Wednesday, December 8, 2010
So I finally got my hammock put up yesterday, which was an adventure in itself. I don’t have hammock hooks so I was just going to strap it between some beams of my roof, but tying the knots with rope turned out to be trickier than Zach and I had planned for, and we ended up having to ask for backup from some Hondurans. Seriously, Hondurans must have something in their blood that makes them innately better at tying knots and just random fix-ups in the house. The knot kept slipping on one end of the room, so my Honduran friend suggested we get on the roof to tie it on the outside of the beam. No problem, just take the glass panels out of the window, tie a broom handle to the rope, and then go for it….
I was in La Esperanza this past weekend and had a lot of fun! I went to support Zach in a basketball tournament, but also just wanted a weekend away from Camasca. Friday I was with a high school graduate friend of mine, making copies, taking pictures, and other types of errands for a scholarship application for her. It is a USAID scholarship for a 2 years associate degree in the USA, and it covers all expenses, a homestay, and intense English classes for a few months before. She is so talented, she was basically like a co-supervisor with me during the Yo Merezco abstinence program, and she has been at the top of her class for years. I spent a fair amount of time with her the last few months of the school year, and went to a graduation reception at her house last Thursday. Well, I thought it was just a graduation party. I rode the bus an hour and a half towards La Esperanza before getting off near her house (she lives between 2 municipalities, not really part of any particular aldea nor municipality). When I walked inside, I saw over a hundred people. Turns out it was a worship service to give thanks for her graduation, and it literally lasted over 3 hours, with singing, several preachers, praying, etc. Two people got saved after the intense end-of-times lecture. (You would think a preacher that was invited would make the effort to know her name, but when it came to his turn, he said, “and thank you for this young girl, I can’t remember her name but…”). I met her grandmother, who was the sweetest lady ever, and latched on to me as soon as I arrived. During the last prayers, she put her head on my shoulder and kept saying, “cuanto me gozo, cuanto me gozo”, which means, “how happy I am, how happy I am.” Her dad told me that they almost took her out of high school the last year because money was so short, but somehow sold some firewood to have enough money. But the younger daughter will only go through middle school, because of finances. THESE are the students that deserve higher education. A high school degree can really change the fortune of a family, and a college degree is really life-changing. She was telling Zach that before they had power in their home, she used to study by hours at night by candelight, and her dad would always come in her room at night to make sure that the light was out, since she would fall asleep studying. Only a couple years ago, they got power in their house as part of some project, but no other house in their community has electricity. Her mom is a housewife and sometimes sells used clothing that she buys in La Esperanza, and her dad takes pictures for events. But with their money combined, their annual salary is still less than $2,000 a year. They have 4 kids and 3 adults in the house.
ANYWAYS, so all Friday we were running around trying to get the papers together. Peace Corps forgot to send out the application info to everyone so we only had 2 days to get letters of recommendation, copies of grades, birth certificates, etc. It was so so cold in La Esperanza, too. I had on a shirt, sweater, jacket, and scarf (that I bought there for $1.50, so you can imagine the quality), and I was chilly still. Saturday I went to the tournament and it turns out that all these young women from my community were there! None of them had told me, geez. So I was wearing Chacos, stretch jeans, etc, not at all dressed to play, but they convinced me to play because they were so tired and out of shape, so I convinced a high school kid there to let me use his tennis shoes and I played. I was exhausted in like 2 seconds, partly because it was cold and the air took my breath away, but mainly because I am out of shape. We got KILLED by the La Esperanza team, but I was proud of my one basket J The guys’ team lost too. Poor Zach, he tried to get together a team from Camasca, and it ended up being—Zach, another volunteer from a different municipality, a German guy who happened to be in La Esperanza that day, a high school kid from La Esperanza (but that graduated from the colegio in Camasca), and a random guy from La Esperanza who happened to be watching the tournament. A high school teacher from Camasca was going to play but he went to the bank and then we never saw him again. Go Team Camasca. The La Esperanza team came out in jerseys, with their basketball drills, and there were at least 10 of them. Zach ended up referee-ing at the end for a game between 2 other teams, and it was so funny because there was this loud guy from La Esperanza that challenged every call, and at the end Zach threw him out of the game! Zach won the free throw contest at the end and won a cake..weird, right? But we divided it up among everyone and it was actually really tasty! Went to Fogon that night to dance, and then left the next day for Camasca.
Yesterday (Tuesday) I went to the fair in Concepcion, the nearby municipality. I really liked the one in Camasca so I thought this would be fun too. It started at 1pm but our ride didn’t get us there until 3:30pm, but no wait, it didn’t start until after we arrived anyways. It was decent, but the whole set-up wasn’t as nice as Camasca. The rodeo circle was crappily constructed, and there wasn’t much seating and it wasn’t covered like in Camasca. The bull riders weren’t as talented either. Oh, and about 30 minutes into it, the bulls escaped. No, really. They got through some hole in the fence and the riders had to go chase them down, so for another hour at least we were just waiting for the bulls to come back. Then later on they had the “smallest horse in the world” (aka a small pony) and they had little kids from the community ride it. Well this pony acted like a bull and was trying to throw the kids off! I couldn’t believe it, these kids were getting thrown off without helmuts, and had no idea what was going on. One kid held on so tightly and I thought he was going to have his head bashed in the fence. Oh, but wait, there was more. Then “Sensual Elizabeth” (which I am sometimes called in my town too, awkward) came out in basically a cowgirl bathing suit to sing and shake her boobies, and all the camera phones came out. And there was a comedian too, but he was pretty dirty. He asked the crowd if they wanted the milder version, since there were kids there, and they said no, they wanted the full thing. Oh geez. I was going to go home and change and come back for the dance, but I figured it would be the same as always, that I’d arrive and there would be lots of drunks, guys would try to touch me, and I wouldn’t have good people to dance with. I decided to stay in and watch Big Bang Theory on my computer J
(by the way, Zach kind of figured out how to restore some stuff on my computer from the virus, but it is still definitely infected)
Going to a community tomorrow to help with a workshop on community-owned banks, and then some friends of ours from La Esperanza are coming to visit. Need to think of something fun in Camasca to do with them…
Monday, December 6, 2010
So my computer is infected with a virus. Well, not sure about the actual computer yet, but my flash drive and my back up hard drive are definitely infected. I’m not sure when or how, but it definitely doesn’t surprise me since I have to carry around my USB a lot and stick it in random computers. People here don’t really value virus protection programs as much as we do in the States, and also internet cafes pass along viruses like crazy. I am just super frustrated because I have a ton of TV shows and movies on there, plus important documents for Peace Corps. Yes, I did back them all up..on my external hard drive…which is infected as well. Zach has the same virus and lost a lot of his stuff too. I’m taking my computer home for Christmas and hoping some stuff can be recovered. I am just nervous to open any document at this point for fear of infecting my computer.
In other news, Camasca is dead right now. School is over, and the municipality is basically shut down for vacations as well. So why can’t I just go ahead and go home too? Oh well, I’ll be home in exactly a week!
I went to several school graduations last week. On Monday, a friend of mine’s son graduated from kindergarten, and I went to the ceremony. It was really cute. The kids all dressed up in purple, the boys with a black vest and pants and a purple shirt, and the girls in fancy purple dresses. Quite a difference from the cap and gown-wear at the other kindergarten. It’s funny how they treat kinder graduation as such a big event and accomplishment. After the ceremony I was at Nolvia’s house to eat tamales (of course!), and it was her birthday so I brought her something small but everyone acted like they didn’t even remember her birthday, sad. Last year I was there and we made a cake, but I didn’t have time this year, felt kind of bad for that. The next day, Tuesday, was the long-awaited high school graduation. It was so special to see all of them graduate, even if the ceremony was long. After the graduation, I went to several graduates’ houses for food, which is nice to see people but I always feel so much pressure to eat. Maybe if there was a little variety, but I know before walking in to a house that they will serve me jello, a plate of beef, rice, potatoes, and tortillas, cake, and maybe a tamal as well. So think of that times 5…a lot of food! That night two of the students had hired DJs for the evening, and they put one in the salon municipal and the other in the outside plaza. It was quite interesting to hear them both at once. Fortunately I finished the night without gum in my hair like the last town dance….
