Amapala, the United States, and return to poverty

May 18, 2009
Part I
It has been about a month since we last wrote but hey, we were in the US seeing many of you in person for more than half of that time so give us a break. We made it home finally, after a grueling day of flying and then spending the night in the cold, cold LA airport only a 50 minute flight away from home. It was a nice day, not humid or hot and we enjoyed relaxing and eating US food after a long time without it. To make a long story short, we saw a lot of people, ate a lot of food (I mean a lot of food), and most importantly of all we got to see Robert and Erika get married. Congrats to the newlyweds and thanks for taking us to the airport on our way out of town. The wedding was beautiful and a lot of fun.

Part II
Before we went home we went to Isla del Tigre, an island that is part of Honduras in the Gulf of Fonseca in the Pacific Ocean, with other married couples in PC Honduras. We spent our last weekend in Honduras there before going home so that was lots of fun. It is a nice little place with nice sandy beaches and warm water to swim in. We also hiked to the top of the dormant volcano where we could see Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua. It was beautiful and we saw some amazing sunsets while staying there. (See photos). To get to and from the island you have to take a boat, which was fun. Apparently on weekends they have a swim to the island but sadly no one in our group participated in this. As a side note, the island is also featured on the back of the 2 Lempira Note here in Honduras.

Part III
We have been back in Catacamas now for 4 full days, getting back into the swing of things. The first night back, Shannon found a GIANT Wolf spider on our kitchen wall and made Kevin come kill it. The thing was huge, bigger than the palm of Kevin’s hand! Kevin wanted to take a picture of it but was afraid it would escape and Shannon would never forgive him for that (besides the fact that she probably wouldn’t have slept at all that night, fearing the spider would come get her in her sleep because what else would spiders do?). It has rained every night we have been home and the power has gone out every day since we have been home, including right now as we write this. Of course we started when the power was on but it left, tried to come back on, and left again. Now the air is still with no fan to blow the air around. When we left three weeks ago, everything was dead and the fields were being burned off for the planting of the new crops for when the rains come. Now, things are as green as they possibly could be and apparently it rained A LOT while we were gone, a month or so ahead of normal. It is nice when it rains because it cools things off but then it gets humid and sometimes the air gets really still and we don't like that. Work is coming along here. Shannon is continuing where she left of and Kevin starts his English class at the university on Thursday where he will teach Thursday and Friday mornings and they just started a new trimester so he will also be busier helping some other teachers with field activities. We also received a new volunteer here in Catacamas, a female business volunteer from California so that is exciting. We received 4 new volunteers in Olancho, all females, taking our total females here in Olancho from 2 to 5. Shannon was happy about that, and frankly so were some male volunteers in the area. That about sums it up for now as life continues on in the third world.

May 23, 2009
So, we have had problems with internet and have been too busy to get this darn blog post posted. It has continued to rain every night, except Thursday where it only rained in the afternoon and evening. A couple of nights it rained really hard and we found we have three leaks in our roof when it rains hard, leaving a puddle on the kitchen floor. When it rains that hard our street also turns into a river, a pretty awesome sight actually. Our back patio also floods and we have to sweep it off. Things are pretty much back to normal here. It was really hard to adjust at first and Shannon especially, was not very happy. We are getting used to living in a third world country again but still miss the U.S. We have been showing the new volunteer around and it is interesting to see her reactions as we were there 6 months ago. We have both been told that we look fatter which is true since we both gained about 5 pounds at home! The new kittens have grown a lot and we are looking for homes for them and hopefully getting the older ones fixed now that we have found a vet who performs that surgery. Today on the bus back from Juticalpa, a car passed us and we heard what sounded like gun shots. People on the bus said that they were shooting at cows but who knows…oh Olancho.