We are FINALLY volunteers!

So we had our swearing in ceremony Friday and are oficially volunteers! We had the ceremony at the U.S. Embassy and then went to the Ambassador´s house where we were able to use the pool and play volleyball/basketball, and just hang out. It was a great day and it felt good to finally be volunteers and to be done with training. It felt a little like graduating from high school and going off to college (I will try to post pictures soon). We are now in Catacamas and it is miserably hot and humid...much like Austin in the summer only without air conditioning and our fan broke. Hopefully we will get used to this weather soon. We met the other two volunteers in our site yesterday and they seem really nice. It was good to hear about Catacamas from their points of view. They also told us about a nice house where other volunteers have lived that the landlady wants to rent to us. Hopefully we can go check it out soon. We have not done much in the way of work yet but we are going with one of the other volunteers tomorrow to help teach English since Shannon will be taking over that class soon. Right now we are just enjoying our new found freedom and learning about Catacamas and everything in the city. It was sad saying goodbye to everyone and knowing that we will not be able to see them for at least three months as we are not allowed to travel until then. I´m sure that three months will fly by as these past two and a half have! Kevin bought an Abercrombie polo shirt yesterday at the market for 25 lempiras which is about 1.30 USD. That is pretty awesome. They do not have shoes his size here though so that is not good.

Site Visit

So we are visiting our site in Catacamas right now and it is fabulous! It is rather hot and humid (kind of like Texas) but otherwise perfect. The city is pretty big, depending on who you talk to, the population varies from 35,000 to 70,000. The city is extremely well laid out and the roads are paved and big by Honduran standards. So far, it is by far the nicest city I have seen. The roads are clean and actually have street signs and stop lights. There is pretty much everything we need here but it is more expensive than in smaller cities. Kevin is working with an agricultural university and one of his counterparts is from the US abd speaks English. So far he really likes it especially since the university is air conditioned and has wireless internet! I have five counterparts and it seems like I am going to be super busy. They told me that they have enough work for 100 volunteers! I am working with a substance abuse program, the administration office for all of the schools, a high school, a health center, and an agency that seems very similar to CPS. It is a bit overwhelming but I think I will really like it. Our host family is very nice and we actually have hot water and a washing machine! The family consists of a mother, her daughter and son who are in their 20s, and her three grandchildren, two twin girls who are 11 months and a 10 year old girl. We like it a lot and the food is really good too. Queso Olanchano is much better than the rest of the cheese out there and luckily we live in the cheese and dairy region. Olancho, our department, is called the ¨wild East¨and is supposed to be similar to Texas. Supposedly there are lots of guns and it is an unlawful land where people take the law into their own hands and have family feuds. I think that is more in the country because Catacamas seems very civilized. There are lots of cows and everyone eats red meat. There have been a lot of storms with crazy lightening and thunder but our mom says that is rare. The department of Olancho is the biggest department in Honduras and is bigger than El Salvador, but a lot of it is farm land and forrest. It´s very pretty, we are surrounded by lush mountains and love it!

Tarantulas and despedidas

Happy Wedding Jon and Sarah! We are so sad that we are not there to celebrate with you guys! On a horrible note, there was a giant tarantula in my room this morning. I nearly died of fright but somehow I managed to compose myself and squish it. Now I am afraid of my room and really glad that I have a mosquito net so at least nothing can touch me while I sleep. Thankfully we´re going back to Zarabanda in 3 days where I do not think that they have tarantulas. Tomorrow is our despedida for our families (in Kev´s town too). I am helping to make a ton of brownies (from scratch since I´m a super chef) and fruit salad. It should be interesting... Elizabeth, Hilary, and I gave our HIV/AIDS charla yesterday and it actually went really well. Our class was really well-behaved considering they were ninth graders. They participated and I think they actually laughed less than we did when we received the charla from current volunteers. My favorite part was watching them put condoms on bananas and of course the question and answer part. We got one question asking how to have sex and at what age. Luckily our director was there and he helped us out since my Spanish is not quite that good yet. Kev said that his charla went well too, his group was much larger so he did not have to talk as much which he liked. Otherwise not a lot is going on here. Just hot and humid and I want to die everytime I have to walk somewhere.

Last week of FBT

So things have been rather crazy here. My town has been having a ton of peace festivals which are super interesting, especially when the entire crowd chants “Jesus Cristo” and the Catholic youth group performs plays where the devil tries to corrupt a young boy and Jesus saves him. I love it! A young girl in Kevin’s town was struck by lightening and killed yesterday so that is very sad. I guess she was taking the clothes off the clothesline because it was starting to rain and lightening struck her. Kevin was outside when it happened and is pretty sure that he saw the lightening strike that killed her. I think that she was related to his host family but he did not know her. Now the town is in mourning for 9 days and it is an extremely sad situation. My group had our cultural day yesterday and we got to watch folkloric dancers and eat lots of good Honduran food. We also imparted some of our culture by teaching them games like red light green light, duck duck goose, three legged races, and making rice krispie treats. It was a hit! I am in Tegucigalpa again because I had to get my last rabies shot and another girl had to go to the doctor. We are bringing back a speaker for our AIDS panel tomorrow so we get to spend the night here! All of the volunteers 2 groups ahead of us are leaving Saturday and they are all here doing paperwork and going to the doctor. It is nice to be able to talk to them because we are replacing a lot of them and they give good advice. Tomorrow we all have to give charlas (lectures) on HIV/AIDS for 4 hours to the local high schools. I am missing out on all the preparation but will be back in time to give the charla. That should be interesting. So things are going well and we only have a few days until we are back together in Zarabanda and then we get to visit our site!