Day 5: JESUS what IS that racket.


I think I can live with missing the comic day..... (for an explaination on that visit the ever lovely Mr chod)........... just, I must be more spiritual since visiting
the 40foot tall concrete statue of Jesus Cristo that overlooks Tegucigalpa!

It's set in a national park dedicated to meditation and 'religious oration' and the religious
experience was really enhanced by the Britney Spears and eminem songs blasting out from the
speakers around Christ's feet! apparently they were getting ready for a presidential visit.

A la manana quiero visiter el mercado para camer muchos frutos tropicala!

impressed? it's probably less-than-perfect but I can say stuff like that all by myself.

Oh yea, we were sat out in the restaurant garden last night and somebody opened a door just as a
bat flew past and knocked it out. they wouldn't let me pick it up i case it had rabies but I
talked to it for a bit until everyone thought I was mad, then don Raphael put it in a dark
corner of the garden. It either recovered and flew away or was eaten by the cat. we don't know.
I like to think the former! ...for those who don't know mand or me then Mand's personal fave ever comic character is batman, hense why occasionally I will refer to her as Batmandy.

Well, the maid's turning off the lights so I think I'll go up to my room now - she's really
nice, v.young and from one of the poorest parts of the country - when she arrived 3 years ago
she hadn't seen a telephone or eaten with a fork even! with the money she's earned here she's
built a house for her parents, bought them some pigs and donkeys and paid for her 2 youngest
sisters to go to school - their dad wouldn't pay because girls are just to work in the home!

It really is a totally different way of life here- but there's no sign of this culture shock
they kept going on about.

Day 2: Lessons in spanish muggings.

Well, I´ve survived my first day of intensive Spanish lessons- becauseI know a bit they´ve put me in the top group and it´s really hard work. I should be going home now to practise but instead we´re all going out for something to eat and maybe a beer or two, it´s 6pm here now and just cooling down.

Still getting on well with everyone in the group - everyone´s arrived now so there are nearly 30 of us and quite a strange mixture too although I was surprised that it´s mostly English people and only a coupla americans and one canadian.

I´ve got a feeling that these 3 months are going to go really quickly - the volunteers that have been here a while have been telling us about all the places to go on weekends and stuff to do - and the horror stories - one american lad was mugged within 5 hours of arriving and then again the next day! but as he´s very obviously a loud american I think we may have found the cause!
we´re all sticking in geoups though and as there are 3 of us staying at the same house we can share cabs together so we´re pretty safe.

Beginings:

The journey was a pretty damn long one. Starting at London Heathrow she flew over the pond to New York where she had a 7 hour stop over before flying on to florida and eventually on to Honduras city.......or so the plan was.

I received an email this morning saying:-

"Well, after a bit of a nightmare journey, I'm here, safe and sound and being really well looked after by lovely people.

I met a girl called Farrah on the plane, she's from Canada and here to do journalism - she can speak really good Spanish which was helpful when our plane was rerouted and we were left on the other side of Honduras! American Airlines only provided one bus and it wasn't big enough so we were left behind - and it was almost 40 degrees! fortunately a hondura lady on the plane who spoke perfect English took pityon us and gave us a lift to Tegucigalpa (4 hour drive). We went to her house and she gave us food and let us phone our co-ordinator who came and picked us up. You wouldn't believe her house - it was 4 storeys and gorgeous, like something out of the movies - it turned out her husband runs one of the main power companies, owns a football club and has a tractor factory!!

Our co-ordinator picked us up and took us to her parents house where 6 volunteers are staying and we had a big family meal outside. Farrah and I am staying at the co-ordinators house for the first week of Spanish lessons then I go out to La Esperanza - which apparently is one of the nicest districts and is quite high in the mountains so it is cooler there. The house here is lovely, they collect Honduran art and the walls are covered in really colourful oil paintings. We are being taken for a meal at a restaurant to meet all the other volunteers tonight- all the ones I've met so far have been English!

The country is beauftiful but so many of the people are so poor - there were tiny children by the sides of the road selling fruit and stuff and people living in little huts along the sides of the road."

She also sent me a rough itnery of what she's going to be doing so I'll add it here and you are guaranteed to be bitter.

The Honduras leg.
"For the first 8 weeks teaching I am staying with onother volunteer at the house of a lady called Olga, apparently she lives with her 14 year old son and has been doing this for ages. her house has a proper toilet! and an outside shower (?) and telephone, washing machine, electricity etc with internet facilities next door - cool.

while I'm with her I will be teaching at a primary school and helping out on a project for people over 14 who didn't finish their education. 3 hours a day teaching!" (since she worked in the Dingle and Everton last year it'll be a pleasant chance to deal with nice kids)

The Utila leg.
"Then on the 22nd June I go to the Bay islands conservation association on Utila Island where I could:
* plan and participate in field trips around the island with school children.
* clean beaches
* help with coconut tree reforestation
*appear on local TV!
I can also help out with lessons about conservation in local schools the centre has computers and stuff and there are internet cafe's on the island so I'll be able to keep in touch.

It's a caribbean island so they speak English as their first language there - island english anyway."

If you're not bitter yet look at the pix on the website.... anyhow I digress....

"...may I quote from my Honduras guide book...."Utila measures about 7 miles long and almost 3 miles wide, it is the smallest of the bay islands with population 2000. It is 19 miles off the Honduran coast with average temps 79-85F all year round with the water being nearly the same. About 2 thirds of the island is mangrove forest . There are no big resorts on Utila, just family run places. It's a great place to go and rest and hang out away from the crowds and touristy expectations. It has fringing coral reefs with turtles etc, excellent sites for snorkelling. Utila has a very funky, international atmosphere, kind of what the Caribbean must have been like in the 1950's before the hordes of package tourists and club meds took over."

It goes on to list really cheap hotels (B&B from $4 per night!) and loads of places to eat where the backpackers go - but as the islands so small it's all together anyway! as well as the beaches and coral reefs and the mangroves (which you can canoe through!) there are caves in the only hill there to explore and visits to the other islands, banana plantations and Mayan ruins!

God I am going to hate this!!!!

and after I finish my placement I can stay there for a week and explore the mangrove forests! I was a bit disappointed about not going to the rainforest.... until I read about the mangrove!"