back in honduras

Hello all. I hope you all read the wonderful previous entry by my good friend Becky. Thanks Becky! So I left the US on Feb 6th, and managed to get back to my house the same day, despite my bus being held up for an hour in a huge line of cars due to an accident with a semi blocking the entire road. It was sooo nice to come back. And when I walked around on Saturday, everyone was so happy to see me and saying they had been worried and that they were missing me. Being in the US for so long was great; it was really nice enjoying hot showers and good food, but it also made me appreciate my relaxed life here. I love Peace Corps.
I´ve spent the last week catching up with everything. School started on Monday, so I´m planning some activities to do with the students.
My illness is no longer a mystery. My last test results just came back and apparently, I have brucella, which you get from eating unpasteurised milk products. Of course I didn´t know I was eating unpasteurised milk and I don´t know where I got it. It´s a pretty rare disease. But I should be ok, I just have to take antibiotics every day for 6 weeks.
So, that´s all for now. Happy Valentine´s Day!

Hello from Becky!

Hi Everyone who reads this blog! This is Becky, Kristyn's friend from college.

(Kristyn and me, senior year of college!)

How are all of you doing?

I'm doing pretty well :) Kristyn wrote an entry for me today in my blog, so I thought that I would be nice and reciprocate. Kristyn hasn't written an entry in a long time, so I'll try to help her out and let you know what she's been up to.

First of all, Kristyn arrived in the US about three weeks ago. As some of you may know, she was sick with what she thought was Dengue. She was really tired and had chills...and all of this happened right before her big DC trip! She was disappointed, but excited to come visit anyway.

For most of her trip, Kristyn stayed with our friend Julia (her room mate from college). Julia just got a nice house in Arlington, VA. right outside of DC so Kristyn was excited to go see it. For the first few days of her trip, Kristyn was pretty busy. She went to some museums in DC, out to dinner with friends from college...she even got to visit with a family that had babysat for during junior and senior year of college. She stayed with that family a few nights too.

A few days after Kristyn arrived, her friend Brianna, who's also a Peace Corps volunteer came into town. Brianna had gotten her and Kristyn some tickets to great events going on. Saturday, January 18th Brianna got Kristyn and her tickets to a women's luncheon that Michelle Obama was supposed to go to. Unfortunately, Michelle didn't make it...though there was a cake/candles/singing for her! Later that night, Brianna scored FOUR tickets to an inaugural ball...which I was able to go to too! I even brought a friend's girlfriend with me as my date.

(Kristyn and I at the ball. Look at our cool VIP passes!)

Kristyn, Brianna, Jackie (my friend) and I went to the People's Inaugural Ball. It was at the Grand Hyatt in downtown Washington, DC-very nice. There was dancing, a live band, some hors d'oeuvres, drinks, a fashion show-a very fun evening! Later, we went and met up with a friend from school, and went out dancing! Even though Kristyn was sick, she stayed up pretty late that night...missing the metro, having to catch a cab back to the house she was staying at in Maryland.

The next few days of the 'inauguration' weekend were pretty fun. We all had brunch at Julia's house in Arlington, VA on Sunday and hung out for the rest of the day.

(Kristyn, Julia, me and Giuliana)

Kristyn slept a lot because she wasn't feeling well. On Monday, her grandma, Aunt (Karen) and Aunt's boyfriend came to pick Kristyn up. They took a day trip to Thomas Jefferson's house in Monticello, VA. It's a bit of a drive from DC (around 3 hours I think) but it was very beautiful there and they had a good time.

(Aunt Karen, Kristyn, Grandma at Monticello!)

Tuesday, the BIG inauguration day, Kristyn was very busy. For some reason, the people who were organizing the Peace Corps delegation in the inaugural parade took her name off of THE list and Kristyn thought she might not be able to walk in the parade! She and Brianna were very upset! Luckily, after making some phone calls, and meeting with a guy named Corey, Kristyn was put BACK on the list and allowed to march in the inaugural parade. She had to get up at 4:30 am, take a bus from where she was staying with her Aunt and Grandma, to the DC metro and then take the metro into the city. The metro was packed and because of the MILLIONS of people that came in for Obama, took a while. She waited outside for most of the day, but was finally able to march in the afternoon. How exciting!

(Kristyn and Brianna, waiting to march in the Peace Corps tent)

(The group gets ready to march!)


The rest of the week, Kristyn wasn't feeling very well. She was supposed to come visit ME in New York City where I live, but she wasn't able to make it. It was very sad. She had to go to a few Peace Corps doctors...and it took a long time. She got some blood work done, including a MALARIA test.

Once Monday rolled around, Kristyn was actually feeling a bit better. At this point, she was again staying with our friend Julia. Julia was happy to get to spend some time with Kristyn after not seeing her much over the past few years. She had another doctor's appointment, and the Dr. told her the Malaria tests, among other things, were negative. The doctor told her though that she couldn't go back to Honduras for another week at least because he wanted to monitor her and make sure she didn't have anything more serious.

Kristyn didn't know what to do. She hadn't told anyone in her town in Honduras that she would be gone this long, and she was missing the other Peace Corps volunteers. But she had all this extra time so...

she came to visit ME in New York City! I was so happy! From this past Friday, January 30th, through early Monday, February 2nd Kristyn was here! We did a lot of stuff while she was here. We went out Friday night, and Kristyn got to meet my room mates (I have two) and some of my other friends. Saturday we went to brunch (a very New York City thing to do) and then to a modern art gallery near where I live. Saturday night my friend had a Kansas Day party, so Kristyn came to that with me. Sunday, we went to a Chinese New Year parade in downtown Manhattan and then to the NYC transit museum in Brooklyn. We ended our day at my friend's apartment in Astoria, Queens (where I live too) and watched some of the superbowl. It was great having her here, especially after seeing her place in Honduras when I went to visit in June.

(Kristyn and I in an old subway car at the NYC transit museum. She loves to take pictures like this :) )

Monday morning Kristyn headed back to DC for another Doctor's appointment. The doctor wanted to run just a FEW more tests even though Kristyn seemed fine. The next day she had another Doctor's appointment and on Wednesday she found out that she could head back to Honduras on Friday morning. She's still not exactly sure what she had in the first place, but it was probably something like Dengue.

Kristyn was very happy!

In the meantime, the waiting between Doctor's appointments and extra down time wasn't all bad. Kristyn got to see 'Slumdog Millionaire', do a lot of shopping, eat some good 'American' food like Dairy Queen and Potbellys. And she got to spend time with her friends, which is never a bad thing.

All in all, Kristyn has had a great trip to the US but she's ready to go back! I was so happy to get to see her, since I miss her a lot! In college we talked every day, multiple times and hung out a lot. So, it's been hard not having her here to talk to. But, now I got to spend a little bit of time with Kristyn, and it won't be so hard when I dont' see her until September.

:)

That's all for me. Hope you're all having a good day and Kristyn says 'HI' to all of you!

xo
Becky

Happy Holidays

I apologize for not updating in so long. I'm not much of a writer, unless it's for school, so I have to force myself to write every time I do a blog. And this past month with all the holidays, it's been even harder.

I’m going to start with Donkey Polo, which took place December 12-13. Donkey Polo, or Burro Polo, was started by a Municipal Development Peace Corps Volunteer 12 years ago in the town of Yuscaran, which is in the south-east, near the Nicaraguan border. Donkey Polo is basically what it sounds, a simplified game of polo played on donkeys instead of horses. It’s always volunteers versus the Hondurans of Yuscaran, and every single year the Hondurans have won. By a lot. This year we scored 2 and they scored at least 13. The game takes place during the Yuscaran town feria, so there are lots of food stands set up in the park, music, and a stage with events going on. Yuscaran is a beautiful town, and it’s near where we had our field based training for about 6 weeks, so I already had a good impression of that area of the country. I currently live on the complete opposite side of the country, but since Honduras is about the size of Tennessee, traveling across it is worth it for something as fun as Donkey Polo.

We played on a concrete soccer/basketball court, which was covered in donkey poop by the end. Because so many of us wanted to play, we broke it up into quarters and switched up each quarter. I played last, and my stupid donkey would not move, no matter how hard I hit it. And when it did decide to move, it would run in the opposite direction of where the action was! I was getting pretty frustrated with it. For most of my time in the game, I was smushed up against the fence because that’s where my donkey wanted to stand. On the plus side, I got some good pictures of myself on a donkey. On the down side, I don’t know when I’ll be able to post those pictures, because whenever I try, they don’t load. But overall, it was a really fun weekend. Donkey Polo was a once in a lifetime thing, only to be experienced in Honduras.

Now for the holidays. I’ve now spent my second Christmas and second New Year’s in Honduras. Christmas really isn’t the same here as in the US; it’s just not such a big deal here. There’s not much Christmas music, or decorations, or Christmas cookies, or exchanging of gifts. People usually get together with family and the woman make tamales and pan (a type of bread eaten with coffee). And at night lots of men get really drunk, someone told me there were 30 murders Christmas Eve night from drunk people having machete fights, or shooting each other. I don’t know if the number’s correct, but I’m sure there were a lot of drunken murders that night. It’s so sad that happens on such a holy night.

I spent Christmas at a fellow volunteer's site, in Nueva Ocotepeque, which is at the western most part of the country, near the borders of El Salvador and Guatemala. There were 5 of us there, volunteers from my group. On the 23rd, we went up to an aldea so that Brianna (the volunteer who lives there) could give out Christmas cards and cookies. On the 24^th, we made lots of good food and hiked up the side of a mountain behind the house, which has an amazing view of the town, and we had a picnic and watched the sunset. It was beautiful. . It’s tradition to stay up until midnight on the 24^th and set off fireworks, the same as the 31^st, but we went to bed around 10, which was probably safer. The 25^th, we made lots of good food again, and had a nice dinner and a secret santa gift exchange. The next day, we walked to this old cemetery and that night we went to karaoke (I didn't sing). So it was a really nice few days.

For New Year’s Eve, I went with another volunteer to his Honduran counterpart’s house, and there was a small party. There were tamales, honduran chop suey (they use ramen noodles, soy sauce, and lots of vegetables), and some other snacks. The night was really fun; there was music and lots of fireworks. Here it's tradition to have fireworks for Christmas and New Year's. And they make a man out of old rags and put clothes on him, kind of like a scarecrow, and they stuff him full of fireworks and set him off at midnight! Its supposed to represent the old year.

Not much happened over the Holiday weeks, since most people either had family visiting or were gone visiting family. I’ve been helping out in the library a lot, getting ready for the New Year. We took everything down, cleaned, and made new decorations.

The Sunday after New Year’s I began to feel really sick, kind of like I had the flu. My body was really achy and I kept getting the chills, but I was still up and functioning part of the day. By Wednesday I still wasn’t feeling well, and it suddenly occurred to me that I had the symptoms of dengue. Achy muscles, cramps, fever, chills, headache, pain behind eyes, tiredness, etc. Some of you might remember I was in the hospital my first week in Honduras, and dengue was a possibility. But I’m fairly positive that wasn’t dengue, it was just some kind of virus.This time it really is dengue. So Wednesday morning, I called the Peace Corps doctors but they just told me what I already knew, drink lots of fluids, take Panadol (local version of Tyenol), and rest. So that’s what I’ve been doing. Wednesday and Thursday were probably the worst days. It’s awful being sick. But people have really been taking care of me. On Thursday morning I texted the librarian that I thought I had dengue, which is why I hadn’t gone to the library the afternoon before and I didn’t think I’d go that day.

So on Thursday, Laura, the volunteer in the town next to me, came over to take care of me all day. We talked and she brought me food and made me tea. It was really nice of here. And a few people in town stopped by to see how I was. The man who works in the mayor’s office and is president of the library junta stopped by, the lady who works in the market gave me a Gatorade, and right after Laura left at 4, the two librarians (they are both about my age) stopped by and brought me crackers and juice. They stayed for about an hour. One of them told me stories of a heart condition she had when she was young and she had to get her lungs drained. She described what it was like to be in the children’s ward of the public hospital. They wouldn’t even let the parents in to be with their children. There were lots of little kids there with swollen heads, and bellies, with tubes sticking out of them, and they were all scared and alone. After listening to her stories, I felt much better. My dengue seemed like nothing next to the suffering of those kids. One of the things that makes me saddest in life is seeing really hurt or ill little kids. So anyway, it was really nice of them to come see me. After they left, I slept from 5:30-8:30, woke up, had some soup, read a little, and went back to bed at 10. This morning I’m feeling somewhat better, hopefully the fever doesn’t come back.So that's the start to my New Year. Hopefully this will fill my sickness quota for the rest of the year.

Thanksgiving and World AIDS Day

I’m trying to think of everything’s that happened since I last wrote. Thanksgiving went well. We had about 20 people, mostly volunteers, but also a few Americans here teaching at bilingual schools or working with other organizations doing Peace Corps-type work. Everyone there I had met before, and several are some of my best friends here, so it was nice gathering.

We found frozen turkey in the back freezer of a little corner store, which was good because it was easier than killing a turkey, but had me a little worried because we didn’t know how long it had been in that freezer or whether it had been defrosted and refrozen several times. Despite my doubts, the turkey turned out excellent. We had excellent homemade stuffing as well as Stove Top Stuffing, homemade wheat bread and garlic rolls, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, and some other dishes. There were many excellent desserts, including pumpkin pie, chocolate pecan pie, dirt dessert, peanut butter chocolate bars, a fruit salad, a jello mold, and more.

Our biggest setback of the day is that the water went out sometime Wednesday night and when I left Friday morning it still had not come back. So we spent all day Thursday without water, which made cleaning, cooking, washing plates, flushing the toilet, etc., a challenge. We took buckets and made trips to neighbors’ houses begging for water. No one in the neighborhood had water, but they all have pilas (like water tanks) whereas the house we were staying at doesn’t, so they were able to spare us some water. Despite all the setbacks, the day turned out really nice.

A couple days before Thanksgiving, my host parents and I had a meeting with a rural bank in one of the aldeas, which we helped form. They invited us for a celebration 1 year anniversary lunch. It was pretty neat to see that this group we helped form and train is going strong a year later. It’s a really great community with motivated people.

This past week we celebrated World AIDS Day, which is December 1st. I organized a small committee to plan events for the day, and we decided to have activities the whole week. Our committee included the Doctor from the health center, the librarian and her assistant, a local pastor, a representative from PDA (the local chapter of World Vision, a Christian aid organization), and representatives from the municipality. The doctor is a woman, and just started at our health center a few months ago, although she lives in our town. I really like her, she’s very motivated and friendly. I’d like to work more with her. Of all the activitys we planned for the week, about half actually happened.

On Monday, the 1st, we had an inauguration of the week, with the mayor, doctor, and pastor giving little speeches, and then, with the school band and some HIV/AIDS banners, we walked from the health center to the park. Our town’s TV channel came to film it all, and for the rest of the day I had people telling me they saw me on TV.

We were discussing having a health fair in the park on Tuesday, with the nurses doing HIV tests and handing out pamphlets, but that didn’t quite get organized. On Wednesday night I gave a talk to a group of 8 teenagers about HIV/AIDS. It’s a pre-prepared charla that Peace Corps gives us, and it has a lot of activities and games, rather than a lot of talking. Another volunteer came to help me out, and the Doctor came to participate and explain some of the more complicated medical parts. I was really worried no one would come, and it did take away to round up enough kids to participate, but in the end it went really well.

On Thursday we were supposed to have an AIDS patient come in to talk to a small group about his/her story and how it is living with AIDS, but the person in charge of the activity fell through, so that didn’t happen. I spent all of Thursday in the library, helping put together decorations for the float for the parade Friday. It was fun, I had never worked on a float before. I’ll try to post pictures of it. So we were in the library until 8pm on Thursday, cutting, gluing, etc. Friday morning we all meet at 7:30am to decorate the car. It was a really overcast day, but we decided to go ahead with it. As we were finishing up the car, it started raining steadily, so I went to talk to the doctor, and we all decided that we’d have to postpone the parade so that the rain wouldn’t ruin all the decorations. It was pretty disappointing after all the work we put into it, but now everyone has more time to improve their floats!
So it’s been a pretty busy week, with good days and bad days.

futbol and café

Wednesday night was a big soccer game, Honduras vs. Mexico, playing in Honduras. As a fundraiser for the library youth group, we set up the projector in the community center and showed the game in there. They charged a little for entrance and sold popcorn and pop. It was fun watching the game on such a big screen. Honduras won, 1-0, so of course everyone was super excited. Thursday morning I went to pick coffee in the farm of one of the old men who sells in the market. Coffee picking is hard, dirty work that pays practically nothing. I just went for the experience and to spend time with people. I picked a decent amount, they said. It’s definitely not something I’d want to do on a regular basis. At least it wasn´t raining. It’s been pretty cold this week, but not too rainy.

Right now, I’m putting together a group to plan activities for World AIDS Day, which is December 1st. We decided to make it a week-long event and have things each day, from the 1st to the 6th, and end the week with a little parade, Sat the 6th. It should be good, but there’s a lot of work to do.

On Sunday I think I’m going to a wedding. It will be the 3rd wedding I’ve gone to in the past month. Weddings here are definitely different than in the US. It´s fun going to different weddings and birthday parties and seeing how people celebrate.

yay obama!

It’s been a while since I last wrote, so let’s see. All the people who were evacuated have now returned to their houses, so that’s good. School lets out in about a week so I want to start a sport club and an environmental club to do with the kids during vacations. Coffee season is starting, the coffee berries are turning red and ready to pick. So during break, a lot of kids will be busy picking coffee. We had some super cold days last week, but the past 4 days or so have been really warm and sunny. It’s weird how the weather changes so drastically.

My friend from college, Ashlee, was here this past week visiting. She speaks Spanish well, so it was nice introducing her to all my friends in town. We spent time in my town and then for Halloween we went to a big party that volunteers have every year in the town of Copan Ruins, which is a touristy town near Mayan ruins. It was my first time there, and I really liked it. It’s clean, pretty, and has lots of good restaurants.

There was live music both nights and a costume party one night. There were some pretty good costumes. I was a nance tree. Nances are this little yellow fruit that is absolutely disgusting. It looks similar to a cherry, but it’s yellow and has a putrid smell, and gross taste and texture. They only grow in Honduras, as far as I know. Pretty much every volunteer hates them, and Hondurans are always trying to give us nances or nance juice. Once I was at a teacher’s house and she gave me nance juice, and I didn’t want to be rude, so I tried drinking it, but I couldn’t do it, it’s a gag reflex. So I thought a nance tree would be a scary costume. Anyway, the party was fun. We didn’t actually visit the ruins, because it’s kind of expensive to enter, but hopefully I’ll be able to go back before I leave.

Ashlee flew in and out of El Salvador, so we went to San Salvador the day before her flight. San Salvador is so nice; I was really surprised. It has nice malls and stores, and I think it’s just all around nicer than either of the big cities in Honduras. I definitely enjoyed going to the nice malls.

We were able to watch the elections on US channels, in English, so that was good. Watching Obama win just made me so extremely happy. And I’m reading Dreams from My Father right now, wish just makes me respect him even more. When he wrote that book, he didn’t have presidential aspirations, so it’s a very honest book. He’s had such an interesting life.

I saw Obama speak at Georgetown University in October 2006, my senior year. He was giving a talk about fossil fuel possibilities and I took the day off of my internship at the Sierra Club to go see him speak. I remember it was a beautiful fall day, and I walked to Georgetown from my apartment. He was such a good speaker and I thought then that some day this man could be President, and I’m seeing him speak right now. I didn’t think he’d be President so soon! Everyone here is really happy he won. People in El Salvador and in Honduras have been congratulating me on Obama winning and saying how happy they are about it. It’s such an exciting time to be an American. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so patriotic.

In other news, we think my duck, Paco, is actually a girl. So I´m thinking up a new name. Also, our town library now has a webpage up if you want to check it out. It´s in Spanish and it stills needs some work, but it´s something. There are some good pictures under the ‘Galeria de Imagenes’ tab. Here´s the link: http://www.bibliotecasanpedro.es.tl/
Go to it so we can get more hits!

natural disasters

there´s been a lot going on here the past week. Last Friday there was a huge landslide up in one of the mountains, which wiped out an entire aldea (village). Luckily, they had some warning and everyone got out in time, but they lost everything in their homes. Then the dirt from the landslide fell into the river, creating a large, natural damn. So whenever this damn breaks, all the water behind it will come rushing down the river. About 5 aldeas down the river were evacuated. There are hundreds of evacuees staying in the school and in the munincipal meeting room of the town next to mine, and about 25 people staying here. So I´ve been going almost every day to play with the kids and keep them occupied. They are just waiting; they can´t go back to thier homes until the damn breaks. I have to say the local government, police, army, and NGOs have been very organized taking care of the evacuees and keeping everything in order. Also, throughout the country, there has been a lot of flooding, and, in certain parts, tremors. So people are being evacuated all over. It´s pretty crazy. The other volunteers near me and I are safe, and Peace Corps is well aware of the situation. In other news, I have a friend from the US coming on Tuesday, so I´m excited about that. It´s fun having visitors.

I just want to write a quick update. I decided against having a cat; I just don't really like cats. So I gave him back to the people who gave him to me. My duck is doing well and getting big. He pretty much lives at my neighbors' but he's happy because he has a pond to swim in and geese to hang out with. My neighbors had a couple turkeys, but the male turkey just attacked and killed the female turkey! I told them he's too aggressive and dangerous. I don't want my duck in danger of a turkey attack. So we are going to kill and eat the aggressive turkey. He gets the death penalty for killing his wife. I think we're going to have him for Thanksgiving. Hondurans obviously don't celebrate Thanksgiving but they know what it is, so we'll have a little Thanksgiving dinner.

The map is finally finished! It took exactly one month to do. Next week we are going to celebrate. Me and the students will write our names on the wall and I'll make a cake. And I want to organize some geography activities. The map looks pretty good, although it's far from perfect. I'll post pictures of the whole process when I get a chance. The electricity has been going out a lot lately, so I haven't had much chance to use internet.

Right now I'm in the Peace Corps office in Tegucigalpa. My group is here for mid-term medical exams. We have to poop in a cup, get a physical, and go to the dentist. I traveled all day yesterday to get here, I have the medical stuff today, and I'll travel all day tommorrow to get back to my town. It's just so far.

kitty

I had a really good weekend. On Friday during the day I hung out in the market. I didn’t paint the map border like I had planned because we ran out of paint thinner and the one hardware store in town didn’t have any. I didn’t feel like going to one of the neighboring towns to get some, so instead I just hung out and talked to people. We played soccer for a little while and I made paper airplanes with the kids. It was really relaxing, and sitting there making paper airplanes, I thought about what a great job I have. In the US, I’d never be able to be sitting around on a Friday afternoon making paper airplanes and get paid for it.
Around 4pm I left for my friend Kyler’s site, a volunteer about 35 minutes in bus from me. It was the feria in his town this weekend. It was bigger than our feria, but we had better rides. The ferris wheel in our feria was pretty big and it went super fast. At this feria, they had a little ferris wheel, and it was manual. There was no motor, just a man standing at the bottom, hand-pulling it. He was a very strong man.
On Saturday, there was bull-riding. We had bull-riding in our feria, but I didn’t go because it was raining. So Saturday was the first time I’d ever seen bull-riding, other than on TV. There were 9 bulls and a small ring, and the guys took turns riding. Kyler said he was going to ride one but I was kind of skeptical. He was all ready with his sombrero, belt, and cowboy shirt. During the event, he stood down by the riders and the bulls and I sat in the stands with another volunteer, Meghan, who came to watch. It was pretty scary to watch the riding, and a couple guys almost got stepped on by the bull, although no one did actually get hurt. So I was really thinking that Kyler would back out and decide not to ride. But then he was suiting up to go. The participants wore a helmet that looked like a baseball catcher’s helmet, but was a little different. And they wore a padded leather vest. I was kind of nervous when Kyler got on the bull, but he did well, stayed on for about 5 seconds, and he fell well and didn’t hurt anything. And then the announcer did a quick interview and congratulated him. It’s not everyday you see a gringo riding bulls in Honduras. It was all pretty exciting.
Sunday, I went with my neighbors to their niece’s 12th birthday party. The party was in a community in the mountains, so we all crowded into the back of a pickup truck to drive up there. It was a nice, small party. We ate tamales, talked, and had cake. I knew most of the people there, so it was nice to talk to people. There were some cute little kids there, too.
Sunday evening, walking home from the little store down the street, around 6:30, I saw a little animal in the street. It was kind of dark out and at first I thought it was a rat, but then realized it was a tiny kitten. So I chased it and grabbed it, so that a car wouldn’t hit it in the dark, and asked around to see who it belonged to. The twins across the street, two 8 year olds, said it belonged to them, their cat recently had 3 kittens, but that they were giving away the kittens and I could have it if I wanted it. I don’t really want a cat, but this kitten is just so little and cute. And it needs care, it’s dirty and skinny. I told them I wasn’t sure I wanted it, but could they loan it to me. So I brought it home, gave it a bath and some milk, and it’s sitting in my lap sleeping as I type this. I don’t really want a cat, but I do like this kitten. And my duck’s kind of left me, so I no longer have a pet.
Things have been going well lately. The map is almost done, we should finish by Tuesday I think. It´s looking great!

1 year in site!

Saturday the 27th is my 1 year in site date. I’ve been a Peace Corps Volunteer for a year. I’m half-way done. That actually seems about right, I wouldn’t say the time is passing slow or fast, it just seems likes it’s been a year. This past year I’ve met many people, formed strong friendships, become a part of this community, and have learned a lot about Honduras and Hondurans. I’ve gained a much better understanding of the factors holding back Honduras and why. There are so many things I’ve learned and grown to understand this year. This experience is definitely preparing me to work in the field of international affairs. I’d really like to get my master’s in international environmental policy at some point after Peace Corps.
I came to my site with a lot of big ideas and plans. Now I’ve come to see that most of them aren’t really feasible, but that even if I can’t reach my big goals, my time here isn’t wasted. Although there is more I’d like to be achieving, I know my relationships and the lives I’m touching does count for a lot. I do complain about certain things here and how hard it can be, but I’m so happy I’m doing Peace Corps. There’s really no other experience like it. Even working in an NGO or government organization in a developing country wouldn’t be the same, because here I’m free to work in whatever I want to and whatever the community wants me to; I’m not tied down by a work plan, boss, or budget. This next year, I hope to get involved in more sustainable activities and get to know more people. I think the next year actually will go fast. There´s so much I want to do in work and travel, and planning for my post-Peace Corps life.
That´s all for now. I don´t think I´ll be celebrating Saturday, just working on the map, but I´ll be thinking about how my time here is half over.