September 24th, 2013

This blog post is overdue!  I have so many things in head that have happened recently.  Here’s kind of a basic overview of how things are going right now.  You can skip to headings below to read more about individual topics.  :)  Things are going well.  I’m really busy, but I’m happy.  I like teaching, but it is pretty difficult.  I’m finding myself constantly redesigning lessons right in the middle of classes as I see that what is and what’s not working.  I think that my Spanish has gotten a little better just out of necessity in the classroom… stop! sit down! hands to yourself!  I love my students, but most of them are angsty preteens that are just on the verge of being too cool to learn English.  Definitely still trying to win some of them over.

Vacation!

I just got back two days ago from my first vacation.  It was wonderful.  The other volunteers and I took a couple buses to get to Tela, a coastal town.  It was wonderful to eat in restaurants and cafes and sit on the beach.  The water was really clear, and there very few people there.   We only had one full day there, but it was worth it… cold drinks, good company, a beautiful Mass, and pizza.  I really missed the kids, and I’m feeling refreshed and ready to get back to work.

Dia del Nino (Kid’s Day)

A couple weeks ago we celebrated Dia Del Nino. The festivities began with a fiesta during the weekend.  Everyone dressed up and got “guapo” for the event.  The fiesta was in our cafeteria and was pretty legitimate complete with a disco ball, Honduran pop music, classic rock (Rock Around the Clock), and Gangnam Style.  Needless to say, we were all sweating profusely the entire time.  The night ended with a present for each kid, which was a new shirt, unless you were lucky enough to be a preschooler and get a giant stuffed animal.  Later that week, we celebrated again at the school with a carnival of sorts.  Everyone got the day off of school, and all of the teachers planned and ran games.  After games, there were pinatas and cake.  

Since the older boys/teenagers weren’t too thrilled about the carnival/pinatas, they got their own treat for Dia Del Nino.  The principal of the school invited all of them to hang out at his house that night to watch the Honduras Panama soccer game.  I got to go too, and it was a pretty cool experience.  Side note here, the principal of the school, Osman, is amazing.  He’s 23 (younger than me!), and he owns a modest house in the neighboring village where he lives with his wife and baby girl.  He works so hard, really cares about all of the kids, and is leading a team of teachers that don’t all speak the same language.  Anyhow, back to the story, Osman dragged out his plasma screen tv onto his little front stoop, and fashioned some homemade benches from cinder blocks and random scraps of wood.   About thirty of us crowded around the tv for two hours, and I loved watching the emotion of the game.  When Honduras scored, there were back slaps and cheers that lasted for several minutes.  The sad part was that the game ended in a tie after Honduras had been leading.  The teenagers still had a good time though.

The teachers/volunteers put in a lot of work before the festivities

Doesn't he look fancy for the fiesta?

Fiesta!

The little one in the middle is our youngest kid here

These two goofballs are my students

Pinata with circle of safety

Day-to-Day Life

During the week, the kids get up at 5:00 to get dressed and do chores before breakfast, but I get up around 6:00 to get ready for school, which begins at 7:15.  Sometimes I go to breakfast in the comedor, but more often than not I hide in the house to enjoy cornflakes.  Typical Honduran breakfasts consist of beans, tortillas, cheese, and maybe eggs.  My digestive system is just not ready for that before 7:00… or at least not yet.  During the school day, I teach four to five 45-minute classes.  We have a thirty-minute snack break in the morning, which is always some type of fresh fruit.  Lunch lasts about 30-40 minutes.  The food served in the comedor is usually pretty good and we have a nice variety: beans and tortillas of course, chicken fried rice, spaghetti, chop suey, balleadas, baked chicken, etc.  Every once in a while we’ll get a day where every meal seems to be based around beans, but those are rare.  No one needs to worry about me withering away here, I’m well-fed!  School ends at 2:15.  The kids head back to the hogar where they do more chores and their homework.  

Usually I do some planning or grading after school, and then head home for a little break before evening activities/dinner.  A large portion of that “break” is also spent doing laundry.  Laundry is a losing battle here.  It’s done one article of clothing at a time by hand in a basin type thing called a pila.  I kind of like using the pila.  It’s relaxing; it just takes so much time.  After the whole cleaning process, the clothes are hung to “dry.”  It’s the rainy season right now, and the climate is so humid that you’re lucky if your clothes dry before they get rained on or get that musty smell that’s just horrible and need to be washed again.  Anyhow, usually I head back out to the main hang-out areas in the hogar an hour or so before dinner, which is at 5:30.  After dinner, everybody just kind of hangs out in the main area of the hogar for about two hours.  We end the day with prayer circle, which is pretty beautiul.  We hold hands and people take turns saying intentions aloud.  We end with an Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be, and “Buenas Noches”  hugs for everyone.

There are some variables within the week.  Twice a week my community (the other volunteers and I) have community time with dinner, conversation, and prayer in English.  Once a week, I spend two hours with the teenagers during an afternoon homework session time.  On Thursdays, we have a holy hour with some type of religious activity/service after dinner.  So far, I’ve found time for about one run a week, which consists of me running laps around the soccer field after the kids are in bed.  Weekends are a little bit different, but I think that you’re a hero if you’ve made it this far in my musings so I’ll save your eyes and my thoughts for a different post.

Our Living Room/Kitchen

My Room shared with my friend/fellow volunteer Emily

One Final Story

Last week, the volunteers were in charge of the holy hour for the week.  We based our theme around forgiveness, and planned a mini-skit of the prodigal son.  We were going to watch the complimentary Veggie Tales episode, but of course the power and internet went out an hour before the holy hour started.  We brainstormed to come up with another activity.  We decided to do an activity to show a relationship between two people represented by a string.  During the activity, the string would be cut with scissors to show an offense/sin, and then it would be tied back together to show forgiveness.  To kill more time, we decided that we wanted all of the kids to do the activity at the same time… all 92 of them.  Yep.  It was raining cats and dogs outside, and the kids were wound up.  I was the one giving directions (in Spanish) on the microphone during the activity.  It was utter chaos.  Kids were refusing to do it or had no idea what they were doing, and nobody was listening.  Finally, I pointed at a pair of kids who were holding a string between them and seemed to be doing the right thing, and said, “This is a good example right here.”  I failed to notice that at least one and possibly both of the kids had the string in their mouths.  Next thing we knew, everyone around the room started putting the strings in their mouths or looking at me or the other volunteers with very puzzled expressions.  I tried to say “not in your mouth,” but I think it got lost in translation.  Somehow we muddled through the rest of the activity, and I think the message of the activity got across to maybe about half of those present.  During the quiet reflection time that followed the activity, I just kept laughing quietly, and the whole thing still makes me smile now.  Things may not be perfect or easy here, but they are pretty entertaining and interesting all of the time.

September 7, 2013/ 7-9-13

Well I am now an experienced bilingual teacher as I have an entire week under my belt.  The week of school definitely had its ups and downs, but overall it was good.  It’s a tricky balance of figuring out how much instruction to give in English and how much to give in broken Spanish.  Almost all of the kids know very little to no English.  The feedback I got after the first day was that nobody understood what was going on.  I know it’s just going to take time.  Luckily, the kids really want to learn, though they have some hurdles to overcome.  They have severe gaps in their educational backgrounds, and they don’t seem to be accustomed to high expectations.  My Honduran co-teacher is really helpful.  She is only 19 and is studying education at a university on the weekends.  Everyday she walks about a mile to school and then walks back after school with other teachers.  She lives in the nearby town where we all go to Mass on Sundays if it doesn’t rain too much on Saturday.  We have to walk or drive across a river to get to the town, and if the river is too big, we’re stuck so we have a prayer service on the grounds.

Last weekend, there was a soccer tournament in the nearest town.  It was pretty serious business.  There were even official Amigos de Jesus jerseys.  Both of our teams of the younger boys and the teenage boys were victorious so it was a good day.  After dinner last night, I played soccer with several of the little boys ranging from about 6 to 9-year-olds.  Yes, that is the level of my soccer skills.  Plus, these little guys are really good already!  Like I said, it's really serious here. First of all, I had to ask them if I could play.  They gracefully agreed, and then proceeded to yell a bunch of complicated rules at me in Spanish.  This wasn’t just an ordinary game of soccer.  It took me about 10 minutes to figure it all out, but I eventually got it.  They were so cute and mighty running up and down the field in their bare feet.  I see bright futures for them in their futbol endeavors here.

One of the awesome things I get to do this year is have a caseload of kids with whom I check in periodically.  I began that process today with an 11-year-old boy who is quiet and kind of hangs out on the fringes.  I taught him how to play Crazy 8s and Go Fish.  He learned quickly, and we played for a good hour.  It was really cool for me to spend some time one-on-one with a kid, and I think he really enjoyed the individual attention too.  With ninety-plus kids here, just about everything is shared.  Sometimes its hard for me to figure out how to share time, attention, and activities with everybody so I really enjoyed my time with him.

The other volunteers here are doing amazing things in different roles.  Click on this link to read an amazing story written by one of the other volunteers about one of our newest kids: http://www.amigosdejesusblog.blogspot.com/

August 27, 2013, 27-8-13

Hello friends.  I found out last week that my main job here is to be a teacher of “educatodos bilingue.”  This is a class of nine kids who have shown great potential to learn in the past, but haven’t been given many opportunities.  They all really want to learn English.  There’s not really a curriculum so wish me luck!  We begin on Thursday.  I have a Honduran co-teacher who knows a lot of useful information that I don’t, like how to laminate posters by hand.  We spent the majority of two days cleaning and setting up the classroom.  I had to relearn how to set-up a classroom with minimal supplies and without being able to run the nearest Walmart.  Tomorrow, we’ll be planning our lessons.

I’ve started to settle in a little more, and the kids are continually the best part of this place.  I love hanging out with them, though my conversational skills are still limited.   Weekends here are like summer camp.  This past weekend, we played ultimate frisbee, capture the flag, kickball, soccer, and card games.  On Sunday, we had a couples dance competition.  One of my favorite kids (a tiny little guy about 7-years-old) claimed me for his partner as soon as it was announced.  It was great.  In the evenings, we watched movies.  One night the sound for the movie (Astroboy) didn’t work.  There was something faulty with the dubbing I think. The kids sat on hard wooden benches in the cafeteria and watched it for an hour without sound.  It’s a different world here.

A couple nights ago we got to have the oldest “kids” over to the volunteer house for dinner.  They all grew up here, and they’re all really cool.  The oldest is twenty-five, and he’s in charge of the agricultural department now, and the youngest is twenty and is still studying in high school.  We asked them for advice for our year here at Amigos, and they told us to respect the kids and the kids will respect us.  After dinner, we played games, including the card game, Pig or Spoons.  It was a pretty fierce competition and entertained all of us for about an hour.

Sorry, there aren’t pictures yet!  They’re coming!

August 16, 2013, 16-8-13

Hola!  I’m here!  It’s difficult to write an update because I’m in such a different place now than I was a week ago, both physically and mentally.  Copan was a vacation, but Amigos is amazing.  In all honesty, the first few days were very overwhelming.  The language barrier is still so tough, and there has been a ton of adjustment in such a short amount of time, but every day it’s getting better.  Today, I worked in agriculture, which was awesome.  I got to try about ten fruits that I’d never heard of before and chew on sugar cane fresh from the field.  I weeded part of the garden, tried to use a * (hoe), got a tour of the entire grounds, and chatted with the workers during our snack break of pepsi and chips.  All of the workers in agro are former or current children of Amigos.  

Later I got to hang out with the little girls for a while and they were kind enough to braid my hair.  And then the bell rang to summon all of us to the front gate and... Amigos welcomed three new children today!  It brought tears to my eyes to watch the entire Amigos family welcome these children home.  One of the new little guys is just so excited that there are pants and shoes here.  

Even though I can’t speak too much with the kids, I am able to see their excitement, openess, and resilience.  Already, a few of them have stolen my heart.  The entire hogar is simply beautiful.  The kids live in dormitories divided by gender and age.  There is an entire Honduran staff that cares for the children along with a good number of gringo volunteers and workers.  The whole thing is a really smooth operation, though there are so many needs still.  

Currently, I’m in the midst of orientation, which lasts until next Friday.  Sometime next week I’ll have a semi-official job here at the hogar.  Thank you all for your thoughts, prayers, and emails.  I’m sorry that I haven’t been able to send individual emails or phone calls.  My internet access is kind of limited right now, but I’m hoping to have more access in the future.  

One final thought.  As I alluded to above, the first few days were pretty tough for me here.  Sharing a house with ten semi-strangers, not speaking the language, meeting over one hundred new people, seeing the intense needs of the hogar... it’s just a lot to process.  So of course I did what most people from stable families do, I called home and cried on the phone to my mom.  She listened and gave me exactly the words of encouragement I needed to hear.  The juxtapostion of it really hit me after I hung up though.  Here I am falling back on the support system that I’ve had for my entire life, and these kids don’t have that.   They arrive at Amigos de Jesus after surviving incredibly traumatic events usually with nothing more but the clothes on their backs.  They have to adjust to this strange place without a familiar face or voice anywhere.  What strength!  I’m not sure how to resolve or justify this juxtaposition in my own mind, except to realize that I am SO fortunate.  We live in a broken world, and life just isn’t fair.

August 5, 2013/ 5-8-13

This is my final week of Spanish classes in Copan, and I’m so excited to be heading back to Amigos de Jesus soon!  I leave Saturday, and there is supposed to be some sort of singing competition/festival with the kids and staff when we arrive back at the hogar (home).  It sounds like a great welcome.

Last weekend, I visited an inactive volcano in Guatemala.  The other volunteers and I went with an awesome Honduran family with lots of random relatives packed into an “autobus” or 13-passenger van.  The hike was tough, but the views made it worthwhile, and there was a beautiful lake in the crater of the volcano.

Ipala Lake Inside the Crater

The water was cold, but it felt great!

This weekend I went kayaking in the Rio de Copan.  Very beautiful and a whole different perspective of the culture.  Men and boys were fishing, and women and girls were washing clothing against the rocks of the river.  All of the people were wearing little clothing, and stared pretty incredulously at the gringas in the the mini plastic boats who were disturbing their laundry/fishing waters.

Later, we visited a pretty awesome bird park.  The second photo is more indicative of my feelings with those three aves on my person.

The bird on the left was so pretty

And as if that wasn’t enough for one weekend, I was invited along with a group of people to dinner at a finca (small farm) about a mile outside of town.  This finca is owned by a retired couple who formerly lived in Canada and decided they wanted a change of pace.  They have open air structures, including an outdoor kitchen, many lemon trees, two horses, four dogs, chickens, three Honduran workers, and all the time in the world.  It was fascinating to observe their life and imagine what it would be like to drink fresh-squeezed lemonade all of time and interact very little with the outside world.

Gigantic lemon from the finca

Next time you hear from me, I’ll be at the hogar of Amigos de Jesus- God Willing!

July 20, 2013/ 20-7-13

Another week of Spanish classes, another week in Copan.  I’m about at the halfway point of my classes now, and I’m starting to get a little antsy to return to Amigos de Jesus.  I definitely haven’t mastered Spanish, and life in Copan is nice, but it’s a bit sleepy at times.  I’m staying busy with studying and doing fun things on the weekends.  It’s also been great to get to know three of the other volunteers this week.  

The crew so far- Pat, Ali, Me, & Emily

Last Sunday afternoon, I went with two friends to agua caliente (natural hot springs).  Unfortunately, I couldn’t take my camera, but they were beautiful!  We soaked in small natural pools complete with miniature waterfalls in the middle of a rain forest.

Today, I went ziplining on a canopy tour with my new friend and co-volunteer, Emily, (another one!).  It was incredible.  We were really nervous, especially after we signed our lives away on waivers and then received about a whole two minutes of instructions in broken English.  Next thing we knew, the guides were attaching us to the first line and saying, “Lista?” (Ready?)  I definitely said “no” at one point, but we still went!  It was so much fun and a great adrendaline rush as we soared over valleys in between the mountains.  The pictures are good, but they don’t do the views justice.

Gearing up- couldn't get the picture to rotate.  :(

Ahhhh

Thanks for reading and for the continued thoughts, prayers, emails, messages, etc.  They mean so much to me.  I’ll update again with some new adventures soon.  Adios!

July 13, 2013 (13-7-13 in Spanish)

Hola!  I think I’ve made some progress with my Spanish, but it’s difficult to tell.  The complexity of the language is pretty amazing.  I just keep thinking how people say that Spanish is an easy language to learn!  I’m not seeing it yet.  A couple days ago I inadvertently told my host brother and mom that I was a hot babe.  I was trying to tell them that I was hot (as in my body temperature) from running.  They kind of looked at me funny when I said “Yo estoy caliente/I am hot.”  My teacher told me the next day that food or other things can be caliente,  but humans have calor... unless you’re referring to your level of attractiveness.  Noted.

Speaking of temperature though, the climate here is so different.  The temperature is not actually that high (somewhere between 70-80 degrees), but the humidity is almost 100%.  It’s intense.  It makes my hair poofy and my skin oily, and it takes forever for anything to dry.  I now pretty much know my way all around Copan.  I’ve scouted out the best internet cafes (including the only one with AC), and I’ve found some people who speak English other than me.  Life with my host family is good.  Their maid, Hilda, used to work in restaurants so she is a really good cook!  Most days for lunch, I have some type of meat with rice or other pasta, corn tortillas, vegetables, and fresh-squeezed juice.  I’m getting spoiled here not having to do any cooking or chores.  They don’t eat chocolate very much at all though.  :(

Last weekend, I got the explore the Mayan Ruins near Copan with my friend Julie.  It was pretty amazing to see the complexity of the structures of the ancient culture.  Archaeologists speculate that the Mayans used to play a game using an 8-lb. ball that was kind of like a combination of volleyball, basketball, and dodgeball.  They had to get the ball to hit the eyes of macaw statues on the perimeter of the court.  After the game, the captain of the winning team received gifts of jade, and the captain of the losing team was sacrificed to the gods.

Game Court without a gruesome game occurring

Dancing Jaguar at Ruinas

Bird's Eye View of Ruinas

Julie and Me

I’m looking forward to other volunteers coming to Copan to begin language school.  The first wave of them come this weekend.  Hasta luego!