Well I have been in training now for what seems like years. The language training is definitely needed but I am about done with the technical training. We have gone to a couple different schools to give charlas about stuff like tooth brushing and protecting the environment. The actual hands on experiences are worthwhile but I am definitely sick of sitting in class and learning about how to implement projects etc because it is all really abstract. My Spanish is coming along very slowly. Some days I get really discouraged and exhausted by it but other days I feel like I have improved a little. It is a pretty painful process but hopefully I will come out of all this quasi-fluent. My host family is still being really helpful, they definitely make an effort to try to talk to me and understand me. The other night my host mom was asking me about the healthcare system in the US and we were debating the pros and cons. It was definitely a chance to flex my Spanish muscles, although I hope she seeks an alternative explanation elsewhere because I am not exactly eloquent. I did talk about how mike and char are in med school, so guys if you read this, now there is a woman in Honduras deeply interested in your futures and up to date on your educational pursuits, don’t let her down.
My days are all pretty busy and start really early. For example last Sunday I woke up and did the following:
- Washed my clothes. This involves filling the washing machine up with water from the pila. It usually takes about 7 or 8 giant bucketfuls that I have to lug across the yard. Then, when it is time for the rinse cycle, you repeat this. The whole family likes to watch me and laugh when I spill on myself (see the laundry story later in this post).Then I hang them in the yard while abuela watches and tells me over and over how many people I have in my family (“there’s your mom, dad, brother, and YOU!”) She then spends the next several hours literally watching my clothes dry and poking at them. It is awkward to have an 80 year old woman manhandling your underwear.
- Ate breakfast, did dishes
- Organized, swept, and mopped my room. Made my bed.
- Washed a pair of shoes, dust here is killer, mud is even worse post rain
- Went to the market, admired the animal bits everywhere and checked out the dvd area (I have a growing collection of children’s movies in Spanish, there are usually about 4-6 movies per dvd and they cost roughly about $1.50)
- Got ice cream on the way home with my host sister (strawberry flavored because it was the morning, and fruit is healthy…)
- Took down my clothes, folded them and put them away (it is hot and dry most of the time so they dry really quickly). Abuela let me know which ones dried first, also gave me the family count update (still 4 of us).
- Sat down and watched a cartoon with my other host sister. Looked at the clock to see if it was an appropriate time to call a volunteer see if they would entertain me. It was 9:40. How in the world?! Must learn to space out chores.
- I dallied around a while longer ate lunch, then went to the internet café and got more ice cream with Christine and Joe (there are limited things to do here, I eat a lot of ice cream). Then we ate in the park while a giant group of teenagers stared at us. While they stared at us, we stared at a bolo (drunk). All in all a pretty wild Sunday.
Now more random stories:Food:- The food my host family serves me is generally pretty good. It is a little higher in fat content than I would like but whatever. We eat tortillas with everything. The other day for lunch I had potato salad, rice, and tortillas…aka starch for a week. Hondurans don’t typically put anything in their tortillas, they just roll the up and hold the tortilla in one hand and fork or spoon (usually spoon) in the other and push the food on the utensil with the tortilla. They always give me a giant stack of them with my food so I have to sneak some back in the tortilla basket (sidenote: as I was writing this I looked outside and abuelo was casually peeing on the fence outside. The bathroom is 7 feet away, oh abuelo). Several days a week my host aunt cooks lunch for me. These days are my everests because apparently all her kids are boys so she serves me as much as she serves her sons. So.much.food.
- Last weekend, my worst eating nightmare came true. I was served sopa de mondongo. For those of you that have never had the pleasure, this is cow intestine soup. Now, I have eaten a lot of things that I have not wanted to eat because I don’t want to be rude but I always said I would draw the line at mondongo. However, my host sister made the soup and I really like her and she seemed really proud as she dropped the m. bomb on me. So, naturally, being the conscientious pct that I am, I took a deep breath and took the plunge. The bowl was huge. I did my best to just eat the veggies and stuff and not the cow bits. My host mom asked me if I liked it and I gave an unenthusiastic “uhh yea..” Then my host sister strolls in with a tiny little bowl of soup. Seriously, it was like a teaspoon of soup and I had a freaking caldron. I looked at her and said “Why do I get this GIANT bowl and you have that little thing?!” She giggled and replied “Oh I don’t really like it.” Shitttt, then why in the world am I sitting in front of a giant bowl of cow guts? So I say “No fair! Look at this giant bowl, there is no way I can eat all of this I am going to get fat!” We all had a good laugh and I skillfully avoided eating the cow parts (got to maintain my girlish figure?) At dinner that same day, my host mom gives me a big smile and says “Here, this won’t make you fat.” It was three giant greasy hashbrowns, move over Jenny Craig, there’s a new diet in town. (bad news, I wrote the previous earlier this week and it is the weekend again, lunch today? The mon. adios mio)
- We had to go into Teguz yesterday to get our residency cards made (yes, I am now an official resident of Honduras, weird). The muni d and PAM volunteers were there too so it was good to see everyone. We got to go out to lunch. “Going out” consisted of going to a little strip of America on the side of the highway. Our dining choices included: Popeye’s (not the one burnt down in the protests obvi), Wendy’s, Burger King, Dominos, Pizza Hut, Dunkin Donuts, and McDonalds. It was weird. We all enjoyed the opportunity to gorge ourselves on American fat instead of Honduran fat. I ate a ridiculous amount. Then when I got home that night all I wanted was something healthy for dinner. What did we have? Ice cream and cookies. I miss food groups.
Cats: Our cat had kittens the first night I was here. Previously, I wasn’t very interested in them because they kind of looked like little rats but now they are cute. They have just started playing with each other and toddling about. The other night one of them broke out of its little box and I was watching it stumble around the kitchen. Its brother and sister soon followed suit. Now, I didn’t lay a hand on the kittens, they got out all by themselves. However, I am now accused of teaching the kittens to walk. They stumble around like little drunks every time they break out of their box and everyone shakes their head and sighs saying “sarah, why did you teach the kittens to walk?” Sorry. From now on I will stop secretly sneaking out of my room in the middle of the night and crawling on my hands in knees in front of impressionable kittens. They also really want me to take one with me. I am kind of afraid they are going to sneak one in my suitcase when I leave.
Me and the media: A couple weekends ago one of my friend’s parents threw him a birthday party. Naturally, all the YD trainees were invited, and of course a giant group of gringos naturally draws some attention. His host dad invited the guy that hosts a nightly show on the town’s tv channel. He videotaped the whole party, including us awkwardly sitting on the stairs listening to a Mariachi band. My favorite shots were the close-ups of the birthday boy’s face. This footage was then played, without any editing or sound (only a music background), multiple times on tv. Awkward.
The following week I was running down the street at about 5:50, going to meet up with the girls I run with at our usual corner. I made the mistake of taking the road that runs right past the radio broadcast station. Later that day one of our language teachers asks “What girl is running alone at 5 in the morning by herself? That is dangerous.” Uhhh… I ran by myself for 2 minutes at 5:50 so I suppose I am the culprit. Apparently the guy said something to the effect of “There is a gringa that always runs by herself down the street at 5 in the morning! Someone should tell her not to do that.” Well, thanks bud for informing the whole town the road I run down and that I am alone for at least part of it, and also for grossly over exaggerating . Needless to say I have changed my habits slightly (don’t worry parents, I assure you I am perfectly safe).
Me and a couple of the other trainees have been working with a group for kids with special needs. Last week we helped them organize and prepare for a fair they put on to raise money. I was in charge of selling rice krispies. Naturally, my friend from the local tv station showed up and wanted to talk to the Americana. Obviously, this was awkward. I have no Spanish skills. I basically ended up saying rice krispie treat a couple times. Luckily, when aired, he did it without sound and added his own music in the background. Even though you couldn’t hear me, I assure you I still managed to be incredibly awkward.
Laundry Story: So as explained, laundry is quite the process here. Either you have to do it by hand (something I have thus far avoided) or use the washing machine and lug buckets and buckets of water. I did it for the first time the other weekend and I had my host sister show me the ropes. This was my first mistake. In retrospect it was not wise to select the 9 year old as a teacher. I lugged the millions of buckets of water to the washing machine and started it up (my sister made sure to explain to me what soap is). Everything was going well, then I had to add the water for the rinse cycle. At this point an old lady had come over to wash some of my host mom’s clothes by hand (she pays her, something I assure you I will be looking into). She was standing by the pila, at the easiest place to get water so I had to walk around the the other side. At this point the pila was getting low so I had to practically dive in the pila to get water out. My bucket was super heavy and it was really awkward lifting it out from my angle so I ended up spilling water all over myself every time I got a bucketful. The old lady just stared at me and made no offer to move aside so I could get to the water more easily. The rest of my family found it hysterical to watch me soak myself. I finally fill up the washer again and it proceeds to rinse. The washing machine stops and I went to get my clothes out. Then my host sister says “You have to add another round of water.” This seems strange to me, since they have already been rinsed but I take her word for it and dutifully begin the painful process of filling up the stupid machine again. During one trip to the pila I stepped on an ant hole. Ants bite. A lot. Their bites feel like a bee sting mosquito bite combo. I had 28 bites on my right foot. Terrible. Then, to make things better, my host mom comes outside and looks at me and says “why are you filling it up again? Only twice!” Oh, thanks for the tip sis. She then proceeded to laugh at me for the next 10 minutes. Now, at this point I thought I had pretty much reached my low. I had soaked myself to the bone and did way more work than was necessary. I was wrong. I hung up that load of clothes and started a load of sheets and stuff. Then the old washer lady walks over to the washing machine, looks inside, and starts yelling at me. I have no idea what she was talking about but I did manage to catch her calling me a thief over and over again. I just smiled awkwardly and slowly backed away. I retreated into my room. However, when I have my door open it is a straight shot to the pila. She stood there scrubbing clothes and glaring at me for the next 2 hours. She scares me.
Midnight Mystery story: The other night I was sleeping and I woke up because I heard plastic bags rustling around. I thought it was in my room because I have a plastic bag hanging up that has my reserve snacks (crackers and chocolate) and a plastic bag with trash in it. I thought maybe it was the wind or something moving them but then I didn’t see them moved so I figured it was something outside and went back to sleep. The next night I awoke to the same noise. I whipped out my handy headlamp and shined it on my trash bag. It was moving. There was no wind. Animal! At this point my mind was a bit frantic. I couldn’t stop picturing the giant rat feasting on my cracker crumbs. I debated my options: 1. Try to ignore the ominous rustling sound and go back to sleep and remove the (hopefully) critter free trash bag asap in the morning. 2. Approach the bag, grab it, throw it outside. I opted for option 2.
To prepare for my mission, I strapped on my headlamp and surveyed the obstacles between my room and the trash pile on the far side of the yard. I would have to leap over the dog that sleeps on the step but other than that my path was clear. I made sure the door to the outside was unlocked and wide open and I mentally prepared myself for what was ahead. I took a deep breath and crept towards the bag. I freed one side of the bag and jumped back onto my bed (in case the animal decided to attack). I waited for a minute, then went for it. I grabbed the bag and, holding it as far away from me as possible, sprinted for the trash. I leapt over Boxie and threw the bag on top of the trash pile. Then I saw it, the outline of a mouse skittering about the bottom of the bad. Sick. The cat, who sleeps in the kitchen with her kittens, came to investigate the ruckus. I like to think she got a little snack. I shut the door and went to my room, proud and relieved. I settled back into bed and then, I heard the kittens meowing at the top of their lungs. They had gotten out of their box to look for their mom, who was outside. Shit, I had to get the cat back inside. Midnight operation number 2. I managed to get the cat back inside but at that point the three kittens were scattered all over the house so I had to search for them too. It was not fun, nor easy but finally I extracted the last one from underneath the kitchen table and returned to my bed.
I don’t keep trash in my room anymore.
The Church The other day I woke up and I was feeling a little sick. I went and worked out anyway but was still feeling sick when I got back and only ate a little bit of my breakfast (I also didn’t drink my coffee which is a sure sign of bad things to come). We had to give a charla about environmental education in an aldea about 20 minutes away so we all piled in the cars. The way there I was definitely not enjoying the rough roads and cramped car. I made it through and gave my charla but by the end of it was I was definitely not feeling well. We piled back in the car and I tried to pull myself together. About 15 minutes into the drive I really thought I was going to throw up. I even went so far as to pull out a plastic bag (everyone sitting around me was slightly perturbed). I somehow managed to make it back to the training center with no incident. I went home, refused lunch, and passed out for an hour. Then I had to go help set up for family day at a Catholic church in town. Family day (or cultural day) is a day when all the volunteers and their families get together for a potluck celebration. By the time I got to the church (it was about a 20 minute walk in 90 degree weather) I was really not feeling well. I did my best and when my family arrived I went and sat with them. A few minutes after they got there I felt it. I was definitely going to throw up. I walked out of the room as fast as I could, past a few concerned volunteers who knew I was not feeling well. I managed to make it to the sidewalk in front of the church and then, threw up. I kept moving and managed to make it around the corner before it got really bad. It was pretty much that scene from exorcist but my head wasn’t spinning and I was actually throwing up on a church. I finished, and then turned around to go back in the church and excuse myself. But, naturally, my ordeal did not stop there. As I turned around the woman in charge of the project I am working with yelled from across the street “Sarah! Are you sick?” Uh, slightly. She trudges across the street with a friend in tow. At this point my eyes were bleary, my nose was running and I was probably splattered with the contents of my stomach. She looks at me and says, “You look sick” and then proceeds to give me a hug and kiss hello. Then she introduces me to her friend who would be helping us with our project. I think it is safe to say I have never met anyone I would be working with on a professional level looking so terrible. Not a highlight of my life.
I managed to find my program manager and get him to drive me home. My family came home later after a lovely evening and my host mom started to ask me for all my symptoms. I told her that I was just really nauseous and tired but other than that nothing else. She gave me a once over and said “There’s only one illness in Honduras with those symptoms” then she stroked her stomach. She was implying I was pregnant. I assure you all, that unless Jesus is getting a baby brother or sister, this is a false diagnosis.
I can't think of anymore stories right now but i miss you all!
oh, and congrats kschmitz on the new job!!!
