Swimming without suits (almost)

We have been working hard since our last post and trip to La Moskitia. Shannon continues working with her English classes, Colgate program, HIV/AIDS, helping with Kevin’s swimming team, presentations, and many other random things. Kevin has been focusing on his swimming team as well as helping with English in the university and will start working with a class next week to hopefully start a recycling program at the university. We both went to Tegucigalpa this past Saturday with the athletes from the university that participated in the third annual JUDUCA (Juegos Deportivos Universitarios de Centroamérica). Eight countries and 19 universities were present at the games. It was the first time our university took teams to this event and we were represented in soccer, indoor soccer, basketball, swimming, track, tae kwan do, and chess. It was the first time many of these athletes had participated in a competition like this.
The Universidad Nacionál de Agricultura is set up so the students take classes about four hours a day and work about four hours a day on the university land. It is a hands-on approach to learning as well as regular classroom learning. After their time allotted to eat their three meals, study, and do anything else they need to do, they don’t have much free time. The students call it jail, and it kind of is like a jail. Everyone lives on campus, no one can leave without permission, and they are not allowed to have tattoos, piercings (for males), long hair (for males), drink alcohol, smoke, or fight. They get strikes for missing class, doing badly in classes, or getting caught breaking the rules. If they get too many strikes, or fail a class, they get kicked out of the university.
The universities we competed against were much more like universities at home. You can take classes when you want and then do whatever you want in your free time. They have real sports teams set up like universities at home. The swimmers were told from the very beginning that they would probably not win at this competition and would probably face competitors who had swum their whole lives. They wanted to go ahead and do it so we put in about two months of practice starting from learning to breathe in freestyle as well as learning all of the other strokes and they advanced a lot (at the beginning Shannon could beat all of them and by the end they could all beat her in 50 yards). Minus Easter week and the time we spent back home in March, they really only had 5 full weeks of practice. Needless to say, having never swam competitively in their lives and barely knowing how to swim when we started, we went to the competition with low expectations. When we arrived at the pool, the other teams were wearing their warm-up suits with their school names and had flags from their schools and we knew that these teams were for real. We were standing there in jeans and polo shirts. Our team dove off blocks for the first time in their lives the morning the meet started and we bought suits and goggles at eight o’clock the night before!
Our guys swam hard but we still finished last in almost every event we swam. One of our swimmers had the only false start of the meet, not that the meet was run super well but that is another story and Kevin is still upset about that. Afterwards, they all asked if we were still going to practice and were excited to continue swimming. So, we will. The next JUDUCA is in two years in Guatemala. The four swimmers we took are all freshman or sophomores and can practice, without our help, for two more years and keep improving. We will help them until we leave and continue to teach people to swim and how to improve their techniques if they already know how. The other teams from our university did just about as well as the swimmers but we did get one bronze medal in tae kwon do and the chess players were still competing when we left with the hopes to medal.
Our swimmers learned a lot from this experience and it is something they will never forget. We all went to the opening ceremonies and were introduced like in the Olympics where the teams walk in after the name of the country. Shannon and Kevin got to walk in the front with the University president and other professors who were there. Kevin got to give out medals to the swimmers as he was the only representative for the university at the swimming closing ceremonies. He also got the best seat, right next to the JUDUCA queen. Shannon and Kevin got free food and lodging for a few days and got to see parts of Tegucigalpa they had never seen. We got to bond with the students and learn a lot of slang! We also went to a playoff soccer game for one of the major teams in the capital with most of the athletes from the university which was a lot of fun. Our first soccer game in Honduras, unfortunately not the national team but better than nothing. Overall, this was an awesome experience for everyone that will never be forgotten.

home and La Moskitia

Almost another month has passed since our last post due to varying circumstances. We went home on an unplanned trip after Kevin’s grandmother passed away in March. It was under sad circumstances that we returned home but we were glad to be able to spend time with our family and friends.
The weekend before we went home we participated in a training activity with the new group of volunteers who are currently in training. We represented the married couples support group, one of five support groups that PC Honduras offered. We got to talk about what each of the groups did as well as any other questions the trainees may have had. It was a good 4 hours of interaction with the new group and we think they learned and enjoyed it as well. It was almost two years ago when we were in their positions wondering just what Honduras had in store for us in the future and were full of questions about PC life that were answered on the same activity day.
After being spoiled at home with whatever food we wanted, we flew back overnight to Honduras, caught a ride most of the way home from some nice people we met on the plane, finally got home that night to clean some cat messes that had been created while we were gone and packed our stuff to get ready for our planned vacation to La Moskitia, the wildlands of Central America. If you didn’t read the last blog, it is the largest intact forest in Central America and we went right into the middle of it. It was a lovely nine day trip that we will never forget. We took a plane in and then traveled around in dugout boats on lagoons and rivers until the last day when we rode a vehicle out on the beach. The first day was spent in the Savannah where we saw some huge cranes, caimans, water buffalo and other animals. Day two involved going to more of a beach community and a cultural night of dancing with the locals. Day three was the long, six hour boat ride up river to the community of Las Marias. Day four we went farther upriver and took a short walk in the jungle and saw some ancient petroglyphs. Days five, six, and seven were a camping trip/hike into the jungle and climbing Pico Dama (you cant get up the top rock face but can hike up until that point). During the trip, two types of monkeys, many birds, snakes, lizards and other animals were spotted. We also had to climb up roots ( really fun for Shannon and her broken toe) and use branches at some points to get up the trail. On the hike out we saw wild hog marks and jaguar poop as well. Day eight was back down the river to another beach community where we learned to fish like the locals although only one person caught one (Yay Ana!). We refreshed ourselves with coconut juice and soda and got ready to start our adventure home at three in the morning. Two hours by boat, three and a half hours in the back of a truck on the beach and dusty roads with 14 people packed in the bed. Some waiting, then many more hours on a bus that kept stopping and making us mad. We finally made it home at about seven that night only to find the cats had peed on our bed and we had to clean it off before we could go to sleep. What a trip!
All in all, it was a fabulous trip and a great chance to see a different part of Honduras. All the people speak the local language of Miskito and do not learn Spanish until they enter school. Most speak Miskito in their houses as well and only use Spanish when speaking to non-Miskito people. They were no cars and only a few motorcycles in most of the communities which meant no dust! Everything was green and beautiful and the people were very welcoming. We didn’t feel like we were in Honduras anymore. Now it is back to the real world of dust and heat…