Bienvenida a Ocotepeque

Everyone should know what the title to this blog means, just from being a person alive during the Will Smith era. This weekend was our hastily thrown together welcome party for volunteers in Ocotepeque. Each new PCV gets one night to sleep out of site during his or her first two months if it’s for an approved welcome party. Since no one was really planning anything special, a nearby friend Xiah decided to have everyone over Saturday night for her feria, to lure us into staying Sunday morning to march for the parade under the PC banner. It was fun; throughout the night there were about ten of us and the next morning several other volunteers joined us. I saw a bunch of people I hadn’t seen in awhile and met a few new people.

A few interesting observations: Xiah had over some other people, one friend she had known for most of her service and his wife and friend. Xiah’s friend and his friend were German and his wife was Peruvian. It was a very interesting dynamic, since all of us PCVs have English as a first language and Spanish as a second (or third). None of us spoke any German. Of the Germans, they both had German as their first language, but after that, one was better at speaking English while the other was better at Spanish. The Peruvian girl, who didn’t talk much at all the whole night, spoke Spanish best, then German, then could do a little English. It was fun, at times, to hear everyone talking and getting along and three languages more or less flowing easily. It seemed very Peace Corps-y, I must admit.

So was sleeping three in a bed (one person gave up halfway through and spent the night in the hammock) and on the floor. Xiah owns a goat, so there was that in and out of the house. We all had fun drinking, some of them went dancing, and we all stayed up several hours (for me, almost 5) later than usual. The next morning, we had an incredible breakfast of American-tasting coffee and banana pancakes with melted chocolate as topping and then headed to the parade. Towards the end of the route, my friend Stephen and I left first since he was going to go play in a soccer game in Senti. I wanted the ride and was not particularly looking forward to more parade marching in the oppressive heat. It was fun hanging out and then watching a bit of the soccer game, though I left soon after it finally started. It was almost like a Sunday back home, where I would have been watching my sisters play, although “with more Spanish cursing,” Stephen pointed out.

After that, I stopped in Senti to have a bite to eat with Matt and discuss our plans for the week, since I’ll be going to at least part of his training in Santa Rosa de Copan. I got my mail – my first package to my site, yay, thanks Gram! – and then got a ride back up to my site with people who, I think, were only going halfway up the mountain. But they took me all the way to Cisco despite my protests. One of the daughters in the back with me spoke fairly good English and I think they wanted us to talk, but she was pretty shy. But she really was pretty good. Most students who learn English learn it from people who barely speak English themselves, have heavy accents, and can only do things like say the alphabet or name colors. Between English and Spanish though, we were able to have an OK conversation. I was super exhausted when I got home late Sunday afternoon and after hanging out with my family and going to bed early, I let myself sleep in Monday. But it’s just about time to get all geared up for some more traveling, this time to Santa Rosa! After this trip though, I need to stop spending so much money. Maybe I’ll stay in site for Thanksgiving…we’ll see.

Random note: I kind of just realized how odd it is that my host family here doesn’t own a hammock. It’s so very un-Honduran of them. I miss hammocks and definitely look forward to having my own.