Honduras Always Wins

I have had an interesting few weeks here in Honduras.  I spent a week at Reconnect, where all the business volunteers currently serving in Honduras had 4 days worth of meetings and training sessions.  The volunteers from water and sanitation project, as well as the volunteers from the health project also had their reconnects at the same location.  This meant that there were around 75 volunteers in one place.  It was a shock to be around so many Americans again, after spending almost 4 months secluded in my little mountain village.  All in all, it was a good week and it was great to catch up with my friends from training who I had not seen since our swearing in ceremony back in May.

At reconnect, as well as having business technical sessions, we had some cross project sessions with all the volunteers present. In one session, we talked about the things that make living and working as a PCV in Honduras difficult.  In a short amount of time we had a long list of things that ranged from people not showing up to meetings (a common occurrence here) to the safety and security problems we face living in Honduras.  One volunteer, who has the reputation of being a bit pessimistic, simply said “Honduras always wins.”  What she meant by this is that as hard as we work to try and accomplish something, nothing is EVER easy here and things usually end up working against you.

There is a lot of truth to the statement "Honduras always wins."  I should start by saying, I have no regrets about my decision to come to Honduras as a PCV.  I have high hopes for what I can accomplish during my 27 months in country.  That being said, nothing is ever easy here and the more time I spend here, the more it seems that "Honduras always wins" in one way or another.

I feel like my blogs have been fairly upbeat and positive.  I have been trying to keep everything in perspective and not let the little things get to me.  Well, these past few weeks have just not been very great.  I debated whether or not I wanted to be write this post, but I want to be honest with myself (and the 5 of you that actually read my blog).  Sometimes things just really suck here and I have lately found myself thinking “Honduras always wins.”

To start things off, I finally got sick (it took me more than 6 months) last week.  It was nothing major and I knew it was bound to happen eventually, but it still put me in a bad mood (and left me feeling pretty bad for a few days).  I think the worst part was that the previous week I had just been bragging to all my PCV friends about how I had made it 6 months without getting sick as most of them have had amoebas 3 times, had a few bacterial infections and even a case of pneumonia which required hospitalization.  I guess that’s what I get for thinking my six years in Indonesia left me a stomach made of steel and gave me a stronger immune system than everyone who grew up in the States!  To add insult to injury this week, I also had to eat the biggest bowl of Sopa de Mondogo (tripe soup) that I have ever seen in my life.  A family from my town had invited me to lunch and as I sat down at the table, “Honduras always wins”, popped into my head.  Let me say that an upset stomach and giant chucks of tripe do not go well together.   To make things just a little worse, one of the little boys in the family insisted on making vomiting sounds all through lunch and constantly discussing what tripe was and where it came from.      

To continue my less than stellar week, a change was made to Peace Corps Honduras policy that will change the next 20 months of my service.  PC Honduras has banned large gatherings of Volunteers and has also limited how many nights we can be out of site per month.  Our country director also cancelled a PCV tradition of having a Halloween party in Copan Ruins (not a PC sponsored event) that I have been looking forward to since arriving in site.   I am pretty upset about these new changes.  As a volunteer that is living in a small rural community, my sanity really depends on having a few times a year where I can be with a big group of Americans and just let loose a little.  Don’t get me wrong, I love my site and the people that live there, but  I have zero social life in my town.  My friends are all old ladies or little kids, as everyone my age tends to leave town or be married with 3 kids by the time they hit 24.  I am in my room by 8:30 most nights and have been reading at least a book a week and going through the movies on my external hard drive at an alarming rate.  I need the opportunity to get together with 10 or 15 other gringos, drink a few beers and act like a normal 24 year old every once in awhile.  The policy was put in place to prevent safety and security incidences that are more likely to occur when there are large groups of Volunteers in one place.  I understand why PC Honduras had to implement this policy, but that doesn’t make it any easier to accept. 

I also have also been having a rough time with my work lately.  I started teaching a business course in the high school a few months ago.  I was feeling pretty good about my progress, but then, of course,  Honduras had to go and win.  The students at my local high school have pretty much been in strike on and off for the past 6 weeks (yes, the students go on strike here, as well as the teachers).  Now, some of teachers have stopped coming to the school because they have not been paid in 6 months.  As of right now, I have missed more classes than I have taught.  Then of course there is the fact that every meeting I have attended  during the past few weeks has started anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours late.  I can't bring myself to show up late to meetings and because I this, I usually end up sitting alone for at leas half an hour until someone finally shows up for the meeting.  I try to practice patience, but sometimes I lack all the patience needed to work in this country.   

On a more serious note, I also got some news about an incident that occurred to an American woman (not a peace corps volunteer) in my nearest big city, that I visit 3 or 4 times a month.  While the incident happened in an area I have never visited, it is only a few blocks away from where I usually run all my errands when I am in town.  I was upset not only to hear about what happened to this young woman, but also how little help the local authorities have provided her.  After hearing about this incident, I was reminded that I can't let my guard down so easily.  

On top of all of that, a long list of other minor things happened to me that ended up being the cherry on top of a bad week:  I had a weird bug bite on my face that stung/burned/tingled for about 12 hours, we lost power for 18 hours, someone hacked my cell phone and signed me up for a bunch of subscriptions that ate up all the money I put on my phone and my favorite jeans (I only have two pairs) now have a hole in them from being washed by hand so many times.  The list goes on, but I will spare ya'll the complete list!

So there is my rant.  I want to reinforce the fact that I am in fact, happy to be here, even though I might sound like I am complaining  a lot in this post.  What’s life without some challenges, right! I promise that in the next post we will get back to the happy and positive stuff (like how I made orange wine with a woman’s group for 6 hours one Sunday or how I scored two goals in that last game I played with my woman's soccer team)!