Weekend adventures

This past weekend was a good time, with a nice mix of solo adventures, meeting other volunteers, cultural/Spanish time, and just a bit of relaxation. In other words, it was pretty perfect. I had a lot of fun while still feeling productive and resting up. Saturday I slept in just a bit (woke up a few minutes before six) and decided not to run, for the only day last week. Instead, I got ready to make my first solo trip to San Marco. I left the house a little later than I wanted, around eight, since my breakfast took forever to be ready. But I won’t actually complain about the food/service here in my host family…they are pretty awesome all the time. I ended up walking all the way down the mountain, since there was no one driving on the road. It was a little weird, but I had planned for that to happen, just in case. After a quick stop at my banking agent, I luckily got a jalon all the way to the entrance of San Marco (instead of the entrance to Senti) from a really nice guy who knew lots of other PCVs from the past. When he was telling me about one volunteer from the 80s, he was very amused when I told him I was two years old at the time.

I finally made it to San Marco around 10 and walked right to the Banco Occidente, the bank where I needed to pay for my internet modem (which had been shut off Wednesday night). This led to an intense series of frustrations, some of which, sure, I should have expected, but others were so ridiculously ludicrous that it really made me angry. First, the bank is attached with a Western Union. Which shouldn’t be a big deal…except for several very important facts: 22% (22%!) of the Honduras economy (I don’t know how to phrase this in economical terms, but you should understand what I mean) comes from money sent from the US. That is an incredibly huge amount. Think about it…for the average family, more than a FIFTH of the money they make in a year is just sent to them from family members in the states. Crazy. Also, the bank was about an hour away from closing until Monday. The Western Union and actual bank tellers are all mixed in one big line. So…after several false starts, I finally realized I did indeed have to wait in the big huge line of people waiting to get money from Western Union, even though I just wanted to give the bank my money. I waited over an hour.

Finally, I get to my teller and luckily I could understand her (except when she kept saying money amounts, then she talked too fast) and she could understand me. But more frustrations: There’s a random $7 charge because it’s the first time I’m paying for my modem. Fine. I can’t pay with check because my checks are from a different bank. OK, whatever. But here was the thing that was super annoying: you can’t pay more than one month at a time. For no apparent reason. You have to go and repeat this process each month. I WANT to give them their money and they won’t let me. It’s ridiculous. I was talking to people about it after and no one understands, because people don’t pay bills here all the time. It’s super hard to get people to pay for things when they have no real address, and no credit cards, and live up in the mountains, and just don’t care if they keep getting final notices or whatever. And here I am, trying to pay for a few months so I don’t have to repeat this every week, and they won’t allow you. That killed me.

But after I finally got out of there, the day was all good. I met up with Luke, the only other YD volunteer in Ocotepeque, and another PCV at the smoothie place I love so much. We only had like an hour to talk (we should have had like twenty minutes, but he kept missing his bus because he didn’t really care that much about getting back) but he was definitely as cool as people had told me. After the guys left, I got my bearings and then went off. I stopped by the market, where I only ended up buying ice cube trays, which I probably won’t use until I’m in my own place. I looked at light jackets/fleeces and rain boots, but decided to wait just a bit longer. After the market, I went to the giant school supply story, which I was not prepared for at all. It’s actually a 2-story store with an abundance of school supplies, appliances, tools, clothing, and home goods. Now that I’m thinking about it…it was basically Sears. I was totally overwhelmed.

But it was a good kind of overwhelmed. When I left, about $11 poorer, I had tons of charla paper, markers, a few notebooks, construction paper, and lots of laminates to decorate with. It was exciting, to think that now I am actually capable of doing some work. It was also good to get an idea of prices for appliance-like things I might want in my house soon enough. That’s an entry on its own, but I think I may have found where I’m going to live when I move out. I don’t want to get too excited or too ahead of myself until I have something more concrete than a random relative’s word, though. After that adventure, I walked around San Marco a bit more, sampling some internet sites and doing some random grocery shopping. I did find a place with fast internet, but my thumb drive wasn’t working there so it was mostly useless. I also found real peanut butter, at a really good price, so I bought three jars. That was pretty exciting – I know, quite the life here. I finally made it back to the entrance just as the bus was about to leave, so it was perfect timing.

The ride back to Senti took awhile though, since for some reason we stopped at the high school to wait for the kids to get out of school. It was annoying, because I was just far enough away to not want to get out and walk and instead had to wait. After I got off, I went right to get my mail from Gram and Bop and found my banking agent store closed. It was finally time to head home, so I got to the bus stop to head back up the mountain just after five. It was still perfectly sunny out, streets with lots of people on them, a busy lively town. I even had Matt’s dog, Jackson, to keep me company. All I needed was the bus (which I thought might be done for the day) or a jalon back up.

An hour and a half later, I was still stranded at the bus stop. A few cars went by, but only one went up to Cisco and it didn’t want to give me a ride. It’s getting dark and the little girls that were keeping me company left, although the one did tell me I could sleep over her house if I couldn’t get a ride back. Cute, but not very helpful. Really, thank God I had Jackson or I would have been completely a mess. As it was, I eventually called Matt to make sure he wasn’t coming back that night (he wasn’t) and was starting to weigh my options. I really didn’t want to call anyone else and look like the dumb Gringo stranded a mile away from her own town…but when the bolos came, then I really did start to think about calling. I saw my sister go by on a motorcycle a few minutes later (also not helpful) and figured she’d call when she got back home. I didn’t know what to do and was starting to get a bit freaked out and then finally I was saved! Two really nice guys gave me a jalon back up, even insisting I sit up front with them so I didn’t have to ride in back with the bolos. I think that was the most relieved I’d ever been in Honduras (though if I had been able to attend my fantasy draft, I think that would have been better). When I got back to my house, I saw the missed calls from my family but all was well. They thought it was pretty weird I waited for over an hour and a half for a jalon too, even it was a tiny bit on the late side.

The next day, I tried sleeping in to no avail. I was up before seven and ate breakfast before going on a pathetic run. I had decided two weeks ago to do my usual long, slow Sunday run as a loop around my town, which was not very far but involved an incredible amount of big hills. The first time I did it, I was impressed with myself for doing it just under a half an hour, with less than 4 minutes of walking time (3 of those 4 minutes on the biggest hill in the world that I usually take a break on when I’m walking up). This time, I just couldn’t do it. I started walking after twelve minutes in. Lame, but at least I did a good run today to make up for it.

I spent the rest of Sunday visiting with my counterpart from the health center – we’ll call her Valerie. I had talked to her about wanting to try to visit all the churches in the area and she said I could go with her to the Catholic church anytime I wanted, but that the first Sundays of the month were best, since that’s when the priest from Senti comes. After meeting almost her entire family (parents, son, and three out of four siblings), we headed over to the gorgeous, huge church, which is right by her house. It’s also literally next door to the library and just before the school. You can see it from all over town and it really adds a pretty touch to the sights here in Cisco. Anyway, the service was slightly more interesting than the one I went to at the Evangelical church two weeks ago. I could follow a little bit more of what was going on, just because I am familiar with what happens in a Catholic church at home, but I was still lost a majority of the time. Some things, like the way the official people were dressed and all the standing/sitting/kneeling, were the same, which was comforting. Other things seemed very different, like when only a few small group of people could get communion and that there wasn’t much singing in general (opposite in this way to both the Evangelical church here and the Catholic church at home). Still, I’m glad I went. I saw some new faces and people got to see me. At least this time I wasn’t given a big welcome in front of everyone, even though I had met the priest before we started. I was glad for that.

After church, I went back with Valerie to her house to hang out a little bit, chat, and drink coffee. She has a really cute house, made just for her, right near the house of her parents and all her brothers. She’s really fun to listen to and I really like her company, even though she might be the most pushy of my counterparts (which is interesting, since anyone who knows them would think Profe was much worse). The rest of the day was spent relaxing and working on paperwork. For some reason though, I couldn’t fall asleep last night and I ended up getting up just a bit later than usual today. Therefore, I ran and ate and got ready later and didn’t go to the school, but this ended up working in my favor. Instead, I was able to meet with all three of my counterparts and finalize my work plan for the next two to three months. More feeling productive…and pretty soon, I might actually start being productive. We’ll see (a phrase I use all the time here)!