pig flu is just a conspiracy

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