Saturday, May 19, 2012

Morning has broken like the first morning…


I know that a while ago I posted about how much I love nights here, but I think that I have found something better.  For those of you who don’t know, I wake up insanely early here (5:15 – which to me is insanely early) and although the first half-hour to hour typically don’t go so well, I’m outside supervising the girl’s morning chores by 6:20, and let me say that I absolutely LOVE the mornings here.  It is really cool to watch the sun rise over the building – or actually I prefer to watch the shadows on the western side of the building (the sun rises in the East, right?) move and the whole side light up with sun.  It really is a great way to start the day, because although it isn’t watching the sun rise, it kinda is… Additionally, it is chillier in the mornings (not chilly enough anymore to warrant a sweater, especially if you eventually end up in the sun) but not as hot as it is at noon.  About a month ago (and still, occasionally) it reminds me of camping in WI during the summer, where is still slightly brisk in the mornings when you wake up.  Lately, it’s been raining so in the mornings there is a beautiful fog that half covers the trees in the mountain that you can see over the walls of the school.  It’s so peaceful and beautiful.  I don’t know if this makes any sense, but mornings really make me feel blessed to be here.  That’s all… loves to everyone at home. 

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

I'll be your honey bee


I have been here more than a week without Thalia, and while I’m getting along fine in the Spanish language department without my walking talking Spanish-English dictionary, our room is very lonely without her… and the girls are definitely missing her.  However, this past week I have felt insanely blessed as the girls are showering twice as much love on me because I’m now the only volunteer.  Also, with Thalia not being here… I have more to do, so I’ve been kept busy, whether it is preparing for my English class (a new module just started), teaching the extra review session in the afternoons, taking all of the girls shopping instead of just half, facilitating study every night, or doing whatever the sisters ask me to do (making woven foam heart pockets for mother’s day or being a sub for gym class – yes, I was a gym teacher today). 

Yesi's house
This past weekend I went to Yesi Karina’s house, and let me just say that her family is absolutely AMAZING!  Her parents are so incredibly kind, and she has an older sister who is 21 years old.  Additionally, although all of the other girls’ families have a farm in which they grow coffee, they all live in a small town and they have to travel somewhere around 20 minutes to get to their farm.  Yesi, on the other hand, lives in the middle of her family’s land and it was incredibly beautiful.  They live in the mountains.  You can look out from her front porch at her family’s and other family’s coffee farms with interspersed banana trees among the mountains… it is exceptionally beautiful in the mornings when the mountains are still slightly shrouded in fog.  I took a couple of pictures, but they don’t nearly do it justice.  It was so peaceful there!  In addition to farming coffee, Yesi’s dad has a couple of bee colonies from which they collect honey when it isn’t coffee season (which I was informed was in November – which means that I probably won’t be able to bring any home which is a real bummer because the coffee that I get at the girl’s houses is actually good.  I don’t typically drink coffee and this stuff is great black with only some sugar).  They even game me some of their honey in a gatorade bottle because they didn’t have an jars on hand… it is really good.

On Saturday, I traveled with Yesi, her boyfriend, her mom, her sister, and her sister’s boyfriend to San Pedro de Cópan, and a couple of other small towns close to where she lives to run some errands.  There really isn’t a whole lot to report on the day, but it was fun nonetheless. 

Yesi, her boyfriend, her sister's boyfriend
and Mary Lou
Sunday we briefly celebrated Mother’s Day at Yesi’s grandma’s house, which is absolutely beautiful.  Of course we were fed – as always happens when people go to other’s houses.  You are literally not allowed to go to someone’s house without eating food.  I told Yesi’s aunt that I wasn’t hungry (for breakfast Yesi’s mom basically gave me three meals) as did a couple of the other members of our group, so she goes “so then 4 meals, 5 and 6” – there were six of us and, of course, out she comes with 6 plates of food.  But it was cool seeing her family get together in a way that was similar to family gatherings at home.  It seemed to be more planned with family as opposed to people just showing up at someone’s house like what usually occurs. 

We traveled back to Santa Rosa later on Sunday… every time I travel I seem to experience a new method.  This time I was in the bed of the truck again (this time without cushions like when I traveled with the sisters) with 5 other people – which means we were able to sit down – but it also means that I now have quite a lovely bruise in the middle of my back along my spine.  Oh well, such is life.  And as I told my dad last night… of course the beds of trucks here are fully equipped with seat belts, full body armor, and helmets. 

On a slightly different note…  it is said that people from the Midwest are exceptionally nice and friendly…  I just want to put it out there that Hondurans have us beat about 100 times over.  It is crazy traveling with them because no matter where you go, they always run into someone that they know… even if you have traveled and hour away from their house.  You would not believe how many times we were stopped by someone who Yesi went to school with at some point, or someone who knew someone that she was related to.  When you drive past a house, if anyone is outside, the driver honks the horn to say “hi,” and someone else always comments on who that person is related to and what they are up to now… it is really cool how everyone knows everyone.  But I’m sure that there are no secrets here… everyone knows everyone’s business.  It has a small-town feel, but that small town seems to cover all of Honduras. 


Loves to everyone at home! 

Sunday, May 6, 2012

What is that one song that Donkey sings about being alone?





So much has happened since I have last updated this blog… I guess I’ll start at the beginning. 

Last weekend I went to Isabelle’s house for the weekend.  We (Isabelle, Osiris, me, and Isabelle’s brother) left from the school around 1:30 with Suami’s dad’s truck (Suami is another student at the school).  Suami’s dad dropped us off in Limpera.  We then waited for some family friends of Isabelle to pick us up for the 45 minute ride from town to her house.  Along came two family friends… on motorbikes.  So, I hopped on the back of the bike of some guy I didn’t even know and rode with him on a gravel, Honduran road for 45 minutes.  A couple of things about this experience: 1. I would like to thank Perry for being the first person who I rode on a motorcycle with, because of that I wasn’t completely scared out of my mind to be riding a bike again.  2.  Riding motorcycles here is a little different as the bikes are smaller and there is a place to hold onto on the back of the bike, but it definitely is an arm and ab work out to keep balanced and not fall off the bike as you are going up and down hills that are extremely bumpy – I thought I was going to be super sore the next day, but thankfully I wasn’t.  3.  It is a completely different experience to be riding through this beautiful country in the open as opposed to inside a vehicle… the trip was absolutely gorgeous – both the wind and the view.  The only part that was unfortunate was the fact that there was dust EVERYWHERE!  I was so dirty when I eventually got to Isabelle’s house… and therefore dirty the rest of the weekend.

Isabelle’s family was absolutely beautiful!  She has four (I think) siblings.  I say I think because there were always other people in her house.  Additionally, her mother feeds at least three kids who aren’t hers every meal, so I was never quite sure who exactly were her siblings.  But learning this (that her mom feeds additional kids) was a beautiful lesson for me.  Isabelle doesn’t have a whole lot of money (something that Sor Mirna felt she had to make extra clear to me before I left), and yet her mother opens her house to whoever comes by – there were always people I didn’t know coming in and out of the house – and gives everyone who came in food.  Literally, you could not enter her house without receiving something to eat or drink!  This also means that I ate more in that weekend than I had in a long time (eventually I had to tell them that they were giving me too much food!) 

On Saturday morning, I made tortillas with the girls.  I swear, they make a TON of tortillas everyday and they make them about three times a day!  I seriously don’t know how they eat so many!  I asked Isabelle how many they make a day and she didn’t know because they don’t count, but a lot.  I have become better at making tortillas, but every time someone new teaches me, they change the technique with which they teach me a little bit… so I’m still trying to find the best way to make them.  It still takes me about twice as long to make one as the girls here, and mine are never round… but they are getting better.  We then went to Isabelle’s cousin’s house because she had some ripe peaches and oranges growing behind her house.  So we picked them and ate them… the orange was not quite ripe, and I wouldn’t suggest eating un-ripe oranges… they aren’t good.  The peaches on the other hand was delicious!  The only thing about peaches here is that they are about half the size of peaches that you can buy at the store and they are a lot fuzzier… so people tend to peel them with a knife before eating them… it makes eating/preparing to eat the peach a lot more time-consuming, but it is definitely worth it.  In the afternoon, we went to the river to swim… and it was a ton of fun!  We took two younger boys who didn’t know how to swim, and it was amusing to watch Isabel teach the boys.  Other than that, we just kina hung out… The girls asked me if I wanted to help them make pasteles (which are pretty much smoother and skinnier tortillas that are filled with rice, folded over into a half circle, and fried).  However, I haven’t mastered the making tortillas thing, and these needed to be circles, so I opted to just watch.  Other than that, we pretty much just hung out. 

Sunday, we were planning on leaving at 11:00 in the morning, but the guy who was supposed to drive us to Santa Rosa (or at least to Lempira where we could catch a bus to Santa Rosa, I’m not sure which) never showed up.  We waited until 1:00 at which time Osiris’s dad decided to drive us to Lempira.  From there, we caught a bus to Las Flores, and then another bus to Santa Rosa… so I was able to spend more time navigating my favorite bus system!  We made it back to the school around 4:30 at which time I took a much needed, and appreciated shower. 

On Tuesday, we didn’t have school because it was worker’s day.  So, the sisters took a trip to visit some houses of ex-students as well as one who was an interna, is now a nun, but is sick with some rare disease.  Because all the sisters have for a vehicle is a small truck, and four sisters went with us, Thalia and I sat in the bed of the truck on a couple of mats and it was a HOT day!  We stopped at one girl’s house – she wasn’t there as she is currently a first year postulant or aspirant (I’m not really sure which), but we talked with her parents for a while and they gave us a ton of food!  And I was able to try more new kinds of fruit!  We then traveled on to the nun who is sick’s house.  The sisters all were talking to her and Thalia and I got kicked out, so we amused ourselves with games.  For lunch, the family loaned us their second home that is in the mountains and ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL and really peaceful.  I definitely wouldn’t mind going back some time for a weekend retreat type thing.  Anyways, we had a typical “road lunch,” which if I was in the US would probably be some sort of easy fruit and sandwiches and chips… but in Honduras, we had hard boiled eggs, beans, platinos, and cream.  The cream actually ended up spilling and making a mess on the way… long story short, sandwiches are WAY easier.

And then Thalia left me on Friday.  Initially, I didn’t think that I would be able to take her to the airport because I have to give classes in the morning, but Sor Che was nice enough to offer to proctor the exam I was giving, which meant that I was able to go with Thalia and Sor Xiomara to the airport.  It was sad to see her go (I almost took pictures of her leaving, but I thought that it would be a little too motherly of me) and now I’m here solo until Ashley comes in June.  After dropping Thalia off, we traveled around San Pedro collecting donations and buying fruit.  We then went to the school in San Pedro to wait for the two Novices that are going to be staying at our school and helping out for the next month.  I guess the year before you profess, you kina “live the life” so the novices are here pretty much doing everything the sisters do.  They are both really nice.

So, I guess that is this week.  On a somewhat separate note… the bugs of Santa Rosa are finally coming out (I think it is because it is getting hotter and the rainy season is just about upon us) but as I was writing this during study, I got at least 10 new mosquito bites, all of them on my legs!  Not fun!

Anyways, loves to everyone at home, I’ll be seeing you in about 2 months!