sass in the main

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!