http://www.travelblog.org/Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Central America Caribbean , Honduras en-us Wed, 08 Oct 2008 06:29:43 BST Wed, 08 Oct 2008 06:29:43 BST SoftHotChewySugar coatedSteamy fresh and hot to the touch.This is what the average student of El Alba has to look forward to after any given school day. As the bell rings the collection of students squeeze themselves through the doors like panicked cows through cold steel gates. Shoulder to shoulder each one pushing and screaming towards the same ultimate goal freedom.However unlike animals h http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Comayagua/blog-332047.html Ok... so I haven't written a blog entry for more than a week now. For those of you who read them diligently I am truly sorry. For those of you who find these blog updates to be a just another spam email your welcome.That being said lets begin with today's entry.This last weekend I decided to go visit Karina for Dia de La Biblia. It is a day when Christians have church services in the park http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/El-Paraiso/El-Paraiso/blog-329567.html Several entries back I promised pictures of the house and this evening there is finally time to sit down and relax. What's even better is that there are no storms the electricity is functioning properly the computer turned on and the internet connection is good. This never happensThe family I live with had 8 children. Their father bought a big house so each child could have their room. That http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Copan/blog-328022.html The ride from Semuc Champey was an adventure in itself A collectivo a vehicle about the size of a large van is a main source of transportation in Guatemala. With 21 people crammed into it we started our trip to Xela. The driver could serioulsy enter the Indy 5oo the way he was racing down the windy bumpy roads taking corners so fast that the tires were screeching. Even the locals on the coll http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Bay-Islands/Roatan/blog-327968.html The past week or so has been so busy with days off that I never had a chance to talk about our Field trip last Friday. We all know that Wednesday was kid's day but I might have neglected to tell you that the celebration cut off was Seventh grade. Needless to say I had many a classroom full of very distracted children.Meester let us play. We have de classes every day. All the other teachers http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Comayagua/blog-325996.html If you think the 4th of July is big you should visit Honduras the 15th of September. Or the 14. or the 13. In Honduras celebrations start the 13th and go until the 15. Children get almost a week off school. Santa Rita is a town of 7000 or so and they had three parades with no less than 5 schools. I had no idea it was this big. The 12th all the teachers worked from 12 in the afternoon unti http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Copan/blog-325449.html So here in Honduras Independence day lasts from September 13th to September 15th. This year it fell on a weekend so by the time Friday came around everybody started to feel the buzz. I celebrated by going to visit Karina in El Paraiso. No surprise there.On Friday night we all relaxed and talked about the parades and all the different schools in town. Here in Honduras each school marches. The http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/El-Paraiso/El-Paraiso/blog-325423.html The 2 hour bus ride to La Ceiba was in the pouring rain but finding the hostel was simple and everyone was so friendly. I was taken to dinner at a baleada place practically the national food of Honduras. The next day after a cat nap in a hamock I took a jeep up into the national park outside Ceiba called Pico Bonito. The place was beautiful full of enormous leaves hills tall trees tropical http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/La-Ceiba/blog-325294.html Hey EveryoneSorry I havent been able to update this much. The internet is really unreliable. I am going to post a bunch of pictures on this entry. I will write about what is going on later. The computer and internet are pretty slow so I cant do too much at once. So there are some pictures. I will put up more soon. I need to upload some from my camera and get some from Sarahs friend.A new forei http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Omoa/blog-325113.html 45 Surgeries and 89 appointments today http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Bay-Islands/Roatan/blog-324963.html What hit me first about Tela was its obvious state of poverty. For a place advertised as the upandcoming tourist beach hot spot in Central America it needs a lot of work. Being the off season there wasn't enough people for a Garifuna tour. So I went for second best and tried the Garifuna Museum but soon found out the building was there but the museum didn't exist. When that fell through there http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Tela/blog-324776.html Surgery Day http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Bay-Islands/Roatan/blog-324484.html The long weekend was spent in the town of Catacamas in the deparment of Ochlando near La Mosquitia. Our first day we took a tour of the town watched students practice the marching band for Mondays parade and climbed the 800 steps to the cross overlooking Catacamas. Our coordinator had written a letter to the mayor asking to have the steps cleaned before our arrival and for security. Four poli http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/La-Mosquitia/blog-324311.html September 10 was Children's Day at school and it was exactly that a day all about the children. Of course there were no classes. First the kids donned their clown hats and posed for a picture. Then they played for a few hours. We had a few organized games with prizes like musical chairs land and sea they had to jump over the rope to be on the land or in the sea if they jumped on the wrong sid http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Copan/blog-323689.html Itrsquos 630 pm and as I am under house arrest in sketchcity enduring 95 degree weather and 80 humidity I sit and write in an attempt to drown out the short lived pleasures of a woman echoing across the adjacent rooftop which is right outside my window. Sigh. I look forward to moving along through Central America rather quickly. Well if three days on a bus is quickly then my statement hol http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Tegucigalpa/blog-323610.html I keep reminding myself the wizened Rumi with each abrasive rub. Itrsquos 95 degrees and humid grossly humid. Sweat is constantly running on my skin. AC only lessens the pain I have yet to be somewhere indoors that was truly cool. Honduras is NOT my favorite place. Irsquove been in the two major cities San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa not on some beach or islandhellip. The typical touris http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Tegucigalpa/blog-323609.html The Rio Dulce is a riverboat harbor that flows to the Caribbean Sea on the N.E. side of Guatemala. I found this groovy little place to stay with Alex and Jamie my travel companions who live in Chicago. I met Alex in Antigua the first week I was there. Later I see him and Jamie 300 miles from there on this remote beach and it turns out we are staying in the same hotel. We hang out a few days toget http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Tegucigalpa/blog-323279.html Irsquod considered going diving today. But Irsquove just been getting so tired so easily. And while I find diving to be mentally rejuvenating physically it drains me. And as much as I love it the more I plan my trip to South Africa the more aware I am that I need to keep saving my money. So I decided against diving.Instead I decided to make a day at the beach. Even with the cost to th http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Roatan/West-Bay/blog-323195.html World Vets Travel Blog Wednesday Sept 10 2008 Roatan HondurasDay ldquoMinusrdquo OnerdquoI usually start with day one but since this trip started out as such a ldquonail bitterrdquo I thought I might include a little of the pretrip drama. The World Vets Roatan Team will be heading to Honduras. Our goal is to spayneuter over 300 animals. We will also be vaccinating and treating as http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Bay-Islands/Roatan/blog-323193.html Honduras beats Jamaica Honduras 2 Jamaica 0Tonight the city was electric after the defeat of Jamaica. The win was a triumph over the long time rivals and will provide a huge step up into the World cup qualifications. Although every game here is treated like the Stanley cup finals THIS game seemed more important than any other. Why that is I just don't know. The Hondurans just love beating http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Comayagua/blog-322219.html This last weekend Honduras played Canada. I told all my students that Canada would win and they freaked out. Apparently Canada has never beaten Honduras. Last time the score was 4 to 0. This time Honduras beat Canada 2 to 1 so needless to say my Monday was filled with a lot of Meester... Canada Que pasoAll in all it was a good Monday. I enjoy Mondays because my schedule is very easy. http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Comayagua/blog-321534.html This Wednesday is Da de los Nios or Children's Day here in Honduras and today we celebrated the day by uniting two congregations for a service. The Baptist church I attend here has a very small baby church started in Limn a community about 15 minutes to the east of Santa Rita. There are three adults and about 20 children in the church in Limn. So our church from Santa Rita about 10 adul http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Copan/blog-321124.html First stop in Honduras for us was Copan which is an ancient Mayan city now of course just ruins. We decided not to pay a guide this time and just bought a booklet. The grounds are huge and first of all we started following a path through the jungle which was nice to see the trees and lots of butterflies but we kept walking into spiderwebs so decided to cut it short. At the gate there were to http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/blog-320961.html HeySorry it has been a while since I wrote but the internet at the school has been broken all week. I am at an internet cafe now and the internet is really slow so I am only going to write a little. I promise I will post pictures as soon as the intenet at the school works. I am glad to see that so many people are reading this. Hello Brian and Kelly Uncle Kurt Uncle Mark Uncle Dave Vicky an http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Omoa/blog-320271.html Honduras After school I never thought Id spend 7 hours on a school bus. But that is how we got from Belize City to Punta Gorda. They squish as many people as they can on the buses and thru the aisles and make stops wherever someone wants to be picked up. You rotate from knees on the seat in front of you squashed down a bit to head on the seat in front of you to sitting up straight...every 10 min http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Bay-Islands/Utila/blog-320259.html This week I have introduced the double warning policy. When students disrupt class they are given a warning. I write their names on the board and next to the names a write a number. Each student gets two warnings and when they work their number up to three they must leave the classroom. Sometimes the class will cheer for certain students to get a number like its a game. So when Carmen leaves http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Comayagua/blog-319915.html We are well into week 2 of school and things are in full swing around here I have been learning a lot these past few weeks. But amidst all the work it is important to have fun too and that is what I did last Sunday. The pastor's wife in my church recently started working at the Mayan Ruins. They are about 10 minutes away by car from my house. We were talking one day and the family asked me if I http://www.travelblog.org//Central-America-Caribbean/Honduras/Copan/blog-319529.html