"Our House - Concepción de Maria, Honduras"
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Check out the Mundane Diary pages for the exciting and not so exciting daily grind
Saturday December 15, 2001- We arrived home from a training conference yesterday. The conference was held on the island of El Tigre. Jennifer and I left last Sunday, stayed the night at another volunteer's house in Choluteca then we took a bus to a town called "colloliito". Where we caught a "ferry" which was just some guys fishing boat that they used to move people back and forth between the island and the mainland. The boat was about 25 feet long, could sit 3 people across and had about 6 seats in it.
We arrived on the island and were greeted by my Area Peace Corps Director, Jeff Cohen, who told us we could help ourselves to a soda and relax. A while later we went to our host family's home. The house was very simple and the latrine was even simpler. As the host "father" just kind of hovered about the house. We were occupying their house and sleeping in the bedroom/kitchen, the door between the bedroom/kitchen and the living room (where the front door was) was a screen door. When we changed our cloths we had to be quick less we be seen by those coming and going in the living room. Our host family along with 90 others on the island make up a network of guest houses on the island which visitors and tourist can use for a very cheap place to stay. The cost is 100 lempira per night per person (about $6.50 a night), which compared to the hotel on the island is cheap (the hotel costs $30.00 and $60.00 per person). However it is not like staying at a hotel. It is like staying in a rustic cabin. They only complaint I had was for the latrine. I am very happy that we have a porcelain toilet in our site, because I don't think I could handle any extended period of time using a rustic latrine. The latrine conducted of a cement slab with a rough cement seat built in to it, and a tiny tin shack built around it. At night there were 30-40 cockroaches (as big as they come) sitting on top, inside of, and out side of the stool, and usually a scorpion or two on the floor with a cockroach in its claws. After shining a flashlight and banging the cardboard box sitting next to the stool (used for used toilet paper) against the floor and stool, it was usually free enough of bug to go in quick and take care of business. During training I leaned about how to build a "good" latrine, this one was not very good because of the bugs, and due to the fact that there was no ventilation. The stench and gasses in the latrine were terrible, and could have been fixed with a little lye and a proper vent pipe. The family we stayed with also had a house on the beach and a little restaurant. The shower, which was at the beach house, consisted of something that looked like a small tool shed with a bucket of water in it, and the latrine was pretty much the same as the one at the other house.
Aside from the icky latrines, the island was very beautiful with lots of beaches, lots of fresh fish, and lots of sunshine. Jennifer and I are both much darker now. The conference was very nice, and I wish my training sessions in the states involved sitting on a beach under a palm tree talking about what we can do to improve the lives of the people around us.
Saturday December 01, 2001-I got up at 5:30 AM this morning to meet with my neighbor “Don Lito” who was gracious enough to invite me along for the morning ritual of “ordiando los vacas” or milking the cows. I sat out in front of his house, after I arrived at 6AM, for about 20 minutes before he appeared from his house with two buckets and long strand of rope. While I was waiting there was a gentleman in the street who took a seat next to me and started a conversation. We spoke breifly about what a nice guy “Don Lito” was and how he knew the volunteer who served in the site before we arrived, the famous “Mateo”.
Don Lito and I walked for about 5 minutes up the road from the corner we both live on, to his pasture behind the kindergarten. There penned in with wooden posts and lots of barbed wire were two huge cows. Honduran cows are all huge, about 1 ½ times the size of a Minnesota cow. If you remember the old commercial for Schlitz Malt Liquor with the big huge bull or the bulls they fight in the bull fighting ring. This is the kind of cow it was. They all have horns with the only distinction being that the males have huge horns and the females have smaller horns. There were also two calves penned up in a separate area. “Don Lito” let the first calf out, it found its mother and started taking in some morning milk. “Don Lito” directed the calf’s mouth with much skill to each of the mother’s teats and then yanked the calf’s head away and tied it securely to the front leg of the mother. This was to keep the calf from drinking all of the milk and keep it from getting in the way. “Don Lito” cleaned off the cow's utter with some water and a washcloth, and then proceeded to milk, by hand, with no stool or anything else to sit on. I gave it try and found that it was much harder work to do than it looked. “Don Lito” had the technique down perfect and shot milk into the bucket like a machine. My technique needed some practice and became sporadic as the milk was depleted from the cow. After finishing with the first cow we untied the calf and set a 2 gallon bucket of milk on the nearby stone fence. We repeated the earlier steps, letting out the other calf, strapping him to the leg, and all that. The second cow was a little different and harder to milk. As we were milking her “Don Lito” jumps up and starts screaming at the other cow. Who has climbed up on top of a stone troth used years ago for feeding many more cows, and had managed to tip over the entire bucket of milk. “Don Lito” in true Honduran farmer fashion picked up a stick and started beating the back end of the cow and chasing it around the small field. He yelled some obscenities in Spanish and told the cow that it was receiving punishment for tipping over the milk. The cow more scared than hurt just kept running away, not quite sure what to do. “Don Lito” returned to milking and finished filling a much smaller bucket from the smaller cow. He then looked at the 2 gallons that had been spilled on the ground and went back to chasing the cow with a small stick, whacking it in the hind end when ever he was with in striking distance. I think he realized how silly he looked because he gave me a big grin when he came back and we both kind of laughed about the whole thing. He was thrilled to have been the person to have taught me how to milk a cow. I told him I would come with him another day and bring Jennifer with me. He told me when I go home that I will have to convince Jennifer that we should buy a cow, so I would have one to milk too.
November 20, 2001- I'm dreaming of turkey....We left at 4 am yesterday to make it to the first part of a Thanksgiving day celebration 5 hours away in Pespire. We met up with 28 other volunteers and went to a "farm house" on a large river where we celebrated Thanksgiving a few days earlier. The do not celebrate Thanksgiving in Honduras. The election that on November 25th puts all the Peace Corps volunteers in the country on a "stand fast" starting November 22, Thanksgiving day. The "stand fast" is to protect us from any problems that may occurs in and around election time as politics tends to flare tempers. There is also a possibility of rioting after the elections from normal citizens as well as the local gangs in the major cities. So we celebrate a day early.
The Thanksgiving feast was more than I could have hoped for. Everyone brought a dish and the hostess bought turkey. We had a great dinner with turkey, mashed potatoes, and lots of other traditional foods. I got the honor of cutting the turkey after our hostess (a Peace Corps volunteer) decided that cutting a turkey with a machete was harder that it looked. I cut up the turkey and it actually fed all 30 of us.
Jennifer enjoyed a nice swim with other volunteers in the nearby river, while I enjoyed a cold beverage and a game of cribbage.
The actual thanksgiving day we talked to my family on the phone at around 1 PM. Everyone was there including an aunt and uncle with my cousins. I got to talk to everyone but one of the cousins. It was nice to hear their voices and fortunately we had a really good phone connection that made us sound like we were right next door.
For dinner Jennifer fixed chicken breasts marinated in garlic, onion, and mushroom mix, mashed potatoes, and cheese bread. We had it with a nice peach wine and had the cookies Andrea sent us for dessert. We also used the place settings my Mom had sent us. After dinner we went up to our neighbors house to wait for Jennifer’s parents to call. We waited for an hour but they didn’t call.We are hoping that there was just some miscommunication about the time, or that there were problems with the phone. We have a chat session scheduled for Saturday as well via the internet.
November 5, 2001- No White Christmas This Year- We have been in our permanent site for almost a week now. My bout with mononucleosis has mostly passed. We spent our first week as full fledged Peace Corps Volunteers at a very nice bed and breakfast in Tegucigalpa, Honduras; paid for by the PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Office.) After explaining my situation in Valley de Angeles (kids screaming, moms leaving, etc), and dropping the hint to the country director and the assistant Peace Corps Medical Director that Jen and I would really love to spend a week in a bed and breakfast to recover and prepare for our move to our site, the final decision came down from the PCMO director that we would have to spend a week at Leslie's Place. During the week we checked out several other B&B's in the area, and Leslie's Place turned out to be one of the nicest in the area. We got a free continental breakfast, a nice room, and free Internet access. A real plus since everywhere else we had to pay for internet or go to the Peace Corps office. Our stay at Leslie's Place was not a very good prep for coming to our site, as we were very spoiled with modern amenities, but it was a nice relaxing week. Armed with a daily stipend for food and reimbursement for travel by taxi or bus in the city, Jen and I took advantage of our time eating good food, watching 71 channels of cable, surfing the web, talking to friends and family on the web through Yahoo's messenger, going to the Circus (yes there was a circus in town), and going to see Super Jesus. I will have to scan a picture of that when I get a chance.
We arrived in the south of Honduras on Monday October 29, 2001 and stayed the night in Choluteca with another couple that lives in this monstrous, hot, dirty, dusty pit of a town. We did some shopping the next day, Tuesday October 30, 2001, buying a small fridge, some food, and a bed with our community partner who arrived in a small truck with a passenger. In the middle of shopping we stopped in the middle of town and just sat. Our community partner explained that we just had wait here for a second. Soon his wife emerged from the crowd and I was pushed into the back of the pick up. "Great!" I thought "I'm going to violate one of the 'if you break this rule, we'll send you home' rules and I haven't even made it to my site yet". I have to explain there are only 5 rules that I know of so far that if you break them and they find out they will send you home.
Rule #1- Don't ride motorcycles (this is a great rule because too many volunteers in the past have died on motorcycles, but it is, by far, the fastest means of transportation available here), if you do and get caught you will be kicked out of Peace Corps, no exceptions.
Rule #2- Don't ride in the back of Pickup trucks, it is illegal, and if you are caught or seen ridding in the back of a pickup truck on a paved road you will be immediately sent home, no exceptions.
Rule #3 Don't get pregnant, of course the sensitive PCMO has said if you do get pregnant you will be flown to Washington, DC for counseling to help you make your decision as to what you want to do. To carry the pregnancy to full term would mean getting kicked out of Peace Corps. We hope to take advantage of the "Workman's Compensation" side of this little enclave at the end of our service. Apparently if you do get pregnant it is covered by workman's compensation. Nine months of free health care during a pregnancy - can't beat that.
Rule #4- Don't have affairs with married people in your village. If you do and the people in your community complain, you will be kicked out of Peace Corps.
Rule #5- Don't do illegal stuff or things that will provide you with a large profit margin. Things like making, possessing, or using illegal drugs are good ones for getting kicked out. Things like selling or trading Land Rovers, as one inventive Peace Corps volunteer in Africa did, make a decent profit is also a reason to get kicked out of the Peace Corps.
I'm sure there are more things you could do to get sent home for, but these are the ones they brought up with regularity. now...on to our site.
After riding for 3 hours in the back of a small Toyota pickup with a refrigerator, a queen sized bed, all our luggage(4 back packs), and 3 large rubber made bins, and a couple of boxes of stuff; crunched up into a ball in the front left corner of the pickup in the 2'X2' hole left by the fridge and bed coming together, many times having to stand up to regain feeling in my legs and butt, we arrived in our site at our new home. There were many there to greet us and help us carry our things in. It was a very nice reception.
After a few tense days of negotiating with our landlord, who was determined to get the same amount out of us as they had from the previous two volunteer (even though we had one less room), we have been settling in nicely. Jennifer has been adjusting to the fact that we are here for 2 years and will be missing all the holidays and what comes with them in the states, family, friends, weather changes, candy at Halloween. I have been adjusting to the same things, as well as that fact that I have no idea what we are going to do here for 2 years. We have a lot of work to do to improve our Spanish, get to know the community, and develop projects. Our current big projects involve home improvements and cooking. Life here is very peaceful and I think I'm going to like it.
October 11, 2001 - A lot can happen in 9 days. I am sitting in my room in Valle de Angeles, recovering. Last week Wednesday I started to feel ill. I had a dentist appointment on Friday and decided that if my condition did not improve the next day I was going to travel to the capitol one day early, as my neighbor had contracted dengue, a virus carried by a certain type of misquotes kind of like malaria. I had most of the signs that it was dengue, fever, sweats, and a slight rash. I arrived in Tegucigalpa and went to the Peace Corps Medical Office where I waited 2 hours to be seen and was told to go get a blood test. Later in the afternoon I was told my blood test was fine and there was nothing wrong with me.
The next day I went to the dentist where I had the worst dental procedure of my life, an extraction. They pulled and chipped and tugged until the second from last molar on the upper left side of my mouth was completely torn out, then he yanked and prodded and pulled a little more to make sure the roots were gone too. I got to keep the tooth as a souvenir. I had to have it pulled after the molar cracked completely in half.
I was driven home by a driver from the training center and for the most part the tooth extraction went perfect. I had a dentist who has been described by many as "one of the best" in Honduras. I went home and slept a restless night in Valle de Angeles. Jennifer arrived on Saturday after not having seen me for two week (we were separated for a portion of our training) to find me curled up on the bed with a temperature of 103 and a red rash that covered me from head to foot.
I was pretty sure it was dengue and it would be gone in a day or two, as I'd had it now for 3 days. The typical dengue cycle lasts 3-5 days. Jennifer became concerned and called the medical director who told us we would be going to the hospital as soon as they could find us a ride. A driver showed up two hours later and we checked into a 1950's style hospital in the capitol. Since it was Saturday we didn't find out until Monday that I in fact had Mono-nucleuses, which consequently has the same symptoms as dengue. The prognosis was not very welcome. The recovery time for dengue is about a week, the recovery time for mono can be up to a month and a half. Being the strapping young lad I am, I have been recovering very well and after 5 days in the hospital I was ready for battle again.
Unfortunately Peace Corps Medical doesn't share my enthusiasm for service and I have been ordered to stay in my house and rest. So here I am passing the time by "resting" in my host home. It's not very peaceful here though. When the children are not sleeping they are screaming, so much for resting and relaxing. The good news is that I will not be missing any important training and will still graduate even though I will be missing the 2 final weeks of training.
October 2, 2001 - A few things...First- I got word today that they are going to repair my tooth in country and I will be receiving an annoying bridge. I feel like an old man who hasn't taken good care of his teeth. I think I'll sue the dentist that did my root canal and failed to put a crown on my tooth!! I've had 3 dentist tell me that the way my root canal was capped, with a simple filling, was a really bad work of dentistry. Oh well. I also wrote a letter to Peace Corps Washington about how I was a little disheartened with the prospect of having to have this procedure done, and having to have it done here. I really wanted an implant that would be more permanent. I get the feeling I will be dealing with this bridge for the rest of my life, and that makes me sad.
On a bright note...I went to the capitol with two of my fellow trainees to find a printer to complete our community project. We needed a plotter (a really big printer) to print out a large map of the city. For the last 4 weeks we have been working on a project for which my laptop has been very useful. Two of the people in my group, Jennifer and David, have masters degrees in international development and urban planning or something like that. They have a very good working knowledge of ArcView, which is a program for correlating geographic data with various types of information. In the states it is called GIS or Geographic Information Systems. Since the city we are working in, Sabanagrande, is not too huge, we were lent two GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) units to map the city. The map turned out very good. The process for getting it printed was almost as difficult as the process for creating the map. We went to the national geographic institute (the people here who do all the national mapping, not to be confused with the magazine), who gave us the run around and eventually let us use their brand new plotter, which they themselves had never used. It was a beautiful piece of equipment paid for by the fine citizens of the USA; in fact all the computers and equipment in their office were gifts from the USGS (United States Geological Survey) who is financed here by USAid, and which is subsequently paid for by US tax payers.
The printer/plotter as I said is a beautiful machine and we had the honor taking it on it maiden voyage as no one in the office knew how to use it, so it never got used. It was sad to see all these people who couldn't even install a simple print driver. We had gone to the Peace Corps Office and downloaded the drivers we would need to make the printer work and had them installed and the printer functioning in less than 10 minutes. We had to make some minor corrections as when you make things 24"x36" any flaws no matter how minor stick out. So we made our corrections and printed 4 maps for the municipality of Sabanagrande. They turned out really well, and it was well worth the hard work. Unfortunately this is an election year and they probably won't be used for at least a year if they are ever used at all.
The political situation here is enough to cause a small revolution. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a revolution here with in the next 10 years. The current rate of inflation has devalued their currency and increased inflation by %250 over the last 15 years. There is currently a drought and I heard a rumor that the actual value of their currency, currently 15.80 Lempira for every American Dollar, is probably closer to 23 or 25 Lempira for every dollar. This combined with the fact that was a drought during the last growing season which eliminated most of the crops in the southern half of the country makes for a very dangerous economic situation. In addition this is an election year, which will result in the "robbing" of the coffers. Under Honduran law the new politicians can fire and hire new people loyal to him/her in the local and national government. The employees who are released are paid a severance pay which is graduated according to how many years they have worked for the government. This change over often drains millions of lempira from the coffers of the government as many employees will receive as much as an entire years salary when they leave. The system here makes American politics very palatable.
September 30, 2001 - I finally have the house to myself, so I thought I would take out my laptop and add an entry and play for a while. My host mom's business (see Sept. 11th) bring in a lot of traffic and I don't feel comfortable with every one knowing I'm the gringo with the computer. She went to the capitol today to visit her daughter. Speaking of gringo I found out that the word "gringo" was coined during the Mexican-American war. Apparently the American troops wore green uniforms and the Mexicans would shout in their limited English, with thick accents, and lack of knowledge about English word ordering (in Spanish the order of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives are often switched around) produced "green go" a war cry which was supposed to drive the "green" American army away. Since then we have been referred to as gringos in Central America. Everyone here seems to know the history behind this story. I didn't take too much offense to the name "gringo" until I heard the story behind it. A few racial slurs regarding illegal Spanish speaking aliens in the U.S. came to mind. This thought passed quickly as I have never been one for racial epitaphs and it would be in very bad taste.
I then thought about the incident the other night in the kitchen of my host home. There was an older woman, Susie, my host mom, and the "empleada" (a young girl that works for my host mom doing laundry, helping with meals, and cleaning). The older woman Susie was commenting on how nice the "empleada" (a person who works in someone's house) looked in her light green dress as it made her look lighter skinned, which therefore made her "prettier". This is a culture that defines and names people according to what they look like, and people who are lighter skinned are considered more "beautiful". People in the U.S. who are awfully offended when someone is described by the color of skin or race would have a bit of difficulty here. If you are not skinny then your name here may become "Gordo(a)" (Spanish for fat), if you are dark skinned you may become one of the many different words they have for varying shades of dark skin, if you are skinny you may become "flaca" (Spanish for skinny), if you are missing a finger or arm or leg you may become one of the many words they have to describe that, and if you are a white person you may become a "gringo(a)". In most cases people from the U.S. who are not of European decent are referred to by their ethnic background. Asians become "Chinos" regardless of which Asian country they may have roots in, Middle easterners become "ayrabs", people with darker skin usually become "Garufuno" which is the name of one of the native peoples on the northern Caribbean coast who's heritage in this country started 100's of years ago after a few slave ships crashed off the coast and many of the slaves swam to shore and escaped.
This is an interesting point to me as this is a culture in which their styles of communication revolved around and around in a spiral before actually getting to the point. We have been told that being direct here is very rude and we need to perfect the art of going in circles for a while before getting to the point or just not getting to the point and letting people read between the lines. There is a lot of reading between the lines here, which makes it difficult with limited Spanish skills. Thursday was a good example of this. Meredith (the person who I am sharing a Spanish instructor with) and I were in Spanish class we were both tired and not feeling well, the class was dragging on a new subject that was hard to comprehend the use of, and at one point our Spanish teacher asked us what was wrong. We told her we were tired and didn't feel well. When she didn't take this "read between the lines hint" and continued to ask what was wrong I told her I was suffering from culture shock, was tired of having 4-6 hours of Spanish every day and didn't really want to be in her class at that particular moment. It was done in a sincere tone of voice, but proved to be way too direct. She immediately began to say it was her lesson plan, that she was a bad teacher and was on the verge of tears. So much for being honest. She is better and I think she understand, to some degree, that we just have bad days sometimes. Only 5 days to go and then I will be back together with Jennifer, this being apart thing is driving me crazy!
September 28, 2001 - I am finishing up my 4 weeks of FBT, field based training, in Sabanagrande and have one more week to go. It is Friday, but we have classes on Saturdays here as well. It is 12 AM and I haven't been up this late since I got to Honduras; except one other time when Jennifer and I went out dancing. My usual bed time is around 9 PM, but tonight we had a little sing along/party at one of the volunteers host homes. One of the guys in our group really likes to sing and play guitar. I had the opportunity to sing and play "In the Light" by DC Talk for them. Everyone was pretty impressed and thought it was a really cool song. It was pretty fun to tell them it was a Christian tune, since most of them think Christian music is boring or hard to listen to. This is a beautiful little town and I have enjoyed my time here, although adjusting to refried red beans and eggs over easy for just about every meal has been a bit of an adjustment. I can't wait to be able to cook for myself again. No one here cooks with pepper and if salt is used it is used to excess. I have made friends in with the people I am serving with and look forward to seeing them in our future days as Peace Corps Volunteers. Next week we will be constructing a community bulletin board which came about after a K,E.E.P.R.A.H. study we did indicated that the community was not very aware of what was going on as far as services, politics, and organizations were concerned in Sabanagrande.
September 23, 2001 - I just returned from a 4 day visit to our future "home" and the site where we will be spending the next 2 years. Jennifer and I, along with our 58 other Peace Corps Trainees (we have lost 4 so far one to a medical problem and two to romantic interests at home and one to intense culture shock), attended "Community Partner Day" where we met with the people who would be helping us help the communities we will be working in for the next two years. We had lunch at a convention center and then headed out to our site. Luckily my community partner has a truck so we were able to ride with him to our site. The 6 hour car ride took us from Tegucigalpa(the capital) to Choluteca (a city in the south where we refueled, purchased a large bottle of purified water for the week, and delivered mail for an upcoming meeting being put on my community partner), then to Conception de Maria which is the closest municipality in the southwest to the Nicaraguan Boarder.
The drive up the mountain took about 2 hours and was beautiful. When we reached Corpus, about the halfway point, the view of the valley below and the tiny dots of light that made up Choluteca, were awe-inspiring. We could see for what was probably 30-50 miles, including a small neighboring aldea (town) inside Nicaragua. After the sun set it was even slower going as the road to Conception de Maria is very poor and has suffered much damage, some new(from the current rainy season) and some remaining from Hurricane Mitch. We arrived and were truly disappointed in our surrounding, this was not the oasis paradise we had dreamed of. It was just another mountain town in Honduras. I'm convinced that Towns in Honduras always look worse at night. We were then in for a bigger surprise when we saw the "house" that had been reserved for us. It was a series of 5 room, hotel style, made of Cement block and each divided into individual quarters. Luckily the last volunteers left their beds, a fan and a few other things behind so we didn't sweat to death on the nasty tile floor that was in desperate need of being cleaned.
We went to bed nearly in tears at the prospect of spending the next two years in the tiny little Municipality 3 hours away from any kind of sizable city and almost 6 from the capitol by bus. The next morning we awoke to the sound of barking dogs, playing children, chickens and a bus driver who was sure if he honked his horn just a little longer more people would want to ride his bus down the mountain. We skipped breakfast and asked ourselves several times what we were doing in the Peace Corps. Over the next three days we got to know the Municipality (which wasn't difficult as it is very small), met most of the important people in the town and got a few free meals. There are many different opportunities for computer development here as there are computers at the High School (el colegio), the Cooperative (Cooperativa), and the municipality in conjunction with the Reiken Foundation (a rich former Peace Corps volunteer determined to put "Modern" libraries in third world countries), AOL and some other organization are building a Information Center (Centro de Informacion). The center will consist of 6 networked computers with internet access. My job will be to help set them up, help them develop a system for maintenance, and help them develop a system for management. The project already seems impossible and it is going to be very interesting to see how we manage internet access in a town that has a limited number of telephones and where dial up access for a single computer cost 1 lempira a minute plus a monthly fee of $15.00 US dollars. It will be fun and frustrating to see everything unfold over the next year or so.
On the bright side our land lady agreed to allow to do a little construction and was going to put in a door way between two of the rooms. This will work out well as we decided we only needed two of the rooms and wanted them connected. We plan on building a kitchen counter top type area and repainting the walls. She also wanted to put in a ceiling which will be nice. Right now the ceiling looks like something in a warehouse. The roof is a laminated and corrugated asbestos with large steel beams for support. She said the ceiling would cool the room down, give it a nicer look, and keep some of the animals and bugs out.
We are protected 24 hours a day as we share a common patio (that also has a variety of fruit and vegetable growing in it) with our landlord who has two of the meanest German Shepherds I've ever seen. I haven't met a dog yet that has intimidated me, until now... These dogs have no fear and will bite if someone invades their territory. This was proven one night when called up for dinner in the house the male dog "Ranger" came after me and was trying to get close enough to bite me before the maid came out and settled him down. We started paying "Satan's minions" , as I like to call them, homage by feeding them parts of our meals to make peace with them. By the last night we were in pretty good with them, as I went out a 3 AM to go the bath room (which is out side and about 30 feet from our door). Ranger was waiting outside my door with an anxious "when is someone going to try to break in so I can eat them" look on his well bread German Shepherd face, but gave a slight wag of his tail when he saw it was only me. I went to the bathroom and we passed, hesitantly by each other in the night, with no problems. We left feeling much more confident than when we had arrived, but still pondering being so removed from the mainstream and living in such a rural setting (we regularly see cows, chickens, pigs, horses, mule, and other fun farm animals roaming the street.)
Also on a high note there were two computers, a scanner, a printer and a digital camera waiting for me when I arrived. Unfortunately I think the guy I am replacing took the digital camera with him(I'm sure it will come back soon) and I didn't get any digital images to post here, but I am sure in the next couple of months I will be able to update and upload some images. The area we are living in is very beautiful, it would be great for anyone interesting in doing a photographic adventure to Central America. I can't wait to either get a nice digital camera (which would probably be best since we don't have any place to develop film nearby, or my 35mm set up. I would love to have both. Vamos a Ver...we'll see.
September 11, 2001 - I've been in my FBT site (Field Base Training) for about a week and half now. I am living with an older lady who has 5 children, 4 of which live with in 1 house of their mom. My new host mom, Lidia Nunez, is awesome. She runs a "comidor" which is where people come over to buy home cooked meals and eat them at her kitchen table. Her house is a three room house brick house with an apartment below the main house (this is where her son lives). She sleeps on a mattress in the main room and has given me the one bedroom. The bedroom is just a half wall that divides the small bedroom from the main room. I am stationed in Sabana Grande (translated it means: Large Savanna) and am here with 11 other volunteers who are also working in municipal development. Yesterday was "Dia de Ninos" day of the children. Our group broke into several groups and went into the town and gave out candy, played games, and had piñatas to bust apart. It was very fun. I taught them how to play "duck duck goose" which translates better than "duck, duck, gray duck".
We found out today about the terrorist attacks in the US and our classes for the day have been canceled. We are currently (while I type this) at David and Jennifer's host family house (David and Jennifer are another couple who are in Municipal Development) watching "Stewart Little". We watched about 3 hours of coverage and nothing had changed. We changed the channel when the media here started showing dead bodies.
September 2, 2001 - Yesterday was Sept. 1st, exactly 11 years ago yesterday Jennifer and I went on our first official "date". It seems like it was only a few years ago. That is one of the disadvantages of being truly in love and having fun with your spouse, time really goes quickly. Or...maybe it is just because I'm getting older. I've heard that life just goes faster as you get older and doesn't slow down. I have a couple of stories today. The first has to do with Peace Corps computers and the second with birthday celebrations.
The Peace Corps office in Tegucigalpa has two computers in their office for the in country volunteers to work, send email, and do other computer related activities. Honduras has 250+ volunteers here. The largest contingency of Peace Corps volunteers in the world (this is mostly due to the huge damage Hurricane Mitch caused a few years back, they are in desperate need of development work). Two computers is not very many to share among 250+ volunteers. While I was in the office last week, when I went for my dentist visit, I noticed some peculiar things happening on the computer and so I updated the virus software. To my dismay there were two undiscovered viruses on one of the computers and I know there is at least one other on the second computer, but may never know as it doesn't have virus software installed on it. The anti-virus program tried to destroy the virus, but only made matters worse. The virus has embedded itself in many of the programs and changed some of the registry keys, which means now that it's main file has been eliminated many of the programs will not run without doing some extensive work on the machine. I advised the woman in control of the computers and she said they were working on it and would like my help. Unfortunately I am not available as Jennifer and the rest of the trainees are heading out today to go to our field based training sites. This makes me sad, not because I won't get to fix the computers, but because since Jennifer and I are in different sectors we will be separated for four weeks. We will see each other in the middle when we go to visit the site we will be assigned to for the next two years, but four weeks is a long time.
Ok, a Honduran Birthday...Two days ago we attended a neighbor boys 10th birthday celebration. We arrived a little late and missed the smashing of the piñata, which I heard didn't go too well as the birthday boy knocked it on the ground failing to break it open, but before they had a chance to recover it and hang it back up the wild little pack of children attacked the piñata and tore it open to get at the candy, causing some of the b-day boy's tears to flow. They then brought out the birthday cake. It was a very nice cake that they had made a special trip into the capitol for. It had white frosting with flowers and a toy school bus on the top. They placed a single candle in the center and we sang happy birthday. He blew out the candle and everyone cheered, and then re-lit the candle and told him they wanted a photograph, and that he needed to get his face closer to the cake. So he leaned down and blew out the candle again, only this time one aunt reached down and pulled the candle out of the cake while two others forced his sweaty little face into the top of the cake. Everyone thought this was just hilarious, except the birthday boy who looked like he was fighting back tears. Needless to say the PC volunteers at the party, myself included, were pretty shocked and intrigued by the whole situation. Can you imagine being 10 years old at your birthday party and having your aunts shove your face into the cake? The ins and outs of the culture are definitely an eye opener here.
August 30, 2001- Yesterday we had a productive round of emailing and were thoroughly satisfied with the fact that the computers were working well and our connection speeds were at a level that allowed no time for the whistling of the "Jeopardy" game show timer (which if you sing in perfect time is exactly 15 seconds for the first full stanza, and the fact that I (we) spend a lot of time whistling this waiting for web pages to load while checking our email). As we entered the Hondutel building as well as afterwards I noticed a kind of odd site. The "vigilancia" or armed guard was not armed today. I thought this a bit odd. I however found the reason when we entered the building. No it wasn't being robbed or anything exciting like that, but there was a fully loaded shotgun just laying unattended on the chairs in the lobby. I no longer felt all that safe and wondered what would happen if a mother with children like the ones that live in our house came in the door for an afternoon session of surfing the web. We left Hondutel and as we did I made a point to look at the shotgun with a scared puzzled look on my face and asked the woman who ran the place "where is the guard, is everything ok." She just kind of giggled and pointed outside, looking either a little amused at my reaction or disappointed that Hondutel had hired a not so vigilant "vigilancia". Only in Honduras!
August 25, 2001 - "Regalos de Hijos, Fogata, and Mondongo Soup" Today I have three short stories about yesterdays adventures. The first we will call "Regalos de Hijos or Gifts of Children". As we arrived home from the training center yesterday we were pleasantly surprised to find a new face in the kitchen of our host home. The "abuela" or grandmother of our host mom has was there taking care of the three kids, well...she was there. We introduced ourselves and after a little time our host mom arrived home. Later Jennifer told me that the grandmother was very concerned that we didn't have any children yet. It is very unusual for a married couple to not have children here. Jennifer politely advised her that we want children, we just can't have them while in the Peace Corps or we will be sent home. The grandmother then went on to tell Jennifer that there were 2 newborn babies from different families that were dropped off at the hospital today. This is a pretty common occurrence here as young girls and poor mothers figure the government can take better care of their babies than they can. The grandmother then asked Jennifer if we wanted them, as if she had an inside track to get them for us. Jennifer just smiled. She then tried giving us one of her great-grandchildren, to which our host mom said in Spanish "Grandma those are my children and you can't give them away". Grandma responded with "why not? he would have a much better life with these two than with you." This was pretty funny coming from a 90 year old grandmother, but also sad as we later talked to a neighbor who worked as a nurse in the hospital and told us that 5-6 children are abandoned daily at the hospitals in the capitol. In a country the size of Ohio this is a very sad predicament.
As of yesterday I am officially a Honduran. We have been hearing about and joking about a local delicacy called "Mondongo". It is a soup that is described by the locals as "really good". I had it for the first time last night at the neighbors house. She likes to invite us over for dinner as she is hosting another Peace Corps couple that we are in training with. The only catch about the soup is that one of its main ingredients is the intestine of a cow. As first I was wondering what process could they possible go through to make a cow intestine edible, but I guess it is quite a lengthy process and it is some of the cleanest food you can buy here. I also wondered what they could do to make it edible since I imagined cow intestines to be very stretchy and hard to chew. The soup looks a lot like vegetable soup with huge vegetables. I was really excited when she brought it out, as I love Campbell's Vegetable Beef Soup. This pretty much just tasted like boiled vegetables. I had one piece of intestine in my bowl about 2" X 2" in size I tried cutting off a piece with my spoon, but soon discovered that they don't really do anything about the chewy elastic nature of cow intestine. After much work and everyone at the table, as well as most of the host family, watching me I managed to tear off a small chunk of cow intestine to try. It tasted like chicken, and had the consistency of really chewy chicken skin. Everyone at the table (Jennifer and the other couple) were waiting with baited breath to hear what the infamous "Mondongo" tasted like, since all but my wife were too scared to try it (she only had one vegetable). Overall, my Mondongo experience was a little disappointing as I was willing to overlook the "cow intestine" part if the broth and vegetable tasted good, but like I said it just tasted like boiled vegetables. However, our host neighbor has officially made me a "Honduran" since I was the only one brave enough to try her soup.
Also yesterday while at dinner David and Jennifer, the other couple, relayed to us that some of the local kids were going to have a "fogata" later in their honor. David and Jennifer spend time playing with the neighbor kids and the kids have become quite fond of them. We then found out that a "fogata" is a bonfire. Sure enough, as we were leaving after dinner, here came a group of about 6 kids all carrying various items from trash they found in the street and some wood. We were then informed that the "fogata" was going to take place right there in the street. I was quite amused, as we watched them search for a location. They first chose right in front of David and Jennifer's host mom's door, then went across the street up against the building, then to right in the middle of the street, and finally decided to have their campfire in the street but off to the side. We walked past a little while later and there they were reading from a small new testament for kids enjoying their fire. They also sang a couple of songs for us and wanted to know what each one of their names were in English. Only in Honduras...would 5-10 year old children be starting fires in the middle of the street, singing songs into the late night hours and conversing with the local "gringos" (foreigners).
August 22, 2001 - I tried updating the web site today, keyword being tried. I went to the local Hondutel, which we have been calling the internet cafe. In reality it is just a big cement building with 13 networked computers connected to a central relay point in the capitol by a "T1" line. From there it is sent to a regional satellite relay station and from there who knows where. As I sat down at the Pentium 233 with only 32 megs of ram I marveled at the fact that I was about to update the web site with a CD I had just burned, using shareware I had downloaded before I left the US, on a networked computer, guarded by some guy whose name I haven't asked yet, but who I say hello and goodbye to every time I visit, in the middle of Honduras. In the middle of Honduras being the key word there. Oh did I mention the guard is always armed with a shotgun. There are a lot of walking around with shotguns here. I saw a guy in the middle of the city waiting for a bus, his shotgun resting at his side. I think he was on his way home from work. A few firearms and a good reference and you can find yourself work down here. As I started the process of checking email and uploading the web pages, I received a proxy server error. No problem, I'll just disable the proxy settings in the web browser, no luck. I ask the woman who knows enough to turn the computers on and take my money when I'm done what the problem was. She says she doesn't know and starts making phone calls. There is only one guy in town who knows what is going on with the network and everyday he tells me he will have the software to get me on his network with my laptop "tomorrow", it's always "tomorrow". The nice lady tells me that they are doing system maintenance in Tegucigalpa at the main Hondutel building and the internet would be down for 1 to 1 1/2 hours. In other words I should go home there won't be any more internet today. They close in 3 hours, but I'm pretty sure the system won't be up and running in two, so I walk home..."only in Honduras".
I had a class today on communication in my Municipal Development technical class. A guy named David from the southwest group came by to relate some stories and chat with us about keeping open lines of communication with in the community and municipality in which we work. He works in a medium sized community with a population of about 12,000 people. He related the story about an attempt to build better communication in the municipalities offices. He proposed to the "mayor" and "council member" that a set of mailboxes in the main office would facilitate communication and maybe then his phone messages wouldn't get lost by the secretary or whoever else happened to answer the phone. After it was completed he had a 9 box mail space and a new way to keep communication lines open. The emergency management coordinator was excited to see it and wanted to know when they were going to be able to use it to make cheese. Apparently the squares were the perfect size for cheese making. This being the volunteers first effort at a "sustainable project" he started to wonder if, when he left, it would continue to be used for mail or be scarified for cheese making.
August 18th, 2001 - We have been advised not to travel on the 13th and 18th of the month, as the gangs with corresponding numbers are supposed to be active on these days. We went to Choluteca on Thursday for a volunteer visit. This is when trainees get matched up with volunteers in the field and spend a few days with them to get a real look at what volunteers do. We were with Raj and Nina Shah in Choluteca which is in the south. This particular area is said to be where the devil lives because it is so hot. We had to take 2 showers a day and I don't think I stopped sweating from the time I stepped off the bus to the time we left. The temp was 98 with a low of about 88, and those were cool days. It was a very interesting visit. While there we visited a cashew farm, a group of women making paper in a small aldea (town), met one of the richer guys in town, a bank president, visited a large market to buy vegetables for our dinner, and observed the emergency communication system work first hand. Click on the cashew farm or making paper links for the full stories, you'll never look at the nuts the same again. We met a really rich guy who owns 3 cashew farms in Choluteca. He insisted on taking us out for dinner, but we ran into some problems when the mother of one of the volunteers we were visiting had a stoke and was in the hospital. On Friday they decided that they should travel home to be with her, cutting our visit a day short. The couple we stayed with were regional emergency zone coordinators and were responsible for keeping track of volunteers in the area and delving messages from the Peace Corps office, like "don't travel to Tegucigalpa unless you have to." They had to deliver the "stay out of Tegucigalpa message to about 40 people in their region, most of which do not have telephones, one in particular didn't have a phone in their town, so one of the local bus driver's was given a message to deliver to the volunteer. On the way home we saw at least 3 police/military check points with the police forces searching buses and vehicles for "Mares" as the gang members called around here. We came back to Valle De Angeles today on the 18th with out incident. There was a very strong police and military force in the capitol city, as well as Valle de Angeles.
August 13th, 2001 - After 3 weeks in country...now the 14th The three ellipticals are there as I was just about to write how everything was going great and I love this new place I am in. Then the 2 year old started hitting enter and playing with the mouse. He screamed when I pushed his hands away and told him no. Then his mom, sister, and older brother wanted to know what the three different pointer control devices were (I have a pointer stick on my keyboard, a touch pad and a physical optical mouse that I occasionally use, all of which control the pointer on the screen). So, I explained each and of course let each one try them out. Then the two year old started screaming more because he didn't get to participate. It was about then that I rethought my original positive outlook and retreated to my room before my computer became open game for exploration. Overall my in country experience has been fulfilling, but very challenging. I was really excited about learning the language until two weeks into language training I discovered the only way I was going to learn the language was going to be independent study, since my "teachers" techniques didn't really mesh with my style of learning, or anyone else in my class or other classes she has been in.
Adjusting to the food has been a challenge. I finally convinced my host mom that I really don't eat the same amount as her 6'2" 240lb manual labor husband. Especially when it comes to red beans and some of the finer oil soaked delicacies. I remember how much I liked those fried banana chips when as I told my host mom I liked fried plantains. When she came out with hot plantains soaked to the middle in hot oil, I decided the preparation of this particular food would be done a bit differently once we were out on our own. We now have boiled plantains or bananas which are not too bad if you can stand the texture. Today we had chicken bologna and cheese sandwiches with catsup and mantequilla. Mantequilla which is eaten with most everything (at least if your a Honduran) is a rich cream mixed with butter varying in constancy, sweetness and content depending on where you buy it. It is like a mix of butter and sour cream. I think it would be great on baked patties, but not on bananas.
Last night there was a large gang fight in the central market of Comayaguala, a neighbor city to Tegucigalpa. This wouldn't be too disturbing, but my language class was supposed to be in the market yesterday morning. Another language group went there instead and we went to a smaller market, but later in the day we were told there was rioting in the streets and it wasn't safe to go into the city and that no one was to travel into the city. We had returned to the training center 30 km away only 3 hours earlier. Apparently two rival gangs had a little tussle killed a few of the others member and police had moved in to quiet the problem. Today we were assured that everything would be under control before we go into the city tomorrow to catch a bus to Choluteca where we will be staying with another married couple for our volunteer visit. We will be spending a few day with this couple talking about there experiences so far in the peace corps and helping to make our decision on whether we want to stay or not. I didn't have second thoughts until today when, on our way to the internet cafe, our host mom met us in the street and said the police were closing the small convenience stores that dot every street in town, as they heard rumors that some of the gang members were in town. She assured us we were safe, but that it probably would be best to just go home so we didn't get caught out after dark with an expensive piece of equipment strapped to my back. The laptop is nice, but it cost as much as the average national annual salary, so I try to be really careful about who sees it. I watched a little bit of the news and I guess the police were now looking in Santa Lucia for additional gang members. The city is not very big and our training center is right off the main road. I'm not sure if we will be going to school tomorrow. I guess we will see.
Aside from the recent events I have overall felt very secure here. The people are very nice and the weather has been awesome.
July 28th, 2001 - We made it! We flew into Tegucigalpa on Wednesday and have been adjusting to our new way of life. The training center/staff, our new family, new food, and a whole new way of life. Everything is still moving quickly. We have so much to learn. Our Spanish is coming along and have no choice but to learn. We are the old married couple in the group, with most of the people in our group being 4-6 years young than us with only a few exceptions. They are all really excited about the night life and parting, while Jen and I try to recover from long days on sitting. For the most part I am very happy with our arrangements. Our host Mom, Erika, and her children, Allison 8, Jorge 6, and Gerardo 2, are all very wonderful and are so nice to have opened their house to us. The dad, Jorge Sr. is currently in Japan studying. It has been interesting. We were very excited to find out there is an internet cafe 5 minutes from our house and that they are becoming more and more popular outside of the main city. So we should be able to stay "connected" for the next few months.
July 24th, 2001 - Writing from 30,000 feet! You gotta love technology. Jen is snoozing next to me as we are flying to Miami for the first leg of our journey. The last few days have been exhaustive. We have gotten about 8 hours of sleep over the last three days and only 2 of those were last night. I'm way too pumped up for what is to come to sleep. I re-read my job description and am wondering what I got myself into. I'm having doubts about my qualifications and am so curious as to what we will be doing once we get there. We knew the last week would go quickly, but I never thought I would be screaming into my Star Trek Communicator "Scotty, Scotty!!!!! Take the dylithium crystals off line, were moving way to fast. She's breaking up!!!!!!!" I'm just happy we are on our way and praying I have internet access.
July 17, 2001 - Only a few days to go. I have one more day of work left. I will really miss this place, it is reassuring to know that I have a job when I get back. The process of packing up all of our belongings and filtering out all but a backpacks worth of clothing and personal items has been interesting. I am starting to get a little nervous about what is to come. Especially if I have done all this work on the web page and won't be able to do update or receive email. There will be a lot of disappointment if we don't have access to email. Even if it was only once a month, that would be better than nothing.
June 24, 2001 - We received a letter from the Peace Corps today requesting that we contact them to accept or decline an offer to serve in Honduras. We are very excited and have accepted the positions. The general description of our jobs has me doing Municipal development and Jennifer doing business development. We have no idea what these two things will consist of, but I am sure that it will be exciting.
May 12, 2000 - The Beginning. ...God created man to his own image: to the image of God he created him: male and female he created them. And the Lord God built the rib which he took from Adam into a woman: and brought her to Adam. And Adam said: This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man. Wherefore a man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they shall be two in one flesh. Genesis 1:27, 22-24
When I married Jennifer I had no Idea what I was getting into. I had hopes and aspirations. I had expectations and fears. I soon found out my perceptions of marriage would be reshaped and expanded on in ways I never imagined. The wedding itself, I would like to think, was a testimony to what the rest of our life is to become. Grand, beautiful, spiritually fulfilling, and a completion of God's plan in our lives. Jennifer was created by God to be my wife, for that I will be eternally grateful.
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