"All that I am or hope to be I owe to my mother." -Abraham Lincoln
May 6, 2002
Dear Friends and Family,
We thought our life was simple, but it just got simpler. This week we had a surprise visit from a group of kids from El Piñon. This is the neighboring village where we work at the kindergarten up in the mountains. We had invited the older school children to come down to Concepción de Maria some weekend and visit the library. This is at least an hour walk for the students, but we have been encouraging the youth to use the new library and take advantage of its resources. The very next Saturday after our invitation the students made the hike to see the library. Unfortunately, they chose a day when our electricity was out and the library was closed. These bright little faces came to our house to tell us the news and sweetly added that they were hungry from their long walk. Of course this pulled at the heart strings and we could not send them home to hike up the mountain without lunch. Inviting them into our home opened our eyes to the comforts of our own Honduran house, which we thought was pretty primitive. But, before we explain we should describe further where these children live.
In the mountains, they live in adobe homes with dirt floors. Usually their houses have one or two rooms at the most. Some homes are built with branches of bamboo, resulting in many spaces within the walls. The entire family, children and parents alike, sleep on the floor on flat woven mats that suffice as beds. If they are a little better off they sleep in hammocks. You will never see “décor” hanging on the walls or “things” displayed on shelves within their homes. It is simply a shelter. Nothing more. Nothing less. The kitchen is part of the main room and consists of a fire pit in the corner with a couple pewter bowls for cooking. Often the family owns a few odd plates or bowls for serving. Silverware is not common and tortillas are used in place of spoons and forks. There is no refrigerator, no stove, no microwave, no coffee pot, and no bread maker. Without the luxury of electricity on the mountain, these appliances have no meaning. Their day is strictly structured by the sun. Keep this image in mind as you read on.
Shawn invited the children in and I immediately started calculating how we would feed seven additional mouths. While I was rummaging through our food bin (we store all of our non-perishable food items in a large rubber maid tub in order to keep out the bugs), Shawn gave the children some water. He went to the fridge and poured cold water to quench their thirst. With the first drink they looked at Shawn with sparkling eyes, like he had just given them the best candy they had ever tried; “it’s cold!” they commented with excitement. They were all amazed and Shawn and I were humbled. I cherish our cold water on the hot 100 degree days. I have never for one moment imagined the children up on the mountain not knowing how refreshing cold water is to drink. The little girls were very polite and put the glasses back where Shawn had taken them from our dish shelf. We smiled and explained to them that we would be using the glasses for lunch and would wash them after we were finished.
Spaghetti became the solution for lunch. It is fast and easy and can feed many. I opened two bags of pasta and had one of the little girls help me open a big can of spaghetti sauce. I handed her the can opener and she held it upside down. I smiled and showed her how to use the can opener and she was delighted at this invention! Canned goods are not very common and can openers are almost unheard of in the mountains. They are readily available in the fancier grocery stores, but the people in the “country” rarely shop there. If a can needs to be opened they use a knife, plunging it into the can around the edge until the top is cut open.
After I put the sauce in a pan, I asked my little helper where she put the can’s cover and she said she had thrown it away. Minutes later, Shawn came in the house carrying the sharp edged cover, which she had thrown out the door onto our patio. We explained to the kids that we have a garbage can for discarding trash. Littering is a common practice here. People throw their trash outside their homes, which accumulates and is occasionally burned. Granted they don’t produce a huge amount of garbage, but enough to litter their surroundings. Many yards resemble garbage dumps with miscellaneous debris strewn about. Shawn and I collect our trash and burn it in a homemade incinerator that Shawn built in the back yard, as there is no organized garbage collection or waste management where we live.
While the spaghetti was boiling, the children were fascinated with the photos we have plastered on our refrigerator. I should back up. First, they were intrigued with the refrigerator itself and kept commenting on how “beautiful” it was. Then they went through each photo asking the names of those pictured. The children kept requesting, “Please give me a picture as a remembrance of you”. But, they were quickly distracted when they discovered our bookshelf. They each had to touch a book. “Please give me a book, Jennifer” they begged. I smiled as one little girl held up a thick John Grisham novel in English. I told the six year old I would love to share, but that she doesn’t know how to read in English and Shawn and I use our books to study and learn (as John Grisham is a great professor of law and conspiracy theories). As the spaghetti sauce was heating up, the kids went through every item in our home stating how “beautiful and pretty” the decorations were. “Wow, a clock!” “Look at the candles on the shelf!” “They have a calendar!”
In the meantime, Shawn started taking digital photos of the children. They were so excited to get their photo taken that they would push in front of each other to get in front of the camera. After ten minutes into the photo session they discovered that they would all get plenty of time in the spot light. In Shawn’s attempt to take individual photos they insisted that I, Jennifer, model with them. Shawn then put the photos on our laptop computer to present a slide show. Our new little friends were amazed and giggled uncontrollably with each photo that popped up on the screen. They loved seeing their own faces!
Lunch was finally ready to serve. We sat with seven polite little guests and ate spaghetti with tortillas. In Honduras a meal doesn’t pass without the accompaniment of tortillas. They were fond of the American-style spaghetti, as the Honduran recipe for pasta is usually noodles and catsup. After lunch the children sang songs to us that they had learned in school and then had to start their journey home.
When they left, our house looked different to us. We love having a food bin, a fridge, and ice for our ice tea. We love having books to read and a clock on the wall. This is our comfortable home!
We hope you all have a very Happy Mother’s Day weekend! This Mother’s Day will be extra special to us as we will be celebrating two years of marriage on May 12th!
Sending our best,
Shawn and Jennifer
Peace Corps Honduras
Website: globalsilveras.com
“Enjoy yourself. These are the “good old days” you’re going to miss in the years ahead.” Anonymous