A busy Sunday

I think I have made my first real Honduran friend.  Lettie is 18 and works (helps to cook and clean) at my host-mom's parents' house.  I spend a good amount of time over there and after she found out I like to run, she asked if I wanted to go walk with her last Sunday.  She walks every day but it is always during my work hours, and she  has classes in late afternoon so Sunday is really our only over-lapping free time.  We walked for a few hours, all up and down the mountain roads and through parts of "town" that I didn't even know were parts of town.  She is very sweet and motivated, and asked if I wanted to walk with her every Sunday.  So yesterday afternoon, we walked about an hour to the hot springs which are over on a different mountain.  We passed a few houses with children playing outside and they joined us.  The springs are on the side of a mountain, which is actually an ancient volcano.  It was really cool seeing such clear water flow down with steam rising up, and there were a few cement baths that someone built to catch the water in.  We walked through the woods along the river to the source of the water, and in the clear pools of water we could see it bubbling up from the ground.  It was a fun adventure, and the views along the walk were gorgeous.

On the walk

Me and Lettie

A bath from the hot springs

The hot water with steam rising up, very cool

We were both standing on a tiny rock and had to jump back over to solid land because everything that appears yellow is hot sponge.

A chunk of natural sponge.

The closer we got to the source, the hotter the water was.

The water bubbling up from the ground.

It was hard to catch the bubbles on camera, but you can see the ripples from the bubbles...

A view of my town from above 

The blue house right in the center is my house!

A beautiful path through the woods.

Later that night after dinner, my family told me we were going to the circus.  Apparently every year a different circus company comes to town.  It was very small, but they had a circus tent set up with a couple pieces of equipment and some animals.  There were only 4 people who did all the acts.  One young man was kind of the gymnast; he juggled fire and swung around on a trapeze.  The three men did a lot of acts dressed as clowns and basically talking/cracking jokes.  The one lady did a couple of dances that were pretty impressive since she recently had a baby, which I know because all Honduran mothers breast-feed their babies anytime, in front of anyone, in any place.  The skits were pretty funny, but it might be the smallest circus in the world.  It was still a new, fun experience!

Mundo Magico= Magical World

Me, Xiomara, and Lettie

Right before Omar took the picture, I peeked inside and saw the old, rusty condition of the equipment, and this is my expression of uncertainty.

Sitting on the bleachers, which are slabs of wood placed on other slabs of wood.

These are the circus animals.  Two ducks, and there was a parrot in a cage as well.

Making Fogones

Three fellow volunteers who live near my site, Stacie, Caitlin, and Jacqui, have been working with a group of youth at a colegio (high school) in Stacie's site, El Nispero.  The invited me to come participate in/observe the project on Friday because they were going to make a fogon at the colegio so the youth could learn step by step, and then each group of students had to make a fogon as well.  A fogon is like a wood stove; feed the mouth of the fogon with wood and it heats the plancha on top, which is the flat metal cooking surface.

I took the 6am bus to El Nispero because we were planning to begin at 7:30am.  When I arrived I found out the director of the school wouldn't let the students miss all of their classes so we couldn't begin until 11:30am.  We went early to the school anyway because we had to get our materials ready and start making the clay to build the fogon.  Basically, the students all had to go home to change into older clothes and some even had to bring their materials for their own fogones to the school still, so we did not even get started with our demonstration until 1:30.  At that point the girls had decided there would not be enough time that afternoon to make our fogon and for the students to make their fogones, meaning they would not be ready to go make fogones the next morning in people's homes.  So we took our time teaching the process on Friday afternoon and told the students they had to come back on Saturday morning to make their own fogones, and then on Sunday they would go to the aldea (tiny, poor town in the mountains) to make the fogones for the families who needed them.  This schedule turned out to be better and not as rushed because the students participated as we taught them on Friday, and then they had all morning on Saturday to work in their groups making a fogon, with our guidance.

I was planning to leave on Saturday at noon after spending some time with the students while they made their fogones.  However, I was misinformed about the bus times and after waiting 2 hours for a bus that never came, was told it had left 30 minutes before I got there and there would be no more buses that day.  So I was stuck for another night, which wasn't all bad since I got to spend more time with fellow Americans.  Then the next morning when the other girls were meeting the students at 5:30am to walk the hour up the mountain to the aldea to make fogones for families, I went outside to wait for the 5:30am bus.  But there was no bus at 5:30am, and there was no bus at 6:30am like I was told.  The bus didn't come until 7am and I was told that the other bus drivers just didn't feel like doing the early route since it was Sunday.  Unfortunately, this is how all of Honduras operates and I will have to get used to it.

Making clay to build the fogon.

Making clay: mud, water, ash (to avoid cracking)

Building the fogon, using clay and bricks

Using a machete to cut the bottom out of a tin can

It is coming along...

Me and Jacqui

Pouring ash into the empty space to act as an insulator

Securing the plancha

Adding the chimney

Our fogon, freshly made.

A stick bug!

Using our new fogon the next morning to make coffee for the students.

Machetes are not the safest tools...

But they get the job done.

Keeping watch over the fire.

Making corn tortillas on the fogon!

The students fogones.

Falling in love with Honduras

Since I forgot my camera at home, let me paint a mental picture.
It is a warm, sunny Sunday afternoon in the mountains of Honduras, and I am walking through a field of waist high grass in an over-sized shirt and old jeans tucked into giant rubber knee-high boots.  I meet the lady who lives next to my host-dad's property and cares for his cows.  She has a 60 pound pig running through her house and across her yard, chasing her dog and roosters.  We spend a while chatting, in Spanish of course, while my host dad fixes the syringes of medicine to give to the sick cow.  We head towards the field, tromping straight through mud puddles and piles of cow and horse manure, and climbing over and under barbed wire fences.  Of course the sick cow is all the way across the field hiding behind a clump of trees, meaning we have to walk past all the other gigantic cows and horses to reach her.  Well.  Did you know that cows like affection just as much as the normal house hold pet?  I'm standing still for just a moment, taking in the view of the clouds and the corn fields on the mountain side when a massive cow (the top of her head is taller than mine) ambles up to me and nudges me the shoulder, almost knocking me over, and looking to be pet.  For the first time in my life, I lovingly stroke a cow's neck as if she is a horse, and scratch her ears as if she is a dog.  I walk away to catch up with my host-dad, but this cow follows me all around the field.  After giving medicine to a skinny, sickly cow that will hopefully save her life, we trudge back across the fields as it begins to rain.  Who would think that sloshing through mud in the cold rain in a field of cows in the mountains of Honduras would rank as my number one afternoon of the past four months?  It did.

I hope that even without photos, you were able to imagine what that afternoon was like for me.  An incredible experience.  Definitely a first; I've been having a lot of firsts in Honduras.  The Saturday night before that adventure I went to my first Honduran dance with my host family in the central hall in our town.  The famous band of Santa Barbara came to play and I danced merengue and punta with my family all night long!  I also played in my first soccer game in years, with my town's women's soccer team.  We play five-on-five and the goalies are guys, and the games take place at a little indoor court with a lighting system and all!  It is pretty fancy for Honduras, and there is a big snack shed with tables where people can come and watch the games.  Our game lasted for almost 2 hours and I scored 3 goals, which I was very proud of since I haven't played soccer since I was about 10 years old.  It was really fun and I hope to keep playing with those girls because it is good integration into the community as well as exercise.  I also run every day, which is a lot more difficult here in the mountains than it is on the flat roads of Charleston.  But usually after I run, I walk up the mountain road and back as my cool down, and lately the neighborhood children have started to follow me.  I walk all the way up to the top of the mountain where the road ends and every day more and more kids walk with me. It is really cute because all of the mothers and grandmothers lean out of the windows to wave as I pass by, and the children ask me to translate words into English for them.  I am definitely lucky to live where I live because my town is beautiful, my family is wonderful, and my neighbors are friendly.  I couldn't be happier!

My host-brothers and mom attempting to dance with me.

I'm trying to understand the dance by staring at their feet.

My host-parents dancing :)

The street still flowing with water days after a heavy rain.

My house is the blue two-story.

Up the road from my house.

Walking up the mountain with the chickens and horses.  

Some of the children walking with me!

The views are incredible in my town.

The center park.

The giant trees in Center Park that they want to cut down :(

The back of my house shaded by a banana tree.

Home.