...

I cooked the turkey, gravy (from scratch!) and sausage apple stuffing (my usual dishes for thanksgiving) and other people cooked mashed potatoes, yam, green bean cassarole, corn, buns, etc. The only dish we did not have was cranberry sauce, but overall it was a very successful thanksgiving dinner. We didn't get to enjoy leftovers the next day as we went to Catacamas where another volunteer lived (in the nicest house ever!) but i'm sure mark and tj enjoyed the leftovers the next couple of days.

In Catacamas we had an "Always Sunny in Philadelphia" party - apparently it is very popular with the Olancho volunteers, so I stocked up on some episodes to watch. It is like a live version of Family Guy - very inappropriate. After my weekend there, I went to Santa Barbara to visit some people that work with coffee. I learned a lot there and hope to continue working with some of the people I met - I believe that there is a lot of potential in working with coffee at my site.

While in Santa Barbara they had their feria (celebration of the saint the city was named after) and we saw a bull riding event. The highlight was during a break when a dog wandered into the bull pen. The rodeo clown snuck up on the dog while it was licking itself, and then to the delight of the crowd he grabbed the dog by the hind legs and started swinging the dog around! It was the most hilarious thing I ever saw and I was fortunate enough to grab it on video camera. I caught it in mid swing - i wish i got it from the beginning! I will try to post it later. The dog was unhurt, but it was hilarious....

The second most amusing event was that night. In the central park there was an area set up as an outdoor night club and another area with a live band. There was a backup dancer and the band had a guy come up to stand while she danced provacatively. Then it was his turn to dance for her. That part was whatever, but then they brought a little kid up! The dancer danced/grinded on him (but not directly on him), but when it was the little kid's turn, he started dry humping her leg!! Everyone started cracking up and then a band member lifted him up and he was dry humping the dancer's torso! I wish I had a video of that.... but it was awesome.

I'm back in my site now and next up is Christmas. I'm not sure what I'll be doing, but I do plan on going to the bay islands for new years to get my scuba certification! hope to be able to update the blog before then, but if not, Happy Holidays and Happy New Years everyone!

Its good to be back

So it feels good to be back in Honduras.

After about a week in the states, I have to admit that while it was fun, I was feeling anxious to get back. I loved seeing friends, eating good food, but it really did not feel like home. For one thing, I was not independent - I was staying with friends and they were taking me out and paying for me. It is wonderful to have friends that want to take care of you, but for me I hated being so dependent. Right now Honduras is home, and I don't really have plans on going back until I finish my service.

I also wish to apologize to the friends I was not able to meet with - there just did not seem to be enough time for me to do everything. I wish I was there longer to meet with everyone and to get more accomplished, but it became very expensive. Essentially, that means everyone will have to come down here to visit and see me.

Since I've been back, we have had Halloween, a training session, and school is out now. Thanksgiving is coming around the corner as well as Christmas and New Years. I am looking forward to the beginning of next year where there will be no activities and I can just relax. Halloween was over a weekend, and I'll have to say that I was very impressed at the creativity of some volunteers. I took the easy way out and just put on Avatar face paint I picked up in the states. I looked more like urban warfare smurf than Avatar; more than several people asked me what the heck I was supposed to be, but kudos to the people (one or two) that actually guessed. Pictures are on Picassa.

The Olanchoers really outdid themselves. There were 4 guys that dressed up as the 4 Honduran beers and they won best contest. Sexiest costume went to the 6 female volunteers dressed up as Lady Gaga. Truly impressive. My personal favorite was a volunteer that dressed up as Mario Kart. With the bar raised so high, I have no idea what I will do for next year.

One of the activities from Halloween was outdoors, with beer, volleyball and ziplining. I think this was one of my favorite days so far in my service - peace corps guatemala came out as well, so we had a great time outdoors. Guess I'm getting older, but these outdoor activities are preferable to the drink and party events at night.

After Halloween 2 volunteers stayed one night at my place before we headed down to the capital for training. They lived far away and did not want to go home just to travel all the way back again, so we went down together. It was fun catching a ride from the mayor as he had a training event as well. Being back in Valle De Angeles (our first training site) brought back great memories, but it was COLD! The weather is definitely getting colder now, and I'm glad that I brought back a sleeping back and did not take back my winter jacket - with no heating and insulation, it gets very chilly in some places, especially at night.

Thanksgiving is coming up soon as well, so probably will visit a friend's site in Olancho to celebrate with other volunteers and several of us have tentatively planned to go to the islands after christmas and into new years to get scuba certified and to relax.

well, lunch is here, so until next post...

It has been a while since my last confession...

I'm heading back to New York on the 1st of October to the 11th for Dave and Tracy's wedding, so I am looking forward to meeting up with everyone, resupplying (taking back an empty suitcase!) and dropping off items that I found out I really don't need (blazer, dress shoes). Also looking forward to pigging out - one volunteer I talked to told me they gained 10 lbs on one visit. Good times!

Right now I am currently working with the school a lot more than my primary counterpart, but with school letting out in November, not sure how that will work out. I did talk to the mayor, so we may be trying to do a water purification project again that was shelved back about a month ago.

In the meantime I plan on doing research into coffee and to visit some schools while in NY to see how else I can contribute.

I uploaded new pictures on picassa so I figure that I can write a bit about those (I'm using the mayor's modem as I am fixing his laptop).

Dia De Lempira (Lempira Day)

Dia de Lempira is to celebrate Lempira, a national hero in Honduras. He was one of many to lead a revolt against the Spanish Conquistadors but was one of the most successful. He was so successful that the Spanish led him into a trap under the pretense of a treaty but then they assassinated him. For this day the school kids dress up in indigenous clothes to commemorate him. There was a big celebration at the school as well, with a beauty pageant (I think) and dancing, etc. My host mom asked me to take pictures of her son at kindergarten as she would be in school and would miss the festivities there, but unfortunately there were no celebrations there due to lack of funds. But it was fun nonetheless to see the kids in colorful costumes.

Trujillo

On the north coast of Honduras is Trujillo, which was where we had the Third Chapter meeting. Generally the Third Chapter is for volunteers over 40 years old, but due to member shortages the 30+ crowd was invited as well (even though I turn 30 end of September, I was invited). I took the opportunity to visit a part of Honduras that I probably won't see again as it takes about 12 hours to get there by bus from my site, but it was fun nonetheless. I got to meet some volunteers that I probably would not have been able to as their sites are far away from mine, and it was a good time to relax and get out of the house. We stayed at Casa de Kiwi, a hotel owned by a New Zealander and employed by lots of transients from the States and the U.K. It was fun to hang out at and speak English, knock a few back and relax. But by being located on the Caribbean side, it was more like a large salt water lake than an ocean but I enjoyed it still. Slightly envious of the volunteers placed there, but I do enjoy the climate at my site a lot more.

Not pictured but an event that I enjoyed is Noche de Fumadores. Every town has a patron saint and every year they have a feria (celebration) for that saint. The end of August was the feria for Santa Rosa, the big city near my site (where I go grocery shopping and transfer bus if I ever need to go anywhere). Being a cigar exporter, the one night celebrated the cigars and was sponsored by other alcohol companies so it was a night of free cigars and booze. Lots of peace corps volunteers showed up and it was a great time to hang out with everyone again. I think I smoked about 5 cigars that night and took home about as many (not including the gift cigars that I received and bought off other volunteers that were not taking their's). I also toured a cigar plant earlier that day which was fun and informative.

Shortly after we had the business reconnect (3 months after we are placed in site we meet as projects to discuss work related issues) so we met up again. Coming up on year end it seems that there will be lots of get togethers - next is Halloween with a big party at Copan Ruins, followed by Thanksgiving and then Christmas. Thanksgiving and Halloween are probably the two biggest as lots of people head back for Christmas. But I'll be sticking around here, and hopefully I can organize a trip up to the islands to get scuba certified! Honduras is the cheapest to get certified anywhere in the world, with packages including certification and lodging. Hope that all this doesn't seem like Peace Corps is one big party because there is a lot of work in between....

Technology in developing worlds

Technology is a double edged sword in developing countries. My site for example is a rural site up in the mountains and it, along with hundreds of other sites in Honduras, would not be connected to the outside world if it were not for technology. There is no infrastructure in these rural sites it would be difficult to persuade the phone companies to build the infrastructure for a telecommunications system miles away from the closest big city for only a couple hundred people that live there. It wouldn make fiscal sense. Multiply that by the hundreds of little villages around Honduras and you could see it would be a big drain on resources for the phone companies just to lay the wire. However, with cell phones, all they need to do is put up one tower and all of a sudden thousands of people can get cheap cell phones and pay as you go plans. In Honduras just about everyone pays per minute (about 5 cents a minute or per message) and incoming calls and messages are free. So now even in my small site I can make and receive calls.
Satellite T.V enables people in my site to get the latest soap operas and music channels. One person will get a dish and will split the signal for a charge. It comes to cost about $5 per month. With cell phones and satellite T.V, anyone that visits my site would find it hard to believe that they were in a 3rd world country.
But despite these luxuries, the majority of the people here have never used a computer. There is no internet here unless you get a wireless modem, but only about 4 or 5 people in town have computers in their house (the educated ones). The rest of the people will most likely live and die by the coffee fields, with T.V as their only comforting refuge. As this world had entered the digital age, the people in developing worlds are falling more and more behind. Yes it brings them luxuries but it also makes it almost impossible to catch up. They need to know how to learn to use computers to get a job in a well paying company but how will they get such computers or education? There only option to earn a living is to continue what their parents did and work on the coffee fields and thus the cycle starts all over again. This doesn even account for the effects of said technology on the people. Cell phone thefts are probably the most common theft here in Honduras. Many people die from refusing to give up their cell phones as well. And the effects of T.V? The people here see the wealth on T.V and desperately want to live those lives. However, they don want to put the work into getting it. As T.V glamorizes everything (no one wants to see a T.V show of the daily grind of the average working guy), they don see all the hard work that goes into making an honest living. This is compounded with the fact that many Hondurans live off of remittances they have family members who are in the states working (most illegally) and they send money back to Honduras. Considering that the average Honduran in a rural site such as mine only makes $70 a month, when a family member mails back $4,000 for a year work it is easy to decide to not work at all.
So this is essentially one aspect of the situation in Honduras right now. Still to be discussed are the rampant drug gangs and drugs, corrupt police and government, the education system that is going down the drain, and the companies from the developed countries that are here to take advantage of the situation.
On that note I did get a blackberry. I got it because I have no internet at my site and didn want to have to bring my computer to the bit city just to check email the blackberry has wi-fi so it would be all I need to take. It came with a month of free internet and blackberry services so I am connected at the moment but once it is up I will be back in the dark.

update 2

I have been in my new house for a month now but I still am not fully furnished. I need to buy a table and bookshelves as all my stuff is on the floor. I have spent personal money as well much to my chagrin. I have also been traveling a lot as well. August proves to be busy as well - the peace corps olympics as well as a noche de fumadores (smokers night). It is a night celebrating cigars as santa rosa, the largrest city near my site, is known for their cigars. Unfortunately for me that means a lot more money to spend. A lucky thing is that by being in such a small site I don't spend much money as there is nothing to do. But right now moving in has drained my resources. But you can't put a price on experience, right?
But I will have to admit that my peace corps experience is nothing like I imagined. People living here are not living in huts or anything. They have cable tv and everyone has a cellphone. But the cell plan that everyone has is pay as you go. It is free to receive calls and texts and it only costs to call and send. Their ar plans but those are limited to the well off. They still rely on firewood to cook and the water is not drinkable without purification. But that in itself does not make that much of a hardship - their are people in the states that live in the mountains like that. More on this next time...

quick update

ok so im finally living by myself!! sweet freedom. it is a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom house, but one bedroom is occupied with some belongings of the owner who is in america at the moment. i will be living there for the next year, and we will see what happens after that. i will do a proper update soon, as i plan on getting a wireless modem. it is slow at my site, about 53k, but in the bigger sites it is a lot faster. it costs about 15 dollars a month, but i think it is worth it because of all the usefull info on the web. oh, and i will be going back to new york for a wedding in october, so i hope to see everyone then. this is the only planned trip back to the states i forsee during my peacecorps service, so i hope to make it worthwhile!

Sometimes you don’t realize how important something is…until it is gone

Sorry if this post takes a serious tone, but I have to get something off my chest. I’ve only been in the Peace Corps for about four months now, but you start to realize all the things you have taken for granted in your life. To put things into perspective, I get $50 a month to pay for housing, which is about the norm for employed people in my site. I’ve paid more to eat out in New York. My monthly living allowance? About $215 to pay for everything else such as food, water, transportation, cell phone, internet, clothes, etc. That is less than a weekend out back home. The Honduran government, in an effort to reduce the usage of electricity, provides free electricity to all houses as long as they are under certain monthly usage (in terms of kilowatts). If they go over, then it can be expensive so it is an incentive to conserve electricity use. Food is either cooked on a wood burning stove or an electric powered stove, but the majority of the people use wood burning – even those who have an electric stove. The wood is acquired from the trees around them even though it is a protected area as the government is trying to reforest the area. The water that we receive is from the rivers, so after a heavy rainstorm you can expect to receive brown water (from all the earth the rain water picks up as it flows down). This is the water that you have to wash your dishes, your clothes, and even your body. Water doesn’t come every day so you have a pila (a cement tub) to save up water. Toilets have to be flushed by pouring water down them manually – if you splash the water, be prepared to have it get on you. The Honduran sewage system – if you can call it that as there is no centralized sewage in small areas like mine) – cannot handle toilet paper so you have to place it in trashcans next to the toilet. There is no trash collecting service so you have to burn all your trash – even the toilet paper from your bathroom. It is common for people to litter and throw their trash outside on the streets while walking, riding a car or even a bus. Why would you want to carry it home where you would have to burn it? There is no recycling either.

In my site they are undergoing a construction project so we have had no water for the longest time. The pila has run dry – I believe that water leaks out somewhere. We have had lots of rain, almost every night, but even when we collect it in small buckets and put it in the pila, the leak makes sure that the next morning we don’t have enough. With the little water we have, we have to wash dishes, flush the toilet, and when we have enough water, bath ourselves. We can’t even wash clothes right now. I hadn’t been able to take a shower/bathe for a while, so last night (I’m writing this on June 17), I finally had enough and decided to bathe myself. In the rain. I took a bar of soap, went to a corner in the backyard and tried to get wet (took about 5 minutes as it wasn’t raining as hard as I would have liked). I then lathered myself up and then waited in the rain for about another 5 minutes to try to get all the soap off. The corner of the roof had a steady stream of water from all the water that was running down it so I strategically placed myself under it to get maximum water. My source of light? The frequent lightning overhead. And I did this all while wearing my boxers so not to flash my host family.

But everything I’ve posted above? I knew that when I signed up for the Peace Corps that I would have to make sacrifices. I can’t expect to live in the same conditions as I was accustomed to in the U.S. I’m not really bothered too much by what I’ve written above. What I found that I really had taken for granted, the heart of this whole post is something I believe we all take for granted: the toilet seat. You see, when I first arrived into this house, to my chagrin I found that the toilet only had the right half of the toilet seat. Sure the toilet was disgusting as sometimes the water wouldn’t flush and there would be feces floating around in the toilet. That sometimes when I tried to flush it before I used it the water would splatter (as you would have to hold the bucket high up to get sufficient power to plough through whatever is clogging the pipe. But I found solace that at least whenever I had to do my business, I would only have to lean to the right and I would still be able to do my business. It wasn’t ideal, but it worked. But I was horrified yesterday morning when I heard a distinct clattering sound of hard plastic hitting the floor and my host mom cursing in disgust. When I looked into the bathroom, my worst fears were confirmed – my anchor, my only solace of hope and comfort in the bathroom, the right side of the toilet seat, had fallen off. I don’t believe they plan on buying a new toilet seat until after I leave because they want to remodel the hose then, so obviously it doesn’t make sense to buy a seat when they’ll just buy a new toilet soon anyway. But that means that for one month from now on I will have to squat to use the bathroom. I know that lots of girls squat in the United States (when using public bathrooms), and one guy as well (Dave), but I’ve always just lined the toilet seat with toilet paper to do my business in comfort. But yesterday was the first time I had to squat over a toilet (that isn’t a hole in the ground). I just can’t understand how anyone does that. Since I have arrived here, I have been pretty fast with the business. However, I was so unaccustomed to squatting that it took longer than usual, and my legs got really fatigued. I had to brace myself with one arm on the wall behind me for support. It was not a pleasant experience. When I was finally done, I got dressed and walked to the school, but my legs were so wobbly that I was walking like a drunk. At school, some of the kids wanted to play and I just couldn’t get my legs to comply. Needless to say, going forward for the next month, I will dread the mornings (like I did this one). So the next time you are doing your business comfortably at home, please think of me. As for me, when I finally find a house to move into, I think I will buy an extra toilet seat…just in case.

Welcome to San Augustin

So I have taken some new pictures of my new site and they are on the web. It is real quiet here, but real beautiful at the same time. Being up in the mountains is very cool and we don’t have much malaria or dengue problems here. But we do have the Chagas bug, which I encourage you to read up on. They predominately live in houses made of adobe (lots of those here), so I definitely don’t want be living in one of those. I’m at a lost in how I can help here as there isn’t really a lot of infrastructure here. When visiting another volunteer, I ran into an ex-volunteer (RPCV – returned peace corps volunteer) and she said that she was surprised that another Business Volunteer was placed in San Augustine as the other volunteer worked primarily with the municipality. She thought that they would place a Municipal Development volunteer here and I can see why – there doesn’t appear to be much business here that I can support. Business opportunities for where I am are not much as the majority live off their earnings from coffee and the women primarily stay at home to wash, cook, clean, and take care of the kids (everyone hand washes clothes of the entire family, and the kids get out of school at 1). It may, however, be a different story in the neighboring towns – they don’t earn as much as the people that I’m around. I may have to trek all the way to the other areas to see how I can help then in income generating ideas. But it will primarily revolve around farming, or raising livestock. Also, I hope to see how I can help the schools out there – there is only one teacher per town (I use that word very loosely – its more like a neighborhood that is far away), one class room, and the teacher teaches all from 1-6^th grade. After, the kids generally join their parents in the field to work. The kids in my town (or urban area) are a bit more fortunate – they get to go to school until the 9^th grade, and then they can take a bus to either Dulce Nombre (the closest neighboring town) or Santa Rosa (the biggest city in Copan) to continue their education.

My primary counterpart is the municipality of San Augustine, but right now I’m working a lot with the school as I’m still trying to find out how I can help in the muni. The school here has a computer room with 24 computers (16 set up as they don’t have enough tables at the moment). I’m organizing the room so it can accommodate more computers and tables (the 16 they had set up were on the perimeter of the room, with not enough outlets for all), setting up a restricted account for the students (lots of the computers there was no admin log in, so anyone would be able to install/uninstall anything they wanted), and installing Microsoft Office, a Spanish typing program, and Rosetta Stone (so they can practice English) on all of them. I hope to find other programs as well, or educational games, so that can help the students get accustomed to using computers. I also plan on teaching Word and Excel classes to the student and teachers as well. Other future plans are to set up a network (there is a server, router etc. and wireless adaptors on 16 of the computers), to teach volleyball (they have nets and balls), basketball (may need help from you guys in the states to get some new basket balls) as well as baseball. One thing that sucked is that after the other volunteer left, no one else continued his work with the baseball team. My plan to circumvent that is to form sports clubs like they have in schools in Asia. The older, more experienced students can teach the newer younger students (while the basics are covered in physical education). Hopefully this will be more of a sustainable model. But the other problem is that adult supervision will be needed. I have some willing people from the municipality, but I hope that other adults, especially the parents, will start taking more of an interest in the lives of the students.

Down the line include HIV/AIDS presentations, business simulation, health presentations, and I especially would like to start a gardening club as well. Considering that the majority of these kids are coming from families that work with growing coffee, they should know the science behind it. Also it would be healthy to diversify their diet and eat more vegetables. Not to sound ungrateful (having lived away from home for about 12 years that a home-cooked meal is always appreciated) but I really can’t stand to eat corn tortilla, beans and eggs any longer. I really want to start cooking for myself, and once I do I definitely want to start holding cooking classes for those who are interested. Other preoccupations right now is that I need to start looking for a house to live in – I’m allowed to move out on the 15^th of July and definitely look forward to that. The first thing I plan to buy aside from a bed is an electroducha – the heated showerhead. Cold showers do not make me happy. But that being said, I’ve never taken quicker showers in my life. I usually stand in front of the water and count to 10, almost hyperventilating from the anticipation, then I jump in and get wet in 10 seconds, turn the water off, lather up, then turn the water on and rinse off in 20 seconds. To be fair, the second time is not as bad. But the first 10 seconds while I pump myself up to jump into the frigid water? Not good times. Electroducha may even be the first thing I buy. Screw it, I can sleep on the floor – I’ll have a nice warm shower to wash myself off after.

But I think I may need help from anyone that is willing – I need to start looking for companies or organizations that my be willing to donate items to the school here in Honduras. Basketballs, books (in Spanish), equipment for their rarely used laboratory, perhaps even games as well. I’ll try to flesh out more ideas, but if anyone has a good contact for any of the above that would definitely be helpful. I also need to learn about the coffee industry, to find out how I can increase the incomes of the coffee producing people here. They don’t really grow their plants according to best practice – they just do what their parents, and their parents’ parents have been doing in the past. Anyone with info on that would be helpful as well – I’ll be looking on the internet once I visit someplace that has it as well.

To leave on an amusing note, I received a phone call one day from a random Honduran. He said that he was watching my son as we spoke and that if I didn’t want anything to happen to him, that I was to send him money. Now these phone scams are becoming more and more popular in Honduras – people call random numbers and try to scare them into sending money. Tracking those numbers down don’t help as people are mugged here very frequently for both their money and their cell phones. As such people get new numbers all the time. For me, I’m just surprised that the scammer didn’t try to tailor his scam to me, a non-Spanish speaker. I didn’t understand what he was trying to say, so I handed the phone to a municipal worker here, who then gave it to someone else laughing, and then eventually to the police officer that is stationed here which is when the scammer hung up. I’m sad that I didn’t get a chance to find out more about my son....

new final mailing address

on the side bar, but here it is:

Stephen Ahn

Apartado Postal 1800

Santa Rosa De Copan

Honduras, America Central

Volunteer at last!!

I haven’t been able to update in a while because my site has no internet! I live in a small town of about 2,000 people. The roads are all made of dirt, there are pigs and chicken running around, and there is no market to buy food (closest things are pulperias). The closest big city is a two hour bus ride away in Santa Rosa where they have more stuff. But the only bus leaves my site at 7am and leaves Santa Rosa at 3pm, so not too flexible. I will be working with the town government as well as the school. The school is tiny – 1st to 9th grade, and each grade is only one classroom. I definitely find the benefit of replacing a volunteer – the people here accept me more readily so integration should not be too hard. They go out of their way to make me comfortable and are more trusting of me. My host family was recommended by the outgoing volunteer and they are nice – the dad is only 3 years older than me and they have two kids – one 9 and one 3 ½. The mom is a teacher and the dad owns a coffee farm. This whole town exists because of coffee – about 20% of the families here own coffee farms and the rest work as manual laborers. I need to figure out how I can improve what goes on here – the owners of the coffee farms work from October to May, which is coffee season, and then they just chill until it starts again. It may sound nice but it creates a mentality of doing nothing for about four months. The manual laborers as well – they prefer to work three days a week and then they don’t do anything for the other four days. I think one of the first things I need to do is to help change the mentality. I see what makes Americans different; perhaps what makes them so successful - it’s the mentality of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and that you can be whatever you want to be. For me it seems that here people are kind of resigned to their fate. I think that trying to change that mentality is going to be my first step. Also, for a small town, there isn’t a sense of community. I feel that everyone kind of does their own thing, which is a real shame. Another project I’m thinking of are events to bring everyone together on a semi-regular basis; for example, bingo night or movie night, or even a party or dance. Since my town is a dry town (no alcohol sold – sad, yes), they shouldn’t get too rowdy. Plus, everyone has a gun.
My second group to work with is the school. Interesting thing about school here – it starts at 8am and ends at 1pm. I don’t recall school being so short for me, but I could be wrong. I really hope to improve the educational system here – not for all of Honduras, but for my town at least. They have a computer center but no one knows how to really use computers. When I met with the teachers, I asked what they hoped I would help with – they said English, computers, physical education, health, and sports. I said that I didn’t have a problem with this, but that I would need the teachers to commit to spend extra hours to learn and to teach the students as well. When I said this and asked who would be willing to spend time, no one raised their hands. The director then suggested I start with physical education first. This kind of raised the issue of the sustainability of our work. If I do all the work now, who would continue when I leave? That is another issue I have to tackle – doing the work for them for two years and then leaving will not solve any of their issues. But I’m glad I’m thinking about this now instead of a year and a half from now.
In other news, I’ve been to Santa Rosa (the big city) 3 times in two weeks. I was kind of tired of it for a while. Fun story – the second time I went to Santa Rosa with the people at my municipality, we were driving back around 7pm. The road to our town is up a long windy dirt road. It was dark and about 20 minutes outside of town we saw a car blocking the road, and people with flashlights in the hill above and below. We were told before of stories how bandits would block the road to stop cars and would rob them at gunpoint. The municipal worker waited for 5 minutes to see what was happening and then started to drive in reverse at high speed. He said it was not worth the risk – we had ladies in the car, and they tried to call the one policeman in the town. It turned out that he had left that afternoon which didn’t help with the mood. We did a J turn and then hightailed it back to Santa Rosa to sleep in a hotel. I called the Peace Corps to tell them of the situation as well (policy). I was told we made the right decision – better safe than sorry.
The next morning we drove back up to our town once again, and who do we see? The same car from the previous night. It turns out that they were deer hunters, and we traded a few laughs. They said they were signaling with the light to drive past them, but who in their right mind would take that gamble? Good times all in all.
Today (6/4) I went with the kids from the school to a field, where they ran around playing games and soccer. One person actually had a football (American), so I taught them to play football. Needless to say it was really fun, but I forgot to take sunblock. My face hurts.
I posted picture from the last week at Peace Corps training along with our swearing in (now we are formal
Peace Corps volunteers, not peace corps trainees). I’ll post pictures of my new site next time.

Copan

Last week we found out our final site placements… the location we would be spending the next two years of our lives. I’m going to Copan! Peace Corps doesn’t recommend we share with the whole world exactly where we are going, but I’ll be in a small city in Copan. Copan is in the west of Honduras, on the boarder with Guatemala. The Copan ruins are there as well. I’ll be going to Copan with one other business volunteer (she will be south of where I am), along with a Water & Sanitation volunteer in another site north west of me and a Health volunteer about south west of me. Those are only the volunteers from this group; there are other volunteers from previous groups there already. What is also nice is that I’m a bus ride away from San Pedro Sula, the major transportation center of the north. There are lots of factories there owned by Koreans, so I should have no problem finding Korean food as well as Korean groceries. When we go to our sites, we will have to live with our new host family for at least 2 months. Also, we will not be able to leave our site for those 2 months. We aren’t allowed to take vacation days until 3 months in; until then we are allowed “walk abouts” which means we are allowed to travel somewhere overnight in case we want to visit other volunteers, need to run errands at other locations, etc. I am definitely looking forward to my new site even though I am told that I have big shoes to fill. I am replacing another volunteer, what everyone calls a ‘super volunteer’ because he did so much for his community. Lots of the other volunteers specifically said that they didn’t want to go to replace him because of the expectations to live up to. Somehow I ended up with this site, but I’m ok with it. I plan on going in with no expectations of what I want to do; I’ll just go in and see what there is that I can do to improve and help my community.
Other big news – I passed the language proficiency exam! We had to get at least a level of intermediate medium to swear in as volunteers. I started out as a novice, but today I had my interview and I was cleared as an INT-M. That also means that I’m eligible to receive a tutor for the next three months – something that is only available to those at the INT-M level. So it turned out great. If I had not been able to pass I would have been required to stay at the training site for another week to study and then take another exam. If that wasn’t enough I would have had another week again. But I’m glad to start my life in my new site, where the real world is waiting for me.
Our last week in Ojojona we held a business simulation at a high school in a nearby community. We each had a classroom of students and we taught them basic marketing, production and accounting. The students then had to form their own businesses, create a product and then sell – all in four days. My group made bracelets to sell. I definitely felt more comfortable speaking Spanish in front of a crowd after the HIV/AIDS charla and I feel I did a lot better this time. Also during this week was when we found out about our site announcements – they drew a map of Honduras on the ground, explained where the sites were and then told us who was going to which site. That was followed by pizza and cake – good times!
Also, I went on an excursion to see some caves near Ojojona, which was fun. We managed to get a jalon (hitchhike) to the location of the caves and back. Nothing like sitting on the back of a pickup truck… I also went on a grueling hike to La Tigre National Park. We couldn’t get to the waterfalls because we had to get back early to catch a bus, but we had some nice views when we went.
In other news, I am back at the first training site with my first host family. We are here for this last week of training; on Thursday we meet our counterparts, and on Friday we have our swearing in ceremony as volunteers. We will meet the ambassador and all the other good stuff – it should be fun. We then leave for our sites early Saturday morning, so this is the last time a lot of us will see each other until 3 months. That is when we will all get back together to learn about grant writing and all that other good stuff. I left my family in Ojojona last Saturday, which is why I wasn’t able to post anything. I’ll be leaving this coming Saturday so I don’t know when the next time will be to update everything – I was told that there isn’t good wireless internet access where I am going. I may have to look into getting a landline when I move out on my own, or may have to use the local internet café if there is one. Lastly, I adjusted the blog so that anyone can post comments without having to sign up, so please let me know if you have any questions or what not. Until next time… new pics posted as well....