Kayleigh, Hayley, Igor, and Andri...posing in front of my house at the end of the adventure.

man she got pollen all OVA her face.

Lago Atitlan.

flowers will you make me an honest woman.

kayleigh, posing above the lovliest swimmin' hole ever.

more semuc champey!

oh. my. heaaaaaaaveeennnssssss.

petrified by heighs after a staggering ascent.

here is kayleigh, dwarfed by stone.

doin' handstands on the rio dulce.

en la selva.

gabe, heide, and kayleigh during our many kayaking adventures.

crazy eerie mangrove channels. LOOKIT THE REFLECTIONZ.

27 October 2010

Hey, chochachos! Heaven knows what you people have been doing to entertain your minds during my long blog hiatus, but I can only hope it’s been productive and enlightening. You’ve all probably been brain-storming about your respective Halloween costumes, buyin’ the fabric store out of fake bear fur and googly eyes…time to get SEXY! Am I right, or am I right? As I shall be spending my third consecutive Halloween here in Honduras, where there is no real candy to be found and no one dresses up, I’ll probably spend the night weeping alone in my hammock and sucking down pineapple juice, pausing occasionally to stagger outside and contemplate the spooky, scary moon while Igor tries in vain to wiggle out of the adorable rotten pumpkin costume I will make him out of a garbage bag.

In the past one and a half months, I have leapt over the chasm of uncertainty and fully transitioned from a humble volunteer to just another unemployed twenty-something in need of a haircut. During the first couple weeks in September, I finished up all my projects and then headed to Tegucigalpa for the week, for our “Closing of Service” examinations and final interviews. I turned in many a report to the Peace Corps, who responded by giving my tender areas a cursory prodding (all healthy, yippee) and tossing my residency card into the incinerator. “Peace out, loser,” said Uncle Sam, and suddenly I found myself just another tourist in the donut-hole of Central America. I spent a week moseying around, saying adios to various old host families from training and visiting a few pals. Then I headed back to the Lubey Lubes on October 1 for a surprise attack on Douglas’ third birthday, arriving in style in the back of a dump truck (no buses due to rain) with a cake, piñata and crappy plastic tricycle balanced on my knees. The kids were delighted and much merriment was exchanged. I hung around for a few more days, being a creepy doppelganger on poor Margaret, the new volunteer, and enjoying the novelty of lying in my hammock all morning and not feeling guilty about it. Then I carefully rolled my shorts, undies and t-shirts into little burritos and inserted them into my backpack, tossed my house keys to Nely and the kids, and strolled out of town to go north and meet the one and only Kayleigh Gamble, my partner in crime from the ‘ol college days.

Ah, to be free! No more reporting vacation days and telling the Peace Corps where I am (or rather, explicitly not doing that and hoping they won’t find out), no more cramming two weeks of adventures into five days because I have to get back to site…let me tell you what, people, ain’t nothin’ like traveling around as an unemployed person. (Money concerns not being an issue because when you use a credit card, it’s like the ATM is giving you money for free…hell yes, Science.) Fortunately, Kayleigh is also wallowing happily in the mucky-muck of semi-employment, and was able to obtain three whole weeks from her employer. The dame stepped off the airplane with a saucy little travel pack and a duffle sagging with forty pounds of SNACKS. Freakin’ chex mix…reeses peanut butter cups…trail mix…pretzels….dried fruit…for she is a lady of my own heart. Of course, adventuring around with Kayleigh would have been just as awesome without the duffle ‘o snacks. First of all, she is a smoky burrito of kindness, excellent humor, insatiable spunk for adventure, and silliness, with a mixture of shredded intelligence and wit melted on top. Mmm. Second of all, our names rhyme. This was an issue we addressed when we lived together in The Tit by creating nicknames, which were Turbo (me) and Nitro (her). However, these don’t translate as well in Spanish, or to the international backpacker community (which is made up mostly of 20-year-old Israeli dudes with pierced nipples and bulging muscles, we found), so we soon developed a great comedic timing when people inevitably asked our names. “I’m Hayley,” I would respond, looking to Kayleigh mischievously. “And I’m Kayleigh,” she would say with a sigh, rolling her eyes, both of us obviously so over the fact that we had rhyming names and were traveling together. Man, we had fun.

Snacks in tow, we headed to the Honduran coastal town of Omoa, where, according to Kayleigh, we spent the afternoon riding beach cruisers around in the surrounding villages “just like Korean business men” (in that we were incongruous to the environment and the people, obviously). I love riding bikes. We spent the night at a little backpacker’s hostel called Roli’s Place, which had beautiful green lawns, mossy mango trees and at least four different bunnies hopping around. However, they go on my Screw That Noise List because when the lady discovered that Kayleigh and I had climbed a tree to eat some snacks and contemplate the late afternoon, she screamed at us for like four minutes, some nonsense about “you are not children” and “I can’t believe you would smash an orchid like that.” Alright YES WE SMASHED AN ORCHID AND I AM VERY SORRY, but it was already half dead, and there were like 5,000 other orchids all over the place. And it wasn’t even flowering. We felt ashamed but later just pity, because she thinks climbing trees is an activity restricted only to children and will never know the magic of eye-level epiphytes at sunset. In retaliation, Kayleigh snapped off a piece of the water faucet in the bathroom (she claims it was “accidental,” but I saw right through that little facade). The next day, we scurried away under the lady’s reproachful glare and swung across the border into the little Guatemalan Caribbean town of Puerto Barrios, where we ate some beans and then took a boat up the Rio Dulce. We then alighted at my favorite little lodge, the Finca Tatin, which is a bunch of awesome tree-house bungalows in the dang jungle, right on the edge of the deliciously green river, which flows lazily to the sea. We’d been there not an hour when, low and below, who steps onto the dock but none other than MY FAVORITE PEACE CORPS BUDDY GABE!!! And his lady Heide!!! I almost peed myself with surprise and delight (actually, I might have let a couple drops escape…my bladder control ain’t what it used to be) and we celebrated this most unlikely coincidence by immediately hurling ourselves off the rope swing into the river. The four of us spent the next three days kayaking miles down-river and into eerie mangrove channels, hiking in the jungle, eating copious amounts of delicious food, sweating out toxins in the Mayan sauna, and then replacing the toxins by drinking cold beers in the hammocks. It was delicious.

Our upper arm muscles bulging like the youth of Israel from all that kayakin’, Kaylz and Haylz then bussed it north many hours to the little town of El Remate, which is between Flores and the Mayan ruins of Tikal. We spent the night at an eco-lodge called “Mirador del Duende,” in a little open-air adobe hut, which the Flintstones might have enjoyed had they really wanted to contract scabies and sleep on filthy mattresses that smelled like a homeless grandma. The next day we wasted all kinds of time and hitch-hiked into the ruins by early afternoon, just in time for the crowds to dwindle, but far too late to miss the once-a-year opportunity of “Dia de la Raza” (sort of like cultural history day), in which all the important Mayan chiefs come and do hella important ceremonies with their villages. JAGUARS BE DAMNED. We totally missed all the dancing and everything…but at least we were able to waft some smoke from the smoldering ceremonial fires onto our t-shirts. The families walking around were dressed in beautiful typical Mayan dress, with loom-woven skirts and embroidered shirts. We scrambled all over the ruins, drinking bottled water and taking pictures, just as the Mayan gods would have wanted it. We saw the sunset atop the breathtakingly-high Temple IV, which towers above the jungle canopy and was maybe one of the most beautiful evenings I’ve ever experienced. The ruins are built within the dense jungle, connected by narrow paths and neat signs, and the forest is filled with all kinds of monkeys (we saw howlers and spider) and birds and crazy mammals. In the evening, everyone starts hollering and the noise is majestic. That night, we camped in the grounds just outside the entrance to the park, suffering terrible cold and what was perhaps the Nastiest Mattress In the World (we fools opted not to bring my tent and camping supplies, thus falling to the mercy of the Guatemalan parks service). We spread our raincoats on top and spooned. We awoke at 4:00am, hustled to the entrance and tried to bribe our way into the park two hours early to watch the sun rise from Temple IV, a common activity, but the guards had drank too much Asshole Power Shake that morning and spitefully refused us entry. When we finally were allowed in at 6:00am, when the park opens for realz, we’d missed the real sunrise and I was supremely pissed. Kayleigh calmed me while I spat angry bitter words at the selfish pricks, and we galloped off to the temple to see what was left of Father Sun stretching his melty fingers over the treetops.

Our next stop was what is often toted as “the most beautiful place in Guatemala,” Semuc Champey. I didn’t really know what to expect, other than “a real pretty swimmin’ hole.” Oh my my, oh yes yes, it was. We drove for like seven hours south from Flores, through winding mountains and little villages, roaring past women and children walking along the road, dressed like cotton rainbows and carrying mysterious bundles of woven blankets on their backs by way of forehead strap. We finally arrived in the little town of Lanquin, which I can only imagine used to be a quiet little village until people discovered that tourists would pay money to go swim in their river. Now, it’s blossomed into a rather bustling little town full of hostels and places to eat. Kayleigh and I decided to feed the social monkey on our backs and stay at the “El Retiro Lodge,” which is nestled on a lovely rushing river and has over 100 beds, all filled with dirty backpackers (mostly Israelis). Clutching my dinner tray and staring at the buzzing open-air dining room, scanning the tables for a pair of seats near the cool kids…my god, it was like being back in middle school. Only with beer and less social anxiety…and my armpit glands produce far less sweat now than they did then. We did indeed make some friends, and it was a fun couple of nights, I must say. But the best part was the next day when they toted us all along the windy roads for half an hour to some awesome underground caves, filled with a rushing river which we have to navigate as we scrambled around, waving candles and gasping through waterfalls. After the cave adventure, we hiked a bit into the National Park and…my god. It was like something out of Fern Gully. Nestled in a towering mountain canyon of dangly jungle lies a series of deep limestone pools, all bright turquoise. The water is deliciously cool and so crystal clear you can see it when the fish poop. The water comes roaring down the mountain and grinds its way under a 20 meter natural bridge of rock, then suddenly calms and becomes....the most beautiful spot in Guatemala. We spent the afternoon diving around like awestruck mermaids and buying homemade chocolate from local kids. I’ll never look at the color blue the same way again.

“Enough nature, let’s go buy textiles,” said we, and so it came to pass. Kayleigh and I bussed it to Guatemala City, and then on down to Lago Atitlan, an enormous clear lake in the south-west-ish part of the country, bordered by hells of volcanoes and beautiful little traditional villages (at this point, I might as well just admit that I always felt too embarrassed to aim my camera at unsuspecting village women, so I in fact have nary a picture of their traditional dress, which is shameful and sad. Whatever, though, you guys can just go to Wikipedia.). Kayleigh and I spent the next four nights delighting in the lake, trying to stop each other from buying 90 pounds of woven items and other artisania but ending up just enable one another in such binges (ah, textiles, the crack cocaine of the tasteful lady) and making more new friends. We stayed in the town of Santa Cruz, at this cool little hostel called La Iguana Perdida. The food was INCREDIBLE, the beds were clean and comfy (we stayed in another open-air room, but it was 7 kinds of delightful), and the people were lovely, too. We spent a day hiking for four hours through a literal orgy of wildflowers, and came home with so much pollen on our noses that our day-long binge of my second-favorite drug of choice (next to handmade crap) was obvious to everyone. Flowers I love you flowers! We went to the market one day and attended a cross-dressing bon-fire party one night, as well (not much of a stretch for certain individuals). After several nights on the lake, though, it was time to leave (Kayleigh was close to getting us kicked out for befriending the kitchen ladies and trying to help them chop vegetables, a noted no-no).

We bussed it back up toward the city and parked ourselves in Antigua for the night, where we wandered for close to an hour before we found my most delightful Peace Corps friend’s grandmother’s house, a beautiful old home in the center of town. Despite our tardiness, Ana’s grandma Margarita and her mother, Sonia, who happened to be visiting from the states, greeted us in their time-worn nighties and presented us with bowls of beans, fancy French bread, and fistfuls of Milk Duds and Whoppers. We all giggled in Spanish late into the night before tucking in, lulled to sleep by the indignant commentary of Roberto, the pet parrot. I pretended Margarita was my Guatemalen grandmother and it was delightful. The next day, deliciously well-rested, Kayleigh and I headed to the capital and began the multi-bus adventure down into El Salvador and to the coast, where we crashed onto my most favorite beach just after sunset. I’ve had the good luck to visit Playa El Zonte about three times previous, and it was just as excellent as always…huge waves, black sparkly sand, toasty sandwiches and hunky dudes all over the place. Mmm, surfers. Kayleigh and I spent the next day riding waves and exploring tide pools, and had the great fortune to have arrived on the same night as a local “Gastronomical Fair.” We rode in the back of a truck bed with the rest of the hotel’s staff for half an hour in the warm, salty air under a perfect full moon, spotting owls and enjoying the way pine trees frame the Mama Moon. Then I ate so much awesome food I was farting out my ears and it was amazing. Tamales, soup, empanadas, cake, hot cocoa…my god. Once we got back, I played a late-night game of ping-pong with a goofy, tender-hearted local guy named Javier, which turned into an all-night series of conversations about everything and culminated in a beautiful sunrise. A few hours later, he cheerfully (albeit drowsily) drove Kayleigh and I into the capital, where we caught a series of buses all the way to the Honduran border and he hurried home to have his weekly fish lunch with his grandpa. Then, hip hooray, hot damn and hell yes, Honduras Honduras Honduras! After two weeks of amazing adventures, I couldn’t believe how happy I was to be home once again. We crashed at my Peace Corps friend Jessie’s home, and I bummed around the south for two days while Kayleigh rekindled friendships in several villages where she had volunteered a couple years ago. We met up two days later, bussed into Alubarén, and Kayleigh was given the whirl-wind tour, complete with swimmin’ hole cannon balls and meetin’ the baby possee. (The kids had made a surprise for me—a two-layer mud-cake with rose-petal décor, and the ladies made me another—six sheets embroidered with various sentences and images, including a huge one of Igor and his brother, Kaiser, facing one another, which were all layed out on my bed with a sign on top declaring everyone’s love for me.) My god but it’s good to be home. We spent the night in our final embrace of pretend sisterhood and the next day, our Slumber Party with Credit Cards was officially over, as Kayleigh headed out solo to catch her flight up in San Pedro Sula and I was left with nothing but salty tears, an over-squeezed heart, and way too many tiny woven coin purses.

Dudes and ladies, I would like to reflect further on what it’s like to be in the final stretch of my Honduran life, as I leave in exactly 10 days for the United States of Deliciousness, but it is late and I am sleepy and I must awaken in the bowels of the night to take Igor on the 4am bus to Tegus so the vet can declare him healthy enough for you people. Therefore, please await Part II of the Final Blog in the coming weeks, in which I shall ruminate poetically about what it’s like to leave your second family behind in a cloud of jet exhaust. Until then…nighty night.

Looooove,

Hayley

chipilín. mmmmm tasty.

anona is a delicious fruit. it looks like an artichoke but it ain´t....it´s sweet and pulpy and has lots of black seeds.

igor and kaiser love each other very much. that is true.

awesome dusk rainbow i saw the other day...NO BIG DEAL.

two cipotes with igor, up at their school

kiddies in class...poor bastards.

poor little lisbeth, now one appendix less.

1 September 2010Hey, chochachos! Want to know what is Hella Delicious? MINT TEA PLUS ALLSPICE. It’s like…10,000 hot ‘n slurpy candycanes all up in my mouthhole, dancin’ around to the Jingle-something-rock and then later making you have to go pee. Mmmm. Ain’t that what Christmas is all about? Dancing and then later, peeing? It’s true I have the Season of Sweaters on the brain…though it’s only September, I now have a PLANE TICKET HOME TO AMERICA WHERE THE PIES RUN FREE AND YOUR MOMMA MAKES YOU WAFFLES ON SUNDAYS. And since I am now wriggling with excitement at the thought of trampling the grass of my motherland, all I can think about is wearing long pants, socks, and hells of wool. As a dedicated, card-carrying Sweaty Individual, I do enjoy the hot ‘n balmy more than anything, but after nearly 2.5 years of that I am ready to binge on icy rain and other such delights found in Norcal in the wintertime. Plus In ‘n Out. Everybody get ready to see some binging in that realm as well. Naum naum naum. Anyways. Mark your agendas, folks and ladies, cause I am gonna drink my first soda-beverage sweetened with corn syrup in two years on November 6 (Hondurans do it with cane sugar). For those of you currently regarding your Hayley Scrapbook with furrowed brows, you’re correct that as I began my service in September of 2008, oughn’t I be done in September 2010? The answer is YEP. And done in September I shall be…the 24th to be precise. However, I got some unfinished business in this here region, mainly involving tending to my illegal alpaca farm up in Guatemala, which I have been unable to see to as a Peace Corps volunteer (damn government passport!) My dear pal and darling Adventure Associate Kayleigh shall be joining me in early October, at which point we’ll get all UP in Guatemala’s face for three weeks, possibly giving a cursory head-nod to Belize, and of course our secret island (the one where the illegal alpaca farm is). Should be las tetas, if you receive my meaning….and I think that you do. After said darling bosom friend departs for the Land of the Free, I shall return to my site (SURPRISE!! Buahaha) and fetch my life partner, Igor, who shall be immediately whisked to the vet for a very official, multi-sealed (arr! arr! clapping of flippers!) Health Certificate that says he is healthy as a dog can be and thus fit for entry into the states (and if he aint, I’m prepared to do the ‘ol pretending-to-sneeze-but-instead-of-snot-i-secretly-throw-ten-dollars-over-the-counter maneuver). Then we’ll return to Alubarén, spend a few last days with my pueblo, celebrate Igor’s 2nd birthday on the 5th, and then, on NOVEMBER SIXTH…hooray and hot damn but if it ain’t ol Hayley, eatin’ our sandwiches and siphoning gas outta our cars! Guys, she’s back!! If two months ahead of departure seem mildly premature for such giddy yakking, then you can just paint me purple and call me Little Miss Prema-Yak, cause I am delighted to be returning home to my warm, snuggly family and all them Tasty Situations. I still am incredulous that departing a place I have lovingly lived in for two years has yet to incite great wracking sobs, or even muted sniffles disguised as a cold, but I reckon that as the real departure looms closer I shall begin to feel the grief and despair I search for. Until then, I’ma continue to loop the mental reel of the moment in which momma and poppa Kercher fetch me at the San Francisco airport, arms all wide and beckoning, eyes all misty, hands all full of In ‘n Out. Be careful! Do not drop my milkshake. Work-wise, I am just wrapping everything up in a NEAT LITTLE PACK-AGE (to quote Homer). My English/teaching methodology class, abstinence education and sex-ed class, pregnant women’s club, reading tutoring, dental hygiene classes, hypertension workshops…it’s all over, chochachos. Now all I’ve got left are the obligatory “clausuras” (like a graduation ceremony) that are expected at the termination of any activity. Cake and soda are shared, diplomas are handed out, photos are taken (Hondurans are particularly fond of the inspiring “let’s pose stiffly while you shake my hand with your left and hand me my diploma with your right, staring stonily at the camera”) and everyone races home to beat the rain. Hooray! The folks here in Alubarén are all now aware that I’m on my way out, and I get asked “Ya se va?” about 40 times a day (“You leaving now?”). Yes. Ya me voy. The next question is inevitably, “Well, what tasty little morsel of gringa wealth are you going to leave me as a memento to our deep and lasting friendship? How bout that hammock? You takin’ that mini-fridge back to the States with ya? Can I have your pants? Give me your pants.” Etc. I have begun to slyly give away random articles of clothing (like my stack of Mysteriously Stained Underpants…mmm, funky) and such, but I’m still dreading the deluge of demands I know awaits me. But I do want to give away all my crap; I don’t need it and you should see the way folks’ faces light up at the presentation of gym shorts or plastic dishware. But as an American, the whole “don’t ask for a present” dogma is so engraved in my mind that even though I am perfectly AWARE that asking for something you fancy is not rude in Honduran culture, I still can’t curb the reflexive desire to give things to those who do NOT ask, and stubbornly deny those who do. Screw YOU, impoverished elderly woman asking for a coffee cup! Get the hell off my porch! Not everyone is reacting to my pending departure that way, though…my best friends, Nely and the kids (the country jam band) are simply doing the same thing I am, which is making a real effort to SUCK that juice outta every moment we have together…goin’ to the swimmin’ hole or river instead of spending the afternoon in the hammock, cooking dinner together instead of alone (tonight we made “chipilín,” which is a strangely delicious green leafy bush you first boil and then fry in lard and salt…who knew vegetation could be so slurpygood?), and making tenderhearted comments every other day about how much we adore one another (oodles). Especially my little novio, Douglas…my god but do I love that kid. A quick summary of things that have happened since my last blog, for those of you are more action oriented and less concerned with lame-ass prattling: · My delightful pal Eddie (of peace corps fame) came to visit for a weekend and we spent three days leaping into swimming holes (obviously), eating as much corn as my neighbors could shove at us, and playing with dolls. And Matchbox cars (thanks again, Leetha!). · I purchased a shiny, solid-gold kennel crate for my one and only love muffin, Igor. He is in love with the idea of having his own personal fort in which to sleep and fart (the apple doesn’t fall far) and I anticipate no problems in hauling him to America in it, provided he likes hanging out in forts for 12 hours at a time. I plan on drugging him moderately for the voyage, which is how forts should be enjoyed anyway. · Alubarén celebrated her annual Feria (town fair), which was unremarkable, unless you think shooting off cannon-esque firecrackers for 15 straight minutes every night at 4:00am for 7 days is remarkable. Which I do not. Also, there were the annual ‘catch that greasy pig’ and ‘sexiest 6-year-old in town’ competitions, which were adorable and repugnant, respectively. · My dear little 9-year-old friend Lisbeth (she lives across the street with Nely, who is her aunt) very nearly died from a burst appendix, and has been in the hospital since August 10th. She is still there, but should be released any day now. Maybe the scariest episode of my life. · I contracted, suffered through, and recovered from the infamous mosquito-borne Dengue Fever…though I had no fever to speak of and participated in the annual Peace Corps Olympics with nary a hitch. My only symptom? A freaky-ass rash all over my body. Blotchy goodness. · Igor and his brother Kaiser both spent a week as very sick little dudes, puking out their ears (so to speak) and yelping in pain every time they tried to eat something. I think my neighbor poisoned them with bologna, which she has threatened to do twice in the past (though not specifically with bologna). Too bad she and her tainted meats are no match for the strength of Honduran mutts. If she does it again, though, I will shank her in the goddamn kidneys until the Bad Blood comes and she Dies. · The wet season continues to shake its damp hide all over Honduras, spraying the country with road-destroying droplets and that distinctive wet-dog smell. People all over the country have been losing homes due to the incessant downpours (people are losing lives, too) and all kinds of roads are washed out. The buses haven’t been able to leave Alubarén for a week now and the sky is sagging from all that heavy weight. Time to get some rainbow suspenders from the Goodwill, sky. The good side, though, is that all this rain makes the butterflies get ALL up in our faces, which makes strolling around outside just a delightful event. Seriously, there are so many bright and stripeity fellas flitting around you’d think it was Butterfly Pride Week. “Flippy-flippy flutter-flutter! What ends with fly and starts with butter! We are citizens of the Meadow and we demand our Constitutional Rights!” Etc. Plus, while the sky has yet to convert them into an elastic support system, we are averaging about 1.9 rainbows per week, which is just downright Special. · The new volunteer who shall replace me has been appointed by the Peace Corps Crew, and it is none other than the delightful Margaret, an ebullient dame who I met during a trainee event. She’s got sunshine leaking out of her eyeballs and I can’t think of a better match for this town…the kids are gonna adore her. Unfortunately, she IS a blonde bombshell, which only serves to perpetuate the widely-held misconception among Hondurans that all gringas are blonde, blue-eyed and giggly. I will pass down to her my ugliest man-shorts, though, which should help deter some of the more forward young men in this pueblo. Well, that about does it for today. We shall now begin the Final Countdown (do-do-dooo-do, do-do-dodo-dooooo, etc.) and please expect only one or two more blog-sandwiches before this remarkably-un-sundamaged lady ends the sweatiest, most far-out adventure of her tiny life to-date and heads home to the land of bacon and blueberry farms. Gonna be great.
Looooove,Hayley and Igor (who is in his fort right now, tuckered out from stone-cold murdering a tarantula for me with his bare (no, not bear, dog) paws. Talk about earning your keep.

Igor in the 2010 Regional Grand Opening of the Most Freaking Expensive Dog Kennel Ever

the awesome swimmin hole 3 hours away from our homes...went there hikin through the woods and crossing raging rivers with nely, the kids, her brothers, and my good buddy eddie

noel with his leaf boat

Igor, guarding the giant bucket of spaghetti and tortillas

lisbeth, alison, and noel making leaf boats

eddie!

water fallllll!!! don't ever climb under one of those things, though. you might drown.

douglas, nely and me.

alison pretending to be a campesino who has to do her washing in the river (seriously, that was the game)

eddie? eddie!

on the way to the swimmin hole.wooosh there we go

my little buddy douglas, who comes over every day and demands to bathe himself at the pila "yo solito" (all by myself)

the kid won't stop!

this is what i do to naughty little boys. INTO THE CAGE, BABY.13 August 2010Hey, chochachos!

Instead of a normal bloggy blog, I have copied-n-pasted the infamous "Close-of-Service" Survey that all us "seniors" have to fill out...please enjoy.

Name: Hayley Kercher

Site: Alubarén, F.M., also known (by me) as The Lubes, or when I’m feeling playful, the Lubey Lubes.

Project: Youth Development

Nicknames: Most people in my site call me Heely (yes, just like those sweet sneakers), but that’s not so much a nickname as it is an adorable mispronunciation.

Biggest Accomplishment: Leading my baseball team in a consecutive series of wretched defeats, thus generously teaching the children the thrill of being good losers. You’re welcome, babies.

Biggest Disappointment: My god. The teachers here. One hundred times, one thousand times. You cradle the future in your pudgy little hands and you do NOTHING.

Biggest Regret: Not doing anything to curb the rampant rape-n-pillage of our madre tierra here, except for discreetly furrowing my eyebrows when people throw soda bottles out the bus window.

Things you will miss most: Little Douglas (my 2-year-old neighbor) yelling from across the street in his tiny voice “YA SE LEVANTO, HEELY?!” when I yank my creaky front-door open every morning. Sitting in their house in the afternoon and drinking coffee and eating corn and its by-products (or mangos if it aint corn season). Having my entire world revolve around a 1.5 mile radius. The love and joy I feel radiating into my soul from the big brown eyes of the kiddies in my town. Taking said kiddies on Adventures in the hills. Jesus. Everything. I love you Honduras.

Things you will miss least: Working with the teachers. And the fierce fiery inferno that is my house. And the tarantulas.

Worst Illness: Once a tórsano (bot-fly) laid an egg in my eyeball and then it turned into a larvae and it was hella gross. Then it got infected and they had to amputate my eye (rather like melon balling) and now I have a glass one. But please don’t ask me about it as I’m sensitive.

Biggest Freak-out: When I was taking a shower in Gabe’s house on top of his pretty green mountain during a thunderstorm and was briefly electrocuted by a rogue bolt of lightening that hit just outside the bathroom and traveled through the hose and into my body. I bellowed several short, hoarse screams (like a muppet, I’m told) and leapt out of the shower, dripping soapy water all over Gabe’s bathroom floor while I pranced around, flapping my hands and panicking in all my pasty naked glory. Biggest fear during PC: That I would wake up one sweaty morning, smack my mouth, stretch my arms, rub my cute little eyes, and focus in on a giant tarantula, suspended above my face like a mid-air nightmare on my mosquito net. Most useful thing I brought: Underpants.

Least useful thing I brought: Orthopedic inserts. I never did wear them. Also, a whole fistful of bobby-pins. Why??

Favorite activity I did when bored: Go scrambling around in the hills behind my house with Igor and the kiddies, just stompin around lookin at all kinds of dragonflies and such, cannonballing into swimming holes. Weirdest thing I did when bored: Sit with my feet touching sole-to-sole in my hammock and pretend that my big toes were giant worms (a la Tremors) and then make them fight to the death. Also, I like to close all the windows in my house and dress like a Cowboy and then do the Butt-Cheek Dance.

Greatest lie I told at my site: What? No, I don’t have to pay any extra to take Igor back to the states with me. Totally free.

Favorite Honduran Inquiry: Once, at the swimming hole, my neighbor timidly implored me to show her my nipple, because she was so curious about what a little gringa nipple might look like.

Best Honduran Gesture: Oh, but there are so many. But if I have to choose just one, I will have to go with my personal favorite, the lip-point. But runner-up for the nose-scrunchy “What?” thing and the belly ruuuuuuuub.

Favorite CD/Song during my service: Oh heavens, I cannot decide such a thing. Let’s just say I listen to hella jangly banjos.

Song I would be content never to hear again: Pretty much any Jesus-Love-Ballad featuring a dude that sounds like a weasel and his trusty A-tonal Casio keyboard, played on a bus.

Favorite books during service: Before Peace Corps, I had no idea who Tom Robbins was. Can you imagine?

Favorite Honduran fashion: The women’s soccer team in my town like to do their daily activities with stylish tops made of plastic garbage bags on under their bien socado polyester shirts, to help them “lost weight.” It’s a thing, seriously.

Best jalon: When my two buddies from home and I were camping on Punta Sal and had wandered 4 hours through the jungle to the other side of the peninsula to find a nice campsite, only to discover the destined beach was all kinds of buggy and actually sort of feo. We were starving and hot and tired and not at all looking forward to hiking another four hours back with all our shit, when all of a sudden, a shnazzy speed boat built for 20 zoomed into the remote cove, picked a group of day-tripping gringo missionaries who had been hiking and suddenly appeared out of nowhere from the trees, and offered us a ride back to the main beach where all the prettiness hangs out. We got to ride in the very front, and since it was a tour group, they stopped a couple times on the way back to the main beach to do awesome things like leap off the stern into secret Ocean Caves and such. Best of all, there were Snacks.

Worst jalon: ain’t no such thing. Jalons are Fun Things.

Best bus ride: I like riding the bus out of my site, at 5:30am, rolling up and down the hills and watchin the stars fade and morning sun do its thang all over the emerging horizon. All homes with tortilla smoke driftin out the roof and little kids herdin their cows with a stick. Worst bus ride: That exact SAME bus, only entering the mountain from the freeway, all terrible and boiling hot at 2:00pm, dusty as shit and stinky, with all the pleasantries of the morning evaporated by the sun.

Favorite food: I really dig a nice bean and rice soup, all thick and savory and spliced with generous sprinkling of culantro, bien espeso. With like four hot, thick corn tortillas.

Worst thing I smelled: Having a wet dog sleep under my bed, immediately after rolling the hell out of a dead animal of some sort. Stupidest thing I did in the past 2 years: Once, while hiking up Volcan Maderas in Nicaragua, I drank a mud puddle. I’d forgotten to fill my Nalgene, and was halfway up the mountain before I discovered this. It was like little knives of thirst stabbing me in the tender under-belly that is my throat. Thus, in a swirly moment of dehydrated delirium did I thus fill my belly with an entire liter of chestnut-colored water. Later, Giardia called me and was like “Hey, Haylz, wanna hang?” and I was all “Not really, Giardia, I’m kinda busy at the moment,” and Giardia was all like “Too bad man, I’m already on my way! I hope you got good Netflix!” but I didn’t because that does not exist in Honduras. So then I peed out my butt (POMB) for several days.

Untrue fact told to you as an undeniable truth: jelly beans do not exist here (yes they DO, they’re called Perlas and it is awesome.)

You know you’ve been in Honduras too long when: your Honduran visa expires.

I never thought I would: learn to enjoy hangin out by myself, with myself, for such an extended period of time.

If I had to do it all over again I: would not….NOT do it again. (As in, double negative…as in, would.)

Favorite piropo: I always enjoy it when a dude abruptly leans into my face while walking by me on the street and blows me an obscenely loud smooch followed by an “mmm mi amor.” Lovely.Favorite Ropa Americana t-shirt: my glow-in-the-dark dinosaur facts t-shirt. Sorry, but it’s just the best there is.

Favorite animal story: The first time the shroud of mystery surrounding bird sex was finally lifted. To this day, when a rooster walks by I slide up and surreptitiously shut and lock my doors, my heart a-poundin’ and palms sweating.. My god.

Best habit acquired: Learning to fork-lift my food from my crotch to my face while curled up in my hammock, plate balanced on my thighs, book in my hand and surprisingly little dinner on my shirt.

Worst habit acquired: Putting things off till tomorrow because that’s what everyone else does. Also, never picking up my dog’s turds.

Things you missed most from the U.S.: Toasty sandwiches with remarkable insides, tasty microbrewy beer, sumptuous cheeses, sushi, and the ability to decide I want any of the above in my mouf and making that happen, all in the same moment. Also, ridin’ around in my bike on nice smooth suburbian streets and such.

Things you missed least from the U.S.: Pesto. Because I ate a whole vat of it every single week.

Honduras Highlights: The time I went to the beach with my neighbors who’d never seen the ocean before. Everyone got sunburned as hell and all kinds of gritty sand up in their cracks and dehydrated as the dickens and it was GLORIOUS. Also, I sure have taken a particular delight in knowing and loving you all, my happy friends. Let’s stay up all night and eat candy! Best advice for fellow PCVs: Hot damn and hells yes, this is the most glorious job in the world and don’t let the lack of sumptuous cheeses blind you to that fact. Livin’ in quaint little green pueblitos, savin’ the babies from all kinds of typhoid and rolling in the love of neighbors and such COME ON THIS IS THE SHIT AND YOU KNOW IT.

Most likely to (for yourself or for others): eat three bags of Perlitas before I finish fillin it out (me).

I AM TOO SMALL TO DRESS AS AN INDIAN. AS SUCH, I SHALL SADLY EAT THIS CORN.

I AM GONNA SHOOT THE HELL OUT OF THAT TARANTULA.

LOOK, I HAVE THIS CORN.

LOOK! I ALSO HAVE THIS CORN!

Alison, Noel, and Lisbeth. One little, two little, three little indians...jumping on the bed.

dramatic photo shoot while Igor shows off his new Look.

naum naum naum i love me some corn.

gabe, me, and phil, in our spelunking helmets they gave us to soar around the canopy in.

oh heeeeeeeeyyyyyyy

Jungle River Lodge at Pico Bonito. hells yes.

The river at sunset.

view from the janky little train that took us to Refugio de Vida Silvestre Cuero y Salado (wildlife refuge)

there she is!! best train ever.

here we are in our private swimming pool. the OCEAN. with DOLPHINS. (not shown.)

commence the jigglin!

angry monkey above our tent in Punta Sal.

a blue-assed baboon has infiltrated the sleeping quarters! QUICK SHOOT HIM. SHOOT HIM WITH A DART.

Another angry howler monkey, not pleased to have three smelly gringos bedding down in his lair.

19 July 2010

Hey, chochachos! Apologies to all you folksies, I did not mean to let two months go by without a bloggy blog but HEY LOOKS LIKE THAT IS PRECISELY WHAT HAS HAPPENED. This entry, despite such an unfortunate hiatus, shall not be as delightful nor long as usual, because a) it is extremely late (9:15pm) and b) my keyboard is being just 7 kinds of DICK right now, aka my delete and enter keys no longer work, which is surprisingly crippling (every time I make a typo I have to highlight it and then hit cut…GOD it’s tedious, but the nerd inside me refuses to let them lay). Also, weirdly, every time I hit the P key, the cursor automatically goes back a space, so all my P words require further maintenance. I suppose it’s to be expected, though, considering good ‘ol Laptoppy has been with me for 7 years. All I ask is that she stay somewhat alive until my service here ends and I can finish all my Documents, then I shall retire her to the lush, green fields of The Edge of a Country Road Where I Shall Dump Her, every laptops’ dream. All with wild poppies growin’ up all around her, hella tiny adorable mice makin’ their tiny adorable homes in her rusty battery hutch…someone get Bob Ross on the phone, he’s gonna wanna come paint this one!

In other news, hells of Items have transpired since my last e-missive. Lesse. My abstinence-Ed/sex-ed/female empowerment/life skills/planning for the future/please don’t get pregnant before you graduate workshops (also known as Yo Merezco, or “I Deserve”) have begun, one with the 6th grade boys and one with the girls. I tried to get a male counterpart to help me with the boys (no sixth grade kid I know wants to hear a sweaty gringa yammer on about wet dreams, boners and espermatozoides, whilst making little swimming motions with her hand to demonstrate the movement of a sperm), but the guy who was delighted to work with me was actually lying about his delight, and has yet to show up to a single workshop session (there are 11, and we’re halfway done by now) despite my constant needling. So, I’m doing it alone. And it’s actually fine…the girls are absolute ANGELS—every time we meet it feels like a support group for adolescent girls, which it should be, and the girls just adore it. They actually whine when it’s time to close the sessions up, which are always two hours long…unbelievable. And the boys, while slightly less mature and much more prone to rowdiness, still sit quietly while they are subjected to two hours of me bumbling around, saying the word “penetrar” while thrusting my index finger into my fist far too often.

That’s pretty much the only new development work-wise…reading tutoring with the little guys twice a week is going swimmingly, and it’s enjoyable because the results are tangible and relatively quick…all the kids without legitimate learning disabilities are advancing quite nicely due to the one-on-one attention, and the small handful that aren’t are at least progressing somewhat, even if it is at a snail’s pace. Most of the kids actually LOVE it, and fight over who gets to go next…the Treasure Chest is a very handy tool, indeed. And it’s nice because since I do the program in the library, which is usually closed due to our terrifyingly awful excuse for a librarian, the kids get to come in during recess and read books at the tables, which they normally would not be able to do. Obviously my keeping it open isn’t very sustainable, but then again, not much of what I do actually is. But don’t tell Peace Corps that.

The most exciting, delightful, adventurely, Blasty Blast event in the past two months, however, has not been helping my community. No, I have yet again taken advantage of my deliciously-flexible schedule and departed from Alubarén for a full two weeks to engage in jungly shenanigans with two of my dearest chums from the old college days (picture us wearing Letter jackets and hoisting steins of pissy beer), Gabe and Phil (yes, Gabe, the one in Northwestern’s Premier Drum and Dance Ensemble, Boomshaka…haven’t you heard? And Phil…of Wisconsin fame, the one who likes to fondle a sweater or two and isn’t afraid to crawl into bed with a clarinet when invited). The two arrived in San Pedro Sula one hot and balmy morning, and we thus departed eastly, cavorting wildly across Honduras’ North Coast, stopping to dip our toes in the warm, aqua water of the Caribbean and hurl our poo at howler monkeys (they started it!) along the way. It was AWESOME. First we spent a day or two in Tela, a cool little Caribbean town where another Peace Corps volunteer is fortunate enough to be located, hanging out, buying supplies, and watching one of the Honduras World Cup games on TV whilst stuffing our faces with tacos. Then, packs brimming with green plantains, rice, beans, tortillas, and smores fixin’s, we grabbed a bus to a little Garifuna town called Tornabe, where we spent a delightful night in a wooden cabin on the sand, and fell asleep listening to our stomachs digesting fried fish and the waves gently lapping at the shore. The next day, we got a ride in the back of a truck to a teeny Garifuna village called Miami, which is at the buffer zone of Punta Sal National Park (now actually called Jeannette Kawas National Park), which was our first destination. In Miami we paid entrance to the park, which is a long sexy peninsula covered by dense rainforest and edged in white sand beaches and clear, blue waters. It was incredibly beautiful. After paying our entrance, we paid a fisherman to take us across the bay in his little boat, thus cutting a 5-hour hike in the boiling sun to a delightful 15 minute jet across the water. Once on the peninsula (which really felt like an island), we tipped our hats to the lone ranger, Pedro, and set off in search of the perfect deserted beach to set up camp. After hiking the whole morning, however, we realized none of the other beaches were a good idea (either too rocky, too buggy, or too tiny), and grudgingly headed back to the beach where Pedro lived in a little hut, along with another family who sells over-priced meals to the tour groups that are dropped on the park for a couple of hours nearly every day. Still wanting to maintain our idealistic dream of camping alone on a deserted beach, we tramped about 6 minutes away along a shale-y path to a tiny little beachcito, and pitched the tent among the dried-out mangrove forest. PERFECT, we said. THIS WILL BE THE TITS. Famous last words. Don’t get me wrong, during the DAY it was awesome…hiking around the jungle, with troops of monkeys howling and swinging above our heads, huge butterflies shamelessly flaunting their weightless bodies, giant blue grabs edging around everywhere, snakes hiding on trunks and crazy jungle spiders stretching their webs between enormous mossy trees…it was indescribably gorgeous and wonderful. And of course, near-constant dips in our private little swimming hole, the Caribbean ocean (at one point, we even spotted a pod of dolphins leaping and swimming around, totally havin’ the best dolphin-time ever). But at night, our own personal Hell began. The tent transformed into a tiny little sauna, and the three of us lay sweating in each other’s armpits, too hot to sleep despite being exhausted. Then the tent began filling with chiggers, which are tiny enough to crawl through the tent mesh and perhaps the most infuriating thing in the world—meaning that not only were we sweating to death, we were also clawing the first layer of skin off our bodies. Then, the thunderstorms began, filling our crappy Honduran tent with water and making everything nice and stinky. The heat, however, did not decrease. Add all that, plus scary monkeys hooting above our heads and the vague warnings of hungry jaguars issued to us by Pedro, and I don’t think any of us slept a wink. We spent one more night on the island and then snagged a ride back to Tela with a tour group.

From there, we headed further east to the city of La Ceiba, where we spent a delightful night comparing rashes, eating delicious food, and sleeping under a pile of blankets in our OWN beds with the AC on Arctic-Tundra. It was maybe the best night of my life. Then we took a chicken bus out into the country, to the village of La Union, where we boarded a tiny little “train” left over from the Banana Republic days of Honduras’ exporting heyday and chugged off through the green drippy farmlands, toward the sea, to spend a couple days in the Cuero y Salado Wildlife Refuge, which is essentially a giant tributary, where two rivers meet the ocean in a mess of beautiful mangrove madness, filled with manatees, crocodiles, alligators, birds, snakes, turtles, and other critters. We stayed in a cute little bunk house and set out at 5am the next day with out teenage guide Eric, who deftly guided us up the river in his heavy canoe and into the beautiful mangroves. It was a bummer, though, because it was right smack in the middle of Hurricane Alex (well, not smack in the middle, actually, more like, severely to the left of) and it was raining nonstop all day. But no matter! Eric made Phil and Gabe paddle and instructed me to sit in the middle, “like a Queen,” which I most certainly did (though I did help Gabe paddle a couple times, for gender-equality’s sake). We totally saw a manatee and gave him a high-five! (Maybe.) We also may have seen a crocodile, and definitely saw hells of birds.

Then we headed back to Ceiba, spent another night in our delightfully icy hotel and had the most delicious food ever (I recommend Hotel La Italia for lodging and Mango Tango for dining, those of you who are taking notes….and Casa Jaguar for boozing.) The next day, we took a bus into the buffer zone of nearby National Park Pico Bonito, which is one of Honduras’ biggest (though most of it is off-limits). We spent three nights at the fantastically chill and beautiful Jungle River Lodge, balancing our time between leaping off giant boulders into the sweet clear swirling water below, rafting the Class I-V rapids, soaring through the treetops on zip lines, plugging our arteries with tasty German food from up the road (Omega Lodge), swirling around in the cool water under the full moon, reading paperbacks in hammocks, drinking icy Imperials, hiking two hours into the jungle to stand under 60m waterfalls, and chit-chatting with the other backpackers and local folks, while carefully avoiding the hugest Douche in the world, this guy from South Africa who, as previously mentioned, was a Huge Douche. Despite the douche, though, I think this last leg of the trip was our favorite, due to the unbeatable combination of natural beauty and the availability of cold beer. Also, no chiggers. Finally, the boys had to go back to the states amid tears and huggles and I had to go back to the Lubey Lubes, now fully vacationed and thus prepared to continue in my endeavors to develop the youth.

In closing, and in other news simultaneously, the corn harvest is in full swing and I have been eating myself sick with corn in all of its tasty disguises. Also, tomorrow in Indian Day, in which all the kids dress up like they imagine Indians might and parade around town. It’s awesome. Alison, Noel, and Lisbeth weren’t going to participate because Nely has been in Tegus all last week visiting her sister, so I declared I would help and spent the past weekend sewing little burlap skirts and Tarzan shirts, while the kids glued beans and rice into designs and braided hemp headbands which we then glued parrot feathers to. We also spent nearly 48 hours painstakingly sewing green corn husks to aforementioned Tarzan shirts, which, if I do say so myself, look positively bitchin’. Hooray for Dia Del Indio!

Dudes and ladies, I am wiped out and shall now retire to my mosquito-netted bed, thankfully so because due to the nonstop rain we’ve had since May, the mosquitoes are INSANE and you can’t breathe without inhaling 30 of them at once. Anyway. Igor and I send our love and shall report again soon. Until then, I love you guys.

Love, Hayley

Yesica, my now 8-year-old neighbor, doing the obligatory "mordida" on her birthday cake.

ana, my now 25-year-old special buddy, doin the obligatory crooked-honker-thing.

Nely and her mom Tina on morther's day. She tried to hide douglas behind her because he wasn't supposed to be part of the mother-daughter photo, but he snuck in anyway. Tina dyed her hair black for the occasion.

This kid can put away bonbones (suckers) like it's his well-paying but without-benefits JOB. Oh, douglitas. (p.s. mom and dad, do you recognize that shirt??)

tina, my boyfriend, and myself.

27 May 2010

Hey, chochachos! Guess what? IT’S REAL WINTER!!!! Hot damn and hooray, the rainy season is officially upon us and life is awesome. It’s been raining non-stop for nearly a week, and everything is a spongy, negative-moist Drippin’ Situation. It’s almost…too wet. The buses haven’t been able to get down the mountain for five days (if you’re reading this, it’s because I managed to get to Tegucigalpa today), everyone is a nice splattery-brown from the hips down and the roads are soupy, gooey disasters. However, everyone was thankful it finally began because after our little “fake winter” of a week of rain at the end of April, we had almost three full weeks without rain—which wouldn’t have been an issue if people had waited to plant their beans and corn like they were told to (on the news!!). But all that rain was just too beautiful to pass up and everyone decided that God had sent us an early Christmas present, and planted their crops. And then we had three weeks of bright blue skies and not a drop of rain, and everyone’s little three-inch-high green stalks wilted and threatened to suicide themselves. However, the “real” rains finally did descend upon Alubarén, not unlike the rivulets of back sweat that ran into my Nether Region and caused several unfortunate episodes of the ‘ol Swamp Ass. But (no pun intended), as previously mentioned, it’s Winter now and all can rejoice in the little mini rivers of cow crap and dead frog guts rushing through town down toward the river. Mmm. And let me tell you, NOTHING smells as delightful as the rotting corpse of a toad the size of a football, just outside the house but close enough to my neighbor Nelo’s property that it is officially his responsibility, not mine (nor anyone else’s, which I learned when I heard not one but several folks mention in passing, in the typical joking passive-aggressive manner of Hondurans, that Nelo and Nelo alone was responsible for disposing of the calf-sized amphibian stiff).

The good news is that since rain is now old news, the sudden and extreme hatchings of crotch-diver beetles and their associates have tapered off and I share my hammock with perhaps five beetles per night, as opposed to the 5,000,000 I was picking out of my plate of beans a month ago (here I am referring to my dinner, not creating some sort of lewd new euphemism for private parts). However, the bad news is that the relentless rains have saturated the dirt around my house, and all the little critters that live in said dirt, namely snakes and tarantulas, come sputtering up to the surface, gasping for air, and when they finally catch their breath decide that they’ve had enough of the Swamp Ass and why not try that nice, dry den over yonder, the one that smells like wet dog and Swedish Fish (thanks Erika!)?? I’ve actually yet to have any wriggly snakes up in here, but I know it’s just a matter of time. However, several tarantulas have gone on evening strolls through my home, though you’d think they’d learn that that kind of recreation just leads to a slow and painful death. Just two nights ago, I was lying in my hammock, watching a movie on my laptop (some awesome documentary about wolves with a lot of Native American flute music in it), when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. Creepy, scuttle-y movement. Movement that instills a sense of panic in the observer, causing one to leap out of the hammock and flap her hands around in a weird gringa-fied version of the finger-snap that Hondurans do to express surprise/humor/fright/exhaustion/many other things, and is really cool when they do it, but makes certain North American ladies look like they’re suffering from some kind of spastic mental problem because she doesn’t actually do the snappy thing but just shakes both hands as if flinging water droplets off….anyway. It was a big, black, furry spider, about the size of a grapefruit, with ambition the size of a soccer ball. I leapt out of my hammock and flapped my hands around for a bit, as previously mentioned, but was too scared to smash it with a broom because it was so freaking big and I knew it would get all splattery and such (for those of you who don’t know me, I am a huge arachnophobic. As in, I should be receiving government money to pay for my condition, it’s so debilitating.) Plus, my broom was outside by the pila. So I raced into my room and quickly found my can of cheap, Honduran-brand Raid (called Oko) and, trying not to pee my pants out of my butt, sprayed the bastard from an entirely useless distance of seven feet. He just kind of looked at me and chuckled, and kept on scuttling till he reaching the baseball duffle bags I have stacked up by the door, which he wisely hid behind. Too freaked out to dig him out and finish the job, I just slammed my laptop shut, hit the lights and leapt into bed, tucking and re-tucking my mosquito net around me like a kid with OCD. Trembling, I lay awake until about 6:30, convinced every scuttle-y noise was the sound of a vengeful furball coming to position himself directly above my face on the net, which is my absolute worst fear in life. Once the sun was up, I ran across the street, fetched my bleary-eyed neighbor Elias, and waited outside wringing my hands while he calmly pulled the bags to the side, smashed the spider with my broom, swept him outside, and went back across the street, no doubt to return to bed. Now I find myself glancing over my shoulder every couple of minutes (just now, for example), convinced I’m going to see another goliath in the exact same spot I saw the other one last night. (Nope, all clear.) Que patetica.

In other news, I am now officially done with this 3-month workshop I’ve been doing in the high school, for four hours a week. Designed to orient them in the job market, help them select appropriate future careers or jobs based on their skills and aptitudes, and learn how to be successful employees and/or bosses, it’s one of those things that has awesome material and is entirely useful, so of the course the teenagers couldn’t care less. Though I can’t blame them; if I was a bored high schooler and some foreign lady with just two different outfits and extreme pit-stains came and yelled at me about the future every week, I’d hate it too. They didn’t put much into the workshop, and it’s hard to say how much they got out of it, but it’s over, so thank god. I never want to work with high school kids again. I am a Babies dame through and through, and that’s the truth.

I also finally had my baseball clausura (obligatory closing-of-ceremonies, with cake and diplomas). I made a huge fruit salad (though accidentally including a rancid cantaloupe which people were too polite to comment on but almost killed me when I tried a piece), bought a cake and 18 liters of Coke. We also had a scary clown-ish piñata named Ruperto (thanks, Dona Marta!) and the kids all got fancy Peace Corps diplomas and some pictures I’d had printed up of them from the games. It was sort of slam-blam-thank-you-senora, but since a thunder storm was a-brewin’, it was for a best that we hustled along from speech-to-pinata-to-fruit-to-diaplomas-to-cake-to-adios. The parents sat around and slipped extra bowls of fruit into their purses to bring home to grandma while I handed out little awards for best batter and fielder, most improved, best attitude, and MVP (all of which I selected one for both boys and girls, except the MVP, la Mera Pantera). It was hella cute. I’ll miss playing baseball in the melting sun every day….and by miss it, I mean not a day goes by that I don’t wake up and give myself a high five for not having to play baseball today. WORST. SPORT. EVER. THERE I SAID IT. We should have started a professional recreational swimmin’ hole splashing team.

My little literacy project is going awesome. I’ve got about 10 second-grades and 10 third-graders, all of whom were selected to participate by their teacher because they couldn’t read. I come by once a week and pull them out of class one by one and hustle them into the library, where all the magic is. Each kid is given a Ziplock baggie with an index card in it, with a group of words (or syllables, if they can’t do whole words yet) written on it that they must practice at home. After a week’s time, we sit together again in the library, and if they can read the card without difficulty and errors, they get to select a prize from the Treasure Chest and move onto the next card. If not, they stick with the same card until they learn it. First we did vowels, then vowels paired with the letter ‘m’ (so they get a card with ma, me, mi, mo, mu), then words (mama, mime, mame, etc.). Once they pass ‘m’, they move onto ‘p’ and practice “papa, pipa, pepe,” etc. Then it’s onto Level 2, with “s”, “l”, “n”, and then onto level three….there are six levels in all. Almost all the kids started unable to identify the vowels and nearly all the children are now onto Level Two, so we’re slowly but surely making progress. It’s awesome, because these are the kids that usually sit in the back and aren’t given any school work because their lazy teachers know they can’t read and won’t be able to do the work anyway. But not anymore! Yay literacy!

In other library-themed news, I almost killed a man the other day. The roof in the library has been leaking badly for two years now, due to an askew piece of metal. Fixing it was just a matter of climbing up there and yanking the thing back in place, which we (the library committee) have been talking about doing for two years and keep putting it off. Finally, I got sick of waiting for “tomorrow,” which as we all know never comes, and took matters into my own hands. I marched over to this guy Tito’s house, who does odd jobs and had previously agreed to climb up and do the job, and dragged him with me and his little ladder to the school yard. He clamored up, walked along the metal-enforced beam along the middle of the peaked room, and fixed the hole in about two seconds. Then he came back and began to climb down the ladder, but felt insecure placing his left foot after his right, as it couldn’t quite reach the rung without him slipping down a bit more. So he climbed back up and started walking along the roof toward the other side, to see if he could climb down that way, while I’m still standing there holding the ladder. All of the sudden I heard a huge crash and some guy on the other side of the walls screams “TITO’S DEAD!” My heart stopped and I raced around the corner, chanting “ohmygodohmygod,” and ran right smack into Tito, who was strolling out of the library, brushing debris off his pants. “The roof is rotten,” he commented, and stooped to pick up his bike to head up the hill to open the water valves (one of his jobs in town). There was now a pony-sized hole in the roof, and the roof is not particularly low. When I asked him how in the world he wasn’t hurt, he just shrugged and said he landed standing up, “como Espider Mahn.” I couldn’t stop shaking, paralyzed with the thought that I’d almost killed a father of six, but he was totally nonchalant and even laughing about it. We spent the next week fixing the roof with three new sheets of zinc metal, to replace the rotten asbestos (yes, all the school and educational buildings here are made with poisonous roofs, and they don’t care it’s bad for you—it’s “much cooler than a metal roof,” so it’s worth it). We had to use nearly half of the money we had in our library fund…what was a 30 lempira project of 10 minutes turned into a 600 lempira week-long endeavor. So much for making a positive different in my community.

If my two-year adventure here in Honduras was a day, then I would now be bathed in the crispy golden light of late-afternoon. I still have enough time to scamper around and do several Items of extreme Fun and Utility, but soon the sun is gonna duck behind the green bowl of mountains that surround this pueblo and I’ll have to head home before the it gets too dark to watch where I step. Every day people ask me “Ya se va?!”, Are you leaving now?!, to which I always respond, NO of course not, I’m here till September! At which point they point out that’s only four months away and I won’t even be here for the squash harvest. No, I say, but at least I’ll be here for the fair and independence day. Yes, they say. That’s true. At least you’ll be here for the fair (which is a joke because the fair here sucks). Anyway, I haven’t really, TRULY begun to process that my life here is winding down, but I talk about it every day and I assume that soon real gut-feeling will kick in with those words. Until then, please enjoy my artful sunset metaphor in lieu of real emotional insight into what leaving my sweaty, loving home for the past two years feels like.

At least maybe once I get back to the states I’ll stop talking to myself so much. Seriously, I’m getting concerned. I do voices and everything.

Love

Hayley

P.S. Thursday, June 3, 2010 UPDATE!! I never did get to Tegus last week…soon after I wrote last week’s blog, what was delightful amounts of rain turned into a 5-day non-stop downpour of Extreme Negative Moist proportions, which is to say, hurricane-y. Or rather, there were several hurricanes “around” (like Guatemala and the Pacific coast) which turned into what any credible meteorologist would describe as “butt-loads of rain for H-town.” To quote little ‘ol Tom Robbins, “It rained a sickness. And it rained a fear. And it rained an odor. And it rained a murder. It rained an omen. And it rained a poison. And it rained a pigment. And it rained a seizure.” The river outgrew its banks like a one of those people with giantism might outgrow childhood pants—way to quickly, and to such a degree as to make people stare with grim nervousness. Which is exactly what Alubarén did. As the days progressed (eight days without electricity, six days without bridges in or out of town), the folks gathered near the river in tank tops and umbrellas to watch the crashing river take out entire trees and rush away with insane amounts of plastic garbage. All our bridges were under water, and people began stocking up on food, fearing that a lack of transport would result in a shortage (I just bought an entire sack of coffee, which we drank by the gallon daily). Folks here are pretty nervous about hurricanes, since Hurricane Mitch spanked the dickens outta Honduras 10 years ago, but we were fortunate and no one in my town suffered severe flooding in the house or anything like that. And once the rains began to let up a bit, people relaxed and it was downright enjoyable. No work, no school, just hangin’ around in shorts and sweatshirts (yes! it was below 90!) and drinking cup after cup of sugary black coffee until it grew dark; then rocking in hammocks to the flickery light of candles until established bedtime of electricity-less days, which is 7:30pm. Now it’s back to normal, but the river is still very strong. Be careful babies!

crazy sunset cloud formations...doesnt that look like Snoopy, peering off a cliff during a full moon? I KNOW RIGHT?!

Yes Igor you DO look awesome bathed in late afternoon sunlight.

the hill david and i (and igor) scrambled up.

ambulatory bovine alert!!

the only photo of us together, ever.

lubey lubes on a humid afternoon.

Gary, my pet garrobo that lives in the random rock heap I have outside my home. He sits and suns himself all day long.

Las Panteras, after our championship.

dog pile of joy...despite losing. thats right children, pound out your misery.

Fernando on first!

Nely and her birthday donuts.

Little Geyli and her grandpappy.

My backyard on an early misty morning

my extremely pregnant landlady Mirian, who actually just had her baby the day before yesterday...a little baby boy named Eli! yay!

Rony and Mirian. Landlords of the future.

Little Elvin, practicing good oral hygiene.

My friend Aida's younger sister, Xiomara, with her new husband Marlon and their puppy, Tuta, in their new home.

Doesn't little Carlos sit like a king? He looks ever so benevolent, yet wise...

the little types of El Jicaro, scrubbin away.

Semana santa sunset.

permanent waves.

cotton candy evening

23 April 2010Hey, chochachos! Guess what? IT’S FAKE WINTER!!!!! A little old man told me on the bus like two months ago that we would experience an “invierno falso” in April, and he’s totally right (real winter begins in the middle of May). If it ain’t fake winter right now, then I’ll eat my mittens and hat (though not really, ‘cause I need those puppies!). Actually, that’s a lie. When Hondurans refer to “winter” they mean the rainy season, which if anything is actually HOTTER than summer because of the moisture-induced humidity. However, the rain storms cool everything off and so it’s totally worth it, 100 times, 1,000 times. So anyway, a month ago I was bitchin’ about how hot and dry it is, how there’s no water, how all the plants are dead…please consider such insignificant groanings null and void. Beginning about two weeks ago, we’ve had late-afternoon thunderstorms maybe every three or four days, with deliciously squishy results, foliage-wise. My basil is completely on steroids, and all the trees have suddenly exploded with leaves and new twigglies. The grass and weeds are growing like they’re 13-year-old boys, only without the painful self-awareness and wet dreams. My pila is filled with water regularly every other day, and the swimmin’ holes have swelled marvelously (here I could make another puberty-esque metaphor, but I’ll refrain as there might be children reading this). However, the rainy season isn’t just all rainbows and tambourines—there are evils afoot, too, which I shall list below in no significant order:

1. The beetles. The rains make all these huge, crunchy beetles emerge from somewhere, and they congregate in the evenings around the light. This means that while lying in my hammock, eating or reading or whatever, I am constantly plucking this plastic-enforced monsters off my shirt, my hair, my food, my skin, etc., though it’s a rather fruitless battle because no sooner do I yank one off and hurl his little scarab ass across the room does another dive-bomb me—they seem to love it. Also, the hammock lounge position (feet together, knees bent like a frog) means that there are gaping caves between my shorts and thighs, which is the perfect target for such kamikaze pilots…which is why I spend maybe a fourth of my evening fishing donut-hole sized insects out of my crotch.

2. The amphibians. Now, don’t get me wrong. Unlike every single Honduran ever, I am not deathly afraid of toads and their slightly less grotesque cousins, the frog. I actually like them. The rains, however, have encouraged them to emerge from their secret lairs carved into the sides of remote mountain ranges and they are taking over the damn place. At night, the toads hop into my house and lazily hunt the beetles that have turtled-over and wobble on their backs, tiny sticker legs waving around hopefully. That’s all fine and good. The frogs, aided by sticky feet, spider-man-frog it around the walls and ceiling, hanging out by the light and slurping down any and all flying insects. Fine by me. They also fill the night air with an incredible cacophony of different chirps, squawks, and croaks—it sounds like an intergalactic laser gun fight. Also great—if you think there is better falling asleep music, then you’re a liar, ‘cause there isn’t. Wonderful. What I DON’T approve of, however, is the frogs’ collective decision to turn my bathing barrel and pila into an all-night bath-house…and here I am referring to the infamous bathhouses of ill repute. You can also imagine my pila as a shadowy truck stop along a lone highway in the 1980s. Either way, there is a lot of mixing of bodily fluids and I often go out for a late-night pee, only to find various slimy green couples playing two-frog twister. One Friday, I left to go to Tegus for the day to do errands at the Peace Corps office. My neighbor Tina called me, very distressed, at about 10:00am, to inform me that I had “thousands of frog eggs floating in my pila.” She said she scooped out what she could but that there was still a lot in there. I returned home Saturday to find a thick blanket of tiny black tadpoles carpeting the bottom of my concrete pila, wriggling around like spermies. The shower barrel was spawn-free, but had two toad turds floating in it, which look just like mini dog turds. DAMN YOU, ANPHIBIANS. I called the kids over and we carefully filled 10 baggies with tadpoles, which we carried to the creek and released in a very Free Willy-esque moment. The rest I drained out and scrubbed down with soap…same with Turd Island. I’m touched these young lovers are sneaking out of their burrows to come tangle at my house, but if it happens again I’m gonna have to take serious measures. Like filling my pila with ginger-ale…boiling hot, Texas-style ginger ale!!!

I guess that’s it, complaint-wise. I love the thunderstorms…the anticipation as the gray-purple mass forms on the horizon and heads toward us, usually from the north-east. I love the flash of light followed by sharp crackles and booms, all the crazy pageantry of nature that we Californians can’t understand (no summer rain!). I love the sheets of water pouring off my zinc roof, and the roar it creates, so loud I can’t even carry a conversation with myself (“Another peanut M&M, Hayley?” “WHAT. EMINEM SUCKS. WHAT?" And I love the sudden greenification of my house and the hills around it. So even if this is a fake winter…I’m diggin’ it. Just don’t plant your corn yet. I won’t say much about Semana Santa except that it was awesome. I slightly overdid it the first day and spend every waking moment in the ocean, which resulted in a) a ridiculous sunburn, b) painful, blistered lips, and c) an inner AND outer ear infection, in BOTH ears. Totally worth it, though. The waves were 6-feet-high every day and my buddies and I spent our days rolling and riding around on them, eating toasty sandwiches and drinking icy beverages of fruity origins. Sand castles were also made, and I may or may not have pissed off an entire bar full of people by abusing my water-gun privileges and exercising my shoddy aiming skills. Fortunately, I averted the mob by blending into the crowd, something I do naturally in Central America.

Our baseball “championship” (April 17) went about as expected, which is to say we lost. Reitoca hosted it this year, but it sucked because unlike previous years, the Peace Corps has no baseball funds, or they seem to have it tied up in a mysterious “coaches training” that was supposed to happen in February and has yet to be mentioned. Either way, no dough for championships, regional or otherwise, and certainly none for the National Championship. In previous years it’s been held in Tegucigalpa in a real stadium, all expenses paid for the kids—they got hotel rooms, food, medals, even a trip to a children’s museum. Not no more…now we don’t even have funds to pay for a real umpire to come to the regional championships. Which, I suppose, would be pointless, considering there aren’t trophies or a National competition. Either way, with my buddy David’s departure date looming (this Monday! Tear.), we decided to have one anyway, so the kids could have some closure (since Reitoca is the only other community nearby with a baseball team, once he leaves, we’ll have no one to play against until they get another volunteer, which isn’t until September). However, it was essentially like any other scrimmage, except David marked the field with ashes and we made the kids sing the national anthem before they played (horrific disaster…one of my kids Kenssy conducted it, and none of the kids followed her…they finished the song six different times). I only brought 14 kids this time, because I’ve been having lower numbers (no one wants to be a loser, I guess). One of my best pitcher’s moms refused to let him come, because she was “sick of watching him lose.” Not that she’s ever been to a game. So poor Enner had to pitch the whole time. As it was, they played pretty good, and we even scored a run! Reitoca got three, thus beating us with a resounding 3-1 final score, and Las Panteras seemed no worse for the wear, as I suspect they now go into games assuming they will lose. It was fun on the way over, though…I taught them all Spanish versions of those dorky call-and-repeat spirit songs we used to sing in T-ball, as well as the ever popular “GIMME A P! (P!) GIMME AN A! (A!)…” etc. They belted them out all the way to Reitoca and begged to sing them on the way home, too, even though we’d lost. So at least they’re good losers…though when we entered Alubarén proper they all started screaming and cheering and shouting “WE WON! WE WON!” to the people outside, which we most certainly had not. I didn’t stop them, though. A little self-deception never hurt anyone, that’s what I always say.

As I mentioned, David, my “pretend site-mate” and one-man adventure cohort, is on his way out; his two-year alarm clock is finally going off. Since he doesn’t live in my town, my day-to-day life won’t change much, but I’ll miss him coming over on the weekends once a month, to scramble around in the hills behind my house, cool off in the swimmin’ hole, lie in the hammocks and stuff our faces with candy and trail mix sent from the states, all the while greasing the gossip chains of my neighborhood as folks stand around and whisper about how “that other gringo” spends the night and therefore must be my boyfriend. It’s hard to explain that actually, American culture permits that a lady and a dude can be platonic friends and spend our evenings alone together, not boning but playing Hangman on my wall with sidewalk chalk while eating buckets of homemade pesto and drinking two liters of Coke, each. Ah, the differences of culture. Anyway, David and I decided we should have one final fling, and he came over last week to celebrate our Closing of Ceremonies. We made a picnic (rice crispy treats, sandwiches (tuna and cheese on wheat bread; god bless you Tegus supermarket) and a big thermos of ice cold homemade lemonade) and we set off into the jungley hills behind my house, Igor racing around our heels. Determined to make it a genuine Adventure, we scanned the horizon and declared it time to finally climb the abrupt peak that juts out of the mountain but which we’d never scaled. We circled around behind it and, lacking a path, just bushwacked our way to the top. There we ate our lunch (Igor had dog biscuits sent down from gramma and grampa Kercher), peered down at Alubarén, and reflected on life. Getting down was, for some unexplainable reason, extremely treacherous and I led us down several VERY wrong paths (all ended in some abrupt abyss) until we finally stumbled upon the way we’d come up, which turned out to be the only way that didn’t involve “that god-damn gully AGAIN!”. Stupid gully. Then we tramped up and over and down and through the woods, along the cow paths, until we got to the swimmin’ hole, where we splashed around and ate the last of our ‘crispies and drank more lemonade. Finally, we headed up to my favorite sittin’ hill and watched the sun set, slurping down the last tangy drops of god’s gift to beverages. A remarkable Closing of Ceremonies, indeed. Then we headed back to the Tarantula Oven for a pesto, soda, and candy. So long, pal.

Such is life. My time to peace out is fast approaching (I only have 5 months left) and after that I have no idea where I’ll go or what I’ll do. Any ideas?

Bed tiiiiiiime………just me and Fanny the Fan.

Love,Hayley

Henri, my second-best pitcher.

Enner, my first-best pitcher.

Las Panteras de Alubaren!

On the bus ride over (before their souls were crushed by defeat)

well if that aint a rooster in a windowsill

mouth-themed art.

little guys coloring their mouths.

view from the path on the way to the school...alubaren is waaaay down there in the valley.

the third grade penpals! with their charming yet grossly incompetent teacher.

Igor and Kaiser, sopping wet after a trip to the swimmin hole.

leapin in!! dont break your face!

noel and his nature-made waterslide.

is douglas peering at us over those shades because he's cool...or because they're super-perscription and his eyes are aching?? child torture for photo ops is a large part of what peace corps volunteers do in the field.

three generations of amazing women (dona anita, chepa, and maricela). all great friends of mine.

27 March 2010Hey, chochachos! So my buddy Patrick got this awesome purple-camouflage t-shirt, which, being too small for him, was bequeathed to me. It reads “BUTT SWEAT AND TEARS,” which is 1) hilarious and 2) entirely accurate of my current situation. I’m not actually crying (though I did weep slightly last night watching “Milk” on ‘ol laptoppy) but I got swamp-ass like you wouldn’t even BELIEVE. Seriously. Honduras is all like “oo, you likes the heet, si? I geef you MORE!!” and totally throwing the lever to the “Butt Sweat 24-7” level of solar radiation. Anyway. I just thought you guys might like to hear about that.

I also have swamp ass on my throat. Little weird blisters that pop and sting—right in the creases of my neck fat, formed from the slight inclination of the head as a result from reading in the hammock. March and April are the hottest time of year in the south of Honduras, as everyone gazes ruefully at hazy blue horizon, waiting for the rain clouds that won’t appear until mid-May (save for a freak rain shower that fell a couple weeks ago and rained out baseball practice! Delicious). All the plants have transformed into brittle, leafless skeletons and the dust is everywhere, coating all surfaces in a nice gritty filth. The cicadas drone incessantly and the toads hide in my latrine, looking for the Moist. Poor Igor just lies on the floor and pants frantically, though he is a warm-weather dog through and through and does much better here than I’m sure he’ll do in the states (the dope shivers with cold whenever we go to Tegucigalpa). The water shortage continues, though I really can’t complain because I have my whole pila to myself and most people have to share it with mom, dad, grandpa, grandma, kids, aunts, uncles…everyone in the house. So I let Nely come over and wash clothes and take baths all the time. Sometimes, I just lie down in my underpants and let Igor lick me clean…dog saliva is antibacterial, you know. The only good thing about the dry season here is the mangos are beginning to ripen, so I can switch from crunching on sour green ones (still tasty) to slurping down delicious sticky orange awesomeness. Also, “jocotes” are in season now, also known as “plums,” (ciruelas) though they do not resemble North American plums in any way (they’re like little round balls of sweetish flesh, about the size of a walnut, with a huge pit). Maranones are ripe now, which I have plenty of in my backyard. They taste like 100 gallons of butt sweat, though, so I give them all away. Fun fact—the nut on top of the fruit is where cashews come from! SCIENCE. Anyway, bitch bitch moan moan I’m hot and such, but it ain’t so bad cause 1) I borrowed the fan from the library, which has no electricity anyway, and 2) the swimmin’ holes still have water, so goin’ on adventures is always fun. Last week, Nely and the kids and I (plus Igor) hiked for about an hour and a half to get to these amazing pools that are SO deep…you can jump off rocky boulders above and never touch the bottom. Plus, there is a shallow pool where the kids can splash around. We brought little bean tamales and it was delightful.

Work is goin’ awesome. The little penpal project I started up with the third-graders is adorable—they sent letters back and forth with an incredibly smart first grade bilingual classroom in Minnesota, taught by a former Honduran Peace Corps volunteer, Anne. It’s kind of sad, because the kids in Minnesota are a) 6 and 7 years old and b) learning Spanish for the first time, and their letters are still better written than my third graders. But the kids get a kick out of it, and draw great pictures to accompany their letters (which I send off in a manila envelope). So far we’re only written twice, once introducing ourselves and talking about favorites and hobbies, and this past week, where the kids wrote about Semana Santa (Holy Week), which is exactly like American spring break, except instead of teenagers making bad decisions, it’s chock-full of Jesus, excursions to the nearest water source for swimming, and the consumption of fish-cake soup. The little letters explained as such. It’s funny, though, because the third-graders all write little adult-ish phrases in the letters, like beginning with a “Hello, dear friend, allow me to hope that you are currently blessed with fine health and your family as well” (though totally botched spelling-wise) and “may the tiny baby-God bless you today and always.” Those Spanish-immersion blondies in Minnesota are gonna be like “que????” Their letters are pretty funny too, though damn impressive—they throw the “le” and “se” around like it’s their job and their spelling is excellent. My favorite one was from a kid who wrote (in Spanish) “I’m so happy you are my new friend. I used to not have any friends, but now I have exactly 101 and you are one of them. You are my best friend in the whole world and I love you so much.” I want to meet this 6-year-old with so much love.

Aside from that, I’m hiking up mountains twice a week to visit two aldea schools for my oral hygiene project, totally yellin’ at ‘em about cavities and such. The kids are little angels and always so eager to participate—it’s adorable. This week, we colored pictures of the mouth and learned to identify all the different components. It’s a damn good thing I’m a Scientist. In my village journeys, I’ve been able to form a closer friendship with a woman named Aida and her family, including little baby Geyly, who is now four-months old. Every Wednesday, on my way down the mountain after Colgate, I stop at their bright-green, open-air house and have lunch with her. Or rather, she puts a huge plate of beans and rice and tortillas in front of me and watches me eat it, concerned with my “tiny waist” and lack of boobs (seriously!). In addition to little “Hayley,” she has a four-year-old son named Esteven who has the raddest bowl-cut ever. He likes to show me his blocks that his dad made for him, and is also a fan of watching me stuff my face with food. I’m also friends with Aida’s sister, Xiomara, and her husband, Marlon. They’re newlyweds and have decided to stay childless for the first couple years, which is very rare in Honduran culture. They’re in the middle of building a house (made of mud-and-straw bricks), and are sleeping in the half of it that has a roof while they finish the rest. They’re all really wonderful people and I’m delighted to have some real friends outside of Alubarén proper. It’s like Burrito Tuesday all over again (this thing my friends and I did in high school than involved eating burritos on Tuesday), only instead of burritos it’s beans and rice and tortillas, and instead of Tuesday it’s Wednesday.

Baseball season is, thank tiny-baby-God, finally almost nearing an end. We had our last “friendly scrimmage” today, in Reitoca. I’ve spent the past month convincing parents to let their kids play, despite the fact that no one wants their kid to be on a losing team, and did much damage to my “we’re improving everyday!” argument when Reitoca took us to school in the mini-van of Pain today, beating us 4-0 (our most painful loss yet). We took the bus over early this morning, all sweaty-eyed and bushy-tailed, dressed to the nines in our sassy golden get-up. The game started out all right, and we came very close to scoring runs several times (bases loaded, with my best batters at the plate…) but never managed to get a point. Meanwhile, Reitoca was playing just as crappily, with just one point to our zero. Then, in the fourth inning, with two kids on base, their best batter slammed a ball into outer-space and won them three additional points with his fancy homerun. After we lost, my kids didn’t seem too disappointed—we’re used to being losers now—and instead ran around giggling and hamming it up for the camera, while I took individual shots of them posing in front out our team flag, one knee up and one knee down, with their hand on a bat, just like the cheesy pictures we take in American little league. The parents were pissed, though, and much berating was going on until I finally lost it and yelled at them (the parents) that if they couldn’t support the kids positively then they shouldn’t come to the games (a message that needed to be said, but I shouldn’t have lost my temper, because know they’ll all talk smack about me behind my back). Anyway. We bused it home, I laid in the hammock and stuffed my face with avocado, tomatoes and basil salad (all local grown, chumps) and drank chai iced tea (thanks mom and dad!) with my new best friend, Fanny the Fan (I’m all like, Hey, Fanny, do you like tarantulas? And she’s all “Noo-oo-oo” while shaking her head slowly to-and-fro). Anyway, just three more weeks until the “championship” on April 17 (though it will be essentially the same thing as a scrimmage since Peace Corps has no money in the baseball program for trophies, trips to Tegus, or anything of that sort) and baseball will have ended until next year, at which point the next sucker volunteer can have ‘em. I should have formed a “hangin’ out in the swimmin’ hole” team.

Hella bedtimes, folks…I gotta rest up for my Semana Santa adventures, which are beginning soon and involve salt water and hammocks. MYSTERIOUS!!

Love,Hayley

muddy fingahs!!!!!

birthday partyyyyyy

mud cake and a mud heart!!

FELIZ CUMPLEANOS JILI SORPRESA

me and igor on the kitchen floor

douglas, the great chicken wrangler.

thankfully the toy is covering his business this time

11 March 2010

Hey, chochachos! If my writing seems more sage and geriatric today, that is because ya’ll are accustomed to reading the words of a 23-year-old, and this chochacha is now 24. So, please attribute any sudden leaps in wisdom and/or insight to my advancing age and the gifts—and burdens, yes, there are burdens as well—that come with it.

As the Hondurans say, I was “a little baby once again” this past Tuesday, March 9th. My second birthday in Honduras, this time fortunately bereft of extremely tiny panties, which were given to me in great numbers last year by various individuals. I woke up early because I had to get out to a village (Alto de las Mesas) to start a Colgate project with the school there, in which the kiddies brush their teeth with hopeless abandon every day after snack-time and receive weekly lectures regarding oral hygiene and the toothly sciences. This week, the lecture was just on how to brush your teeth correctly, though, which was nice and easy. Unfortunately, it meant brushing my teeth six times in 30 minutes, as I chose to do a demonstration with each grade, even though it’s a one-room school with one teacher for the whole lot (60 kids total). Let’s face it; I just love brushing my teeth. It’s so awesome. Anyway, I stayed the whole day, and clamored down the mountain (to get to the school from the dirt road, you have to walk up a mega-steep dusty narrow path that edges along the rim of a steep mountain, banked by corn and sugar cane plants) with the teacher, Maricela (who is also in my English class). As we approached the main road, we heard a truck coming (free jalon!) so I started to race down the hill like a dang goat, which was stupid because goat I am not. About 8 feet from the road, in plain site of the driver of the truck and several people standing around outside a house, I totally ate it and slid down face-first, my skirt all sliding around to suggestive leg-levels and my glasses all goin’ askew. I wasn’t hurt, except for a skinned leg and arm, but jesus in a juice box was I embarrassed. Everyone rushed over and was hella concerned, tryin’ to clean me up…meanwhile I’m covered in red dirt and laughing like crazy. Awesome. The driver of the truck did give us a jalon back to Alubarén, though, so that was rad. Then I went home for a quick shower and lunch before my 4pm English class. As I approached my house, the neighbor kids came streaming out yelling my name like they always do, trying to drag me into their house to see the surprise they had for me. Unfortunately, I had to pry their feeble little baby hands off my skirt and make them wait until that evening, because I was all kinds of rushin’.

Off I dashed to English class, where I told my class of teachers that I had prepared a special surprise for them, in honor of my birthday. Murmurs of joy spread throughout the class, which were abruptly extinguished when, cackling madly, I whipped out the manila envelope filled with pre-tests they all had to take (which I should have given to them on Day 1, whoopsies). The test was hellsa chunkity, like 5 pages, so I just sat and dangled my legs from the desk while they grumbled their way through it. As they finished about 50 minutes later, they wandered outside and waited on the little soccer-playin’-concrete-slab (or so I though). When the last teacher handed me her test, I stepped outside to call the others in, only to find them GONE. I was like AW HELL NO YOU CHEATIN’ DESERTERS and such, full of Anger, until I saw one of them heading back into the school with a huge bottle of soda in her arms. Yay! Birthday Soda! I ducked back in so she wouldn’t see that I saw her coming, and busied myself writing on the board while they whispered and giggled outside. Suddenly, all 15 of them burst back into the room, grinning like little kids, bearing a little sugary-bread thing they’d bought at the pulperia and covered with 24 matches. They began to sing “Happy Birthday” (in English!) and took pictures of me with their camera phones while I blew out the “candles.” Then they doused me with bags of water (it’s typical to attack the birthday girl or boy with eggs and other crap, so I guess I got off lucky), handed out bags of chips and lolly-pops and cups of soda, and we participated in the great age-old tradition of forfeiting school time for consuming delicious treats. By the time we finished it was 5:30, so I just let everyone go home half an hour early. I walked up the road to my house, where Alison, Noel, Douglas, Cristina, and Yesica were waiting for me. They made me close my eyes and lead me through the house into the backyard, before finally arriving at the base of a big orange tree. “SORPRESA!!” they all screamed, and I opened my eyes to find a succulent mud birthday cake waiting for me at the base of the tree, complete with 24 little sticks, masquerading as candles. They’d also made a giant mud heart with my name inside, and with cinders from the fire had carefully written “FELIZ CUMPLEANOS JILI SORPRESA!!” on the concrete. Then they made me sit down and each presented me with a little hand-made envelope, covering in drawings, with sweet little birthday letters inside. My eyeballs, they did sweat a little, I must say…those kids have a vice grip on my soul. Then we trooped inside and made chocolate-banana smoothies, like we did last year, and sliced open a big juicy watermelon. My landlords gave me a huge sleeveless muscle-tee that I can never wear in public, with a picture of a Honduran beach on the front. Maybe I’ll wear it to baseball practice one day and freak out off the adolescent boys. Tina gave me an apple and a chocolate bar, and Lisbeth gave me a pencil, an eraser, a pencil sharpener, and a pen (her pencil case seems to have gone on a diet recently, I wonder why that might be?). But the best was that mud cake, which is now dry and sitting on a paper plate on my shelf in my room. Though I will admit I snuck a tiny bite before I put it up for display…god, those kids know how to mix dirt and water. Like imported Swiss fudge on ‘roids.

That’s about it for the Birthday Special…baseball is goin’ great, my little misfits are having a wonderful time, and getting excited for our up-coming scrimmage in Reitoca on the 27th of this month. Colgate, Joven a Joven and TEAM are all cominn’ along beautifully, and I’m gettin’ ready to start a Nature Club in the school. Finally, I get to start the pinecone-art sweatshop I’ve always dreamed of (though pinecones don’t exist in Alubarén, I have a huge bag of them I collected when I lived in Santa Rita).

My bed just texted me “haylz come on man it’s so l8t, come put on yr shortz and loser mouth-guard and get yr slumberz on”…so I guess I’d better go.

Looooove

Hayley

P.S. Birthday Update: I got a sweet ride to Tegus on Friday afternoon and met up with some friends, who treated me to surprise party with cold beers and an incredible smorgesborge of fancy cakes (chocolate caramel, cheesecake with raspberries, and carrot cake ) and ice cream. And they sang so beautifully!! You guys is the best.

beach day! the whole gang...except for little andri, who was passed out in the shade.

esau found some cangrejas...which he brought back to alubaren in a pepsi bottle and then fried in lard and bullion cubes.

douglas playin with the boats.

splashin' around with grandma

SO SALTYYYYY

cute swimsuit little lady

grandma tina and her nietos

ah, cedeno...

esau, nuria, lisbeth, alison and noel...in the swishy swashy warm waters

douglas in his little sand lounge chair

they'll be pickin sand out of their butts for weeks

diggin and jumpin

playin soccer!! before some chumps swiped it

douglas playin in the sand

"I'm on a boat, ******-******!" says Andri. "Got my flippy-floppies!" agrees Douglas.

the kids and igor with some side-walk chalk art they did on my house...yeah i been doin some external decorating lately.

the serious shot.

21 February 2010

Hey, chochachos! It’s about 8:00pm on Sunday night, and I am waiting quite patiently for my Hayley Rice to finish….which is, in case the reader is wondering, is rice. With tomatoes and green peppers and onions. Hells yes Also, I have some spicy sausage I am gonna throw in there, and then throw in my MOUTH. Naum naum naum, naum.

So I’m a big fan of the concept of “Beach Day!”, in which one packs the car with sandwiches, soda, and Frisbees, and takes to the beach with one’s buddies for swimming and adventures. Honduras is nestled in the tender bosom of not one but two oceans, so in my hunk of time here I’ve had many opportunities to embark on such Beach Days. My neighbors, “Nely and the kids” (a nickname I have for them, which my buddy Patrick says should always be followed by “The Country Jam-Band”) always stay and take care of Igor while I cavort around the country, my pockets heavy with US tax-payers’ money, and I always feel guilty that I can travel about so easily and they can’t, ‘cause they’re hella poor. So we decided as an early “Semana Santa” adventure, we would embark on a Beach Day adventure of our own. I went to the market on Thursday and bought all the fixins’ for tamales (corn flour mix, potatoes, chicken, onions, sweet pepper, vegetable-based lard, spices and salts) and Friday afternoon we made about 60 chunkity ‘ol tamales, wrapped up steamy in huge green banana leaves. Then we packed baskets with blankets, towels, extra clothes, water, sunscreen, the works. Saturday morning, at 5:00am, my landlord Rony, who is married to Nely’s half-sister Mirian, pulled up outside the house with his two kids, Esau and Nuria (and his pockets full of gas money, provided by Uncle Sam). Nely, little Douglas, and her dad Ruben (the old man with Parkinson’s, if you recall) sat up front while the rest of us (Tina, Elias, Esau, Nuria, Lisbeth, Andri, Alison, Noel, and me) settled onto the foam pad we’d placed in the truck bed. The kids chattered excitedly about what the beach would be like (none of them had ever been to the ocean), while little motion-sick Alison barfed continuously into various plastic bags, which were then ceremoniously dumped over the edge of the car into the dirt as we flew along. We watched the stars disappear and the sun come up over the mountains as we drove along, and after an hour and a half we reached the paved road. By 8:00am, we arrived at the southern beach town of Cedeno, parked the car near a little shack at one end of the beach, and unloaded ourselves into the sand. This particular shack provided chairs, shade, and hammocks to the folks who purchased their wares, so we bought a bunch of sodas to complement our bucket packed to the brim with tamales. The kids stripped down to their underwear in about three seconds and sprinted toward the surf. “AHHH IT’S SALTY!! IT’S SALTY!! OH NO!!!” screamed Alison, totally upset by the fact she couldn’t drink it. “MY EYES! THEY BURN!” They quickly got used to the salt water, though, and from that moment on until we left at 3:00pm, the kids didn’t leave the ocean once (except to ingest tamales as quickly as Science would allow). I had brought my Frisbee and Noel his new soccer ball my dad sent him, but both toys went basically unused as the kids were way too enthralled by the crashing waves. We played a Catcher in the Rye type game in which I would stand waist-deep in the water and snag the kids as the receding surf dragged them out…then, as the waves rolled in, I would launch them like little brown surf-boards and they would “surf” in. The only people who didn’t enjoy the water were Ruben, who shuffled around dressed for the office in leather shoes, pinstriped slacks, and a long-sleeved cotton shirt, and Douglas and Andri, the two-year-olds, who were so terrified by the immense body of water that they refused to even go near it. However, there were little fishing boats pulled up on the sand, and they had a great time climbing around and playing in the sand (Douglas tried to eat it, and then sat there gagging until someone ran over and rinsed his mouth out). At 3pm, we piled back into the truck and set off for home. This time, the ride was much more unpleasant, because the sun-burned, tired kids were very cranky and we were all melting under the blistering sun. At least Alison wasn’t puking nonstop again; she passed out in my lap after 10 minutes in and slept almost the whole way home. When we arrived at 6:00pm, everyone took baths and then we made a quick dinner of eggs, chorizo, cream, and tortillas before calling it an early night. The kids passed out on the floor, on top of the same dirty pad we’d had in the truck, mumbling about waves (I bet they all pissed the bed). Hells yes Beach Day!

I’ve suddenly found myself rather busy, which is nice. I began TEAM (Teaching English and Methodology) classes this week, with 16 teachers, and that went quite smoothly. I went by the high school one morning, to recruit baseball players, and mentioned to the principal that I’d like to start a project called “Youth to Youth: Work Skills and Orientation”; a 10-session, 40-hour work-shop that helps the kids identify their aptitudes and labor interests and, once they’ve identified possible careers or jobs they might enjoy, orients them on how to pursue them. It’s very intense and work-heavy, both for the facilitator and the participants, and I’ve been stressing about it because my counter-part that was trained in how to facilitate the program with me has since jumped ship and enrolled in the Police Academy—I’m flyin’ solo. So anyway, I sit down with the principal, and she whips out her little calendar, and figures out when the 11th and 12th graders could sacrifice an entire morning. We decide that Fridays would be best, and she announces that we must begin the NEXT DAY. I stay up until freakin’ 2:00am creating all the visual aids I would need and preparing, and wake up at 5:45am to I can get to the school by 7:00am. Despite my sleep deprivation and nervousness, the workshop went really well for the first day and the kids seemed into it (the methodology is excellent and uses a lot of games and activities). I enjoy it, sort of…though pre-schoolers and little guys like that are much more my thing and dealing with 37 high schoolers was definitely a challenge for me…they definitely think I’m super lame (probably because I kept telling jokes and doing things that can only be fairly described as such). We had the next session the next day, Friday, and from now one will have one session per week until we finish. Oh heavens.

On the baseball front, Las Panteras have suffered a revolution and an abrupt re-enrollment. After we lost our first game, all the big kids that have played baseball for two years decided baseball is no longer cool, and ceremoniously quit (including my pitchers, catchers, and best basemen). I tried everything—talking to their parents, talking to them, going to the school—but it’s a closed case. Baseball is officially Hella Lame. I went to the school and recruited heavily, and all this week I’ve had numbers higher than I’ve seen all year—20 kids came on Wednesday, and 24 on Friday. But the dynamics are totally different. Before, the kids were the same ones who played with John (the volunteer before me)—generally well-behaved, successful kids whose parents are involved in the community and the churches. And, since they began with John, most of the kids were now pretty big and pretty good players. However, since they all quit, the ranks have been re-filled with all the little ragamuffins—the kids who roam the pueblo all day because their parents don’t care, little urchins who do poorly in school and stay up until 10:00pm every night playing soccer in the street because they don’t have enforced bedtimes. A lot of them have drunks for dads, and these kids have mouths on ‘em that would make a very surly pirate blush and say, “Well, I never!”. Essentially, these little guys, the smelly kids at school, have become the core of Las Panteras. Baseball is no longer for the cool kids, it’s for the underdogs. This interesting social phenomenon came about very abruptly—I didn’t specifically invite this crowd of kids, I just issued a general invitation at the school and showed up a the baseball field the next day, expecting nobody to show and instead being greeted by 20 very punctual children, all eager to play. It’s frustrating, because the regional championship is in April and I’m now starting from scratch with kids who have no idea how to play baseball, but it’s awesome having a group of kids who are just there to play and not obsessing over whether or not we win our little scrimmages against Reitoca. And the best part of all is that these kids, who are always getting yelled at in school and bear the reputation of the “bad kids” have now accomplished two practices in which they were as good as GOLD. No cussing, no fighting, no rudeness (except for one kid who straight-up peed on another kid…needless to say, Pee Boy has been removed from the team). Maybe this will act as a catalyst in a life-changing metamorphosis in these children, and then Disney will make a movie about it. The rag-tag group of misfits who manage to win the big game…just like in Wet Hot American Summer. Only instead of calling it off and running off into the woods, we actually will play and it will be Awesome.

Love,

Hayley

P.S. I just found a tarantula the size of my face chillin on my bedroom wall. But my neighbor squished it with a broom so it's cool.

Igor and our basil forest. yes, i eat pesto weekly, so what?

Las Panteras, posing in my yard during our after-party (celebrating that we...lost? i dont know.)

Some of the kiddies in the Readers Club, with notebooks and McDonald's toys. Ah, literacy!

Making egg-carton dragons.

Aurelio is too busy to smile.

Little Elvin, my neighbor, gettin' to work.

Nice polar bear Cristian!

Dancing polar bears, la la la...

Escarleth and friends gettin' busy durin arts and farts and crafts.

6 February 2010

Hey, chochachos! Well hooty-hoo, lookit that, a whole month has passed since my last blog. You guys have probably been super bored. I hope you all took advantage of your new-found free time and tackled those projects you’ve had hovering for the past few years (200 piece jigsaw puzzles, cleaning your toenails, writing your thesis, etc.). Anyway, you can put down that letter to grandma, because I got a hot new steamy blog all ready for ya’s. Topped with Funyons!

Today was a sweaty bummer. After training Las Panteras in the stupid sport of baseball for the past three months (practicing EVERY DAY for two hours in the punishing Honduran sun), we finally had our first game today—a scrimmage against neighbors Reitoca, who are trained by my fellow Peace Corps buddy David. Now, last year, we managed to lose every single game we played against Reitoca except for one, and this year it’s been rough going trying to get the kids to show up for practice—they’re all like “Why play if we’re just gonna lose?” and “We’d rather play soccer!” Of course, there are still loads of kids who want to play, mainly groups of 8-year-old girls who idolize me. I can’t seem to get the 12-year-old boys to follow suit. Anyway, despite the resounding negativity, I felt confident that we could win the game with a little luck, and so we set out parading behind our banner toward the field at about 8:00am this morning. We got there, marked the field with ashes the kids brought from their mom’s wood-ovens, warmed up, and began the game. In the first inning, Reitoca didn’t get a single player on base, and we scored a run with a “jonron!” It was awesome. 1-0, bitches. Then the next inning, no changes. Then, in the third inning, Reitoca got lucky and scored three runs, mainly due to a crazy fluke batter who sent the ball into the bowels of left field, leaving our outfielders searching in the weeds. Finally, we reached the final inning (we only play five here). We batted second, and we found ourselves with two outs, bases loaded. It was Kelvin’s turn to bat, a new-comer who has a lot of spunk but whose technique is basically “swing wildly at anything, no matter what.” I kept yelling “Wait for the good ones! Don’t swing!,” hoping he’d get walked to first base and thus earn us a run. Pitch one. STRIKE. Pitch two. STRIKE. Pitch three….WHAM! Kelvin smacks it, straight to…first base. Our guy on third runs as hard as he can toward home, but the first baseman stomps the bag, thus ending the game, before our guy can cross the plate. We were soooo close to tying it up, but it just wasn’t in the cards…my kids were furious. Half the bigger kids threw their gloves down and stomped off, others dissolved into tears, were teased by the others, and then tried to fight them. It was a disaster. After screaming “Come BACK here, you guys! C’mon!” the kids finally grouped up so I could give them a little pep talk. We almost did it, you guys played great, don’t feel bad, we’ll get ‘em next time…but you could tell they didn’t want to hear it. I invited them all to come to my house at 2:00pm for the after-party (which I’d planned as a hopeful celebratory event, alas) and we went our separate ways, while Reitoca drove slowly down the road in their giant truck whooping and taunting. It was pretty sad.

At two, all the kids showed up (each player toting about 5 siblings), and I cranked up the Rolling Stones and handed out puzzles, paper and markers, and the kids amused themselves playing tag and coloring while I dished out watermelon, popcorn, and home-made orange smoothies to 33 children. Then we circled up under my big cherry tree and talked about the game. Since they were all much more chilled out, this time it went a lot better, and we talked about how close the game had been and how if it wasn’t for that crazy left-field slammer we would have won. We talked about sportsmanship and how we weren’t always going to lose; how the next game could be different and how important it is to keep trying and not give up. Blah, blah, you guys are losers, you’re never going to account to anything…I like to tell it to ‘em straight. Then I brought out a big piñata filled with candy and little toys, and the kids smashed it to pieces. Only two kids got cracked in the head! New record! Then I sent them home and spent the next hour picking up watermelon rinds and plastic cups. Boo…urns.

Oh, well. I’m thinking of making t-shirts for everyone that says “There’s No Crying in Baseball…Even when you lose every single game, ever, because your coach secretly hates baseball and is no good at teaching it.” Wouldn’t that be cute?

The dry season is in full-swing. Or should I say, Honduras, most especially the south, is getting totally boned by a terrible draught. And it’s not consensual boning, if you receive my meaning. And I think that you do. Every sponge-full of water taken from the pila is measured and used carefully, and every drop of dirty water is conserved to dump in the toilet or sprinkle on my Basil Forest I’ve planted in the yard. The guy in charge of opening and closing the water valves in the community has become a hated man, as every day that goes by without water, everyone mutters, “That guy NEVER gives me water.” People accuse others of sneaking up and closing the valves a little after he leaves, so less water leaves, leaving more for themselves when it’s their turn. When the water does come, it comes in spurts and dribbles, and people stand agonized by their pilas, hoping it will be enough to add a couple inches of water. There are days when I have not a single drop, and I can’t bathe, can’t brush my teeth, can’t wash my clothes, can’t flush out the latrine, can’t even drink (on those days, I head sheepishly down to my neighbors, who often have water when I don’t, and vice-versa—we’re on different water lines). The other day my landlord woke me up at 6:00am hollering my name at the gate, and I walked outside rubbing my eyes to the sight of Rony standing on the steps in a towel—“Hayley, we haven’t got any water—can I take a bath here?” It’s an exercise in community support, because as much as I hate to give away even a drop of my precious water, I know there will be a time when I’ll have to go clean up at their house, too. The hills have turned brown, the river is totally dry, and all the soft luscious green plants have dried out and turned into vicious thorns and spines. The air is hot and dry all day long, and only at dusk do we get any kind of relief from the heat. Many of the corn and bean crops suffered from our dry winter and people are going hungry. The good news is that the mango trees are flowering and some of the other dry-season fruit trees are producing, so money can soon be made selling that produce in the market in Tegucigalpa.

Next Monday, school begins, thus ending the 4-month summer vacation for the kids, and for me as well. I’ve spent my summer break doing daily baseball and twice-weekly “Readers Club” in the library, and that’s about it. Bout time for some real work…I was beginning to get incredibly lazy. We’re going to reduce baseball to Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and the Readers Club has finished. It was great while it lasted, though…the kids loved it. The little guys came on Monday mornings, and the big kids on Wednesdays. First, the kids spent about half an hour reading silently to themselves, choosing from the books I’d laid out on the tables. Then, they circle up, and each kid shares the book he read and what it was about. Then, I read a story out loud, and then the kids retire to the tables for a related art project. For example, after we read “The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush,” all the kids were given a sheet of white paper and watercolors and painted sunsets. Or another time, we read “Lars the Polar Bear,” and the kids glued cotton balls to cut-outs of polar bears and glued them to Artic scenes they painted themselves. To celebrate the last meeting, this week we read “The Paper-Bag Princess” and “Leo and Memo,” both of which feature dragons and/or crocodiles. Then I handed out egg-cartons and they painted them green (though most of them opted to paint them multi-colored for some reason) and we turned them into scary, toothy reptilian monsters. Then I handed out as prizes some notebooks Mom’s friend Leetha had sent me, and some crappy little McDonald’s toys I’d had donated. And that was that! The kids were all begging me to keep the club going, but we can’t do it in the mornings because they have class, and I won’t have time to do it in the afternoons. But our new superintendent is on the Library Committee, so I’m hoping to get him to force the teachers to take their classes to the library once a week for silent reading or story hour, something they flat-out refused to do last year.

I’ll be starting “Team 2” in a week or so, which will be the same English classes I was giving to the teachers as the year before, only now it’s a level up. I’ll also be starting my “Yo Merezco” abstinence-education and female-empowerment workshop with the fifth and sixth-grade girls. I’ll continue doing oral-hygiene education in the village schools with free toothbrushes and toothpaste for all the kids, courtesy of Colgate, and I’ll also continue with my Pregnant Women’s Club and Hypertension Workshops in the Health Center. In March, I’ll begin a three-month workshop called “Youth to Youth,” which orientates and trains junior and seniors in high school in how to prepare themselves for the work-force after high school—gets them thinking about their characteristics and aptitudes, about what sort of work they would enjoy, or whether they would be better suited as entrepreneurs, and how to successfully apply for a job. Plus we throw in healthy doses of decision-making, self-esteem improvement, and life-skills such as good communication and positive coexistence with other people. Should be fun, but the manual is very complicated and I’m nervous because the counter-part I was supposed to do it with has left to join the police academy, so I have to train someone new. Finally, I’m going to start a Nature Club in the elementary school and give classes on environment education, and the kids are going to get baby trees through an NGO called “Trees for the Future.” They’ll tend these fruit tree saplings themselves, and then they get to take them home and plant them in their homes. Oh, and we’re going to do pen-pals with another third-grade class in the states!

At the end on the month, I’ll have my annual “Re-Connect” conference in which all the Youth Development volunteers get together to share knowledge and stuff. I’m psyched though, ‘cause I’m going to leave a couple days early and go camping in La Tigra national forest with some fellow volunteers. Then, a week later, I’m going to go climb the highest peak in Honduras, Montana de Celaque! I’m gonna capture a gnome and roast him over a spit. No reason. Just feel like it.

Finally, in political news, Pepe Lobo took up the charge as Honduras’ new president a couple weeks ago, amid much fanfare in the national soccer stadium (the best part was Pepe doing laps around the stadium in a glorified go-cart and waving happily at the people while sexy ladies danced around him and dudes dressed in white did some good ‘ol fashioned Ribbon Dancing. It was excellent). Our ex-prez Zelaya (you may remember him from such coups in which he was removed by force and then exiled to the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa) is now, I imagine, drinking a remarkably-garnished beverage on the beaches of the Dominican Republic, which is to be his new home. Be careful, Zelaya, don’t get sunburned! I imagine he must be mighty pasty after so many months without stepping outside.

Time to get goin’, chochachos…I have to go to a vigil for a women in my community who died about a week ago, of a heart attack (I was actually in the health center with my pregnant women when she was carried in by three men, followed by a string of wailing daughters…they placed her on the table, the doctor checked her vitals, declared her dead, and then the center suddenly filled with mourning family members). This makes the fourth death in my community in the past month, all of them heart attacks…too much grease and salt in the diet! I don’t think their habits are close to changing, despite the educational attempts by the health center and the constant reminder that a fatty diet leads to high-blood pressure and heart attacks. Sometimes it feels very, very futile.

Love,

Hayley

my alter ego, hairy hayley.

garbage-filled bottles used as building materials; part of a recycling project used by Hacienda Merida.

Gabe kayaking home from Magic Monkey Marsh at sunset...note the fin-shaped cloud behind me. a warning of things to come?!?!

sunset in the river

howler monkey butt!!

sassy mangrove roots.

magic monkey marsh town!

howler monkey, eating fruit.

4pm in the MMM

hard to see cause the pictures so small, but it's a neat shot of a dude standing up in his fishing boat

where are the monkeys gabe?!?

volcan concepcion

dont you make that face at me

mmm yes

gabe and i with our friends barney and chris, at the crater later on Volcan Maderas

ooooo jungle...working our up way up the volcano

shot of volcan concepcion from the porch of Finca Magdalena on New Years day

9 January 2010

Hey, chochachos! Happy New Years, etc. I hope you guys all spent it the way I like to in America, which is drinking an entire bottle of Martinelli’s sparkling apple cider all by myself and steadily working my way through a tub of Red Vines while reading online comics. God, I miss the states. Instead, I had to settle for 12 crummy days in lame ‘ol Nicaragua…the soaring, smoking volcanoes, the immense monkey-rimmed lakes and lagoons, the stretches of pristine beach with sexy curly waves, all totally rideable and such…what I would have given to trade it all for 30 minutes on YouTube and some FunDip. But alas, the sacrifices I make as a selfless Peace Corps volunteer are mighty and I was forced to welcome the New Year in my new favorite Central American country. I know. I know. It’s sad. Sucks to be me!

With plans to meet my PC buddy Gabe in the southern Honduran town of Choluteca, I waved goodbye to a howling Igor and strolled down the road at about 9am. After a delightful jalon in the back of a nice couple’s pick-up, I grabbed a bus headed south at about 11:00am and was high-fivin’ Gabe by 2:00pm. We shared a Tupperware of tortillas and pesto I’d brought from home (the neighborhood kiddies and I had made a huge batch the night before, with plans to give a plate of it to everybody, only to discover that if there is anything Hondurans hate more than cold milk with their cornflakes, it’s pesto) and silently mocked the first of many European dirty hippies who choose to stroll around barefoot in the nastiness that is a Honduran street, amidst the people who actually are too poor to have shoes. We hopped on a little white bus to the border, Guasaule, followed by a 15-minute bicycle-rick-shaw ride across the border and through customs. Once money was changed to the Nicaraguan cordova, we grabbed another bus to the city of Chinendenga, then another to the first stop in our odyssey, Leon.

Gabe and I wandered alongside the pinworm-infested hippies till we found the part of town where our buddies Ana and Justin were waiting for us. We settled into our hostel, a chill little place called Sonati, complete with hummingbird garden, rocking chairs, and the tallest bunk-beds in the history of stackable sleeping arrangements. We spent the night wandering around the historical city, getting into minimal amounts of trouble and wondering why all the bars were empty. The next day, we headed to the market and from there took a very crowded chicken bus to the coast, about half an hour away. We spent the day at Poneloya beach, rolling around in the warm black sand and struggling to maintain upright in the fierce waves, which were the strongest I’d ever been in. I would not be the least bit surprised to discover a dirty little creek leaking steroids into the ocean. We ate lunch at a seaside restaurant which had no seafood—actually, it didn’t have anything, except curry chicken, which is what we all ended up ordering. Fortunately, it was hells of delicious. That evening, we took the same bus back to Leon, but it managed to morph from “crowded” to “jesus I can feel at least four different crotches pressing up against me.” They packed so many people onto that bus I didn’t need to hold on to anything to remain upright. It was like a sweaty, salty, smelly cattle truck, only instead of cattle it was Nicaraguan dudes and instead of a truck it was a bus I paid to be on. But despite the unfortunate degree of boners touching my butt and armpits touching my head, we all made it back to Leon alive. Then we wandered around, took pictures of the millions of old cathedrals and statues (except for me, because I was too lazy to tote my camera), and then had delicious Mediterranean food and mojitos. God I love mojitos. So sugary, so minty, so fizzy…but I digress.

The next day, we got up bright and early and headed out looking for a tour company who could take us up the nearby Cerro Negro volcano (the most active volcano in all of central America!), which offers the unique extreme “sport” of volcano boarding. We found our guide, and after a slight detour during which I had to dig around in vast bins of used shoes in the market to find a cheap pair (open-toed shoes are not allowed for volcano boarding, apparently, and the only footwear I’d brought were my sexy Chacos), we headed down a black, sandy road toward the volcano. Once we got to the foot of the mountain, our guide handed out giant slabs of wood with plastic on the bottom and a loop of twine on the top. Our “safety gear” was stuffed in a little burlap sack with he slung over his shoulder, and up we trooped, staggering around with our unwieldy sleds acting as unwanted sails as the crazy winds whipped around us. The volcano, extremely active as she is, is devoid of any vegetation and is covered with sharp, crumbly black gravel. After about an hour and a half of melting under the vicious sun, exacerbated by the vast sea of black around us, we made it to the summit and then humped it along a windswept ridge, peering down into the sulfur-stinky, yellow-smoky crater below. The guide then admitted that since he only had safety suits for two, the ladies would get them (yay boobies!). Everyone got elbow and knee pads, but the goggles the company promised were nowhere to be found and those of us without sunglasses (Ana) were given the “slow” sleds as a compromise. First went Justin, who was given a “fast” sled and promptly sat down, grabbed his little rope, stuck his legs out in front of him, and zoomed off in a spray of gravel. Then went Gabe, who had a slow sled, and had to scootch his way down the mountain like the fat kid who gets stuck in the slush. Really, Gabe. Lay off the Hot Pockets and maybe volcano boarding would be more exciting. Then it was my turn, with my ‘fast’ board, and I made it to the bottom in about 15 seconds. It was exhilarating, but not so much that I couldn’t sing “volcano boarding, volcano boarding, la-la-la, volcano boarding,” to myself as I flew down. I made it to the bottom without skidding off and getting a nasty roadburn, which is the main danger involved in this activity, but I was cleaning black dirt out of my ears, nose, ears, and mouth for about two days afterwards. Then came Ana, on a “slow” board, moving at such a ladylike clip that she placed one hand on her hip and the other in a slow, regal Queen-Wave. Then our guide came down, carving up the gravel on a crudely fashioned snowboard, gave us all high fives, broke open a cantaloupe, and drove us back to our hostel.

The next day, the four of us bussed it to the capital of Nicaragua, Managua, where we immediately caught another bus to Granada, another large, colonial city. Granada is on the shore of what must be one of the biggest lakes in central America, Lago de Nicaragua, which features a huge, mystical island in the middle composed of two volcanoes (more on that later). Granada, like Leon, is overflowing with old crap, like cathedrals and parks and cobblestones and such. We met up with Ana’s friend Beth, a buddy visiting from the states, and sprawled out in our new home for the next couple days, a rad hostel called Oasis—nice beds in the dorms, each with its own locker big enough for a backpack, free computer use, a pool, a garden atrium and tasty breakfast…doesn’t get much sweeter than that for $6 a night. Granada, unlike Leon, has a raucous nightlife and we enjoyed tasty sandwiches and far too much tequila, which was necessary since we were celebrating the 24th anniversary of Gabe’s birth. The exact sequence of events that evening is a little hazy, though I do recall walking all the way back to the hostel before we decided NO, it was too EARLY to go to bed on Gabe’s birthday, even though all the bars were closing, which resulted in all of us trooping back for one more round of beers. The poorly-decorated sports bar (they had half an English-style jumping saddle sawed in half and glued to the wall) gave us the stink eye but grudgingly slid five more Victoria’s across the counter, which, by the way, are better than Honduran beer, sorry to say. The next day we spent the morning floating in the pool and drinking coffee, and after much pleading on my part, rented retro Shwinn’s in the afternoon and biked along the lakeshore, pausing only to wait out a five-minute rainstorm and, later, to rescue a tiny baby turtle who was crossing the road way too slowly (Gabe and I were the terrapin rescuers, to be fair—SOME PEOPLE felt it was not worth stopping and continued biking on to the Flaming Gates of the Fiery Lakes of Smoldering Indifference). Anyway. Later that afternoon, our fellow PC friends Bug and Emilie joined the group, and we passed the night at a resoundingly disappointing restaurant called “Imagine,” created by a Lennon-obsessed New Mexico ex-pat whose menu featured fancy-sounding dishes, all listed at prices easily triple what we had seen anywhere else in the city. Since it was our last night in Granada, we tried it anyway. Like all things involving New Mexico and starfruit, the night ended in regret. But it was okay, because the next day we blew smooches to Granada and bussed it down to Rivas, a little town that is the jumping off point for many places, including our next destination, the Isla de Ometepe.

The ferry ride across the lake took about an hour, which we passed sitting on the upper deck and gazing at the two green humps rising out of the approaching island, their peaks shrouded in a perpetual ring of clouds and mist. Once we docked, we hooked up with a cool British pair named Barney and Chris (lady), and a lone Aussie dude named Blair. Now 10, we managed to avoid the slow three-hour bus ride across the island and instead rented a mini-van taxi and sped cheaply to the rad hostel we decided to stay at, Finca Magdalena. It’s actually a working farm, growing coffee, rice, and other products, and functions as a cooperative, collectively owned and operated by 20-some families on the island. It’s a huge, funky old barn converted into “rustic” (fancy word for shitty) sleeping quarters for the poor travelers who seek its eaves. However, make no mistake, I ain’t complaining, I am actually a fan of crappy sleeping conditions (as are all campers) and the place had such an awesome vibe. Migrating artisania-makin’ hippies from Spain and Argentina sprawl everywhere, braiding bracelets and threading earrings, while backpackers from all over the world sip the organic coffee made right in the backyard. The folks who work there are all locals, extremely laid-back and goofy kids who don’t really care what anyone does as long as it’s all friendly and good-hearted. We arrived there in the early afternoon on New Year’s Eve, and immediately fell in love with the place. The finca is pretty isolated, nestled at the literal trail-head of Volcan Maderas, the smaller, jungle-covered of the two volcanoes (Concepcion, the other volcano, is active and located at the other end of the barbell-shaped island). Bars unavailable, the staff did the next best thing which was provide a huge radio and an unlimited supply of ice-cold liters of beer, which we ticked off honor-style as we drank them. There were maybe about 30 of us that night, a nice hodgepodge of folks from around the world, and we passed the warm hours dancing around, stomping about the smooth wood floors of the barn and frequently dashing outside to twirl a bit under the gloriously full New Year’s moon. The countdown was in Spanish, and christened with a spray of warm Nicaraguan beer. It was beautiful.

The next day, Justin headed to the capital for health reasons and the rest of us rented bikes and rode to a nice beach about an hour away, where we passed the afternoon, enjoying the surprisingly strong waves and keeping a constant watch out for the endemic Fresh Water Bull Shark, the only species of shark found in fresh water. The aggressive, dangerous shark used to be found in great numbers in this lake, but due to over-hunting, is only now making a slow comeback from near extinction in these waters. I’m pretty good at punching sharks though, so I think everyone felt pretty safe as long as I was in the water with them. That night, we chilled in the moonlit jungle behind the finca, listening for howler monkeys. The next day, the girls decided it was time for some tropical beach action, so they headed south to the famous, Cancun-esque town of San Juan del Sur. I wasn’t ready to leave the misty magic mountain yet, though, and neither was my trusty sidekick Gabe, so we woke up early, packed a daypack, and hired a guide with our English friends Barney and Chris to take us up the volcano. We left at about 8:00am and began the four-hour slog up the mountain. And I do mean slog. Because the volcano is so tall, steep, and jungly, it’s surrounded by a constant veil of mist. And the spongy moss on the trees grabs that mist and makes sweet, sweet misty-mossy love it to, and the mist falls like drippy-droppies to the ground below. So it’s sort of like climbing up a vertical mud puddle. It might have been one of the hardest hikes I’ve ever done, due only to its steepness and slipperiness. And the fact that 40 minutes into the hike, I reached for my Nalgene, only to discover I’d packed it near empty, meaning to fill it on my way out and totally forgetting to do so. Gabe had two liters of water, but one of those was nearly gone and I didn’t want to drink all his water. I suffered for another hour or so, makin’ Nala eyes at the glistening water drops all around me and contemplating ripping moss off the branches and sucking the liquid out of them. Finally, I was so desperate that I quickly ducked off the trail and filled my bottle with the creamy-colored muddy run-off and chugged three quick gulps before our guide could spot me and yell at me. Whatever! Gringos love giardia! We can’t get enough of it. Everybody knows that.

At about noon we made it to the summit, a little pocket protected from the howling winds by a Tolkien-y cluster of gnarled, moss-covered trees and hanging vines. We then began a short but incredibly steep descent into the volcano’s crater, aided by a series of ropes and switchbacks. Once in the crater, we were disappointed to see that the mist hung so low and thick that one couldn’t see more than three feet off the shore of the (allegedly) blue lagoon nestled in the bowl. It was still beautiful, though. We quickly ate our sandwiches and drank our water (Gabe shared his with me), posed for a picture, and clamored back out of the crater lake to begin the grueling descent. While not as sweaty as the ascent, it was just as hard and took just as long, because one has to pick one’s way down the steep, muddy rocks with extreme caution. Ass-sledding is not an option, due to the boulders. However, I didn’t wipe out once, so I guess that’s a good thing. We arrived at the finca in late afternoon, hosed off our entirely brown lower-bodies, and treated ourselves to mugs of hot, tasty coffee and thick slices of homemade chocolate cake with cookies on top.

The original plan was to leave for San Juan the next day, but Gabe and I decided the island was too awesome and warranted one more day of adventures. So we shot an e-mail to the ladies and headed out the next day, blowing more smooches to our new friends at Magdalena and hoofin’ it down the road with our pretty little thumbs out in the wind. Pretty soon a truck pulled over and we swung into the bed, cruising along toward the junction between the two volcanoes. Then we hopped out and began to walk down the dirt road toward another finca we’d heard about, and before long we had another free ride to that place too. Hacienda Merida was definitely higher-class than Magdalena, with slightly higher prices ($5 a bed instead of $2.50), fancier food and crazy signs all over the place demanding NO WALKING BAREFOOT and NO ILLEGAL DRUGS. Gabe and I had a damn tasty lunch, took a little nappy-poo, and rented kayaks at about 3:00pm, heading out along the shore toward an alleged river-mouth that was supposed to be pretty and tranquil. It was a gorgeous ride. Every 10 minutes or so we’d pass a little clapboard house right on the edge of the water, with little half-naked kiddies sitting in the tree-trunk canoes each family owns for fishing. After about an hour and a half of leisurely paddling, we finally swung into the “river,” which was actually a wide, lazy-flowing marsh surrounded by the most gorgeous wildlife and flora I’ve ever seen. Huge flowering trees bent over the river, their enormous roots forming little caves and mangroves for the multiple species of giant birds to stand in and look pretty. Gabe practically peed himself with glee, and could be heard exclaiming “Ohmigosh! An egret! And oh, oh! Look! A HERON! And a stork! And—oh jesus—are those CRANES?!” They all looked pretty much the same to me (giant birds bigger than a 5th grader that sound like bears), but it was nice having a friend with such a bird fetish around to distinguish them for me. Intricate webs of lilies and other flowing water plants fanned out toward the middle of the little river, and thick green vines hung down all over the place. Gabe and I separated for a while, and spent almost an entire hour apart, slowly paddling around with our eyes falling out of our faces and our mouths agape, listening to the strange cries of the water birds and the eerie splashes of unseen animals sliding into the water. I had my heart set on seeing howler monkeys, a promise I’d made to my little buddy Max back in the states, and was starting to feel like I was never going to get a chance. Suddenly, Gabe cries out quietly, “Hayley! A monkey!” I whipped my kayak around and, sure enough, there was a huge howler hanging low in the canopy, shoving flowers in his mouth. We paddled closer and he turned to watch us. He grunted a few warning herr, herrs and we sat, mesmerized, watching him and his four friends leap from branch to branch, grazing happily in the late-afternoon sunshine. It was the first time I’d ever seen a wild monkey and it was in perhaps the most beautiful setting I could ask for. Then, I saw a rainbow. Thanks, Nature.

As the sun dipped toward the horizon and spilled metaphorical gasoline all over the surface and lit it on fire, we realized we had to get going, because the water is rougher at night and we didn’t want to have to navigate the entire trip in the dark. Kayaking at sunset was so fun I thought my eyeballs were gonna explode, and doing it under the stars was awesome, too (though finding the dock of the hacienda in darkness was a challenge…Gabe gets total credit for finding it). We finally made it back just in time for the 7:00pm dinner buffet, made us some friends, and passed the night relaxing on the dock. The next morning, Gabe decided he wasn’t feeling up for Girl Talk on the Beach, so he headed back to Honduras and I headed solo toward the south, to meet up with Ana, Beth, Bug and Emilie in San Juan del Sur. I got there easy as pie, but their hostel was full so I quickly found a room in a dirt-cheap, and dirt-dirty, place down the street (Soya…not recommended). San Juan del Sur is so full of foreigners it didn’t even feel like Nicaragua—I’ve never seen so many white people in a Central American town before. That said, I had a pretty bitchin’ time, so I guess I can’t complain. There seems to be a growing colony of Canadians there, and I met more of them in the two nights I was there than I have in my whole life. I had a great time though, and Bug and I went on crazy Adventures with our new Canadian buddies, Lucus and Travis, until daybreak. The next day, we headed out to a gorgeous local beach called Maderas, a chill little spot with medium-sized, beautiful waves and not too many people. I rented a boogie board and spent the day catching waves, skipping around in the sand and playing Frisbee. It was awesome. Then we headed back to San Juan and had a fun last night (sort of…Ana and Beth stayed in and Bug was sick, so Emilie and I wandered around and harassed people/drank expensive cranberry juice/made friends with some real-live Cougars. We all departed early the next day for Honduras. In seven hours I was at the border and we all spent the night in Emilie’s site, which is about 30 minutes away from Gausaule. We made spaghetti and watched “I Heart Huckabees,” a perennial favorite, and crashed hard. The next day, I bussed it home and was hugging Igor by four pm.

Brevity version: I climbed a bunch of stuff and slid down a bunch of stuff and ate and drank a bunch of stuff and had a bunch of fun and it was hella awesome and Nicaragua is the best.

The End.

Love

Hayley

Mariana making her mom a christmas card...we read If You Take a Mouse to the Movies.

Neil and Enner hard at work. Produce placement!!!

Makin´santa cards.

Posing with newborn ¨Hayley¨

Aida and her two kids...including little Geyli!

just in case you guys were wondering what it might look like if igor and kaiser drank at the same time.

25 December 2009

Merry Christmas, chochachos! It’s about nine o’clock pm on Christmas—my second one in Honduras. Perhaps you guys think it’s sad to be alone on Christmas, typing on an dilapidated laptop, sipping a solitary mug of tea and listening to that one Charlie Brown Christmas song on repeat (you know, the one that’s all slow and goes do-do-doooo, do-dooooo….do-do-dooooo, do-doooooo…if you’ve seen Arrested Development or any Peanuts cartoons then we’re on the same page). But you guys are hellsa wrong cause this ain’t sad at ALL. That’s because today isn’t actually Christmas. Not in Honduras, anyway. Hondurans celebrate Navidad on the 24th, and today, the 25th, seems to be reserved for loafing off your tamale hangover, and, if you’re a man, drinking a butt-load of booze and shooting your gun off all freaking afternoon. Since I’m not a man, I abstained from gettin’ my slant on/shooting the air and instead spent the morning pouring concrete with my landlord Rony (who also refrained from boozing it up), fixing a 6-meter section of fence that wasn’t connected to the ground and had thus become an excellent escape port for Igor and his devious brother Kaiser. Afterwards, I made fresh lemon smoothies for Rony and the two dudes he brought with him to help with the fence. Then I ate a leftover tamale and spent about three hours washing clothes…then I cleaned the house…as well as other assorted proofs that I am a domesticated lady now. Whenever I remembered it was Christmas day, I would feel a little funny and sort of sad I wasn’t with my family, eating breakfast casserole and opening presents in our jammies. But, like I said, it doesn’t count as a lame way to spend the holiday because a) YESTERDAY was Honduran Christmas, and b) what better way to celebrate Jesus’ birthday than scrubbing out your undies in the beating tropical sun? I broke my own personal record and managed to consume EIGHT, count them EIGHT, hulking Honduran tamales yesterday. I know. I am an impressive person. Please, feel free to bask in my amazingness. Throw money and panties at my feet, if you feel the urge. I spent the morning eating tamales and drinking coffee with Nely and the kids, then wandered around the neighborhood, delivering little plates of bastard Rice Crispy Treats…and I say bastard because I used wonky Honduran marshmallows and, in lieu of rice crispies, had to use Frosted Flakes. They turned out very greasy (a little heavy handed with the margarine, I is) and barf colored (the marshmallows were all different colors, which did not result in rainbow magic but instead blended to a gross, zomie-esque gray) but they tasted okay and the neighbors were quite delighted. They have no idea…an American child would have refused to eat them, I reckon. Unless it was a really deprived American child whose parents don’t believe in refined sugar—they’ll take anything they can get.

At each house, I was given a tamale on a plate with a cup of soda or coffee (except for Nelo, my 50-something bachelor neighbor who spends his days leaning in his doorway and frequently dying his hair black…he certainly cannot make tamales). By two o’clock, I was bursting, but onward I marched, stoically packing in the slippery bundles without faltering. Then I headed up the road and did a big lap around town, stopping at a couple special friends’ homes, where I ate MORE tamales, as well as torrejas, which is a hella tasty French-toast-esque dessert typical of Christmastime. I got home by early evening, at which point I had to shower and get dressed up for Christmas church, which I’d been invited to by Nely and Glenda. Four hours later, after countless rounds of singing and clapping, sermons, and little dramatizations of the nativity by the kids, we were released around 11:00pm (I’m not gonna lie, this was super boring and I spent most of the time playing with a little plastic pony Douglas had). Then Nely, the kids and I went to Mirian and Rony’s house (my landlords and Nely’s half-sister), where we sat down to a midnight feast of apples, grapes, oranges, and of course tamales and coffee all around. I finally got home at about 1:00am, though it was hard to sleep due to all the children setting off firecrackers outside (which they do the entire month of December, and without cessation on Christmas day). My body was also struggling to adjust to the extreme gluttony I’d participated in…but one of the nice things about living alone is you can fart as much as you want and no one complains.

This past week was a good one. I met with my pregnant women’s club, and we talked about how to be a good parent, which was fun…it’s hard to delve too deep in 45 minutes, but we talked about behavior management and communication and self-esteem in the child, among other topics, and the ladies participated fairly well, which is always delightful (sometimes they just sit in silence and don’t say a damn word, which is uncomfortable). As I was leaving the health center and walking down the road, Aida, of the women who used to be in the club, approached me with her four-week-old baby girl. We chatted a bit and I ooh-ed and aah-ed her squirmy little squinchy-eyed bundle of joy, and asked her what the baby’s name was. Aida smiled and said, “I named her after you.” She spells it differently (“Geyli,” since the ‘g’ can make the ‘h’ sound in Spanish), but still…I feel so SPECIAL. Fortunately, I had my camera with me, so I took a couple pics of mom and baby (as well as little Geyli’s big brother), and then Aida took one of Big Hayley and Little Geyli together. They live out in one of the aldeas of Alubarén, but we made plans that I’ll go visit them in January so I can meet Aida’s spouse and the rest of her family.

Together with our mediocre librarian, I have opened the library and finally begun my summer reading project. My “Club de Lectores,” or Reader’s Club, is basically a glorified story-hour, but the kids seem to love it and it’s going really well. On Monday mornings, the little guys (four to eight) come from 10-11:30am, and on Wednesday the bigger kids (nine and up) come. For the first half hour, the kids are free to sit and look at the 12-15 books I’ve selected and placed on the tables (I don’t let them browse the book shelves themselves because they just yank out books, look at them for two seconds, and pull out another…plus, this way, I can pick the best books for their ages). It’s awesome, because thanks to Johana, the volunteer who started the library 10 years ago and has continued to send books, the selection for children is pretty good. After half an hour, the kids scootch their chairs in a semi-circle and I read them a story I’ve picked out for the day. Then, using the art supplies donated over the past year by folks back in the states, we do a related art project. The first day, the little kids and I read “Silvester and the Magic Pebble” (in Spanish, obviously). Then they each got a sheet of paper and drew a picture of what they would do if they had a magic pebble. Many of the kids were too young/behind to write their own names, so afterwards we practiced that. On Wednesday, I read the bigger kids “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day” and then the kids had to write a short story about someone having a terrible day and the things that go wrong, complete with illustrations. The next week the little guys read “Lily and Her Purple Plastic Purse,” and then glued cut-outs of Lily and her purse that I’d made previously out of construction paper. For the big kids, I read the first several chapters of “James and the Giant Peach,” and then they drew pictures of Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker. This week, for Christmas, I read each class “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and “If You Take a Mouse to the Movies,” and then they made little Santa cards for their moms. Seriously fun stuff. I’ve also been pilfering the young-adult section, taking home “Little House on the Prairie” and “Island of the Blue Dolphins,” which are the perfect level for my Spanish. I hope the Ingalls make it through the long Dakota winter!!! Shut up I ain’t nerdy, YOU’RE nerdy. Aren’t you late for your nerd meeting? Nerd.

Found another coral snake in my latrine—my neighbor Dario killed it with a machete. Poor little guy…I feel bad for hiring out his murder but I don’t want to get bitten and totally die. So, I win. In other garden news, my basil patch is growing tremendously well…I have about 20 plants, all over are over a foot tall now. I made my first batch of pesto the other day, to celebrate the best holiday ever, which is December 19th, a festival invented over four years ago by myself and one Matt McCorkle, in which one must eat pesto and watch the 1972 Jamaican classic “The Harder They Come”…I had my dad bring me my copy of the movie when they came to visit. David came over and we ate hella tasty pesto (thanks to the UC Davis olive oil my mom brought me and the parmesan cheese I found in Tegus) and watched the flick. It might seem boastful to say my holiday is the best in the world, but I’ve got the celestial proof if ya’ll don’t believe me. David and I had clamored up the hills behind my house to enjoy the late-afternoon sunshine and kick-off the holiday by watching the sunset. Remember, this is the middle of December—well into our dry season. No more rain, not since the first of November. More over, we had a nasty drought during the wet season. So anyway, David and I are sittin’ up on the hill, looking at the gray clouds in the distance, and commenting on how much we missed the rain. We glance up, and David spies…A RAINBOW. Just smearing its beautiful, wondrous self across that hot Honduran sky. About ten minutes later, upon further contemplation of the sky, I see that our rainbow has become a DOUBLE RAINBOW. Dudes, I AIN’T EVEN KIDDING. We freaked out and I practically peed myself. A double rainbow! During the dry season! Craziness. Then, suddenly, we looked up and noticed a THIRD rainbow stretching across the sky, wider and brighter than out first two. That’s right, people. THREE FREAKING RAINBOWS. Then, the most magical thing of all happened. It began to rain. And not just sprinkle-sprankles. It poured, it dumped, and David and I gleefully slipped and slid our way down the mountain back to my house. When we arrived, we were totally soaked, and it was absolutely amazing. People were talking about the miracle rainstorm for days afterwards, but it wasn’t a miracle…it was just Somebody upstairs sayin’ “Hayley, I dig what you’re doin’.” I feel like God sent me a December 19th holiday card or something.

Because I am the luckiest lady in the world, I am leaving tomorrow for Nicaragua, to celebrate the New Year with my Peace Corps posse. Hell yes and hot damn I am ready for some volcanoes and lakes and swishy-swashy-warm pacific ocean….so you see, even though I am spending Christmas without my family and presents and stockings and pies, my life really isn’t all too rough down here.

Looooooooooove

Hayley

Douglas is uncomfortable that Noel gets to hold his red car, awesome gifts from mom's friends Leetha and Tai.

Alison with her little blue car....Douglas insisted on having two (one for each hand).

DELIGHTED.

Yesica, Noel, Alison, and Douglas with their new loot.

right before he gauged the other one's eye out! or, at least tried to.

this is exactly what i look like when i dance. Dancing Jaguar is my guru.

View of part of the Copan Ruins.

me and the folksies in front of a sepultura.

wendy kercher! also, andy kercher, questioning our crazy guide fidel.

god we're beautiful.

this picture looks hella dark...but it's us on a pier in roatan. maybe it will be brighter on your monitor, viewer.

the loins/womb of which i am the fruit, in the jungle of pico bonito.

dad and i hiked down to the base of this waterfall. this was after i broke my glasses but you CANT EVEN TELL.

mom and i chillin on a buttress root.

so jaunty!!

green jungle snake...on the side of the road.

5 December 2009

Hey, chochachos!

Whoops, guess a month has dang near slipped by since my last post...I’ve been busy basking in parental affection and the like, so I suppose that’s a good excuse as any. I said goodbye to my folks exactly a week ago, who arrived on November 19th. As the date to fetch them at the airport approached, my landlords became increasingly anxious regarding the state of my home, lest the gringo parents judge them negatively for the healthy abundance of cobwebs in all corners of my dwelling, swaying heavily in the breeze, pregnant with dead bugs. “Clean those up!” says my landlady. “But they catch mosquitos!” says I. “Let’s cut your lawn!” says my landlord. “No, I like the green grass!” says I. “Clean up those old plastic soda bottles you leave strewn about like a hillbilly!” says my landlords in unison. “How do you guys know what hillbillies are?” says I. Etc. In the end I did a fair amount of sweeping the dirt outside, and mopped thoroughly inside, and cleaned up the spare car parts I’d let Cletus scatter about our front yard, and called it good. Nely announced she would like nothing more than to accompany me to the airport, as it was probably the only opportunity she would ever have to go there and was dying to see a plane land. So we set off early Thursday morning, first hitting up the market to buy a ton of ingredients for tamales, our planned parental menu. Then we headed to the airport, where we enjoyed ridiculously garnished coffee beverages (sweet heaven do I love me some whipped cream) and waited for the Kercher Parents to make their much awaited arrival. I was waiting for them at the gate with a handmade, meticulously painted sign bearing the name KERCHER, lest they be confused about which sweaty, red-faced wanna-be albino was theirs to claim. Many hugs and smooches were exchanged, and we hopped (after some ado) into our little rental car to head down south to Alubarén. After a 30-second panic that I had somehow guided us onto the wrong freeway (I hadn’t) and a rather unfortunate event at the gas station in which I allowed us to be swindled into filling the crappy Toyota with premium gas and be called names by a mean old lady (she called me a “stuck-up bitch” because I wouldn’t give her any money), we were finally on the open road, the sun low in the sky and the road-side horses plentiful (much to Wendy and Andy’s amazement). After about an hour and a half, we turned off the freeway (escorted by Andy’s diligent turn-signal application) and began a two-hour roller-coaster that I will never again attempt in a tiny sedan. Woefully optimistic about such a car’s abilities to navigate the rocky, steep dirt roads that lead to Alubarén, I foolishly did NOT encourage the parental units to rent a 4x4 or some other vehicle created for such conditions. As such, we spent the rest of the afternoon sloooowly picking our way up and down the hills, as the Little Carola That Could strained and clunked its way toward my pueblo. We did, however, make it one piece, save for a front bumper which detached itself in the journey—which my dad and an eight-year-old skillfully reattached with rusty wire, leaving it literally better than ever (the hubcabs, which were attached with zip-ties, held fast—which was good because I didn’t have any extra zip-ties).

We were met with a small hoard of excited neighbors, the kids throwing themselves around Andy and Wendy’s waists and the adults happily shaking hands and awkwardly trying to kiss the American’s cheeks, which is always hilarious. Nely and her mom had been planning to make us tamales the next day, but due to a family problem which required one of them to speed across the country to sit on an aunt’s sickbed, they decided to make the tamales right then and there. Tamales are an all-day affair, with a multiple-layered process and much prep work. Starting them at 6:30pm is just seven kinds of crazy, yet that is exactly what my selfless neighbors set themselves to do. We trooped into my house and Igor set about Phase One of his masterpiece plan “Worm My Way Into The Old Folks Hearts So They Let Me Live With Them For A Bit”, by dancing and licking and rubbing and gazing lovingly into their faces with his fixing golden eyes. After an evening of chopping potatoes, child-wooing, and skillfully-translated conversations, we trooped up to my house and collapsed in bed. The next day was spent relaxin’ in the ‘ol Tarantula Oven, playin’ baseball with Las Panteras, strolling around the town, and meeting my friends (usually followed by an invitation to sit down and drink some soda). I was in hog heaven combining my two worlds, and I know my folks loved getting to see and experience it all. Plus, it was a huge ego-booster for ‘em…the first thing out of everyone’s mouth after “nice to meet you,” was “Heeli, your parents! They are so young! Your father, so handsome! Your mother, so beautiful!” Seriously. I was starting to get an inferiority complex, they were getting hit on so much…then I realized I am the fruit of the coupling of such attractive people and I felt better about myself. I also learned a new, super-creepy Honduran euphemism for spending time with parents…as I introduced my folks to a neighbor, she winked and said, “Ohhh, Hayley, you’re gonna suck some titty tonight, aren’t you?” Uh…lemme ask my mom, but I wasn’t planning on it, no. I thought maybe just that particular woman was being lewd, but it happened several more times.

“Doña Maria, this is my mom Wendy and my dad Andy.”

“Oh, pleased to meet you both! Hayley, you’re gonna suck some titty tonight, I bet!”

PLEASE, HONDURAS. I myself am a healthy subscriber to coarse and vulgar humor, but I don’t like hearing that phrase coming from old Honduran women’s mouths. I suppose it’s a reference to being united with one’s parents once again, becoming a nursing babe once again…but as they say, once you can buckle your own overalls, you ain’t a suckling infant no more. Anyway. Gross.

That night we celebrated Andy and Wendy’s last night in the ‘lubes by gorging ourselves on tamales and soda and imported left-over Halloween candy. My neighbor Glenda presented mom and dad with a handmade embroidered pillowcase that said something about sweet dreams, and Tina presented them with an embroidered tortilla cloth that Nely had made for them with a basket of fruit and the words “Senor Bendice Esta Casa,” which means “God Bless This House.” We left for vacation the next morning after a group shot with all my neighbors, the kids running (well, walking due to the necessitated low speed) alongside the car and Tina crying. These folks are my family down here, and it was very special for me to be able to blend my two worlds in this way.

We then left reality and traveled into luxery-vacation-land, in which we jet-setted around Honduras, delighting (some of us more than others) in hot-water showers, fancy multi-course meals and comfortable beds with real, non-foam mattresses. Sweet jesus in a juice box, it was awesome. First we went to La Ceiba and spent two days in Pico Bonito National Park. Our beautiful B&B (Casa Cangrejal) was right in the buffer-zone of the protected area, so we ate our breakfast with the birds and the butterflies in the morning before hiking 10 minutes down the road into the jungle. We went on an amazing 5-hour roundtrip hike (with no sandwiches!) up the mountain, carefully avoiding the giant ant freeways and the amazing Blue Morpho butterflies, which are bigger than my face. My parents had never hiked in rain forest before, so it was a thrilling experience for them (and me as well, obviously). The trail was very well maintained and we saw almost no other hikers, which was nice. The middle point of the loop was an 80-meter waterfall, which pours down a rocky wall, covered with moss and leafy plants. Dad and I actually hiked down to the base of the fall, where I promptly sat down under the turbo-shower and only slightly broke my glasses (again). The next day, our jungle-appetites sated, we took the mildly-turbulent ferry across the Caribbean to Roatan, one of the Bay Islands. We stayed in a remarkably un-occupied resort called Fosters, which was located on the prettiest beach on the island. (I say remarkably because everyone knows the average traveler prefers their home-away-from-home to be stocked with mouse poop, grimy bathrooms and shoddy carpentry, and that is PRECISELY what this idyllic little bungalow offered). But, as my grandma says, it’s just a bed—no one goes to vacation on the beach to stay inside all day, reading Middlesex (ahem, Wendy Kercher). Just kidding, the literary habits were kept to a minimum and Wendy spent most of her standing—damn, can that girl stand!—in the turquoise, tranquil waters of the Caribbean, while Andy and I snorkeled till our mouths pickled themselves, gliding over the beautiful coral reefs and occasionally diving down into the deep blue trenches to slap eels and taunt small sharks. Twice, a Carnival cruise ship arrival and dumped like 2,000 people in the island, which is no doubt devastating to the natural environment; through excellent for the business owners. It made for pretty good people-watching, as Wendy and I strolled through the throngs of fat, greased-up Americans with a beer in one hand and a corn-dog in the other, bobbing waist-deep in the sea. They all had to return to the boat by 4pm, though, which left the late-afternoon delightfully solitary. Ugh. The food was also amazing, and I happily devoured my weight in many varieties of shrimp during our stay there (coconut thai shrimp, blue-cheese-and-sun-dried-tomato shrimp, etc). We found one restaurant, Bite on the Beach, so tasty we ate there TWICE, while I alternated between slurping down delicious minty cocktails whose name escapes me and rubbing their freaking INCREDIBLE home-grown lettuce on my cheek, declaring my love before slowly dipping it in olive oil and grinding it to heaven in my mouth.

To finish our family outing, we headed to Copan for two days, to check out the famous Mayan ruins. Andy, forever the recreational learner, had done some reading on the glyphs before our trip, and was able to supplement our guide Fidel, who made up for a shoddy command of English with rambling nonsequitors and a robust quantity-over-quality attitude. Still, it was amazing…the ruins were so much bigger than I imagined and Honduras has done a fair job preserving them. My favorite parts were the giant stadiums with impressive staircases, down which sacrificed heads would tumble during ceremonies; and the ball court. I also really dug on the sculptures, most especially the dancing jaguar, who, if my glyph reading is accurate, and I believe it is, seems to model his style much after mine…it’s amazing what the Mayan culture produced long before the rest of the world had so much as an inkling. We also spent some time poking around in souvenir shops, eating tasty food, drinking tasty wine, and enjoying each other’s company. The next day, we took an early bus to San Pedro Sula, smooched goodbye, and went our separate ways. I moped my way to a fellow volunteer’s house nearby, where I passed the elections (Pepe Lobo, the conservative candidate, won!). Now back in Alubarén, I am passing my time nibbling on the delicacies my loving parents brought for me (hella Swedish fish and chocolates, hells yes) and gearing up for an attempt to instill a love of literature in the Honduran youths.

Mom and Dad, thanks for comin’ to see ‘ol Hayley…it was the highlight of the year. And it’s not just ‘cause you brought my candy, neither. I love you guys.

Adiooooos

Hayley

Alison the graduate under her awesome balloon arc, with her new dress and dolly. Also pictured is bro Noel, who was sad because he received no presents.

Ah, the obligatory diploma picture.

Igor's brother Navigante at the dogs' first birthday party.

GIMME THE TREAT I CANNOT WAIT ANY LONGERRRRR

This was the fastest picture I've ever taken.

birthday boy

the peace corpse, a ninja turtle, and a recycling plant

PEACE CORPSE AHHHHHHHhhhhhh gosh im clever.

saturday at the swimmin' hole

igor loves this place...you can tell.

my novio douglas and i.

noel and grandma tina in the agua

douglas loves to swim...aw.

10 November 2009

Hey, chochachos!

Dudes guess what? Nicaragua totally saved our back, a little bit. Nicaragua was all like “hells YEAH we got rain, you waaaaant some?” and Honduras was like “I…yes. Please, don’t make me beg.” And Nicaragua was like, “If you want the rain, you’ll have to dance for it.” And Honduras danced (while crying quietly) and rain it did. It was just for the weekend, but it was awesome. I woke up last Saturday morning and was hit with nostalgia like a sock full of marbles…it was COLD. I mean it was probably in the 60s, but to me it felt freezing. It was gray and drizzly outside, which it NEVER is in the morning. I immediately put on socks, and flannel pants, and a hooded sweatshirt, and proceeded to spend the next four hours swaying in my hammock, watching the rain and drinking cup after cup of delicious coffee from Copan. I considered buying a blanket, really I did. It was awesome; it felt like just fall…I pretended I was back in Chicago, gettin’ my autumn on. Then I pretended I was in California, and had even MORE fun. The roads became so muddy the buses got stuck; my grass became squishy, and the river swelled a bit. It was over by Monday morning, but the weekend was just delightful. Thanks, Nicaragua! You guys always know just what I like.

Rain aside, this weekend was also a blasty-blast because it was the graduation for both kindergarten and sixth grade. I’m a pretty popular lady among folks of that age group, so I walked the red carpet at both events. They have a thing here where a family with a graduating child asks a family friend or relative to be the “madrina” or “padrino” of the kid (godmother or godfather) for the ceremony. Basically this entails attending the graduation and sitting at the little plastic table each family has, drinking a cup of coke and taking many pictures. When the kid’s name is called, you go up and take a picture with them, one hand on their diploma, the other on a gift you bought for them (but the kid can’t have it yet!). Then you go sit back down, wait for the ceremony to end, and then go back to the family’s house and have dinner (rice, meat, veggies, lots of soda) and the kid finally gets to open his or her present. Saturday night I attended the 6th grade graduation as my neighbor Enner’s madrina. His mom, Glenda, is a good friend of mine, and his little sister Jessica and I are also bosom buddies (is that creepy? I don’t mean it to be. She’s six). Enner is kind of a punk, but I do love him and he’s a pretty decent pitcher on my baseball team (for his present, I bought him a baseball cap). Sunday, I attended the kindergarten graduation as Alison’s madrina. Alison is my best buddy Nelly’s 5-year-old daughter and my across-the-street neighbor…she’s also one of my favorites. It was adorable, they paid a neighbor (the currency is one 3-liter bottle of Coke) to do her hair all fancy-pancy, and painted her nails, and put on make-up, and her fancy blue church dress. Nelly even spent the better half of the morning making this amazing balloon arc, by tying a million balloons to a plastic tube stuck in two sand-filled coffee cans. Very creative. The parties were a lot of fun…god, I love soda.

And we had ANOTHER party the Thursday before, on November 5th, celebrating Igor’s first birthday! At about 4:00pm I decided we should have a fiesta, so I sent some neighbor kids with bikes to go invite Igor’s three litter mates in the area and their respective kid owners. I got busy making little ground-beef birthday cakes for each dog, while my little buddy Nuria deftly created a million crepe paper streamers. Her mom (and my landlord) Mirian raked the sand and leaves in my yard, and Douglas helpfully peed on my floor. Nelly and her mom Tina (proud owners of Kaiser, Igor’s brother) brought over a bunch of plastic chairs. By 5:00pm the kids and dogs had arrived, and Nuria placed a crepe paper garland on each dog (one of them, Princesa, is her’s). Kaiser is, of course, Nelly’s dog, and another kid on my baseball team Samer owns the fourth, a white one named Navigante. I gave each kid a hamburger patty with a candle stuck in it and we sang Happy Birthday. Then I told each kid to make a wish out loud on the dog’s behalf (I went first, and said in a dog voice, “I wish I could eat my birthday treat now!” and all the kids copied me…unimaginative bastards). Then we blew out the candles, removed them, and placed the plates on the ground. In about two seconds all the meat was gone and the dogs were left to rip the crepe paper off one another while we humans had several cups of Coke and cookies. It was perhaps the best dog birthday…ever?!?

Yesterday was my first baseball practice of the season…we picked up right where we left off. We have a handful of newcomers but the team is pretty much the same. We met at the field right at 2:00pm, ran our lap, did our stretches, and did throwing and catching exercises until 4:00pm. Today was more of the same but we did batting and fielding instead. I spent a fair amount of time yelling at the kids—they’re such PUNKS, always throwing rocks and cussing—but after I sent one cocky 13-year-old home they calmed down. I think this year will go a lot smoother, but it’s a bummer because there is no national championship as a goal. The Peace Corps has sort of sold out to the Dodgers, which is great because they’re funding this awesome week-long clinic for our Honduran coaches. Awesome, but not for me, because I don’t HAVE a damn Honduran coach. One of my kid’s dads is interested (also my landlord), but by interested I mean he likes to come and watch, when he feels like it, and doesn’t want to adhere to the rigid time commitment. He’s out of work at the moment due to an injury, actually, and I think he might just be bored. But he’s a good guy, and not a creep with young girls, so I’ll see if I can entice him to commit to being our coach for REALS.

Oh, yeah, Halloween! Dudes. Halloween was AWESOME. We stayed in this rad hostel called La Iguana Azul and just had wonderful dang time runnin’ around the cool town of Copan. The first night there was this great party at a local bar Via Via (which I showed up at in my dog food costume, only to find NO ONE else was in costume except for three dudes dressed as Drugs, Sex, and Rock ‘n Roll, respectively). But it didn’t matter, because it is hellsa fun to run around dressed up like dog food. Saturday, Halloween proper, was even more fun…I looked pretty good as the Peace Corpse, and we went to parties at several different bars before ending up at this one with an awesome live band. Oh, to dance like a dorky white girl with face paint….such a treat. It was fun because the whole town seemed to welcome this onslaught of gringos (or at least, those who could profit from our presence seemed to welcome us) and it was wonderful to catch up with all my old buddies I haven’t seen in a year. I also met a bunch of volunteers for the first time, some of whom were Excellent. So hooray and hot damn. Saturday afternoon, before the party began, a bunch of us went to this place called Macaw Mountain, which is basically a glorified nature park with a wide collection of exotic birds in large outdoor enclosures, as well as a bitchin’ swimming hole. There was even a section where the birds were loose on perches, and you could have them climb on your head and nibble your earlobe…which I enjoyed….perhaps too much. (Though at one point I had enticed this green macaw onto my arm, and was enjoying his heft, when a park employee came running up and was like “dude that’s the bird that claws people’s eyes out when they least expect it!”, which kind of killed the moment). I opted not to check out the ruins, since I’ll be headed there in about two weeks with Wendy and Andy Kercher (who arrive in Honduras in exactly eight days!!!!). Man. I had fun.

So yeah, T-minus ALMOST NO TIME AT ALL until my folks get here. I’m so excited, I could just barf. All ova this keyboard!!! But I won’t, cause this is the only one I got. I feel like the luckiest dame in the world…I can’t wait to hug my mom and dad. I haven’t seen them in like 17 months, and it feels more like 18. Which is nearly 20! It feels like it’s been nearly 20 months…which is nearly 24, which is two years. So you understand my excitement.

Time for bed, dudes…I am so exhausted from yelling at children about Sports.

Love,

Hayley

Lisbeth, reading one of the new books my grandma sent me. i wish i could turn this photo normally!

the gang, reading the awesome childrens books that my awesome mimi sent

tina and her hubby Ruben on his 74th birthday

ruben, attacking the rabbit-coyote with youthful vigor

nelly and douglas on his second birthday

douglas attacking the rabbit-coyote with even more youthful vigor (thats right, we reuse pinatas in alubaren)

looking down into the valley of one of the aldeas where I work

spank that pinata, ruben!

23 October 2009

Hey, chochachos!

Crap, crap, crapity crap. “Oh no Hayley whatever seems to be the matter” you say? WELL, IT AIN’T A GIANT MUDDY DEATH TRAP AROUND HERE AND THAT IS VERY WORRYING. In case you guys are too busy eating delicious toasty sandwiches and then driving to buy MORE sandwich fixins’ when they run out, or whatever it is you do in America, as I have now forgotten, it is OCTOBER, people. Moreover, it is nearly November. In Honduras, as with pretty much all tropical places (I assume), October is, as the kids say, “negative moist.” It is supposed to just rain and rain, with torrential monsoons of fat warm wet drops bombarding the Dickens outta everything. The rivers swell, the roads wash out, little pink wormies drown, and the cuffs of people’s pants take on a permanent brown tone. BUT that’s how it HAS to be, because from November to May, not a single drop falls (at least in the south of Honduras) and we depend on the chunkity-ass rivers to supply us with drinking, bathing, and irrigating water. But WHAT THE HELL, PEOPLE. It isn’t raining!! And it hasn’t rained since the second week of October! And when it WAS raining, it wasn’t all that much! Last year at this time, I was leaping into a swirling, churning river and squealing gleefully as the rapids shot me down stream. This year, I can walk across the same river and not even get my butt wet. The water flows lazily along, with bits of garbage floating along peacefully. Bob Ross would love to come here and get his paint on, I’m sure, but for Alubarén’s purposes, this is bad news. The corn crops are already stunted, and with no rain, the harvest is gonna be hells of meager. Same with the beans. And the squash. Everything is already drying out, beginning to take on the toasty, dusty film of summer. I was burning some used toilet paper in my yard the other day (just one of my many new hobbies) and the fire leapt to the grass and started spreading! And just a couple weeks ago, that same lawn was a thick squishy green delight of life. I never realized how much I love the rainy season until I noted its abrupt departure and the rapid encroachment of summer, shoving its dry, crackly body in front of the withering green of winter like a particularly arid bully in the school lunch line. Oh, but how summer loves those baked Tator Tots! This is gonna be a long-ass summer.

Summer seems to be moving onto the seen in other areas, too. Usually, the kids are in school until mid-November, at which point they are turned out to graze the crusty grass of Endless Summer, until it ends in February and the kids don their uniforms and head back for some learnin’. This year, however, the Ministry of Education decided that what with the political unrest, it would be prudent to release the kids a month early, in mid-October. The elections are scheduled for the very end of November, and the schools are used as community polling places. So obviously, we must have the schools barren for a good six weeks prior. You know, just in case. So the teachers were given orders to pass ALL their students, whether they should be passed or not, hastily administered some last-minute tests (though I can’t imagine why, if they were going to pass the entire class anyway) and swept the youngsters out the doors for a nice hearty summer break of nearly four months. One of my projects is called TEAM, and involves four hours of English class and creative teaching methodology for about 23 local teachers, who then replicate the classes in their own schools, thus giving the kids a good dose of basic English as well as dynamic, interactive learning that gets them off their feet and eschews rote-memorization for 50 pleasant minutes. Anyway, I had TEAM scheduled to go into November, including two observations per teacher out at village schools where they teach. When the Ministry announced they were chopping the school year down at the knee caps, I had to hurry the hell up and finish all my classes before the teachers took off for Tegucigalpa, where many of them reside when they’re not teaching in the country schools. As such, I was only able to observe each teacher once instead of twice, which was a shame because I always enjoy going out into the aldeas (villages). The people are always so friendly and happy to see one another, greeting their neighbors on the path like cherished family members. You feel like Alubarén has great poverty, but then you walk two hours out to some remote aldea, which is really just a cluster of houses, and suddenly Alubarén seems like a wealthy metropolis. The folks out in the aldeas are so poor, they don’t even have doors on their mud houses. Latrines are uncommon; most families just go out in the open air. The kids show up at school barefoot, the required white-and-blue uniforms are nonexistent. To get to many of the aldeas, the teachers in Alubarén walk 15 minutes to a bus pick-up spot, take the 6:15am bus that passes on its way to Tegus, ride it for 20 minutes, then get off and head their separate ways. One teacher I went with hikes for over an hour down a steep ravine into a valley so isolated I was shocked to find the number of houses that claim that little area as Los Amates, their home. Hiking back UP to the road after class was rather hellish, it was so steep and so hot. She told me she often goes on mule but that week the poor guy was occupied hauling sand for a construction project.

So needless to say, I’ve been hells of busy trying to suddenly wrap up all of my school-related projects before the kids scatter and the teachers leave. I’m also about to begin baseball again, which I’m looking forward too, though I have enjoyed my several months of free afternoons. I’ve also been happily celebrating many birthdays, including little Douglas turning two and his grandpa Ruben turning 74. Both birthdays were celebrated across the street at their house, with cake, a piñata, and tasty food. Douglas was very serious about beating (well, gently tapping) his piñata, but managed to do such a delicate job in removing the candy that the rabbit/coyote/whatever thing was salvaged for Don Ruben’s birthday two weeks later. Douglas’ birthday was lots of fun, but Ruben’s was very special. As I’ve mentioned, he has pretty bad Parkinson’s, and so for this birthday family and friends turned up from all over the place to celebrate another year. They clapped and strummed guitars and sang church songs, prayed, and gave little speeches (I actually gave one too, and nearly began to cry, which was awkward). Then they passed out the ubiquitous plastic plates of rice-and-chicken-with-three-tortillas and little cups of coke. Then frosting was smeared on the old man’s face, as tradition mandates, we sang three different Happy Birthday songs (one of which I directed in English), ate cake, had more soda, and the party dissipated. Same format as every party in this one-trick-pony-town, which I enjoy. Ruben, in his quiet, wavery voice, gave a little speech from his plastic lawn about the incredible love he has in his heart for the people in his life, and for life itself. A retired pastor in the Evangelical church, his outlook on life is so upbeat and optimistic you feel like a better person just listening to him. He is perhaps of the most adored members of the community.

I’m gettin’ seven kinds of psyched because in exactly one week, I leave for the Mayan Ruins of Copan to celebrate the best holiday ever, aka HALLOWEEN. Every year there is a giant Halloween party in the little town of Copan Ruinas, which boasts the actual ruins outside of town. All the volunteers in Honduras that can go, do, as well as any other ex-pats or folks who celebrate the holiday (Halloween is generally not celebrated in Latin America). I freakin’ LOVE costume parties, and the fact that this one is a huge crazy fun-fest in an awesome location with like 500 people makes me want to sweat candy corn outta my eyes. I actually have two costumes picked out, one for Friday night, and one for the actual Halloween party on Saturday. Friday night, I shall stand around havin’ a great ol time as a bag of dog food. Igor blows through 50 pound sack of “Dogui” kibble in no time, so I have a quite a stack of empty bags. I’m just gonna cut leg and arm holes and stuff it with newspaper. For Saturday night, I’m following my heart as a lover of “pun” costumes and shall make my debut as “the Peace Corpse.” GET IT?! Cause, you know, dumb people might pronounce “corps” as “corpse”…. AND it works in Spanish, because we’re known as “El Cuerpo de Paz,” which means “the Body of Peace.” I found a sweet orange tie-dyed tank top with a giant white peace sign on the front, and shall wear that with many other stereotypical hippie paraphernalia whilst smearing my face with corpse-like face paint and fake blood. Basically, I win.

My buddies Noel, Alison and Douglas just barged into my house asking permission to collect the many windfall cherries that are strewn about my yard, so I’d better wrap this up. If you give a kid permission to pick cherries, chances are, he’s gonna want a plastic bag to go with it…and a glass of juice. And if you give him juice, chances are he’s gonna pee on the floor and then you’ll have to splash some water on it and make a promise to mop later, which you inevitably will not.

Only 27 more days until parental units Andy and Wendy fly down to Honduras for nine days of Adventures!! They’re gonna spend two days in the tourist gem that is Alubarén, and then we’re heading north to the Pico Bonito National Park, where I intend on tricking my mom into going white-water rafting in the rain forest, which sounds too bitchin’ to pass up. Then we’re headed to the sexy Bay Islands to snorkel until a sea turtle eats a stray appendage and/or the backs of knees become too sunburned. Then we’re heading off to Copan to scope out the ruins (I’m gonna bring my dog-food costume just in case). Then they head home, filled with tender memories of the best nine days ever spent with their precious first-born child. And to that I say, yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!

Love,

Hayley

according to patrick, i look like "something from harry potter" in this picture. i don't know how to interpret that, unless perhaps he's inferring that everyone in harry potter has a sunburned forehead. patrick looks like a dork in a honduras-purchased polo shirt.

Hawk Waterfall! in the beautiful misty cloud forests of Parque Nacional Montana de Comayagua.

cascada!

Gabe doing his duty as a tour guide [note: this photo is definitely not staged.]

you may consider us the three musketeers.

tiny baby waterfall!

Gabe utilizing his sorry excuse for a pila...but it's okay because he has the sweetest view in the world.

Douglas chillin' in my hammock. That's his cousin Andri in my other hammock in the background.

My kindergarten buddies marching in the Independence Day parade of Alubaren.

Alison and her neighbor Yesica, her cousins Lisbeth and Andri, and her brother Noel.

Nina Independencia!! I guess I could have put her in front of something prettier than my clothesline.

Remember baby Javier, my old host mom Suyapa's youngest? He's a crazy monster baby now and runs around like a track star.

27 September 2009

Hey, chochachos!

Guess what today is? Nothing other than my official half-way mark of service, THAT’S ALL. Though actually it was the 28th of September that I arrived in Alubarén last year, but that’s because I cheated and came a day late so I could be sneaky and have a fun time with my buddies from training one last time. Anyway. I can’t think of anything to say about this moment that isn’t just a bunch of clichés out at a cliché family reunion, totally singing songs about bein’ clichés and eating snacks that clichés eat….I can’t believe how time has flown; it seems like only yesterday I was dragging two huge suitcases up the dirt road, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and sweaty-faced, etc. Time really has flown, but not any faster than it always does. That would require that Honduras be in some sort of time-accelerator-warp. Let’s not be crazy here people. EVERYBODY CALM THE HELL DOWN.

I am currently eating hot green squash with sugar sprinkled on top that my neighbor Glenda just brought me in a little bowl. It is delicious.

After a particularly long period of “mini summer,” we have now departed the hot-and-dry-all-the-damn-time period and entered the hot-and-muddy-because-it-rains-like-the-tears-of-an-adolescent-boy-listening-to-The-Cure-in-a-sit-down-bath-in-the-eighties every dang day. I rather like thunder storms…they’re so violent and warm and extreme, nothing like the cold wintery rain that California gets. My yard LOVES it; I’ve had to pay a dude to come machete all my grass and weeds into submission again because it was getting waist-tall and I’ve been finding snakes and such in places I do not want them (aka eye-ball level in my shower, for starters). I’ve planted a bucket full ‘o basil, which is coming along delightfully. I can’t wait to eat it on EVERYTHING. The rain is also making the river grow, which is awesome…I can’t wait till October (wait, I guess that’s this Thursday…I can’t wait till late October) when the river gets nice and swift and deep and we can go tubing in it. Lightening, however, can just take its business SOMEWHERE ELSE (more on than in a second).

A couple weekends ago I went with my buddy Patrick to go visit our friend Gabe in his site, a tiny 400-person village up in the mountain of Comayagua, in the western-ish part of the country. Gabe is a Protected Areas Management volunteer (as is Patrick) so the lucky bastard lives practically IN the Parque Nacional Montana de Comayagua, a beautiful national park that is mostly cloud forest and dripping with water (it supplies water to a jillion communities, I believe). His town is called Rio Negro, and is basically a small cluster of houses nestled into the forest. “This here is coffee country,” said Gabe, hitching his thumbs behind his over-all straps, and I believe him. Everywhere I looked grew short, shiny coffee bushes, and I tasted some of the best coffee I’ve ever had while eating dinner at his old host-mom’s house (and promptly bought three pounds of it). Gabe’s house is small but nice, though like the rest of his community, has no electricity. We’d stopped at the grocery store before heading up the mountain, so the three of us prepared a tasty meal of eggplant, spaghetti, and quesillo (a mozzarella-like cheese). Then we sat out of his amazing porch that looks down onto the basin below and admired the incredible lightening storm dancing on and stabbing up the open valley. In the morning, the clouds hang in the trees like they ain’t got no better place to be, and the birds just go crazy flyin’ around while Gabe identifies them with his nerdy little bird book (I’m jealous). Then he took us on the sweetest hike ever, especially considering the trail head is a five-minute walk from his back door. The trail winds through cloud forest for about an hour before reaching a small waterfall, and Gabe stopped and explained all the leaves and trees and plants and insects for us whenever we asked. Then we decided to scramble up the higher ‘trail’ to get to a bigger, more impressive waterfall, which was about another hour up the mountain. The trail, however, was barely existent, and Gabe had to force our way through with his machete much of the time, constantly looking out for the bright orange plastic ribbon marking where the trail aspires to be. The trail was also hells of steep and quite muddy, which meant that we had to crawl on all fours for much of the time, pulling ourselves up by vines and roots and branches. I pretended I was a chimpanzee and thoroughly enjoyed myself. We were so filthy by the time we got there! It was awesome. I love filth. Especially cloud forest filth…everything there smells so awesome and mushroomy and soily. Delightful. Getting down was even harder, because it was so steep and slick, so I finally just waited until the boys got a good ways ahead, squatted down on my heels, and skied down the slope. I don’t think I need to mention how filthy I became after sliding down a muddy mountain on my ass. Patrick didn’t like it much, though, because I would invariably catch up to them in about 10 seconds and smash into the backs of his legs. I kept doing it, however. Soon karma caught up to me, though, when we began walking through a sunny meadow and I tripped and fell flat on my face in a GIANT ant-hill. Biting ants, people! I start screaming and leaping around and smacking at myself while the guys just howl with laughter. I think the worst thing about Honduras is definitely the bitey ants.

We got home late afternoon, with just enough time for the three of us to shower and head over for a six o’clock dinner with Gabe’s old host family. I was busy scrubbing my filthsome shorts, so the guys went first. When it was my turn it was already raining pretty good, but no one ever told me of the dangers of showering during a thunder storm, so I jumped into the bathroom and rinsed myself with nice cold mountain water. I has just finished soaped and shampooing myself to hell and was just beginning to rinse myself when….when….I TOTALLY GOT ZAPPED BY GOD HIMSELF. A lightening bolt landed just outside the house and the electricity ran right through the hose I had in my hand and the water I had squirtin’ all over myself and just jolted me. I SCREAMED bloody murder and threw the hose down, then screamed again. Then I leapt out of the shower and stood dripping soap all over the floor while I whimpered to myself and explained in hysterical tones to the concerned boys on the other side of the door what had happened to me. It reminded me of the time I grabbed a hot-wire fence as a kid and stood there screaming and electrocuting myself until my dad came and ripped my fingers free. I continued to stand there and stare up fretfully at the small sky-light in Gabe’s bathroom ceiling for about half an hour. Finally I jumped back in, rinsed off for about 30 seconds, and jumped back out. I then spent the rest of the night recounting my horror story to anyone who would listen (Gabe’s old host-family, my family on the phone, and the boys several more times).

The next day we had delicious hot mountain coffee and pancakes for breakfast (I warmed everything by zapping it with my fingers, like the Emperor) and then set off for another adventure. We went over to the little Tourism Center (basically just this guy’s house), saw the four eco-cabins they have built for tourists, and had some juice. The family was incredibly nice and the mom couldn’t seem to stop stuffing us with food, followed by promises of more food (“You like those fried corn cakes, do ya? Well wait till ya try my homemade CHICKEN SOUP!”) Then we hiked down to this little waterfall and pond where the guy had built a sweet hydro-generator! His house is only one in Gabe’s community with electricity. It was totally amazing. But not as amazing as his WINE CAVE. You slosh through this freezing cold pond and force yourself under a pounding waterfall to reach a little cave hidden behind the dumping water. There, this enterprising man has hidden a bottle of homemade wine, complete with several little wooden cups. Unfortunately, the idea is a lot radder than the actual place, because a) the wine tasted like vinegar and puke, b) the cups smelled like my childhood friend Jennifer’s turtle tanks, and c) the cave was tiny and freezing and very wet, not my ideal wine-drinkin’ local. But at least now I can say I’ve drank crappy moon-shine in a cave.

So Honduras, like all over Central American countries, celebrates its independence day on September 15th. In a typical year, the kids basically stop learning or doing anything productive in school for a full six weeks before the 15th, spending their precious four hours of school practicing marching around, twirling batons or pompoms (if you’re a girl), banging on a drum (if you’re a boy), and singing the National Anthem, which has like 100 stanzas. However, this year was a little different, because the kids had already lost so much school due to the coup. So the Ministry of Education declared that no school could waste class preparing for Independence Day, which was sad for the kids but an excellent decision. As such, Alubarén’s “Quince de Septiembre” parade was rather thrown together and lame, but at least no minds were deprived of long division unncecessarily. My little neighbor Alison, one of Nelly’s kids, was crowned “Nina de Independencia” in her kindergarten class, so I had a great time walking next to her in the parade and taking a million pictures. She LOVED getting to wear lipstick and earrings and have her nails painted and her hair done (in case anyone is wondering how the exchange rate is doing down here, the local hairdresser charges one three-liter bottle of Coke to style a 5-year-old’s hair). It was a proud moment for Nelly…there are lots of cute girlies in Alison’s class, so the teacher must think Alison is pretty special to have chosen her.

I had a really special day the other day…about twice a month, I go into the health center and give a health lecture about high blood pressure to the poor people sitting in the waiting room. Usually there are about 30 people sitting in the church-like pews, talking quietly or comforting fussy babies. It’s almost always folks that come in from the surrounding villages, or aldeas. Aldea folks are, typically, must more shy and quiet, especially around gringos. Doing a workshop with folks from the aldeas is often like pulling teeth—people no one will even LOOK at me, much less participate and speak and contribute to the group. My monthly health lectures are no different. I always follow a similar format, asking questions about what they might know about high blood pressure, how it’s caused, how to prevent it, etc. And, usually, no one says anything, and then one of the nurses Franklin comes in and yells at them for being so rude to me, which just makes it WORSE, and then I just have to go through the lesson about the evils of salt and saturated fat and pretend I’m talking to people instead of robots who are programmed to only stare shyly at the ground. But this month was AWESOME!!! I don’t know what the difference was—all of the people were new to my lecture, no repeats—and most were from aldeas. But they listened when I was speaking, contributed when I asked them questions, and then began peppering me with so many questions I ended up staying a whole hour later than usual. I brought up the dangers of alcohol and how it can affect the heart, and encouraged them to give the local AA chapter a try if they were struggling with drinking. An older man then stood up, took off his cowboy hat, and began to share with this health center waiting room his own personal history with alcohol and how it nearly destroyed his life and his health. He looked around at all the other men and told them how wonderful AA was and that they should give it a try if they were “tired of being drunks.” Then he sat down. Then a young woman raised her hand a little, and addressed the group, saying how she had never really considered what her food was doing to her and her childrens’ hearts, and that from here on out she wasn’t going to cook with manteca (vegetable-based lard) anymore, only vegetable oil. And “only a teeny bit of salt!” She finished her speech and another woman declared she was going to start exercising to lose weight. Then we started discussing alternative recipes for meals (making rice without manteca, for example, or spaghetti without the obligatory 2 bars of margarine), and the women started getting all excited about the new ways they were going to prepare meals. Hooray for days like today.

Tomorrow is the “clausura” (closing ceremony?) of my “Yo Merezco” abstinence-education workshop. We’re going to eat cake, drink soda, bash open piñatas, play games, and pointedly not have sexual relations until we’re ready. This cake better be the best freaking cake ever, though, because it’s costing us $25 DOLLARS. That’s….so much of my money. God damn.

NOW I am eating dinner I just made, which is rice cooked up all tasty with tomatoes, celery, cilantro, sweet pepper, onions, garlic, and eggplant. One of the ladies who sells produce has really been bringin’ in the good stuff lately. I mean, eggplant?! In Alubarén?! It is awesome. I am kind of obsessed with eggplant these days. Weird.

The other day I played in the annual “teacher’s soccer game” (Alubaren versus one of the aldeas). It was rather hilarious because many the teachers were fat and running around in tight jeans, and everyone was shouting “GO HEELI!!” because my un-encumbered body could move around quicker than theirs. But then I got too cocky and totally wiped out, skinning my knee, which turned me into an instant celebrity. Even now, over a week later, people keep coming up to me—“Jili, is it true you hurt yourself?! Let me see! Oh, Diosito [tiny baby God].” Seriously. I’m FAMOUS for my skinned knee.

I guess since I’m describing my meals I’ve sort of run of out things to say at the moment. Lesse….I got a little bird’s nest in my lime tree! I think it’s a sparrow. I have no reason to think this other than the momma bird is small and brown. What else…man, I guess I actually went a whole blog entry without talking about Igor. He is doing excellently, and continues to grow, though I think he’s almost done now (he’ll be a year old in November!). The other day I noticed in the evening that his left eye was almost swollen shut, and totally freaked out, convinced he was pulling an Erika and going blind on me. I force fed him an Advil and slept fretfully. In the morning, however, his eye was totally normal, so I guess a bee or something must have stung him.

Time for bed…it’s nearly 9:30! Though the other day I made a new record for myself…the lights had been out all day and it was storming so violently I was afraid to be in my hammock, convinced a rogue lightening bolt would hit the roof and travel through the cotton and fry me. So I crawled into bed and decided just to chill and relax until the storm passed. This was at like 6:45pm…the next thing I knew, it was 7:00am and Igor was nosing me through my mosquito net. I am a human miracle!

Looove,

Hayley

locals paddling about in their wooden canoes. probably either fishing, or thinking about fishing.

look at how delighted we are!

manatees live here! ALLEGEDLY.

riverfront of where we stayed. the guy in the picture is the portuguese butthead.

path winding through the forest toward my treehouse.

sprinkle sprakle raindrops! that there's a cabin.

chops descending our awesome staircase.

dusk.

approaching dusk? everything is green.

just around the river bend (come on lets not pretend we havent all seen Pocahontas)

chops, t-bag, and our extremely sassy boat driver lady. note the cut-offs.

our jungle guide and me after the hike.

from inside the CAVE of TIGERS!

secret jungle island.

glowy leaves!!!!

amazing twisty vine. they call it the monkey ladder. it should be called the twisted glaze.

moss!!! which flakes off onto your skin in a delightful way when hugged.

chops eatin' breakfast at the beach.

7 September 2009

Hey, chochachos!

So one of the excellent things about Life here is the fact that people are constantly wandering around selling stuff, thereby often eliminating the need to actually enter a store to buy Items. Ride the bus, and more likely than not you will be able to purchase tomatoes, squirt guns, toothbrushes, bars of soap all taped together just the way you like ‘em, crappy flashlights, seasonal fruit, bags ‘o water, hot meals, belts, scrunchies, pills, God, and boiled corn—all before you even reach your destination. It is, like I mentioned earlier, Excellent—especially if you don’t particularly enjoy shopping, which I particularly do not. This type of business transaction is not only confined to the buses, either—the case in point being that about three minutes ago, some kids came to my door like they do every day at about 4:00pm selling fried doughnuts covered in sugar for two lempiras each (about a dime…I think). They are so tasty, a dog barks. How many of you guys get doughnut vendors selling hot fresh-baked items for a dime apiece a-comin’ to your door every dang ol day? JUST ME I WIN. Suckers!

Sorry, I ain’t tryin to be a jerk sandwich. I take it back. No one is sucker. No one with door-to-door doughnut service, that is.

I spent the day today scrubbing out a bunch of extremely nasty clothes in the pila and performing similar acts of “just got home from vacation, time to get hygienic again” activities. THAT’S RIGHT. I TOTALLY WENT ON A VACATION. AND IT WAS TOTALLY AWESOME. While I’ve had many an Adventure in the year I’ve been working here in Alubarén, I haven’t really taken a bigger trip since last New Years, when I went to El Salvador. So when my buddy from home, Chops, decided he wanted to come visit me in H-Town, I was like “hells yes dude lets do this thing,” which we subsequently did [do this thing]. We were GONNA go on said adventure back in June, but then Honduras got all wonky on me politically and we had to postpone. But no matter, because reschedule we did, and have spent the past bunch of days just runnin’ all over central America and havin’ 7 kinds of fun. We spent a day together in my site, wandering up and down our one road, sittin’ on my Sitting Hill, relaxing near but not in my Swimmin’ Hole (it was hosting the annual Algae and Gunk Convention of 2009), and otherwise enjoying the fruits that Alubarén has to offer. My house was a little crazy because Nely and the family were crashing there, their house in the midst of a desperately-needed re-roofing, but it was fine if not a cozy and chill way for Chops to get to know some local folks. Nely and I (mostly Nely) cooked up some beans and rice and fried bananas, bought a 3-liter bottle of Coke for the occasion, and had us a big ol’ Honduran meal. We chilled in plastic lawn chairs under my flowering cherry tree (crappy Honduran ones, not to be confused with what the rest of the world knows as cherries) and watched lightning flicker in the distance. Early the next morning, after a breakfast of eggs and leftover bananas, I handed the keys over to Nely (“stay as long as necessary but please don’t let the kids piss in my bed”), hugged Igor, and Chops and I tramped off into the rising sun (don’t worry I had a hat on).

The jalón (free ride) gods were smilin’ on us, because not five minutes into our trek to where the buses pass, a nice pick-up truck rolled by and offered us a lift all the way to the “desvio pavementado,” AKA where the dirt road meets the paved freeway. This journey is usually a two-hour bus ride, but in a jalon it is a delightful hour-ish ride, rollin’ up and down the green hills and carefully avoiding cows, chickens, and school children. Once we got to the freeway we grabbed a bus headed south and crossed the border into El Salvador. We spent a couple days at the same surfer lodge I’d stayed at in January, “Olas Permanentes,” not because I am afraid of change but because I was so enamored with its tasty sandwiches and awesome waves and beautiful beach and cheap rooms and plentiful hammocks I just couldn’t imagine staying anywhere else. The first thing I did upon arrival was run up the retaining wall/patio of the hotel to check out the beach, and was shocked and severely pissed to discover that the Ocean is a fickle mistress and had totally gotten a botched boob job in my 8 months of absence, which is to say that the open, wide stretches of black sand beach had been replaced by boulders and rocks and the beach was basically only existent during low tide—otherwise the water was violently bashing itself against the wall. Apparently the wet season = stronger waves, and the current is so strong it carries away much of the sand, thus exposing all those ugly rocks. It was still delightful, and swim/surf/boogie board we did, but only during low tide, and with much caution. On our last night, we were the ONLY guests in the joint, and a storm hit that was so forceful we hid in our bunk-beds and recorded a 2-minute electronic missive on my camera, bidding farewell to our respective families. It was pretty good…I might go ahead and save it in case I am ever in any sort of hostage situation and don’t have a pen handy.

Our thirst for the beach quenched like a gringo with a mouthful of dry sand, we headed north-west and spent the last leg of our adventure fulfilling my personal life-long dream, which as many of you may know is “live in a tree house in the jungle.” Technically, TECHNICALLY, it wasn’t actually a tree house, but it was a small, rickety, thatch-roofed structure that had to be entered via a psychedelic twirly-whirly staircase, and it was engulfed in trees and vines and all sorts of drippy verdant vegetation, so I am willing to make a small fib when I tell people about it (feel free to do the same). And it was most certainly and delightfully a rain-foresty jungle, all filled with jaguars and monkeys and crocodiles and birds and spiders bigger than my freaking face (though the latter was the only creature I actually saw). Chops and I only planned to stay a night, but due to the extreme Awesomeness of the whole ensemble, we ended up staying for three. This little hideaway lodge was tucked into the jungle along a wide, warm river, and on the boat ride over we met two delightful Aussie brothers, AJ and Tristan, who were on an adventure of their own. They decided to come with us, and two became four for the next couple days. I dare say Chops and I could not have asked for better companions, and I was rather sad to leave ‘em behind when the time came for us to go home. Sometimes I just feel so happy that the world is constantly producing wonderful people for me to befriend. Thanks, world.

The lodge was powered by solar energy, and the folks that run it were extremely laid-back and friendly (except for the douchey Portuguese guy, who I invite to sit on a tarantula and SPIN). Every night everyone eats dinner all together, inhaling fresh pita bread and tasty green garlic goo and carrot/squash soups and fish casseroles. When not eating, Chops, Tristan, AJ and I passed the time by going on Adventures all day. We kayaked to a biotope a couple of hours down the river and hiked around in the Protected Zone one day, which was beautiful jungle with equally beautifully-maintained trails. It was interesting because many of the locals filled us in on the current struggle going on between the people who live on the protected area and the conservationists who are trying to maintain it as such. Land must be protected, but when it comes at the cost of seizing the land from the locals who live on it, things get as hairy as the eight-legged, many-eyed fellas who inhabit the bathrooms at night (I spent a lot of time peeing in the bushes…but that’s unrelated to anything except my metaphor). Eco-tourism is obviously a great way for the locals to earn money and protect their land at the same time, but unfortunately the common pattern is that all the eco-lodges and such are owned by foreigners. A nice NGO/volunteer-based scaffolding support-system would be a good start, but I didn’t see much of that in this particular area.

Our final kayak destination was a rather elusive restaurant tucked into a small cove, which was ironically not serving food on that particular day, because everyone had gone to town. The four of us pleaded the two women who had stayed behind with hungry eyes (I dramatically wiped rivulets of saliva from my chin with a shaky hand; Chops quietly chewed coca leaves to stave his hunger), and finally one of the ladies made us four mediocre papaya smoothies served in impressive glass margarita goblets. Off we kayaked back down the river, only to be caught—no, wrong word—only to be delightfully involved in a sudden late-afternoon down-pour. We alternated between gliding through the sheets of water and floating with arms outstretched, letting the warm drops slide down our faces like a bunch of joyous eight-year-olds, lubed up with Banana Boat, sliding belly-down on a hosed-off plastic tarp. Seriously, that is exactly the way in which the water ran down my face. I even heard tiny little voices screaming “yaaaay!”, but that might have been my imagination or perhaps a hunger-induced hallucination. After whooping and grinning through the storm, we paddled past a rainbow and arrived a couple hours later at a small river-side restaurant and hot springs. We relaxed in the steamy, farty-smelling water while this delightfully functioning restaurant fried us up a mess o’ fish and fries. We ate dinner as the sun set, and paddled the last half an hour to our lodge as dusk made itself at home on the glassy water.

The next day, we hired a local guide to take us on a sweet hike through the jungle, which was totally worth it—he took us to a delightfully cold swimming hole and a muggy cave and pointed out the local plants and bugs, and also brought us through a couple small villages, which were beautiful. It was sweaty as the dang Dickens but I’ve never hiked through such eyeball-explodin’ awesomeness before (sorry, Erika—too soon?). That evening was our last, and we risked the crocodiles by goin’ off the rope swing into the river after dinner. Sing-alongs were had with an Israeli guy and his guitar and egg-shakers, cold beers were consumed and many a special moment was passed listening to the frogs holler at each other. I peed under a tree next the bathroom-turned-tarantula-hotel one last time, clamored up the wooden staircase like an albino spider monkey, crawled into my squishy, mosquito-netted bunk, and fell asleep listening to the sprinkle-sprankle of jungle night-life one last time. The next morning, after breakfast, Chops and I hugged our buddies goodbye and headed home.

Brief summary for those of you who only have time for the Cliff Notes edition: Chops and I had a blasty-blast in various bodies of water and/or trees. We made lots of rad friends and it was the best time ever and that is what I did on my summer vacation the END.

Love,

Hayley

sittin' on our sittin' hill

lookin down toward Alubaren from my Secret Area

igor pretending he is a greyhound

oh man this is so Purina

for those of you familiar with the Sexy Bear Pose, this is the Sexy Igor Pose.

hunting moths.

me and the fam

oh, just indians and i (anner and eliezer)

goofy Lempiras

you can't shoot me with an arrow! barack obama will bring the pain.

sassy indian maidens.

waiting for the parade AKA lap around the park.

this little guy won the boys' fashion show. because of his excessive soot, i believe.

9 August 2009

Hey, chochachos!

So I am extremely pissed at Igor, because I just spent like 20 minutes looking for my camera, which I was sure I’d left sitting in its little case on the plastic lawn chair I have for such purposes (storing items/bottoms). After searching all two rooms in my house extensively, I glanced outside and saw the telltale silver glint, nestled gently in a heap of dried grass and burned garbage that Igor likes to nap in. Two feet away was the black carrying case, neatly shredded—Igor made sure to ruin all the zippers so it no longer closes. Even though I know you’re not supposed to punish the dog unless you catch him in the act, I still spanked Igor like three times with a flip-flop, which is our usual method of behavior control. Fortunately, the camera seems to work just fine…otherwise I probably would still be spanking Igor. IGOR. HOW DARE YOU TOUCH THINGS ON MY SPECIAL LAWN CHAIR.

I forgive him, though, because he is but a nine-month-old puppy face and doesn’t know about things such as “electronics” and “warranty” and “respecting Hayley’s property.” He’s much more hyper now than he used to be (maybe because we finally nicked that blood parasite) and also more mischievous…he has yet to ruin anything valuable of mine but he loves to take things outside and leap around with them in his mouth, most especially brooms and plastic soda bottles. Oh, how Igor loves brooms. He grabs them right in the middle of the broomstick and then prances all over the yard like a tightrope freak. One time he was galloping around with his favorite broom and tried to race into the doorway. Totally t-boned himself. It was extremely hilarious. Yesterday was a lazy Saturday afternoon, so I decided to take Igor on one of our late-afternoon Adventures. We had just had a 20 minute thunderstorm so everything was nice and drippy and there was great cloud cover, which means one can traipse about in the out-of-doors and not risk bring fried to death. We head out behind my house, cross a little creek, scramble up a steep slope for like 15 minutes, and then it’s a sweet hike through scrubby bushes and moss-covered rocks to my favorite sitting place, which is a great open hill. I can sit there and look down at the whole little valley, look at my pueblo and listen to everything around me. Sitting up above a town means that if you listen carefully enough you can hear hells of different layers of noises and sounds. And since the hill is surrounded by mango groves and a heavily-forested river gully, there is a whole other dimension of natural noises. So Igor sprints around and flattens himself in the grass and explodes out like a lion and does other puppy things while I sit on the very highest point of the hill and chill out under the warm drippy clouds and listen. Whinnying horses, grunting pigs, crowing roosters, thumping soccer balls, pulsing reggaeton, roaring motorcycles, chirping and singing birds, barking dogs, shrieking or crying or shouting kids, and nagging mothers…plus all the buzzing and humming bugs that live in the grass. This is probably the closest to meditating I will ever get. I like to practice what I call “light yoga,” which basically involves me sitting down and occasionally sipping from a can of guava juice I’d brought.

After our adventure, Igor and I hiked back home and headed to the plaza, because Alubarén is currently in feria, which is a tradition every municipality of moderate girth practices. Think of the summertime country fairs of America, and remove everything except mobile vendors offering crappy food and plastic jewelry, and you’ve basically got a Honduran feria. Of course, bigger and richer communities often have really awesome ferias, but Alubarén’s is completely lame (and I say that with love). Basically it’s just a yearly opportunity for all the drunks to go on a four-day bender and for people to sell fried tacos and grilled meat. But they have little activities every day, like folk dancing and live music (I got to lay in bed and listen to a Garifuna punta band cover Mexican mariachi artist Vicente Fernandez songs until 2:00am last night), and other typical Honduran feria events, such as “catch the greased-up pig” (the prize is the pig), “climb the greased-up pole” (the prize is being totally greasy afterwards), and my favorite, “El Toro Fuego,” which involves no grease and lots of pyrotechnics. Basically a dude puts a giant metal cage on his head designed to look like a bull’s head, and packs it with fireworks and shooting sparks and then chases the village children around while exploding all over the place. Totally insanely dangerous. I love it. Last time I saw a Toro Fuego was in Reitoca’s feria, and I totally punched a dude in the face during the panic. This time, I was in the park with Nely and the kids when the Toro Fuego guy burst out of no where. Everyone took off screaming and I tripped on and nearly trampled to death an 8-year-old boy. Whoopsies! That was last night, and tonight they’re going to have another favorite of mine, El Rifeo, in which all the men in town cross-dress and strut around in borrowed skirts and tube tops with socks stuffed into the bras. I’m as shocked as you are that this type of gender-bending occurs in Machismo-Land, but apparently it’s a big deal and the sexist man gets a prize. For the rest of the feria, they have a bunch of activities lifted from any American high school’s social calander, such as a night of karaoke, a dance off, several modeling competitions for both genders, and the selection and crowning of the Queen of the Feria.

So basically, I have not been wanting for entertainment these days. A couple weeks ago Honduras celebrated National Indian Day, in which they commemorate their tribal roots by forcing all the kids to come to school half-naked and march around town while doing the stereotypical Indian war-whoop, which is exactly the same in America (you know, the woo-woo-woo thing with the open hand and the mouth). I say forced, but the kids under 10 really do love it. The all come in skimpy little outfits made of grasses, corn husks, banana leaves, or, in the cases of more technologically-advanced Indians, cardboard and plastic. Chicken feathers are stuck in braids or headbands, and the girls often carry little baskets of squash or corn. The boys totally lucked out on accessories, because they get to carry sweet bows and arrows, many of which actually work. Also, soot is a very popular cosmetic—most of the boys have sooty moustaches or beards, as well as a liberal application all over the body (thus teaching the young folks that Indians are filthy and maybe slept in ovens). I was wandering around the school taking pictures when the principal saw me and asked me if I’d like to be a judge in the post-parade fashion show (the best Indian got like 100 lempiras as a prize), which I most certainly DID. It was adorable, though some of the little kids were too scared to model their outfits (one unfortunate first grader’s mom had made her a mermaid-esque bra thing with round gourds covered in chicken feathers, and the boys kept shouting TITTIES! at her until she ran home crying). For my judging services, they paid me in an ice-cold coke, which was extremely tasty. Oh, how I love soda.

This past week was also special because John, The Prince of Alubarén, aka the volunteer who lived here before me, came back for a brief two-day visit. Even a year after his departure I still hear stories and affectionate reflection about him almost every day. I can honestly say I don’t think there is a person who lives here who doesn’t consider him a good friend…he is so LOVED. It’s beautiful. So it was rad to see him back in town, interacting with all his old friends and neighbors. It was also really fun getting to know him, because I’d only really met him once and he’s maybe the nicest dude in the world. He and his college buddy Brice had been backpacking around Central America for a couple weeks and Alubarén was one of their last stops…so they tramped around the town saying hello-and-goodbye to everyone, while I went about my merry ways of stopping teen pregnancy and teaching English. They bought me dinner at all three of the little eateries in town and we spent our two nights chilling in my hammocks, drinking illegally purchased beer, and playing Fart Tennis (they mopped the floor with my ass). It makes me excited for when I come back to visit in a couple years. I hope the volunteer here when I return has ample hammock space and a talent for pedos.

In case anyone is wondering what exactly is happening with our whole military coup/political crisis thing, my advice is to check google, ‘cause I got no idea. After several weeks of relative chill-ness, things have started to heat up again—this week, some pro-Mel demonstrators burned a public city bus and a huge Popeye’s restaurant (yes, the fried chicken chain). A couple weeks ago, Zelaya tried to enter the country through a Nicaraguan border and failed, and then camped out there for several days, hollering at his supporters through a bullhorn. Micheletti is still in power and Zelaya still wants to come back, but they’ve resolved nothing. They’re still involved in peace talks with the Costa Rican President Arias as a mediator, but it doesn’t seem to be getting us anywhere, especially since word on the street is that Arias now has the pig flu (excuse me I mean H1N1). Honestly, the general elections for the new president are in three months…at this point the easiest solution would be to let Micheletti stay in power until then. But I guess that ain’t exactly fair or legal…maybe they should make a chart and take turns. Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, Micheletti gets to be prez, and Tuesday, Thursday, and the weekend, Zelaya is in charge. I will email this idea to the Government.

And finally, in the Bowels News of the day, I recently went to Tegus following a nasty three-week bout of POMP and was given serious antibiotics for the intestinal infection I had acquired. I am now healthy for what seems like the first time in hella days, and I must say, this whole “being hungry” and “being able to eat food without immediately expelling it into my latrine with the force and cadence of a trumpet corp” is a pretty sweet deal. Hooray and hot damn for health.

Well my my will you look at that, it is 12:30pm AKA TIME FOR SOME TORTILLAS AND BEANS AND CHEESE!

Loooooove,

Hayley

Two sixth grade girls in my "I Derseerve" abstinence workshop, making the "Chain of Abstinence"....very inspiring.

My neighbor Rubio, with his banjo (this one goes out to you, dad!)

18 July 2009

Hey, chochachos! Sorry, I can’t hack ‘howdy dudes’ anymore. It just makes me think of “Hey, dude!”, which those of you fortunate enough to have had Nickelodeon as a child (and, obviously, fortunate enough to have been a child in the nineties) will recall as the teenagers-on-a-dude-ranch sitcom. All ladies wearin’ sleeveless denim tops, knotted in that sassy limbo that is the below-the-navel-above-the-jeans region…all guys with floppy man-bangs…everybody eatin’ outside, on picnic tables…hilarity all ensuing when the experienced ranch-hands let the excessively-fringed greenhorns take the toughest stallions EVER on a trail ride…man. I hope that show was as awesome as I remember it. Next time I am on a non-dial-up computer I am totally going to YouTube the DICKENS out of “Hey, Dude!” and see what’s up with the old gang. Meanwhile, back at the non-1990s/non-horse ranch ranch, things are...semi-crisis like. Think of your typical political crisis as a delicious sirloin hamburger. Then replace that delicious sirloin with crappy pre-formed hamburger patties, and cook them (aka throw the still-frozen meat-disc into the frying pan) medium rare. This non-deadly, but certainly non-tasty burger, is essentially the state of the union down here in H-Town (if I may). The past couple weeks have been a delightful exercise in what happens when a country decides to oust its own leader. Following the coup, Honduras was surprised to discover that no one outside of Honduras (except Thailand, I think…random) supported their decision to get rid of Zelaya. Nearly every Honduran I spoke to (aka all my neighbors and such, all poor campesinos) echoed similar sentiments—“we HAD to get rid of Zelaya like that, there was no more time and he was about to do a big sassy power-grab and ruin our democracy.” Most people are indignant that any other country (especially Venezuela) should stick its nose in their business regarding their political issues, and continue to organize politically in a way I’d never have expected. The news here showed massive demonstrations for Peace and Democracy marching around in all the major cities, with children, youth, old folks and everyone in between chanting “STAY OUT, ZELAYA!” and “IT WASN’T A COUP!” (Since the military is not in power, and they all acted together, they’re trying to argue it wasn’t a coup and was a legal maneuver.) The government issued a country-wide curfew and was constantly interrupting the normal television programs to update the public on what was going on. Fortunately, though, because the vast majority of Hondurans seem to be against Zelaya, there has been little conflict or blood-shed at any of the demonstrations. The Peace Corps has restricted our movement around—some days we were instructed not to leave even our homes, and other days we were allowed to leave our sites to go to nearby towns. Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula, however, continue to remain off-limits. The boiling point was reached last week, when they closed the airport on Tuesday, July 7—Zelaya attempted to re-enter the country and people stormed the runway and blocked his plane. One person was killed in the struggle. Zelaya has yet to enter the country, and recently had the first face-to-face meeting with Micheletti (the president of Congress, who was placed as the new president of the country after they kicked Zelaya out), mediated by Costa Rica’s president. Nothing has been resolved yet, but things seem to be calmer and I expect life will return to normal relatively soon. The vibe I get from the folks I talk to is that they want Micheletti to stay until November, when we have the general elections to choose a new president. However, that’s flexible—even Micheletti said he will step down if people want him too—people seem to be saying “ANYONE but Zelaya!” At first, everyone I spoke to was very vehement that Zelaya not even be allowed to return to Honduras, because “he’s a corrupt thief” and it will just bring more disruption. Now, however, people seem willing to allow him to return to Honduras—just not as President. I expect a conclusion will be reached in the next couple of weeks. Being in a country involved in such a political crisis has been kinda exciting, I’ll be honest—mainly because this type of thing could never happen in the states (can you imagine if the military, congress, and supreme court had kidnapped Bush on the eve of some huge decision he was about to make and sent him to Canada, then, with massive citizen support, managed to argue it was a legit move?). I’m also lucky because the “coup” hasn’t really affected me in any important way...my little dusty pueblo in the middle of nowhere goes about its sleepy, sweaty business no matter what happens in the big cities, and the only danger I face here has either 0 or 8 feet, and are not known to participate in mass demonstrations (though if I ever catch wind of a tarantula or snake peace march I will become a Peace Corps deserted and go straight to the beaches of El Salvador). However, Zelaya DID ruin my Guatemalan adventures with my excellent college buddy Chops…the day Chops’ plane was supposed to land, Honduras closed its airports and American Airlines cancelled all flights, due to the riots at the airport. But it was for the best, because I was totally POMB (Peein’ Out My Butt) anyway and traveling would have been extremely gross. So Chops is gonna come in August and I ain’t gonna have any diarrhea and we’re gonna have a great ol time. Hells of hooray! Because the government shut down the schools for a couple weeks during all this government hoo-hah, I haven’t had as much to do—just my English and methodology classes for teachers, pregnant women’s club, hypertension classes, and abstinence workshop. But one exciting development is that I finally wrangled together the folks who used to be involved with our little library (which was founded 10 years ago by a Peace Corps volunteer named Johana and has been bolted shut for like two or three years) and meet with the mayor. The mayor agreed to pay a small stipend to our librarian (1,000 lempiras a month, about $50) to open the library four hours a day. SUCCESS!! It’s just a tiny room attached to the school, with four huge shelves stuffed with incredibly dusty books. Most of the books are useless crap—seriously—but there is a nice selection of children’s story books as well as some chapter books and novels for adolescents and adults. Pleasure reading is not an activity pursued by any Honduran that I know, but I’m working with the preschool and elementary school teachers to form reading clubs, so hopefully we can change that, at least a little bit. The kids here love to be read to, so my plan is that if we can get the teachers to use the library and read to their kids a couple times a week, maybe the kids will start coming on their own. Once school lets out in November I’m going to start a “summer vacation literacy project,” but that’s a ways off. The library still needs a lot of work and supplies. The librarian we have at the moment is horribly incompetent—I had to explain to her the concept of alphabetical order—and the whole idea of organizing the books into sections based on topic (non-fiction, fiction, science, history, etc.) is very challenging for her, too. Her attitude is seven kinds of awful, too—she’s very childish and gossipy and makes no effort to hide the fact she’s in this for the money and not much else. However, she was the only one we could find who was interested and had the time and “experience,” so for the time being, she’s the boss. I want to fix up the library a little, maybe buy a rug and some pillows or squishy chairs for the kid’s reading corner, and buy some posters or decorations to liven the place up. We can also use more Spanish books, so if anyone has any (especially children’s books), send ‘em my way. I just received a shipment of 30 pounds of books from the Darien Book Aid organization, which is located in Darien, Connecticut (what up, Brickmans!). They were amazing and sent me the box free of charge. Unfortunately, their Spanish section is limited, so the majority of what I received was in English. But beggars can’t be choosers, so I am very thankful for their support and generosity. Yay for NGOs! Man, I can’t believe it’s July…I celebrated the fourth last weekend with my neighbors in the most American way possible—slightly burned hotdogs. I bought like 20 of them (20 for a dollar, can’t beat that price) and fashioned a grill over Nely’s woodstove. We diced up lettuce and tomatoes and served the dogs on toasted buns with ketchup. Everyone drank a butt-load of soda and had at least two hotdogs, so it was excellent. Then I handed out firecrackers to the kids (good influence, I know) and we had a great ol time. They asked me to sing the national anthem, which was brutal. No effort was made to hide their collective look of horror as I screeched my way through it…couldn’t we have written an anthem that is a little easier, tone-wise? Like Old McDonald? Then David came over, and we ate a ton of chips and drank more soda. On July 9th, I hit my one-year mark of being in-country, and will celebrate my halfway-through-service mark in September. It feels like I’ve been living in Alubarén forever. I’m sweating. Time to go. Love,

Haylz

the gang. alison is pissed because the angry ants bit her feet.

Igor practicing for his career as a Pedigree dog food model.

my best bud nely, in her garden.

my other best bud.

noel frolicking in the fields behind our houses.

noel, alison and cristina surprised me with this bottle-cap flower arrangement at my pila.

and cristina planted me this coluis. alison refused to change out of her pajamas all day.

igor in the yard, post machete work.

alison with the turtle we found in my yard.

this caterpillar enjoys my shoe. also, good god, my ankle sure looks ugly up close.

overcoming her fright.

such a beautiful little dude. or lady. who knows.

tarantulaaaaaaa!!!!!

just strolling about my yard.

this used to be a small mountain of sand...igor flattened it. fatty.

my melon patch, completely overgrown. plus papaya trees!

my secret sittin´area, before we took a machete to it.

obed hard at work.

my baseball team with US baseball player and scout Raphael Avila, who came to do a workshop. He was actually from the Dominican Republic, I think. I forget. The kids loved it.

my yard and pila, pre machete attack.

little toad i found in my room.

28 June 2009

Howdy dudes,

I can now count two separate times when my jaw has literally fallen open in wonder and disbelief this weekend. The first was yesterday, Saturday, June 27, when my neighbor casually mentioned that she didn’t know that that “dead singer Michael Jackson was black.” I was like hang on, what do you mean, dead singer? And she’s all like “yeah a doctor injected him in the heart and killed him.” Now, this is the same neighbor that sent me into hysterics when she somehow botched the news that the Obamas got a new dog and informed me she saw on the news that “Barack Obama had a new woman,” so I wasn’t sure if I could believe her. Then I remembered I had heard the Ranchera radio station play Thriller three times that morning, and realized she might have her facts straight. I immediately called my buddy who confirmed MJ’s death, though informed me that was “so three days ago.” (To which I reply, shut up, I live in a television-less cave and my only supply of current events comes from my neighbors whose television has never been changed from the telenovela channel.) So all I can say about that is, Michael Jackson, it sucks you’re dead and I hope your babies are okay.

So I awoke this morning, still reeling from the loss of El Rey de Pop, to a text-message from my Peace Corps boss informing me, in the succinct way that only a Spanish text-message can, that there had been a military coup and we no longer had a president. Actually, it said “golpe del estado,” and I struggled through the early-morning boogers my brains coats itself in to remember what the particular phrase meant. Then my four months in Chile paid off and I remember from all those boring lectures that that means the military busts in waving machine guns wildly in each hand, blows up the presidential palace, kills the president, and totally takes over the country, ruling with a bloody fist for like 18 years. “Crap,” I though.

Turns out, Honduras must have read the “Military Coups for Dummies” manual (or at least wikipedia’d that shit) because this thing was classy. I mean, totally seamless. Our now ex-president Mel Zelaya (Liberal party) has been hollering all over the news for the past couple weeks (or maybe more, I only just noticed it myself) that he wants to change Honduras into a “participatory democracy.” At first, no one seemed to know what he was talking about, and people seemed to vaguely agree with him…no one knew exactly what he meant, but he kept saying that with his new plan, the needs of the people who find a voice and the poor would finally get the representation they wanted. Finally, though, it became clear that he actually wanted to do was RE-WRITE THE CONSTITUTION to model that of Venezuela. “Our constitution is too rigid!” he said in a speech last night, the eve of his kidnapping. “C’mon, guys! Let’s change it!” His new “democracy” would involve him having full authority over the Congress and Supreme Court and would allow him to be president FOREVER. Fortunately, even the most humble campesinos recognized this for the Hugo Chavez drivel that is was and I can’t say I spoke to a single Honduran who supported Zelaya’s proposed plan, which he called “La Cuarta Urna” (or something, I’m not even sure). Today, Sunday, June 28, was supposed to be the “voting” day—he’d dispatched people with ballot boxes in all the communities so the people could vote on his plan, offering a hefty “bonus” (bribe) for the folks that voted. He asked the military to force people to participate, and to support him on this, but they admirably refused. The Congress and the Supreme Court also refused, declaring that such a Constitutional re-write and power-grab was against the law. And so, the three entities of law creation, law enforcement, and law trying banded together and kidnapped his blind-to-popular-will-of-the-people butt. This is how I imagine it went down:

SCENE: IN A TOP-SECRET TREE HOUSE SOMEWHERE IN THE MOUNTAINS OF TEGUCIGALPA

MILITARY: Hey, guys.

CONGRESS: Hey man.

SUPREME COURT: ‘Sup.

MILITARY: You both told your moms you were spending the night at each other’s houses, right?

CONGRESS: Yeah dude.

SUPREME COURT: Yeah, AND I stole 100 lempiras from her purse and bought us a bunch of Twizzlers and Mountain Dews.

MILITARY: Aw, sweet! Good move, SC. Anyway, Zelaya is totally being a wiener about his four-years of presidency coming to an end. All like “waaah I don’t wanna leave let’s be communists and I’ll be the dictator FOR EVER.” So I’m thinking, kidnap his ass?

CONGRESS: I’m down. Where will we send him?

SUPREME COURT: I’ve heard Costa Rica is nice for exile.

MILITARY: Word. Meeting adjourned.

NARRORATOR: And so the three boys played Bak-u-gan and gorged themselves on candy and soda until daybreak, at which point, giddy with refined sugar and caffeine, they nabbed the president of Honduras and sent him to Costa Rica.

THE END.

So that’s pretty much what happened. Most of the Honduran people are totally down with it. They’ve installed the current president of the Congress (Micheletti) as the acting President until elections roll around in January. Most people seem to be in support of the coup—no one liked Zelaya’s “Cuarta Urna” plan, and the fact that his schemes were all illegal made him lose any legitimacy in the eyes of the people. However, there are people who, Zelaya supporters or not, don’t agree with the situation because of the way it was carried out. Blah blah “military removal of the President isn’t legal, either” blah blah. I guess coups aren’t very “democratic.” But re-writing the Constitution and assigning yourself never-ending leadership doesn’t exactly fit that title, either. So I guess I’m not really for the coup…but in my opinion, it’s the lesser of two evils in this situation. The only issue is, the international community seems to be rather upset about the whole charade and I’ve heard rumors that Venezuela is prepared to go to war in order to reinstate Zelaya as the proper president. So basically, I have no idea what is going to happen. But I feel frustrated because we’re not allowed to leave our communities at the moment (due to potentially violent protests), and in one week, my college buddy Chops is supposed to arrive so we can go have crazy-go-nuts Jungle Adventures in Guatemala. Come on Honduras, don’t ruin my Jungle Adventures. Please?

Other than that little thing, not much else is new. My weeds situation got mildly out of control, in the sense that the snakes started to have secret Snake Party meetings there, which eventually spilled into my house (picture, if you will, me lying in my hammock one night, reading Newsweek, listening to Cat Stevens, drinking tea, aka TOTALLY PEACEFUL, and some smart-ass snakey dude just slithers all angrily out from some corner and crosses the room). I said angrily because his head was raised, like a water snake or something….it gave me the creeps. I leapt out of my hammock and sort of death-gripped my magazine, clutching my heart (literally, just like in the movies!) with the other hand and unsure of what to do. The snake continued his angsty migration toward the open door and disappeared into the rainy night. I have no idea if it was poisonous or not. Then, later that night, I carefully tiptoed out to my latrine, and was brushing my teeth when something compelled me to turn around. Slithering toward me was ANOTHER freaking snake! I sort of jerked my foot at it and it flipped over and ran away. HAH. Anyway, I decided that was enough and spent the next three days breaking my back with my neighbors Obed and Elias, wielding machetes and cutting every blade of grass and greenery into complete submission. Nothing quite makes you appreciate lawnmowers like cutting an entire yard of knee-high grass with a machete…it was just like the Olden Tymes. We found a baby turtle, a harmless garden snake, and the biggest, hairiest tarantula I’ve ever seen (of all the critters we found, he didn’t make the cut…my neighbor Tina stabbed him with a stick while giggling madly and crying, “He’s ripe to die!” I did not stop her.) It was hard work, and I miss my jungle, but it’s nice to be able to walk around at night and not worry about having to kung-fu a snake to death with a magazine or anything.

I’ve begun my abstinence group, which is a roaring success so far…none of my sixth or seventh grade girlies have become pregnant this week (to my knowledge) and I KNOW no one has HIV, either. Score one for abstinence! We’ll continue to meet for two hours a week (each group) until October. And, due to the genius of my mom, I’ve decided I want to start an herb-growing club with local women (perhaps the very same pregnant women of my pregnant women’s club, though I’m not sure how much time they’ll have to tend a garden once their bun in the over pops out). We’ll see. If anyone has any insight on such a group, or materials they want to suggest, shoot me an e-mail. Or e-mail me a shoot! (Get it? As in, the first little green guy that pushes out of the ground…) I’ve also begun doing chats at the health center once a month about high blood pressure and how to avoid it (stop eating so much saturated fat dipped in salt, guys!).

My paragraphs seem to be getting shorter. I think that means it’s time for bed.

(Though all the gunshots I’ve been hearing in favorite of Zelaya’s removal are not very sleep-inducing…and this crazy “Mexican chili bean” tea I found abandoned in the Peace Corps lounge is making me sweat.)

Love, all over the dang place,

Hayley

14 June 2009

Howdy, dudes,

Yeah that’s right. Tooootally stickin’ by my guns about that new greeting. You all thought I’d forget. YOU WERE WRONG.

It’s raining like god like the spigot on when he was filling up his pila and then left to go on a bike ride and totally forgot about it…which is something I would never do, by the by. But anyway, it’s raining. Which brings me to a certain interesting Flora and Fauna Fact about Honduras: where’re all them toads at?? ‘kay, that’s a question, not a fact, but still: a week ago, every time it rained, my open doorway turned into a freaking toad Social Mixer…a bunch of toads all standing around awkwardly, girl toads all on one side giggling to each other, boy toads all on the other side, nervously inhaling all the snacks that the Social Committee put out…you know what I mean. Hells of toads, in my house. I would usually lie in my hammock and watch them, because a toad hunting is kind of intense. They focus in on a fallen beetle, left for dead by his comrades (they’re not heartless; they just know how the world works). Then the toad quick-hops over and shlurps him into his mouth. I’ve seen certain toads catch and eat like 7 bugs in 10 minutes. That’s good eatin’, man. But now, it’s raining like the dang dickens and there are NO toads, not even one. What the hell people?

The onset of winter here in the south of Honduras is getting pretty rough…the mountain passes are all snowed in and I heard ‘bout one group of folks tryin’ to make pass…got stranded up near the summit and several of ‘em turned to cannibalism before they could force their way back down the other side. OH WAIT I’M SORRY THAT IS THE DONNOR PARTY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. I always mix that up! Whoopsies. Actually it is just incredibly moist here, with increasing degrees of moist as the days go by. And it’s so damn hot, even my kneecaps sweat. My melon patch continues to explode all the place…I harvesting three cantaloupes today. Melon Day! And my yard just fills up with all kinds of lush, green plants…my landlords came over the other day and set their 12-year-old kid and his machete on ‘em, but I screamed and threw myself on top. NOT MY WEEDS, I screamed. ANYTHING BUT MY WEEDS. They tried to convince me I should machete them all to pieces because snakes will hide in them, but that is ridiculous because we all know where the snakes like to hide (my latrine; see previous blog entry for details). And after six months of living in a damn desert, excuuuuuuse me for delighting in the jungley-goodness that has finally descended upon my abode. The plants are even creeping into my bathroom!! All climbin’ up the walls with their little viney fingers…I’m thrilled. My landlords then decided I should not have to get my feet muddy whilst walking out back to the pila/wash/latrine area, so they paid to a guy to make several shoddy cement walk ways. I liked my yard when it was concrete free, but I guess it ain’t really my house anyways, it doesn’t matter.

Other news…let’s see, Igor is now the laughing stock of all the dogs in Alubarén. Whenever he walks by they all snicker “Jajajaja you weenie, your Owner cut your eggs off!” (The Spanish slang for testicles is eggs, not nuts/balls as we say in English). Then they clutch their own spawn-heavy egg-sacks and make crude gestures at him as he slinks away. Yes, it’s true. I committed the Honduran un-thinkable and had Igor neutered. NO ONE in this country fixes their pets; in fact, I found myself defending my decision about 15 times a day, in the face of great moral dissent. People find it sick and cruel that I am “playing god” by taking away my dog’s manliness—what joy will Igor have in life now that he can’t chase bitches and walk around with a big ‘ol saggy sack? I got really good at my response: “How many strays are there in Alubarén, in Honduras? If we don’t spay and neuter the dogs, they leave all the female dogs pregnant, who have a million baby dogs who are abandoned in the street, and no one loves them, and they are sooo very skinny (at this point I hold up my pinky finger, the Honduran gesture to indicate skinniness), and they have diseases, that they can give to PEOPLE, and then THEY have babies, and it just goes on and on….” Sometimes the person I would be talking to would think about it, and then agree with me. You’re right. We should control the stray dog population that is totally out of control. Sometimes the person would say, Yes, but….poor Igor! (At which point, I am in agreement…poor Igor. I’m sorry I took away your genitals.) And then ONE TIME a dude replied, “Okay, I see your point, but they should just fix the female dogs instead. It’s not fair to take a male’s genitals away!” I was like “dude that is the most sexist thing ever but I gotta bus to catch so see ya later” (it’s true, I did). Anyway, Igor had to spend a terrifying night alone in a crate in the vet’s office, but his stitches are healing up nice and he doesn’t seem to miss a certain familiar weight he used to have dangling between his legs. And now PETA can’t shame us when we come back to the states.

This past week was “Student Week,” a stupid “holiday” in which the kids don’t have to go to school, which is stupid because they barely have school anyway. It should be called “Teacher Week,” because they’re the only ones who want it. Anyway, since all my work is with the kiddies, I also had the week off, which I spent very productively. PSSSYYYCCCHH!! I didn’t really do anything, except hang out with the neighbors and drink lots of coffee. Also, I gave a 30-minute lecture to the folks waiting in the health clinic about the dangers of saturated fats and salt, because everyone and their mom here has high blood pressure. That was Friday morning…around noon, My Pretend-Site-Mate David (the fella who lives about an hour walking-distance from here) came over, and we packed a picnic (aka bought two plates of awful fried chicken and potatoes, plus a two-liter bottle of soda) and headed out to my favorite swimmin’ hole up in the mountains. He stayed the night ‘cause of the big late-afternoon rain storm, so I once again willingly submitted myself to all kinds of neighborhood gossip for the sake of companionship. Unfortunately, I got the ‘ol “2.5 Hour Dysentery,” and totally almost died for the majority of the night. I’d had the sass-gut all week, and it was just as burbly that day as any other, but right about 6:00pm, I basically just started POMB (Peeing Out My Butt, it’s a medical term for when you got craaa-aaazy diarrhea), with just the worst stomach cramps of all time ever. I actually though I was dying. I would come staggering back in and collapse in the hammock, only to spring up three minutes later, sprinting out the door and up the yard as David cries “What, AGAIN?” after me. Finally (after I totally pooped my pants with BLOOD on the way) I just stayed put in there, and sent several instructional text messages about what kind of soup and juice to buy me to David, who was amusing himself in the house by reading some Christopher Moore novel. At about 9:30pm, I was totally empty and feeling better so I had some Victory Soup and Victory Juice and we watched a movie on his computer. Now I’m totally healthy and fine, but with the 2.5 Hour Dysentery a recent memory, and the fact that the water coming out of my pila has become dirt-brown due to who the hell knows what, I’ve decided to start the Hayley Kercher Water Treatment Process, in which I tie an old pair of undies around the faucet to act as a filter (check) and add chlorine to my drinking water (double check). SO I’m feelin’ great! And my water has that great “Fruit of the Looms Found Floating in a Swimming Pool” taste we all know and love.

HEY it’s summer in America! Happy Summer dudes!!

Love,

Hayley

Scumbag 2, before we kil't him.

Obed looks so....excited!

a very deadly baby black coral snake, waiting to bite my ass in my latrine.

igor enjoys laying in the sand pile and scraping said sand into his crotch.

"it's true."

hell YES i scored the only dang goal during donkey polo

oh, serafin. my noble steed.

you can't really tell, but that kid is wearing GLOVES! cheater! thinking-ahead-cheater!

someday, after his immigration to the states, im gonna make igor his very own giant sand-box in the shade.

Dos de mayo 2009

Hey, chochachos! Man I should come up with a new greeting, huh…that’s gettin’ pretty old, you know? Alright…from now on I shall be greeting this blog with a “Howdy, dudes,” or at least until that one gets boring, too. Case CLOSED. *gavel noise*

Howdy, dudes,

I want you all to know that me writing this blog right now is an intense bodily sacrifice, because my butt was destroyed (literally, it might fall off!) in a recent Donkey Polo competition in which we kicked some ass and lost profoundly to a Honduran team of dudes on donkeys, playin’ polo. Those have got to be the BONIEST critters in the whole entire dang animal kingdom. I’m going to suggest tiny saddles for next year. So anyway, that’s why sittin’ in this here wooden chair is so ouchy. But that’s why god invented hammocks…they cushion one’s pompis in a way grounded seats never will. Blessed are the hammocks. I suppose this machine IS a laptop, I could conceivably take it me on a journey to the hammock in the other (the only other) room. But it’s kind of heavy and extremely burny (this is the Chubby Chunk 2001 of dell, 6 years ago)..the old guy is finally dying a slow and painful death, and in doing so has made himself very fragile. My butt doesn’t hurt so bad that I can’t stay here and write a bit more.

So yeah, Donkey Polo was this past weekend in the little cobblestoney pueblo of Yuscuran, in the department of Danli (I think…or maybe it’s El Paraiso…anyway). It was beautiful, at least compared to certain parts of the south. Lots of pine trees, very hilly. Igor and I trekked up to Tegus Friday morning, and a certain somebody got his blood drawn, nuts inspected, ears washed, and endured an awful plastic stick up his poor little fluffy hiney. Once the vet was done, Igor and I hopped on a bus headed toward Yuscuran, plus several other gringos we’d hooked up with at the Secret Clubhouse aka the volunteer lounge at the PC office. Unlike previous encounters with city buses, in which a shake of my sassy gringa hair and a beaming smile of sassy gringa teeth was all the convincing necessary, the dudes on the bus were totally NOT interested in having Igor climb aboard. He’s not even that big! He only weighs 40 lbs, and that’s 40 pounds of LOVE. I had to plead and cajole the bus driver for like 30 seconds, walking alongside the moving bus and shouting into the folding door how “bien educado” (well behaved) and “super aseado” (super clean) little Igor is. They finally let us on, under the conditions that we “move immediately to the very last seat in this damn bus,” which we promptly did. It was weird, usually Igor is a hit on the buses, ‘cause he does cute things like stick his head out the window and guerilla-warfar-crawl on his elbows around under people’s seats, waggling his tail). But this bus was totally anti-dog…stupid city folk. The women were all fresa (prissy) about it, makin’ gross-out noises and dramatically yanking their elbows away from his wet, snuffling nose…the teenage girls in the typical navy-and-white school uniforms behind him would all scream hysterically if Igor turned his head toward them, and one lady kept yanking her kid’s feet away from Igor’s face, even though he was totally just sleeping on the floor. Needless to say I was relieved when we finally arrived and stepped down off the bus. The volunteer who lives here’s house was just 4 blocks down the hill, and the great gringo train chugga-chugged off for the first time in many that weekend. It was just a blasty-blast, a great big ol bunch of folks smushed into that tiny house, hangin’ out at nights on her concrete roof and spending the day hours hikin’ around the protected Park area, sleeping (Igor like to be the little spoon), eatin’, wandering around the pueblo, loitering by the central park, and engaging in general FunTimes. This weekend was also Yuscuran’s annual Mango Festival, so there were loads of people, dancing, and singing and selling tasty food and a jillion pounds of mangos. And, of course, there was the 13th Annual Donkey Polo Championship, which we lost for the 13th time in a row. It wasn’t fair, those Hondurans grabbed all the good donkeys first, and all the gringos (the other team) were left with the stationary, ornery ones. Unfair advantage, I say! But I did manage to steal a certain donkey “Serafin,” who was, according to the word on the street, “bueno.” In this situation, the word on the street was the group of four 4th grade kids who I met on the sidewalk and befriended over the course of 15 minutes. I then paid them a grand total of seven lollipops (bonbones) to hold Igor’s leash and keep up with the pack of donkeys, so he could see me and thus not freak the heck out (poor dude gets nervous when we’re out of the countryside, and doesn’t tolerate being separated from me). Those kids did a terrific job, scrambling after the pack of 40 donkeys walking, trotting and running (what they do is too jarring to be called a canter, if you ask me) around the central park, Igor nearly ripping their arms out of their sockets as he strained to run after me, while a dude shouted to the public about the impending game. We then “paraded” over to the old high school concrete soccer court, where we would be playing the game. We had three subbing periods, and lost like 30-1, but it was still a hilarious blast. Some people fell off! That “1” point we had, by the way, was scored by yours truly, aboard the good-ship Serafin. Ahem. NO BIG DEAL. After Peace Corps I may consider a career as a professional polo rider-person…what are they called? Polo players? That sounds right. Im’a become a Professional Polo Player. A PPP.

Getting’ home from Yuscuran proved somewhat more challenging at first, as the only bus that would have taken me to Tegus in time to catch the bus to my pueblo refused to let me and my dog aboard…caninists. I almost cried for a second, then I realized “wait a minute, you can just get a sweet jalon dude,” and promptly lifted my chin and sauntered over to the nearest corner. A truck passed. I waved at em and jerked my head but they waggled their fingers at me to say “no we’re not going far,” and so I waited for the next. Drank some juice out of a bag. Igor peed. Another truck drove by, a shiny red double-cabin pick-up with a nice plastic lined bed, totally empty. Jalon jackpot. I waved at em…they pulled right over and rolled down their windows and smiled at me. Some young couple, obviously from Tegus, driving home from visiting the Mango Festival. I asked em where they were headed and they told me Tegucigalpa, at which point I totally turned on my smiley-gringa faucet full-blast and exclaimed, “Oh, WOW! Could you maybe give me a lift there?” They offered me a seat in the cabin but I gestured to my dog and said it’d be better if I rode in the truck bed (which I totally prefer). They said of course, I said you have saved my life, thank god, may little tiny god bless your souls, and then lifted Igor into the truck paila and then launched myself in as well. Just as they started to pull away, another dude from my Peace Corps group can running down the hill, screaming “WAIT! WAIT!” in English. I slapped the side of the car a couple times to signify “hey stop for a sec” and shouted that he better ask them first before he just jumps in. He ran around, gringo-charmed them, and then jumped in the bed with me and Igor. The three of us then sailed to Tegus in style, the sun warming our faces (which were lathered with sunscreen), the wind in our hair, the sky in our eyes and the trees in our noses (too much?). It took about an hour, exactly half the time it took to travel the same distance on bus (we actually passed the bus that had shunned me and I totally stuck my tongue out as rudely as possible). Then Igor and I took a cab to the market where my bus was waiting, and caught the 11:30am bus (last one of the day to my pueblo), arriving to the street where the buses are parked with enough time to peruse the market, buying random things (two spoons, a mug, a good kitchen knife, and two forks) as well as tasty things (cheese, big mangos, fresh, juicy pineapple slices). By 3:30pm that day we were home...after huggin’ the neighborhood posse I immediately stretched out in my hammock, while Igor dug and scratched about in the mud and wet sand until a nice and damp cool layin’ patch was created. He then flopped down in said patch and scooped wet sand onto his tummy and legs, as he loves to do.

CRAP I just burned my beans! I started cookin’ em late today, like 6:00pm, and whilst I was waiting for them to cook I was fed other beans, by Tina, plus four tortillas and some avocado. So I’m not even hungry any more, and I figured I’d get some writing done while they finished…and dangnabbit they got all death-burny on me. Now my house smells like a butt. Sorry, Igor.

Oh dudes, don’t worry, that earthquake didn’t hurt me none. I recall waking up at like 2am or so when it hit, and thought to myself: “Oh, an earthquake. That’s normal.” and promptly fell back asleep. When I awoke the next morning, I remembered what had happened but decided it must have been a dream. It wasn’t until I heard two ladies chattin’ about it in the street did I realize that it actually did happen. So yeah, no big deal here in the south…but our brothers up in the north of Honduras had it much worse, many people died and even more people lost their homes. I’m not sure on how many exactly.

A Haiku:

Small snake, why you here?

All up in my latrine-face.

We machete’d you.

Yes, that’s right, I was totally sittin’ on my toilet-seat-less toilet bowl in my little wooden latrine, havin’ me a delightful morning pee, minding my own business, when I noticed a strange loopy shape in the space between the concrete wall and the wooden doorjam. I got out and peered in from the other side, then poked a stick. When the loopy thing sloooowly began to slither out toward me, I realized it was a little snakey dude! At first I was delighted, as I rather like snakes, and he was so little and cute. I decided to fetch my neighbor Obed to assess the situation. Obed marched over and coaxed the little critter out of his hiding hole.

“Hayley, that’s a black coral snake,” he said.

“Soooo? You mean an itty-bitty coral-woral? With his widdle tonguey and teeny-weeny stripeys?” I said.

Then Obed informed me that coral snakes will kill you if they bite you, and that the littlest ones are the most dangerous and deadly. He then CAPTURED it in his bare freaking hands, totally Crocodile Hunter style, and posed casually while I took many pictures. Then he told me we had to kill it, because of all the kids always running around…it was too dangerous to let go. I had some moral difficulties with this, because Honduras is big enough for me AND my cutie-wutsie snakey-wakey…but he told me to fetch the machete, so I did as I was told. Definitely didn’t want any dead neighborhood kids haunting my soul forever after. Poor little Scumbag 2 (as I named him) was wasted with a few quick hacks to the neck. I’m sorry it had to end this way, Scumbag 2.

I wish I had more Swedish Fish.

Love,

Hayley

Gabe and Igor at the swimmin' hole

One of my colgate kids happily avoiding a lifetime of oral health problems

i brushed my teeth five times that day...these are my kindergarteners in town

he needs two hands

little ali

freaking claw-spiders, all over my house...this is held by alex, the Brave Neighbor

view of alubaren from my sittin' hill...

douglas checking kaiser for fleas

do it igor!

bat dog! when the wind hits just right...

wrasslin with my dude

alison, contemplating

igor sittin in the river.

me and douglas, sittin on my front steps

the kids with alison's birthday surprise, a clifford pinata i imported all the way from tegus

alison and her uncle alex (nely's brother)

patrick and igor at da swimmin hole

please note douglas is too rude to end his phone conversation for the picture (featuring nely and noel)

noel, nely's son

hermanos! kaiser loves to give igor kisses on the face. they're very close.

this picture is hilarious.

one of my aldea kids the man loves mangos.

reading a book (thanks Mrs. Kaufmann!) to my preschoolers

the whole gang, at alison's 5th birthday

on our way to the regional championship!

17 May 2009

Hey, chochachos! Man do you guys ever get those zits in your armpits that hurt like the dickens? I totally got one of those things goin’ on right now. Armpit zits = not cool. I bet if a famous journalist was doing a story on Things That Ain’t Cool he or she would totally fly down to Honduras to interview me, cause of my armpit situation I got right now. The front-page picture could be a shot of me showing the camera the red bump and wincing painfully. If you guys know any famous journalists, send them down here. I got a story for em!

Other than that, though, I’m pretty good. I got just ALL kinds of lonely last night, I don’t know why…I was just lying in my hammock, drinkin’ some crazy-delicious cactus tea (thanks, Mimi!!) and thinking about stuff when I just started feeling all lonesome. It’s not that I miss the States…I don’t. Really. Yes, I miss the ample and toasty sandwiches that are available at all hours of the day due to the natural abundance of supermarkets and toasters. And I miss delicious frosty beers of the fancy variety, all on tap, all served to me in a pint glass. And I miss pretzels. And chocolate. And dried fruit. And Swedish Fish (thanks again, Mimi!!). But those are all a) related to things I put in my mouth and chew up, and b) of trivial importance (after all, I can and will stuff myself when I get back to the land of delicious treats in September 2010). But I don’t miss the cars, and the stress, and the greed, and the self-centeredness, and the obsession with money and Things, and the constant need to be entertained, and all that stuff. I could live here in my little yellow concrete and adobe bungalow forever (can I call it a bungalow? I’m unsure of the actual definition of that term, but I’m rather fond of it, so whatever it’s a dang old bungalow as far as I’m concerned). I love my latrine and pila and bath barrel outside, and I love my mango groves all over the place, and my swimming holes, and hills all around my house, and my chirpy birds and blinky bugs (more on that in a bit) and all the little kids that own this town and are my most constant companions. And I love my dog. But even though my neighbors have become my family and the kids my gang of friends and drinking a cup of coffee in a plastic chair my idea of a bitchin’ Friday night…sometimes I just get hells of lonely for all you guys back home. I made a big poster the other day; glued like 15 pictures I’d brought from home glued to a sheet of poster board, colored it all up with crayons, framed it with sticks and hung it from the ceiling with hemp. So it’s not that I’m homesick, per se…just peoplesick. I think part of it has to do with the fact I don’t have much to do in the evenings here—after about 7 or 8:00pm, when the neighbors have turned in and I’ve eaten my dinner, I just lay in my hammock and pet Igor and think about stuff…you’d be surprised, with all one’s reading materials exhausted and no TV or iPod, you get really good at just thinking and thinking and thinking, flowing from one topic to another in your head without direction. It’s sort of like a silent conversation between myself and myself. I’m not crazy, though…just introspective. There’s a difference.

I can’t complain though. A week ago, two fellow volunteers Gabe and Patrick came and visited me in my site, which was excellent fun. David, the volunteer who lives in the next pueblo over (like an hour walking), came over too and the four of us had a great old time, eating tasty foods and speaking in English and having adventures. With my neighbors Nely and the kids, we hiked out to these awesome little swimming holes carved out of the rocks by the water, surrounded by little caves and big trees. It was very beautiful, and the rust-colored water (due to the rotting leaves at the bottom of the pools) was delightfully cold. The next day just me and the gringos hiked back out and swam some more, ate a lot of guacamole and tortillas, and then had a crazy two-hour hike back home “as the crow flies,” as in tramping up and down vertical hills, weaving (very carefully) through farmer’s crops and stoppin’ at what I like to call Mango Town, where a thick carpet of freshly-fallen mangos cover the dirt under the canopy of green. (You gotta be sure and only eat the ones without worms, though…unless you’re into worms. Igor, for example, is not picky). Then we scrambled up to my favorite look-out spot, an isolated little perch on top of a rocky hill that gives you a view of the whole town. Later we made spaghetti, and each drank 4-5 “purple drinks,” which are these awesome popsicles in plastic tube-shaped bags (think short, fat, Otter Pops) that my neighbor, Nelo, sells as beverages. Drinking liquid popsicles = making a lot of my childhood dreams a reality.

It’s the rainy season now! About two weeks ago, David came over to work on a project we were doing together. It was a hot Saturday afternoon, just like any other….when SUDDENLY, the sky turned chunky gray and the thunder boomed and it just RAINED like the dang old dickens, all that day, all night, and most of the morning the next day (David spent the night on my floor on my extra mattress, which provided a lot of fodder for my gossip-hungry neighbors). Ever since, it’s rained every other day or so. My backyard, which used to be pure dirt except for the small patches where I dumped pails of water, has transformed itself entirely. It looks like someone ate a bunch of green Skittles and then just barfed all over the place. EVERYTHING is growing! Everything is green! Everything is flowering! It’s crazy. I have a lawn where I used to have dust. Random seeds I’d thrown around casually have sprouted, resulting in a small watermelon patch by my front door (from the time I was too lazy to throw the seeds and rinds away properly) and a bean patch by my water spigot (from when I sit and sort through the good and bad beans for dinner). And my cantaloupe patch has taken over about half my yard now. I can’t get over how green and leafy and wonderful everything has become. At night, sometimes I just go and sit out in the darkness, and enjoy the blinky-ness of the night. Fireflies are crazy this time of year; the air is so thick with them it looks like a psychedelic light show. The lightening flashing over the mountains adds a distant layer to the blinky-blink. The waaaaap-waaaaap of the toads and the laser-gun frogs are like an auditory blinky-blink…and, since the lights usually go out if it’s raining, the flickering candles from people’s homes makes it all the blinkier. Basically I’m just delighted that we’re finally ending the dry season and beginning the wet season…we’ll have rain now until November. I get water in my pila almost every day now, and the torrential downpours make running and screaming in the water a neighborhood activity. Dang but man I love this rain!

My butt is sweaty…I’m gonna go take a bath. Hooray!

Love

Hayley

26 April 2009

Hey, chochachos! Dudes I just killed a tiny baby scorpion in my dang house! I was sweeping (yes I am domesticated in that sort of way) in the kitchen and I saw this little critter go scuttling across the floor. I bent down to see what the tiny thing was and discovered it was an itty-bitty arachnid of the stingy variety. I quickly shanked it to death with my broom and swept it outside, and then ran over to announce to Nely what I’d done. Of course she and Tina were duly impressed and then Tina became quite concerned, telling me the mom scorpion was surely nearby, giving birth (?) to many more tiny scorpions. Either way, I have to find her, but I’m not really interested in hosting a scorpion day-care center so she should probably find another place to birth her young (though obviously Tina is mistaken about the live-birth thing…everyone and their momma knows scorpions are marsupials).

Well, last Saturday was the big regional baseball tournament, hosted with honor by non other than Alubarén. Originally, both Reitoca and Pespire (another town in the south) were supposed to come and play, but Pespire backed out at the last minute—their volunteer said he couldn’t wrassle up enough kids to play. Very disappointing for us, since the rules state that in order to win the tournament you MUST have two wins under your belt—aka we would have to play Reitoca twice, potentially three times in the event of a tie. Saturday morning came, and the 15 kids I’d selected to play, plus all the others that are part of the team but not old enough/too sucky/too bratty to be picked for the tournament team, showed up at my doorstep as planned at 8:00am. In their little yellow jerseys with marching black baseball pants and yellow caps, they looked very professional. We hoisted the Panteras flag that John (volunteer before me; he started the team from scratch!) made by hand and marched proudly through town up to the baseball field. The kids, wanted to make a good impression on Reitoca, who were beginning to arrive, quickly arranged themselves in two neat lines in the center of the field and began to play catch. Eventually, my program direction Ronaldo and his wife showed up, with a member of the National Baseball Federation of Honduras (yes they exist!) who would act as the main umpire. They dragged a cooler of water they’d brought for the kids over, we marked up the field with ashes the kid’s had brought in bags from their moms’ woodstoves, and got all the kids together to sing the national anthem and give a couple short speeches about how cool this whole deal was. Then, sweating profusely under the baking 9:00am sun, we headed to our respective sides of the diamond. Reitoca was up to bat first, so we headed out to our fielding positions…PLAY BALL! (I actually shout this all the time when we play, the kids love it and I feel like I’m in the movie A League of Their Own). I was a nervous wreck the whole time, leaping around and spazzing out to the point where the kids asked me to sit down. As it turned out, I had no reason to be nervous, because my kids were so determined to get back the loss we’d suffered to Reitoca last week in the scrimmage that they played their hearts out. Reitoca struck out without a single run! Our turn at bat…after two outs, Las Panteras had batted and walked until the bases were loaded, with 9-year-old Nuria, one of my two girls, crouching on third. Lisbeth, my other girl, a stocky little 8-year-old who reminds me of myself as an 8-year-old softball player (terrified of the ball, prefers to sit deep in the outfield where one can chew on one’s leathery glove in peace or play with the dirt) was up to bat. All the boys groaned…Lisbeth can only hit slowly lobbed balls, and has never, in my knowledge, made contact with a real pitch…there was no way she was going to bring Nuria home. Pitch one…she swings a strike. Pitch two…another strike. Pitch three…BAM! Well, maybe not “bam,” she only hit it slightly past the pitcher, but she hit the damn ball! She stood there dumbfounded for a minute until all out frantic screams “CORRE!! CORRE!!!” sunk in and she threw the bat down and dashed off to first. Fortunately, Reitoca’s fielding skills are not 100% yet and through many fumbles of her gentle grounder, Lisbeth made it to first safely and Nuria shot across home plate, our first run of the game. It was awesome…all the boys raced over and lifted Nuria up and carried her around chanting “Nuria! Nuria!” while she beamed ear to ear. Then they ran over and did the same to Lisbeth, until I had to pull them off because the next batter was waiting and they were all over the field. It was so awesome for them, as the only girls on the team and arguably two of my worst players…who says girls can’t play baseball? Hm?! Anyway, the game continued with Reitoca striking out or getting tagged out, and we scored two more runs before the 5-inning cap was up, finishing with a glorious 3-0 win. We screamed and leapt around while Reitoca shuffled around disappointedly. Then I lead the troops of 40 kids down the road to Dona Marta’s house, who sells tasty meals and had agreed to cook the teams’ lunches, paid for by the mayor’s office, thanks to a well-worded request for funding sent by yours truly. The kids sat under the trees by the riverbed and ate their chicken and rice and guzzled bags of water while I sat inside with David and the umpires. After about an hour rest, we headed back to the field for the second game. This time, Reitoca was in it to win, and my kids entered somewhat cockily, despite my many warnings that anything could happen. Reitoca played much better and beat our butts 4-0. By this time, it was 2:30, and the sun was deadly overhead (no shade at our field). The cluster of families that had come to watch were wilting under black umbrellas and the bags of water we’d bought were long gone. However, it was 1-1, and a tie-breaking game was needed. I huddled up my kids and we screamed LAS PANTERS! LOS MEJORES! and I knew we were going to win…their energy was incredible. Reitoca started off at bat, and the inning ended without a run scored. Then we came up to bat, and scored an incredible four runs in the same inning, which for us was insane. I’ve never screamed so hard….the game was in the bag. Unfortunately, there is a rule that no pitcher can pitch more than 5 innings or one complete game, and at the conclusion of this first inning, my two good pitchers Neil and Kevin were now through. I had to put in Junior, who has trained as pitcher since November but remains pretty terrible, probably because I don’t know how to help him…he throws hard but always slightly to the left, AKA the king of balls. To the horror of everyone watching, and to his own increasing frustration, he proceeded to walk everyone and their mom across home plate…by the third inning Reitoca had caught up, 5-5. By the time the fifth and final inning ended, they had somehow crept past us and won 7-5. At first, my kids were incredulous. “That’s it? We lost? It’s over?” They had won last year (with one game against another town) and gone to Tegucigalpa for the championship, and had assumed they would naturally go again. Reitoca was ecstatic, screaming and shouting and jumping all over the place. My kids burst into tears…I’ve never seen so many 13-year-old boys in tears. It was terrible. They were inconsolable. I felt the worst for Junior, who took off running for his house and never came to my place for the after party with cake and soda, supplied by my project director Sandra. We had a good long talk at my house, and while they were still sniffling, I tried to explain that the world of sports is about losing just as much as it’s about winning, and that they played their very best and that’s all they can do. They ate their cake and drank their coke, but it still wasn’t a very fun party. We took this past week off to recuperate, and starting tomorrow, we’re going to practice once or twice a week, just for fun, until the rainy season begins, when we’ll throw in our hats until November, which it gets dry again.

To be honest, though, despite how much I hate losing (especially to freaking Reitoca, those cocky bastards…if David weren’t my dear pretend-site-mate I would never walk over there again…), it’s kind of a blessing in disguise that we lost, because my cessation of incessant baseball practicing has been seamlessly replaced by “tons of work,” at least in the Peace Corps sense. Tuesdays and Thursdays I have a two-hour English and teaching methodology class with about 40 teachers (20 each day) from my town and the surrounding villages, which is going excellently, thank you very much. They are all very eager to learn English and have great high spirits. I like it a lot more than I thought it would. Every Thursday I walk about half an hour up the mountain to reach a nearby aldea (village) called San Antonio, where I do Colgate-sponsored oral health with the 3-room school house of 1-6th grade (each teacher teaches two grades in one class). Starting this coming week, I’ll be doing the same project with the kindergarteners in my town, as well as another two-room schoolhouse in an aldea that’s about an hour away, called Santa Rita. It’s a great program; Colgate donated the toothpaste and toothbrushes and little posters for the kids to chart their progress, and they keep them at school in little labeled cups. Once a week I go in and do a little health chat and a project (usually an art-themed one, since they get no creative art at school). They we go outside and brush together, which is hilarious because the little kids dribbled all over themselves and the big kids are so embarrassed to be brushing their teeth in front of the opposite sex that they go through great lengths to hide themselves while brushing (squatting behind chairs, hiding in the outhouse, climbing trees, etc.). Igor comes with me, and keeps the kids in line by trotting around and jumping on them (trying to break this habit).

I just left my computer and went on an adventure!! It’s about 6:20 right now and getting dark, but we left about 45 minutes ago, at like 5:30 or so. It’s the best time of day here in my opinion, cause it’s toasty warm but not burny like the fire-death of sun. Me and my baby posse, plus my best buddy Nely, tramped though the hills to the dry river bed to collect mangos and let the dogs romp. Igor is turning into quite the water dog, to the point where I can’t leave any containers of water bigger than a cereal bowl on the floor inside or out, because he will sniff it out and frantically try to squeeze himself into it, this making a huge mess (last night I came outside to find him sitting happily in a big paila of water I had left under the faucet to fill up for watering plants (paila = plastic container)). I take him out every day to romp through the mango groves and he’ll race toward the little pools in the deeper spots of the dry river, charge in gulping water and spinning around until he’s soaked. If it’s deep enough he’ll swim around and then charge out at full speed, disappear, and then come back at a full gallop two seconds later, thrash into the water, and repeat the process. Once he’s thoroughly soaked, he’ll sprint off down the path—though I discovered if I hide behind a tree or don’t immediately follow him, once he realizes I’m not racing behind him he’ll come trotting back to look for me. I can’t wait to take him to the ocean some day….probably in the states, though, cause he really is getting too big for bus travel, except for the ones the guys in my pueblo drive, and that’s only because I’m the gringa and I can basically get away with murder.

That’s it for now…I’m excited because my parents sent me a great big box for my birthday filled with dried fruit, nuts, chocolate, and Newsweek magazines chock-filled with Obamamania…my favorite combination. Im’a gonna go lay in my hammock and indulge in said delights. I love you guys…Happy Spring to all you kids in Chicago that are finally thawing out.

Love,

Hayley

Garifuna kids swimming on a giant lobster in the ocean.

alison and noel playing marbles

las panteras!

29 March 2009

Hey, chochachos! WHOOPS HELLS OF DAYS HAVE PASSED SINCE I LAST WROTE ANYTHING ON THIS THING. And I’ve been near the internet a whole lot in the past couple weeks, too…but I just didn’t have time to write anything beforehand. Sorry, man. Now then, first thing first:

IGOR’S WEINER IS JUST FINE, THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR GREAT AND PROFOUND CONCERN. I took him to the vet and they did some blood work AND stuck that little poo-stick up his butthole, so he was totally pissed at me afterwards and gave me the silent treatment for several hours. It turns out he has a blood parasite (doesn’t that sound INSANE?!), so they put him on some strong antibiotics, as well as some pink pepperminty goo I squirt into his mouth, which allegedly is protecting his stomach from the strong-ness of the pills. He seems to be fine now (All Quiet on the Wiener Front, hahahaha) so that’s awesome. Though my neighbors all think I’m insane for giving PILLS to a DOG (though not nearly as insane as they think I am for my planned castration of poor Igor, which they find unfair and cruel). And I arrived home yesterday to find that Kaiser, Igor’s brother and our neighbor, was quite sick himself and hadn’t eaten in three or four days…he looked like some kind of terrible beige-colored skeleton-dog and was refusing everything I shoved in front of him, from baloney to scrambled eggs to dog food to milk. It was crazy how much he had physically deteriorated in the week I was away from home. His eyes were sort of half-shut, his nose was dry, he wasn’t walking or playing, and he totally looked like he was about to die. He wouldn’t even drink water. I had some of those needle-less syringes that I use to squirt aforementioned pink goo into Igor’s mouth, so I bought a bag of milk and force fed the whole thing to Kaiser over the course of 24 hours. I totally felt like those vets on Animal Planet now, all speakin’ with an affected British accent and wearing scrubs with dog bones and paw prints on them….Kaiser woke up this morning (sometimes he and Igor have slumber parties under my bed and stay up all night giggling and chewing on opposite ends of the same sock) and ate half a scrambled egg on his own, and this evening he ate a cup of dog food, too. He spent about an hour running around with Igor and is now asleep under my bed (again), so it looks like we’re in the clear...hooray, man. I have no idea what he was sick with, though according to Tina (his owner, my neighbor, Igor’s aunt and pet-sitter), he stopped eating shortly after he was vaccinated against rabies from a traveling medical brigade that passed through, so maybe it had something to do with that. Either way, Kaiser is doing much better and so is Igor.

Igor, actually, is doing better than good…he’s AWESOME. He’s growing like a small horse, despite the “trashy garbage dog food” I feed him, as the vet calls it. They always sneer down at me when I admit I feed him the cheapest dog food on the market, then whip out honest-to-god pamphlets about Pedigree and Science Diet, both of which are sold in Tegucigalpa for millions of dollars. Or whatever, I don’t know how much but it’s a freaking lot more than “Dogui” which is what Igor happily eats. I tried explaining to the vet that that’s all they sell in my town, and I don’t want to haul huge sacks of Science Diet Pro-Plan for Adolescent Dogs or whatever the hell all the way to my pueblo, but I’m not kidding anybody—Igor eats the bargain-bin stuff cause I’m cheap as hell. Sorry, little man. But I supplement his diet with raw chicken and scrambled eggs and such, so he doesn’t get all lame inside. Not that Igor could ever be lame…he’s so perfect. I really lucked out because I’ve begun to realize he is the CHILLEST puppy in the world. He travels with me on long, hot bus rides, all the way to the south or through the city or wherever, only to arrive to a strange new house or apartment or wherever we’re crashing for the night, and he never freaks out. He sits up on my lap and contemplates the lowly, ambulating street dogs as we cruise along on the bus, or settles down under my feet to sleep (though sometimes I forget about him and he army-crawls underneath all the seats, only to emerge between a startled lady’s legs at the other end of the bus). Once at my friends’ house (we’ve done this three times now, with three different friends), he finds a nice hunk of floor to lay on and just sits back and watches the action…none of this insane HOLY-GOD-IM-A-PUPPY-SO-IM-GONNA-RUN-AROUND-NON-STOP-AND-GO-CRAZY bullshit. No way. Igor is all like “whatever man the floor is nice” and just hangs out. He does have his crazy playful moments, but they’re just that—moments. ALSO he never pees inside, ever. And will tell the hostess her salsa is delicious when actually it’s a little heavy on the mango.

All right enough crazy-dog-lady rants. Other things that are new with me….I celebrated my 23rd birthday on March 9th, which was rather uneventful and relaxed, pretty much like any other day…except word spread pretty quick so I received many hugs and ‘congratulations!’ from my townfolks. My neighbors Tina and Nely and the kids had planned to make fried chicken and such and eat it with me, but Alex missed the bus coming into the pueblo from Tegus, and he had all the ingredients, so we had to postpone til the next day (it was delicious and we made chocolate-banana smoothies instead of cake, which are AWESOME). On my actual birthday evening, about 10 Evangelical missionaries from North Carolina showed up, as they do every year, so I ended up celebrating my birthday by eating real SANDWICHES, which is my favorite food, with real Southern Baptists, which is not my favorite food (good news for them, that would suck to come down here expecting to evangelize people and instead get eaten by a Peace Corps volunteer). They built Alubarén’s Evangelical church, and come back about once to year, to venture out into the surrounding villages and save people’s souls from eternal damnation. I am very good friends with the pastor of the church here (his kids play on my baseball team), and he asked me a couple days in advance if I could help the gringos with the translating, since none of them speak Spanish and their usual translators couldn’t make it, or something along those lines. I’m still not sure why exactly I said yes, since translating for missionaries teeters very precariously on the edge of actually evangelizing people myself, which is counter to my purpose here in Honduras, both officially and personally. I thought it would be fun to translate (it wasn’t, really) and that it would be fun to hang out with other Americans for a week (it was). But my own moral code is very much against taking advantage of people living in poverty and wiping out their own culture and replacing it with my own, so it was a very uncomfortable week and to be honest, I regret doing it. I spent most of the week helping the gringas play with the local kids, while the gringos helped built a church. Playing with the kids is great, in and of itself, but when it came time to translate Bible stories and prayers, I felt awful. A voice kept screaming in my head “WHAT THE HELL HAYLEY YOU’RE NOT IN HONDURAS TO TELL PEOPLE ABOUT JESUS CHRIST” but I had made a promise to the pastor and I didn’t want to wreck my relationship with him. The missionaries were extremely nice, and it was clear they were down here because they want to help…but it’s just so conflicting for me as a sustainable development worker. They roll out in their personal bus to the poorest villages, chucking candy and toys at kids out of the back of the moving truck, and hand out jewelry, food, clothes, Beanie Babies, and more toys to the locals that immediately gather around them. I know it feels good to give to the poor, but it just makes it harder for me when they’re gone (all the time, people come up at me and ask me what I’ve got for them). It also breeds dependence and reinforces this mental hierarchy they’ve got that gringos are better than brown people, and they we’re all rich and will come down and hand things out to them. It’s true that a free bag of rice or a new shirt are amazing gifts that they treasure, but handing out little sacks of goodies once in a while doesn’t do any good in the long run, and is actually detrimental. I understand why they do it (it feels so good to see a kid smile because of something you did), but that’s exactly it—it’s a selfless act that is selfish at the same time. Anyway, I hope none of my new missionary friends in North Carolina read this, because I never told them how I felt about their decision to come to Honduras (I’m a wuss and ever since I stupidly brought up Obama on the first day I realized avoiding confrontation was the easiest route) and they probably have no idea how uncomfortable I was or how negatively I feel about missionary work in general. If you ARE reading this, dudes, no hard feelings—you were all really nice and I liked getting to know you. And you guys had the BEST snack table in the whole pueblo, hands down.

In other news, I just spent a whole week in Valle de Angeles (pine-fresh mountain town where I spent much of my training time, living with Suyapa and the kiddies) for a training on a youth program I am going to be implementing in the high school. It’s called Youth to Youth, and it’s a rather intensive “welcome to the workforce” workshop that lasts for months, facilitating that necessary WHO-AM-IIIIIIIIII?! moment where the kids can search inside their innermost soul and decide which of the six sectors in the economic market they wish to pursue. It’s funny, because I remember being 16 and none of my career goals I had at the moment (journalist, whale-trainer at Sea World (yes I know most girls let go of this after 6th grade)) panned out—and all those aptitude tests are sort of bullshit, anyway. But it’s a good program because after the initial WHO-AM-IIIII?! period it instructs the kiddies on how to build a resume, search for and apply for a job, how to not botch an interview, etc., which are all good solid skills they definitely need if they want to find a job and will not learn out here in the campo. I decided to just angrily leap over the whole teacher mess, and brought my rad 19-year-old coworker from the NGO where I work. Her job is working with the youth in Alubarén, so it’s perfect. And she’s a cutie who knows how to work the ubiquitous Honduran woman outfit (extremely tight and tapered jeans, polyester tank top so tight that the fat squeezes out at the armpit holes and in the obligatory 1-2 inch gap between the pants and the hem of the shirt; perfectly color-coordinated button earrings; high heels), so I know the guys will show up. The training in Valle was really fun, actually, and lots of my fellow gringo friends were their, with their own counterparts in tow. The place had cable TV and a pool and hot showers, and served sandwiches several times during the week, so I was basically in heaven. And I came two days early to visit with Suyapa and the kids, which was also awesome—we took all the neighborhood kids on a big picnic adventure in the woods and I spent about six hours sliding down pine-needley hills on my butt, hurling pinecones down the mountain, deliberately smearing sap on my fingers, and all sorts of other pine-fresh-mountain activities that living in the dust bowl of the south so cruelly deprives me of.

After the workshop, I went to Tegus for the night instead of going home so I could visit with my “crazy Honduran hippie dude friends” who I met through a strange chain of connections and rather adore. They live in a house that is about as tree-house-esque as it could be without actually being IN a dang tree, which is AWESOME. So we spent the evening chilling and listening to sweet music and eating delicious chicken and such. Then we went to see a PLAY (whaaaat, fine arts in Honduras??), which was part of some sort of theatre festival being put on by their university. To be honest, the play was terrible and boring and I actually fell ASLEEP for part of it, but I think that speaks more to my newfound old-lady-hood than the script. I also think I was totally crashing a date, but I’m pretty much used to being awkward so I just tried not to notice the making out. Then we went home and I slept on the floor in a borrowed sleeping bag, with visions of seeing Igor after 8 long days of separation dancing in my head.

I’d better get going…it’s nearly ten o’clock and that makes me want to crawl under my mosquito net and sweat myself to sleep.

Love,

Hayley

p.s. Dude, twice this week I have awakened to discover several turds in my latrine. Turds I did not leave there the night before. What the HELL people. Someone is totally hopping my fence in the dark of the night to drop a deuce in my own personal wooden pooping room, OR there is some kind of asshole ghost who isn’t considerate enough to dump the requisite bowl of water in the toilet afterwards. But we know that can’t be it, cause ghosts don’t poo, and I also noticed lots of excessively wadded-up paper in my little soiled-paper-bag I got hanging off the door, and I myself am a folder, not a wadder. So tonight I’m gonna sleep next the latrine, hidden amongst my oregano and tomato plants, and when the mystery pooper arrives I’m gonna throw water on him and yell cusses real loud in English.

April 4 2009

Hey, chochachos! Man, my cursor isn’t blinking. Is that a sign of computer death? QUICK SOMEONE GO CHECK ON WEBMD.COM RIGHT NOW COOL THANKS LET ME KNOW

Anyway. So today was the “big day” aka “the day Las Panteras de Alubarén play against Los Rayos de Reitoca” aka our first baseball game, which EVERYONE (me, my kids, Reitoica, David, the President of the United States Mister Barack Obama) (really, he sent me a e-mail about it) assumed we would totally take home bundled up in a neat little package, stowed in our well-seasoned athletic pockets. However, we did not mop the proverbial dirt lot with Reitoca…to the contrary, they beat us 9-2, which was astounding to all and almost too much for my poor Panteras to bear. I think David must be the world’s best baseball coach (though I am thinking of reporting him to the Peace Corps for giving his kids steroids, which I think is pret-tay obvious). They’d only been practicing three weeks! We’ve been at it basically daily since November! The only calls for a strong, guttural WHAT THE HELL, PEOPLE. Anyway. I guess time does not necessarily trump “real baseball skill and knowledge on the part of the coach.” Fortunately, it was just a “partido de amistad” aka a scrimmage that doesn’t mean anything, which I reminded my baseball kids basically nonstop. I tried to go the goofy route and did a lot of hysterical pretend-crying fits after we lost, which as those of you who know me will concur, is my go-to move for making upset children laugh. Laugh they did, but it was obvious they were really disappointed/pissed…the game was so freaking intense. I had the hugest butterflies in my stomach and felt quite sad when we lost…I didn’t realize I cared so much. But I think it was mostly due to mistakes we made (for example, I put all my 7-8 year olds batting, fielding, and pitching first, so that they’d get the experience since they won’t be playing in the real championship, which was a huge mistake…I guess I shoulda opened the game with the big kids and closed with the little guys…Reitoca got ahead and we never caught up). Plus they were several rules I didn’t know about (god-damn in-field fly rule BULLSHIT), and my pitchers aren’t all that super terrific amazing. PLUS it was hot as freaking NUTS and there was no shade and despite hats, sunglasses, and extreme re-layering of SPF 50 sunscreen, we all (well, mostly me, since they’re brown) got wicked sunburns.

But all is well….we dried our tears and my whole team and I retreated to my house to lounge on the warm tile floors, stand in front of the fan, listen to the Beatles (sorry no reggaeton) and drown our sorrows in six liters (literally) of ice-cold Coca-Cola and 42 (literally) little bags of churros, which are chips…among the 20 of us. Despite the disappointing lose, the two hours we spent together were lovely and I for one was filled with a genuine love of life once the loss was put in perspective. As I told them, in life you have to learn to win and you have to learn to lose, and this was a perfect lesson in disappointment. Then the kids enthusiastically completed two one-hundred-piece jigsaw puzzles (thanks, Whitney!), which was astonishing. We chilled and chatted (at one point I got very coach-y and made them go around the room and say one thing they liked about the game (our two runs) and one thing they would like to improve on personally. But mostly I just laid in the hammock and drank Coke and watched the kids do puzzles. We’re taking next week off (Semana Santa, chochachos!) and then we got five days to practice for the Regional Championship, which is April 18th.

Anyway. Dang. But today was awesome, anyway…after the boys left, I took a shower, ate some mangos, and went to hang out with Nely, Tina, Ruben, and the kiddies. We decided it was silly that there was a river nearby with mango-rich trees that we weren’t taking advantage of, so we headed out into the sunburned hills and clamored across dry river beds and squeezed through boulders that, despite being in the shade, were almost hot to the touch. Finally we arrived at the mango-shaded pond and everyone flung themselves in almost frantically. After we cooled down everyone, including little 20-month-old Douglas, collected ripe soft mangos, freshly fallen to the ground, and we all laid in the sweaty shade and gorged, with occasional re-dipping in the pond when one began to dry off. Then we hiked back and here I am, eating pasta I made with my very own homegrown oregano, as well as a bunch of delicious vegetation ingredients brought from the local veggie stand. And a whole stick of margarine. I’m typing and listening to awesome jams and enjoying the discomfort of the heat (better than being cold, that’s what I always say….it may suck but at least I can walk around in board shorts and a tee shirt and a ponytail and that’s it; I freaking hate being cold…). But I think now that it’s nearly five o’clock I’m gonna go outside and enjoy afternoon-becoming-dusk, which is the most delightful part of the day here.

……….two hours later.

Man, I just got back from like two hours out back in my garden. It was so lovely out where I can’t even describe it…though I’m going to, right now, just because I want to. If that sort of thing bores you maybe you want to scroll back up and look at some pictures or something. Get a soda. Read a magazine. Make me a sandwich.

First I dumped about half my pila on all my plants in my wild and somewhat scrubby garden I’ve got going on (a real delight, being able to water plants these days). I got my melon patch, my tomato, my oregano, all the fruit trees, all the grasses and shrubs, as well as the rough, rooty ground cover that manages to grow back where I water a lot. Then I dragged out two plastic chairs, one for my butt and one for my feets, kicked off my chacos, and had me a nice sit. It was sort of like that Creedence song “doo, doo, dooooo, lookin’ out my back door,” ‘cept it wasn’t a door, which is even better (doorways are so restricting, you know?). Igor and Kaiser came out and scratched up and then flopped down in the fresh med underneath my little lime tree, and we just laid back and listened. Sometimes I can’t even handle how much I love this place, even though it’s hot as balls and dry and stuff, not to mention mondo poor…I just love Alubarén so much. We chilled out in the warm evening air, finally relieved of the burning sun which had ducked behind the ridge of the green mountain bowl in which we live. I laid back and just existed. Listened to the cicada chorus…low ones, high pitched whiny ones, chirpy ones, deep droney ones…layered upon the cicadas were all the birds crying out and singing, coming out of hiding to taking advantage of the bugs, which were plentiful. We watched dragonflies and gnats and mosquitoes and bees cruise along, and if I relaxed my eyes and adjusted my perception enough to see the farthest possible point, I counted up to nine sopilotes (immense beautiful black buzzards) drifting and swirling way up in the blue sky, so distant they were just specks in the distance. The garden was making the nice settling noise that freshly watered dirt does, and I could hear the cows belching and groaning all over the place as the wrinkled farmer dudes, machetes swinging, walked them back to their homes after a day of grazing up in the hills. Like always, I could hear children everywhere…little girls squealing, babies crying, three teenage boys earnestly chatting about something as they passed by, and some lone toddler off somewhere calling out “mamaaaaaaaa” over and over again. I could hear my neighbor splashing bowls of water on herself out in the backyard, who was also listening to some Mexican ranchera on her radio. As the afternoon faded into a bluer evening, and little details like flower petals and ants on a tree branch and bright green seedlings spouting in my compost head dissolved, I rolled my head back and watch the moon for a while, a nice bright pearl color. It’s almost full, and as one my baseball boys commented the other day, it looks like someone was out with their eraser and soppily removed part of the moon’s edge. I found the first star, and made the obligatory wish, out loud in English. I know it doesn’t count if you say it aloud, but since no one can understand me here, I figure it’s the same as saying it in my head.

Sometimes I don’t think I ever want to live anywhere but here, in my little two-room tin-roof house, out here in the campo with my dog and the cows and my plants, playing with children all day and relaxing all evening. If only all you guys weren’t way over there…come on dudes come down and live here with me so I never have to leave! Please!

I’m sick of sitting in front of this computer. Plus I ate literally about 10 orange mangos today so I need to go be horizontal…a job made easy by my hammock.

I love you guys. Hooray!

Love,

Hayley

naum naum naum i love my rawhide that grampa andy sent me!

the swimmin' hole...featured are alison, jessica, and lisbeth.

me in my hammock with my favorite little guys, noel, alison and douglas...if you look carefully you can see douglas is in the process of peeing on my leg.

my little neighbor guys, elvin and elmer and....i forget the middle kid's name.

with their older sisters, brenda and sulema.

walking back to our houses after swimmin in the river...there goes jessica and igor.

enner, glenda, douglas, neil, and nely...all neighbors. enner and neil are two excellent pitchers on my baseball team, too.

Eliqui, Chui, and Alison coloring on my floor...thanks for the art supplies, folks!

i love this little old lady. she gives me mangos and CLIMBS TREES. and she's like a hundred years old.

me and my baby, out by the river.

more coloring, featuring the tongue of Andri...

Chui and his little brother Cristian, my next door neighbors.

Douglas, like me, prefers green. And no pants.

Igor (pre-weiner infection)

he's all like DANG MOMMA WHY CAN'T I COLOR TOO and im all like CAUSE YOU AINT GOT NO OPPOSABLE THUMBS DARLIN

5 March 2009

Hey, chochachos! More specifically, hey Dad, happy dang ‘ol birthday. I can’t believe you’re finally 30! Don’t go crazy and go buy a riding lawn-mower or something else related to a manly mid-life crisis—that kind of purchase requires a lot of maintenance (like matching trucker hat, water-bottle holster, etc). Igor is also celebrating today—he turns four months old. He snuck into my safe last night (how did he get that code?!) and bought a crazy riding lawn-mower on E-bay, which I suppose is why I thought to warn you, Dad. We don’t even have a lawn, unless you count dirt and scrubby weeds, which I don’t. Anyway, Happy Birthday! If I could make this blog into an extravagant pop-up card, I would.

This month is getting’ CRAZY GO NUTS. I totally have items to do all the time, which is a nice change from my lounging-about-all-day-long-on-the-government’s-money period, AKA summer break. But now that the kiddies are in school, I can take advantage and do all kinds of stuff. I gathered all the teachers that pertain to Alubarén together the other day (about 40 or 50 of them) and told them about the project I’m starting soon, called TEAM (Teaching English and Methodology). Basically, this is a project through the Ministry of Education in partnership with Peace Corps Honduras, and I will be teaching weekly English classes, using American methodology, to all the teachers interested. They all get manuals and CDs and all the materials necessary. The idea is that as I teach the classes, the teachers then turn around and replicate the class to their students. If the teachers come to all the classes and get good grades, they get certificates from the Ministry of Education at the end of the year that states they are now certified to teach English. EVERYONE seemed interested, but I have another meeting today to discuss the schedule and we should begin meeting toward the end of the month, once the manuals come in. I wasn’t too crazy about the concept of teaching English, but it’s required by the state that the kids learn it, and the teachers can’t teach it if they don’t know it, so it’s a good fit.

I’m also going to start a program called Sonrisas Brillantes, or Bright Smiles, which is a project through Colgate toothpaste and Peace Corps. Colgate donated a ton of soaps, toothbrushes, and toothpastes, and manuals for how to teach oral hygiene. I was just going to do one school in an aldea, but I decided I might as well cover as many kids as possible, so I’m going to attempt to do it with ALL the first-grade teachers in the area, which would be about 13 teachers, reaching about 230 kids. (I know that doesn’t sound like much, but it means crazy work for me because I have to go out to each school to help the teacher do the workshops and supervise the tooth brushing, and some of these villages are like three hours walking up and down the mountains.) The kids keep the toothbrushes and toothpaste at the school, and all brush together after the school snack, and then after six months, they get another toothbrush to take home. The idea is that you drill it into their little, moldable six-year-old minds that they must brush every day, and hope the habit sticks. That would be great if it did, cause basically no one around here has all their teeth. Thank goodness mangos are so soft.

I’m also beginning a project, another Peace Corps Honduras one, called Joven a Joven, or Youth to Youth. It involves a week-long training in Valle de Angeles, to which I must bring a teacher from my town, and then we come back and implement the workshop, which is like 2 hours a week for 15 weeks. It’s an awesome program, which trains the high schoolers in leadership, team work, how to identify, apply for, and be successful in jobs, sexual health, self-esteem, the whole deal—though I do believe the focus is on how to enter the work force after graduation. So I went to the District office the other day and ran the idea by them, and they loved it, so then I went and spoke to the principal, and SHE loved it, and told me she’d pick a good teacher for me. I was delighted when she chose Rubenia (fake name), because she’s very involved with the kids, does a lot of extra curricular stuff, and really seems to genuinely care for the kids welfare (though she DOES scream a lot). But she also teaches first grade in the mornings at the elementary school, so we went to go ask the principal of the school (aka my counterpart and old host granny) if she could excuse Rubenia for a week (since the principal doesn’t teach any classes, it’s her job to fill in and substitute when a teacher can’t make it). I imagined she’d be delighted at the opportunity for the high schoolers to participate in such a great workshop, and since she’d taught first grade before, wouldn’t mind subbing the class for five days. I was very mega wrong. If I hadn’t seen her temper tantrum with my own eyes, I never would have believed that a 60-something year old woman would be capable of acting quite so childish. She went off on this crazy, disjointed, screaming rant about how first graders are very delicate little kids, and that it’s the most important grade because it’s when they learn to read, and that it’s VERY irresponsible for Rubenia to ask for a week off, and that there is NO WAY she will sub for Rubenia because her first graders are a bunch of cry-babies, and it’s EASY to sub for older grades because you can just give them busy work and then sit back at your desk, but with first graders you have to make them repeat stuff like parrots the whole time or they don’t learn (yes, she actually said all that. And she’s the PRINCIPAL.) Then she repeated herself several times that you mustn’t ever yell at the kids or hit them, and then if they cry you must give them water. Then she repeated again how irresponsible it is to ask for a week off, and that doesn’t Rubenia even want her kids to learn to read? It was basically a disaster, and I was trying very hard not to let my face should how I felt inside—incredulous that the principal of the school was pitching an actual FIT because subbing for first grade would require more involvement than sitting back at her desk while the kids copy words over and over. Once the other teachers left, she started ranting to me about how it’s not FAIR that they always pick Rubenia for trainings, and she’s such a TERRIBLE teacher, always yelling and beating the kids, and that she’s SICK of Rubenia always getting picked for stuff, and it’s not fair. So basically it sounds like she’s got a personal vendetta against Rubenia, and I don’t even know what to do. But I want to do this training, and I have to bring a teacher…dang man. It’s like professionalism doesn’t exist here.

Baseball is going awesome. The kids and I made this cool thing with tires the other day—basically two huge tires stacked on the ground, and then one balanced on top vertically, wedged into place with rocks and sand and cow shit. Then I marked off 46 feet and BAM! we got a hella sweet target-practice doohickey for my pitchers (Kevin, Neil, Junior, Ever and Enner). Genius. We finally have a fixed date for our tournaments, too—April 18th for the regional one, and June 11th for the Nationals (which we only go to if we’re Regional Champions). Aww yeah VIVA LAS PANTERAS.

Last weekend was a blast…I took a bus down south to Choluteca and then to another town called Monjaras, which is on the coast of the Pacific, in Honduras’s little Golfo de Fonseca. I chilled there for the weekend with fellow volunteers Matt, Joel, Emilie, and Erik, and while it was no El Salvador, it was nice to be in the ocean, dirty as it was (I collected like 10 plastic bags and stuff while I was swimming). Because it was a gulf, the waves weren’t anything to speak of either, but it was nice and warm. We had fried fish and cold beers and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. I finally made it home late Sunday afternoon, despite several unpleasant travel glitches….Leaving Monjaras, I grabbed a jalon in the back of the pick-up with a nice old lady and her kid, though due to some kind of communication error they did NOT take me where I thought they were going to (Choluteca), which I realized after an hour and a half of bumping along a random dirt road instead of the freeway. My left kneecap got rather sunburned, but other than that, it was okay…eventually we ended up in another city, San Lorenzo, and I hopped out and grabbed a passing bus that was headed north toward Tegucigalpa. The bus was crammed, but the nice bus attendant gave me his over-turned bucket next to the driver. Except that meant I then had to sit there while the four dudes breathed on me and asked me the typical Honduran-male questions, which are “are you married? Do you want to be married while you’re here? Do you have a boyfriend? Would you like one? Do you have kids? Would you like some? Why are gringas so extremely beautiful? Don’t you think Honduran men are extremely sexy? Do you live alone? Can I have your number?” etc. It’s always uncomfortable and I just give terse little answers and try to look frumpy. I finally hopped off when they got to the entrance to my mountain, where I waited about 15 minutes until a bus turned up the road, headed toward Reitoca, the pueblo near mine. I gratefully sat down next to a farmer and his daughter (farmers tend not to bug me), which was awesome until the kid puked on my legs. But it was pretty watery puke, so I guess I can’t complain.

Thanks to those of you who have sent me children’s books in Spanish…I am still waiting on the library to open, but I’ve been reading them aloud to my various baby-friends in my hammock, and next week will be going to the preschool to read aloud to them, too. One of my little neighbor kids, Elqui, is particularly attached to me…he’s always waiting outside my gate for me, and the other night I gathered him into my hammock and read Buenas Noches, Luna (goodnight, moon; courtesy of Letha!), and he LOVED it. He was mainly concerned about why a baby rabbit was sleeping in a bed instead of outside, but once we got beyond that, he was pretty happy. He’s easy to please. The other day he informed me it was his birthday. I asked him how old he was turning (even though I already knew he was turning five), and he said “Uh…two.” WRONG. But I gave him a little plastic Hot Wheels car (thanks, Aunt Lisa!) and, on a whim, a cantaloupe. He was THRILLED and raced home screaming “I’M GONNA EAT THIS WATERMELON RIGHT NOW!!” I hope he wasn’t disappointed when he figured out it wasn’t a watermelon at all.

Mmm, delicious…it’s about 10:00am right now and Igor and I are enjoyed a snack of banana smoothies…I recently discovered the little guy goes nuts for banana smoothies, so he gets about one a week now. No wonder he’s such a fatty.

Time to go…pee!

Love,

Hayley

P.S. Shortly after I wrote this blog, I noticed that Igor seems to have the 4-month-old-puppy equivalent of an STD...in any case, he's got green goo oozing out of his little puppy pee-pee, so we're currently in Tegus and about to go see the vet. Poor little dude...is it too crude to call this "pene de pus"?

12 February 2009

Hey, chochachos! Happy February 12th…it wasn’t until tonight that I realized Valentine’s Day is coming up, which is sort of weird…people here do celebrate it, but they call it the Day of Love and Friendship, which I think is much more hilarious. Differently from the states, and at the same time EXTREMELY Honduran, my neighbors have informed me that Catrachos (Hondurans) celebrate by sending what I translate as: “hella text-messages.” So apparently I needn’t worry myself with 32 boxes of candy hearts and/or tiny cards with Spongebob on them…I just gotta make sure I have saldo (cell-phone minutes, sold in tasty little cards or sketchy re-cargas). CHECK.

So dudes, I just ate the first ripe mango of my life in Honduras, and it was….AWESOME. At first I totally pulled a novie move and chomped right into the skin, but after two extremely unsatisfying bites, I realized my mistake and tore the rest of the skin off before I ate it (yes, this was an extremely sticky process, most of which ended up on my shirt). Don Nativo was selling them today in his little pulperia/produce stand, and I just stared at them. “What fruit is that?!” I asked…because all I’ve seen so far is little hard, green mangos that you peel and dip in chile and salt and eat; it’s a crunchy, sour, salty experience—Hondurans seem to have a thing for taking fruit and eating it before it ripe, with as many masking condiments as possible. Anyway, when he informed me they were ripe mangos, I had 7 heart attacks and promptly bought five, at the price of one lempira each, which is like a nickel. Then I also purchased a selection of all of the other produce he had at the moment, which included two green sweet peppers, an avocado, and three tomatoes. Hells of tasty dinner, that is.

So this week was relatively busy Peace Corps style…meaning that I had something to do every day that wasn’t just playing baseball with the kids. I’ve been “steadily” (AKA lazily) working on this workshop on classroom management for the pre-school teachers for like three months…I didn’t have any documents or manuals or anything so I kind of just pulled most of it out of my b..rain. Anyway, it finally happened this Wednesday (aka yesterday), and considering that it was my very first solo workshop-facilitating (and creating, right down to snack time and ice-breakers), it went pretty awesomely. Almost everyone showed up, no one was too late (although two women did skip out to go take advantage of the health clinic in town, which was cool), and lots of people participated (like thirty!). I honestly think they learned a lot…although I totally forgot to measure if they learned a lot, which is by administering a pre- and post-workshop quiz, which is allegedly Peace Corps protocol…crap. We talked about lots of things, like atmosphere in the classroom, appropriate punishment, creativity in the classroom, using the curriculum they’ve got, being constant and firm, and, above all, using positive reinforcement with a basic token economy instead of just getting all screamy and negative. I made them do a lot of group work and dramatizations, though sometimes I think I stretched their willingness to be silly and involved a bit much…essentially a game in which they had to mill about the room making animal noises. While that type of ice-breaker wouldn’t faze a group of young American teachers, it was too much for them to bear. No matter. It was a fun and novel experience to work with an NGO to get funding for a workshop I was to do independently, and the fact that I actually did it and it actually went well is rather exhilarating. And exhausting.

Not much else is new. Igor continues to grow, and recently made his virgin voyage to Tegucigalpa, clutched in my lap on the bumpy four-hour bus ride. He hated the city…I’ve never seen such a scared little guy. He also hated the cold. When we got to the vet, he got all vaccinated, as well as tested for and then treated for parasites, a process which involved the vet sticking a long plastic poo-collector thing up his little butt…poor, poor Igor. He was VERY upset at this procedure and proceeded to be very sullen and angry at me for the rest of the afternoon. I then toted him to the nearby Peace Corps office, so I could show him to my friends and bosses, and also get some work done. This almost went smoothly, until the main-head-boss-of-Honduras-Peace-Corps-lady Trudy walked in on Igor and Sandra (my project leader). So poor Igor was kicked to the curb…which I guess makes sense, considering he had just moments before christened Sandra’s office floor with a little puddle of liquefied nervousness. We crashed for the night at my rad-Honduran-hippie-friends-who-live-in-a-glorified-tree-house, which was also upsetting for poor little Igor (he has never been away from home before!) But after a couple hours he settled down and was his old self, hella stealing shoes and chasing cats up the wall. When it was time for bed, I brought out his special flannel shirt and we snuggled together in my sleeping bag on the floor. Tegucigalpa is mighty cold this time of year (mighty cold by Honduran standards, not Chicago standards…I’m talking switch from shorts-and-a-tee-shirt to jeans-and-socks-sweatshirt-recommended).

Las Panteras continue to practice every day, with no observable progress but plumb plucky spirits. We start every practice by huddling up, and putting our hands/paws together. Then I should, “QUIEN SOMOS?!” (Who are we?!) and the boys and girls scream, “LAS PANTERAS!” Then I shout, “QUE SOMOS?” (What are we?!) and they all scream, “LOS MEJORES!” (The best!) Then we take off and run a lap around the dirt field, and then meet in the middle and do our stretches in a big circle. Depending on the number of kids and day of the week, we either play a scrimmage (definitely their favorite) or do various batting/fielding/catching/throwing/base running drills. Then we huddle up at the end of the two hour practice, and I do something called “La Mera Pantera,” which is essentially MVP. I single out a kid who made a great play, or had a great attitude, or improved something, or perhaps, for the first time ever, chose not to throw a screaming “N’HOMBRE, N’HOMBRE” hurling-glove-to-the-dirt-and-stomping-around-temper-tantrum after being tagged out (that was today’s, given to a remarkably calm, 12-year-old kid named Ever). I actually had a meeting before practice with the parents today, which I’d never done before…it was fun getting everyone together; we ate cookies and drank pepsi and I told them to support our team, to come watch their kids play, and they we have a “big” championship coming up. One of the moms stood up halfway through and announced in a relatively scary voice that we had to do everything possible to win the regional championship; that we won it last year and it would be shameful to not do it again (she was looking at me intently while she stated this and it made me rather sweaty, like maybe she would not think twice about feeding me venomous tortillas if I made her kids lose). The two dads in the room came up to me afterward and enthusiastically informed me they would do ANYTHING to make sure we win. It’s hilarious and great to see this extremely competitive side to my kids’ folks, though, so I love it…even through it does make me a little nervous for myself if we happen to lose. Which we might…if only baseball was scored based on how many balls you could drop, with extra points if dropped in an extremely clutch moment in the game.

May you dream with the tiny angels! (A direct translation of my favorite Spanish good-night phrase)

Hayley

18 February 2009

What’s UP, chochachos! I have recently discovered that Reitoca, the next pueblo over, now has working INTERNET. That’s right. I no longer have to travel four hours on multiple buses and taxies to check e-mail/read Achewood/upload bloggy-blogs to you people. So that’s freaking sweet.

Valentine’s Day, last Saturday, was fun…I woke up and made papaya smoothies with my neighborhood posse of children (plus Nely and Tina), which we drank in my yard. Then I handed out little foam hearts (thanks, Sherry Carpenter!!) with little candies to all the kids, which was cute. They were all shrieking “CAN I PUT THIS ON MY FACE?!” and I’d be like, “SURE MAN PUT THAT DANG THING ANYWHERE YOU WANT” and the kids would be all “HOOORRAAAAY!!! ANYWHERE!!!” and proceed to stick them all over themselves and then shriek some more. Ah, the Day of Love and Friendship. I sent and received many text messages, so I’m pretty sure I did a good job. Then my friend David, the volunteer who lives in Reitoca, came over so we could eat baleadas and drink cokes and speak English in my little house while I locked the gate to keep the babies out. Of course, the fact he came over on Valentine’s Day didn’t do a thing to help quell the rumor that we’re actually secret novios…he was gonna crash for the night on my spare mattress, so he wouldn’t have to leave at like 4:00pm to walk home, but I think—no, I know—that would have just been too much for my gossipy townsfolk. They don’t know what a blog is, but I bet they would have created some kind of campo version just to spread the word that the gringa and her secret boyfriend are sharing a secret overnight Valentine’s Day situation. It’s actually really annoying, that this culture is so unwilling to accept platonic man-lady friendship…in the states, havin’ a guy friend spend the night wouldn’t be weird or eyebrow-raising. And the neighbors probably wouldn’t even know/care. But here, you can’t even walk around next to the dude without people elbowing each other and whispering about it as you walk by. Part of me just wants to say screw it, it won’t kill me if they gossip about me, but the other part actually lets the culture here get to me enough where I would feel really embarrassed knowing they were talking about me and David (or whomever) like that. Dang man.

The next day, Sunday, was equally delightful…I went hiking with a million babies and my neighbors through a dry creek bed, under a grove of mangos, until we got to a less-dry creek bed, which housed a very tiny and rather dirty swimming hole. I was hot and sweaty, though, and the water didn’t have green scrum floating on it yet, so I thrashed in fully-clothed and basked in the delightful sensation of goose bumps in the south of Honduras. After a bit I got out and sat on the mossy rocks with the moms and a random hella-old farmer lady who stopped by, chewing on green mangos and watching the kids shriek and splash around. (One kid even filled a plastic bag with water and dropped it from a little cliff into the rocks below, which filled my soul with intense pride. God I love throwin’ bags of water off of stuff…) At one point I noticed one of the ladies staring rather blatantly at the chest-region of my tank-top, which was plastered to my torso with river water. “Oh,” she sighed, “I bet Hayley’s nipples are just so white and pretty.” I didn’t really know how to respond to that, so I just said “Yes.” and hoped she would not press further, which, being the shameless Honduran campo woman that she was, she certainly did. “Show us them!” “Yeah, show us!” “We wanna see gringa nipples!” I was trapped. So I whipped ‘em out…I even had to turn around so that the third and final lady would not be left out of the once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity of gringa-nipple viewing. Actually, it wasn’t embarrassing…I totally understood where they were coming from. After all, haven’t we all wondered what the nipples of someone of a different color look like? (No? Stop lying to yourself.) A perfect example of a) how Honduran campo folks have no shame, about anything, but especially regarding the body; and b) how long I’ve been here, that whipping out the nips didn’t even make me blush. Fortunately, though, none of the kids saw…wouldn’t want that getting back to my baseball team.

I can’t wait for the rain to start up again, in April or May or whenever…it’s getting so dry, I barely have water. My pila hasn’t been full in a week, and the barrel I keep my bathing water in in getting dangerously low, too. I’ve even had to wash my dishes at the neighbors a couple of times, who had water when I didn’t….it’s ANNOYING as HELL, dang it. I have so many sweaty shirts to cleanse! And my compost heap is getting cracky! And my plants are wilty! And I’m SMELLY! I talked to the dude in charge of the water, but he told me that’s just how it is this time of year. So I guess I’ll just drink pond water and DIE (which is what I wanted to shout at him, but didn’t).

Unrelated, I also found a dead baby chicken in the pila the other day, which was gross and sad. How did it get in there? Part of me is worried some punk kid threw it in there, as a practical joke….because chickens can’t really get into my yard due to the chain link fence. And chicks can’t fly…I think it was a terrorist attack. Maybe the same terrorist that ripped down my “VIVA OBAMA” sign, back at the my old host family’s house…I’m considering getting a rifle and taping it to a machete AKA bayonet, campo style. Watch the heck out, terrorists. Im’a shank you.

Love,

Hayley

Neighborhood boys getting insane on my floor.

My tiny baby compost heap! That's right, avocado skins. Bake in the sun and become dirt.

Three of my neighbors, Noel, Neil, and Enner, solemnly displaying in my backyard the new hit of the neighborhood, a giant plastic rainbow slinky that Whitney sent me.

One of my favorite little babies, Douglas, sitting atop a random barrel I have in my front yard for no real good reason.

Here he is again...you can't really see it, but he's holding onto aforementioned slinky.

My bathing quarters.

A view of my house AKA Tarantula Oven, from the road.

Alison and Noel playing in my yard, stretching the slinky to their hearts delight.

Tina and me!

My baby, gazing at my face with adoring eyes.

Igor leads a very indulgent life.

Igor contemplating the gravel in my yard.

Alison, getting her slink on in my backyard.

A CAVE! In La Tigra. I saw giant crickets inside.

An old mining shaft (also in La Tigra) that is now used as a water souce for the local community at the base of the mountain...I think.

Words do not describe my contentment.

Quite possibly the coolest picture anyone has ever taken of Justin, ever.

Same for Dora.

CHRISTMAS CARD.

Waterfall, duh.

4 February 2009

Hey, chochachos! It’s an extremely, extremely blustery night here in Alubarén…I feel as though if I were to go outside with the right duct-tape-to-cotton-sheet ratio, I could totally fly. However, it’s too windy to go outside, so here I sit with my computer-machine and a cup of tea (yes, it’s going to be a pee-in-the-bucket sort of night…which is essentially synonymous with “havin’ a real good time”). Igor is lying at my feet, breathing moist-ily onto the top of my foot and being adorable without exerting much effort. I recently purchased him a little green nylon collar, so he has dropped the formalities with his rag bow-tie and is now strutting about like the stud he is (literally...though not forever. Little does he know, he’s about to become the very first dog to ever be neutered in Alubarén. Possibly via machete). I am still falling in love with my puppy…he now follows me so well he doesn’t need a leash, so we parade about the pueblo together, which usually results in old ladies stopping and commenting, “Oh, how nice, you’re with your little pet…and he’s such a fatty!” (It’s true. He’s a total pig.) He’s also very “bien educado,” and draws gasps of admiration whenever he performs the only trick he’s mastered at the tender age of three months, which is to sit on command (in Spanish, obviously…he’s a bilingual pup but I think he’s more comfortable with his native tongue). Of course, he has his annoying habits…he plays this game he calls “haul all of Hayley’s shoes and flip-flops outside and hide them in the dirt,” and has also been known to tear holes in certain people’s mosquito netting, thus rendering it “pigeon netting”…but when he pops his little head and paws onto the side of my hammock and snuggles into my belly for a nap while I read, all I feel is love. SIGH. (In that sense, he’s come in quite handy when the annoying men around town ask me if I’m looking for a Honduran boyfriend…I just point to Igor and inform them that yes, thank you, I’ve found one.) (Yes, I’m aware that’s creepy and kind of gross. I just play the weird-gringa card and run away.)

Enough about Igor…so, the other day, I totally celebrated Christmas AMERICAN STYLE, WITH PRESENTS….even though it was February. Apparently, the mail system here (dude with a backpack) had a bit of kink, and let all the materialized love from the states build up, only to shoot it all to me in a torrent of goodies. The mail-lady called me and was like “Uhh dude come to the post office, and being a kid with you to carry your shit.” I RAN there, and joyfully carried home not one but MANY boxes, filled with awesome Christmas goodies, as well as like 10 letters. Humming Jingle Bells Batman Smells, I leapt into my hammock and, trying to savor every moment, carefully sliced open the cardboard boxes. It was awesome. I cried. Thanks, dudes.

When I left for Honduras, I lashed to my backpack several large and cumbersome camping things, including but not limited to my tent, hiking boots, my sleeping bag, camping pad, camp stove, mess kit, and way too many knives. “Hayley, you’re a durn fool,” said my mom. “That is some heavy-ass stuff. Also you will not use it.” To that I replied, “The HELL I won’t use it; Honduras is all jungle and I totally wanna go camping around in the jungle.” As it turns out, only part of Honduras is jungle, and for the first 7 months I had little time nor opportunity to embark on any nature adventures requiring over-night lodging. However, I recently decided the non-sweltering forests of Honduras had eluded me and my “Best Friends Clubhouse” (aka little two-person tent) long enough, and so me and some buddies finally loaded up the packs and tramped out into the woods. Specifically, I met up in Tegucigalpa with some Peace Corps friends, and we left early Saturday morning for La Tigra, Honduras’ oldest national park, which is surprisingly close and easy to get to. We loaded onto a city bus, and road it as far as Jutiapa, a community at the border of the protected area—it took about 45 minutes, I think. They unloaded us at the bottom of the mountain, and we stood there, trying to psych ourselves up for the incredibly steep multiple-hour-long hike up the paved road to the park entrance. However, the psyching was unnecessary because the ride-gods were good to us and a nice fellow with a pick-up truck pulled up before we had even shouldered our backpacks. We leapt in and enjoyed a beautiful 20 minute ride up the mountain, waving joyfully to the locals on the way and occasionally yelping with spontaneous happiness to not have had to waste half the day hauling our crap up the freeway. Once we unloaded and thanked our jalon, we took our stuff into the visitor’s center, where two cute kids immediately sold us delicious banana pancake things. We left our stuff there, and departed for what ended up being one of my favorite hikes, the cloud forest trail. It’s INCREDIBLE this place is to close to the city...you step in and you feel like you’re in Ferngully, minus Batty. The vegetation was nothing like crusty old Alubarén, where it hasn’t seen a drop of moisture since October….I’m talking hella-rainforest style. (Well, cloud forest…but since I’ve yet to see a real rain forest, this was close enough.) Huge gnarled trees, fluffy with thick mats of moss, awesome fern-trees, which previously I’d only read about, strange plants with leaves big enough to swaddle a manatee, drooping vines, all dripping with water…we saw waterfalls, and heard what I’m sure were the most exotic birds in the whole wide world (except for one particularly elusive species, which upon closer examination turned out not to be a bizarre mating call but actually a shoddy drainage pipe). Later that day, we returned to the visitor’s center and hauled our stuff about 40 minutes into the forest to the only campground in the whole park, which was rather disappointing in many respects (housed what must have been a Large Spider Family Reunion, contained only small, wet sticks for firewood, and was perhaps the only campground in the world that is, paradoxically, never flat). Despite its inconveniences, however, we pitched our two tents, had a fire both nights, and stoically avoided any spider bites, so I suppose I can’t complain. The next day we pretty much hiked the rest of the park (it’s not very large, in comparison to some you might find in the states), and my mind was totally blown. We alternated between lush, jungle-y cloud forest with towering waterfalls, cool pine groves, and stretches of golden broad-leaf deciduous woods with a thick carpeting of crunchy fall leaves on the forest floor that seemed like something out of a Midwestern calendar. We saw many caves (and spelunked most of them, thanks to my trusty headlamp) and several abandoned mines (relics from La Tigra’s relatively recent history as a mining site). The whole adventure was delightfully disorientating, and I can’t think of anything more excellent then lounging in the leaves around a little fire with several buddies, eating candy and burning stuff. The next camping outing is scheduled for April…hells of hooray, yo.

You’d think from the focus of my blogs, all I do as a Peace Corps volunteer is play with puppies and pointedly spend time in the woods that are not in my site, but that’s not the case. I totally do stuff. Summer break is finally ending here in Honduras, and the kids are grudgingly (though not nearly as grudgingly as the teachers) gearing up to get back into the scholastic groove. They start Monday, allegedly (I’ll believe it when I see it…). That’s good news for me, as the summer break season is always a bit slow for the youth-oriented volunteer. I’m going to be starting an oral-hygiene project, sponsored by Colgate, in the surrounding villages, and that should be fun…they donated a bunch of little toothbrushes and toothpastes and I’m going to train the school teachers to do little health classes on a weekly basis, while the kids practice brushing their teeth after the school snack. Should be cool…I’m also going to be teaching the teachers in my town how to teach English to their kids, using American methodology, which is nice and imperialistic but admittedly a huge improvement to the rote-memorization tactics used here. So, no one can say I don’t do stuff. That’s some stuff I’m gonna do!

As for stuff I’m currently doing, that is basically summed up in one word: BEISBOL! Las Panteras continues to be a lovable pain for me, which I’m sure any youth coach can attest to…it’s fun, and the kids are great, but good GOD they are little monsters at the same time. However, it’s a great exercise in patience for me, since half the things I want to scream at them I can’t, because I can’t do it in Spanish (I definitely yelled, “COME ON, GUYS!” today. In English). Seriously, though, they are great kids despite their constant desire to fight and shout cusses. I usually have about 20 kids at practice, which is perfect. The dynamics are very interesting…I have the older boys who played last year with John, who are great because they help the younger, newer kids, but terrible because they are constantly trying to exert their emerging manhood by seeing if they can break the rules (they can’t). The younger kids are much better behaved, but also much worse at the sport of baseball, which frustrates the older kids to no end. One of the rules of a PC baseball team is you must have as least two girls…I began the season with like seven, but now I’m down to the required two. One is little Nuria, a 10-year-old who can actually throw and catch pretty well and has a very plucky spirit. The other is Lisbeth, a nine-year-old kid with a heart of gold but who is admittedly still too immature to be trolling around with 20 older boys under the hot sun every day…a rare day indeed when she doesn’t come running, sniffling because someone hurt her feelings (the kid can’t throw or catch to save her life, which sometimes results in criticism from her more coordinated teammates). However, I’ve got to hand it to her, because she comes to every single practice with a smile on her face and always offers to help out. The kids are all bursting with enthusiasm these days, because the Peace Corps recently announced that no other than ALUBARÉN would be hosting the regional tournament this year, on the 28th of March. That is big news for us, and the kids feel very proud that the other teams are going to have to truck up our steamy mountain to play in the tournament. We will play against two other teams, Pespire and Reitoca, and the team that wins will go to the National Championship in Tegucigalpa. I really hope we make it…the kids want it so bad, and since they went last year, if we don’t make it this year I will feel like I’ve failed as a skilled baseball coach (which I admittedly am not).

Other than that, I spent a lot of time doing what I’ve been doing since the day I arrived, which is socializing with the townfolk. My new neighbors, especially…Tina and Rubuen, their two children Alex (19) and Nely (26), and Nely’s three adorable children, Alison (4), Noel (6), and Douglas (about 17 months). When I’m not over there, sitting in hammocks in the shade and sipping on sweet coffee, everyone’s over here, sitting in hammocks in the shade, sipping sweet coffee and watching the kids search for “cherries” in the dirt. I truly love them. And I know they love me…the other day, when I was randomly barfing up my guts without avail for 24 hours, Tina brought me several cups of cinnamon tea and was so concerned she almost carried me to the health clinic (I recovered, however). The first thing I do in the morning when I let the dog out is shout GOOD MORNING! to them, to which the kids always bellow back GOOD MORNING! before racing over to harvest any cherries the wind knocked down during the night. They bring me tortillas, I bring them beans. They bring me bananas, I bring them melons. I share my Christmas goodies, and Tina presents me with an embroidered tortilla-cloth she made just for me. It’s like having real family, right across the street…I wish I could help them more. They’re so poor. Ruben, the father/grandfather, has a bad case of Parkinson’s and shakes so bad he can’t even dress himself, but they can’t afford medicine. Tonight, while Tina and I were sitting outside watching the day turn to dusk and the kids charge up and down the road engaged in Coke-bottle-cap warfare, she broke down into tears and asked me if there was any cure for Parkinson’s. I had to tell her no…she told me some man on the bus told her he had the cure and sold her some little bottles of liquid. I held her hand and she cried for the husband she used to have, who is slowly turning in another child for her to care for…every night, she told me, she prays that they will discover the cure for Parkinson’s for her husband will go back to normal. And yet despite the intense emotional and physical challenges this family faces, I’ve never met a happier, more loving and joyful group of people. They appreciate everything. That’s what I love about them…they’re so genuine.

Bedtime…I love you guys.

Love and paz,

Hayley

me and esau in my hammock....no, i did not pick the colors. damn it.

Ana looking good (but not nearly as good as me) in my Adventure Hat at our hotel in el salvador.

salvadorean sunrise....feliz ano nuevo, chochachos.

Esau and Nuria, two of my favorite little kids....both play on my baseball team and their folks are my landlords. here they are in my Hammock of Love.

a bow-tie? its not even 7:00 yet! Oh, Igor, don't be so ostentatious.

oh yes you ARE the best puppy ever. oh yes you are.

Oh, Igor. You sassy man.

17 January 2009

Happy New Year, chochachos! Once again I have failed to upload a blog for a bit. But I’ve been just busy as the dickens eating sandwiches in the ocean and caring for my new baby (yes it’s true, I’m a new mommy). Now, I’m sure you’re all very confused. “Doesn’t Peace Corps kick you out if you get knocked up??” Yes. Yes they do. But I have “cersumvented” (anyone? Is it still cool to make Arrested Development references?) that problem by adopting, not a baby but a very fuzzy little sassy-pants puppy, whom I’ve named Igor. He’s about 10 weeks old and fat as hell (maybe because the skeletal street dogs make me sad, I can’t seem to stop feeding him). He has cinnamon colored legs and his body is a nice dark gray. He’s got little perky ears that flop down, and, like I said, is extremely fluffy. His tail is kind of short, too. His birth mother (who has visitation rights whenever she wants) is a huge, ugly-ass yellow mutt named Princesa, who managed to birth nine puppies in November (the 5th, specifically). I’ve had my eye on him (being the fluffiest of them all) since then, and the other day my neighbor Gila called me up and told me to come get my dog. Unlike the other pups, Igor is really chill and hardly ever barks. He’s also a genius, according to my dad, because he’s naturally potty-trained…he just goes outside to pee or poop and so far has yet to soil the house, even though he sleeps indoors. His favorite activities involve sleeping, eating, and chasing around jicara, which are these round goard things that fall from trees, about the size of baseballs. The first night I got him, he just cried and screamed all night long. The next night, he slept until about 3:30am, then proceeded to scream until 7:000am. Since then, however, he tucks in at the same time I do (about lame o’clock) and wakes up at about 5:30, quietly chewing all my clothes to pieces until I get up and let him out to pee. It’s crazy how much we’ve bonded in the past week…I’ve totally fallen in love. It’s like having a really, really easy baby. He follows me everywhere (he even waits patiently by the door while I read Harry Potter in Spanish while in my latrine) and comes when he’s called. He goes everywhere with me. Now, when the neighborhood kids see me coming, instead of screaming HEELIE they belt out IGGOOOORRR!!!! It’s great because his littler-mate, Kaiser, lives across the road with my awesome neighbors Neli and Tina (and Alison, Douglas, Noel, Alex, and Ruben) so they happily take care of my baby when I go to baseball or on trips.

So obviously I’m finally in my own place (adopting a dog with a host family would probably be hella rude). Igor and I love the Tarantula Oven, in all of its steamy glory. The house is small, divided in half by a wall with a little doorway. The first room is where I spent most of my time if I’m in the house, as it serves as playroom for the neighborhood kids that are always around, a kitchen (I’ve got a mini-fridge on the floor, and a little one-burner electric stove that sits on a table, plus a bookcase which holds my dishes, rice, and beans), and a living room (I’ve got a huge woven hammock hanging from the rafters). It’s got two windows, which helps with the heat. In the other room, I’ve got my bed (complete with diarrhea-green Vietnam-era mosquito net the Peace Corps graciously gave me), a wobbly table a neighbor lent me, and another bookcase, this time filled with my clothes, books, and many bottles of sunscreen and bug spray. To be honest, the name isn’t really all that accurate—despite the fact it will be an oven come the hot-as-balls months (March-June), due to the low, tin roofing and lack of air flow, it’s not too bad at the moment. And I have to see ANY tarantulas, at all, in Honduras. But they exist! And I’m ready! (My neighbor Tina, like most Hondurans I’ve met, is petrified of toads. So we’ve struck a deal in which she will remove any tarantulas from my home and I will de-toad her place.)

The best part about my house, though, is the yard. It’s nice and big, with lots of fruit trees (lemon, orange, cherry, plum, etc). Though I should clarify that Honduran cherries are terrible little balls of mealy semi-sweet white pulp and “plums” are hard little green things that taste like butts. Either way, it’s awesome. Out behind the house, up a tiny incline, is my pila, shower/barrel, and latrine. My landlords put a nice chain-link fence with a locking gate around the whole place, so I’m hells of secure. There is a handsome white horse who lives next door on one side, and a bunch of kids on the other. Today, we hauled wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow filled with dirt, cow manure, ashes, and leaves into the backyard…that’s right, I’m totally making a sweet compost pile. In a couple of months, when my compost is hella composty, I’m gonna plant vegetables and stuff. And then I’m gonna eat em. And totally not get bean-scurvy.

It’s nice being back after my week vacation in El Salvador…I’m working on a workshop I’ll give to all the preschool teachers in our area (33 in total), I’m giving computer classes to the employees at the NGO where I work, I’m doing baseball, my pregnant women’s club, and soon I’ll be started a weekly story-and-art hour at the library, as well as a program that teaches teachers how to teach English to their students. HELLS OF BUSY. But El Salvador was so freaking INCREDIBLE, if I get stressed I just put on some sweet dub reggae and bask in my memories.

I hooked up in Choluteca with four gringo friends, Ana, Gabe, Emilie, and Justin, and together we boarded a bus to the border. Crossing was ridiculously easy, all we did was saunter across and the inspector-lady glanced at our residency cards and waved us on. Then we caught a bus to large city called San Miguel, then another one straight down the coast, to a beach town called Cuco. The sun was hanging low in the sky when we got there, and we basically ran to the first hotel we saw, right on the water. In a record amount of time we had changed into swimsuits and I stumbled into the Pacific just as the sun was smearing red and orange all over the dang place. It was HEAVEN. The water down there is warm as bath water…you can stay in for house and never get even a little cold. After swimming we had dinner and some cold beers and hit the hay. Once in bed, I managed to lacerate my cornea with a grain of sand, and, in route to the bathroom mirror while screaming like a nancy, I stepped on a belt buckle and shanked the hell out of sole of my foot. I awoke the next day with my eye nearly swollen shut and my foot equally stabby in pain. An auspicious beginning. Throwing caution to the wind (aka I’m a dumbass) I went swimming all day anyway, while debated over the grilled shrimp and cold beers whether or not I should seek medical help for my eye. Later that day we wandered down the beach until we found some cheap cinderblock-and-hammock hostel built right onto the sand that rented rooms for like $7, on a sweet, unpopulated beach called Playa las Flores. The folks there were super nice, and one the surfer dudes who worked there took me out on his 8.5-foot longboard, and before I knew it, I was hangin’ ten, hella gnarly bro, etc. (This later proved to be my most successful surfing endeavor of the entire trip, which I attribute to the non-insane waves, the handsome surfer dude, and his monstrously large board.) That night we got a jalon into town in the back of a truck and ate papusas until our stomachs neared explosion of cheesy-beany goodness.

The next morning we decided to go for one last swim before heading up the coast to meet up with our friends, which was great until the riptide subtly pulled Ana and I out to sea. We started to swim back, but, still caught in the current, we got tired quickly and Ana started to panic. I got scared to and started to call for help. Emilie and Justin came out, and Emilie basically saved Ana, who couldn’t swim anymore, and helped her get in. I’m still not sure how exactly I made it in. Anyway, we won. Suck it, Ocean.

After an extremely long and sweaty day of traveling north-west on chicken buses, involving many detours, undesirable urinating locations (such as ditches, and for one of my companeros who shall remain names, on the floor of the actual bus), and more than one drunken mariachi, we arrived in La Libertad, a allegedly shady coastal city. We caught a jalon in a nice man’s pick-up to the beach community of El Zonte, where our friends were waiting. At about 9:00pm, after a delightful ride along the coast under the moon, with the warm wind in our hair, we stumbled into Olas Permanentes, aka the best hotel in the world. I’m not sure how our friends found it, but it was incredible. Right on a beautiful black-sand beach, we found ourselves in a friendly little surfer hotel with cheap rooms, comfy hammocks under palm fronds looking out at the water, tasty toasted sandwiches (you guys know how I feel about that) and sweet island dub reggae playing softly out of speakers woven into the many dangly drift-wood art creations that smattered the cabanas. It was so wonderful we immediately ditched any plans to continue north (as we’d originally wanted to do) and spent too many days to count waking up, surfing, boogie boarding, eating sandwiches, and making friends with the delightful folks who called this awesome place home. At night we went to beach parties, or dragged lawn chairs into the surf to sip a beer and contemplate the stars. We spent New Years Eve chilling at a couple different shin-digs on the sand, finally making it back to our hotel by about 3:00am. Then me and a couple buddies decided to wait up and welcome in the new year, and spent the next couple hours splashing around in the warm waves and waiting for the sun to rise. By the time we finally left, it felt like leaving home. I can’t wait to go back.

Only three more days until Obama swears in! I don’t have a TV in the T.O., but I’m sure they’ve been going on and on about it and I’m gonna try to find a neighbor who will let me watch history unfold.

Paz,

Hayley (and Igor, who is currently chewing on my big toe)

25 December 2008

Merry Christmas, chochachos! Dang I guess I got all “busy” and stuff and stopped blogging for a bit. Not that it really matters, since internet doesn’t exist in the Lubes. But anyway. Merry Christmas! Today, Christmas Day, wasn’t anything special—I just got up, washed my clothes for a couple hours, rode my bike around, and ate several tamales. Yesterday was the big tamale (pun intended…is that a pun?), and most folks were up at 5:00am, boiling masa (corn meal stuff), killing chickens and pigs, gathering banana leaves, and boiling beans for the big Tamale Feast. I helped Sandra slice up potatoes and stuff, and then watched as Paula, her mom (and my counterpart), laid a piece of banana leaf on the counter, dolloped corny-goo in the middle, then beans, then potato, then red stuff, then dead animal bits (mmm delicious). Then Paula would wrap it all up and her mom, who looks like she’s 200 years old and can’t hear, would tie them up with a little piece of fiber. Once they were all done, we loaded them into a huge pot with a bit of water and boiled ‘em for hours. Other families also make torejas, which is sort of like what French toast would be if it decided to go to college and really make something of itself—it’s so hot and gooey and drenched in honey. Celebrating Christmas away from my parents, not to mention my culture, was a little weird. Back in the America-land Christmas is basically the biggest thing that happens to a kid all year—no doubt due to the presents. Here, presents aren’t really exchanged like we do—parents buy their kids clothes, but that’s about it. No tree, no Santa, no stockings. Here, all the focus is on the food. Christmas doesn’t hold the same frenzied joy that it does back home—I ran into several kids who weren’t even aware it was Christmas. Except for the excess of firecrackers (HELL YES FIRECRACKERS), the violent increase in drunk men passed out in the dirt (I awoke Christmas Eve to the sound of a bolo (drunk) barfing at the top of his lungs in the street outside my house), and the communal feasting of tamales, it’s basically like any other day. I didn’t even stay up till midnight! (Officially an old campo woman.)

This past weekend, though, was such a blasty-blast it makes up for the fact I didn’t get any Christmas presents. On Friday, I was hanging out in Reitoca (nearby municipality) for a two-day Fondo Cristiano meeting, which including a Christmas dinner. The dinner was delicious, and I amused myself and others by trying to dance to traditional “cuerdo” music (string band, basically). It was sort of like a high school dance, only with booze. (Or maybe there always was booze at the high school dances and I just didn’t know.) The men were getting drunk as quickly as possible (even the band would stop every could of songs and, with decreasing discreetness, dump guaro into their cokes), and the women would send the local strumpet to fix herself a mixed drink, then return and very surreptitiously tip it into empty cups outstretched underneath the table. (Only skank-wad ladies drink here, or so says the culture.) I danced meringue with my boss and this very frightened-looking 20-year-old kid who works in another town. I stepped on his toes like eight times. So that was all Thursday night, and on Friday the main-boss dude was headed to Tegus, so I hopped in his car with him and caught a free lift to the city. My host mom and her sister and kids happened to be there too, so I crashed at their house and had a great time going to the mall and eating two Cinnabons, just like an American. Saturday night I met up with my friend Andy, a fellow volunteer, and we went to an awesome Honduran house party with some friends of his. It was so fun, a dog barks. People were hanging around, drinking beers and smoking, listening to crazy music and talking—no guaro, no reggaeton, no creepy men. It felt like I was back in the states—the crazy hippie Hondurans at this party weren’t anything like the humble folks waiting for me back in the campo. It reminded me of being in Chile. To be honest, I think the party has widened my mental representation of what it means to be a Honduran—until now, I’d pretty much only interacted with the country mice, which are arguably quite different from the city mice. In fact, I met one dude, who suddenly struck me as familiar. After chatting with him for a minute, I realized why it felt like I knew him—he was from a small pueblo in the south, too, and just happened to be visiting. This was also an interesting discovery; that I’ve been here enough that I can get a vibe about where people are from in the country. A bunch of people asked me for my phone number and promised camping excursions and adventures, so we’ll see if any real friendships come out of this. Either way, though, it was the most fun I’ve had after 9:30pm in a very long time.

I’d better go to bed…tomorrow I have my Pregnant Women’s Club (the theme is about the actual birthing process, what goes on and what the danger signs are). Then I’m going to move into my new house! I’ve had some of my stuff there for the past couple weeks, and now I’m finally gonna finish the job. On Saturday, I leave for El Salvador a week of surfing (I’m gonna learn!) and chilling on the beach with about 10 gringo friends. When I get back, I’ll be living in my new little house, aka the Tarantula Oven. Come visit! I have two hammocks, and the latrine has some plants around it. Real cozy like.

Love,

Hayley

12 December 2008

Hey, chochachos! Dang I’m sleepy. I’ve turned into a mega-old woman these days…9:30pm rolls around and I’m just huge exaggerated yawns and stretching. I’ve turned into my father. I can’t even sleep in anymore, either!! If I wake up and the clock says 8:00am, that means that either a) someone has kidnapped my hella-screamy host sister, or b) it must be Saturday. Which, coincidentally, is tomorrow. Currently, Carlita (3-year-old sister) and Said (9-year-old host cousin) are screaming and thundering up and down the slippery tile hallway, collapsing in a pile at my doorway and screaming some more. Oh, good. Now she’s shrieking in anger. Dang I wish I had a door…I would name him Doory (Dori?!) and he would be my friend. Not that I don’t adore the little kid, she’s really grown on me…but jesus god does she love to scream. Sometimes when she’s in a I’m-three-and-can’t-accurately-express-with-words-the-frustration-I-feel-right-now moods she does this lion-bark thing where she screams at you in short, throaty bursts of rage. It’s kind of scary. Today I received an awesome box of art supplies from my delightful Aunt Lisa, which also had a big bag of trail mix. I brought it into my host mom’s room to share with her and Carla, who were lying in bed giggling, and they thought it was AWESOME (which it is). Carlita then proceeded to pull a “Wendy Kercher,” which, for those of you who’ve never seen the dame eat trail mix, involves carefully picked out all the M&Ms and ignoring any non-chocolate product. I was chatting with Sandra and turned to see Carlita with a HUGE heap of candies in her lap, which she promptly shoved into her mouth with astonishing speed, breaking all kinds of oral-volume records (think tiny brown hamster?).

I made some pretty big mistakes today. Basically, someone (John, maybe?) sent a huge bag of baseball shoes for my baseball team, like 40 pairs. So I dragged this bag to my house from Tegus the other day, and had plans to divvy em up at practice today. On my way home from lunch, though, I passed three of my baseball kids, so I told them to come to my house and I’d give them their shoes now, thinking it would make things easier in the afternoon with less kids waiting for shoes. So they come, and get all outfitted. Now here, when someone is “regalando” (giving out) something, it must release some kind of scent into the air, because before I knew it, all kinds of neighbors and more baseball kids were shoving onto my porch with their hands outstretched. Why not, I figured, might as well get some more baseball kids out of the way…even though a lot of the kids who’d shown up were the “once and while” players, instead of the “every day” players…we had like 40 pairs so I figured it would be fine. Then, some neighborhood moms starting arriving, requesting pairs for their little boys or nephews or whatever. I explained they were donated with the intention of giving them to my baseball players, and that it would be dishonest to hand them out to other people. The moms got mad and called me a cheapskate, and left somewhat huffily. I know the rule here is that if you have something good, you share it, but obviously it’s not cool to take people’s donations from the states and misuse them (even though a kid with a new pair of shoes isn’t exactly misuse…). Anyway, now the problem was that I’d given out an awful lot of shoes to baseball players, many of whom don’t come all the time, and now I was out of shoes for several of my older players, who come every day (the issue being we had a ton of smaller shoes and only a few pairs of bigger shoes). But it was too late, I can’t very well wrench the cleats out of the kids’ hands, especially since a lot of them had already washed them and had walked home staring at the ground, admiring every single shiny, clackity step. So, crap. I called my boss and she said there are three pairs of larger-sized cleats in the office that she’ll save for me, so at least Cristian, Robin, and Junior won’t be hella pissed at me anymore. But the truth is, I really messed up—I should have brought the cleats to practice to give them to the kids who were there, instead of accidentally screwing over the kids who didn’t know I was handing out cleats and, at the same time, accidentally tripling our daily attendance. So today, 38 kids arrived at the campo, armed with new cleats, except for the few who couldn’t find a pair who fit (such as my older, bigger kids). Needless to say, tensions were running high—the older kids were pissed that our numbers had suddenly tripled and they had no cleats, and the younger, smaller kids were fighting. I had to send two kids home for cusses and for telling one of the girls to go to bed with him. I tried to have a baseball game, but the teams were so big the majority spent time waiting to bat or waiting for the ball to come their way. I also let the kids pitch for the first time, so we barely got any hits; it was mostly just a bunch of walks. Then, of course, all these grown men showed up to play soccer and were all pissed we had taken over the field. When the practice ended, I kind of wanted to cry (but I can’t because we all know about the rules regarding crying and baseball). So I went to Cristian’s house and hung out with his mom Toña, ate eggs and beans and then spent a cathartic evening in the hammock watching Titanic in Spanish with her three-year-old kid Elvis (PS, Hondurans are hells of obsessed with Titanic). Then Toña, the mother, asked me if the ocean really exists, and when I said yes, she asked, “But where?,” which ignited a conversation regarding the Earth’s spherical properties and how land-and-water works.

So, I went to Tegus this past week, Monday through Thursday. Monday I went to the doctor—after a couple days of splatter-foot (diarrhea) I thought maybe I should go poop in a cup for them, which I did, and it was discovered I have some kind of crazy intestinal bacteria infection thing. So now I have these little plastic vials (think teeny Squeeze-Its) filled with something, as well as antibiotic pills, which I take twice daily. My favorite part is drinking whatever it is that inside the vials and pretending I’m a giant enjoying a Squeeze-It. On Tuesday, I hopped on a bus and traveled to Santa Lucia, a cute little town right next to Valle de Angeles, where I used to live. We were having our Safety and Security meeting, for all the volunteers who live in the department of Francisco Morazan. It was super great, because the hotel was awesome, the food was delicious, the showers were HOT!!, and my friends were there. The next morning, I caught another bus to Santa Rita, to visit my old host family!! Just like old times, as I descended down the hill my two little sisters Melani and Madeline came screaming up the road, and dragged me home to a weeping-with-joy (literally) Suyapa and a beaming Javier, who can now toddle a few steps and is a poster child for Adorableness. We ate lunch, and then hiked up a nearby mountain to enjoy the view of the valley with all the neighborhood kids (including little Javier, who sat like a prince in his crappy stroller, which Suyapa and I took turns shoving up the mountain, stopping every two feet to remove a pinecone from the wheels). When we “summited,” we just relaxed on the soft pine-needley ground, chucked pinecones down the hill, and breathed in the sweet mountain air. It was so wonderful to be back in the cool, piney woods like that, especially with my first family…if Bob Ross had been there he would painted the hell out of us.

Oh heavens, it’s 10:15pm. It’s bedtime so hard right now.

Love,

Hayley

p.s. I love you guys.

Nedi! She makes me tamales and soup. Scarlett's "mom" /grandma.

Here is my best friend Scarlett.

here we are after a grueling baseball practice.

here are my kids hangin out on the soccer field.

Here i am telling them how to be white blood cells.

they straight up hate AIDS. hate it to HELL.

Here are all the townspeople of alubaren who are interested in HIV/AIDS prevention; aka my baseball team who i forced to participate.

7 December 2008

Hey, chochachos! Today is basically the best day ever. Why, you ask?? Because yesterday I opened the library with the woman who has the keys, as well as the gringa Johanna who lived here ten years ago and founded the dang thing, and who is here visiting, and now I have copies of “Anastasia,” “Ramona the Pest,” and “Tuck Everlasting,” all in Spanish. I loved those books as a kid and now I get to relive them in the mediocre way that only a Spanish translation can yield. Woo! The library had like seven inches of dust on the floor because the roof has a hole in it, but other than that it was looking pretty good. It has four big shelves filled with books, most of which were brought by Johanna on various visits (she is married to a Alubarén native and comes to visit every couple of years to check on the library, bring books, and visit her family). There ARE some kids books, which I didn’t realize—though not many. There are also many research-y books, and about 200 copies of some book called “Where do you turn when it hurts?” or something, about God and poverty. They’re all in English. I have no idea where they came from. There were four little tables and a handful of chairs, too. The current problem is that we have two women who want to be librarians, and only enough funds for one. It’s turned into a bit of a cat-fight, and I’m still struggling to understand why we can’t just vote and pick one. One of the issues is that the whole “Library Board” is made of three or four people, all of whom are family, so people complain that it’s turned into nepotism. (Apparently there used to be several members who were not related, but they’re since quit). However, as Johanna pointed out, this “family-ized” board has received money and books and none of it has been stolen or lost, so why rock the boat. We’ll see. I do want to open it up though, and start a weekly story time followed by a related art project with the kids. Hopefully we can do that before the New Year. In the meantime, I’m still hells of psyched to have Beverly Clearly and Lois Lowry en espanol for my own reading pleasure.

As many of you well-informed citizens might know, the 1st of December was World AIDS Day. I wasn’t actually aware of that until about a week beforehand, when Fondo Cristiano announced they were going to do something to celebrate. They then single-handedly changed World AIDS Day to the second of December, because the first was the day after Honduras’ internal elections and they informed me that the locals would be too tired from partying all night to come out to anything we might do. “We’ll do a march with the high school band, have health charlas, and of course lots of skits,” Franco informed me. We decided it would go down in the park like last time. Franco then proceeded to go sit in the little room where we have a computer and listen to music, while my two coworkers got to work on the giant mural, which is the centerpiece of any Honduran public campaign (created by taking a giant portable chalk board, covering it in big pieces of white paper, and cutting and pasting letters that state whatever it is we’re celebrating, which in this case read “Dia Mundial Contra VIH/SIDA”). I had this great mental vision of a park teeming with locals, eager to learn about the dangers of unprotected sex. I decided to make some “educational games,” where people could come up and pick a “Fact or Fiction” flap on a giant board and win a condom and lollipop with a correct response, or receive a little illustration of some behavior (people kissing, people sharing a glass of water, people boning) and win said condom/lollipop if correctly placed on the “Safe” or “Unsafe” side of the board. Then I planned out this skit with some local kids, which demonstrated how HIV works in the human body and how it turns in AIDS, eventually killing the infected person. My coworkers were in charge of planning the march and forming a skit for themselves. We also invited two neighboring villages to come participate. The big day came, windy as the dickens (why does this always happen?). I had placed a couple posters around the pueblo advertising what we were going to do, but by 9:00am the only people who had shown up were about 20 kids from my baseball team, who may (or may not) have been threatened by a certain gringa baseball coach that absence from the event would result in extra laps during practice (that might be a rumor, though, we Peace Corps volunteers believe in positive reinforcement and would never resort to threats in order to gain attendance at an event…). We also had to change location to the elementary school at the last minute, because over the weekend the alcaldia (local government) had decided it would be a good time to start tearing up the park to rebuild it. So now it’s like 9:30, and our numbers had swelled to the incredible amount of about 30. So I took a lap around the park with a megaphone, and forced/bribed my baseball kids to follow me, who seemed excited at first, waving their little white flags I’d made with the AIDS ribbon on them. I announced we were about to march against AIDS, and that everyone should come out and join us and win “free prizes,” and that did you know AIDS was transmitted through three fluids: blood, breast milk, and sexual fluids?? (Once I started yelling through the megaphone about “sex fluids” my baseball kids just looked mortified). We headed back to the school to begin the real march, but almost no one new came to join us. World AIDS Day had now become “Hayley’s Baseball Team Learns About AIDS Day.” (Oh yeah, the marching band part also fell through). So off we went, up the dirt road and around the park, with little 7-year-old Anner cheerfully thrusting flags and little red paper ribbons with safety pins onto any interested parties, baseball kids Cristian, Samer, Jairo, Hanci, and Toño carrying a banner, and everybody else walking dutifully behind, while I continued to holler about sex fluids in Spanish through the megaphone. Once we got back to the school, everyone crammed into the shade and we went through the schedule, enjoying several prayers, a health talk given by yours truly, and a couple of skits. Then we played the games and I handed out condoms to old ladies, eight-year-olds, and everyone in between. Awesome.

Baseball is going awesome. We practice every day from 3-5pm up at the “campo,” which is the town’s soccer “field.” (It’s actually a huge dirt lot scarred by potholes and small ravines and an ample covering of cow and horse manure). (The latter actually comes in handy—cow shit makes awesome bases, as I discovered.) We run a lap around the field, then form a circle in the middle and stretch our muscles, during which time jokes are told (throw-back to my drumline days, aww-blaht). Then we play catch for a while, then do some other type of drill or game, and usually I split them into two teams and we play a short game. It’s funny because most of them can’t really catch, and no one seems to know where to throw the ball when they do catch it, so there are always tons of home runs. (I realize as a coach it’s my job to tell them where to do throw it, but I’m learning too, so whatever. We got time.) Sometimes it’s a liiiiittle stressful, because the kids fight a lot (I’ve had to send like three kids home for the day already due to the cusses and kicking), but some high school kids have started to show up and help me, which is awesome. VIVA LAS PANTERAS. Again, though, if anyone has kid-sized baseball mitts lying around, send those puppies to me and I will take pictures of the kids playing with them with looks of pure joy on their faces.

So the other day one of my baseball kids Esau (who’s mother is my future landlord) asked me if I’d like to have dinner at his house after the 6th Grade Graduation that Friday evening. I said of course, unknowing that this was a subtle invitation for my to be his Madrina, which is basically like an adult selected to walk across the “stage” area with the graduating kid when he gets his diploma. There is also the requirement of a gift. Now, I didn’t know anything about that, so when I showed up at the graduation on Friday and his mom ushered me to a special chair at their table set aside for the Madrina, I had several small heart attacks (since I had no present for the kid). The present is actually sort of a big deal, in the sense that it’s expected and then lots of pictures of taken with the madrina and the kid, with the present thrust out in front. So we had all our photo opts gift-less, and I apologized profusely several times while his mother awkwardly told me not to worry about it (oh, but I did). Then all the kids sat in the middle of the concrete court while the adults sat around them at special tables, and we listened to “We Are The Champions” on repeat for about two hours while the kids got their diplomas and the principal yelled at the crowd for not applauding enough. Then I went to Esau’s house and ate rice mixed with chicken bits. I’m gonna buy a present for him this weekend.

Guess that’s about it for now. I went to the Evangelical church last night and enjoyed it more than the Catholic mass (much easier to hear and understand), but after the preacher started yelling about the evils of Cartoon Network (their slogan, “Hacemos lo que Queremos,” or “We do what we want”, doesn’t sit well with him), I was ready to leave. Either way, my neighbors and Johanna the gringa invited me and the entire congregation was so delighted they included us in their prayer.

Peace out dudes!

Love, Hayley

My little preschoolers trying to dance during the Day Against Child Abuse. Please note the obvious struggle against the wind.

Carlita getting her 11am sugar fix, while being snuggled by her sugar-enabler, Mami Sandra. Note the squinchy anger-eyes.

Little Javier, whom you might remember from my first host family, can now toddle a few steps at a time. Here he eagerly approaches the Baby Chute.

Baby Javier loves him some Baby Chute.

20 November 2008

Hey, chochachos! So, for the first time in my short Honduran history, I actually felt COLD this week. In Alubarén. Another cold front blew through, which they call a “norte,” again resulting in anyone under the age of 10 and over the age of 60 only daring to brave the elements if well-protected by any number of knit hats, sweaters, and long pants. During the day it was just warm and blustery, and at night it would cool down to where I would have to wear jeans and a sweatshirt, possibly the first time I’ve had to wear such an ensemble since my brief period in the piney mountains of Valle de Angeles. Too bad I forgot I was going to a tropical country when I packed—I literally have like four sweatshirts here, as well as several long-sleeved shirts…maybe I will sew them into drapes. Or cut them into strips and make a hammock. Speaking of hammocks, my neighbor’s sister, Chepa, bought a beautiful, huge handmade hammock because she “felt sorry” for the person selling it, and is now going to sell it to me (though I don’t feel sorry for anybody). It’s even got fringe!! I think you guys know how I feel about fringe. Or maybe you don’t. But I am FOR IT. In other news, this same lady (Chepa) is going to lend me a little wooden bed for my two years here, AND gave me several little cuttings so I can have plant-friends. And for those of you who lived with me in the Tit, I promise I won’t do what I did last year and let my little cuttings sit on the kitchen table and grow algae for like seven months before throwing them away on move-out day. I’m going to teach the plants English, and they shall be my friends.

So there is sort of a “Honduran Murphy’s Law” that I’ve come to accept, meaning that nothing here ever goes as planned and my own personal skills in dealing with disappointment and frustration have really had a chance to develop. So, still preparing for International Day Against Child Abuse on Wednesday, I showed up on Monday and asked how the drama practice had gone with the high school kids on Friday—I’d been unable to attend. Franco, the guy left in charge of this, who is also sort of my boss, just shrugged and smiled and said, “Yes, well, they didn’t show up.” I figured this might happen (see! I’m leaning!) so I had pestered the six students for their phone numbers ahead of time and left the list of names and numbers for Franco. I asked why he hadn’t called them when they failed to show, and he said “Yeah, no…we’re just not gonna do the drama.” So I stabbed him in the face. No actually, I called all the kids and asked why they hadn’t shown up, and each one said they had forgotten. So I told them we were gonna practice tomorrow, Tuessday, at 2:00pm, and could they come? They all promised they would, and in return I promised fresco (soda) and churros (chips). Tuesday at 2:00pm rolls around—no high schoolers. So I call them, and each one has an excuse…one was going to kill a pig, two had headaches, one didn’t answer, and the remaining two were busy but said they’d be right over. Only one came. So by now it’s like 3:00pm, and I’ve got myself one high schooler, and two neighborhood kids I’d hastily snagged in the interim, named Bella and Karen. We quickly wrote a skit, which involved an abusive mother, two little girls, and a caring teacher. After practicing a couple times, I dispatched the kids, agreeing to meet at the park the next morning at 9:00am for the beginning of the program.

Meanwhile, the preschool teacher Karen and I were hastily preparing the little guys to dance (aka waggle their arms to and fro above their heads) to a song about smiling and love, and I was mentally practicing a speech in Spanish I was gonna give at the beginning of the program. We headed over at about 9:30 (“Honduran time”—nothing here starts on time, because the collective agreement is that things will begin an hour or so later than what is officially stated), but (Murphy’s Law) the wind was blowing so strong that we could barely get our stuff set up. The giant board with all the illustrations done by the school kids kept falling over, and we had to tie the giant mural to a tree. We set up our sad little card table with chairs for the “invitees,” which included the school principal, a police officer, and several priests. We set up our PA system, which didn’t work, so we resorted to a megaphone. The preschoolers shrieked and ran around on the play ground, and the chickens and dogs wandered around, and that was about it. No one was there. All this time I had asked how they were getting the word out, and they assured me invitations had been sent out. By about 10:15, our invitees were finally there, and about 15 mothers and their children were sitting on benches in the back of the park. I ran over and begged (literally) for them to come sit in front. They grudgingly did so, and with all the extra school kids scampering around, released from school, it looked like about 40 people were there. If that. I only counted four men, three of whom were the lame smelly dudes who always hang out in the park, and probably would have left if the scene hadn’t looked suspiciously like one that might involve free snacks later (it didn’t). Either way, we had to get moving, so Franco grabbed the megaphone and thanked the “crowd” for coming out for our first annual campaign against child abuse. Then he introduced our invitees, and then said something like, “And now our very special Peace Corps volunteer, Hayley the gringita, will say a few words.” I talked for about five minutes, basically arguing that children have the same rights as adults to live without violence and fear, and that as grown-ups it’s our responsibility to protect them. I talked about how most youth in Honduras have experienced violence in the home, usually from the parents, and how detrimental this is to them psychologically. Then I finally got to say my favorite line, which is “If we plant violence, we will harvest violence.” All in all it was a good speech, and when I was done Franco took the megaphone and said, “Such strong words from our gringita.” Thanks, Franco. Then one of the priests stood up to pray, at which point I snuck behind the tree to call my high school thespian, who was missing. After calling three times, she finally answered. I asked where she was, and was fed the typical Honduran “here comes an excuse” line, “Fijise que....” She said her head hurt too much to come. I argued with her, said it was her responsibility, and that without her we couldn’t do the drama, and she said maybe she could come. I pushed her—yes or no? And she finally said no, she wouldn’t be coming. I was pretty pissed, and went over to tell Bella and Karen we couldn’t do the skit. Alison, another school girl sitting nearby, overheard and marched over to me. “I can be an angry mom!” So the show went on, and it was damn cute. No thanks to stupid high school flakey kids. Then the preschoolers danced around, and it was adorable, and then the police offered talked about god knows what for almost 45 minutes (we lost about half our crowd at this point). All the while, the furious wind is still howling, blowing dust and garbage in everyone’s faces and making it impossible to hear. So my first attempt at a public event was mildly disastrous, but at least it wasn’t humiliating (I wore pants, so there was no skirt-blowing-up-everyone-seeing-gringa-undies situation). And I learned a lot (such as: youth cannot be trusted, invitations don’t work, give police officers strict time limits, wind is lame).

I played with Saul on Monday, and found out their going to bring Norlin back!! I guess I’ll have to wait and see if that’s actually true, but it’s the word on the street and I’m so excited. I also got a package from my parents and some letters. Yay! Tuesday, however, was a sad day for me…one of my best friends here, a really bright, outgoing, involved, and hilarious 16-year-old girl named Maria (fake name…just in case), got into some trouble, and her mom sent her to live with a cousin in San Pedro Sula. She and her boyfriend of four years decided to run away together, and snuck off to his house, which is across the river, in the middle of the night. She was gone several days and her mom didn’t know where she was for half the time. Maria and her boyfriend (who is 18) decided they wanted to be married, and slept together, which was her first time. When she returned home to a frantic mom, the whole thing had spun out of control into the scandal of the year. Her mom took her cell phone away, and is threatening to have the guy arrested—he’s got a really bad rep around town and is known for smoking and drinking. Worse still, Maria was acting under the information that you can’t get pregnant the first time, so she was totally unprotected—and is now sitting alone in some cousin’s house, on the other side of the country, with no phone, no friends, worrying about a potential pregnancy and feeling like shit. She called me the night before she left, and told me to meet her at her aunt’s house. I went over and her mom led me into the backyard. She grabbed me by the shoulders, sobbing, and begged me to “talk some sense” into her kid. She looked straight into Maria’s eyes, still crying, and said that she was a foolish girl who made the worst mistake of her life, and that she would never forgive herself for this, and that she should have followed God and had now just wasted so many years of schooling and money and was good for nothing. She said she had shamed the entire family and didn’t know what else to tell her, and left. So we sat down on the stoop, wrapped in sweatshirts, and I just listened to her silence for a long time. She asked me if it was true you could get pregnant the first time. I said yes. We talked for almost three hours, until nearly midnight…this whole thing is especially tragic because Maria is known around town as one of the most promising kids we’ve got—she’s so smart, comes from a great family, is really involved in the community and is just this loving spark of light. I think that is what makes part of this so hard…EVERYONE knows what happened, and the gossip in this place makes it unbearable. People talk about her like this angel, fallen from grace. She feels like she’s ruined her life. Furthermore, she loves this guy, and her family shuns him and is forcing her to dump him and move to the north coast. She kept saying she wishes she could wake up tomorrow and have this all be a bad dream. I’m worried because I feel like she’s going to get very depressed, all alone with her shame and self-deprecating worry. I tried not to give her too much advice, but I told her to think about what it would be like to marry this guy now, to close all the doors she’s got open in front of her, and I think she realized that it’s not too late to call the thing off and move on. She plans to come back to Alubarén in a couple months, and I got the phone number of her cousin so I can call her when she’s up there. I feel so terrible, though…it’s been a long time since I’ve sat with a friend on the worst day of her entire life. Like Maria, I wish it was all just a dream.

It’s almost Thanksgiving. I miss you, Mimi! When I come back we will eat cheese-stuffed olives with those little wooden sticks and drink Gnarly Head and eat turkey and it will be awesome.

Love,

Hayley

26 November 2008

Hey, chochachos! Dang but if it isn’t Thanksgiving eve once again. Tomorrow I plan on celebrating by finding a quiet place to shed my tears without alarming the locals, followed by a meager dinner of fried Spam (a huge thing here, unfortunately) and alarmingly sweet coffee. Then, dressed as a pilgrim, I shall go to the nearest water front (dirty river) and reenact the landing at Plymouth Rock. Then more Spam, which of course shall include more tears.

PSYYYYCCCHHHH!!! Man I totally had you guys. Suckers. Actually, I’m going to celebrate with some fellow gringos in the south, in San Marcos de Colon. I imagine no Spam will be involved, so it should be a pretty joyous occasion. Though it will be my first Thanksgiving away from family, and my first one in four years not spent with Mimi, which makes me very nostalgic. I wish Scientists would hurry the hell up with that teleportation technology; it would come in fairly handy in these have-your-pumpkin-pie-and-eat-it-too situations.

This Monday was Opening Day here in Alubarén…after weeks of collecting (far too many) children, assessing my gear (far too few gloves), monitoring the rain (not no more), and basically just getting the balls to get off my lazy butt and start, Las Panteras Rural Youth Baseball Team de Alubarén are now ready for action. And if by action you mean bickering for two hours under the hot sun, then yes. I started several weeks ago, with a formal meeting at the elementary school for all interested kids, between the ages of 9-13. Over 20 kids showed up at the meeting, and followed what could potentially be described as “aggressive” recruiting, I accidentally signed up like 40 freaking kids. Someone should have told me baseball teams only have like 9 kids on the field at a time...but it’s too late now. All I can do now is pray someone shanks someone else with a piece of broken glass so I can kick him off the team. Anyway, with my list in hand, one of my baseball kids Cristian and I walked to every single house last weekend (36, to be exact). I would knock and we’d be invited in, sat down, and more often than not given some coffee (I was a shaky, sweaty mess by the last house). I talked to the folks, explained who I was and why I’m not John, the gringo who started the team (usually followed by a series of questions such as, “Yes, but when is John coming back?”). Then I’d give my “we’re starting this Monday, come to the campo, wear tennis if you have them, please bring water, come at 3:00pm sharp, no, not 3:15, but 3:00” speech, and we’d be on our way to the next house and next cup of coffee. On Monday I stepped out of my house at 2:45 to find about eight kids waiting expectantly, most of whom did in fact have water with them. Miracles, people. We trooped over to the field, with little 7-year-old Anner clinging to my hand and rubbing his face up and down my furry arm, as he likes to do (he’s too young for the team, but his big brother Eliezer is playing and I just couldn’t say no to the kid). The campo is Alubarén’s soccer field, and by soccer field I mean huge, pot-holed dirt patch covered with a nice layer of dried cow poop. Horse poop, too. But it’s nice because I can use chunks of dried manure as bases, which is about as eco-friendly as you can get. These “Rural Youth Baseball” teams are a Peace Corps Honduras initiative, so they give us equipment that is donated from folks in the states. We hauled the bags of gear to one corner of Cow Poop Field and I let the kids go through the bags and explore the gear…11 rubber balls, 20-something leather balls, 14 gloves, three bats, five helmets, and some catchers gear. This would be almost plenty for a normal sized team, but 14 gloves don’t go very far with 36 ball-players, so after warming up (one lap running around the field following by stretching) I had to split them into little groups of three to play catch, sharing the one mitt among them (if this description is jerking any heart strings, feel free to find any old, small, little-kid gloves in your garage and send ‘em to us!). We practice every day, from 3-5pm, and while the sun is boil-y and the ground is poop-y, it’s a lot of fun. The boys fight a lot (usually over gloves), and the four girls are won’t stop sassing each other, but they’re a good group of kids. And little Anner spends most of his time drinking water and playing in the dirt.

In other exciting news, I received my bike today from the Peace Corps office! It’s a sweet green mountain bike! HOW DID THEY KNOW I LOVE GREEN. IT IS A THANKSGIVING MIRACLE. I still haven’t picked a name for him yet, but I’m thinking of wheeling him into my room together to snuggle in bed with me. We’re going to be excellent friends, I think.

Everyone in Fondo Cristiano is scrambling to prepare for Dia Mundial de VIH/SIDA, or World AIDS Day, which is December 1. However, since our internal elections are on the 30th, we’ve moved World AIDS Day to December 2…don’t tell anyone. We’re going to do the same type of thing, with little skits, some speakers, a health talk (given by me, since our nurses and doctor will be out of town), and other stuff, including a march around the town with a little marching band. Should be interested…I’ll let you guys know if more than chickens and dogs show up this time.

Finally, in very sad news, of one my favorite fellow Peace Corps volunteers and close friend was recently Administratively Separated, which is PC Office lingo for kicked out. He went to the Honduras-Mexico fútbol game in San Pedro Sula, which is against the rules (we’re not supposed to leave our sites for the first three months unless necessary). One of the PC staff saw him on TV, and that was that. I feel terrible because he loved his community and his work, and was so gung-ho about being a volunteer…not to mention we’re only one month away from being able to see games without punishment. I don’t have much else to say except it really sucks and I wish this wasn’t happening to him. I’ll miss you, buddy.

Paz,

Hayley

two of my best buddies here, Lisbeth and Jennifer. We do a lot of monkey-bar action together. Lisbeth is my neighbor, the daugher of Elia, so she and I hang out almost every day.

a very typical birthday scene, from one of the thousands of birthday parties ive been too since ive arrived (im not sure if its because im liked or because they think i will bring bars of gold as birthday presents). Poor strawberry shortcake, as you can see, no longer has any legs.

like all piñata breakings, the kids dive in, elbowing and shoving to get the crappy candy...often with the blindfolded kid still swinging away. to date, ive yet to see tears or blood, which is rather miraculous.

posing dramatically on the ¨hammock bridge" over the river. note that i am modeling my sexy 5th-grade-teacher blouse.

little saul, looking innocent. dont let him fool you.

VIVA OBAMA! please note the sexy teacher blouse.

Here is little Carlita, my sister, gamely trying on all my baseball equipment at once.

13 November 2008

Hey, chochachos! So recently my dad asked me for the definition of chochacho, and I realized there are many of you out there who, fluent Spanish speakers or not, may not know what chochacho means. It is a word that derives from the ancient King Chochacho, more commonly known as “the Incan Fun God.” He didn’t do a whole bunch of typical god stuff, he just liked to hang around with his buddies and fool around. For a more thorough history, please peruse www.achewood.com.

So this week was both crazy and lame in many respects. Crazy in that I actually had real work to do, lame in that that meant less time for playing on the monkey bars in the park, swimming in the river, climbing trees, and hours of sitting in hammocks or plastic chairs and chewing the breeze (mmmnaum-naum-naum-naum). Next week, on the 19th, is the International Day of the Prevention of Child Abuse, and if it’s one thing child-themed NGO’s do well in Honduras, it’s celebrate international days of stuff. Serious, from the banners to the youth-involved skits to the kindergarteners holding signs that say “we have rights,” they’ve got this stuff down to an ART. So, with my counterpart Fondo Cristiano, I’ve been busy as the dickens all well getting ready. I recruited high school kids to be in the play, grade school kids to draw pictures of child abuse (nothing moves your heart more than child art about serious subjects), and the preschool kids to hold signs. Two other girls who work with Fondo designed the giant banner, and I’ve been helping cut out and glue down letters and stuff. Doing stuff like this made me realize how much easier it is to do artsy projects in the states…we had to hand-draw every letter to make stencils, then cut each one out, we had to tape pieces of paper to the giant board to make the white background…since we don’t have printers or anything, EVERYTHING is done by hand. It’s just the olden times, when kids in pioneer schools in the 1800s were cutting out letters to spell “Dia Internacional de Prevencion y Lucha Contra la Violencia en la Ninez y la Juventud” and glue them next to pictures of crying children.

As such, not a whole else is new. I went to paint with Saul on Monday, like I always do, but they weren’t there—apparently they were off visiting Norlin in Tegus. I was bummed, but I used the extra time to hang out with my buddy Dona Marta and eat oranges, so it was all good. I like the oranges here, but I am just biding my time until MANGO SEASON begins…not until April, I’ve heard, but everywhere you look here there is a mango tree, just waiting to fill my mouth with the delicious. So I am 7 kinds of excited.

Recently, I foolishly bought a ridiculously expensive mattress (for when I live on my own), and I was once again reminded that I am a dumbass with money and should not be trusted. But the mattress is big and pretty, so whatever. Plus it’s made of foam, so if it floods here, I am totally safe (foam floats, yes?). Today I walked to Reitoca, the next municipality over. Even though the sun was hells of boiling, the walk was really nice…under my umbrella, walking along the dusty, pebbly road, sandwiched between green mountains and purple flowers dulled with dust and heat…chickens all hidin’ in the bushes, iguana-like lizards called garrobos warming themselves on rocks, cows flickin’ their ears at me as they munch on said dusty flowers, orange-bellied birdies doin’ this whistley thing that makes me think of the Jungles episode of Planet Earth…it’s all very beautiful. Though I can’t believe how dry and brown it’s getting…it no longer feels very jungley here. Just freakin’ hot. But everyone calls out to me as I walk down the road, and more often than not, when I pass someone, he or she will stop, grasp me hand, and wish me a very happy day. I just love the LOVE in this country. And the generosity to strangers. On the way back, some little kid came running out of his house. “My mom says come here!” he shouted at me. I turned around and let myself in their little gate, to find two elderly folks sitting on the porch. The old woman says, “So, you like squash right??” and even though I’d just eaten like 500 fried chickens I said yes, and they sat me down on the chair next to them. Soon I was handed about a plate with a chunk of squash the size of my face, dark green pulp sprinkled with sugar. A glass of frosty coke was placed at my side, and the little boys giggled at me and sat in the hammock near by. Their grandparents were named Dora and Gregorio, and we chatted for almost three hours…including typical topics such as: Are all gringos blonde like you? Why don’t you have babies yet? Are there poor people in the states? Obama is an Indian, right? Do you guys have mountains in the states? Are there deer? Do you have chickens? What are houses like over there? Are there rivers? The boys played marbles and pogs, and two of them promised to be on my baseball team. Once the sun was lower in the sky, I excused myself and they made me promise to come back. Stuff like this—strangers inviting a random person walking down the road to come eat some squash—would never happen in the states, and it’s one of the reasons I love life here so much. I don’t even really like squash, to tell you the truth.

Oh heavens, it’s 10:00pm. Way past my bedtime. Before I go, a quick summary of the crazy dreams I had last night (yes, all of these were last night):

I was riding bikes with my buddies Harrison and Max in my neighborhood in California, and Barack and Michelle Obama walked by. I stammered, “I love you!” and then spent about half an hour strolling with Michelle while she confided in me that she wishes she wasn’t in the spotlight so much and just wants some alone time to relax. I told her I understood.

I was at the movie theatre, and when I went out it was the ocean everywhere. I body-surfed home and it was freaking awesome.

I went to hang out with Caitlin Grogan and John Pappas, two college friends, and when I got to their apartment they were both wearing their bathing suits. “It’s bathing suit time!” they informed me. Which was convenient, cause I just SO HAPPENED TO HAVE MINE ON TOO!!!

Paz,

Hayley

8 November 2008

Hey, chochachos! This past week has been like 10,000 Christmases…a jillion birthdays…10 katrillion December 19ths…it’s like my faith in the intelligence of my country has been restored. It’s like I was hoping wildly my parents would get me that intelligent, good-hearted pony for Christmas, knowing that they probably wouldn’t because I’d always asked for a pony before and been disappointed…and then, lo and behold, I wake up on Christmas morning and there is just the sassiest of ponies waitin’ in the living room, all prancing around and pointedly not crapping on the carpet. Thanks, guys. I got up early on Tuesday and headed over to the Fondo Cristiano office, where I promptly made a huge “VIVA OBAMA” sign in red, white, and blue. I went home and tied it to the door of our porch. The folks back home I had recently talked to seemed optimistic our man would win, but I’m just not as inundated with polls and blogs and interviews as you guys and I didn’t really have a good idea of what was gonna happen. Parked in front of CNN en espanol all day, I watched the crowd in Grant Park and wished like the dang old dickens I was still there, celebrating with all my friends, but I could feel the awesomeness just by watching it (Samir, I totally freaking saw you! They zoomed in on you. You were chewing gum. What flavor was it?). Besides, I was havin’ a pretty crazy party on my own…I sat up in one of the comedors (shacks that sell food) and ate three baleadas (hey, it was a special night) and drank some tamarindo juice (I’m not sure if they’re fruit or what, but they look like rubbery peanuts and people here boil them and make them into delicious juice that sort of tastes like apples). However, the folks eating there were more interested in watching soap operas than history unfold, so I went home and sat alone in the living room, watching the magic of democracy in the hands of the wise while sucking down more tamarindo juice from a bag, tallying up each state and beaming until my facebones hurt and my eyeballs sweated. All this week people have been coming up to me and sayin “VIVA OBAMA!” and patting me on the back enthusiastically. Anyway, all I can say is we freaking did it and THANK YOU. Thank you for voting…thank you to everyone who worked on Obama’s campaign…twerpy idealists or not, this collective decision is the best one we’ve made in a long time and I am so proud of our country I could barf. Yay America!

Everything else is awesome right now, too. My program director came and visited on Tuesday, and we had a meeting with my counterparts. She also brought me a butt-load of baseball gear, so I’ve started throwing the ball around (is that a phrase applicable to baseball or football or both?!?) with the little guys who live near me, namely Eliezer, Anner, Erlin, Eric, Elder, and Ander. My old-lady neighbor Gila also joined in a bit, which was hilarious…she marches out there in her matching blouse-and-skirt outfit that all elderly women here seem to own, and asks me for a glove! She’s got a pretty good arm on her, too. The only problem is that now all this kids know I have baseball gear, so they literally never leave my house. When I wake up in the morning, there they are, waiting outside the porch gate. When I cook dinner, they press their faces against the kitchen window and watch. When I leave the house, they pour out of bushes and drop from trees, inquiring if now would be an okay time to play, even though it’s 8:00am and they’re supposed to be in school. It’s kind of hilarious, actually. But I had a meeting at school this past week and got all the kids signed up, and we’re going to start having official practices once they’re let out for the “summer,” which should be in a week or two.

My program director informed me it’s time to stop drinking coffee on people’s porches all day and be “pro-active,” so I guess vacation time is over. I met with the doctor at the health center, and he’s really awesome. They’ve always reserved the first and last Friday of the month for the pregnant women of Alubarén and the surrounding aldeas, but it’s just for a medical check up and sometimes a health talk. So I told him I wanted to make it more like a club, and he said go for it. I made a big poster that says “Embarazada?” (pregnant) and then under it a logo I designed, with three hella pregnant ladies all hugging and looking happy with “Club de Mujeres Embarazadas” written around it. We had our first meeting this Friday, and despite only 5 of them showed up, it went pretty well. We had a dinamica (basically an ice-breaker game), snacks, and talked about our interests, our pregnancies (I stuffed a soccer ball under my shirt to fit in), and anything else. Then I gave a health talk on nutrition during pregnancy, which involved them pinning pictures of carrots and tomatoes and beans to a giant sheet of paper, among other things. It’s sad because four of them were under 20, and one was only 15. Teenage pregnancy is a huge problem here, and next school year (which starts in February) I’m going to do a lot of work with the kids to try to prevent this. Maybe iron underwear, with padlocks and stuff?

I visited a preschool in a village near here called Jicaro on Wednesday. I went with my neighbor Angie, who has been the preschool teacher there for four years…even though she’s only FOURTEEN. She walks there for 45 minutes every day, teaches for two hours, then turns around and comes back in time for afternoon high school (there are two shifts). She looks and acts like she’s 18—I thought she was kidding and refused to believe she was 14 until a friend corroborated it. The kindergarten was pretty sad…one little room that smelled like mouse piss, with four wobbly benches that looked like the preschoolers themselves might have made them, a crummy chalkboard, and a table with a cardboard box that held some crayons, scissors, and a bottle of glue. This preschool is a state-funded one, unlike the others I’ll be working with, which are funded by the NGO Christian Children’s Fund. Today, the kids were each given two sheets of paper, a blue and a black crayon, and scissors. Sitting on the floor and using the benches as desks, they all colored the fish tank on the first page blue, then colored all the fish on the next page black. Then cut the fish out and glued them into the tank. I flipped through the curriculum book that Angie has, and it’s pretty extensive—full lesson plans for each day of the school year, all of which are accompanied by a CD, with songs and stories for the kids! I asked Angie about it, but she said she keeps the battery-powered CD player at home so it doesn’t get stolen, and doesn’t have all the CDs. As usual, basic infrastructure in place but no one using it. She started the day by asking all the kids about different tastes (salty vs. sweet, etc), which I noticed was part of the first unit—they should be in the last one, since it’s almost the end of the year. Then she did the fish thing, which was from the third unit or something…but the fish activity was supposed to be prefaced by a whole day focused on counting to 10 (that’s how many fish there were) and caring for animals. She didn’t mention either of those aspects once. I asked her later about it—about why she wasn’t following the state-supplied curriculum the way it was meant to be used—and she just looked embarrassed and said I know, I know. The good thing is I can include her in the workshops I’ll be giving the preschool teachers, but the bad thing is I won’t be starting those until next January or February.

Peace Corps informed me I may not live next to a river (there go all my Chris Farley jokes I was going to make, damn it), but it’s okay, I ain’t buggin. I took some kids for a walk today and was chatting with a dude Nelo who owns a pulperia, and he randomly informed me the cute house across the street was empty. I went down the road to the owner’s house, and she said I can have it if I want it. It’s got a big backyard with all kinds of trees, and plants…even roses! The house is small but nice, and very secure—bars on the windows and everything. It’s got a latrine out back, as well as a shower (well, a tube coming out of the wall, but it’s still a shower!) and a pila. It’s got neighbors next door, and I saw a snake slithering around in the backyard! I plan on capturing it later and making it my guard-snake, Scumbag. The only downside is, aside from a hammock which she said I can use, the house doesn’t have any furniture, so I’ll have to fork over the dough to buy a bed and stuff. Balls. Maybe I can train Scumbag to also be a thief and go steal me a mattress from somewhere…

So I got a bunch of mail the other day! Proof the mail system actually works up here, which I admittedly doubted before—hats off to Wilma and her babies-as-carrots calendar. I received a box from my folks, filled with sexy 5th-grade-teacher-esque collared, sleeveless blouses and enough deodorant to last my sweaty self about two years. I also got a bunch of letters and another box from Kayleigh, filled with love and rainbows and metaphorical pinecones…thanks dudes. For serious. For any interested parties, my address here is:

Hayley Kercher

Alubarén, F.M.

11310

Honduras

I know I keep mentioning that…but I’m just saving you guys energy from excessive scrolling. SO THOUGHTFUL. SO KIND. SO DESERVING OF LETTERS.

Guess that’s it…though I want to mention that one of, if not the, best things about Honduras is that at any given moment I am almost guaranteed to hear either “El Choffer” by Mexican ranchera artist Vicente Fernandez, “My Heart Will Go Own,” by Canadian non-ranchera artist Celine Dion, or…are you ready, Northwestern Marching Band kids?....TARZAN BOY. Yes, it seems that Baltimora is enjoying a healthy popularity wave on certain radio stations down here. Nothing makes me day than walking down a dirt road in the middle of a random mountain in Honduras, passing a house with a radio blaring and suddenly having vivid mental images of Gabe, Harrison, Josh, Tom, and/or Tim shaking their butts while I beat my bass drum. Words can’t describe.

In other news, I totally fell and skinned my knee like a child the other day while playing “bate,” this local game kids play that’s like a combo of kick-ball and baseball. The good thing was I was able to use the surgical scrum in my PC medical kit, which was just as exciting as it sounds.

Paz,

Hayley

p.s. VIVA OBAMA!

28 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! Man what the hell that’s the 6th ant I’ve smashed on my leg in the past 10 minutes. Is my bed filled with ants?! At least they’re not the black bitey ants…but they’re the teeny-weeny beige ones, you can barely see ‘em, which is why I call them Mystery Ants. You can feel them crawling on you, but you can’t see them….they’re like the secret agents of the ant world.

Today was real chill. I got up and went to the preschool, but it was mysteriously closed (Mystery Ants, perchance?!?!) so I just wandered up the road and waited for a baby to run out and be my friend, which happened almost immediately. Little six-year-old Jessica yelled “HEELY!” and grabbed me the by the hand, dragging me to her house. Her mom invited me to sit in the hammock and, since it’s orange season right now, began peeling me an orange. I swung and chatted with them for about an hour, while Jessica sat on the ground and ran her hand up and down my legs repeatedly (my blonde furriness is a captivating situation for all). Eventually I left and wandered up the road toward the “post office,” stopping to play a little fútbol with the cipotes (that’s what they call kids here). Turned out the post office was ALSO mysteriously closed (what the hell, ants?), so I went into a nearby pulperia to make friends with the owners. I bought a cucumber, and the woman, whose name I unfortunately forget, sat down and chatted with me for a while (I also received another peeled orange, which I ate). Then I heard “Heeeeely…heeeeeely…” and turned around to see two of my little friends peeking around the doorway—little Katy and Noelia, two preschoolers who know how to party. Katy sits down next to me and goes, “So, you want to come to my house right now, right?” I couldn’t help but laugh out loud…and then she goes like, “You can even cuddle my baby brooooother!”, completely trying to entice me as much as possible. So I said goodbye to my new pulperia friend and followed the two cousins to their house, where their mom Rosi was lying in the hammock, breast-feeding little Edward. I like their house because it’s got a dirt floor and is always filled with baby chickens…it’s kind of like being on a farm, but in the comfort of your living room! We played soccer (with three wadded-up Huggies packages tied together with string), and then played the timeless classic “Lobo,” which is where I stomp around and growl like a wolf and the kids shriek and run away…eventually I catch them and pretend to eat their guts. Then Katy said, “So, you want to eat some lunch, right?” and I turned around to find her mom fixing me a plate of cuajada, which is delicious cow-cheese that sort of tastes like goat-cheese, beans, and tortillas. After lunch, we went next door and played with the kids over there and I chatted with their grandma, who cares for them. I met a 14-year-old named Mirian who can’t read or write, nor identify any numbers. She told me she graduated from third grade but then stopped going. I asked why, and her grandma butted in and said it was because she “couldn’t form the words very well with her tongue.” Mirian speaks just fine, so I found this really confusing. I pressed her about it and never really got a straight answer. We did some basic “if I have two apples and then add one more, how many apples do I have in total?”, which she could do…but if I wrote “2 + 1 = “ on her sheet, all I got was a blank stare, which I realized was because she doesn’t know any of her numbers! So I made some number flash cards, 1-10, and we worked on learning 1-3.

After I left, some more neighbors waved me in, so I dropped in to say hello. It was hilarious because in the two hours that I was there, the little old lady would walk into the room, present me with a plate of food, then walk back out…only to return in 20 minutes with MORE food. I didn’t want to be rude, so I ate it all, but I was so freaking stuffed I thought I was gonna explode. I ate a huge chunk of dark green squash, an ear of corn, a chicken tamale, and a cup of coffee with cookies. She also gave me three bananas and a peeled orange to take with me.

So yes, this week is off to a good start. I went to visit Norlin and Saul yesterday, but Norlin had gone to Tegucigalpa with his grandma to visit his father, who lives there with his twin sister (until yesterday, I didn’t realize that Norlin had a twin, nor that the man who Lourdes lives with isn’t his real dad). The twin does not have Down’s. Apparently this “Hayley wants to send Norlin to school” thing is more complicated than I thought…Lourdes seems to be giving me evasive answers. When at first she told me he’d never been to school, when I excited reported that the preschool teacher would take him she informed me that he’d already done preschool. What about kindergarten, I asked? She told me he’s done that too—at which point her husband, Hernan, interrupted and said he hadn’t. They argued about it for a while, and it became clear neither was sure about what school Norlin has had and when, which I find incredibly confusing—how could they not know? I feel like someone is lying to me. Lourdes doesn’t seem like she wants to send Norlin to school. Maybe this is one of those gringa-butting-in-where-she-doesn’t-belong things…maybe I’m missing something here, culturally or otherwise, regarding Norlin’s education and his mother’s attitude. I don’t know. Anyway, he wasn’t there, so Saul and I painted just the two of us, which was nice. We worked on his colors, and while he doesn’t know any of them, he can do the matching game much faster and with much more ease than his brother. He learned green, brown, and blue, though, which was great. He’ll start preschool in February though, so I’m not so worried about him.

Not much else is new, except I’ve been going swimming in the river every afternoon at about 4:00pm with my posse of little boys, and then playing in the park with my posse of little girls until dinnertime. Life is good.

Only a week to go until the best day of my life!!! The excitement is starting to build here; I get asked daily who I’m voting for, and people here are aware something big is coming. I can’t decide if I’m going to try to stay in Alubarén and try to find a TV with CNN on it, or if I’ll head over to Reitoca where I know David gets the channel. Either way, I’m so excited I can’t sleep and sometimes I just feel like crying. If we win, the pride in my heart is gonna explode all over the place and drown everyone in happiness. QUE GANE OBAMA!!!!

Love,

Hayley

31 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! Happy dang old Halloween. This time last year, I was running around the Tit dressed up as a Tree Fort, droppin’ bags of water off the balcony and enjoying a cold one. This year, I’m in bed by 10:30pm and celebrating by eating raisins that taste suspiciously like soap. No bags of water have been thrown, though I did buy a bag of water today while I received the Virgin de Suyapa, which is Honduras’ patron saint. Either way, I hope you guys are having an excellent time without me.

So for the past week everyone’s been like, “Heely, are you going to come with us to receive the Virgin on Friday?” I never really got a straight answer about what that would entail, except a lot of walking and Catholicism (whenever I get asked which church I go to, I just say I like ALL the churches and couldn’t possibly chose a favorite). But my neighbors invited me, so I went. I knew the Virgin de Suyapa was a statue-thing that stays in a special church in Tegus, but apparently it gets trotted out to visit the pueblos on occasion. So about 100 of us hiked out for about 30 minutes on the main road, and waited for a truck to appear with the virgin. They unloaded not a giant replica of the virgin Mary, which is admittedly what I was expecting, but a golden cage the size of a TV with a little figure inside it. Two women in pink skirts and halter tops solemnly carried the cage between them, and led us all back to town. About 12 high school band students played “The Saints Come Marching In” repeatedly, a song I’ve never enjoyed quite so literally before. We marched, saint in hand, all the way to the Catholic church, which is right next to our central park, and I sat down with my neighbor Elia for mass for a grand total of four minutes before we left. All in all, a delightful experience. All day now they’re been shooting off guns next to the church , and a little old man has been perched in the belfry for about 12 hours, ringing the bells. I hope someone brought him a sandwich.

This week has been good, except for some unexpected sadness. If you recall, when I went to visit Norlin and Saul on Monday, his mother Lourdes told me Norlin was gone “visiting his father.” What she didn’t tell me was that the dad actually has legal custody of Norlin and his twin (who knew Hondurans had custody battles?), and had only “lent” Norlin to her for 60 days. Now he’s taken Norlin back, and when I asked when Norlin was coming home, she said she has no idea, that she has to talk to the social services and see about getting custody. So Norlin is gone. I almost cried when she told me, and it kills me because the kid is gonna have to spend all his time cooped up in the house with his sick grandmother and no one to play with—the dad goes to work and his sister goes to school all day. And I can’t work with him anymore, either. Now I think I understand why Lourdes was being so evasive about his starting school next year…he won’t even be here next school year. I suppose he will certainly come back to visit, but I feel very sad that I won’t get to see him whenever I want. And little Saul is suffering for the lack of his play-mate, too…I went to visit him on Wednesday, and he was just glued to my side, desperate for attention. When I tried to leave to go to the Fondo Cristiano office, he freaked out and was sobbing so hard I just decided to stay for as long as he wanted. He actually tried to padlock me in the house, but fortunately the thing was rusted shut.

I did a little recycling art project with the preschoolers this week. They’re currently “studying” modes of transportation, so I told the teacher I’d bring in materials for a fun art project. I went out wandering around and decided to use garbage (recycling!!), so I started collecting 2-liter bottles of coke, which wasn’t hard. One lady saw me and called me into her home because she had like 500,000 of them piled up in the back. Turns out she’s Nedi’s sister! (Nedi is my awesome neighbor, the grandma of Scarlett.) We chatted for about an hour and she gave me a delicious homemade chocolate popsicle. She also informed me the house next to hers is empty, because her sister and the kids went to live in Tegus. She showed me the house and very enthusiastically tried to rent it to me, but it’s still filled with all their stuff, from multiple beds to dishes to clothes to framed kindergarten diplomas on the walls. Why they left all their belongings is beyond me, but they certainly don’t seem ready to rent it the place out for two years. Anyway. Bottles in hand, I collected a bunch of the little plastic tops from the road, and headed home with a handful of local kids in tow. Using a hammer and nail, we punched holes in all the tops. Using a machete, I cut all the bottles in half length wise, and we folded a little piece of plastic up. Ta-daaaa, coke bottle cars, complete with windshield! I brought all the stuff in today, and the kids tied the wheels to the cars (we’d punched holes in the sides of the bottles for this, too) and then painted them. Hells of successful. Well, only two kids showed up for preschool today, but still. It was adorable.

That’s about it…a “cold front” has blown though for the past couple days, bringing temperatures down to an icy 75-80 degrees. All the kids are running around with knit hats and sweaters on, which is hilarious because I’m still sweating in my tee-shirt. My little host-cousins wanted to go out and play in the park and their mom wouldn’t let them, lest they get sick from the frigid temperatures. The rainy season seems to have abruptly stopped, too…the other day it didn’t rain, and I commented on this, and they were like “well, yes, now it’s summer.” Honduras, you are a wacky dame…but I did wear long pants tonight and that was pretty spectacular.

I was hanging out at the little stand where Doña Dorita sells food tonight, watching ESPN2, and saw that they’re going to play the Northwestern vs. Minnesota (hisss) game tomorrow at 11am!! She said she’d play it just for me, so I’m totally showing up tomorrow morning with all my purple on. GO CATS BEAT THE GOPHERS!

Just five more days till the most awesome day ever. I’m just sayin’.

Paz,

Hayley

here i am in the jungle with a local farmer...we cleared out some banana trees to make a fish hatchery.

Here is my "boyfriend," a sassy little four-year-old Alejandro who lives next door. He likes to swing on the vines on his tree.

here i am in a jungle tree!!!!!

Here is my buddy Scarlett, lounging dramatically on the floor on her house. Also pictured: Boris the cat.

Here is m fiendish little sister, Carlita, eating some fresh coconut.

Here I am washin´my clothes at the pila in my backyard in alubaren. one of the neighbor kids took it, rather artfully i think, through the barbed wire fence. oooooooh.

Here is little Norlin and his kid brother, Saul. Saul is making his Angry Eyes.

20 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! Guess what! It’s raining! OH HEAVENS WHAT A SURPRISE. Not a lot is new here in Alubarén, or as I like to call it, the Lubes…but only in mental jokes to myself, because no one here would think that was funny…actually, you guys probably don’t think it’s funny either. I’m sorry for my bad jokes. Man, my legs are itchy…must be my new leg-beards growin’ in after I shaved em all off for the swearing-in ceremony…yesssss, comin’ in nice and thick. So sparkly and luxurious. And stabby.

So, I finally went swimming in the big river that runs through the Lubes yesterday (Sunday)…my neighbor-friend Lourdes invited me, with her two girls Lisbeth and Kayli and a ton of niños. Because of the rains we’ve been getting the water was really high and running really fast, so we spent like three hours scrambling on rocks up the length of the river and then throwing ourselves into the swirling brown rapids and zooming back down to the sandy calm part. It was a blast, but I managed to break a toenail, scrape my legs up, and get badly sunburned (stupid sneaky Honduran sun, it was so cloudy when we started…). Even so it was excellent fun and the perfect temperature…nothing sucks more than a freezing river (except maybe a Fire River, that would probably be worse). One of the houses I’m lookin’ at renting is right by the river, so if I end up moving in there you can bet I will take all my meals seating in the water. Maybe I can even sling up a hammock in the water…hells yes. The only problem is it’s pretty dirty, people here just throw their garbage in the water—when I complained about it, Lourdes just informed me “No, it’s fine, the current just takes it away!” I’m becoming something of a garbage crusader here…I almost made a 7-year-old cry today when I freaked out after she threw her banana peel in the creek. But they make me cry when they pollute, so it’s fair.

I haven’t gone in to Fondo Cristiano in more than a week! I keep meaning to, but at this point, I feel like my time is better spent just meeting people and hanging out in the community than sitting in an office and eating churros (that’s what they call chips here, which was a BIG disappointment the first time I was offered churros and received crappy cheese puffs instead of the delicious crispy fried dough covered in cinnamon I was expecting). DUDES I just captured a tiny baby gecko that was hanging out in my bed! He was the length of a battery, all grey and adorable…just waiting to be my special bedtime friend. However Peace Corps policy states that I can’t have men in my bed while staying with my host family, so I escorted him outside.

Anyway, I’m still really homesick (which I’ve never felt before, it’s basically a giant America-life-shaped hole inside me), but it’s getting a lot better. The more folks I meet, the happier I feel. Last week I made tortillas with the mother of one of the girlies in the preschool, and then she made me friend bananas and gave me some coke. I also visit my neighbor Scarlett a lot, who’s one of my best friends here (and happens to be three-years-old). She lives with her “mom,” who’s actually her grandma (her real mom abandoned her). Her grandma is named Nedi, and she’s amazing. She’s got super long steely-gray hair and has this slow, laid-back chuckle that is basically her response to everything little Scarlett does. She’s a great mom/grandma, and I love hanging out with them in their little house (and it’s not for the amazing paletas, or homemade popsicles, that they always have on supply). Scarlett likes to model for us, and she’ll strut all over the house, shaking her butt and blowing kisses to an imaginary audience. I have no idea who taught her this. The other day she was asking me about my family, and asks, “What’s your daddy called?” I told her, “My daddy is named Andy,” to which she replied “That’s not true!!” I raised an eyebrow and asked what she thought my dad’s named was. “Your daddy’s name is JOHN!” she informed me matter-of-factly. John, if you recall, is the gringo I’ve replaced…adorable. She’s a very creative kid, though…one day I was twirling her around by her wrists like a helicopter, and making airplane noises. Later on, I heard her buzzing like a plane and poked my head into the room to see her whinging her poor cat Boris around by his paws. Like I said, very creative.

That’s all the news I’ve got for now…I understand the ‘Cats are BOWL BOUND!!! HELLS YES PEOPLE. If it wasn’t for stupid MSU, we’d be undefeated…what a great season. I miss my drumline days terribly (so often I’ll glance at my watch and think, oh man, we’d totally be hacking through Chicken in a Roll right now…), and even more so, I miss my drumline friends. I know the makeup of the line has changed dramatically this year, and I’m excited for Christina and Josh and the all the other new leadership roles you guys have taken up with so many new freshmen. Go throw yourselves a party at the Tit, you’ve earned it (keys are under the mat).

Make good choices, people. Try not to step in too much dog poop (I’ve done that about 8 times in the past week, including TWICE today). Cow poop is okay, though.

Love,

Hayley

P.S. Max and Harrison, make your parents take you guys to a Northwestern football game! Just don’t forget to wear “PURPLE GO TATS”!

23 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! Man I got tasty bluegrass janglin in my ear-holes and I’m eating a big bowl of raw onions, sweet peppers, and tomatoes (aka the vegetation of Alubarén) and it is just a GOOD NIGHT. It’s Thursday the 23rd, aka exactly 12 days until we chose a new president. I actually caught some scrambled CNN en Espanol this morning, and they showed McCain hollering about how Obama’s never seen war, and then Obama giving a bunch of people high-fives. I reckon that about sums up what you guys with your constant CNN (en Ingles) have seen. In a way I’m glad I’m removed from the constant saturation of political bullshit but DANG do I feel outta the loop. But you guys would be surprised how many country folks out here are somewhat well-informed about the haps “allá” (or “other there,” what they call the US); lots of people ask me if I like “el Moreno” or “el trigueño” (aka the dark-skinned guy) or if I like “el que se parece a Bush,” (aka the guy who looks like Bush). I had a passionate conversation tonight with the grandpa of my buddy Scarlett, (whose name is Marcos and has a sweet MTV baseball hat) who wanted to know why we we’re at war with Iraq, and how it might change with a new president. Lots of people have asked me about that, actually, and usually tell me something like “that President of yours really loves war, doesn’t he? Why do you Americans love war so much?” and then I have to explain that most of us don’t actually have little decorative pillows on our beds with “I Love War” cross-stitched onto the fabric. Or maybe you do, I don’t know what kind of sales the Pottery Barn is having these days. What with the Second Great Depression upon us, maybe people are getting desperate for cheap throw pillows…

Too soon? Let me know when I can make Grapes of Wrath jokes (old dudes drinking breast milk, anyone?). Anyway. Sorry. So this week was great, even though I didn’t do much. As I do every Monday, I went over to my friend Lourdes’ house, the woman who has the 10-year-old boy with Down’s Syndrome named Norlin, and a four-year-old (who has some behavior issues of his own) named Saul. I brought my watercolors (which I bought in Honduras and are mondo-sucky; I’ve used them twice and they’re basically gone) and some markers and colored pencils, and sat down to do art with the kids. Like I said before, neither child has been to school before, and their folks haven’t attempted to teach them anything on their own. So I’ve decided to work with the kids and at the same time teach the parents how to teach their children. (They rent a little room that’s connected to the Registry, where their father works, so we painted right in the office.) I cut up a bunch of squares and colored them different colors, and then spread them out in front of Norlin. I handed Norlin a red square, and asked him to find the other red one, the one that was the same. He had a lot of trouble with this matching game, so I took away all of the cards except three pairs. After a lot of encouraging, he successfully found the other red square!! All the people waiting in the Registry cheered and clapped! Norlin just beamed and shouted, “Yo, yo, yo, yo!” (Me, me, me, me!) He still had no idea what color it was, but he usually remembered which was pink and, after half an hour, learned brown as well. Saul also liked the game, but he wasn’t quite so challenged by the matching aspect (though so far, he can’t correctly identify ANY colors). I asked Lourdes if she’d like to send Norlin to school next year (school here starts in February, not the fall), and she said yes. She never tried to send him before because they don’t usually take special-needs kids, but I talked to the kindergarten teacher here and she said she’d love to have him. I talked to the principal of the elementary school (which is separate from kindergarten here), and she said they’d take him the next year if he’s ready for 1st grade. I still have to talk to the woman in charge of the school system in Alubarén (basically a superintendent), but things are looking good for Norlin!! The only issue is, I don’t know if HE wants to go…he says he does, but I know being away from home for a couple hours every day would be rough. Maybe he can start out just going a few days a week…only thing left is teaching him to pee in the toilet, not wherever he is currently standing when the urge strikes him.

That’s about all I did this week, work-wise…played in the park with the kids a lot and spied on the house I want to rent. My friend Edgar knows the owner’s mother (the owner lives in Tegus now), and he said she’d like to rent it to me…I just haven’t spoken to her yet. He said it’s got a bed and a fridge inside that I could use! The house is small and humble, but it’s gorgeous outside. It’s got a huge garden in the front with banana trees and squash plants, a creek that runs around the house and feeds into the river, which it’s right next to…but it’s built way up so flooding wouldn’t be an issue. It’s also got huge trees, an outdoor woodstove, a latrine, a pila, and a little patio with perfect hammock-placement potential. Hells yes. Not that I don’t love my current house and family, but they’re just not quite like my other two families and I don’t think I could live with them for two years. Plus, big trees!!

I spoke with the preschool teacher here, and she wants me to give a workshop to her and all the other preschool teachers on classroom management and strategies for managing child behavior. I’m gonna write up a little manual and design it so it’s interactive and involves a lot of role-playing and practicing…it’s gonna be so sweet. Hella “Silla para Pensar” (thinking chair) and token economies…get ready you little hellions, you ‘bout to learn to behave without even KNOWING you’re learning it. BUAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Guess that’s about it...got all my baseball equipment the other day, including a little notebook John had used with a bunch of old notes in like “batting order” and stuff like that. Stuff that makes me nervous. How do I choose batting order?! That sounds like the sort of thing that people could throw back at me later…all screamin’ and throwin’ baseball hats angrily to the dirt. “You FOOLISH gringa! We wouldn’t have lost that million-dollar tournament if you hadn’t made such a TERRIBLE batting-order! HOW DAAARE YOOOOU” etc etc. I’m pretty sure, also, that I maybe broke the catcher-face-protector thing. Balls.

I love you guys. Happy almost Halloween! We don’t celebrate that glorious day of costumes and candy and adventure, so feel free to send me chocolate and plastic spiders (but no fake cobwebs, I hate that business).

Love,

Hayley

29 September 2008 Hey, chochachos! I’m currently sitting on my bed (a foam pad on a beautiful wooden frame with yellow waxy fibers criss-crossing…I’ve convinced myself it’s sinew, and I kind of like it), listening to some jams (senor bob dylan)…or rather, I’m trying to. My new home here in Alubarén has a tin roof, and since it’s raining like the dickens it’s loud as HELL. I really enjoy it, though. Since it’s hurricane season it basically just dumps warm rain for hours in the afternoon/nighttime every day. It’s annoying because since the streets are dirt with no drainage system, every slanted road becomes an ankle-deep rushing river, and every flat area an ever-widening lake. But it’s worth it because the rain cools everything down, and since I wear chacos everywhere anyway, the wet doesn’t really bother me. Suck it, rain! So yeah, here I am, dudes…in my new community for the next two years. It’s weird, the last time I visited Alubarén, I knew I would be leaving in a couple days to return to my loving family in Santa Rita and my gringo friends and my non-responsibilities of going to class and playing games in the grass with my kiddies. But this time, when I was getting ready to move here knowing I wasn’t coming back, I didn’t feel so excited…I was almost dreading it, to be honest. And then I felt guilty, because they make it sound like we’re supposed to be tearing into our new communities with our arms all stretched above our heads like crazy marathon athletes, totally chugging diluted PowerAde and wearing nipple tape to avoid chafing during the long run…and when I thought about all the responsibilities I have, how much my community wants me to do, and how I don’t really feel ready to do any of it…I kind of just felt like going home to the states. With no sports drinks and certainly no nipple tape. I’ve just become so attached to the folks in Santa Rita, and I really love my Peace Corps friends, and I felt kind of depressed about leaving all them behind and stepping into a new place, with no anonymity and huge expectations. It’s kind of ridiculous, since this moment—actually moving into my community—is supposed to be the first glorious step in my two years of service, and I just straight up didn’t want to do it. Fortunately, though, I sucked it up and pretended that I was excited, and by the time I got to Alubarén and stepped out of my bus, I felt like I was at home. Still no nipple tape, but definitely excited and all the dread and sadness about leaving everyone else behind just kind of evaporated. I think one of the things I was most fretful about was leaving behind my whole support system, but I know I’ll make a new one here. I stepped in the door yesterday, and the three-year-old looked up at me from her hiding place behind the couch and just glared. I think she hates me, actually. My host mom Sandra gave me a hug and immediately showed me the new door on the bathroom, which I was delighted to see (no more turbo poopin’). I hauled my bags into my room, which is painted bright pink and has pretty shell-colored tile floors. The house is small but pretty, and brand new—tile floors, smooth adobe walls, and shiny zinc roof. The little girl, Carlita, immediately followed me in (the drawback to having a sheet for a door is that you can’t lock people out) and began pawing through my stuff. I asked her not to, but she just looks at me and says icily, “Vayase, niña” (go away, girl). God, if you guys could see the way she looks at me…hopefully I can win her love, or these first couple months are gonna be hella awkward (what if she poisons me?!). Today, my first day of work in my community, was a little strange. I’ve never had a job without a boss before, so I didn’t really know what to do. I decided the night before that regular people probably get up at 7:00am every day, so today at precisely that hour I got up and made my bed (aka dragged my one ragged sheet up and fluffed my pillow…it’s too hot here to warrant more than a sheet on the bed). I took a nice cold shower and made breakfast (avocado mashed up with a little oil and salt and two small tomatoes all sliced up, on toasty corn tortillas), and then I read some community development literature until about 9:00am. Then I fetched my shade-machine (aka umbrella), took a deep breath, and left the house. I don’t know why it’s so scary to leave the house here…one I’m outside it’s fine, it’s just the actual leaving part that’s hard. I think it’s because doing regular stuff, like walking around, is kind of taxing…all the Spanish, all the staring, all the attention…it’s just so much easier to hide inside. But I’m getting over that. I walked down the pebbly dirt road, saying “Buenos!” or “Adios!” to everyone I passed (they said “adios” here when passing each other, sort of like a “see ya” thing...and you always greet everybody, even the old dude on the other side of the street who probably can’t hear you anyway). Two seconds later I arrived at the office of my counterpart Fondo Cristiano, but the director Franco wasn’t there. I went into the back where they have a little classroom where the preschool classes are taught, and sat down at the table with all the children and their teacher, Carin. Rural preschools are one of the Fondo’s initiatives that I’ll be working with, so it was cool to see how a class works. The class was kind of barren and dirty, with a couple handmade posters on the walls and some falling-apart labels regarding which corner was for art (no art supplies, though) and which was for motor skills (nada). The Fondo has a curriculum that the preschool teachers must follow which is very similar to preschools in the US, regarding the daily organization and management of the class, as well as the different themes and topics covered, but it seems to me that only some aspects of the curriculum are followed…however, I can’t really made an accurate judgment from one day in one class, so who knows. The teacher had given each child a piece of paper with several squiggly lines, a duck, a bug, and star drawn on it (she had drawn them all by hand), and the kids were to color them in. On the table were about 9 chewed up colored pencils, and the children seemed to be pretty competent sharers. They were all between 4-5 years old, wearing the quintessential Latin American school uniform of a white colored shirt and blue slacks or pleated skirt. The kids were either barefoot or wearing flip-flops, and most of them were rather smudgy-looking. We colored together for a bit, and then I got them up and we stood in a circle. I tried to teach them this simple rhythm game, where I clap a rhythm and they repeat it, but they couldn’t get the concept of waiting until I was done clapping to begin…and most of them would just shriek and clap hysterically while jumping up and down. So it only kind of worked, but that’s all right. Clapping isn’t a real skill, anyway. After that, I spent about half an hour talking to one of the ladies who works in the main office of Fondo, and then I meandered down the main road looking for the post office. A little old man who was sitting on his porch called me over and introduced himself, though it was really hard to understand him ‘cause he didn’t have any teeth. He asked me where I was going and I told him, and he immediately stood up, offered his elbow, and proceeded to escort me like a sweaty pink princess to the post office. His name is Guillermo, and he’s my new friend. The post office turned out to be a ridiculously empty room—it has a small desk, a radio, and two plastic chairs. I asked if the office was functioning, and Wilma, the lady who works there, looked at me like I was crazy and said of course it was. She said if anyone wants to send me a letter or a package, just write my name (or “La Gringa,”) followed by: Alubarén, F.M.

11310

Honduras And it will get to me. Personally, I am delighted to be living somewhere where someone can just send a letter addressed to “the gringa,” followed by the town, and I’ll get it…it just makes me feel really badass. Anyway, Wilma and I sat down and she fixed me a bowl of popcorn and a glass of frosty coke and we chatted for almost two hours. She’s awesome. One of her little boys, Hency, will be on my baseball team, and I spent a while watching him push his little brother and sister around in the wheelbarrow, a pastime that I too am quite fond of (thanks, dad!). After the post office, I walked down to the pulperias and bought two potatoes, three avocados, a pound of tomatoes, a sweet green pepper, two ugly-ass carrots, six eggs, a head of garlic, an onion, and four green bananas. I’m to cook for myself in my home, which I like. I spent the time between buying my food and eating it by sitting in a rocking chair on the porch with my host mom, drinking sugary coffee and watched the crazy rain. Tonight I made tajaditas, which are basically thinly sliced green bananas fried in oil…I know I said I was trying to get away from all the fried stuff, but it’s so delicious. Then I stir-fried all my veggies and heated up some tortillas and ate a delicious gringa meal! I was going to learn to make my own tortillas, but a woman down the path sells delicious little corn ones for dirt cheap, and I’d just as soon eat her delicious ones…plus I’m lazy. My last days in Santa Rita were extremely pleasant, but it was so sad to leave. I spent as much time as possible with my family, including one epic hike in which I hauled little Javier in my arms up and down the mountains for four hours. The gringos threw our families a good-bye/thank-you party, packed up our belongings, pretended we didn’t have terrible seniorities when it came to those last few days of classes, and booked it outta there. The Swearing In ceremony was really nice—we had it at the US Embassy in Tegucigalpa, and I wore my orange-apple dress. After we swore in, they took us the American ambassador’s home, and we played in his pool and basketball courts, despite the pouring rain. I also explored some of his amazing trees in his beautiful jungle-garden, and that was extremely excellent. Anyway, ya’ll won’t be hearing from me as often anymore, due to my great distance from any internet connection…but I’ll still write frequently and just upload ‘em all at once. Please send me letters—and now that I’m actually near a post office for once, I will start sending letters out to you all as well. By the way, it’s my understanding that the Wildcats are 5-0 at the moment—and even all the way down here, I think I can smell a 2009 Pasadena Rose Bowl victory. GO ‘CATS! BEAT THE CHILDREN!! Love, Hayley 5 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! Dang so I just looked at a bunch of pictures from America Times, back when I lived in America Land and hung out with America Friends and did America Things…and now I’m listening to one of my favorite bathroom mixes (Scott Sode knows what I’m talking about) and I’m just hells of nostalgic for all you guys and stuff. I looked at some pictures from some party we threw last fall quarter in the Tit and it just made me miss America College Times…then I recalled how we used to throw big bags of water off the balcony, and I drew a mental parallel to my current use of bags of water, which is drinking—that’s how they sell water here, in little ½ liter bags…or more like baglettes. You nibble a hole in a corner and suckle away…and if I were to try to throw these Honduran bags of water off a balcony, it probably wouldn’t even explode. Things sure are different here. Or at least, my options for harassing pedestrians from multiple-story altitudes are severely limited. So, today is my one-week-versary of being in-site…hooty-hoo! I celebrated by cooking dinner for my host family, and by celebrated I mean they informed me they’d decided I would be cooking tonight. I laughed, and they were like “No, really…go for it!” Then there was this five-minute tango of awkwardness as I tried to decipher if they were kidding or not (they weren’t). Sandra, my host mom, told me to “just make us eggs and tomatoes and potatoes,” so I did just that, all mixed together in a frying pan. They seemed to like it, but they also dumped an entire can of jalapenos on top, so I’m not sure how to interpret that. Whatever, it’s just nice to be able to finally cook…we’ve been out of electricity for the past six days, and when all you have is rice, beans, and eggs, that makes eating rather challenging (lots of avocado and tomato, this past week). The lack of electricity normally wouldn’t be an issue but since this house is pretty nice it only has an electric stove, no outdoor wood-burning oven—so we were basically screwed (I also ate a lot of fried chicken from one of the little eateries here. Jesus Cristo I am so sick of fried chicken). Anyway, six days, many avocados and several bucket-baths later, we are now with electricity again, so everything is awesome. My first week in-site was a little weird. I don’t feel like I’m at home here…I feel like I’m trespassing in someone else’s home, specifically John, the gringo who I am replacing. He is very, very adored by this community, and whoever I might talk to can only gush about what a wonderful, chill volunteer he was. It’s so awesome that they love him so much, and I almost feel like my presence here is just a reminder to them that he’s gone and isn’t coming back (well, I’m sure he will someday). I know that will fade after a while, but I almost feel guilty…I know it’s not that they don’t want me, but I feel like I’m intruding in someone’s home and trying to make their family love me. This week was strange in other ways, too…I feel this pressure to justify my presence here, and it’s very strange to wake up in the morning with no boss and no plans. Because the teachers were striking this week (they do this all the freaking time), there was no school, so I spent most of my time hanging out at the Christian Children’s Fund office (Fondo Cristiano). Obviously I have no projects or work yet, my job right now is just to get to know people. You’d think that’d be a piece of cake, but it’s kind of hard emotionally. I feel very lonely because no one knows me. I don’t really have any friends, which is to expected since I’ve only been here a week. Don’t get me wrong, everyone here is SO FRIENDLY and so loving…but nobody knows me. I know the loneliness will pass, though, so I’m not too worried. It’s so easy to just hide on the porch and read books in English, but I’m trying to force myself to get out and meet people, even though it’s hard. I made a personal rule that I will stop in and sit on the porch/go into the house with at least three new families a day, and it’s been going okay. Everyone seems delighted to meet me, but it’s hard because I can never remember anyone’s names, and several times I’ve enthusiastically introduced myself to someone only to have them inform me that we’ve already met (this keeps freaking happening!). I’m honestly worried I’ll never learn everyone’s names…and then they’re all the aldeas (villages) outside of Alubarén! I never though “meeting people” as a daily task would be so stressful. However, one thing that does rock is my new coworkers at Fondo Cristiano. The office is two 20-year-olds named Heydi and Helen, one 22-year-old named Edgar, a 24-year-old named Erica, and our “boss,” a laid-back 40-something dude named Franco. They’re all really funny and seem genuinely cool, and I feel so thankful to have them…I think they will become some very good friends here. On Friday (Oct. 3), Heydi and I walked to the nearest town, called Reitoca, to run an errand. It took us a good hour to get there, but it was a beautiful walk, through the hot jungley mountains, with little waterfalls splashing down the sides of the mountains and green, flowering trees everywhere (the trees all seem to be flowering right now, which is delightful). Reitoca is a lot like Alubarén, except slightly more developed and a little bigger. They have a Peace Corps volunteer, too, a Business Project guy named David. He got to his site about five months ago, and it was awesome meeting a new gringo who I can hang out with if I need to speak some English and bitch about the heat. Speaking of heat, it’s actually not that bad right now—turns out it rains every SINGLE day in October here, at about 2:00pm on the dot. It might be sunny and hot all morning, but as soon as afternoon hits, the crazy purple clouds roll in from nowhere, the wind picks up, and the skies just dump sheets of water for a couple hours. Then it’s pretty cool for the rest of the day, which is several kinds of fantastic. The electrical storms here are so intense and awesome. Actually, it’s been raining so much here that there are crazy floods all around Honduras, and the many rivers that carve around the mountains here swelled so much that we were literally stranded—the buses can’t go down or come up here when the rivers get too deep. Still, though, I’m trying to appreciate it because come January, all the rain is going to cease and it’s gonna get hot as nuts here, with the harsh sun all the dang time with no relief. Spending the week at Fondo was interesting. One of their initiatives is rural preschools, which they (rather confusingly) call “kinders.” One of my main roles here, it seems, is going to be working with the preschool teachers regarding methodology and classroom management. I’ve sat in on several mornings at the preschool here, and it’s a lot of random chaos, with some coloring in between. I’m not sure how exactly I’m going to approach this rather vague task of “making better” these preschools, so if anyone has any cool pre-K resources they want to send me, go for it! (Remember, my address is just Hayley Kercher, Alubarén F.M., 11310, Honduras). I also got to sit on a meeting with the Madre Guias, or the Guide Mothers…that’s another initiative of Fondo in which moms are training in early stimulation, basic nutrition and hygiene, and other topics appropriate for young children, and then they go into the rural villages and work with the moms there. It’s a really sweet program and they (the Madre Guias) do it all as volunteers! The meeting was awesome because I got to meet like 70 new women and many of their children. Then I sat in on a meeting of the mothers of the preschoolers in Alubarén, which was much smaller. I actually got to talk a bit—they were talking about homework, and I suggested that they give their kiddies some “creative” tasks, like “draw an imaginary animal!” Really basic stuff, but the kids here are NOT encouraged to think creatively, so it’s surprising how challenging stuff like this is for them. This weekend was pretty chill. Today I grabbed some kids and, collecting more and more along the way, we trooped up the hill to the little concrete basketball court that they play fútbol on. We played for about an hour and a half, until the afternoon rain came and we had to run home. Oh damnit…se fue la luz. If there was one sentence to sum up my Honduras experience so far, that would be it….se fue la luz means “the light’s gone away!” and this loss of electricity basically happens with a greater frequency than I wash my hair (which I do all the time). Anyway, I’d better go before my laptop explodes. Paz, Hayley 13 October 2008

Hey, chochachos! After being without electricity for the past week, we’re now back in business juice-wise. And I’m only a little bit sick of avocados and bananas. Actually, it works out because all the neighbors know we only have an electric stove, so often I’ll be walking down the road and someone will call out and offer me beans or cheese and tortillas. Or coffee. Or coke. Delicious…I have to say I am developing quite a amorous relationship with coca-cola…I know it’s terrible for me, but it’s so cold and tasty. I think it has something to do with the extreme carbonated beverage restrictions I endured as a child… I’ve been sleeping alone in the house for the past week or so. Last week, the little old lady who lived behind us died, after which point my host mom Sandra refused to sleep in the house because she was afraid the ghost would bother her. So she, Carlita, and Walmar have all been sleeping in the little bedroom with grandma up the road. They think I’m crazy for politely declining to squeeze myself into that bed with them and opting to sleep in our apparently haunted house. I’ve been sleeping with a machete under my pillow, though, just in case, so if Senora Marijita wafts into my room with malicious intentions I’m all taken care of. The process following a death here is rather intense, actually. The day after she passed away, we went to pay our respects, after stopping at the pulperias to buy a bag of coffee to bring to the family. Just like the other funeral I went to several weeks ago, when we arrived at the house there were just a ton of people standing around, not really talking. Some folks were wearing black, but most were just dressed normally. I followed Sandra into the house, and found a little bed with a tall candle burning on top of each post. In the bed was the woman, laid down with her hands folded on her chest, a lacey, gossamer sheet pulled over her body, and toilet paper stuffed up her nose. At the foot of the bed was about six 3-liter coke bottles, cut in half and filled with beautiful flowers from people’s gardens. As always when I enter a Honduran home, someone immediately leapt up and offered me a plastic chair to sit in, which I proceeded to do in an awkward silence for about 15 minutes, until Sandra gave me usually “Well, let’s go!” and stood to leave. For the next two days, people were milling around in their backyard (aka right outside my window), chatting, laughing, and chanting/singing. I hung around and chatted with the kids through the barbed-wire fence for a couple hours, and we took turns taking pictures. I lent them my camera at their request, and they immediately dashed off into the house. They came back out 10 minutes later and proudly showed my all the extremely-up-close photos they’d taken of the body. They seemed so pleased with their work I just thanked them, but deleted them as soon as I got into my room…I don’t want to give the little-old-lady ghost a reason to harass me. This past week was great because I got to go on several excursions with one of my friends with Fondo Cristiano, Edgar. He took me to a couple different aldeas (villages), which involved crossing several rivers, hiking up boiling dirt roads, ducking through corn fields, and navigating creeks and muddy paths through the jungley forest. That was the first time I’d ever hiked under the canopy, and it was breathtaking. It was very humid, but I’m willing to sweat to see such amazing stuff. At one point we arrived to a little shallow pool with two waterfalls and several creeks feeding into it, framed by huge trees with their thick vines hanging down, ferns growing everywhere and all the rocks covered in dark green moss. I literally had to sit myself down to enjoy it (and to wash the freaking bitey ants off my ankles. Seriously, little black bitey ants, I hate to hell). I’m enjoying myself more, now. I’ve taken the kids to go play several times (including a particularly intense game of steal-the-bacon which definitely involved blood-shed and angry words…god these kids play rough), and I’ve made more neighbor-friends, so now wherever I walk there is a usually a child who knows me and shouts “HOLA HEELY!” Or if they, they urgently announce to whoever is nearby, “Here comes the little gringa!” and wave at me. I feel a lot less lonely…the only thing is now all the kids want to play with me nonstop, and know where I live, and I can’t bear to say no to them when they ask to play, so I’ve essentially forfeited my free time. At least I feel like I’m doing someone productive, though. I’ve made friends with a woman named Lourdes, who is admirably going to high school every day despite the fact she’s in her late 30s and the mother of two. Her older son is a 10-year-old boy named Norlin, who has Down’s Syndrome. She also has a four-year-old named Saul. I met her a while ago at a birthday party (when I first visited Alubarén), and she told me she wanted help with Norlin. The school’s won’t take him, but he’s VERY high-functioning…I can basically talk to him like he’s any other 10-year-old. Anyway, I walked up to their little house today and brought some watercolors, markers, and colored pencils, and did some art with the boys. It was great…Norlin painted all the colors on his paper, and then painstakingly covered it all up with black paint. Little Saul just scribbled on like 15 different sheets with markers. Neither of them know their colors, how to count, or other basic preschool stuff, which obviously isn’t their fault since neither has been to school. Their dad sat with us while we painted, and he told me they have never tried to teach the boys anything like that, because “Norlin can’t learn, and Saul’s too little.” I told him that Norlin can certainly learn, and showed him how to make everything a mini lesson…constantly ask the boys questions, point out the colors, ask them to count, and he (the dad) seemed genuinely excited to start this new angle. By the time I left, Norlin could pretty much identify the color pink without issue! I said I would come work with them and do art stuff every Monday, and they were thrilled. Then we had lunch, which was chicken-foot soup. I’m not kidding. The soup tasted delicious but the chicken foot was the weirdest thing I’ve ever put my mouth on…very rubbery, with bumpy skin and skinny little toes with bones that break apart in your mouth. I’m not gonna lie, I don’t really ever want to eat the feet of any animal again (though I did mentally make a lot of foot-in-mouth puns). I’m going to try to get to the internet this week…there is some internet in a town called Sabanagrande, which I can get to and return from in the same day. However, the main highway between Tegus and the south (which I would travel on) is closed for the next two days, because a “really big rock” fell from the mountains and is blocking all passage. Oh, Honduras. Paz,

Hayley

23 September 2008

Dudes I am actually writing this blog in an internet café, so im gonna make it short and sweet. Basically, everything I said in the previous post (which is new to you guys, so read it) is still true, and in three days I will swear in as an official Peace Corps volunteer! Then I´ll go to my new home in Alubaren and start saving the babies.

Love,

Hayley

16 September 2008

Hey, chochachos! Heavens, it’s been a while. You guys had better get used to that, the nearest Internet source to my site is about two hours away. But I will have a P.O. box in town, so I guess it’s time to do it old-school style. I recently got some letters from you guys, it was the most awesome thing in the world…like a jillion baby pandas being born at once.

A whole lot has happened since I last blogged…I departed from my Talanga family, but not before Dona Dulce and I planted a sapling sand-dollar eucalyptus tree together in the near-darkness, using a pole and a spatula. A lady was selling plants out of a truck on the way home from school that day, and I decided it was the perfect parting gift. I spent my last night hanging out with my host sister at the Cocodrilo, just talking with her and my host-brother Carlos (he’s a dude who lives in Tegus usually). It was really chill and really awesome. The next morning, I got up at 6:00am, ate my last delicious greasy restaurant breakfast, hugged and kissed the fam goodbye, and hopped on a bus for Santa Rita. I arrived in the morning while the girls were at school, then left again to go to classes…when I finally arrived again that evening, the girls saw me coming from the top of the hill and screamed “HAAAAYLEEEEEY!!!” like their vocal chords were going to explode. Seriously, I was worried. It was so great to be back in the house, hanging out in the little living room with Suyapa, Javier, little baby Javier (who can now roll over, sit up, crawl, and edge around the room), and Melani and Madeline. I really forgot how much I love this family here…I am so, so lucky I got TWO families who I love and who love me.

I was only there for a night, though, and left the next morning for a four day visit to my site…ALUBAREN!! I was right, as was every single other gringo in Youth Development...guess they gave us pretty good hints. Anyway, one of my counterparts (who is also my host grandmother) showed up the day before in Valle de Angeles to escort me down south. She’s a solid little old lady, very old fashioned and no-nonsense, but I like her a lot. She wears a lot of matching pantsuits, but instead of pants, it’s a long skirt…skirtsuits? Her name is Paola, and she’s the principal of the elementary school I will be working with. We hauled one of my huge suitcases on the top of one of old American school buses that Honduras uses for public transit (complete with “Blue Bird Transit” signs and stickers inside that say “Values matter in South Carolina!”), and departed from Tegucigalpa for Alubaren. About two hours later, we departed from the highway and began ascending a mostly dirt mountain road, which we climbed and wove around for almost an hour and a half. My jaw was basically open the entire time…it was so beautiful. The mountains were just thick with brilliant green jungle plants, trees with sled-sized leaves and vines hanging from mossy mango trees. We drove through lots of small villages (aldeas), crossed several rivers (on bridges), and finally arrived in the center of Alubaren. There are a little over 1,000 people in the center (casco urbano), and it has the vibe of a very small, isolated, rural town…which it is. There is a pretty park with old gnarled trees in the middle, with a huge white Catholic church next to it. The streets are dusty dirt with stray dogs trotting around and little shoeless kids running up and down, kicking plastic bottles or small balls, sucking on bags of frozen juice, and even doing that thing that kids in the 1800s did that involved smacking a rolling wheel along with a stick. It’s so stinking hot here, I though I would die…I’m basically bathed in sweat at all times, including the middle of the night. All the ladies walk around with umbrellas to protect them from the harsh rays, so I immediately bought a pretty green one and now intend on walking out of here in two years without skin cancer. There are a handful of pulperias (corner store, ranging from a shack with a workbench to a storefront with refrigerators and microwaves…they sell basic food supplies, soap, candy, diapers, whatever), as well as two comedors, which sell meals (fried chicken, baleadas, etc). There is the local government building, called the alcaldia, a health clinic, a post office, and several NGOs, including one that I’ll be working with, called Christian Children’s Fund—it’s a U.S. organization, and it’s great—they basically just sent money and this office (with all Honduran staff) gets to spend it on projects that help develop the community, such as youth groups, community gardens, and preschools, all of which I will be working on. It’s nice because a lot of times NGOs come in, with foreign leadership, do the projects they want to, and then leave—and two years later the projects have all disintegrated because there was no local ownership or personal investment. When the projects, like those of Fondo Cristiano para Niños, are developed, planned, and executed by community members, they actually stick around and continue to improve (usually). Peace Corps volunteers base their community development work around the same principle, and we’re supposed to do only do projects that are sustainable and include local leadership and involvement.

Anyway, I LOVE Alubaren. When you stand in the little streets and look around, all you see in the horizon is great big green mountains and blue skies (evil, hot blue skies). There are lots of little creeks and rivers surrounding the town, which I got to see more of when my new host mom and aunt took me to a funeral. We had to walk about an hour in the heat up a nearby mountain, and it was the greenest, most beautiful thing I’ve seen in Honduras. Just dense jungle forest, full of mango and banana trees, occasionally opening up to large meadows. We were not able to benefit from the canopy, though, because we were hiking up the dirt road, which is basically an oven. The umbrella protects my skin, but it also captures the heat in a little dome of hell right around my face…which is, I suppose, why the women also walk around with little towels draped across their shoulders, to mop sweat off their faces. Despite the heat, though, the hike was gorgeous. It’s very depressing through, because the more rural you get in this country, the more people seem to disregard the concept of a garbage can. Adults and children alike will unwrap whatever they’re about to eat or drink and just toss the garbage on the ground. When we arrived at the home of the man who’d died, we sat on little wooden benches in front of a dirt-floor house high atop the mountain (it was actually cooler up there) under the shade of gorgeous almendra trees, with thick vines hanging all over the place and ferns covering the ground. After I finished my plate of rice and tortillas I asked where the garbage can was, and they just squinted at me and pointed (with their lips, as is Honduran custom) to a little gully nearby. I peeked over and it was filled with plastic bottles, plates, as well as lots of food waste and some Styrofoam. It sucks because this is the most beautiful, undeveloped land in the area and they just chuck garbage all over the place. I know there isn’t a formal garbage collection method up in the mountains (it would have be on donkey if it existed), but they could at least consolidate and bury it instead of spreading it all over the place, including in their only nearby watershed…the school wants me to do environmental ed, though, so I wonder if we can change any of that…the rest of the “funeral” was pretty awkward, because it was just like 20 people sitting outside, eating and not talking. I asked one of the kids to show me the horses on the hill behind to house, and soon I had about 10 little escorts. They were extremely quiet and mainly just watched me with big eyes…I don’t think they’d seen a gringo before, actually. We kind of stood around the horses for a bit in silence—I’d ask them something and they’d just avert their eyes and look at the ground. Finally, I took off my sandals and started to climb an enormous mango tree (mango trees are the best to climb, by the way), and the kids started to giggle. Soon they all followed me up and we spent the next hour sitting up in the canopy, chewing on mangos and talking. I was so relieved because I don’t think I’ve ever felt so awkward around Hondurans before…the silence was unbearable.

My third and final host family is pretty nice. It’s a mom named Sandra, who is a teacher at my elementary school, a dad named Walmar, who works for Fondo Cristiano, and a little three-year-old girl who is adorably cute but rather sinister in character…she’s the kid who pinches the sleeping baby just to make him cry. It’s not the same as my other two families, but I’m pretty comfortable with them and certainly won’t mind staying for my first two months. However, I wish my bedroom had a door, all it’s got is a curtain…and the bathroom doesn’t have either (yes, this is very awkward, and in my four days there I learned how to execute certain maneuvers with extreme speed). They seemed hurt when I mentioned I’d be looking for my own place in a couple months, but nearly all PC volunteers find their own place, and I think I’d want a little more privacy for my next two years. Also, when you guys come visit me, you’ll have a place to crash…and I promise to buy some fans so no one dies of heat exhaustion during the night.

I also met the kids who will be on my baseball team, Las Panteras, and I’m really excited about that. They’re all stellar kids who love to play (they told me they practice every single day for two hours), and informed me they’re the best kids in town because they will never ever drink or do drugs. Alubaren is actually a dry town, but booze is still illegally sold in some places. However, the amount of drunks in town is quite small, which is awesome. Anyway, my baseball kids (all boys and some girls between 8-12) are totally rad. However, on the scale of Knowledge Regarding Baseball, I fall between “Repressed Childhood Memories” and “Understands Kickball,” so if anyone has any pointers or books or anything on how to teach kids baseball, let me know/give me them. Also, if anyone wants to draw parallels between my new sports endeavor and “Kristy’s Krushers,” please be aware I am open to such ideas.

While I’m kind of stressed about all the work that’s ahead of me, as well as the concept of being my own boss, I’m just overwhelmed with how happy I will be in Alubaren. Sitting on the porch of a neighbor, chatting with whoever wanders by and sipping sweet coffee…it’s just so tranquilo. Seriously, give me a hammock and some children that need a friend, and I feel like I could live here forever…

After celebrating Children’s Day for four days with piñatas and toys (Dia del Niño is basically a holiday we don’t have…think birthday for every single kid, all at once, and you’ve got the idea), I departed from Alubaren as the kids were ironing out the last details for the parades they were to take place the next day, September 15th. Every child in a public school in Honduras has basically been out of school for the past month, practicing marching, playing drums, twirling batons, shaking pompoms, carrying flags, and otherwise preparing for Honduras’s independence day. It’s an intense, countrywide sensation of patriotism as every single kid is forced to march for hours in the parades—no one here seems to think, “But isn’t four hours a day of rehearsal with almost no schooling for an entire month rather extreme??”. I was back in Santa Rita in time to see the preparation, and Suyapa was up until 1:00am doing the hair of the girls’ in our neighborhood…and up at 4:00am doing the hair of her two little daughters. I got up at 6:00am, and we were out the door by 7:00am, along with the rest of the world. We arrived in Valle de Angeles and I was overwhelmed by the thousands of people, the majority of whom were teeny miniature cowboys, Indians, policemen, firemen, cheerleaders, baton-twirlers, and of course marching band members…it was a spectacle. Little Madeline was a cheerleader, by the way, and Melani was a baton twirler, complete with high-heel boots and tiny dress. It was an exhausting day, though, and we all slept like rocks that night.

By the way, I definitely got run over by a horse last night. I had taken the kids to the clearing the woods where we play soccer to play games in the dark again, and we were taking a rest in the grass. Two kids on horses came up and starting showing off, galloping up and down. I told them to go on, and that they couldn’t ride in that area because there were little children around. One kid, however, took off galloping anyway. I was seated cross-legged on the grass with Madeline the three-year-old in my lap, and I heard the horse coming up behind me. I turned around just in time to see the boy trying to pull his horse up short behind me—he was running it at me to scare me! The horse couldn’t stop in time, though, and I screamed and ducked down over Madeline, and the horse trampled right over me. It was miraculous that I wasn’t hurt—his hooves grazed my head a bit, but that was it!! The kids kept insisting the children on horseback were drunk, but they just seemed so young I can’t believe it. Either way, one of my more random Honduran events.

Oh my sweet heavens it is bedtimes folks. Buenas noches.

Paz,

Hayley

look guys, pictures! here are ana and i, the MCs for cultural day. yes, that is my natural hair color, thank you for asking.

here i am with all my little friends from one of the village schools.

here is a shot of Talanga, where i´ve been living for the past month or so.

here are derek and i, in the middle of a hike through the hot n moist selva.

hooray for pictures!!

6 September 2008

Hey, chochachos! Today I sweated so much, I got diaper rash. What’s new with you guys? Not diaper rash? That’s a shame. It’s really taking me back to my childhood. I might go steal that cream that they always rub on baby John’s butt… maybe I’ll just relish in this trip down memory lane.

Anyway, it was mega-hot today. Now it’s raining, of course, since this is the wet season in Honduras, and it rains every dang day. I don’t mind the rain, since it usually cools things down, but it sucks because the electricity always goes out when it thunders. So far it’s been on without issue for about three hours, so I’m just keeping my fingers crossed that it’ll stay. Though it doesn’t suck too hard when it goes out, because then I get to walk around with a upside-down teacup with a candle stuck to it, and I like to pretend it’s the times of Horse and Wig, when teabags cost a penny and cholera was a serious concern for everyone.

This is my last Saturday here in Tang-Town, and that fills me with cholera (the metaphorical kind). I leave on Tuesday! I just really wish I didn’t have to leave my host family here…I love Dona Dulce so much, and my sister Dulce, too…and baby John…and Alexa…and Dubal…and all their crazy friends that are always around. Especially in the past couple weeks, I’ve felt just like a member of the family and I can feel my heart growing, like a fungus of love (love-fungi grow really well here, due to the heat and humidity). Today I was sitting on the couch in the restaurant with Dona Dulce, and she turned to me and said something like, “It’s amazing how the heart can grow to love someone so much in such a short period of time,” and squeezed my arm. Then we both sat there trying not to cry and she changed to subject to gringo gossip. Dubal, my dad, keeps walking around grinning and chuckling his high-pitched “hee hee!” which is cute coming from a man of his girth, and muttering, “They gave us the craziest gringa they had!” I don’t know why exactly he thinks I’m so crazy (I have the suspicion it has something to do with my dancing, which they now call “Hacer la mantequilla”), but he seems to delight in it. They showed up the Cultural Day the gringos hosted, which was basically a smorgasbord of Honduran and American food and a series of performances by us and local Hondurans, and just stared at me. Ana, another gringa, and I were the MCs of the event, and were decked out in traditional folkloric dresses, complete with fake black braids that hang down the left shoulder. As you can imagine I looked extremely ridiculous and I don’t think any of the Hondurans knew what to make of it. I looked GOOD. Anyway, each family had to bring a dish, and mine showed up with a chocolate cake that said “Bueno, Hayley, ya la tengo en mi corazon,” which means, “Well, Hayley, now I have you in my heart.” It was deliciously sentimental. They also had a wrapped present for me, which I thought was great. It was a coffee percolator! One of the awesome silvery ones that make like 5 cups of coffee. It’s awesome and it’s exactly what I needed. Anyway, the general mood around the house is sadness that I’m leaving, and a distinct attempt to enjoy every waking moment. Today (Saturday) Honduras played Canada in the rounds for the world cup in 2010, so I painted my arms blue and white and climbed into bed with Dona Dulce to watch the game. She gave me an (enormous) Honduras soccer jersey, and we laid there, sucking on sodas and watching what was a surprising and glorious triumph over Canada. Suck it, Canada!

Today I walked over to see the giant Ceiba tree we have in town, with Patrick, Gabe, and Dora. This tree is ENORMOUS, you’d need at least 10 people holding hands to wrap around its base. It’s got huge buttress roots, and enormous braches that extend out across the dusty square for about 50 feet. Little kids were kicking around a soccer ball barefoot, chickens peckin’ about, old ladies shuffling around with buckets of something balanced on their heads, old men sitting on their porches with their cowboy hats on, hells of dogs trotting around, the air all hot and heavy with the pending rain…it was such a typical Honduran scene that I admit I got a little emotional and my eyeballs almost started to sweat. But they have little two-by-fours wedged into the roots like benches, so Patrick and I perched on them and took several high school senior portrait-esque photos.

The week passed so quickly. Last Sunday I went to Monte Redondo with Ana, where some of the other volunteers are in training, and she and I went on an adventure with Derek and Justin, and some of Derek’s host brothers. We got a ride in the back of the pick-up truck to this little aldea called Rio Hondo, and hiked along the river till we got to this awesome area where we could leap off rocks into the deep waters. We ate fried chicken and drank soda and floated around in the sunshine. We couldn’t get a jalon (ride) back, though, so we hiked for almost two hours through the jungle to Monte Redondo. The kid in the front had to hack through the growth with his machete! It was totally badass, with the warm rain falling on my adventure hat…so much fun. Then I went to Derek’s house and had crab soup (no fur this time).

This week was my last one at the schools, so we had two despedidas (good-bye parties) and it was sad but fun. At my little one-room school house, Ana and I brought a piñata, pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey, and some other treats for the kids. But when we showed up they had prepared for us a 45-minute dance show, featuring reggaeton, punta, and traditional vaquero dance. I took some videos and I wish to god I could show them to you guys…my favorite is this mortified-looking little 8-year-old boy who somehow got roped into doing this dance with about 7 other girls, and they’re all shaking their imaginary bosoms all over the place and he’s trying to do the same, while his friends are shrieking with laughter on the sidelines…it’s just priceless. The games afterward were more or less successful (some of the 6th graders cried when the little kids got to go first for pin-the-tail, and a kid nearly got his face smashed in by an over-zealous piñata-batter, at which point I screamed “STOP!” in English….it was kind of a disaster, actually). Piñatas here are crazy!!! The blindfolded kid just keeps whinging away while everyone else madly scrambles for the candy that may or may not be falling, the gringas shouting in panicked English while the teacher leans against the wall examining her nails…holy moley. Last time I do that. But I’ll miss those little guys…they gave me and Ana each a going-away present, which was some awesome bling. If anyone needs huge plastic diamond earrings and a matching bracelet, just let me know, I might let you borrow mine. The despedida at the other school was also interesting…on our second to last day we decided to do an American-style “Field Day” with relay-races, three-legged races, and Capture the Flag. It was only mildly disastrous, so I guess I ought to be proud. It took us about 45 minutes to organize teams with a mixture of each age group, because the kids kept running off to be with their friends. Once we finally had six teams that had a couple big kids on each team, we tried to do some basic relay races, like “Over-Under” with a ball. That went okay. Then we attempted this great game I read about, called three-legged soccer. It’s exactly what it sounds like. So after we spent like 20 minutes trying to explain the concept and demonstrating and tying 25 pairs of kids today with twine, we realized we had no soccer ball. I figured we could just do a race, but the crappy twine was cutting into the poor kids’ legs and they all had expressions of extreme pain on their faces, so we just ran around and cut all of them free. Again, I wish I could share the video Ana has of a bunch of kids hobbling around, screaming in pain. Twine sucks. Finally, we rallied the troops together and I explained the concept of “Robar the Bandera,” or Capture the Flag. We sent two gringas to each team, and the game began. For about 20 minutes, the kids just faced off awkwardly at the middle line, darting across for two seconds before turning on heel and dashing back into the safety on their own side. I spent most of the time in jail, except for one incident when I had to go explain to my team that burying the flag in the grass so no one knew where it was is actually cheating. It was a hot and rather stressful morning, but it was great anyway. We walked home and got a beer on the way to celebrate, at which point we realized that four gringas drinking a beer at 11:00am was extremely scandalous.

We capped off the week with a sweet workshop on how to give workshops on HIV/AIDS. After a day of learning and prep, they sent us off in groups of threes to give the charlas (workshops/talks) to groups of ninth graders. It was wonderful. The material was excellent; the Peace Corps really emphasizes interactive learning and creative, engaging activities that encourage learning through fun—not such a novel concept in the states, but nothing short of a revolution here. We started with a pre-test; it was incredible how ignorant these kids were—most though HIV could be transmitted through mosquito bites or kissing. And as the charla progressed, I realized they were lacking a lot of really basic biology—a lot of them didn’t understand about eggs and sperm, or didn’t realize women urinate and give birth from two different places, etc. But we passed around a box for them to fill with anonymous questions, and that was great—my lifelong dream of getting to answer the questions “What is masturbation?” or “How does anal sex work?” in Spanish to a bunch of adolescents has finally come true. However, the climax (no pun intended) of this sex-ed/HIV workshop was definitely when we passed out a banana and two condoms to each pair of kids and took them through the steps (there are about 10, by the way) of how to correctly use a condom. I wish I had pictures, guys.

Bedtime…tomorrow is our despedida for the host families. We’re hosting it in the library, and we’re making dessert and coffee. I’m in charge of games!! SCORE. And Monday we find out for sure where our sites will be…and on Tuesday, we depart for Zarabanda once again. We’ll stay with our original host families for a night, then head to our sites for a four-day visit. Then we’ll come back and finish up training. On the 26th of September, we’re officially sworn-in as volunteers, and the very next day, we all take off into the wild green yonder to our respective sites…I can’t believe training is nearly over.

Happy (early) Anniversary, Mom and Dad! I am sending you sweaty e-kisses as we speak.

Love,

Hayley

30 August 2008 Hey, chochachos! It’s a hot ‘n rainy Saturday night, and I just went a little wild and ate a pupusa off the street (delicious hot and melty cheese tortilla thing). Then I went inside and drank some water. OUT OF CONTROOOOOL!!!! If I’m having a tame night, it’s because Honduras has been so wacky in the past couple days. Yesterday my mom Dulce announced we were going to a wedding in Tegus, so I promptly borrowed a dress from a gringa friend and washed my hair. The wedding was to begin at 8:00pm (who gets married at 8pm on a Friday night is what I want to know), but due to some transit issues we didn’t get on the road until 8:30, which meant we rolled into the wedding at about 9:30pm. This seemed entirely unimportant, however. The reception was really fun…in a Honduran wedding sort of way I guess. I expected everyone to be dancing around like crazy, since that is my stereotype of latinos at parties, but it was totally High School Dance style—DJs on stage with a small disco ball, projecting florescent rainbows onto a virtually empty dance floor while everyone sat around, not wanting to be the first one on the floor. My sisters didn’t come, but a host cousin (also named Dulce, obviously) came and was extremely interested in dancing, basically all the time. Now, I like dancing. I do. But I define dancing rather broadly, as “wiggling to the music” or “bobbing to and fro,” and occasionally I will incorporate specific dance steps (such as churning the butter). My cousin Dulce, like all Hondurans, is blessed with liquid hips and an innate skill for deciphering all the subtle differences between the music styles and the accompanying dance moves. So we enter into this awkward music scene, and of course everyone and their mother is staring at me, because I am the tall white-haired freakazoid striding through the middle of the room. Of course, Dulce wants to dance and immediately drags me to the middle of the EMPTY dance floor, which has suddenly been transformed into the Hilariously Awkward Gringa Show, starring Hayley. The night progressed in pretty much the same way, but eventually more people joined the dance floor and it wasn’t so bad. Still, every time I stole a glance at my comfortably seated parents, they were doubled over with laughter. At one point, following the theme of high school dance, a woman approached me and whispered, “Do you see that handsome young man over there?” while pointing to a chubby dude who looked about 20, dancing around with a lady. I nodded, and she continued, “Well, he wants to dance with you.” I kind of expected her to hand me a note, all folded complicatedly with that little fold sticking out, hella middle-school style. I gave her a noncommittal “bueno…” and she took me by the hand and led me over to him, said “There you go, here’s the blondie!”, at which point he ditched the girl he was with and immediately began grooving in front of me. This was maybe the most awkward moment in my life, especially since the chick he ditched just stood there and watched, like a foot away. To make matters worse, Mr. Fat ‘n Sweaty seemed to be really into dancing with his eyes shut, which made me unsure of where exactly I was supposed to be looking. Anyway, this painfully awkward exchange went on for about three minutes, until the song finally freaking ended and I awkwardly offered him a handshake and ran away. Jesus. Anyway, we didn’t eat until almost midnight and I danced until about 2:00am. I woke up this morning at about 7:30am, because I was promised an adventure. I thought it was a family reunion, but everyone stayed home except Dubal, Dona Dulce and I, so I’m not sure what you call it. It was cool though, the first time I’ve hung out with just my parents, and it was really lovely. Dulce and I kept lamenting on how soon I’ll have to head back to Valle de Angeles and how much we’ve grown to love one another. I feel like a part of this family and it breaks my heart that I have to leave ANOTHER family. They’re just so loving…anyway, we drove for like two hours through the beautiful, piney mountains until we got to corn country. We wound through corn fields until we finally happened upon a clearing, where we parked the truck and were met by their friends. They had build this sweet little gazebo out in the middle of rows of corn, with a smattering of mango and papaya trees. The gazebo had a little wood-burning grill and a delightful ratio of people-to-hammock, and we spent the day chewing on carne asada and various corn products (tamales, a thick ‘n hot corn drink that tasted like a tamale, and fried corn patties that also tasted like tamales) while lounging in the shade. I feel very strongly about hammocks and delicious corn products, so this was basically an excellent day for me. Aside from weddings and corn parties, this week has been pretty intense. I get up every day, take my cold shower, eat an enormous breakfast, and hop on the bus to get to my village school, Buena Vista. Sara and I do a project with the kids (so far we’ve done creative writing projects, nutrition, and self-esteem) and then we play some games with the kids until it’s time to go home for lunch. After lunch, Ana and I head to another village school, Jose Trinidad Cabanas, where we do similar projects in the little one-room school. Then I head home, do my prep for the next day, and go to bed (though not before eating my weight in delicious fried foods). Sometimes I have Spanish class, and sometimes instead of Spanish class our project leaders randomly take us to a gorgeous pool two hours away for a day of hippie games and frosty lemonades in the pool (seriously, this happened on Thursday—they called it a “personal health day” and it was extremely awesome). OH THAT REMINDS ME I HAVE REALLY IMPORTANT INFORMATION!!!!! Dudes!! How could I forget!! I THINK I KNOW WHERE MY SITE IS!! Finding out where your site is (where you’ll be placed for your two years of service) is a very lengthy and secretive process here in Youth Development. We have three “interviews,” in which we give our input on what we want to do, what our skills are, and any requests regarding location and/or site characteristics. During our final interview, which I had on Tuesday, our project leaders Rolando and Sandra tell us they’ve picked out a site for us, and give us certain characteristics about it, without telling us where it is. Why it’s so secretive, I don’t know—I just know they don’t officially announce our sites until Sept. 8, which is in 8 days from now. However, they told me enough about my site that I think I’ve got it figured out, and I’m so psyched. They said my site is VERY small and extremely rural. They said it’s on top of a mountain—but when I shrieked with joy they quickly informed me it’s an “ugly mountain, not green and pretty like in the states.” So if anyone wants to visit me on top of Ugly Mountain, just let me know. They said it has a river (yay fishing!) and that they saw a fox and a snake when they were last there (it was unclear in my interview whether the fox and snake were actually hanging out together, but that’s the impression that I got). They said it’s hot as the dickens, and extremely impoverished—one of the poorest areas in its department (there are 18 departments in Honduras, sort of like states). They said I will get a baseball team, and that the volunteer leaving the town is VERY enthusiastic about his baseball players. They said I will be the very first Youth Development volunteer the pueblo will have seen, which means it will be more challenging because I’ll have to train my counterparts on how to work with me. Counterparts are community organizations that I have been paired with for work—and I have three at the moment. One is an NGO that works with mothers and children, one is a primary school that is interested in starting a preschool, and one is a health center. They said it’s very rural, and that I’ll have electricity but no internet or anything. Based on all these clues, I made some phone calls to current volunteers and have deduced I am going to Alubaren, a small town of less than 1,000 in the very south of the Francisco Morazon department, which is the department where I currently live. Alubaren is so far south, though, it’s practically in the southern department of Choluteca. I know I originally said I was anti-south, due to the nasty heat, but I am so thrilled about my counterparts and the tiny, rural aspect that I don’t care. They said I’ll be working in nearby villages, and that to get around the mountainous area I’ll probably have to get a horse! CHILDHOOD DREAMS COMING TRUE: 1. I’m soooo excited to be working with a preschool and a health center….oh heavens. I can’t wait until I find out for sure that it’s Alubaren, but I’m willing to bet several lempiras on it. Puppy update: little Osita seems to have decided my room is the coolest place in the world to hang out, and shows me her affection by leaving little gifts all over the floor while I’m at school. Many a laugh was had at my expense when I, rather flustered with my discovery, tried to explain to my host mom that the puppy had left “mountains of poo” and “wide lakes of pee-pee” on my floor. I guess I should learn how to say “piles” and “puddles.” Either way, she is remarkably still alive and has an extremely well-functioning digestive system.Time for bed, dudes. By the way, I managed to watch Obama’s speech at the DNC the other night (struggling between listening to the faint English in the backyard and the booming Spanish dubbing), and I was so overwhelmed with pride in the new direction my country is headed that my eyeballs sweated a little. Dona Dulce and I had a long talk about him and she’s thrilled, too. GANA OBAMA!! Paz, Hayley

25 August 2008

Hey, chochachos! It’s a balmy Monday night here in Tang-Town…I just got back from a rockin’ birthday party. My family hoisted me into the truck at about 5:00pm, explaining we were going to go eat dinner at my mom’s sister’s house (she has 5 sisters, four of whom live here in Talanga, as well as her 86-year-old mother). When we got there, I was promptly handed a plate of yellow rice with furry crab legs sticking out of it (seriously, they were furry). I looked around and saw other folks chomping on them and sucking out the meat, so I tried to do that as casually as possible, which of course meant that I got a mouthful of crab-fur and tried to surreptitiously remove it from my mouth without anyone noticing, which obviously didn’t happen. Crab: 1, Hayley: 0. Whatever, dude, I didn’t want to eat you anyway. What kind of a sea-creature rocks fur? FAIL. This ended up being a birthday party, which I didn’t realize. For Honduran standards it was incredibly short, we were out of there before 7pm! I had a cup of ice cream, a butt-load of coke, and some delicious pound cake. And I only ate a little bit of crab fuzz. Oh, also, the birthday song they sing here is hilarious. It goes like this: “Now we want cake, now we want cake, even though it’s just a tiny piece, now we want cake! And coca-cola too. And coffee for the old people. And cookies!” SO TRUE.

This past week was platanos, p-l-a-t-a-n-o-s. Tiny chickens came and went, I spent most of my waking moments either teaching little children or planning to teach little children, and, most importantly, I totally ate a jillion pieces of Pizza Hut pizza in Tegucigalpa. I also had a Heineken. And then I went to a grocery store, and I bought a bag of Peanut M&Ms, and it was the best day ever. They’d dragged us all to Tegus for some immigration business, which was boring, but that was totally okay because the lameness made the subsequent feast that much more mind-blowing.

So the other day Alexa bursts into my room, and says, “LOOK WHAT I GOT!!!” while thrusting a baby chick into my face. I don’t totally love chickens (because sometimes they turn into roosters and I think we all know just exactly how I feel about that particular variety of Satan Foul), but this thing was the size of a tennis ball and made all these adorable “piu, piu” noises, so I was okay with it. She named it Gecko. So anyway, apparently she found it in the street, and decided it needed a home, and cuddled this thing all day long, giving it tomatoes and letting it chase her about. She was playing with it in the Cocodrilo when a little girl came up with her mom and said it was HER tiny devil-rooster, and that she’d lost it. Alexa gave it back in a fit of tears, and the little girl’s mom felt so bad that she showed up the next day with a NEW chick for Alexa. Meanwhile, one of our three dogs, Mia (the other two are Ninja, and J-Lo…they used to have a male named Puff Daddy, but he died. Poor J-Lo.) gave birth to several puppies, all of which died except one. Alexa was very excited to have a puppy all her own, until Mia sat on it and killed it. This means that in two days, she’d received and lost two pets. But things were going all right, now that she had Gecko #2, and then the day AFTER that, one of the kitchen employees in the restaurant showed up with a puppy for Alexa…which promptly ate Gecko #2. SO now we have no chickens, and one murderous little puppy who shit in my room yesterday.

In other news, I have saved a ton of babies with my incredible charla-giving skills (a charla is sort of like a talk/presentation). With my gringa partners, we taught the kiddies about self-esteem through the extremely applicable activity of selecting an animal that represents you and drawing a picture of it. It’s tough because these kids are NOT used to any degree of individual thinking or creativity (at least not in the smaller village schools), so our projects are usually met with canned answers (i.e., the only thing the kids claim to enjoy is studying and paying attention to the teacher and they all have the same favorite animal). We wanted to do self-esteem with both age groups, and the big kids’ project was great—using my headlamp, we traced the silhouette of each kid’s head, and following a discussion on their own individual characteristics and interests, they cut out images from magazines and pasted them in the brain area…whether they knew it or not, they were augmenting their self-esteem like the dang dickens. This activity was too much for the little guys, though, which resulted in the animal-esteem activity…kind of a stretch but at least it got them thinking about their own characteristics, and we tried to focus on why they’re each special. We did similar activities at the other school where I’m working, which is called Jose Trinidad Cabanas, located in a little aldea called La Esperanza. This school is called a “unidocente,” which means it’s a one-room schoolhouse with one teacher for all six grades. It’s located against a gorgeous backdrop of purple mountains, and it’s a very humble, sweet school. The big kids take care of and help the little kids, and the teacher is wonderful. After our projects, we take them outside and play awesome hippie games in the grass.

I can’t believe how time is flying here. I only have two weeks left here (I leave Talanga on September 9th)!! On the 8th, I find out where I’m going for two years…the suspense is making me all sweaty (seriously, I’m sweaty!). I really hope my community is teeny-weeny, in the mountains, and that I get to work with babies…we’ll find out, I guess. Maybe there is a community somewhere of tiny babies that live in a tiny village in the mountains, doing tiny things, needing my guidance…

In other news, I am trying to follow the haps of our main man Obama…I heard he picked Joe Biden as his VP, which is totally rockin’. We’re gonna make shirts that say “GANA OBAMA!” and parade around like shameless Americans. Speaking of being shameless Americans, this past Saturday the catholic volunteers in Talanga (there are five of them, they’re basically doing a mini-Peace Corps type deal for a year, and they’re all our age, living in a house together down the street) hosted all 15 of us for dinner. We made spaghetti and vegetables, listened to American music, spoke English, had a couple beers, and played games (I’ve become infatuated with these crazy hippie community-love games from the 70s called New Games). I managed to haul a sizable group into the backyard for a rousing round of Prui, followed by Skin-the-Snake. This was excellent until someone rolled in dog poop. It was basically the first gringo-only celebration I’ve been to since coming here, and it was kind of nice to just relax and speak delicious English.

Well, the geckos that live in the walls are chirping, so that means it’s about time to get my sweaty butt to bed. I love you guys. Tell Obama I said hi!!

Paz,

Hayley

16 August 2008

Hey, chochachos! It’s Saturday MORNING right now, which is crazy. I totally did a terrible thing culturally-integrating-wise…the rule of thumb is if you’re invited somewhere with the family, GO. But this morning, when my sister Dulce came knocking on my door at 7:45 to see if I wanted to go with the family to get coffee in a village nearby, I said…no. And then I slept until 10:00. And it was awesome. And I regret nothing. So there.

This week has been an interesting one, to say the least. For starters, I had another host brother staying in the house—he’s probably 30-something, named Carlos, and has a little 9-year-old son named Carlitos. They both spent a ton of time in England, so they speak excellent English with adorable british accents. Anyway, my little 7-year-old sister Alexa has had to suddenly share everything with her cousin, including toys, television time, and most importantly, her extremely cool new gringa friend. They’ve basically been bickering non-stop, several of which episodes have ended in tears. I really like Carlitos, he’s very bright and sweet and funny, so it’s a shame that they’ve dissolved into war.

I finally started doing some actual field-based training this week—so far it’s just been the same as it was in Valle de Angeles, going to classes all day without any actual practical experience. On Friday (yesterday), I took the 8am bus with three other gringa friends, Bug, Ana, and Sara, and we headed out to a little aldea (village) school named Buena Vista. The school was build by the community parents, and it’s tiny—just a building divided into two classrooms, one for the 1st, 3rd and 4th grades, and one room for the 5th and 6th grades. Each class has 20-30 kids, ranging from four-years-old to 16-years-old. There are just two teachers, and no principal or anything like that. They told us that the parents are heavily involved, and without them they wouldn’t have anything. The little school house is surrounded by patchy grass, where the kids play soccer during recess. They are several small scrubby trees, each housing about three little kids hanging from the branches. They have no electricity or running water—they don’t even have a pila! All the water they use has to be brought from home. The parents take turns bringing the Merienda Esoclar, or the state-mandated “school snack,” which arrives at about 11 or so every morning. It’s usually some rice and beans with some tortillas, though when we visited they had little tamales. A lot of bigger schools have their own kitchens so they can make the kids food on site, but little Buena Vista has no such luck. We showed up as the kids were lining up under a little thatched-roof awning, and the teachers had them clap to greet us, then sing the national Anthem, then pray for us. It was all very sweet. Then we split up, two gringas per classroom, and observed for the morning. Unfortunately, much of the Honduran educational system revolves around rote-memorization and copying, and it was no different here. The teacher would stride to one side of the class, show a card with the letter “T” on it to the little guys, then have them copy “Ta, Te, Ti, To, Tu” over and over again in their little notebooks. Then she’d walk to the other side of the room, write several long division problems on the board, solve them, and have the children copy it into their notebooks. Not a lot of creativity nor self-exploration being facilitated here…it’s hard because I’m looking at their culture through my own biases from being raised in the states, but I have a hard time valuing this style of learning. That said, these teachers have extraordinarily difficult tasks, teaching a classroom with such a wide range of developmental stages, and they work very hard for very little, so I can’t criticize what they do.

17 August 2008

Holy dang, it is raining like the dickens. It’s about 9pm right now, Sunday night…I just hung up with my folks! (Hi Mom! Hi Dad!) It’s rad, they call me every Sunday night, which always helps quell the homesickness I’ve built up over the week. I think about home every day, mentally re-living bike adventures in the warm Evanston night air, climbing little trees and skateboarding with Max and Harrison, dropping bags of water on people from my balcony…god, those were the days. Not that I’m not loving Honduras…I just had such a good time back in the states, too. I really, really miss everybody…HUGS.

This weekend was really awesome. Saturday was similar to last week’s…a bunch of gringos came to Talanga from their prospective FBT sites, and we lounged around, beating the heat by consuming fried chicken, ice cream, beer, soda, popsicles…we had plans to go hiking by the caves again, but the heat got the best of us and I spent a lot of the day in a semi-reclined position. Today, Sunday, was TOTALLY FREAKING AWESOOOOOME because my host family and I fried up some chicken, packed it in a giant plastic tub with a ton of tortillas and beans, put on our swim trunks and headed for the hills. We drove to a family friends’ house out in the campo, where we somehow loaded Dona Dulce, my sister Dulce, her brother Carlos, his son Carlitos, Alexa and her little friend, a family friend and her kid, me, and three other men into a tiny vehicle that can best be described as the cab to a big-rig, minus the big rig, with the normal tires removed and replaced with huge tractor tires. This tiny beast could scramble up Mt. Everest if it wanted to. Most of us, including myself, crammed ourselves in the “bed” of this thing, while everyone else wedged into the cab. We rambled through small fincas of banana, coconut, and mango trees, before making our way into a wonderfully fragrant pine forest, driving over cut rock and up and down impossible little hills. After about half an hour of butt-crunching driving (the metal truck bed was mega-ouchy), we arrived!! We unloaded the food and hiked down to AMAZING THINGS!! A river turned into a sweet little waterfall, falling into a small pool with lots of little rocks for climbing and jumping. We all sat down and immediately dug in, everybody ripping pieces of chicken off with the tortilla and then shoving the whole thing in your mouth. Soda was served up in plastic baggies, which are tied shut, with a hole nibbled into the corner for sucking (typical Honduran beverage consumption). After our picnic we swam around for a bit, then hiked down to an even MORE awesome sight. A huge waterfall plunged down into a very deep, silver-colored pool, which was like a giant crater, with the enormous rock walls rising 30 feet above the water. I got the balls to jump off the cliff into the water, which was awesome. Huge green jungle plants were growing off the rocks, with bright green algae poking out around the waterfall, and crazy ferns everywhere…it was beautiful. We swam around and jumped off the rocks for the rest of the afternoon, finally heading home around 4:00pm.

Oh man, guys. Hells of bedtime.

Love,

Hayley

P.S. I´ve been receiving from letters from you guys!!!! THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. Seriously it´s like the hungry kid who hides Kudos granola bars under her bed and secretly eats them under the covers at night, only instead of hungry it´s miss-y and instead of chewy chocolately goodness it´s letters from home. Everything else is accurate.

12 August 2008

Hey, chochachos! Life continues here in my dollhouse in Talanga, quite delightfully I might add. Today after a language test, my teacher took me out back behind his house where his host family (yep, even the teachers get host families during Field-Based Training) showed us around. Their yard is medium sized but it’s basically a mini-finca! A cluster of sugar cane grows in the back, and he wielded the omnipresent machete and hacked me off a whole stalk to take home. You just chop the outer layers off and chew on the tough, fiber-y insides until all the sugar-water is gone, then spit it out. I like to think of this as tropical chaw, and made several jokes along those lines. Then he saw me eyeing the mango tree, and invited me to climb to the top and pick myself a mango, which I promptly did. The canopy was beautiful and I saw a lot of really amazing-looking bugs I’d never seen before. Once I descended, he asked if I would also like a coconut, and proceeded to jab at a big bunch of them high in a tree with a two-by-four until they fell down. Again, the machete was wielded and I soon had an entire coconut to drink and eat. AWESOME.

Last Saturday was my one-month-versary of being in Honduras, which we celebrated with a big lunch at the restaurant my family owns, called Old House. All the gringos here in Talanga came, followed by a sizable chunk of PAM and Municipal Development gringos. We shoved a bunch of tables together, and before Dona Dulce knew what hit her she had over 20 plates to make up. I served as a waitress of sorts, handing out glass bottles of Canada Dry, Coke, and Fresca and marching out into the din of English every 10 minutes to bellow OKAY SO WHO ORDERED THE CARNE ASADA?! RAISE YOUR HANDS AND KEEP THEM UP!! It was the waitressing experience I’ve always dreamed of. Afterwards we trooped over to the Cocodrilo, the outside patio bar my sister Dulce Carolina owns, and hung out in the sunshine for a couple hours. It was essentially a giant English-speaking gringo-fest of ridiculous proportions. Sunday was also super tranquilo and, like all satisfying closures to a busy week, involved a minor spelunking adventure.

THAT’S RIGHT DUDES I TOTALLY FOUND A CAVE. And if by “found” you mean “was lead to by a gaggle of Honduran children” and by “cave” you mean “yes, a cave” then…YES. I got up at like 8:30, and after a typical Honduran breakfast of refried beans, fried bananas, fried eggs, half an avocado and several tortillas, I slathered myself in sunscreen and set off for the Parque Central (most pueblos have a little central park) to hook up with the gringas and their Honduran child-friends (my child-friend was uninterested). We paraded through town (whenever more than one gringo is in transit, it’s essentially a parade, minus free tiny-frisbees and crappy hard candy being chucked at kid’s heads). We wound through the dirt streets until we got to the base of a small hill, called Cruzita, because it has a giant Cruz (cross) at the top of it. If there’s one thing Honduras loves, it’s Jesus. Anyway, we clamored up the hill, then down the other side, then up a mountain. The view was AWESOME, we saw the whole valley and all the tropical/piney glory that is Honduras. Then we got to this little flat clearing, which upon leaving had filled up with a bunch of ninos playing futbol and preparing to bash open a piñata. Anyway, our kids lead us to the cave, which seemed fairly diminutive at first. Since this is Honduras, it was of course surrounded by a ton of garbage and a horse or two (everywhere you look here, there are stray horses). I had brought my headlamp, so I ducked in behind the bravest Honduran children you’ve ever seen. The entrance was small and cramped, I had to walk while squatting basically—but after the small tunnel we came into a big open room with high ceilings. It was warm and muggy inside, with tons of flying bugs. The floor had a sizable family of big, red cockroaches, but the best part was what was zooming all around us—little brown BATS (or murcielagos, in Spanish)!! They made the cutest bat noises (sounds a lot like, “eee, soy un murcielago! Eee! Eee! Somos murcielagos!”) and flew around all crazy-like. I had a linguistic adventure trying to explain the concept of echo-location and sonar to the children, and we stayed in there for about 20 minutes just admiring the bats. It was a little eerie being in total darkness except for my light, which was dimmed by the thick mist that hung in the air (which also totally fogged my stupid glasses, by the way). It was really awesome, my first time in a cave like that—but incredibly frustrating to see how much freaking GARBAGE people had thrown in there—burned plastic bottles, chip bags, even a rusty machete. The concept of tossing garbage in a garbage can isn’t a universally accepted notion here, and most people won’t think twice about chucking everything out the bus or car window.

Except for the rather blatant disregard for the environment, I’m still loving life here in Honduras. I do miss my old host family, but I also LOVE LOVE LOVE my new one. They’re just so chill. Dubal, the father, works in Tegus and comes home only on weekends, but he’s really cool. He used to be a Congressman, and seems to be heavily involved in the community—he even ran for mayor once! (If you know a child with a mayor obsession, don’t worry, there is literature available.) My mom, Dona Dulce, is just great. She’s very laid back, always smiling or chuckling, shuffling around the Old House kitchen or cuddling little baby John. We spent most of our free time in the restaurant, sitting in chairs behind the counter, watching telenovelas (soap operas) and sucking back sodas (holy moley do they drink a lot of pop here). We do all our eating there, which I absolutely delight in—I get scrumptious restaurant food three times a day! The only downfall is it’s scrumptious restaurant food, which means EVERYTHING needs to spend at least 10 minutes becoming delicious in several inches of oil before it’s served. I’m only here for five weeks though, so I’ve decided it’s not going to kill me and I might as well indulge. God, I love fried bananas.

I found an old junky bike in the back of the garage, covered in several inches of grime, with a chain practically rusted solid. I mentioned my interest in fixing it up, and Dona Dulce told me I could clean it up and she’d have it fixed for me! I gave it a bath the other day, while Alexa washed her brand-new shiny bike next to me. I came home from school the next day, and Dona Dulce handed my a bike registration card—she’d gone through the trouble of registering it with the police; apparently sometimes they stop people to see if they’ve got papers for their bikes. This sounds ridiculous to me, but at least I’m legal now. The chain was de-rusted and the rear wheel doesn’t rub too much on the frame anymore. The Peace Corps has a rule that if a Volunteer is caught riding without a helmet, it’s an automatic Administrative Separation, which is government slang for immediate sacking. Anyway, a fellow gringa found me a helmet in her family’s house, so now I’m cruising around Talanga in extreme style. The only problem is the same thing that happens to me in the states—as soon as I get on a bike, I lose any and all interest in ever walking again, and become quite irritated if I’m forced to ambulate.

I’m also loving spending time with my 26-year-old host sister, Dulce Carolina, who I alternately call Dulce, Carolina, or Caro. She’s got two kids, but seems more like a peer than anything else. She totes me around wherever she goes, whether it’s for a random Sunday-afternoon slice of cake with ice cream on top, out in the campo furtively picking wild mint with which to make mojitos, or over to the Cocodrilo for a licuado (smoothie). I’ve taken to hanging out there with her when it’s slow, chatting in the little kitchen and watching her or Yonari fry chicken wings. Dulce is just great because I feel like I can really talk to her like a friend. She’s sort of a tomboy, with a wicked sense of humor and likes a lot of the same things I do (such as hiking and biking). I can’t get over how great it is to have a Honduran friend my own age.

We just finished our first week of Field-Based Training, which I must admit was not very field-y. We just sat in a classroom all day long, with Spanish from 7:30-11:30, and Youth Development topics from 1-5:00pm. However, the stuff we’re receiving is all extremely important—we learned how to give a taller (workshop) on domestic violence prevention, and had one today on how to start maternal care groups. I think on Friday we’re going to finally start working in schools or other community resources. I had two interviews today, one which was an oral language exam to judge how my Spanish has (or has not) progressed. I entered at the upper-most level of Intermediate, and I’m hoping I’ll end up at the upper-levels of Advanced, but I don’t know. The more I study, the more I’m overwhelmed by how much I don’t know. The other interview I had was a Technical Interview, which deals with what I would or would not like to do in my two years here, and I want in a site. I stressed that I am willing to do anything, anywhere—but that I most love little children and I’d also love to be anywhere BUT the south. However, my project leaders were rather defensive regarding my negative generalizations about the south of Honduras (hot, flat, ugly), and some of their questions give me the suspicion that is precisely where they intend on sending me. I’d rather be out west, in the mountains, but I’m here to work, not relax, and que será, será, I guess.

I miss you guys a LOT. A lot a lot. I was looking at some pictures on my laptoppy and was overcome with how much I wish I could see everybody…and it’s only been a month. I don’t feel homesick, just peoplesick…send me letters!! Though I guess I should put my money where my mouth is and send YOU guys some letters too, instead of mass blog entries...oh heavens.

Well, it’s 9:50pm now, on this rainy Tuesday night, and it’s about time to crawl into my dollhouse and dream my tiny dollhouse dreams. Tomorrow I plan on lassoing a stray horse and taming it, hella Penny-and-Felicity style, so I’ll let you guys know how that progresses.

Paz,

Hayley

P.S. My new favorite Honduran joke: There are a lot of Mormon missionaries here in Honduras. A common slang term for testicles is “los Mormones.” Why? Because they always come in pairs, and one is always bigger than the other. They’re always sweaty, and they always knock at the door, but never enter inside the house. Oh, Honduras.

1 August 2008

Hey, chochachos! DANG I’m tired. It’s like 10:45pm on Friday night, way past my bedtime….I’m only writing in my bloggeroonie right now because I am so filled with my EMOTIONS that I feel to not write would be a waste of sheer guts-power. And I can’t waste my guts! That ain’t sustainable!

Anyway, I’m just so happy with my host family/sad to be leaving them this Sunday. I just got home from a gringo’s birthday party (more on that later) and spend like 30 minutes lying on the bed in the other room, playing with the kids and chatting with Suyapa. Every day I feel more and more at home here and I’m so sad to be leaving. Suyapa always asks the girlies, “Do you want your sister to leave? Are you going to give her permission to leave us?” and they always shout, “NO!!!” On Sunday, I’ll be going to Talanga, a city north of Tegus, for about six weeks. There I’ll be doing my Field-Based Training (FBT), which departs from the sitting-in-criminally-uncomfortable-chairs-for-six-hours-a-day-and-listening-to-theories-behind-sustainable-development-work world and enters the world of hands-on-getting-dirty-in-the-field work. I’m very excited to finally begin working (we do mini-projects, sort of like micro-Peace-Corps), but I’ll be with a new host family and I’d just as soon stay with the one I love here. Plus, I love living here in the campo and Tolanga is more or less a city, though rather undeveloped I’m told. My new host family has a mom, a dad, a host sister of 26 years, and her six-month-old baby. They live in a house behind the restaurant they own, called “Old House” (in English!). It will be an interesting change not to have a house full of bellowing little girls, and I already miss them. There is something awesome about having a little welcome party come charging up the dirt hill every day after school that I will certainly miss. After my six weeks in Tolanga, I’ll return to Santa Rita for my last two weeks of training, and after that I’ll head out to my yet undetermined site for two years.

I spent the first chunk of the week (Sunday-Wednesday) in the dirty south of Honduras, in the port city of San Lorenzo. I say city because it’s got about 50,000 people, but it felt EXACTLY just like any other small-town Honduras. Dirt roads, hella dogs, ladies selling baleadas (Honduran street snack food—delicious chewy tortilla with a thin smear of refried beans and cheese inside), and a jillion kids running around. The only difference was the main streets were paved, they had things like a post office, several banks, restaurants, even a couple discos several bars. The town was very flat, which means bikes are the main form of transit—hooray! Critical Mass would be ridiculous here. It’s really common to see like three grown men riding one bike together—one pedaling, one on the handlebars and one on the frame. I even saw a man riding around with his tiny, tiny baby sitting on his lap. Crazy. It was indeed HOT AS THE DICKENS in this place—probably about 100 degrees in the heat of the day. Not as bad as Dixon, but the sun here is incredibly strong and it basically made me want to die. I was visiting a current volunteer (who’s about to Close of Service, or COS, which means her two years are up) named Lindsay. She was really chill and I loved getting to know her. We spent a good deal of time lying in hammocks, drinking water and trying not to melt. The volunteer visit was really, really fun, but it made me realize how much I’d prefer NOT to be placed in the south. I really hope they stick me somewhere north of Tegucigalpa.

Today was insanely exciting because they brought us MAIL! Some kids got like 500 letters, but I was so psyched ‘cause I got one from my good amigo David (hey man…thank you. Seriously. It made my day). I also got a package from my mom with some things I’d left in California, so all in all it was a good day. The only thing that sucks is I seem to have some kind of mild stomach thing. I’m not afflicted with the pringa-pie (splatter-food, if you recall…our euphemism for diarrhea), but I have terrible stomach gas-cramps that feel EXACTLY like those that accompany the splatter-foot…I don’t know what the deal is. I still have a normal appetite, but jeez. When the stomach cramps hit, I call it “riding the Pain Train,” and signal this to my friends by miming a conductor pulling the cord to honk his horn. I can usually catch Patrick’s eye during Spanish class and solemnly honk my horn twice, to which he will nod knowingly. I find this to be a much more tasteful and discreet way of informing my friends that I am currently experiencing gas. Soy una dama, people. (Dama = dame = LADY).

Tonight was Justin’s, a fellow gringo, birthday. It was at some random house—a friend of a friend, I guess?—but this nice gringo guy who knows him came and picked us all up and took us all home later. This house was beautiful, and they cooked us a delicious dinner, provided an awesome open bar, and an ice cream cake. I couldn’t eat any more food since I’d eaten at home, but I had some rum-and-cokes and danced salsa, punta, and reggaeton (which, for me, all involve pointing my fingers and waggling my butt around and/or churning the butter religiously). I couldn’t get over how nice it was for them to host all us gringos…people here are just SO DANG NICE. It was also really funny because, as someone pointed out, it was the first time I’ve been to a birthday party with an 8:30pm curfew since I was like 12. I texted my mom, “Can I please stay out till 9pm?” and she promptly texted me back, “Yes you may, but take care of yourself!” I for one rather enjoy having someone keep such tight rein on me…she texts me to check up on me like three times a day and it makes me feel cared for, which is kind of comforting in the semi-stressful environment that is Spanish 24/7. Even though I’m rarely alone, I sometimes feel kind of lonely and this makes me feel loved and that’s comforting. I’ve gotten really close to some of my gringo friends here, and am increasingly close to my family, but still…it’s hard being away from everyone I love, surrounding by only Spanish with the constant realization I’m here alone for two years. I love it here and I can’t wait to get to work, but I admit sometimes I wish the bus would just keep going until the States and I’d be home. However I know this will get a lot easier once I stop leaping around and get settled into my community.

All righty I’m gonna pass out…it’s 11pm now and that is most definitely time for me to the fall the heck asleep. For those of you who used the Tigo website to text me, THANKS!! That warmed my itty bitty heart. Too bad I can’t respond. I will try to squeeze some sweat or something into an envelope and send it to you ASAP.

To those of you who didn’t…raise your hand if you want tarantula balls in your mailbox!! The site is www.tigo.com.hn, but the instructions to text me are in Spanish, so you might have to find someone who speaks the language to help you out. My number is 9598-7436!! Seriously. Tarantula balls. No one wants that.

Buenas noches, amigos. I miss you and love you all! I hope everyone is so very happy.

Paz,

Hayley

p.s. I had a dream last night that our main man Obama won the election!! These malaria pills sure give me awesome dreams…

4 August 2008

Holy dang, it’s august. Am I the only one befuddled by that? I haven’t even been here a month yet (that will be on the 9th) but it feels like I’ve been here for years. Sort of. Some things I can’t get used to are:

-drinking things out of bags, not bottles

-tiny black ants/look just like harmless American ants = painful bitey kind.

-huge brown ants = non-bitey

-constant itching around my feet and ankles due to all my mosquito bites (oh hell what if I have scabies?! I just thought about that. Oh man. I might have scabies. I should look into that)

-the lawless insanity that is Honduran driving

-Honduran women storing their cell-phones in their cleavage, always.

-frogs that sound like laser guns (seriously this is awesome, I spent a lot of time pretending to fire laser guns in sync with their croaks and no, this joke does not get old)

-men shouting things at me/whistling/smooching at me on the street

-damn roosters

Some things I especially love about life in Honduras are:

-drinking things out of bags, not bottles

-the school kids who chase after me smiling and waving and saying “HELLOW! HELLOW!”

-the food (seriously, I love beans/rice/tortillas/eggs, I don’t know what everyone is always bitching about. The food here is delicious).

-how freakin’ AMABLE (friendly) people here are

-the tranquility of living in the campo (countryside)

-the intense green everywhere I look.

-the chickens

-my host families

That’s right, I said families. I got two now, dudes! I’m currently in Talanga, sitting in the dark living room of my new house on this balmy Monday night. It’s like 9:40, and I hope to get my sweaty butt in bed within the next 20 minutes. We’ll see if that happens. More about my family in a minute.

Day before yesterday (Saturday) was basically my most urban Honduran adventure to date. I traveled into Tegus with Suyapa, my host mom, and the three little kids. To get out of the countryside, we take a mototaxi, an insane contraption that’s basically a motorcycle-tricycle with a seat on the back and a little nylon roof. They’re actually really fun to take out in the country, but I don’t ride on them too often on the main road because if we were to get in an accident, whatever hit us (assuming it’s bigger than a cat) would totally whomp us flat. So we took the Mototaxi to the calle principal, and then hopped on a Rapidito, a little bus that takes us more or less directly to Tegus. The seats were almost full, so I sat in the back with both girls on my lap. I actually really like traveling with them, because I feel like having two little brown girlies in my arms/lap/hands makes me seem like less of a gringa, and thus less conspicuous. Maybe people assume their mother is a Honduran albino? Anyway, we wound our way through Tegus for almost 30 minutes, and eventually got off and arrived at Suyapa’s sisters’ apartment. She has a million sisters, it seems (I can’t figure out how many exactly) and these four live together in a nice little apartment. It’s in a hilly, dirt-road barrio, but it has a gorgeous view of the city. The sisters are YOUNG (18, 20, 22, 25, or something) are all either studying or working in the city. They were all super friendly and really funny, just like Suyapa. We ordered Pizza Hut delivery (OH MY GOD it was heavenly) and hung around. Then three of them took the girls with them to church and Suyapa, a sister and I went on a mission to get baby Javier’s hair cut—Suyapa wanted it buzzed, but didn’t have the buzzer thing to do so at home. We took a colectivo taxi to the centro (central area with a little park) and found a haircuttery place for guys only. I was sad to see Javier’s furriness drop away (his hair feels like a terrier puppy’s fur) but he looks pretty baller with a buzzed head. He was very polite during his haircut, but kept trying to crane his head back to watch the buzzer, which resulted in the man having to palm his head like a basketball.

My good gringo buddy Derek was also in Tegus with his family at this time, so I hooked up with them for the rest of the evening (they came and fetched me in their mini-van). His parents and host cousin took us to see Batman: The Dark Knight, which was AWESOME. The joker (el Guason, in Spanish) definitely stole the show, and if you haven’t seen the movie, go see it. Anyway, the theatre was in a huge fancy mall, and it looked just like any mall you’d find in the states. To get there, we passed a hundred crappy American food chains (TGI Fridays, Applebees, other such fineries) as well as the most incredible KFC I’ve ever seen (picture an enormous two-story plexiglass bucket of chicken that serves as a giant play-place for children. Know what’s NOT outlawed in Honduras? That’s right. BALL PITS.). It was weird seeing this side of Tegus, especially compared to campo from which I was coming. Anyway, after the movie, Derek’s parents were like “Now who wants to go have some fun, eh??” and took us to a Cuban restaurant for dancing…but it was all high-heels-swishy-dresses-stampy-tango-dancing, so we went to a local disco instead. They bought us (me, Derek, his 22-year-old host cousin) some beers and we watched the dancing for a while. Seriously, it never ceases to amaze me the apparently lack of joints Hondurans have in their hips. They’re like sexy snakes, wiggling all over the place. After a while Derek’s folks got up to dance, and shook it with the best of them on the dance floor for quite a while. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do at this point (group dancing does not seem to be a thing here, and we were an odd number), but the three of us went onto the floor and I danced around with Derek for a bit, while the host cousin disappeared. Derek very patiently attempted to teach me some basic dance steps to the rhythmic brain-tease that is latino music. Fortunately, the steps were similar enough to the drumline’s “Hey Baby” dance that I was able to not make a huge ass of myself (thank god for NUMB). Then I danced for a bit with the host cousin (I think his name was Wilmar?), which was not ‘real dancing’ but much more my style, which is facing whoever you’re dancing with and doing exaggerated, ridiculous things with my face and hands in an attempt to use humor to mask the fact I can’t dance. Wilmar seemed to think this was hilarious and did a pretty good job of miming me (though I must say he can’t do the sprinkler as well as I can, and don’t even get me STARTING on his butter-churning). I got a lot of stares (everywhere I go, people stare) but I tried to just ignore it. I had an awesome time, actually…it was really fun, and my first time in a Honduran disco. When the place closed down around 2am, we left for home (Derek’s dad had been drinking cokes all night, don’t worry). On the way, his dad leaned back and was like, “Now, who wants chicken??” We stopped at a 24-hour roadside chicken stand, and I sound found myself eating a delicious baked chicken breast and some tortillas at 2:30am It was awesome because I don’t think I would have wanted to do all this alone (Tegus is scary at night, sometimes) and here we have a really chill, fun host family who can escort us along to all the fun places. It was like a super play-date for grown-ups and their gringos. I snuck into the house at about 3am (don’t worry, I’d been in text-communication with Suyapa all night so she knew what was up) and woke up the next morning to many sly grins and “Well, well, well, look who finally showed up??” The first thing the girls said to me was, “Why didn’t you come home after the movie last night?” Seriously, you can’t sneak anything by these wise little eyeballs.

Anyway, that was Saturday and now it’s Monday and I’m in Talanga. It was quite sad leaving my host family (Suyapa and the girls all cried) and at first, I was sort of angry that I had to leave in the first place. However, I really do like Talanga—it’s a big town but, of course, with its dirt roads and pigs all over the place, it feels small. I’m living with an awesome host family in a big house behind the restaurant they own, which serves a lot of meat and potatoes. The mom is Dulce and the dad is Dubal. She runs the restaurant and Dubal works in Tegus, coming home only on weekends. They have a 30-something-year-old son, Cristian, who also lives and works in Tegus, and a 26-year-old daughter, also named Dulce. She has a 7-year-old daughter, Alexa, and a 7-month-old son, John. Both her kids were born in the states, where their father lives and works (in Florida). He hopes to come to Honduras in a couple years, they said. Alexa is essentially fluent in English, and reeealllllyyyy wants to practice with me, so we only speak in English. She’s the only one, though, so I still speak in Spanish with the rest of the family. The house is a LOT bigger than the little brick house I had in Santa Rita, with four bedrooms and two bathrooms. They have a lot of property and like four cars…seems the restaurant does pretty well for itself. There is also a bar next door, El Cocodrilo, which is owned by the daughter Dulce. It’s really nice, with an outdoor patio, and I hung out with her behind the counter last night. The whole family is really sweet and friendly, and I especially love Dulce. She and I have a lot in common and it’s awesome to finally have a real Honduran friend my own age. I was so sad to leave my Santa Rita family, but I can tell I’m going to be really happy here.

Anyway, it’s 10:20 and I absolutely need to go to bed, which is a dollhouse. Literally. My room used to be little Alexa’s room (she’s shackin’ up with grandma currently), and the room is a literal museum of stuffed animals, Barbies, and toys. She also has Backstreet Boys stickers on the closet circa 1998. Hot stuff. Anyway, the bed is a giant dollhouse with the bed built into it, so when I’m sleeping my head is literally inside this house. It’s kind of weird but I secretly love it and pretend I’m a giant who is saving up her money for a bigger house but in the meantime has to make due with a human-sized house. This is the game I mentally play when I crawl into bed.

Paz,

Hayley

p.s. my stomach is better! Yay!

Oh heavens, pìctures!! Here I am in the bosque behind me house, with a rock.

Here I am with baby Javier in the house. Suyapa is trying to hide.

Here is my posse!! Alexa, Pamela, Nasaret, Melani, Madeline, Walter, Luis, la bebe. The girlies i nthe red dress, and the one in the front with the white shirt with spots, are my two little host sisters.

My host sister (in red) and two neighbors, playing in the front yard.

Some local vegetation.

Hey dudes, here are some more blog entries, and pictures!! I´m currently in an internet café in San Lorenzo, a biggish city way in the south (in Valle). I´m here, sweating my brains out, visiting a PC volunteer for four days to get a feel for what it´s really like. Like I said, the weather is what hot becomes when it decides to go to college and really make something of itself, but aside from that it´s pretty rad. It´s right by the ocean and the folks are really nice. Anyway, here are some bloggies. Chops requested I put them in order from oldest to newest so they could be read in order, so here that is, for your viewing pleasure. Also, pictures take FOREVER to load here, so I only did a couple.

22 July 2008

Hey, chochachos! It’s Tuesday night, and I’m about to begin working on a paper I have due Thursday regarding HIV/AIDS in Honduras…very sobering data. In all of latinoamerica, Honduras is second only to Haiti in the number of AIDS cases in country. And since the majority (70%) of Honduras is regarded as youth, and almost 50% of Hondurans become sexually active before they’re 18, well…we got our work cut out for us. It’s extremely depressing because in a country of 7.4 million inhabitants, 63,000 are infected with HIV/AIDS (1.8%). The grand majority of these cases are transmitted through (heterosexual) intercourse, and second via mother to baby. Very, very sad.

On a happier note, I went on a short hike tonight after dinner with my gringo buddies Derek and Rob and we found awesome waterfalls!! Actually, I’d seen them before, but from across the gorge (I don’t know what exactly constitutes a gorge geologically (Erika? Paige?) but it sounds more dramatic than valley so Im’a stick with gorge. It also smacks of Rescuers Down Under, but we don’t really need to get into that right now. Anyway, we tramped through shiny green tropical plants, ducked under skinny young pines (as well as several seemingly random cords of barbed wire) until we could hear the water. We clamored down the mountain a bit and hunkered down on some really awesome-smelling moss-covered rocks to watch the water. The falls aren’t anything too spectacular in terms of volume, but since we were so high up they looked quite impressive. Lots of little pools cascading down 50 feet to the next…we reckon we could probably climb down to them if we approached from the other side (not the sheer cliff we were perched on tonight) so maybe I’ll give that a whirl next time I’m out there. The only problem is, the only time we have during the week to hike is in the evenings, which is when all the bugs are out. The mosquitos aren’t actually that bad here, but SOMETHING keeps biting us and leaving tiny bumps with a little red blood-blister-looking dot in the middle. They itch for like two weeks before they go away...not to mention that look frighteningly like what I would imagine the bot-fly looks like (this little guy, or girl I suppose, lays its eggs in your skin. A larvae then hatches and lives in your skin until you discover it and get it out…which is done by suffocating the worm by putting Vaseline over the tiny opening. The worm runs out of breath and comes squirming to the surface in search of air, at which point you grab it with tweezers and pull it out. If this ever happens to me, you can be assured the worm will suffocate by the volume of vomit I will have covered myself in. THIS IS THE GROSSEST THING I CAN IMAGINE. THAT IS ALL).

This weekend was really awesome. After class on Saturday, I headed with some gringos to the nearby town of Valle de Angeles, which is a “cuidad turistico.” This means that every store is laden with Honduran souvenirs, from hippie tunics to machetes (made in El Salvador, of course) to extremely attractive fanny-packs…which I purchased. Anyone who says fanny-packs aren’t the very essence of sexy clearly hasn’t spent enough time around the inherently cool individuals who sport them. Anyway, our plan was to find an internet café to do research, but the incredible freedom of wandering in a real town was too exhilarating and we lost our academic steam. We found a café where some other gringos from our program were having a beer and joined them. It was quite indulgent and I don’t even mind that I had to pay 80 lempiras ($4) for a plate of french fries with avocado and beans. After Valle, we took a bus back to Las Canadas, a little settlement nearish to mine, where a gringa Sara was hosting a mid-afternoon dance party. Her house is beautiful (seriously, it has a fountain in the front yard and a bathroom with higher ceilings than my house) and her host-parents were so nice to host us. We danced to punta, meringue, salsa, Bob Marley, and some Abba. I got to churn the butter for hours! There was so much butter left over, some even got on the mayor.

After the dance/butter fest, Derek, Patrick and I hiked through the woods back up to my colonia, which proved to be quite the short-cut. We had to cross a little water-fall which I delighted in, and promptly exaggerated in girth and force to anyone who wanted to hear about it. I went to bed pretty early that night, and the next morning, my mom, the kids, Patrick and I headed to my host-aunt’s house, which may or may not be a Sunday ritual. Patrick came along ‘cause he’s a veggie and I was going cook my famous fried-tofu lasagna thing. It was a little different because I didn’t have certain ingredients (lasagna noodles, ricotta) but it worked out all right and was extremely tasty anyway. And, since the aunt has internet in her house, I was able to check my e-mail, post a blog, and do all my research for my paper. SCORE. That night, after a harrowing ride home in a mototaxi (basically a three-wheeled motorcycle with a carriage on the back that fits three), Patrick and I went hiking with his awesome three host siblings, Luis, Walter, and Nasaret, plus a cousin whose name I forgot. We rambled until dark, stopping to play a pick-up game of Wadded-Up Raincoat Toss, which had rules that sort of resembled a cross between American football and Ultimate Frisbee.

Guess that’s all for now, amigos. I’ll try to post some pictures soon! Don’t forget you can call me if you want. Also, you can send me text messages FOR FREE from the Tigo website (Tigo is my cellphone provider). You might want to google it, but I think it’s www.tigo.com.hn. The site’s in Spanish, but if you can figure it out, just enter my phone number (9598-7436) and type in your message and I’ll get it! I can’t write back, though.

Paz dudes!

26 July 2008

Hey, chochachos! It’s Saturday night here, about 9:47pm…this is the latest I’ve stayed up in a while (well, since last Wednesday, when I pulled a “Honduran all-nighter” and stayed up till the ghastly hour of 11:23pm working on my HIV/AIDS project). It works out all right though, I basically drink tasty coffee nonstop all day long, so I’m pretty much wired until what I call the Too Much Spanish Equilibrium kicks in and I pass out in my bed in exhaustion. This week was tiring but really fun, I had 7 kinds of adventures and learned a fair amount as well.

I’ve been going through a weird time here, regarding what exactly I want to do. As I’ve mentioned, there are three projects in my Honduras group—Youth Development, Protected Areas Management (PAM), and Municipal Development. This week I sort of had a mini-midlife crisis during which time I recognized that I really wanted to do PAM—it sounds like so much fun, tramping around in the woods, teaching environmental ed, helping farmers improve their techniques in a sustainable way and encouraging productive yet environmentally friendly practices in protected area buffer zones…I talked to the PC people and they said yes, it would be possible to switch. I sat in on a PAM meeting and participated in some activities…but by the end of the day, I was even more confused about what I want/should do…I confess I kind of freaked out in a mild way, which mainly involved trying not to cry—totally weird. But I talked about it with some friends and thought a lot about it, and decided it would be silly to switch groups. Working with kids is what I love and is what I’ve always done and was meant to do. I came down here to help and that is certainly where I can do the most good. My area of expertise is definitely babies and not farming, no matter how much I like running around in the woods. I’m hoping my future site will be in an area where teaching environmental education/care for protected areas is relevant and applicable to the kids lives—but I know that no matter what I’ll be able to do SOMETHING with the kids that involves trees and the reverence thereof. I feel kind of stupid now about almost switching groups—why would I be in anything BUT youth development?—but I blame my brief dabbling in the forbidden fruits of environmental work on culture shock, exhaustion, and too many beans/coffee. Anyway, the PC folks were really nice about the whole thing and everything is back to normal.

I recently discovered (more like learned about) a cool trail that leads from the furthest bus stop up through the mountain to my house! Recently, me and whoever wants to (usually patrick and derek I guess) get off at that stop instead of the one closer to our homes and then hike up. It takes about 45 minutes or so, and it’s really pretty. We wind around lots of little homes, cross a river, and then climb more or less straight up until I get to Santa Rita. One of the things I love about Honduras is that you basically greet every single person you pass with a “Buenas” or “Buenos” and a smile…at least in the campo. If someone is sitting on their porch, you call it out and wave, and they smile and call back. It’s so freakin awesome, it makes me feel connected to everybody even though I’ll probably never see them again. It makes the hike home even that more fun.

Sometimes, if I get home early enough, I’ll drop off my bags and go back out for another hike, usually with a couple gringos and whichever Honduran neighbor kids want to come along (I have a small posse of about 8-10 ninos who seem to appear out of thin air the moment I come home). If I don’t go hiking and stay in, they loiter on the porch or in the yard, and some of them who know Suyapa are often waiting inside on the couch when I come home. The other night when I was working on my AIDS paper and Suyapa and the kids were out of the house, I had about 10 kids outside and three inside, “helping” me with my work. It’s nice because I’m never lonely, but sometimes I need a little space to breath…but when that happens I just tell them I’m meeting up with some gringos to pasear (go out) and they get it. The other night I went on a gringo-only hike and we got to the top of this big mountain and saw the whole valley!! It was incredible. We had some difficulty getting back down, though, we got lost and wandered through a lot of private property, wound up stuck in this narrow chute of barbed wire, only to ford a river and scramble up a ridiculously steep hill…but we’d brought headlamps so even though it was getting dark we all got home alive.

Today we had half-day of class (hooray Saturday!) and then Derek, Patrick, Gabe and I went to Valle de Angeles, the quaint little tourist pueblo nearby. We only get three bucks or so a day, but we haven’t been spending much money lately, so we splurged and went to this little Italian place and got a huge pizza and some beer, followed by ice cream. It was hella indulgent but soooo delicious—I’ve been craving pizza like the sopilotes (vultures that are everywhere here) crave dead horse (like the one in the soccer campo next to my house, which was promptly devoured). After that we decided to try and find this trail we’d read about that leads to some waterfalls, but obviously this plan failed. We hiked up the paved road for like 15 minutes, and headed into the bosque (forest). It never ceases to amaze me how the forests look here…the combo of skinny pines, with their long bright-green needles, nestled in with huge elephant-ear plants, banana trees, and other tropical foliage, is just bizarre. Lots of the trees have crazy vines or moss hanging from them, which only adds to the jungle look, unless you look at the floor and see that familiar red duff that’s all over the mountain forests at home. And, because this is Honduras, there are obviously chickens and roosters and stray dogs and children in the last places you’d expect to see em. We crossed a river (via bridge, for the first time ever…woo lap of luxery!) and labored up an extremely steep mountain, weaving around houses. We finally found one with a bunch of kids outside and asked about the waterfalls. The woman informed us that we were on the wrong side of the river, and did we want to see the gringo child she had? She dragged this incredibly shy four-year-old out of the house, who was indeed complete with white skin, a mop of blonde hair, and blue eyes. He was sucking coca-cola out of a bag, with a straw (lots of beverages, including water, are served in plastic bags here) and waved shyly before ducking back in. We asked her what the deal was, and she said something about how his parents were from the Dominican Republic and she was taking care of him, which made no sense cause he certainly didn’t look Dominican, but whatever. So random. Anyway, we trekked back down, cross the river, and tried the other side. We were tramping along near the river bed when I heard someone shout, “HAYLEY!!! HOLA!!!” I looked over and there were my two host cousins, who’d house I’d visited twice!! It was so random, we were rather lost in the bosque and there appear two Hondurans who I happen to know! I felt extremely popular, like any old Honduran who happened to be out and about might know me. They were on a nature hike with their church group, so many jubilant hugs were exchanged (over a barbed wire fence, unfortunately). ALSO RANDOM. They told us the falls were about two hours up, and since it was 3:30, we decided we didn’t have time, since we had to be home by six. So we hiked up and found some beautiful farm land cleared out, as well as more crazy trees and a mysterious underground water source that sounded exactly like a man-eating cave-panther. We eventually headed back into town and caught a bus going back to our bus stop, and I was indeed home by six.

After dinner tonight, I took all the neighborhood kids out (about 15) to the soccer field (right next to the houses) with my headlamp. The littler ones (my two sisters, for example) were a little nervous with the darkness, but it ended up being a blast. I tried to make everyone sit down and look at the stars (which are obviously mind-blowing out here) but after about 20 seconds they were like “can we get up and play now??” I taught them how to play freeze-tag, which was followed by hide and seek (awesome in pitch-darkness!), followed by red-light-green-light, followed by “Onion”, which is essentially dogpile (they taught me this one), followed by ghost-stories and joke-telling. It was so much fun…we headed in at about 9:00 and the kids were all begging me to go out again tomorrow night. Unfortunately, I can’t, because tomorrow morning I’m leaving for four days to go to my “Volunteer Visit,” where we go off and visit a current volunteer to see what it’s like. I’m going to San Lorenzo, a HUGE (50,000) port city right on the water in the south, in Honduras’ little Pacific outlet (that’s right dudes we got the pacific AND the carribbean!). At first, I was disappointed, because I don’t like the big cities and it’s like 110 degrees there every day. But I changed my mind, because it’ll be a neat chance to see a part of Honduras I probably wouldn’t go to otherwise.

I’m about to pass out dudes. I hope everyone back home is happy and healthy…I really miss you all and I hope to hear from you guys. Love!!

Paz,

Hayley

Hey chochachos!!

Here are like a jillion weeks worth of blogs, all rolled into one delicious handmade corn tortilla. The most recent is at the top. ADIOS!

18 July 2008

Hey, chochachos! It’s Friday night here, and I’m all tucked into bed so I can get up nice and early for school tomorrow. That’s right, Peace Corps is slowly and stealthily obliterating the two-day weekend for us gringos. It’s okay though, it’s just a half day and I’m pretty sure it’s going to involve cultural dancing of some variety (clearly the best variety of dancing). I bought a cell phone today, which was weird. I initially didn’t want to get one, I thought it would cheapen my whole “living without unnecessary beepy things” lifestyle, but living in the campo is a little lonely sometimes and I changed my mind. I immediately called my folks, and gave them my number so they could call me back (it’s insanely expensive to call the states here on a cell phone). It’s free for me to receive calls, so if anyone wants to call me, just dial: 011 (out-going code) + 504 (country code) + 9598-7436. (In total, 011-504-9598-7436). I don’t know exactly what it costs for you guys to call me, but I don’t think it’s too expensive…you can also download Skype and call cell-phones from your computer for pretty cheap, or buy a calling card. Anyway, I can’t call you guys (seriously it’s grossly expensive), so if anyone wants to hear my sassy voice, gimme a ring and I shall answer!

Life continues at a delightful rate. Last Sunday Suyapa, the kids and I went to her sister’s home in nearby Valle de Angeles to spend the day. Her sister has an 18-year-old daughter, and it was fun to hang out with a Honduran who is about my age. We spent the day lounging around, listening to the rain, napping on the bed, drinking soy coffee (basically, you burn the dickens out of soybeans in the oven and brew the remains like coffee…it sounds like something desperate immates would bew (if they were in a soy-only hippie jail I guess) but it tastes awesome!!), eating carrot muffins, and chatting. Really relaxing and just great. I love getting to know the extended family; it makes me feel more connected to the Honduran people, even though it’s just one large family.

On Tuesday night, our little colony threw us gringos a welcome party. One of the neighbors had us and our families over, and we ate chicken and rice, drank coke and danced to punta and reggaeton until the roosters crowed (just kidding, we went to bed at 9:30 and the roosters rarely stop crowing, no matter what time of day or night it is). It was hilarious because Hondurans seem to have a natural ability to wiggle their hips and shimmy their feet and gringos just CAN’T (except for the ones that could…I guess I’m just talking about myself, here, in terms of awkward gringos who can’t dance). I prefer to dance about in a ridiculous manner since trying to look graceful or sexy isn’t really going to happen. I wish I had pictures of the incredulous looks that were shot my way when I started doing my “churn the butter dance.” (This basically involves miming the following while singing the following: “churn the butter, churn the butter, make the toast, make the toast, put the butter on the toast, now EAT that toast, eat that toast, now share that toast with all your friends, share that toast with all your friends, now make more butter…” Seriously. Priceless. I offered to teach the snickering teenagers how they, too, could churn the butter, but no one was interested. I don’t know why. Culture shock?

Training (capacitacion) continues on, but it’s more intense than I thought it would be. I get up at 5:30 every day, and classes begin at 7:30. We have about four hours of Spanish class, followed by lunch and several hours of other types of training (general Honduran information, or seminars/excursions/activities related to Youth Development). The language stuff is crazy…there are about 9 levels we could test into, and I somehow landed in Advanced-Intermediate Plus, which is a step below Low-Advanced. I thought I would test in Intermediate-Intermediate, so I was hella surprised to find out I’d surpassed that. However, they put me in a class with four other students who are all either Low-Advanced or Intermediate-Advanced. It’s kind of overwhelming at times because I feel like I’m holding them back every time I don’t get some concept they all understand. I feel like my Spanish has gotten worse since I’ve arrived, though perhaps I’m just more aware of my errors. I understand almost all of what’s said to me, and I can understand how the grammar is supposed to work, but when I speak, all that comes out of my mouth is jumbly direct translations and fumbled indirect pronouns. I also seem to have forgotten all my irregulars. I’m trying to study as much as possible on my own, but it’s hard because I never seem to have a spare minute!! I arrive home (greeted on the dirt path by my two screaming little sisters, bellowing HERMANA! HERMANA! and racing to greet me each day), help with dinner, eat dinner, play with the girls, put them to bed, and then it’s 9:00 and I’m exhausted!! They’re great little Spanish teachers, though (they speak VERY clearly for such young kids) so I suppose practicing with them is better than reading the grammar alone. The only problem is, I keep practicing my mistakes and I can’t seem to get any of it right. I’m actually concerned I might drop a level.

Because I live in a little colony on a muddy road in the mountains, my social life is very different than it was in the states. I spent almost all my spare time with my family, and very little spare time with any gringos. There is no way for me to get anywhere at night, and even during the day, I have to walk for half an hour before I get to the main road where I could potentially hail a bus. There is no going out here—I haven’t had a beer, been in a bar or a club, or done anything else socially appropriate for my age bracket since I was in the states. And since I am going to be a Youth Development volunteer, working with kids and encouraging them to make healthy life decisions, I am not allowed to (nor would I want to) do any of those things in my future community. Women do not typically drink or socialize in bars in Honduras, especially in rural communities (I guess this rule doesn’t really apply in Tegus or San Pedro Sula, the big cities). People who drink or go to bars, especially in rural communities, are perceived to be (and often are) folks (well, men) who only drink to get drunk. Therefore, it is quite inappropriate that a young, single woman, attempting to be perceived as a professional volunteer working with children, would participate in any of those activities, even if she was just going to a bar to hang out (like we do in the states). At first, accepting the idea that I wasn’t really going to be going out on weekends, going to parties or socializing with young people in bars was sort of hard—this was a big part of college life—but I’ve come to embrace the idea of truly living as a role model for youth for the next two years. I’m actually really excited about it (which is good, considering I don’t have a choice). I suppose I will meet other young people in my community, but how I’m perceived by locals plays a HUGE hand in my success as a volunteer and gossip (chisme) spreads like wildfire in these tiny communities. I’ll have to watch not only what I do, but also who I hang out with and how they’re perceived. This is all sort of speculative, but it ties in with my new role as a youth volunteer (well, trainee) and what exactly that means.

I only have two more weeks here with my family, before they ship me off with the other Youth Development volunteers to receive Field-Based Training (FBT) in another site (with another family). After six weeks there, I’ll return to my current host family for two more weeks of Post-Field-Based Trained (PFBT). After that (11 weeks in total), I’ll hopefully be sworn in as official Peace Corps Volunteer and begin my two years of service in my new community (yet undecided). I very much want to be placed in the mountains and/or forest, but I don’t think they place many Youth Development volunteers there, so I guess I’ll just take whatever they give me. I secretly wish, rather profoundly at times, that I was working in the Protected Areas Management group—they get to save trees, live in the jungle, build stuff and dig up stuff. I feel like I’ve been working with kids for the past eight years or more, and will be doing it for the rest of my life, so I wish I’d applied for the PAM program instead—it would have been a much more unique experience for me. However, I’m trying not to dwell on that and am attempting to approach my YD role without any regrets. I’m also hoping I can combine the two, but that will be much harder if my future community isn’t in an area affected by Protected Areas.

I guess I’d better go…I have to get up early tomorrow for class, and the walk to the bus stop is going to be a fun one (it’s been pouring for about three hours, so I can only imagine the swampy-swampy goodness that’s a-brewin’ outside…yesterday, our school bus carrying us out of our training side almost fell off the side of the mountain (well, more like almost slid into a shallow ravine off the side of a hill), and then got stuck in the mud. All 50 gringos couldn’t push it out, so we have to walk out to the main road and take a regular Honduran bus—our first one ever!!).

I miss you guys a lot (seriously) and I love you all very much (also seriously). Please write to me if you want to!! I will try to send more letters (I’ve only sent one so far, to my grandma) but stamps here are hella expensive and we only get a tiny bit of money. Paz!

12 July 2008

Once we got to the little town outside of Tegucigalpa, Valle de Angeles, we camped out in a hotel for the night—each little cabin came with a porch and a hammock! I climbed a tree and drank a ton of coffee. After a bit of orientation and some Spanish lessons, we trooped over the town where we’ll all be staying for the next several weeks and waited for our host families to come fetch us. I waited to be given the sheet describing my new family, hoping I’d get some young children to play with. So when I saw my sheet read three children, ages six months, three years, and six years, I was SEVEN KINDS OF HAPPY!! I ran outside and my host mom found me, clutching the baby, Javier, to her chest. They loaded us into vans and drove us to the separate little communities where we all were. My host mom, Suyapa, is young, chatty, and really, really nice. She is honest and doesn’t beat around the bush about stuff—very down to earth and has a great sense of humor. We spent hours tonight just talking on the couch, and the more time I spend with her, the more I love her. Her husband, Javier, is also nice and equally young. I haven’t spent as much time with him but he’s very intelligent and likes to talk about books, English, and politics. He’s also hilarious and seems like a very sweet man—he’s great with his little girlies. The girls, Madeline, 3, and Melani, 5, are AMAZING!! The day I arrived, walking up toward the crooked gate made of branches, they came bolting from the porch screaming “MY SISTER IS HERE! MY SISTER IS HERE!” I had about 100 pounds of Honduran love in my arms before I knew what hit me. We’ve basically been inseparable since then…Suyapa told me they hunker down by the gate to wait for me at 3:30pm every day, and sobbed yesterday when I was late coming home. They always call me “hermanita” (technically this means “little sister” but I think it’s pretty evident I’m older, so I’m taking this as a term of endearment) and occasionally the little one will ask me, “Usted come se llama?” because she can never remember my name—Hayley seems to be pretty hard to pronounce for Hondurans. As soon as I come in the house, they grab me by my hand and drag me to my room so I can unlock it (Peace Corps makes us lock our doors when we’re not home to prevent incidents, because neighbors and kids are forever passing through) and they can feast their eyes on my gringo goodies…everything is fascinating for them. They quickly discovered where I hide my candies and little toys I brought for Honduran kids, and if I don’t know where Madeline is, chances are she’s in my room, squatting by my suitcase and admiring the candies within (though she’s very honest and won’t take one without asking first!).

I love their house. It’s in a little community of about 15 casas which all look pretty much the same. They’re small but comfortable, made of brick with tin roofing, and line a muddy dirt road. Most have a little porch or a patio. Ours has a steeply sloping tiny yard with a couple small trees, lots of bushes, and a big pen with five rabbits inside! They race around all day, chasing each other and eating leftover vegetables. A couple roosters cluck around the yard, too. The inside of the house has a large main room which serves as both kitchen and living room, big enough for a couch, an armchair, a table, three kitchen chairs, and a couple storage racks against the walls. They also have a shelf where they keep a small TV and a stereo! Tonight we watched the Honduras vs Guatemala soccer game. The kitchen area is simple but clean, with a four-burner electric stove and a sink. Water, however, doesn’t flow through the taps—they have a giant pila in the backyard, which is basically a huge concrete basin. This is filled once a week when the municipal government turns on the water, and this is then used for the entire week for all bathing and washing. There is a big bowl in the sink we fill with water from the pila, and to wash dishes, we just dab a bit of soap onto the plate, splash some water onto it from with bowl with our hands, swish it around, and then put it aside to dry. It’s a great system because it doesn’t waste as much water and everything comes out just as clean. They have a giant water cooler filled with bottled water, just like one you’d find in the office, in the corner of the kitchen area. We use this water for all drinking, cooking, and tooth-brushing! I carry a little water-bottle of it into the bathroom and use this to rinse off my toothbrush. And I LOOOOVE bathing here! It’s so rad. When I get up in the morning at 5:30am, Suyapa usually has a huge pot of water already on the stove for me, heating up. I eat my cereal and we chat while I wait for my water. Once it’s warm, I carry it into the shower and set it on the floor. Then I use a little dish to splash water all over myself, get all soapy, and then rinse! Seriously, I love this and I don’t ever want to take a shower again…there is something very satisfying about bucket baths. I don’t wash my hair every day, maybe once every three days, and I don’t look like a total grease-ball. I can’t, actually, Peace Corps has very strict rules about our appearance and our professionalism, and this includes several pages of rules that basically delineate the ways in which we are NOT to be dirty hippies. (Suckers! My legs are mega hairy!! Silent rebellion!!!)

The food here is DELICIOUS. Do you know what is delicious? Beans. Cheese. Rice. Home-made tortillas. Fried bananas. Eggs. Tomatoes. That’s what they eat here, and I loooove it. It does sit a little heavy in my stomach, but I told Suyapa how much I love fruits and vegetables and she arrived today after taking two long bus trips to the capital (the only place to go grocery shopping around here, weirdly enough) with three huge bags, over-flowing with broccoli, green beans, cucumbers, star fruit, passion fruit, yuca, lettuce, tomatoes, avocados, passion fruits, oranges, apples, sweet peppers, onions, potatoes…and more. She is a great cook and I love eating with her…it’s very casual. Usually Javier, the father, isn’t home by dinnertime, so Suyapa, the kids and I sit down around the table. She usually has Javier Jr. on her lap, poking bits of egg or dribbling coffee into his mouth (seriously), Melani sits alone, and Madeline and I share a chair (there are only three). Madeline likes to eat my food instead of hers, so I usually let her pick off my plate and then I just eat hers. Then I often offer to wash the dishes and Suyapa gives Javier his bottle while I rinse things off. Then we sit on the couch, chatting or playing. Last night, little Madeline put on my headlamp and we turned off the lights. She spent like 20 minutes trotting around the kitchen table, making train noises and giggling hysterically. Then I sat on the armchair facing the wall and made shadow puppets with the girlies. This is a very happy, affectionate and loving family, and I’m so happy here. Suyapa and I mesh on a lot of levels, I’m discovering…today we had a long discussion about the benefits of living on what one has, being happy with what is possible to obtain and not stressing out about the little things. She gave the example of their couch…it’s pretty ratty, full of holes and the upholstery is raggedy. But, she says, it works, doesn’t it? A couch is there for you to sit on, not to look beautiful. She tucks a sheet over the holes and the problem is solved. Life is short, why waste precious time, energy, and money on things that aren’t absolutely necessary? I couldn’t agree more, though I don’t claim to be as zen about it as she is…I definitely surround myself in things I don’t actually need. It’s a beautiful outlook on like, however, and I’m trying to adapt it as best I can.

It’s not as hot here as I thought it would be, though that has a lot to do with the fact we’re in the mountains and not the lowlands. It’s humid and rains every day. When it’s cloudy or raining, it’s cool enough to warrant a sweatshirt or long pants, but when the sun is out…let’s just say I’m glad I brought my green Adventure hat. Today, for the first time, I ventured out my little house and wandered among the other houses up and down the road. There were lots of kids playing outside, to whom I waved and shouted “Hola Amigos!” The younger kids always say hi back, but some of the adolescents just stare or giggle to each other. I had lunch today at the house of another gringa named Bug, and then my gringo friend Patrick and I went on a hike with his little host siblings. It was really fun, the kids were really sweet and chatty (14-year-old Luis, 8-year-old Walter, and 12-year-old Nasaret). Patrick is a rad guy, as well, and I’m happy we’re friends. We wound all around the colina (colony) on the dirt roads and eventually bush-whacked into the pine forest. No paths, but it wasn’t very dense so walking was easy. It was amazing!! We raced down hills, jumped across gullies, poked at mushrooms, hurled pinecones into the deep valleys, and gawked (well, I gawked, the kids were unfazed) at the waterfalls across the way. We had stopped to take a rest when, suddenly, the sky went dark, the wind picked up, and a huge storm blew in! We sprinted back up the mountain toward some houses. A woman leaned out her window and shouted to come inside to get away from the storm. When we got there, I realized we were above the house and had to drop down through the roofing into her little backyard patio (she was built up against a hill). She fetched us a rickety ladder and we slid down…only then, did I realize, this stranger was actually Patrick’s host mom and my house was just across the road. Life is full of delightful surprises, dudes.

11 July 2008

Hey, chochachos! I’m currently lounging on the twin bed in my very own room at my host family’s house, typing on my laptop and pretending I have internet. Actually, it’s awesome not having g-mail and Achewood.com as constant distractions—I spend a lot less time staring at my computer screen and lot more time staring at other, more interesting and less fluorescent objects, like my host family. But more on them in a bit…

We arrived at the San Pedro Sulo airport last Wednesday the 9th at about noon or so. Or maybe it was like 2:30pm, I don’t remember. We had “woken up” at like 2:30am the night before (aka I lay down for an hour and fretted about the preterito grammar tense until my alarm went off), so my sense of time and place was hells of wonky. I recall trying to figure out if, since 20 lempiras is about one US dollar, than 100 lempiras must be…it was so difficult, I just gave up. (For those of us counting along at home, 100 divided by 20 is 5!). After arrival, we stepped out into the SUFFOCATING humidity, accepted bananas and thick delicious juice drinks handed to us by Peace Corps officials, and clamored upon a bus to take us six hours southly to Tegucigalpa (well, the town next to Tegucigalpa where we would be staying). We were actually supposed to fly directly from Miami to the Tegucigalpa airport, but there was a nasty crash there a couple months ago and they only just reopened it for travel (for those of you who have ever flown into Tegus, you can probably attest to the terribly short runway that was the culprit of this fatal crash). Anyway, since I rather hate being in plane crashes and rather enjoy drinking in the overwhelming sights that is beautiful Honduras, I didn’t mind the bus ride one bit. They also played “Honey, I Blew up the Kid” (I think we all know this as the incredible work of cinematic wonder that is the sequel to “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids!”). This film was dubbed in Spanish and, if I may say so, was severely excellent. This was followed by part 1 of Ben Hur.

I was so overwhelmed as we lurched along the roads. We were boarded on each side by huge fields of fruit trees (mangos, I think) and some sort of tall, thick grass that I couldn’t decipher. OH MY GOD SPIDER!!!!!!! Jesus. I just saw a brown spider scurry into a corner…holy moly. In case no one has ever seen me near an arachnid, it takes a lot for me to let it go into the corner without squishing it or removing it, depending my current bravery level. I am trying to get used to things like that here in the campo, and let me tell you, among all the new aspects of my life here, spiders are the hardest to adjust to. And Honduras isn’t even that bad, comparatively speaking…most spiders here are small and non-dangerous (I have yet to see a tarantula!). Anyway, as I was saying before Senor Arana gave me a freaking heart attack, the six-hour bus ride was great. Honduras is incredibly beautiful, in ways I can’t even describe…well, that’s a lie. I can describe it. And so I shall! GREEN. Everything is brilliantly green. It’s a beautiful, crazy mixture of dense pine trees and bright tropical plants with huge leaves, offering bananas, mangos, and other delicious items. It looks exactly like the tropical jungle I always imagined it would. It’s depressing because among all this incredible natural beauty there are just heaps of trash…but as my gringa friend pointed out today, it’s better than it was 15 years ago and progress doesn’t happen over night. Anyway, the bus trucked on and I forced myself to stay awake as much as possible. We stopped at a little place with a tiny market, a merry-go-round, and two huuuuuge cages containing toucans, parrots, macaws, a peacock, and some sad looking tortoises. It was pretty depressing…I couldn’t figure out why they were there, since it was free to look at them. Weird.

7/7

Heeeeeey chochachos!

Greetings from Washington, D.C.! I'm currently in my room, sitting as close to the air conditioner as possible without actually teetering on TOP of it, gazing out the window at what I am sure are ample sight-seeing opportunities I am more or less pointedly ignoring (unless you count wandering to the bookstore today to buy The Audacity of Hope). I saw the Pentagon as we flew in last night, and I think that's good enough (it's much smaller than I thought it would be). I mean, why go all the way to the White House just to bug a guy? Let's not and say we did!

So I arrived last night, quite sweaty from the humidity and the efforts I exuded from speaking Spanish the whole flight over. I plopped down next to a young girl about my age, and pulled out a book I'm currently reading, entitled "La Compugenio," which is a Betsy Byer's novel for sixth graders that's been translated into spanish ("The Computer Genius"). She immediately looked at me and asked me, in Spanish, why I was reading in Spanish. Flustered, I blurted out "I'm going to Honduras!" and then clarified that I was doing that in a couple days, and was on my way to get all trained up in D.C. She was from Argentina, and was really nice and quite hilarious. We chatted the whole way and it was a great way to practice my Spanish after letting that particular muscle atrophy for the past year.

I got into my hotel and promptly met my roommate, a really nice girl named Vanessa, who hails from San Diego. We were part of a handful of West Coast kids who had to arrive a day early. Today was pretty relaxed--we had to sign in and turn in all our registration forms and what-have-you by about 2pm, then we had the first parts of Staging (orientation) until dinnertime. We covered some safety stuff today, as well as apprehensions and aspirations. It's INSANELY tough getting 50 different people straight--I think everyone is named Katie and from Ohio--but I figure I'll get it in the end. If not, I can always go with the old "heeey, buddy!" standby. That and a enthusiastic high-five usually conceals the fact I don't know who I'm speaking to.

We've also received some info about what will, in fact, actually happen to us upon arrival in Honduras. We'll be greeting by olive-skinned cabana boys, given coconut frond skirts, mango rum smoothies, and fed grapes by three-toed sloths while ushered to the balmy, sandy beaches of tropical Honduras. Sun screen is free there, and the street dogs are made of chocolate!

7/8

SYYYYKE!! Actually, it's the rainy season in Honduras, which means cooler, especially in the mountains, which is where our first three weeks of training will occur. In a couple hours (we gotta get up at 2:30am, holy moly), we'll fly into San Pedro Sula, and then take buses to Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Once there, we'll get transported to some town I forget that starts with a Z (Zapato? let's go with that). We'll stay with a host family for three weeks during our Core Training period, which has a lot to do with customs, language, and other general items (which street dogs are and are not made of candy, etc). After those three weeks, we'll split into one of three groups: Youth Development (me!), Municipal Development, and Protected Areas Management. Each group will go to a different region, where we'll have six weeks of Field-Based Training--basically they'll try to arm us with the skills needed for our specific jobs in Honduras. Finally, we'll return to the Z-town for two more weeks of post-field-based training, reunited with our first host families. After those 11 weeks (good math, guys!), I will hopefully be sworn in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV).

7/9

The past couple days have been mega busy, but fun. I rather like orientations...all the ice breakers, the awkward start-up conversations regarding states of origin and a lot of nodding and "oh, cool!"s....yeeees, this is the meat of my awkward conversational stew upon which I feed. I don't know why I like it, but I do. I've really liked getting to know the folks, too...though it's been overwhelming at times and I feel like I don't know anyone very well yet.

We've spent a lot of time talking about the philosophy of the Peace Corps, talking about why we want to do it, what we want to accomplish, what we stand for and how to own the experience and the opportunities we'll have. I feel a great degree of clarity about my decision to volunteer, something I think I was sort of faking before--I didn't know exactly why I wanted to go overseas for two years to volunteer in a developing nation, I just wanted to...but now, after hashing it out over pitchers of water in air-conditioned hotel conference rooms for two days, I actually get and can verbalize what I was feeling before. We're all neighbors in a global community, we're all humans, we all deserve the same opportunities, but by chance and luck, that's not how it is. I'm incredibly fortunate and I want to help people, especially young children with their lives ahead of them, do everything they can to better their own lives. I don't want to level the playing field--or rather, I can't--but if some people can do certain things to improve their chances, whether it be to go to 8th grade, not get hooked on huffing glue, or just have a positive role model of what a woman can do, then I feel like my presence is justified. The cultural exchange aspect enthralls me, too...all horizons will be broadened, and that brings everyone closer together. The Peace Corps inaugural ambitions of world peace and friendship may be idealistic, but are just as, if not more relevant today as they were in '61, and I really feel like I'm an advocate for something beautiful and real and relevant.

On a less sappy note, they call diarrhea "splatter-foot." Good thing Chacos are hella water-proof!! I'll be blissfully far from any Internet or phones for a couple weeks, if not more than a month, so if you don't hear from me for a while, don't fret. I'm probably saving babies and rinsing off my ankles somewhere, while simultaneously coaching a soccer team, starting an HIV prevention workshop, curing cholera, and bandaging a street dog's broken leg with strips torn from the shirt off my back.

I love love love you all...I promise to be safe and make good choices, as I'm sure all of you will too. Please write me letters if you want to, and I will do the same...seriously, it'll be just like the dark ages, all havin' to write in short-hand so the enemy spies don't find out where our secret HQ is, all sealin' the envelope with earwax and the family crest...badass. Again, my address for letters is:

Hayley Kercher, PCT

Voluntario del Cuerpo de Paz

Aparto Postal 3158

Tegucigalpa, Honduras

America Central

Bus leaves in 2 hours...okay bye!

Love,

Hayley

Oh hey, dudes and ladies! Northwestern's graduation came and went (I found that the immense, billowy purple gown we had to wear filled a hole in my life I didn't even know existed...I wish I'd chosen to do Peace Corps in a country where purple gowns the size of yachts were standard garb). Unfortunately, I foolishly elected to serve in a country where gowns aren't simply frowned upon, they're illegal (okay...that's a lie). That's right, my dear friends, in just a couple days I'll be flyin' on down to Honduras to begin my 27 months of service with the US Peace Corps. (Gowns not allowed.)

A lot of folks have been asking me why I decided to join the PC. I guess the way I feel about it is, why not? I sort of abruptly made the decision last fall, and I'm still not sure I fully realize what exactly I've signed up for. But I know I'll get to help people, which all I wanted to do anyway. Especially little people...dang, I love kiddies. Good thing my program is "Youth Development," eh? I'm also partial to Spanish, and am terribly excited about living in a little rural community..I'm kind of imaging it will be like a real long camping trip. If you're going to accuse me of joining the Peace Corps only so I have a legitimate excuse to be filthy for two years, I won't hear it and I won't respond to it.

I don't feel real nervous or anything, mainly just extremely excited and super curious. I was delirious with joy the entire time I lived in Chile last year (a robust four months), and I can't wait to get back in the friendly bosom of latinoamerica once again. That said, I will miss you guys very, very much and I promise to keep in touch as much as possible. Happiness is only real when shared, so keep your eyeballs peeled for letters and postycards. I'm also keen on bringing carrier pidgeons back into circulation, so if any of you know someone who could help make my dream a reality, let me know.

Until next time, my lovely friends and family. I leave for my Staging (pre-departure orientation) in Washington DC on the 6th of July, and will depart for H-Town at some ungodly hour on the 9th. I'll probably post again before I leave, though.

paz,

Hayley