Time

Well, it has been quite awhile since I last blogged. I have to say that there have been a multitude of reasons why. First and foremost, I am really starting to get swamped with things to do here. There's always people to meet for dinner, papers to be corrected, Spiritual meetings to be had with the other volunteers, errands to be ran (by the way, grocery shopping is a 3 hour long event when you have to walk to three different grocery stores on the opposite ends of town to get what you need), and most importantly SLEEP to be had. Life here in Juticalpa is both mentally and physically draining due to the heat and the fact that tasks which are simple at home are difficult here (washing underwear is also an hour long event. Who would have known?) In any case, I am starting to feel more "acclimated" here, I guess you could say. However; I have had a lot of bouts of homesickness lately which may be why I have been apprehensive to really write.

One major event that has happened over the past couple of weeks since I last posted is the initiation of a Special Olympics team at Nazareth School. For those of you who don't know much about Olancho Aid, Nazareth is a special needs school in Olancho. In fact; it's the ONLY one in Olancho (which is the size of Massachusetts!). In any case; myself, John, Keri, and Eric have started coaching the team of 24 special needs adult and children every Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon. I have to say that it has been a blast and I absolutely enjoy this interaction with these special people every week. I have one little girl on my team named Michelle who told me last week that I was her "best friend' and insisted on shooting about 2 dozen photos with me. Everyday when she sees me, she jumps up and down excitedly. I look forward to seeing her every week now as she makes me feel really welcome and wanted. Special needs individuals are so loving and warm, and they always seem so excited to see myself and the other volunteers; although all we may do with them is kick around a soccer ball. One thing I am going to publically admit is that I am terrible at soccer. So bad in fact that most of the special needs children could whip my behind in a pick-up game. It doesn't seem to matter; however, as they all want you on their team regardless of your ability. One thing that has really touched me about these children is how they all cheer one another one. The more "able-bodied" and more "functional" children cheer on those with less ability; jumping up and down on the sidelines. I often think of children of normal intelligence and how they get frustrated with and angry with one another when a teammate may be losing a game for them. Not these special people. They are filled with such love and care so deeply for one another that we could all certaintly learn a thing of two from them!

As far as other recent activities are concerned, I spent an amazingly relaxing weekend away these past few days. On Friday; myself, Bree, and Keri boarded a bus to Tegucigulpa. From Tegus, we boarded another bus to a village about 45 minutes outside of the city called Valle De Angeles. It was absolutely amazing there, and I will definitely be making a trip back before I go home for Christmas to purchase some secret Christmas presents. :-). In any case, the village is nestled away in a small quaint village with tons of handcrafted gift stores, little "mom and pop" type of pupuseria's, and cute little restaurants. We had a great time poking around, and mostly enjoyed the weather. It was about 20 degrees cooler there, as we were way up in the mountains. For the first time in my 27 years of life, I think I was actually HAPPY to have goosebumps , and even happier to throw on a sweatershirt and long pants. This was the first time in 7 weeks that I haven't sweat for a full 24 hour period and it was amazing. As if all of this wasn't already fantastic enough, the hotel we stayed in was beautiful. Get this: I got to go swimming in a pool and take a SCALDING hot shower. I think I stayed under that running water for about 30 minutes. It was the cleanest I have felt in a month and a half. I must admit that it was majorly disappointing to come home yesterday and stand under my freezing cold shower to bathe. Even worse was turning the water off constantly to shampoo, rinse, and shave. Here at our house; our supply of water is so limited that we use only what we absolutely need to cleanse ourselves. There are no long relaxing showers here! No matter; I will have one again in a couple of weeks during the next of our travels!

We came back yesterday to some kind of unfortunate news. Apparently, it poured for the vast majority of the weekend while we were away, and that led to a lot of flooding here in Olancho. It has been a very rainy past couple of weeks and the river was overflowing. Our house and everything in it was totally fine, but the boy's house had some issues. They were away for the weekend as well, and John lost his camera and some important books, and Eric lost his ipod as their entire house was underwater. I thought that we were in the clear, but when I went to Santa Clara this morning, I discovered that almost everything that I had shipped down for my classroom from the states was ruined. I had a couple of hundred books in my (very small) personal library, and it looks as though most of those are ruined. Also, a bunch of games and flashcards people had donated to me seem ruined as well. I didn't get a chance to go through much of it today, but the prospect of a lot of it being salvagable is pretty grim. They weren't near a window or anything. It just so happens that that is where it decided to flood. In any case, no one here seems to bat an eyelash. Life just moves on. Therefore, I must too. It will definitely be more of a challenge now to occupy my kids when they finish work early though. Oy vey!

In any case, I am off to begin grading progress reports. I had my first parent/teacher conference today and it went surprisingly smooth considering my Spanish capabilities. I guess I am improving a bit in that area. I find that I can understand a lot of what is said to me, but as far as responding; I am still pretty clueless.

I love and miss all of you! I will try to be more frequent in my updates in the future!