Where did September go?

Written Sept 27

These last three weeks seem to have really screamed by. I was at reconnect, and then I got home, and had to go to Lucerna to do my annual report (twice), so I was out of site quite a bit. I was in site all last week, but it went from Monday to Friday in a heart beat. There was no school on Friday, which meant no class with my 5th and 6th grade boys, so it felt like Satruday! Now, it is Tuesday again, and the Women’s Health Work Shop starts tomorrow! Catie, Taryn and I have been preparing for this for a while now, but the fact that it is actually here already, scares me. I am very nervous. This will be my first time as a facilitator for a work shop, and my first time having to speak in Spanish in front of a lot of people. I have done charlas, but that is to no more than 15 or 20 people at a time. There will be about 50 at this work shop. I have not decided if the fact that half of them are other volunteers is a good thing or a bad thing, yet. Sometimes I feel like other volunteers judge way more than Hondurans. Really, Hondurans don’t judge; they understand that we are still learning and tend to be impressed even when your Spanish is pretty minimal! But, other volunteers judge based on how long you have been in Honduras. I know it is true; I have done it. When you meet someone that has been in Honduras for a while now, you think to yourself whether or not their Spanish is up to par with what you think it should be. So, hopefully I don’t get judged to harshly this week. I know I’m struggling - I guess I could have done more to prepare for this week, but I have been pretty busy actually preparing the material that practicing Spanish tended to get pushed to the back burner.

Besides getting ready for this workshop, it has been the feria in my site, which means a lot has been going on. There have been fiestas every weekend, and coronations for the princess and queen of the feria. Also, there have been horse races and a rodeo. I unfortunately missed the rodeo, but I know I will have another opportunity while here in Honduras. I am very bummed that I will be missing the events this week, though. Friday night is the competition for the “Rey Feo” (Ugly King). From what I’ve heard around my community it is a hilarious event! A bunch of guys dress up as women and get up on stage and tell everyone all the latest gossip. I’m actually a little nervous about the gossip part. I know everyone always gossips about me. According to the town gossip, I have about five boyfriends in my town. Basically any time someone sees me talking to a person of the opposite sex, that person is then thought to be my boyfriend. So, hopefully nothing too terrible is said about me during the competition. That is probably one of the larger reasons I want to be there for that particular event - so I can hear what they say about me, but I know it would also be hilarious to see a bunch of Honduran men dressed up as women. It would be a site to see, especially because Honduran men are so machismo that I would never have expected any of them to be ok with dressing up as women.

On another note…

Something happened to me last week that I didn’t think would ever happen to me during my 2-year Peace Corps experience. I got a call from the Country Director, and it, unfortunately, was not a call congratulating my great work here in Honduras. It was a call because Emily was worried about “my current behavior!” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The first thing that ran through my mind, was of course “What on Earth could I have done to merit a call from the Country Director?” I was in shock. So, the reason for the call! This blog! Can you believe it? Apparently someone ready by blog about jaloning and felt the need to share it with the Country Director.

Jaloning is not something the Peace Corps looks very highly upon - and I completely understand that. It can be dangerous and who knows what can happen. But, I guess the fact that I was not doing it by myself made me feel safe, and I didn’t even thinking about that fact that Peace Corps would look at it as a security risk. Two of the jalons that we took that trip were in the cabs of trucks and with people from my site, so that is not “bad” in Peace Corps terms, but it was the 1-hour jalon from Comayagua to Siguat that was the cause for alarm. We rode in the back of a truck, it was on a main road, and we did not know the people driving. I can completely understand why this was cause for concern, but in our defense, there were three of us together, so getting raped was not on our minds - we unfortunately forgot that we are in Honduras and these men could easily have been drug lords or people running from drug lords… who knows!

So - a word of caution for the rest of you Peace Corps folks. Don’t take rides from strangers!!!! The reality of where we are - Honduras - needs to be enough to make us be cautions. As Juan Carlos just informed us, Honduras is no longer just the most dangerous Peace Corps country, it is now the most dangerous country in the United States (besides those countries that are in wars).

So, no rides from strangers, friends!!!!

And, as a second caution - think before you post. When writing blogs, always remember that when you least expect it, someone from Peace Corps can read it. So, when writing, try to keep that in mind!