Written March 25th
Sitting in the conference room, children ages 3-10 are running around outside, hanging off of hand rails, climbing on everything they can reach, yelling and crying. Mothers half-heartedly try to keep their own children in line, but are unsuccessful. Men are nowhere in site - only women and children here. Coughing can be heard coming from every corner and one bulletin board catches everyone’s attention: Colera. Apparently, the Secretario de Salud (health) is not currently doing a campaign (compana) for Colera, but it is prevalent enough for this health center to cover a wall with important information about the illness. Colera is parasite that causes people to get severe diarrhea and vomiting, and can cause death very quickly without medical attention (mainly due to dehydration).
On March 10, 2011 the group of 17 salud trainees went to the Centro de Salud (Cesemo) in Santa Lucia to get an idea of how they run and what can be treated there. The Santa Lucia Cesemo is bigger than most Cesemos out in rural communities, but like all the others, only one doctor works at the center. Because only one doctor services the whole clinic, you end up waiting a long time too see him. Women and children walk, sometimes for two hours, from small aldeas all around a health center early in the morning to get in line to see the doctor, and often times the doctor leaves for the day before getting to all the women that are waiting. The doctor in Santa Lucia works from 6 to 10 am, and the clinics are not open on the weekends. An aldea is a small town with 80 to 120 people, mostly all related and usually consists of about 40 houses.
A small girl who looks about two years old and has dark curly hair crawls around on the hard cement floor of the waiting area while being chased by her older sister, who looks about 11. The older sister is wearing a long tie-died t-shirt covered in dust and dirt, and yells at her little sister while chasing her around. Both girls are followed around by their mother who is talking on her cell phone. The whole family is slightly overweight, and when the two-year-old asks from a Coke-a-Cola, you know she is not getting the proper nutrition.
The Secretario do Salud for Honduras sets all the rules and creates and provides training for health centers and NGOs. Within the Secretario de Salud there are three main departments, one of which is services. With in the services department, there are 18 regional departments of health. There are national, regional and area hospital throughout the 18 department. Near Tegucigalpa, there are three national hospitals. Area hospitals usually have only four specialties including internal medicine, surgery and maternal clinics. There are also Cesars and Cesamos throughout the 298 different municipalities that make up the departments. A Cesamo, like this clinic in Santa Lucia, is classified as a center for health that has one doctor on staff, usually has a lab, and can deal with somewhat complicated health problems. A Cesar on the other hand is headed by a nurse and can only handle basic health problems. If someone has a serious health issue, they are sent to one of the area hospitals, or possibly to a regional or national depending on the severity of the injury/disease. In smaller areas, where there is only a Cesar and or a Cesamo, which are both closed on weekends, there is usually a Cliper, which is an emergency center for basic health issues.
Cesars and Cesamos are “free” for people to go to for treatment. But, it actually costs each person 10 Limpira, nine of which is for material and one Limpira goes to Honduras. However, if the person doesn’t have 10 Limpira, they will still get the help they need. What does tend to be an issue for people going to a health center is that they have to pay for pretty much any medication they may need, which for most people from aldeas is way too expensive. The Cesars will give out aspirin, Tylenol, sulfa (for respiratory infections), and contraceptives for free, but everything else has to be paid for out-of-pocket.
In the Santa Lucia clinic, the two main illnesses they see are respiratory infections and strep throat, but the Santa Lucia clinic does not see many of the illness and diseases that are more prevalent in smaller municipalities. Up until three years ago, no cases of malnutrition had ever come up in the area surrounding Santa Lucia, but since then there have been seven case, which the doctor equates to the fact that people have now been trained to identify malnutrition and are actively seeking cases in order to help.
The Santa Lucia clinc, which is larger than most Cesemos throughout Honduras has a file room, which is where patients blood pressure is taking. To the right is a vaccine room with a fridge with all the correct features: thermometer for temperature checks, ice packs, water bottles, and nothing stored in the door of the fridge. The bulletin board next to the vaccine room has what seems to be Winnie the Pooh and Piglet getting vaccines to try and make little kids more comfortable. Next is a stitching room where specific procedures are done followed by a room for nebuliztion and oral treatment for diarrhea. A small pharmacy, dentist office for traveling dentists, and a medical supply room are on the other side of the center. For such a small center, this Cesamo definitely has a lot going on, but each room is only about 10 x 10.
The health set up in Honduras is definitely different than it is in the United States, but there are actually some similarities, too. I think that the Cesamos down here are similar to our public health centers in the states. In Honduras, they are definitely smaller and dirtier, but the waiting in line for hours and lots of times not actually getting to see a doctor sounds very similar to the situation in the states.
There is a very good chance that when I find out my site placement and my counterpart, it will be someone at a health clinic. A counterpart as the word entails is someone that I am partnered with that will help me integrate into my site, and will hopefully also provide me with some insight into possible projects I can do in my site. It was good to see a Cesamo in action so when I get to my site I will have a little bit of an idea what it will be like, although at this point I don’t know what the size of my site will be. I may end up in such a small area that there is only a Cesar!
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Friday, March 25, 2011
Spiders
Written in March 19th
I am currently sitting in my room staring at a huge black spider on my wall. No bueno! OK, so yes, it is not that huge, but it is thick and black as night and just gross, and I don’t like it. I don’t want it in my room. And, upon closer inspection, I saw what looked like the legs of another one above the first one. The walls and ceilings in this house do not come together to form a nice flush 90 degree angle like they do in the states. Spiders are descending upon me through the space in my ceiling - no me gusta.
I just got done doing a little bit of homework. I went and sat in the living room to do it, so I could spend some time with my family. I feel like even if I don’t say much, it is good to at least be in the same area as my host family. My host dad started asking me if I had any questions. I was actually just looking over my notes from the market visit we had on Friday. I had to find out prices for fruits and vegetables, corn, rice, sugar, butter, coffee, and meat, etc. I also had to pay attention to the hygiene of the market because I’m in the health project.
So, when writing up my “report,” if you will, of my trip to the market, my host father asked it I had any questions. I tried to explain that I wasn’t really studying or doing assignments - I was just writing about my trip to the market. This turned into my host father explaining the differences between vegitales and verduras - which I thought were the same thing. I thought they were both just the same word for vegetables. Apparently that is not the case. Vegitales are things that have flowers - like broccoli and cauliflower and verduras grow undergrownd and are also things like cabbage and lettuce. Also, He said that cabbage is a legumas - which doesn’t make any sense to me. I am going to have to look into their definition of that because to me, legums are types of beans. So yes, I’m confused. The language barrier doesn’t help. The fact that my host dad always likes to mess with me makes it hard to. Sometimes, well, a lot of the times, I don’t understand what he is saying and he laughs at me (not in a mean way, but still). And sometimes I think I understand what he is saying, but he will be laughing and I don’t know why, so I assume that I didn’t understand what he said because I don’t find anything funny about what I thought he said. Spanish is hard when someone is trying to help you but tease you at the same time.
I did strike up a conversation with my host dad and mom to get the conversation away from vegitales vs. verduras. I started asking what things usually cost and compared them to the prices I got when I was at the market. Most prices I got were pretty accurate, but there were a few things with higher prices because I was a “gringo with a lot of money” most likely. That is how Honurans view gringos - we are all rich! Then we started talking about the difference between some Honduran and USA types of foods. Like the lack of butter here in Honduras. They have manteca - which is like Crisco - it is a solid vegetable grease they use like butter to fry EVERYTHING! Then they have mantequilla, which in Spanish classes I learned was butter, but here it is clearly not. Here, mantequilla is like mayo, but it is a dairy product, not made out of eggs like our mayo. We also talked about stinky cheese. That was kind of funny.
I am getting better at having conversations with my host family, but I’m still nowhere near where I want to be with my Spanish. I have my second language interview when I get to FBT. I am really nervous about it. I assume that I will be in Intermediate Mid, I hope so anyways. I don’t feel like I am still in the Intermediate Low category. Since I’ve been here, even though it has not quite been a month, I feel like I have improved a great deal.
In order to organize the party we had Friday night, I had to talk to both our directors in Spanish - they made me. They would only approve it if I asked them in Spanish, which is a good thing, but it was stressful for me. I also had to talk to bus drivers in Spanish - first to see if our driver was going to do it, then once I got on the bus on Friday, I had to talk to him about the price and when to pay him and what he was going to do while we sang karaoke for 2.5 hours - that stressed me out, too. But, I did it! This means my Spanish is improving - I can talk about situations that I have not practiced what so ever. I know that I said things wrong when I was talking to the directors and the bus people, but at least I said things well enough for them to understand what I needed to happen! This is progress! I am excited for the time when I can have a conversation in Spanish without really having to think about it and make my brain hurt!
I am currently sitting in my room staring at a huge black spider on my wall. No bueno! OK, so yes, it is not that huge, but it is thick and black as night and just gross, and I don’t like it. I don’t want it in my room. And, upon closer inspection, I saw what looked like the legs of another one above the first one. The walls and ceilings in this house do not come together to form a nice flush 90 degree angle like they do in the states. Spiders are descending upon me through the space in my ceiling - no me gusta.
I just got done doing a little bit of homework. I went and sat in the living room to do it, so I could spend some time with my family. I feel like even if I don’t say much, it is good to at least be in the same area as my host family. My host dad started asking me if I had any questions. I was actually just looking over my notes from the market visit we had on Friday. I had to find out prices for fruits and vegetables, corn, rice, sugar, butter, coffee, and meat, etc. I also had to pay attention to the hygiene of the market because I’m in the health project.
So, when writing up my “report,” if you will, of my trip to the market, my host father asked it I had any questions. I tried to explain that I wasn’t really studying or doing assignments - I was just writing about my trip to the market. This turned into my host father explaining the differences between vegitales and verduras - which I thought were the same thing. I thought they were both just the same word for vegetables. Apparently that is not the case. Vegitales are things that have flowers - like broccoli and cauliflower and verduras grow undergrownd and are also things like cabbage and lettuce. Also, He said that cabbage is a legumas - which doesn’t make any sense to me. I am going to have to look into their definition of that because to me, legums are types of beans. So yes, I’m confused. The language barrier doesn’t help. The fact that my host dad always likes to mess with me makes it hard to. Sometimes, well, a lot of the times, I don’t understand what he is saying and he laughs at me (not in a mean way, but still). And sometimes I think I understand what he is saying, but he will be laughing and I don’t know why, so I assume that I didn’t understand what he said because I don’t find anything funny about what I thought he said. Spanish is hard when someone is trying to help you but tease you at the same time.
I did strike up a conversation with my host dad and mom to get the conversation away from vegitales vs. verduras. I started asking what things usually cost and compared them to the prices I got when I was at the market. Most prices I got were pretty accurate, but there were a few things with higher prices because I was a “gringo with a lot of money” most likely. That is how Honurans view gringos - we are all rich! Then we started talking about the difference between some Honduran and USA types of foods. Like the lack of butter here in Honduras. They have manteca - which is like Crisco - it is a solid vegetable grease they use like butter to fry EVERYTHING! Then they have mantequilla, which in Spanish classes I learned was butter, but here it is clearly not. Here, mantequilla is like mayo, but it is a dairy product, not made out of eggs like our mayo. We also talked about stinky cheese. That was kind of funny.
I am getting better at having conversations with my host family, but I’m still nowhere near where I want to be with my Spanish. I have my second language interview when I get to FBT. I am really nervous about it. I assume that I will be in Intermediate Mid, I hope so anyways. I don’t feel like I am still in the Intermediate Low category. Since I’ve been here, even though it has not quite been a month, I feel like I have improved a great deal.
In order to organize the party we had Friday night, I had to talk to both our directors in Spanish - they made me. They would only approve it if I asked them in Spanish, which is a good thing, but it was stressful for me. I also had to talk to bus drivers in Spanish - first to see if our driver was going to do it, then once I got on the bus on Friday, I had to talk to him about the price and when to pay him and what he was going to do while we sang karaoke for 2.5 hours - that stressed me out, too. But, I did it! This means my Spanish is improving - I can talk about situations that I have not practiced what so ever. I know that I said things wrong when I was talking to the directors and the bus people, but at least I said things well enough for them to understand what I needed to happen! This is progress! I am excited for the time when I can have a conversation in Spanish without really having to think about it and make my brain hurt!
La Tigra
La tigra - well that was an adventure. We had been informed by the group of students that hiked through the park the previous week that it was pretty intense. Given they got lost and hiked quite a bit more than they needed, I thought maybe they exaggerated just a bit, but no - they sure did not. We were dropped off at the top of a road that wound down into San Juansito. Once in San Juansito, we had to walk up to the entrance to La Tigra. This was a 3 km distance, with at least a fricking 70 percent gradient. It took us more than an hour and a half to get to the entrance of the park. By the time we made it to the visitor center, I was beat. After walking up a hill for an hour and a half, something my feet were not used to doing even in my tennis shoes that I wear running for an hour - I ended up with blisters. They were painful, but I prevailed. I put on band-aids - thank you Melissa - and kept on truckin’. There were nine of us that went on this journey, and we were all able to keep each other motivated. After leaving the visitor center, we only had 15 more minutes of hills and then it flattened out, thankfully. This part of the journey - actually in the park - was beautiful. The area we have been in is different. We have pine trees and dusty, deserty ground. La Tigra was a jungle. Dark green big leaves and vines, actual moisture around us. It took us about two hours to get to the waterfall that was our final destination. It was gorgeous, but not what I was expecting. It was a 75+ foot tall straight up rock cliff with small bits of water streaming down. In the rainy season, I’m sure there is a lot more water running, but still it would never be like some of the awesome waterfalls I have seen in the states. But, it was till very beautiful.
What took us 3.5 hours to hike in, took us 2.5 hours to hike out. Downhill is always easier, but we were also just in a hurry to get off of our feet. By this time, I was not the only one complaining about feet hurting. But, also, by this time, my feet hurt 50 times more than they did when we were only just starting our journey. Thankfully, after inspection, I only had two blisters that were going to be a problem. The next day, I wore my flip flops to training - even though it is against the rules. I was not about to put my feet into shoes and make my blisters 10-times worse. I wanted one day for them to heal before I started putting band-aids over them and sticking them in shoes. So, I covered the blisters in Jean’s Devil’s Club Salve, put on my flip flops and went to training. I thought I was in the clear, but then right before we all sat down for our Monday-morning debriefing, Luis, our director came up to me and said he was going to drive me home really quickly to change my shoes. I told him about my blisters and that I simply couldn’t put shoes on yet, and he didn’t force me to go. It is one of those things, though. He saw I was breaking the “rules” and even though it isn’t that big of a deal it is something that he had to approach me for, which I don’t like. I want all experiences the staff have with me to be good ones! The next day, though, I put band-aids on and toughed it out, and they were glad to see that I did.
This week was packed full of activities in Training - NOT!! Monday and Tuesday were ridiculously boring. All the language trainers and techs were doing site visits for our Field Based Training, which starts next week!!!! So, we had two days - 8 hrs a piece - of sitting in the main salon being talked at. We had a couple more safety and security discussions, which was mostly a bunch of repeated information that seemed unnecessary in my book. We did get the chance to chat with quite a few current volunteers, though, which was nice. The intercultural talks were the hardest parts. Some of these were fun and gave us the opportunity to get to know each other a little better through some games, but then there was one afternoon (4 hours straight) that was completely unnecessary and made me feel like I was in 7th grade or something. Thankfully, on Wednesday, we had our language facilitators back. Four days with out Spanish class was too much. I felt like I lost a lot of my Spanish because of course, when I’m spending time with other trainees, we talk English. I know we shouldn’t, but we do. Friday, we took our language skills and put them to the test. All the language classes were broken up into different groups for field trips. We had to take the bus to Tegus, take a taxi to a bus station and ask questions about buses, then take a taxi to a market and buy some things out host families had asked for, then we had to make our way to the Peace Corps Office for a tour. I loved it. We did have a language facilitator meet us in Tegus, but we had to get to Tegus ourselves and then get to the location we were meeting our language facilitator. From their, they accompanied us to the market. My group got done at the market quickly and were able to walk to the town center and shop around a little bit. We ended up just going to Wendy’s because a lot of people wanted Frosties!!! I ended up getting one too, and I must say - it was DELISOUS! Tegus is about 30 degrees hotter than it is where our training center is, so I was dieing and the cold Frosty at 10 a.m. just hit the spot. After Wendy’s we walked to the Peace Corps Office. It is good to know where that is! I had actually driven right by it when I was in Tegus last Saturday with my family, but I didn’t know it.
Tonight is another Friday night!! This is our last weekend of training here before we head to Field Based Training, which I am very excited for - except for the fact that I have been told that it is even hotter where we are going for FBT than it is in Tegus. So, I am literally going to die of heat. So, anyways because it is our last weekend together - all the projects, health, business, and water and sanitation go to different FBT sites - I planned something fun. Slater, my neighbor who always likes to go out and meet the Hondurans and have a good time, found out that a restaurant we always go to near by has Karaoke on Firday and Saturday nights. So, the seven of us in my pueblo were going to go, but, I wanted everyone to be involved. The downside was that Karaoke starts at 8 and goes until 10 and the last bus is at 8, so nobody else from the neighboring pueblos were going to be able to join us. So, I asked Luis and Javier - the directors - if it would be ok if we stayed out past our curfew of 9pm (if it was OK with our host families) to go to Karaoke, and they said it was OK, and Javier suggested renting a bus to drive us all home - otherwise we couldn’t do it. Some people would have to walk 2 hours to get home. The bus I asked was going to be way too expensive, but Slater found a cheaper one, and we got it all arranged. So, in about a half hour I will be getting on a bus, with hopefully 30 other trainees on it, to go to Karaoke. We are going to take over the restaurant, but Slater did give them a heads-up last night that we were coming, so they should be ready for a bunch of gringos. It is going to be an interesting night, that is for sure. I’m interested to see how it will pan out. I’m hoping nothing goes wrong, but I’m definitely worried about the bus picking everyone up and dropping us all off - language barriers are fun, and I’m hoping nothing got lost in translation. Although, Slater’s Spanish is great, so I’m sure it will all be fine. I just know that if anything goes wrong it is going to fall in my lap because I was the organizer of the endeavor!
What took us 3.5 hours to hike in, took us 2.5 hours to hike out. Downhill is always easier, but we were also just in a hurry to get off of our feet. By this time, I was not the only one complaining about feet hurting. But, also, by this time, my feet hurt 50 times more than they did when we were only just starting our journey. Thankfully, after inspection, I only had two blisters that were going to be a problem. The next day, I wore my flip flops to training - even though it is against the rules. I was not about to put my feet into shoes and make my blisters 10-times worse. I wanted one day for them to heal before I started putting band-aids over them and sticking them in shoes. So, I covered the blisters in Jean’s Devil’s Club Salve, put on my flip flops and went to training. I thought I was in the clear, but then right before we all sat down for our Monday-morning debriefing, Luis, our director came up to me and said he was going to drive me home really quickly to change my shoes. I told him about my blisters and that I simply couldn’t put shoes on yet, and he didn’t force me to go. It is one of those things, though. He saw I was breaking the “rules” and even though it isn’t that big of a deal it is something that he had to approach me for, which I don’t like. I want all experiences the staff have with me to be good ones! The next day, though, I put band-aids on and toughed it out, and they were glad to see that I did.
This week was packed full of activities in Training - NOT!! Monday and Tuesday were ridiculously boring. All the language trainers and techs were doing site visits for our Field Based Training, which starts next week!!!! So, we had two days - 8 hrs a piece - of sitting in the main salon being talked at. We had a couple more safety and security discussions, which was mostly a bunch of repeated information that seemed unnecessary in my book. We did get the chance to chat with quite a few current volunteers, though, which was nice. The intercultural talks were the hardest parts. Some of these were fun and gave us the opportunity to get to know each other a little better through some games, but then there was one afternoon (4 hours straight) that was completely unnecessary and made me feel like I was in 7th grade or something. Thankfully, on Wednesday, we had our language facilitators back. Four days with out Spanish class was too much. I felt like I lost a lot of my Spanish because of course, when I’m spending time with other trainees, we talk English. I know we shouldn’t, but we do. Friday, we took our language skills and put them to the test. All the language classes were broken up into different groups for field trips. We had to take the bus to Tegus, take a taxi to a bus station and ask questions about buses, then take a taxi to a market and buy some things out host families had asked for, then we had to make our way to the Peace Corps Office for a tour. I loved it. We did have a language facilitator meet us in Tegus, but we had to get to Tegus ourselves and then get to the location we were meeting our language facilitator. From their, they accompanied us to the market. My group got done at the market quickly and were able to walk to the town center and shop around a little bit. We ended up just going to Wendy’s because a lot of people wanted Frosties!!! I ended up getting one too, and I must say - it was DELISOUS! Tegus is about 30 degrees hotter than it is where our training center is, so I was dieing and the cold Frosty at 10 a.m. just hit the spot. After Wendy’s we walked to the Peace Corps Office. It is good to know where that is! I had actually driven right by it when I was in Tegus last Saturday with my family, but I didn’t know it.
Tonight is another Friday night!! This is our last weekend of training here before we head to Field Based Training, which I am very excited for - except for the fact that I have been told that it is even hotter where we are going for FBT than it is in Tegus. So, I am literally going to die of heat. So, anyways because it is our last weekend together - all the projects, health, business, and water and sanitation go to different FBT sites - I planned something fun. Slater, my neighbor who always likes to go out and meet the Hondurans and have a good time, found out that a restaurant we always go to near by has Karaoke on Firday and Saturday nights. So, the seven of us in my pueblo were going to go, but, I wanted everyone to be involved. The downside was that Karaoke starts at 8 and goes until 10 and the last bus is at 8, so nobody else from the neighboring pueblos were going to be able to join us. So, I asked Luis and Javier - the directors - if it would be ok if we stayed out past our curfew of 9pm (if it was OK with our host families) to go to Karaoke, and they said it was OK, and Javier suggested renting a bus to drive us all home - otherwise we couldn’t do it. Some people would have to walk 2 hours to get home. The bus I asked was going to be way too expensive, but Slater found a cheaper one, and we got it all arranged. So, in about a half hour I will be getting on a bus, with hopefully 30 other trainees on it, to go to Karaoke. We are going to take over the restaurant, but Slater did give them a heads-up last night that we were coming, so they should be ready for a bunch of gringos. It is going to be an interesting night, that is for sure. I’m interested to see how it will pan out. I’m hoping nothing goes wrong, but I’m definitely worried about the bus picking everyone up and dropping us all off - language barriers are fun, and I’m hoping nothing got lost in translation. Although, Slater’s Spanish is great, so I’m sure it will all be fine. I just know that if anything goes wrong it is going to fall in my lap because I was the organizer of the endeavor!
Week 2
Written on March 11th
Friday night in Honduras!!! It is a very different atmosphere than Friday night in the states, especially considering most of us trainees are in our 20s and definitely have done our fair share of partying. This Friday, most of us went to our different homes after classes were finished and then met up at a local papusaria (a little restaurant that sells only papusas… which I would say is in the quesadilla family) to shoot the breeze a little after a week of training. By 7 p.m., we were all ready to go home and go to bed - we had a long and busy week.
Let me start with last Sunday, the beginning of a new week! Last Sunday, I went to Valle de Angeles twice in one day, and I had actually spent the day there on Saturday as well! Sunday morning, I went with my host family because they go every Sunday morning. My host father sells eggs, so on Sunday morning he has a few stops to check and see if his clients need more, and he also picks up money from a few places that owes him. Also, besides my host mother’s regular job at a medical office, she also sells pillow cases she makes and clothes she somehow gets from the United States. So, Sunday morning consists of driving around Ville de Angeles running their errands, and we end at my host mother’s aunts house to visit. This Sunday, after returning to Los Planes from our morning adventure, Andrea and Melissa’s families were going to Ville as well, and I went with them just for something fun to do. We ended up getting ice cream, which was amazing, and just walking around - We also had papusas for dinner that night that we got from a street vender. That was my first papusa experience. I have to admit, I am actually not a huge fan of these papusas that everyone seems to love. The cheese here is very strong and salty and they use a lot of it. If the papusas came with beans in them, I think I would enjoy them a whole lot more.
Tuesday was a pretty great day. We of course had four hours of Spanish class in the morning, but in the afternoon, the heath project had a technical class about nutrition and malnutrition, but the information was presented to us by a current Peace Corps Health Volunteer. So, we got to experience someone different than Hector, who is fine, but he can get a little boring day after day after day. It was encouraging to hear some of her stories and have her give us an example of a charla (a short presentation to teach a group of people about something that we are soon going to be giving many of.) The volunteer had great information about nutrition and malnutrition - she is currently making the manual for a new program that will be implemented in the Health program soon. Malnutrition is currently not an actual project with a manual for volunteers to follow when teaching mothers or students at a school, so this volunteer is creating the manual so the rest of the health crew can have some basic guidelines when teaching people about it. Three quarters of this volunteers presentation was in Spanish, which made it hard to understand, but she could usually tell when we had confused looks on our faces and would explain something in English for those of us who didn’t understand. She also had games for us to interact, which was nice because it gave me an idea of how - when I get to my site- I could apply a charla like that. It was a good example for me basically copy for when I become a volunteer! Tuesday was also Demarise’s birthday, so we all went to the same papusaria that we were at tonight. I didn’t get back to my house that night until just before 9 p.m. I was so nervous getting back to my house. I was planning what I was going to say to explain why I was out so late. (Los siento, perro no puedo caminar solo, entonces, you necesite esperar por Daniel y Slater para salir) Nine is our “curfew,” so I was fine, but I still felt bad for staying out so late. However, I didn’t need to be worried at all because my host parents were not even home when I got back to the house!
Wednesday, the Health group went to Santa Lucia to a health center. This was our first field trip and it was fun. But, yet again, the talk that was given to us, was all in Spanish. The doctor that works at the S.L. health clinic only speaks Spanish, so there wasn’t a lot that could be done about that, but that just means I understood only half of the information he gave us. Listening to a doctor talk about the Honduraian health care system in Spanish for 2 hours - Ya, that sounds fun doesn’t it? I understood most of the first half of what the doctor said, but then it seemed that my brain hit a maximum intake level and I was not able to understand anymore. Even when I tried to really stay focused, my brain just wouldn’t keep up with what the Doctor was talking about. After he told us about the health care system set-up in Honduras, we got a tour of the center. Apparently, a good handful of us could end up working with health centers in our sites, so it was good to get a tour and see how they operate. Although, Hector did say that the heath center in S.L. is a lot better than other rural health centers, so we can’t really get a good feel for where we may be working based on what we saw in Santa Lucia.
Thursday, we didn’t have any language classes, which I was actually bummed about. I know that we always complain about having four hours of language class a day, but really - I need more like eight. If I want to master Spanish, I need practice! So, not having language on Thursday was a bit of a draw back for me. But, luckily, I had my Spanish tutorial Thursday afternoon with Carlos (my first language facilitator who I think is absolutely fantastic). The hour that I spent just talking with him in my tutorial, made me feel a whole lot better about my usage of the imperfect past tense! Apparently he talked to my current language teacher about it too because Friday morning, in the one hour of Spanish that we actually had, Karla told me Carlos told her that I was doing great with the past tense. Talk about the grapevine, right!
So, because we only had one hour of Spanish on Friday morning, followed by our typhoid and second rabies vaccine, we had the rest of the morning for “independent language.” Do you think very many of us actually worked on our Spanish - NO. There was an ultimate Frisbee game going on, there were people napping in the sun, people taking a sex quiz from Cosmo, and people just chatting. There were some who were being good and working on Spanish, but we had a good three hours of “independent” study time, and there is no way any of us could be studious for that long. The typhoid vaccine we got hurt. It was one of those that the needle stick didn’t hurt, but then you could feel the medicine entering your arm as they pushed in the syringe! No me gusta. They gave everyone two Tylenol after the shot, too, to help with the pain that we were going to definitely feel later. The bummer deal about getting the typhoid shot then was that the Health group was going out for a manual labor field trip after lunch. So, we were going to be using our arms, and one of them was a bit of a dud.
The health program loaded up into three of the PC Land Cruisers with pick axes, shovels, hoes, horse manure, ash, water, yucca, and a bunch of seeds. Yes, it was community garden day. We hauled everything down a windy, steep trail to an area that was covered in weeds and slimy old lettuce. We were broken up into two groups. Group one prepared the area for a new garden, and a seed bed. This meant machetying all of the greens that were currently there, then racking them all away (but we didn’t have a rake, so that was our hands). Then, after that, we hoed the area loosening up the dirt. When the area was cleared and the dirt was loose, we constructed two seed beds, which meant just really loosening up the dirt and making the bed three or four inches higher than the rest of the area. We planned onions, tomatoes, and radishes in our seed bed because - the onions and tomatoes need to be transplanted once they begin to mature, so we also had some tomato starts that we practiced planting in the other bed we had prepared. After we were finished with that, we switched groups.
The other station was all about learning how to start a compost. Hear in Honduras, that is tricky business. You start with an inclined spot 1 meter by 1 meter - in the shade. Then you put donw thick sticks to ensure your compost pile will not be directly on the ground - so it can drain. Then you put a bunch of dried leaves and or grass down followed by a bunch of green stuff. This would be wear you put your compost from your kitchen, but we used a bunch of the old lettuce that was around, along with all the green weed-type things we pulled up with the lettuce. On top of the greens, you put the manure, followed by dirt and then a sprinkling of ash. The, you water it and start the layers over again. You are supposed to build this up a meter high when you make it, and then you let it sit and ferment for a few weeks. Once it begins to ferment, you stir it every week, and after a couple months, you are ready to use this compost to create your seed beds for your community garden!
This was a really fun day. We all go to be in the sun and do manual labor. Even though we all had a bum arm, we made the best of it and we sweated out a lot of toxins that is for sure. Or, I know I did anyway. I kept pretty busy the whole time though. Every time I needed a break I would give someone the tool I was working with, then get a quick drink of water and switch off with someone else again, so I stayed pretty consistently busy, which I liked.
I am getting ready to go with a bunch of other people to the National Park outside of Valle de Angeles - La Tigra. That is going to be a story for another blog, and hopefully it won’t end up like the story the people who went last week had. They ended up walking through the park for 12 hours semi-lost and had to have our training director come and pick them up at 7:30 pm (they had begun their journey at 6:30 that morning!!!)
Friday night in Honduras!!! It is a very different atmosphere than Friday night in the states, especially considering most of us trainees are in our 20s and definitely have done our fair share of partying. This Friday, most of us went to our different homes after classes were finished and then met up at a local papusaria (a little restaurant that sells only papusas… which I would say is in the quesadilla family) to shoot the breeze a little after a week of training. By 7 p.m., we were all ready to go home and go to bed - we had a long and busy week.
Let me start with last Sunday, the beginning of a new week! Last Sunday, I went to Valle de Angeles twice in one day, and I had actually spent the day there on Saturday as well! Sunday morning, I went with my host family because they go every Sunday morning. My host father sells eggs, so on Sunday morning he has a few stops to check and see if his clients need more, and he also picks up money from a few places that owes him. Also, besides my host mother’s regular job at a medical office, she also sells pillow cases she makes and clothes she somehow gets from the United States. So, Sunday morning consists of driving around Ville de Angeles running their errands, and we end at my host mother’s aunts house to visit. This Sunday, after returning to Los Planes from our morning adventure, Andrea and Melissa’s families were going to Ville as well, and I went with them just for something fun to do. We ended up getting ice cream, which was amazing, and just walking around - We also had papusas for dinner that night that we got from a street vender. That was my first papusa experience. I have to admit, I am actually not a huge fan of these papusas that everyone seems to love. The cheese here is very strong and salty and they use a lot of it. If the papusas came with beans in them, I think I would enjoy them a whole lot more.
Tuesday was a pretty great day. We of course had four hours of Spanish class in the morning, but in the afternoon, the heath project had a technical class about nutrition and malnutrition, but the information was presented to us by a current Peace Corps Health Volunteer. So, we got to experience someone different than Hector, who is fine, but he can get a little boring day after day after day. It was encouraging to hear some of her stories and have her give us an example of a charla (a short presentation to teach a group of people about something that we are soon going to be giving many of.) The volunteer had great information about nutrition and malnutrition - she is currently making the manual for a new program that will be implemented in the Health program soon. Malnutrition is currently not an actual project with a manual for volunteers to follow when teaching mothers or students at a school, so this volunteer is creating the manual so the rest of the health crew can have some basic guidelines when teaching people about it. Three quarters of this volunteers presentation was in Spanish, which made it hard to understand, but she could usually tell when we had confused looks on our faces and would explain something in English for those of us who didn’t understand. She also had games for us to interact, which was nice because it gave me an idea of how - when I get to my site- I could apply a charla like that. It was a good example for me basically copy for when I become a volunteer! Tuesday was also Demarise’s birthday, so we all went to the same papusaria that we were at tonight. I didn’t get back to my house that night until just before 9 p.m. I was so nervous getting back to my house. I was planning what I was going to say to explain why I was out so late. (Los siento, perro no puedo caminar solo, entonces, you necesite esperar por Daniel y Slater para salir) Nine is our “curfew,” so I was fine, but I still felt bad for staying out so late. However, I didn’t need to be worried at all because my host parents were not even home when I got back to the house!
Wednesday, the Health group went to Santa Lucia to a health center. This was our first field trip and it was fun. But, yet again, the talk that was given to us, was all in Spanish. The doctor that works at the S.L. health clinic only speaks Spanish, so there wasn’t a lot that could be done about that, but that just means I understood only half of the information he gave us. Listening to a doctor talk about the Honduraian health care system in Spanish for 2 hours - Ya, that sounds fun doesn’t it? I understood most of the first half of what the doctor said, but then it seemed that my brain hit a maximum intake level and I was not able to understand anymore. Even when I tried to really stay focused, my brain just wouldn’t keep up with what the Doctor was talking about. After he told us about the health care system set-up in Honduras, we got a tour of the center. Apparently, a good handful of us could end up working with health centers in our sites, so it was good to get a tour and see how they operate. Although, Hector did say that the heath center in S.L. is a lot better than other rural health centers, so we can’t really get a good feel for where we may be working based on what we saw in Santa Lucia.
Thursday, we didn’t have any language classes, which I was actually bummed about. I know that we always complain about having four hours of language class a day, but really - I need more like eight. If I want to master Spanish, I need practice! So, not having language on Thursday was a bit of a draw back for me. But, luckily, I had my Spanish tutorial Thursday afternoon with Carlos (my first language facilitator who I think is absolutely fantastic). The hour that I spent just talking with him in my tutorial, made me feel a whole lot better about my usage of the imperfect past tense! Apparently he talked to my current language teacher about it too because Friday morning, in the one hour of Spanish that we actually had, Karla told me Carlos told her that I was doing great with the past tense. Talk about the grapevine, right!
So, because we only had one hour of Spanish on Friday morning, followed by our typhoid and second rabies vaccine, we had the rest of the morning for “independent language.” Do you think very many of us actually worked on our Spanish - NO. There was an ultimate Frisbee game going on, there were people napping in the sun, people taking a sex quiz from Cosmo, and people just chatting. There were some who were being good and working on Spanish, but we had a good three hours of “independent” study time, and there is no way any of us could be studious for that long. The typhoid vaccine we got hurt. It was one of those that the needle stick didn’t hurt, but then you could feel the medicine entering your arm as they pushed in the syringe! No me gusta. They gave everyone two Tylenol after the shot, too, to help with the pain that we were going to definitely feel later. The bummer deal about getting the typhoid shot then was that the Health group was going out for a manual labor field trip after lunch. So, we were going to be using our arms, and one of them was a bit of a dud.
The health program loaded up into three of the PC Land Cruisers with pick axes, shovels, hoes, horse manure, ash, water, yucca, and a bunch of seeds. Yes, it was community garden day. We hauled everything down a windy, steep trail to an area that was covered in weeds and slimy old lettuce. We were broken up into two groups. Group one prepared the area for a new garden, and a seed bed. This meant machetying all of the greens that were currently there, then racking them all away (but we didn’t have a rake, so that was our hands). Then, after that, we hoed the area loosening up the dirt. When the area was cleared and the dirt was loose, we constructed two seed beds, which meant just really loosening up the dirt and making the bed three or four inches higher than the rest of the area. We planned onions, tomatoes, and radishes in our seed bed because - the onions and tomatoes need to be transplanted once they begin to mature, so we also had some tomato starts that we practiced planting in the other bed we had prepared. After we were finished with that, we switched groups.
The other station was all about learning how to start a compost. Hear in Honduras, that is tricky business. You start with an inclined spot 1 meter by 1 meter - in the shade. Then you put donw thick sticks to ensure your compost pile will not be directly on the ground - so it can drain. Then you put a bunch of dried leaves and or grass down followed by a bunch of green stuff. This would be wear you put your compost from your kitchen, but we used a bunch of the old lettuce that was around, along with all the green weed-type things we pulled up with the lettuce. On top of the greens, you put the manure, followed by dirt and then a sprinkling of ash. The, you water it and start the layers over again. You are supposed to build this up a meter high when you make it, and then you let it sit and ferment for a few weeks. Once it begins to ferment, you stir it every week, and after a couple months, you are ready to use this compost to create your seed beds for your community garden!
This was a really fun day. We all go to be in the sun and do manual labor. Even though we all had a bum arm, we made the best of it and we sweated out a lot of toxins that is for sure. Or, I know I did anyway. I kept pretty busy the whole time though. Every time I needed a break I would give someone the tool I was working with, then get a quick drink of water and switch off with someone else again, so I stayed pretty consistently busy, which I liked.
I am getting ready to go with a bunch of other people to the National Park outside of Valle de Angeles - La Tigra. That is going to be a story for another blog, and hopefully it won’t end up like the story the people who went last week had. They ended up walking through the park for 12 hours semi-lost and had to have our training director come and pick them up at 7:30 pm (they had begun their journey at 6:30 that morning!!!)
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Spanish, Spanish and more Spanish
Written on March 4th
Yesterday, I had officially been in Honduras for one week. This one week, though, has felt like three. I am not the only one that feels that way - most of us feel it. Something about the extremity of constantly having to pick our brains to pull out what little Spanish we have in our brains to communicate with people. It makes the ability to comprehend time slightly more difficult. We seem to have all settled in now, though. Compared to my first couple days in Honduras with my host family, I am already so much better at talking with them. It is not that I have learned more Spanish or anything along those lines, I have just slowly been getting better at using the Spanish that I already knew. When you are forced to use it, it thankfully comes relatively quickly.
So, for the Peace Corps Honduras, in order to be sworn in after training, you have to have reached an “Intermediate Mid” level in Spanish. So, the first couple days of training, we had interviews (entrevistas) with the language facilitators. My interviewer, was actually the director of the language program here - Manuel. He is really nice, but that didn’t make me any less nervous when I went in for my interview. Of course mine was on the second day of interviews, so I couldn’t just get it out of the way right off the bat. I walked into the 10 by 10 classroom and sat at the table across from Manuel. He turned on the tape recorder and began! It started simple - say your name, where you are from, where you are living here in Honduras. Then he asked questions about Alaska. He also gave me a card that I had to read in English and then do what ever it said, which was to ask him about his life. I ended up asking him where he lived, if he had a family, how long he had been married. Things like that. I tried asking him what year he moved from where he used to live to where he lives now, but that did NOT work. He told me just to move on and ask a different question! When I made that screw up, I thought for sure I was going to end up in a really low language class.
The levels are as follows:
Novice Low
Novice MidNovice High
Intermediate Low
Intermediate MidIntermediate High
Advanced Low
Advanced Mid
Advanced High
Superb (or something like that)
Later in the day, I looked over the descriptions for each one of the levels and I was really shooting for an Intermediate Low. I felt like I was better than the descriptions for the Novice levels, which basically said you could ask just the basic questions and that you were hard to understand because of your accent. The following day, our language levels were not posted yet, however we were broken up into smaller groups of 10. We were put with people of similar levels for the language facilitators to get another view of our Spanish skills. Then, the following day, we were broken up into our levels. Turns out, I am an Intermediate Low, which I was super excited about. I am in a class with four other people, and our language facilitator is Carlos, who is great. These classes are basically set up to get us talking. We haven’t learned a lot of new material, we just practice talking and end up copying down a lot of new vocabulary words. Apparently, the best way to learn is to describe things and to defend your ideas and opinions, which is exactly what they have us do. Then, each night, we have homework - which so far for my group has been different questions to ask my host family that basically just starts up a dialog and again, gets us talking.
Training has been semi-intense. We have fours hours of language class, followed by four hours of either our technical training, which for me is technical training for HIV/AIDS and Child Survival - there is also a business group and a water and sanitation group (Salud, Nagocios, y Agua y Sanamiento). So, we either have technical training, medical training, security training, or cultural training. The cultural training sessions are always fun because the staff does skits for us that tend to be pretty comical. The security training sessions always put a lot of people on edge. They are a little nerve racking. Juan Carlos, who is the best security facilitator in the Peace Corps (I mean officially), is always full of important, but scary information. He has to tell us about all the thefts, robberies, burglaries, assaults and rapes that happen in the country and to PC Volunteers. He also told us all the national statistics for the same things as well as murders and such that happen in Honduras. Apparently the last few years, crime in Honduras has escalated, which severely limit’s the locations that PC now sends volunteers for safety purposes.
Yesterday, we participated in a drill for security purposes. We were all on a bus, which was held up by two men with guns. They took peoples back packs, and tried taking some women with them as well. The point of this demonstration was for us to always be on guard. We need to not have all of our expensive belongings with us, it is best to put our backpacks on the floor with our foot through the straps, women can put phones and wallets in their bras, and don’t try to fight back - just give them what they want. The Peace Crops main goal is preparation and keeping their volunteers out of those kind of situations. We are not to ride buses at dark - we are not allowed to ride city buses in Tegucigalpa; we have to take a cab. But, there are only certain cabs we can take because a lot of fake cabs are roaming the streets. And always, women should not to travel alone!
Yes, the days that Juan Carlos comes are always so uplifting! He is an awesome instructor, but the material that he always has to share with us is just slightly on the depressing side. Like hearing that there have already been three rapes against PC Volunteers in Honduras this year (2011 - January was only 2 months ago) - Like Honduras has the highest crime rate in Central America. Like we are not supposed to travel to San Pedro Sula because it is Soooo dangerous, but any bus that we take to the Northern, Western, or Eastern parts of the country, will HAVE to stop in San Pedro Sula.
I don’t want to talk too much about what Juan Carlos talks to us about because I don’t want to worry anyone in the States. For the most part, PC volunteers are usually only the victims of thefts - with no violence involved! I can live with my iPod or camera getting stolen just as long as I don’t get hurt in the process!
Today, in my technical training class for Health, we learned all about immunizations in Honduras and then we had a session on breast feeding. Apparently, a lot of women in Honduras don’t breastfeed long enough, which is the best way to keep a child from being malnourished for those first 6 months - as long as the mother’s nutrition is good as well. Working with pregnant woman and women already breastfeeding may be something all of Health people will do at some point, so we needed to know all the details that go along with it. Women in Honduras will often be seen feeding their infant a coca cola! I know right, what are they thinking. But, they want their baby to be fat and happy and when they have cokes, they get fat - lots of sugar. What the women don’t understand is that by not giving them breast milk, the child is not getting any of the nutrients that it needs. Also, apparently many women feed their infants formula because they think it is better, when again, breast milk is the key! So, at some point, I will most likely be giving charlas (small talks) about the importance of breast feeding children for at least the first 6 months.
In this session, Hector brought in a breastfeeding mother, who was able to give us a real visual. I’m sure every one of us have seen someone be breastfed before, but after going over all the parts of the breast and the importance of how the baby latches on, it was actually pretty cool to be able to see it in person. The girl looked like she couldn’t have been over 18 or 19 years old, and her little boy was four months old! So cute. There are four, maybe five men in the Health program this time around, so this session, I’m sure, was a little bit weird for them, but joining the Health program, they knew what they were getting into. The med are going to have to get used to uncomfortable situations like that. We are all going to have to get used to uncomfortable situations like that. We will all at some point in out two years of service be giving talks on how to use condoms to high school children. We will be giving talks to men and women about the risks of STIs and HIV and how to prevent the spread of both. We will be put into awkward situations, so it is better that we get used to it now.
On a completely different note, I did my laundry for the first time the other day. In Honduras, they have Pilas, which is where laundry is done. A Pila is a large concrete hollowed out slab with a washboard built in. So, to do laundry: First, the clothes need to be inside out. You grab one article and place it on the washboard surface and get it wet. Then, you soap it up and with a lot of muscles (muy fuerte) you scrub the article of clothing on the scrub board. You need to be very careful of your knuckles at this time, though. I ended up with some skinned ones, because, like I said, it is made of cement. So, after you feel that you have adequately scrub the piece of clothing, you rinse it out and ring it out. You have to really make sure and do a good job rinsing and ringing because otherwise the soap is going to stay in the clothes and it makes the clothes a little more on the stiff side, so it is no bueno.
All in all, the first week was very successful for me, I would say anyway. I’m getting better at Spanish and I know how to do my laundry by hand. My newest goal is to learn how to make the tortillas the my host grandmother (abuela anfitriona) makes most mornings and that we have with basically every meal. The food is a topic for another day.
Yesterday, I had officially been in Honduras for one week. This one week, though, has felt like three. I am not the only one that feels that way - most of us feel it. Something about the extremity of constantly having to pick our brains to pull out what little Spanish we have in our brains to communicate with people. It makes the ability to comprehend time slightly more difficult. We seem to have all settled in now, though. Compared to my first couple days in Honduras with my host family, I am already so much better at talking with them. It is not that I have learned more Spanish or anything along those lines, I have just slowly been getting better at using the Spanish that I already knew. When you are forced to use it, it thankfully comes relatively quickly.
So, for the Peace Corps Honduras, in order to be sworn in after training, you have to have reached an “Intermediate Mid” level in Spanish. So, the first couple days of training, we had interviews (entrevistas) with the language facilitators. My interviewer, was actually the director of the language program here - Manuel. He is really nice, but that didn’t make me any less nervous when I went in for my interview. Of course mine was on the second day of interviews, so I couldn’t just get it out of the way right off the bat. I walked into the 10 by 10 classroom and sat at the table across from Manuel. He turned on the tape recorder and began! It started simple - say your name, where you are from, where you are living here in Honduras. Then he asked questions about Alaska. He also gave me a card that I had to read in English and then do what ever it said, which was to ask him about his life. I ended up asking him where he lived, if he had a family, how long he had been married. Things like that. I tried asking him what year he moved from where he used to live to where he lives now, but that did NOT work. He told me just to move on and ask a different question! When I made that screw up, I thought for sure I was going to end up in a really low language class.
The levels are as follows:
Novice Low
Novice MidNovice High
Intermediate Low
Intermediate MidIntermediate High
Advanced Low
Advanced Mid
Advanced High
Superb (or something like that)
Later in the day, I looked over the descriptions for each one of the levels and I was really shooting for an Intermediate Low. I felt like I was better than the descriptions for the Novice levels, which basically said you could ask just the basic questions and that you were hard to understand because of your accent. The following day, our language levels were not posted yet, however we were broken up into smaller groups of 10. We were put with people of similar levels for the language facilitators to get another view of our Spanish skills. Then, the following day, we were broken up into our levels. Turns out, I am an Intermediate Low, which I was super excited about. I am in a class with four other people, and our language facilitator is Carlos, who is great. These classes are basically set up to get us talking. We haven’t learned a lot of new material, we just practice talking and end up copying down a lot of new vocabulary words. Apparently, the best way to learn is to describe things and to defend your ideas and opinions, which is exactly what they have us do. Then, each night, we have homework - which so far for my group has been different questions to ask my host family that basically just starts up a dialog and again, gets us talking.
Training has been semi-intense. We have fours hours of language class, followed by four hours of either our technical training, which for me is technical training for HIV/AIDS and Child Survival - there is also a business group and a water and sanitation group (Salud, Nagocios, y Agua y Sanamiento). So, we either have technical training, medical training, security training, or cultural training. The cultural training sessions are always fun because the staff does skits for us that tend to be pretty comical. The security training sessions always put a lot of people on edge. They are a little nerve racking. Juan Carlos, who is the best security facilitator in the Peace Corps (I mean officially), is always full of important, but scary information. He has to tell us about all the thefts, robberies, burglaries, assaults and rapes that happen in the country and to PC Volunteers. He also told us all the national statistics for the same things as well as murders and such that happen in Honduras. Apparently the last few years, crime in Honduras has escalated, which severely limit’s the locations that PC now sends volunteers for safety purposes.
Yesterday, we participated in a drill for security purposes. We were all on a bus, which was held up by two men with guns. They took peoples back packs, and tried taking some women with them as well. The point of this demonstration was for us to always be on guard. We need to not have all of our expensive belongings with us, it is best to put our backpacks on the floor with our foot through the straps, women can put phones and wallets in their bras, and don’t try to fight back - just give them what they want. The Peace Crops main goal is preparation and keeping their volunteers out of those kind of situations. We are not to ride buses at dark - we are not allowed to ride city buses in Tegucigalpa; we have to take a cab. But, there are only certain cabs we can take because a lot of fake cabs are roaming the streets. And always, women should not to travel alone!
Yes, the days that Juan Carlos comes are always so uplifting! He is an awesome instructor, but the material that he always has to share with us is just slightly on the depressing side. Like hearing that there have already been three rapes against PC Volunteers in Honduras this year (2011 - January was only 2 months ago) - Like Honduras has the highest crime rate in Central America. Like we are not supposed to travel to San Pedro Sula because it is Soooo dangerous, but any bus that we take to the Northern, Western, or Eastern parts of the country, will HAVE to stop in San Pedro Sula.
I don’t want to talk too much about what Juan Carlos talks to us about because I don’t want to worry anyone in the States. For the most part, PC volunteers are usually only the victims of thefts - with no violence involved! I can live with my iPod or camera getting stolen just as long as I don’t get hurt in the process!
Today, in my technical training class for Health, we learned all about immunizations in Honduras and then we had a session on breast feeding. Apparently, a lot of women in Honduras don’t breastfeed long enough, which is the best way to keep a child from being malnourished for those first 6 months - as long as the mother’s nutrition is good as well. Working with pregnant woman and women already breastfeeding may be something all of Health people will do at some point, so we needed to know all the details that go along with it. Women in Honduras will often be seen feeding their infant a coca cola! I know right, what are they thinking. But, they want their baby to be fat and happy and when they have cokes, they get fat - lots of sugar. What the women don’t understand is that by not giving them breast milk, the child is not getting any of the nutrients that it needs. Also, apparently many women feed their infants formula because they think it is better, when again, breast milk is the key! So, at some point, I will most likely be giving charlas (small talks) about the importance of breast feeding children for at least the first 6 months.
In this session, Hector brought in a breastfeeding mother, who was able to give us a real visual. I’m sure every one of us have seen someone be breastfed before, but after going over all the parts of the breast and the importance of how the baby latches on, it was actually pretty cool to be able to see it in person. The girl looked like she couldn’t have been over 18 or 19 years old, and her little boy was four months old! So cute. There are four, maybe five men in the Health program this time around, so this session, I’m sure, was a little bit weird for them, but joining the Health program, they knew what they were getting into. The med are going to have to get used to uncomfortable situations like that. We are all going to have to get used to uncomfortable situations like that. We will all at some point in out two years of service be giving talks on how to use condoms to high school children. We will be giving talks to men and women about the risks of STIs and HIV and how to prevent the spread of both. We will be put into awkward situations, so it is better that we get used to it now.
On a completely different note, I did my laundry for the first time the other day. In Honduras, they have Pilas, which is where laundry is done. A Pila is a large concrete hollowed out slab with a washboard built in. So, to do laundry: First, the clothes need to be inside out. You grab one article and place it on the washboard surface and get it wet. Then, you soap it up and with a lot of muscles (muy fuerte) you scrub the article of clothing on the scrub board. You need to be very careful of your knuckles at this time, though. I ended up with some skinned ones, because, like I said, it is made of cement. So, after you feel that you have adequately scrub the piece of clothing, you rinse it out and ring it out. You have to really make sure and do a good job rinsing and ringing because otherwise the soap is going to stay in the clothes and it makes the clothes a little more on the stiff side, so it is no bueno.
All in all, the first week was very successful for me, I would say anyway. I’m getting better at Spanish and I know how to do my laundry by hand. My newest goal is to learn how to make the tortillas the my host grandmother (abuela anfitriona) makes most mornings and that we have with basically every meal. The food is a topic for another day.
Arrival in Honduras
With what sounds like 10 rouge dogs running by my house, barking, I began to get ready for bed on my first night in Honduras. After the dogs made their way beyond my earshot, I let the quite settle in around me. However, I quickly realized that it was not really that quite. The crickets were having a hay-day. Being from Alaska, and partially Washington, I don’t get to hear many crickets. So, standing in my room listening to tons of little insects stroke their legs together, or how ever it works, was almost mesmerizing. To backtrack a little bit, I arrived in Tegucigalpa at about 1pm (on the 24th of February). Before actually landing, we made three large circles around Tegucigalpa because we had to wait out some weather - this took us about a half an hour. Some of the other Peace Corps Trainees (PCT) had told me about the runway/landing in Tegus (as the locals call it), but I really didn’t know what to expect. I’ve landed in Sitka and Ketchikan in 60 mph winds, so I didn’t think much of it, but it was actually pretty intense. I wasn’t scared for my life like I have been landing in SE Alaska at some points, but it was still noteworthy. So, to land in Tegus, the 737 comes in normal, or so you think, but then all the sudden the jet turns hard over to the left. As it gets closer to the runway, it begins to straighten out and then lands (pretty much while still turning to the left) - and, all this while missing hitting the neighboring houses and businesses with the wings by about 20 feet.
After the 53 trainees were all off the plane and through customs, we grabbed the bags that had all been marked with pink yarn. It was a bit of a zoo, but I found my bags and after greeting the three PC officers (and Honduras Director) was told to make my way trough immigration. After having all my bags, even my purse, put through a scanner, like the regular screening you go through to get into the terminal of an airport, I made my way out into the main part of the terminal where more Peace Corps Officers shuffled us all out of the airport to a parking lot, across a street, and to a parking lot with six Land Cruisers and a bus. Each Cruiser had a list of names taped to its window, which was where we were to leave our luggage to be delivered to our host families (familia anfitriona). A yellow school bus was also there to take all of trainees to our training facility. However, this could not happen until we all made it to the parking lot, gave Lisa our medical questionnaire and immunization record, and gave our passports to a male Peace Corps Officer. It took a good 45 minutes for all of us to make it to the Land Cruisers. Amazingly, a cooler full of fruit (my first Honduran banana!!!) and bottled water, pizza and Quaker oatmeal-cookie-things were provided. I didn’t eat the pizza, but everything else was delicious (muy rico!) Waking up at 4 a.m., waiting in the airport for four hours, flying for three hours, and then lugging 120 lbs (not even exaggerating) through a few parking lots in what seemed to me like 95 degree heat, can make one pick up quite the appetite.
We all loaded on the bus and after we began the drive to our training site, we were given a piece of paper about our first host families. I am living with Ana Auristela and Miguel with their kids Michelle, Ana Maricela, and Miguel Earnesto. They are so nice. Ana Maricela is 13 and has been more outgoing than the other two. We even played a card game together. It took about 10 minutes for her to explain the game to me because of the language barrier - understanding what she was saying when telling me the rules was very difficult. But, I’m getting ahead of myself.
It took about an hour to drive from Tegus to Zarabanda (out training site). Here, we were introduced to a ton of the Peace Corps Honduras staff. I don’t remember anyone’s name - except Javier, but that is only because he will be picking the seven of us trainees that will be living in Los Planes up every day and taking us back home after classes for these first three weeks of training. In Zarabanda, we had a really brief - as in only two hours - orientation about water, food, the buddy system, money, and some logistics before we went outside to meet our host families. Auristela and the two girls were there to greet me!
Arriving in Zarabanda, was when my nerves really began to kick in. It was really just a matter of going all in - head first - and talking with my host family as much as possible. I talked as much as I could with them, and I definitely told them right off the bat that my Spanish was not very good - I’m already pretty good at looking confused, saying no comprendo and, repita por favor. The whole family is really nice about it and have been working with me, speaking with me, speaking slower for me and trying to clarify things when I don’t understand. Even though they are really nice and work with me a lot, it doesn’t stop my nerves everyday I walk down our road back to my house after training. There is a little bit of dread everyday, knowing that I am going to have to step inside and go completely into Spanish mode after a day of language classes and training. It literally makes you brain hurt.
Talking with Miguel and Auristel I get so nervous. I don’t want to say things wrong, but really, it is going to happen. I just need to keep talking and not worry about what is coming out of my mouth. Ok, yes, I need to worry about what is coming out of my mouth, but not about basic stuff. At this point, if I say el mesa instead of la mesa, it is not a problem - I just need to keep practicing speaking Spanish and not worry about that basic grammar. Our language instructs just want us to talk, talk, talk. Auristela and Miguel are really good about correcting me when I say thing wrong, too, so that makes it nice. I know that seems a little counterintuitive, but at this point all of us trainees (aspirantes) need to be corrected, so we know what we are doing wrong. After we hear things a few times, we will eventually make the words come out of our mouths correctly.
These first few days have been entirely too mentally fatiguing. Everyone here is over 21 years old, yet we are going to bed at 8:30pm because our brains are so fried by that time that we just have to go to sleep. It is crazy how just working so hard to speak another language for a few hours takes so much energy
After the 53 trainees were all off the plane and through customs, we grabbed the bags that had all been marked with pink yarn. It was a bit of a zoo, but I found my bags and after greeting the three PC officers (and Honduras Director) was told to make my way trough immigration. After having all my bags, even my purse, put through a scanner, like the regular screening you go through to get into the terminal of an airport, I made my way out into the main part of the terminal where more Peace Corps Officers shuffled us all out of the airport to a parking lot, across a street, and to a parking lot with six Land Cruisers and a bus. Each Cruiser had a list of names taped to its window, which was where we were to leave our luggage to be delivered to our host families (familia anfitriona). A yellow school bus was also there to take all of trainees to our training facility. However, this could not happen until we all made it to the parking lot, gave Lisa our medical questionnaire and immunization record, and gave our passports to a male Peace Corps Officer. It took a good 45 minutes for all of us to make it to the Land Cruisers. Amazingly, a cooler full of fruit (my first Honduran banana!!!) and bottled water, pizza and Quaker oatmeal-cookie-things were provided. I didn’t eat the pizza, but everything else was delicious (muy rico!) Waking up at 4 a.m., waiting in the airport for four hours, flying for three hours, and then lugging 120 lbs (not even exaggerating) through a few parking lots in what seemed to me like 95 degree heat, can make one pick up quite the appetite.
We all loaded on the bus and after we began the drive to our training site, we were given a piece of paper about our first host families. I am living with Ana Auristela and Miguel with their kids Michelle, Ana Maricela, and Miguel Earnesto. They are so nice. Ana Maricela is 13 and has been more outgoing than the other two. We even played a card game together. It took about 10 minutes for her to explain the game to me because of the language barrier - understanding what she was saying when telling me the rules was very difficult. But, I’m getting ahead of myself.
It took about an hour to drive from Tegus to Zarabanda (out training site). Here, we were introduced to a ton of the Peace Corps Honduras staff. I don’t remember anyone’s name - except Javier, but that is only because he will be picking the seven of us trainees that will be living in Los Planes up every day and taking us back home after classes for these first three weeks of training. In Zarabanda, we had a really brief - as in only two hours - orientation about water, food, the buddy system, money, and some logistics before we went outside to meet our host families. Auristela and the two girls were there to greet me!
Arriving in Zarabanda, was when my nerves really began to kick in. It was really just a matter of going all in - head first - and talking with my host family as much as possible. I talked as much as I could with them, and I definitely told them right off the bat that my Spanish was not very good - I’m already pretty good at looking confused, saying no comprendo and, repita por favor. The whole family is really nice about it and have been working with me, speaking with me, speaking slower for me and trying to clarify things when I don’t understand. Even though they are really nice and work with me a lot, it doesn’t stop my nerves everyday I walk down our road back to my house after training. There is a little bit of dread everyday, knowing that I am going to have to step inside and go completely into Spanish mode after a day of language classes and training. It literally makes you brain hurt.
Talking with Miguel and Auristel I get so nervous. I don’t want to say things wrong, but really, it is going to happen. I just need to keep talking and not worry about what is coming out of my mouth. Ok, yes, I need to worry about what is coming out of my mouth, but not about basic stuff. At this point, if I say el mesa instead of la mesa, it is not a problem - I just need to keep practicing speaking Spanish and not worry about that basic grammar. Our language instructs just want us to talk, talk, talk. Auristela and Miguel are really good about correcting me when I say thing wrong, too, so that makes it nice. I know that seems a little counterintuitive, but at this point all of us trainees (aspirantes) need to be corrected, so we know what we are doing wrong. After we hear things a few times, we will eventually make the words come out of our mouths correctly.
These first few days have been entirely too mentally fatiguing. Everyone here is over 21 years old, yet we are going to bed at 8:30pm because our brains are so fried by that time that we just have to go to sleep. It is crazy how just working so hard to speak another language for a few hours takes so much energy
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