We have PHOTOS!

I´ve added a link to the webpage with our photo albums. There aren´t too many pictures in there yet because it takes about 15 minutes to add one photo, but I´ll be adding more in the future.
As far as us, things are well. We have a lime tree and and I made a lot of fresh limeade today, it was quite wonderful but I drank a little too much. Saturday is always a cleaning day. This morning, Emily went on a trip with some girls and I cleaned the house and washed clothes for a couple hours! For those worried about the spiders...be afraid, be very afraid...we kill about 5 spiders everyday.

Dog Days of Summer

Congratulations to last week’s trivia winner: Erica Dahl. She will be receiving a complimentary toothbrush and floss.

The highlight of last week was a party on Saturday night that our host mothers put on for us. There was food, games, and dancing. I volunteered to play musical chairs. I lost. When I lost I was told that I had to do something- sing, dance, whatever. So I grabbed the mic like Barry White and seranaded Emily with a beautiful Spanish love song. I figured if I had to be embarrassed she might as well join me!

We´ve been here 15 days but it feels like an eternity. Already people are craving items from the states- chocolate, cheese nips, candy- it´s kind of like being in detox. Spanish classes are moving along. I had to give two 10-15 minute presentations in Spanish, wish I had them on tape, they’d be real entertaining someday when I can actually speak.

I’ve done a lot of athletic things and I’ve been in pretty good shape but I’ve never walked this much in my life. And it really is uphill both ways. Our walk to school through the woods is so steep that we can’t come home that way- we slide down the hill and can’t get footing. I go to the “campo” to play soccer a few times a week. Usually it is a mix of a few volunteers and more locals. I’m used to being really good at sports, so soccer is a bit difficult; I mean yeah, I’m still fast and I can kick it a bit, but I’m no Ronaldihno. Soccer is really fun though, except that the field is a mile or so below the town, so the walk home after the game is really hard.

This last weekend four other volunteers and I went to La Tigra National Park, which is about an hour away. The adventure was mostly just getting there, because we had no knowledge of the bus schedule. The park is a really pretty cloud forest with waterfalls and great views. It was nice to get out of our little town for the day.

Next week we will go in small groups to the markets in the capital to practice our Spanish and buy local fruits and vegetables. A few groups went today, and they returned with Dunkin Donuts and stories of triple decker Baskin Robin’s ice cream cones. They were quickly beaten up by their tortilla eating comrades.

A few of the guys and I have taken to going to the pool hall sometimes after school. It is a nice getaway and girls aren’t allowed (women in pool halls are generally considered prostitutes) so we get to go there and gossip.

In a couple weeks we’ll be splitting up into our respective groups (Youth Development, Municipal Development, and Protected Areas Management) and heading to different cities for Field Based Training. We’ve had many experts come to speak with us about the problems concerning youth in Honduras and I think we have a better grasp of what we’ll be doing. Basically, during the first few months, we’ll be trying to integrate into the community, observe the local culture/customs, and try to do a needs assessment with the local youth. We will be assigned local leaders to work with and we’ll try to implement projects that will benefit the community. The other groups will immediately be able to see tangible results: new water systems, trees planted, etc. That is our challenge, working with youth you don’t immediately (if ever) see the fruits of your labor. More on that boring work stuff some other day.

Our training class has had four people leave now. They left for various reasons, but this whole experience entails a lot of change and generally people don’t like change. There are the obvious things like a different country, different language, different food, having parents again (be home by 9pm!), missing family, and a new job. There are also smaller things like not being able to just “get” the food you want (small town stores don’t have much and no fast food), having to wait days to finish your laundry- clothes won’t dry because it’s been raining for a week, jogging with rocks in your hand so you have something to throw at the dogs, and tons of little cultural things- especially gender stereotypes for women. Really, everyone knew this when they signed up but it can be difficult to deal with nonetheless.

As far as female stereotypes, the Honduran guys weren’t too happy when they saw girls coming to play with us, but when we started to play and they saw the girls could more than hold their own and never hesitated to pass them the ball. It was funny to hear them when one of the girls blasted a perfect cross. That’s us, knockin’ down barriers one at a time!

I almost forgot this week´s trivia, whatever would you do? What are the main exports of Honduras (besides illegal immigrants)?

Santa Lucia and Training

Hello Everyone! We miss you all!

Congratulations to last week’s trivia winner- Jason Iwasaki! Jason has won a 7 day, 6 night stay here in Honduras with us. Airfare not included! Jason, I’ll send the I.O.U. through email. A shout out to Bernie who was just a few minutes behind Jason. Also, I fixed the comment rules, so now you shouldn’t have to sign up for anything to leave a comment- let me know if there are problems.

Well, Emily and I are here in Santa Lucia and things are going well. Our host family is great, we actually have a little apartment type building above their house. There is a mother, father, 16 year old daughter, and 6 year old boy. But the neighbor is family too and everyone hangs out together. We hang out with the kids as much as possible, they are very helpful in practicing Spanish and we are less afraid of sounding like idiots in front of them. Our father is a construction worker and our mother makes and sells tortillas at the pulperia (small store) next door that her sister owns. She makes about 3,000 tortillas a day! We are also very close to the training center; our walk is about 5 minutes compared to others who have a 25 minute walk. We live on a hill, and we just head through the forest and then catch a trail to the training center. There are a lot of spiders here, and really I’m torn- apparently they eat the mosquitoes, but I really hate spiders. Our family doesn’t have a refrigerator and they use an outdoor wood stove for cooking but the food has been great so far.

The town itself is pretty. It has a lot of hills. So forget those buns of steel videos and just come walk around here for a few days. Like all Central American towns, in the center of town is a park. There are stairs near the park where you can hike up and see the entire town and many miles down into the valley. It is a beautiful view! There is also a green lagoon and basketball court near the town center. I’m still exploring so I’ll update you in due time. Also, I’ll try to get some pictures on here (or to a linked site) so you have a better idea as to our living situation and the town.

We have class everyday from 7:30-4:30 and half days on Saturday. So far we’ve had a lot of introductory type lectures and team building activities. The trainers here are excellent and really know what they’re doing. We had our language interviews today to see what classes we’d be placed in next week. For the interview, you basically just sit down and talk with a teacher in Spanish for about 20 minutes. There are three level at each stage and there are three stages: Novice, Intermediate, and Advanced. There are a few people past advanced, they get to do something else. They make everyone else sick!

Today was the first time we’ve had any free time so we all had planned to meet up for a game of soccer. It was pouring down rain though so I didn’t think anyone would be there. I made the 20 minute walk on my own and low and behold there were 15-20 volunteers there. We all got completely drenched and had a very ugly game of soccer. The field overlooks miles of mountains and valleys and is quite nice.

Our group of trainees has become quite close and we’ve only been together a week. I really can’t stress how impressive these people are. Everyone is very competent, and has the ability to either lead or follow depending on the situation. I’m glad we have 10 more weeks together, but it will be sad when we all split up to go to our sites. We laugh a lot too, they told us that 10 people from the group that just finished their service got married- either to other volunteers or to Honduran nationals. So Emily and I have a game where we try to decide who is going to end up in a relationship together. The guys have pretty good odds here- there are 9 single guys and 29 single girls (10 of us already married). So guys, forget your dating scene, join the Peace Corps and your odds skyrocket. They try to keep us out of trouble by telling us the laws and customs around here. Having a date typically means having a chaperone and meeting the parents, and dating “around” isn’t done. Here’s one for ya, if you get someone under 18 (legal age here) pregnant, you either go jail or marry them- hmmm?

It sounds like most current volunteers here have cell phones and that they are quite affordable. Hopefully, Emily and I will be getting one in the future, we aren’t allowed to travel to the capital during training, so it may be awhile. That means that anyone from the states could call us directly (with a phone card I believe) and obviously that we could call you as well.

So that was really long- congrats to all of you who made it the entire way- real troopers!

This week’s trivia question will test your Google ability:

-Do Malaria and Dengue Fever come from the same mosquitoes, and when do those mosquitoes bite? Buena suerta a todos (good luck to all)!

Official Trainees!

It's finally happening. We are official PC trainees. We are in Washington D.C. for more "staging" tomorrow and then leave for Honduras on Wednesday. Today we were scheduled to go to a luncheon with Laura Bush. This is not a normal PC thing but the "Conference of the Americas" is going on right now and they wanted some PC people for a photo op. She was giving a speech in the neighboring room, we stood around for about an hour, then she came in and talked with us for a few minutes- asking where we were from and thanking us for our service. After the pics the Secret Service whisked her away. We are supposed to get copies of the pic and I'll try to post it.

It's great to finally meet the other trainees. There are 48 of us in all, with a strong NW representation. There are people from Wenatchee, South Bend (southwest WA), Eugene, Boise. and SW Oregon. Most people are young (the average PC age is 27), but we have one 60+ guy and a middle aged woman. It is a pretty impressive group as far as degrees and job experience in volunteering and leadership activities. Unlike many of you seem to think, there aren't any hippies, in fact the closest thing to some hippies is a weird couple from Bellingham :)

We got to meet a few PC big wigs- Communications Director, some other important Directors, and the Latin America Director. Emily and I were able to talk with the Latin American Director at length while waiting for Laura Bush, she was a wonderful lady with lots to say.

I must say it's really nice to be here and see other people that are going to be doing the same thing as us. It makes us feel halfway sane. We discussed our anxieties and fears and everyone was nervous about missing family, and hoping that people would come visit...hint hint. We also talked about weird stuff we brought, one girl said she brought a crib board but wasn't sure how to play. I said I brought a crib board too and I'll teach you how to play! Another girl had a friend that was "arty," he made her a doll of himself, complete with his real hair and recorded messages inside the doll from him. How come we didn't get any of those?

One more day left in the U.S....hmmm....what should we do? I know! We'll spend it sitting in a hotel conference room listening to lectures about health and safety! We wish we had some time to get out and see D.C. a little bit. All we've done is drive by the monuments and walk around our expensive area, Dupont Circle. It seems like a nice city with lots to do...it'll have to wait.

We hope all is well with everyone and we miss you already. We welcome all comments- funny, serious, mean, sarcastic, let your personality shine through! I'll try to keep this relatively up to date and I'll also be posting a trivia question with each blog (post a comment with the answer- first one wins), so check back with regularity and you could be rewarded.

Today's question...

How many Peace Corps volunteers are currently serving in Honduras? This is the first one so I'll give you a hint- use one of the links to find the answer.