My name is Natasha, and, thanks to Students for Development, I am now in Honduras working with Canadian Peacemakers International (CPI).  CPI has two major projects on the go here – an agricultural project led by Bryan Butler (http://www.honduranproject.blogspot.com/), and an education project.  Explanations are provided on the CPI website:  http://www.cpi-cpf.ca.

My part in the education project involves teaching short English courses for students enrolled in Grades 7-9 allowing the students to complete the English component of their education in a meaningful way and hopefully empowering them – we come to them where they are at, and they choose to take hold of their education.  Just by having a native English speaker supporting the program in such a way promotes the program and plants seeds of interest.  I’m also working on developing the English course component in the program, which at this point is fairly rough and rudimentary.  The students use the program Educatodos provided by USAID which has been digitalized by CPI and installed in computers for students at the centre in Santa Cruz and in various satellite centres in nearby villages. The program does include English textbooks for 7^th, 8^th and 9^th grade levels which are, unfortunately, much too advanced, as the average student is starting from zero, or possibly “Hello”. The classes which I am teaching are very helpful for me in learning where to begin, how to present things, which topics are important, which are of interest, and which kind of explanations are needed.

It is very rewarding for me working with these students, because this education is not only an opportunity which they have been given, but which they have chosen to take and make a priority in their lives.  Because these are students by choice, they have a real desire to learn.  It is a very special thing to work with adult women – 30, 40, 50 year olds – for whom this education is an opportunity for real change in their lives.  So many people here are blinded or incapacitated by the day to day survival/ subsistence grind, that these women have shown an amazing amount of vision and courage in taking a hold on their education.  Having Grade 9 here opens up many life-changing opportunities for work and further education.

I live in a town called Santa Cruz, about an hour and a half away from San Pedro Sula, the larger city which I flew into.  Tegucigalpa is about four hours’ drive in the other direction.

The office is a bustling place, students coming and going, everyone working or socializing hard… I have some wonderful co-workers:  Manuel is the assistant director here, and the first person I met because he came to pick me up at the airport in San Pedro with a great sign – and my name was even spelled correctly!  We spoke Spanish all the way to Santa Cruz on the public transit, and when we arrived and started to talk to Bryan, I realized that he spoke English! It was a good dive back into Spanish though, easing my fears of having forgotten everything (fears which drove me to study intensely my whole flight from Houston to San Pedro!)  Edelberto is the technical expert here in the office, and also speaks only in English with Bryan and I because he is so keen to learn; I have to say that his interest and work is paying off.  Edel’s brother Santiago is the principle assistant for Bryan’s agriculture work and experiments here at the office, and also comes with me much of the time to teach, helping me in the various communities. Jenny is a welcome addition to the office staff (recently replacing two women who left to go have their babies), taking over the position of administrative assistant.  Lucia and Joselyn are working here temporarily as well, completing their internship for their technical studies.

I have to thank my coworkers in the organization for finding me a great living situation. I live in a separate room (“house”) behind the larger house where my “family”, the owners, live.  As a result, I have a family, yet can operate independently.  There are also two other rooms. One is rented to another couple, and the owners’ son and his wife and daughter live in the other.  All the nearby houses are cousins, or family somehow, so there is a lot of action – active kids especially.  In my first week here, one of the kids helped me sort out who was who and all the names, which I appreciated greatly. After you’ve met someone, there is usually only one window of opportunity to ask for their name again, after that it just seems insulting. (Even if you’re new, the names are new, and you’ve met a hundred new people in a week!)

The air is always pulsing with sounds and activity living so near to the centre of town:  kids playing and screaming, cars, buses and moto-taxis charging by, the clinking and whirring of construction three doors down, dogs barking, a noisy rooster two yards over, (where did we ever get the idea that roosters crowed at dawn?! This guy sends out his strangled cry at all hours of the day and night…) and of course the ever-present pulse of Honduras – Reggaeton.  I am often surprised with new sounds as well – an outdoor mass or a marching band at 8:30 in the morning, for example.  Never a still moment!

My first experience with the tropical rain/ thunderstorms here was incredible.  Walking down the hill with Bryan it started to drizzle, but looking back up the hill I could see the rapidly-advancing wall of water, and we quickly ducked into the nearest shop to wait out the worst of it.  After that first storm, they soon became a regular occurrence – after a beautifully hot and sunny (and not so beautifully humid!) day would arrive the almost-daily storm in all its fury, inevitably throwing the city into darkness for an undetermined amount of time.  The Petzl headlamp that was thoughtfully given to me before I left Canada has been more useful than I could have imagined beforehand!  (Besides the flux in electricity, I also used it constantly in my first few nights here to check if anything was creeping up on me…)

Water is also a constant variable, a fact that people here successfully live around every day without so much as a pause in their everyday lives.  Ever so luckily, I was thrown into the drought (so to speak) first thing, learning to successfully bucket-bathe (who knew there was such technique involved?!) my first few nights in Honduras.  Now I fully appreciate the cold-trickle shower when the water is on, and take it in stride when I am driven to the bucket…

If I had to categorize skills that I was learning in this new environment, “taking things in stride”, “going with the flow” or “chilling out” would certainly all be possible mottos to adopt.  Take bugs, to begin with a vivid example:  in this climate, there are many, many bugs – types I’ve seen before, and types I have not.  They tend to pour in through all the cracks, especially when it rains… or when they are searching for a new home, a new friend…a new food source…  Once you’ve accepted the fact that you can’t win, you are more content to leave them alone unless they directly compromise your space, or until eventually their population has taken up residence and you spend a good while fumigating them…

Those who know me in Canada may want to take a seat before reading on, lest your heart fail you… even spiders take up residence and are left happily to hang in the corners unless they break the unspoken, “you will not enter my space or move around” contract.  I had an amicable living agreement with Pedro, the spider who took up residence just inside my bathroom: whenever I came in the bathroom, he graciously crawled under the door frame to wait his turn in that space.  Unfortunately, he came to an untimely end one day, getting a bit too frisky as he danced away from the RAID fumes as I was terminating thousands of mini-ants.  His cousin José didn’t last very long either.

I very quickly learned another survival tactic that has stood me in good stead – Don’t fight the sweat!  It really is a losing battle, and everyone else is sweating too.

Other tidbits of wisdom:  walks are really strolls, and always bring an umbrella – and toilet paper.  Enjoy being constantly serenaded, and always watch out for vehicles, because this is one major area where the country motto “chill out” definitely does not apply, and they do not look out for you.  Enjoy the adventure of finding whatever it is you are looking for, and the adventure of walking home in the pouring rain as suddenly all the streetlights go out.

It is interesting how some things are much simpler when there is less busy-ness, when there are less conveniences, and how some things require so much more time and effort.  Everyone here has a pila, a concrete structure which holds water and to one or both sides has a washboard-surface where laundry and dishes are done.  The pila is always kept relatively full to provide water all of those times that there is no running water.  As with all techniques that appear so intuitive and easy, washing laundry by hand in the pila takes some skill.  Sure, I can manage – I just spend some quality time every day or two at the pila, trying not to get behind with my laundry and be chained to the pila for an eternity – but the masterfully efficient and effective way in which women here do a family’s load of laundry still escapes me.  Thankfully, as a part of the education project and only an observer of the agriculture project, my suds-up and rinse-out technique serves just fine to remove sweat and so far goes relatively untried against dirt.

The typical food here is wonderful.  Chicken, pork, beef, refried beans, eggs, rice, tortillas, delicious soups, a huge variety of fruit and veggies, tajadas (deep fried plantains – basically banana fries)…  Each day that I teach in a community, they graciously provide a lunch, always delicious.  One thing which I find curious and distressing is that despite the abundance of fruits, vegetables and fertile land, so many people are still malnourished, and children pass by the fruit trees and fruit stands to go to the “Pulperia” to buy chips or other snacks with no nutritional value, using the family’s non-expendable income.  Children all over the world want to eat snacks. The problem comes when the income level makes it a choice between more nutritious options and snacks.  In many cases a lack of knowledge or education may catalyze this problem.  This is also where Bryan’s work becomes so important, as he can demonstrate that nutrition and income can be improved.  Every family with a patch of dirt can plant something of benefit, and any family with a plot of land can begin to think even beyond directly feeding their family to income generation.

And of course I can’t forget to mention the most important activity that brings everyone together here in Honduras:  soccer!  As everyone else, I greatly anticipate games played here in town by the Municipal, the local semi-professional soccer team.  It is a change from everyday life and lifts everyone up with a charge of excitement.  And what better place to meet the mayor, really?  I had seen him at the games several times, and the other day he came over during one of the games to chat.  He already knows Bryan and the work of CPI, so I could explain my part in the projects and talk about what I was seeing and learning.  He thanked me for the work we were doing here, and gave me his perspectives on some of the challenges that are faced by the people and the government of Honduras.

Category: Honduras, On location // 7 Comments »