So it’s time for an update about Honduras and about training. Santa Lucia, where we are, is very hilly, has cobblestone streets, beautiful views of the mountains, a lagoon, and two soccer fields, I consider these the highlights. The lagoon isn’t very big, but it’s pretty cool, it’s actually a pretty green color, and there are ducks and swans in it, and on weekends people have little rowboats and paddle around it. Also on the weekends there are soccer games all day on both fields. Our first weekend here, I went to watch one of my brothers play on his team, which was fun. A lot of trainees play casually after class. I’ve played a few times and it’s fun, but I’m really bad. I also have run a few times. There’s a dirt path/street that goes up into the mountains, and isn’t very busy, so it’s good to run on. There’s another trainee who runs at a similar pace as me, so her and I run together, which is really nice. This path has breathtaking views of the town below and the mountains. The only bad part is that sometimes there are many barking dogs, and although they don’t seem like they’ll hurt us, it’s still alarming.
Usually I wake up around 6:15, get ready and eat breakfast and leave around 7:10. Some people live like half an hour from the center, but I’m pretty close, so I can get there in like ten minutes if I walk fast. Training starts at 7:30. Everyday is a little different, but we always have Spanish classes in the morning, lunch at 11:30, and sometimes more Spanish for an hour or two after lunch.
There are five people in my class. We do a lot of narration, do skits, take turns presenting a grammar topic, and present a news article, that kind of thing. It’s a little frustrating because over the past two years, I haven’t really had grammar, I’ve just taken classes taught in Spanish, and it’s hard sitting in a classroom for that many hours. I also feel like my Spanish should be better than it is, but my issue is really using correct grammar when I’m speaking. Costa Rica was the only time I really had to speak a lot of Spanish, and although I did fine, and had tons of conversations and could take care of things, people wouldn’t correct my grammar. And now I’m going off alone to my site to be a professional and it’s important that I really know the language to be as effective as possible. I’m sure I’ll improve a lot before I become a volunteer, but it’s a process.
After Spanish, we either have CORE, which is like safety and security or health, or we have Project Training, where we split into our respective projects (I’m Municipal Development) and we go over things respective to that. I think there are 15 people in Muni D. We talk about things like the structure and functions of the municipalities, the roles of different government officials, public services, transparency, social auditing, citizen participation, etc. For Security and health, we’ve had info sessions on diseases, how to prepare food and water, how to deal with unwanted attention, transportation safety, etc. Sometimes current volunteers come and talk to us about their experiences.
After training, I like to go run or play soccer, unless it’s raining really hard. After, I go home and shower, do homework, eat dinner. I’m usually asleep by 9:30 or 10. There just isn’t much to do at night.
The food isn’t too bad, although a lot of people are having serious issues with it. I was expecting mainly rice and beans, but I’ve only had rice a couple times, and I’ve had beans a few times, but not served with rice. Hondurans fry a lot of things, which does get hard to eat. I’ve had some good things and some not so good things, but nothing that I absolutely couldn’t eat. I get a lot of tortillas though, and I don’t like them that much. In Costa Rica I got really sick of rice, and here I’m getting really sick of tortillas. I eat like 6 a day sometimes. They’re corn tortillas, and are small and kind of dry. For breakfast I usually get Cornflakes, or sometimes toast, and fresh orange juice. I bring my lunch to school, and I get spaghetti, or some meat with tortillas, and sometimes and apple, watermelon, or papaya.
Some typical Honduran food:
Tacos- tortillas filled with meat, rolled tightly, and fried
Pupusas-tortillas fried, filled with pico de gallo, with cabbage and onion on top
Baleada- tortillas folded and filled with beans, cheese, and either eggs or chicken.
Tamales
Fried plantains
Anyway, it’s not bad.

My host family is good and we’re getting along well. The little girl is really cute. We color and draw together. She had two little rabbits in the house, but then one died, and she just told me that she can’t find the other one, so we’ll see what happens with that.
wednesday we went to Tegucigalpa to the market for Spanish class. My group had 7 people and we took a bus to Teguc and then a taxi to the market. We had to ask prices of things, buy some stuff, and find out bus schedules. It was a good experience. They keep warning us how dangerous the city is, but it doesn’t seem too bad. The market was neat. I bought a pineapple and some oranges for my host family. We then met up at the Peace Corps headquarters, and then they took us to Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins, so that was really exciting. i wrote my reaction about the market visit for class.
on Thursday, we leave to do our volunteer visits. Each of us will go visit a current volunteer in our own program and see what they are working on and the life of a volunteer in the field. We come back that Saturday. i´m going to a town about four hours south of here where it is warmer. i´m really excited. In two weeks, on August 8, we leave for Field Based Training (FBT), where each program goes to a different site. Muni D is going to El Paraiso, which is a city a couple hours from here. It will be interesting to live in a different part of the country for a while. While there, we will still have Spanish but will also work more with people and the government. We don’t find out our permanent sites until Sep. 17, but we’re all wondering what the sites are, and thinking about where we’d like to be placed.
saturday was fun, some of us hiked around the mountains around here for about four hours and we saw some breathtaking views of the city and the mountains. after the hike about 12 of us played soccer for a couple hours, which was really fun.
So things are going well. On the down side, we’ve had four trainees decide to leave. It’s very unusual to have so many people leave, especially in the first two weeks. The last training group didn’t lose anybody. I think the reasons are more personal than having anything to do with the program or Honduras. It’s still hard seeing people go. I really can’t imagine leaving. I’m so happy with everything and I’m excited about the upcoming travels! I <3 Honduras!