Christmas Break

I figured that during this three week break I would become more sure about wanting to stay a second year or more at Mayatan. All of these things that I have been plagued by in teaching I'm beginning to learn are just the hazards of being a teacher. That has helped me to not get as down on myself if I have a bad day. However, this has also contributed to my thinking, "do I really want to go through this every day/week/month/year?"
I have become more sure of two things this break....I for sure am in love with Mayatan, Copan, and my students and want to stay longer for them. I am also more sure of the fact that I am not going to be a teacher for life (I also said going into college teaching wasn't for me...I'm opening my mouth so there's room for my other foot perhaps). I love the town, the school, my students, but I can't see myself as a teacher for my life. It's such a hard and draining job. It's been getting better slowly as I've become more and more accustomed to the job...but still..it's draining!:)
There are days that I get along great with the kids and I think that they all love me and love class and it's just a great day. But then there are still those days in which I come home and I'm pretty sure that my students don't like me at all and hope that I just stay home instead of coming back at Christmas. I think that both those extremes are foolish, but I feel like the life of a teacher combined with my life is a life of extremes. Extremely bad days, extremely good days, and extremely interesting days.:)

Lo que extrañaré

Lots of other teacher have been getting really excited about going home for Christmas and the prospect of all sorts of things, ranging from carpet to friends. I was super excited about going home like a week ago, but over the course of the past week I have been almost dreading leaving Copan. I really like it here! I can’t help but compare it to how I felt about Spain. In Spain I had a list in November of things I wanted to come home to. Included in this list was; chocolate chip cookies, chocolate balls, carpet, no more ugly dogs, being able to drive, having lots of different friends around all the time, American traditions, American culture, not having to order things in Spanish, etc. But here those are all things that I wouldn’t even include in a list if I were making one. I haven’t even thought about making a list of things that I miss because for everything that I miss about the states I’m going to miss at least one thing (if not two) about Copan.
What I won’t miss is “lucha libra,” also known as WWE. Today I found two kids fighting in the hallway, let’s call them boy 1 and boy 2. I called them over and boy 2 explained that boy 1 was picking on boy 3 so he stepped in to break it up. Long story short, I took them to the office and had Norma (who was just there for today) talk to them about why they were fighting. Boy 1 has now been to the office 3 times for fighting, boy 2 five times, and boy 3 three times. Norma let boy 3 go cause he was the “victim” but called the parents of the other two. Come to learn that there’s been a fight between them for some amount of time now. Boy 1’s mom had this response to her son fighting with boy 2, “good for him! I’ve told him that he has permission to hit that kid! I’m tired of him being picked on and he can fight back when he wants to!” In fact, boy 1 has done just that, one time he got a bunch of his friends and went to find boy 2 to beat him up, luckily they never encountered one another. I can’t believe that this kids parents have given him permission to try and beat up another kid! It’s freaking ridiculous! And I wonder why some days I have trouble with kids fighting in my classroom….go figure. So on the list of things that I miss, the top ten list just has one thing on it, “lucha libre.” Oh stupid lucha libre…

El Deseo

Some days I get home from school and just have this great desire to do nothing. I spend all day trying and trying with these kids just hoping that they learn something. There are days that I feel great, like I could teach class standing on my head and the kids would still understand. There are other days in which no matter how hard I try, no matter what I try to tell them they don't want to pay attention and they don't want to try and learn. What ever happened to those days when kids wanted to learn? Oh right, that's not in middle school, that's back in elementary school. I have thought so much about staying a second or third or fifteenth year but it's challenging when certain I come home knowing that I haven't taught anything to the kids. I was hoping that things wouldbe better with the new teacher here but I still just can't get a handle sometimes on how the kids behave. It seems that there are certain days in which I show up without a lot of energy and those are definitely the worst days! If I don't have energy to deal with the kids then they just run wild (like today). Maybe if I had some feedback from people about my teaching style and how I interact with the kids then I could change how I run the class...maybe learn something. After all, almost none of us teachers have any experience, a little feedback would be nice to have in this situation. Oh well...what can you do but just survive to see another day of chaos and class?:)

The Traditional Untradition

For the second time in three years I’m spending Thanksgiving outside of the states. More importantly I’m spending the holiday away from my family. Is this becoming a tradition or something? I was pretty bummed to not be spending Thanksgiving in Yakima with all my family. Although I don’t know most of their names, and we tend to play more card games than talk to each other, it’s the Thanksgiving get together!
Down here we had dinner at the Hotel Marina Copan. It’s one of the nicest in town and the food was a close imitation of American Thanksgiving. I arrived about 10 minutes late (although technically on time here in Honduras) because I was taking a nap. The first half hour or so was really awkward as I was still waking up and didn’t feel much like small talk. We did the usual small talk…making fun of how the group always splits into the “gringos” and “indios.” I don’t really like how we always divide like that, it’s just the natural thing to do. I got to sit at a table with Norma, Marisol, and Rudy. They are all Honduran staff at Mayatan and they are a hoot!
We told all sorts of funny stories and made fun of the “solitaria” (essentially a tape worm) that I have in my stomach because I tend to eat more than the normal person does. However, tonight I just had a regular amount of food, just for the record.:) This is the second Thanksgiving in the past three years that despite not being around family I have been around people that I love and it’s been great. The people down here are amazing and we had an excellent conversation filled with English, Spanish, and Spanglish.
Paige and Ty are due to arrive at any time from San Pedro and I’m getting kind of excited. I should really go to bed because it’s almost 10pm as I write this but I’m trying to stay up for them. 10pm might not seem that late to all of you but when I walked back from Marina Copan at 9:30 this place was a ghost town! I actually love it, not gonna lie.:)

Gustavo!

Man, how could I have forgotten to put this on here? Last week I’m in the middle of class with seventh grade when up walks Rudy (music prof) sweeping the floor outside my classroom. Then I realize, he’s not sweeping the floor, he’s sweeping the gigantic tarantula! The kids all jump out of their seats to see it, but of course nobody wants to even try and touch it. One of the kids put him on a piece of paper and then passed him into a glass box we have in the science room. There we let him sit for two days without food or water. Then on Thursday morning he was looking pretty sickly. We had already named him Gustavo and decided to keep him. So instead of having computers with the 9th graders we collected grasshoppers and pulled off their back legs so they couldn’t jump out of the box. Then we put some water in the box. By mid-day on Thursday Gustavo was looking pretty good. So for 8th grade science we made Gustavo a place to live. He now has lots of dirt, rocks, sticks, and even a cave in which to live! I think that he is finding his new glass box home quite enjoyable compared to his old, boring life of freedom. He doesn’t have to worry about getting lost, eaten by other things, or tired from too much running around. The question is, “how could he not love this new life?”
I am going to pass him off to the new science teacher, Nicki, and she can worry about what to feed him and how to feed him. I had a science book that said tarantulas eat bugs, insects, and beetles (not the band). We’ll see if he’s still alive tomorrow when I go into school. I’m writing this Monday night and we didn’t have school today because of Miriam’s funeral yesterday. I hope we don’t need another velorio and funeral procession for Gustavo.
-Cheque, he was alive...and still is.:)

La Muerte No Significa El Fin

Yesterday afternoon I was given the sad news that our first grade assistant, Miriam, passed away from a massive stroke that she suffered several weeks back. There was a brain bleed that would not stay clotted and doctors could do nothing for her. Unfortunately she never made it back from the hospital in San Pedro, but passed away en route. Last night everybody dropped everything to plan and attend a huge vigil for her in which her body was placed in the church and people could come say one last good-bye to her if they so desired. I definitely did not desire, I know what she looked like just fine.:)
It was sad to say good-bye to a friend. Even sadder because she was only about 41 and left behind two younger daughters. One is only in fourth grade at Mayatan! She did not have a husband and so the children are left with family members in town. I'm not exactly in the best mood after this weekend, but it was such a different and awesome way to have a funeral. The vigil was a great time to just sit with other friends of Miriam's and chat. I got to know a couple of new people and get caught up with old friends. Well...old friends here in Copan for me are people I met 2 months ago.:) Fortunately the family is well taken care of by friends and supported by all of us at the school. It was not the most desirable weekend I've ever had, but I was glad to be in the area and hopefully be of some help to the family...

My Second Casa Copaneca

This has been coming for a little while but I can finally tell you all! I moved this weekend into another house down here in Copan. It’s a long story and I don’t really need to get into all the details but Tyler and I were feeling pretty awkward in our living situation with a guy down here so we decided to talk to him last week. It was just a weird conversation and for the sake of all of us we decided to move out and find a new place. We decided on Wednesday last week to talk with the school and see about moving and here we are, six days later, sitting in our very own apartment. We’re living with a third teacher from the school, Blair, and our apartment is even sweeter than the previous location. We have three bedrooms, three bathrooms, huge living room, nice dining room and kitchen, plus a freaking rooftop! On our roof there’s a hammock and really just a sweet view of the city and a nice place to hang out when it’s not too hot. I’ll have to post pictures as soon as I can. The place is closer to the city, which is a little downside because things will be more expensive, but the plus is it’s right by an awesome restaurant called Picame, which has awesome burgers and baleadas.:) When you come visit now, yes you, there will be a spare bed downstairs in which you can sleep without any problems.
My one hope is that we don’t turn into a huge hangout place for all of the American teachers down here. I really like the connections that we have made with the Honduran teachers and I want to keep that up. I’m hoping to still make time on the weekends for visits to all of the teachers houses and time to hang out with various families. I’m sad to be leaving all of the families that we’ve gotten to know in the area around where we were living, but this will be such a better situation. Woo sweet houses and our very own apartment!

Ants, Rain, Cigars, and Sleeping

Last week a kid in my class says, “Look! Ants!” I was thinking a couple of ants, but what he meant was actually about 5,000 ants in the corner of my room! These were of course the biting ants, is there another kind that would infest my room? As kids start to stomp on the ants the realize the ants bite and quickly decide to stop walking through the huge patch of ants. Then we go outside and see ants climbing all over the wall! There must have been around 30,000 ants climbing all over the wall and in my classroom! We went back into the classroom to see if they were leaving and they started to fall from the ceiling! Ants were crawling along the crossbeams and there were so many that ants were being pushed off and falling onto tables and people. Teodoro (guard) used a whole can of Raid in the room and still there were ants all over. After about an hour or so they were all gone. Teodoro told me that it means rain is coming and he predicted rain that night…
Later that night it did not rain, but the next night it did! It wasn’t quite the rain storm I was hoping for, but it was a decent amount of rain.
This past weekend Tyler and I went to Santa Rosa de Copan, which is about 2-3 hours away from here on the bus. On the way there I got car sick and threw up on two different buses out the window. When we got there Tyler and I each didn’t feel good so we took a three hour nap! I figured that I wasn’t feeling good from being carsick, but I slept 10 hours that night and woke up with a little bit of a soar throat. Things haven’t gotten any better since then, although they haven’t gotten much worse either. I was going to brave it out today at school but instead decided to come home early and have the librarian sub for me. She can handle the little squirts for a couple hours.:)
As for the cigars, when we were in Santa Rosa we took a tour of the cigar factory there in town. They make around 60 or 70,000 completely hand-made cigars each day. There are over 150 different brands of cigars made in the factory and they are shipped out all over the world. Some of the cigars are sold for upwards of $3 or 4 each…that seems like a lot to me for getting cancer. There has to be a cheaper way.:) Still, Tyler and I both got free cigars for going on the tour and I’m not too sure what to do with it. It’s gigantic and just sitting in my bag still right now. Maybe I’ll give it to one of the kids at school as a prize…kids love that sort of thing.:)

An Eventful Weekend of Food and Hospitality

Yay for holidays and extended weekends, that’s the main theme of this past weekend. We were supposed to have Friday off for a holiday but found out last Wednesday that instead we had this Monday off and not Friday. I was super bummed at first, but it all worked out just fine. Tyler and I cooked up some more of the famous Sue Anne Sticky Buns to take around for people at school. Our first stop was once again Norma’s house. It was so great! We spent about an hour and a half there hanging out and glancing at TV as Cecia (5th grade daughter) was watching Princess Diaries 2. We picked up some oranges, cheese, and cream (for baleadas). The even better part, she invited us over for dinner on Saturday night! I’m so excited about that! People around here do everything I’m pretty sure. I complain about lack of free time but Norma is married with two kids, sub-director of the school, teaches several classes (not sure how many exactly) and takes 5 classes at the university on the weekends. Holy freaking moly she is busy. From Norma’s our next stop was Mirian’s house, which we had not visited up to this point. She invited us over to her house yesterday and when we said we can stop by around 11 or 12 she said that she would cook up a little lunch, “Do you like pasta?” She asked. Well by cooking up a little lunch she really meant that she was going to make the worlds most amazing pasta with awesome potatoes, incredible sauce, a little salad on the side, with a coke and lime. It was great to get to hang out at her place, speak some Spanish, hear more about her life and family. From there it was on to Suly’s place for one more house visit. We had yet to visit her house and it was great to find it and meet her mom who she lives with! Suly is super nice and it was a fun time to hang out and relax at her place. We were going to head to Nora’s place for one last stop but decided against it as time was running short. We told her that we would visit, so we have rolls to take her tomorrow and then we’ll stop by her place another day.
Who are all these people you may be asking…well Norma I’ve talked about before I believe, so I’ll skip her and fill you in about Mirian and Suly.
Mirian: she has worked at Mayatan as an assistant for somewhere between 10 and 15 years, I get mixed stories. Her daughter graduated back in ’97 and she has one younger daughter in fourth grade there. Her husband was killed in an accident quite a while ago, 10 plus years, and she hasn’t remarried since then. She lives in a modest house about 10 minutes from our place, if you walk fast.:) She also has two other jobs, at Comercial Copan (a fabric, appliance, clothing, etc store) and a tobacco store in a little café for tourists.
Suly: she is the kindergarten assistant in the morning at Mayatan. She is friends with Megan and Viki, which is how I first met her, but now she’s my friend too!:) She’s been at Mayatan for a while now and is super friendly! Her birthday is May 7…in case you’re wondering…She owns three little parakeet type birds, one that just arrived from a person in Ostuman yesterday. Hence that one has received the name from me, Senor Ostuman.
Once again this past weekend has been filled with generosity and hospitality. Yay for that.:)

Teaching and Pinatas

We have entered yet another week of teaching and the infamous search for a third teacher is not going so hot right now. After Emory told me there was a problem with the kinder teacher moving and her daughter coming to teach kinder I talked with the kinder teacher today and she sounds like she would enjoy teaching science and her daughter wants to teach kinder. So what’s the problem? The world may never know. It’s one of those secrets that goes down in history along with how many licks it takes to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop (1, 2, *crunch*, 3).
I talked to Teodoro yesterday for a little while. He’s the security guard at school and apparently he has 11 kids! ELEVEN! Four of them are grown and out of the house, one is in second grade at Mayatan, then three are at the public school ranging from first to sixth grade. The other three are at the house but working, I suppose. His second grade son is having a birthday on Saturday and I made a joke with him that there was going to be a big fiesta and pinata! Well then I felt bad, because Teodoro told me his family can’t afford a pinata. I think that I’m going to buy them one to take to him at work tomorrow or Wednesday so his kid can have it on Thursday with the family. That would be fun, yah?
I was also a heathen this weekend according to local Evangelicals. I went to the Catholic Mass and I’ve already had at least 10 people ask me about it. Some are Catholics and were really interested in me going and wondered what I thought of it. Others are Evangelicals that are asking “if I go to many churches that worship idols.” I was a little taken aback by that much hostility. I knew that people around here didn’t get along with each other in that regard, but people here are super over the top with the not getting along part! It’s not such a great thing. I loved the Catholic Mass though and I’m planning on going to the Thursday evening mass at 7. Lourdes, one of the cleaning ladies, said that she goes there and is friends with the priest so if I want to meet him we can do that some time pretty soon. She said he would be very excited to meet me because while the Evangelical churches have all sorts of short term mission teams come down here to work and bring money the Catholic church doesn’t have that luxury. So he will be very excited to have an American or two in the service. I’m not sure if that is using me or not, but I don’t even care, I want to go cause I loved the service. I will talk more about what it’s like in my next post or two after I’ve gone to a couple masses.

La Primera de Muchas

The first 5 day week of many has been survived by most. If punishment were death a couple of my kids didn’t make it through the week, but I came out just fine! They told us at the start of the year that we could hold kids after school as punishment but we are responsible for keeping them after and occupied. Two ninth graders decided to push their luck earlier this week by continuing to bother two classmates despite at least 4 warnings. I finally told them to stay after to have a little chat. I gave them the first detention of many this year I’m sure. I had them move books for me from my classroom over to the library where they’ve been needing to go for several weeks. It’s liked forced labor, but better!:) Today (Friday) four seventh graders pushed their luck and get to have a similar privilege next week. The two students I had for detention already called me mean as they left, but in a non-harsh way. I hope that they don’t have to stay after again, but they are hard workers. They tried moving the book all at once in a wheelbarrow and it fell down at least 3 times that I saw. It was pretty funny. They tried to take it down the stairs and it fell. I suggested putting it at the bottom of the stairs and then loading the books but they didn’t like that idea. Instead they wanted to tip the wheelbarrow down so all the books fell out, throwing everything off balance and causing them to fall over…oh to be a ninth grader again.:)
A lot of the kids are really enjoyable, a lot are still neutral, and there are some beyond terrible that I can’t wait to give detention! I’m starting to feel like a really mean teacher on a power streak, so I keep things in check as best as I can. I taught my 8th graders today the phrase, “it’s a cinch!” They were saying the math homework was easy, so I said, “good, it should be a cinch for you!” Their math books have still not arrived, so I’m patching together review work from last year’s seventh grade book but it’s getting too easy as more and more comes back to them. I skipped about half the book this week to get to something more challenging…like converting fractions to decimals and percents! It’s so great to teach math, I love it! Not as much as I would love having a third teacher though. If you want to come teach math you could do that.:)
Have I written anything about that? I don’t think so….Tyler and I are trying to convince Emory to hire a third secondary teacher. Right now there are 26 7th graders, soon to be 27, and the possibility of a 28th. One of the students is special needs and the possible addition is from the US and doesn’t speak any Spanish. I already feel bad for that poor girl because she is going to feel so out of place! What is she going to do for Spanish, social studies, home-ec, and various subjects taught in Spanish?! Oh my…it’s time to go get burgers! Tonight we are celebrating our survival of the whole 5 days. It was tough, but I guess I can survive for another 9 months…or so.:)

A Five Day Week?!

Are you kidding!? We actually have to go to school five straight days? This is ridiculous! I’m quitting!

Well no, I didn’t quit, but this is just getting ridiculous! We have to go to school all five days next week! That is so not fair. The first week we had 3.5 days because of hurricane Felix, then last week we only had 3 because of Children’s day and the parade, and now this week we only had 3 because of Teacher’s day and Independence Day. I’m just not cut out for this whole teaching five days per week kind of job, that’s too much for me. Luckily we have three weeks in a row with Friday off.:) Regardless of how much I want to get the time off though, I suppose that I need to go to class, I need to teach, I need to get the kids involved, and I need to not go crazy!

Today I stopped by Children’s International to see if they needed any volunteers for translating, working with children, tutoring, etc. I would like to volunteer there a couple of times per week if I could, if even just for an hour or so. I walked in, explained that I wanted to help, and a lady took me to the back. I talked to these two guys who looked fairly flabbergasted by the whole “offering to help” ordeal that I was putting them through. They said to come back on Monday when the director/coordinator will be there. I’m not entirely sure what Children’s International does, I just know that they help children. Isn’t that an amazing deduction?! I’m not a teacher for nothing.:) I think that they give out free food to families in need and then also provide a place for kids to play on the playground, study, hang out, and just try to create a network of support. From what I know of it I think it’s a pretty cool sounding organization.

Tyler and I walked by the building on accident last weekend and I immediately wanted to help out in some way. It brought back memories of being in Spain and every Thursday going to the homeless shelter to hand out food with Pedro (who loved to talk my ear off). Pedro taught me the word barranco, which means cliff.:) So hopefully on Monday the director will be in and I can help them with cleaning, tutoring, playing with kids, interpreting, translating, or something else semi-helpful. I think that being able to help out there would be a great way to relax and get rid of some stress from teaching…not to say that teaching is stressful, I wouldn’t dream of saying that.:)

The Joy of Small Copan

This afternoon Tyler and I decided to pay a visit to Jorge’s Cousin Esmeralda and then try and find the house of Norma (sub-director) in order to get out and talk with some people. Last night I made some apple-cinnamon biscuits, I know it’s shocking, so we decided that dropping some off would be a good excuse and SUPER nice of us.

First off we go over to Esmeralda’s and have a nice, quick talk with her about church last night. Tyler and I didn’t go cause we went to a morning service instead. Apparently last night was a really good service and all the young people partnered up with adults and they prayed for each other and she was saying that she wished we were there to pray with her. Then I give her the biscuits, just two, nothing significant really, but since we are really nice people we wanted to share. In turn she invites us over for dinner tonight! Dangit! I was the nice one who was going out of my way to do something for her. She wants to make baleadas this evening and teach us how to make them. So we have a dinner date with her at 5:30-ish.

We leave there and head over to where we think Norma lives. I decide that she gets three biscuits cause I know her better. We find her house after asking around to people and she invites us in. I give her the biscuits and am just beaming from ear to ear with my generosity. She invites us to take a seat and offers us lemonade. So darn, there goes my great generosity, we are equal now. That’s alright, at least I still look pretty good from this deal, I gave her three biscuits she gives us two glasses of lemonade, that’s even. She starts telling us how she makes this crema stuff and cheese at their house. I ask if we can see it and tell her how we’re planning on buying some soon so we should buy from her. She takes us to where they make the cream and cheese and GIVES us a pound of cream and a pound of cheese. I tell her we can pay but she insists that the first one is free, then we can pay her next time. On the way out she also gives us a bunch of bananas! Oh my goodness, my great generosity is nothing!

I’m pretty sure that this is not terribly out of the normal around here to have people be super generous and willing to share. I’m excited to invite these people over to our place for dinner or lunch. Granted all we know how to make is spaghetti and French toast; but those are two high quality American meals.:) So all of this to say…I really like sticking around here in Copan for the extended weekends, instead of spending money on travel I save money by getting free stuff from people. Does that defeat the purpose of generosity? I don’t think so, I just enjoy it to it’s fullest.:)

Another Week Another Dolor de Shushunta

I only had class three of the past five school days, and we’re only having class three days this next week. Due to the hurri/drizzle-cane the first week we only had 3 and a half. Is anybody else noticing a pattern? Actually, we will get to have 5 day weeks eventually. And by “get to” I really mean that “unfortunately I will have to work.” This second week was a whole lot better than the first one in the sense that I didn’t seriously consider quitting and returning home. I suppose that it’s always a bonus to not hate your job. I was looking at the calendar today and I believe that I will be returning home in only 15 weeks for Christmas, that’s nothing! I’ve procrastinated on big assignments in college for longer than that.

This weekend we have 5 days off of school, I’m currently on day two of the weekend and I could get used to this. Instead of thinking about going to class tomorrow I’m thinking, man, I only have 60% of my weekend ahead of me still. Friday we had a huge parade in the morning that our school marched/played in. It was super fun to help out with (which means I walked along the side of the kids to make sure they didn’t kill each other during the parade). Afterwards I took a nap, wrote some letters, and then went to a coffee plantation with all the teachers and staff from school. It was awesome because everybody was invited! From the cleaning ladies to the administration and foreign/native teachers. It was great because I got to practice a lot of Spanish with everybody and learn some new words. One of those lovely words is Shushunta. I know this sounds funny to say about a phonetic language, but I don’t know how to spell it and I’m pretty sure that’s wrong because Spanish doesn’t have the “sh” sound. Regardless, it’s apparently a really funny word/way to say “head.” I love the word!:)

The coffee plantation was a high altitude plantation, which of course means better coffee. I felt dumb when I asked why you want high altitude coffee as everybody responded in a very obvious manner, “the taste is SO much better.” Shoot…I’m obviously no coffee connoisseur. We took a tractor to the top of the plantation and then hiked down a nature trail. As soon as we started to walk some rain drops hit the trees, then the ground, then me. Tyler had my umbrella and he went with the first group which was already safely in the restaurant waiting for us. My group more or less ran down to the restaurant in the rain. Rain here is not like Oregon rain, let that be said now! I was soaked to the bone! I liked to point out though that I was only “medio-mojado” (half wet). Due to running down the hill my back side was totally dry.:) Dinner was really good and by the time we left the restaurant the rain had stopped so we could safely walk back to the busses for our ride home.

Oh joyous times in Honduras. I’m actually going to miss the rainy season come January, even though I don’t really like the rain it’s so nice to cool off in the evenings with a sweet thunder and lightening storm. As long as I’m inside it’s fun to watch and listen. Remember, while my dry season schedule is filling fast with visitors you could still find a space for cheap to visit during the rainy season!:) Thank you for reading this blog. I really enjoy when people send me notes saying that they’ve been keeping up with it. It means a lot to know that people take time to stay involved in what I’m doing down here, at least a little bit.

Francisco=)

Alright, this man deserves his own entry on here because he is that incredible. Have you seen Kindergarten Cop? I haven’t personally, but I hear that we have our real life version of that movie right here at Mayatan. Francisco is probably the closest thing to a mix between Rocky and a Latin American drug lord that you can find. He was the science teacher who when I expressed my worries about being in a first grade class said, “I’ll teach first grade.”

To begin with, he’s from La Ceiba, Honduras, so English is his second language, but it makes it all that much funnier. I wish that you could all meet him. He’s always got his shirt partially buttoned up, he smokes, and never plans anything for class. Right now him and Judie (his wife) are staying with Emory and Linda while they are still trying to find housing around here. And as Tyler reminded me to put in here, Francisco is probably at least in his late fourties.

His response to how class is going is this, “Oh it’s no problem man, ya know, ya just gotta keep ‘em busy man.” Tyler walks past his class the other day and he’s teaching the first graders counting from 1-5. He’s holding a little girls hand in the front of the class with four other kids and the kids are repeating “one”, “two”, etc. As Tyler walks by Francisco looks over and gives him a little wink.

During our infamous drizzle-cane we were walking for a little while down a big hill in town that is cobblestone (like all the streets here that aren’t dirt) and his thought is, “oh man, these streets would be awesome if you were drunk man. You know what I’m sayin’?”

That same day with the rainstorm we were talking and I was asking Francisco what we’ll do if the kinds from Santa Rita can’t make it home. His first response, without hesitation, “They can stay at Emory’s! Hotel Emory man.”

We were hanging out with him and Judie when he said, “I’ll have to cook ya guys breakfast some time. I cook a good breakfast.” Judie immediately responds, “What have you ever cooked?!” His totally cool and non-defensive response is, “Oh you know, I cook toast…eggs…all sorts of good stuff. I’m real good.”

And the last and perhaps my favorite story of all. Somebody the other day was asking if there is anybody at school we can ask, “what is going on right now?” And they would be able to tell you exactly what is happening. It seems like nobody ever knows what is really going on. Francisco’s response, “You show up at 7, teach, and leave at 2, that’s what’s going on.”

I wish that you could all meet him. If he leaves Mayatan for some reason then nothing will ever be as funny the rest of the year. I don’t think a day goes by that I don’t get a laugh out of something he does or says.

A Drizzle-cane

Just to make this more clear as you read, I’m writing this at my computer on Wednesday, Sep 5. After the first day of school on Monday we were informed by the administration at school that Hurricane Felix is on it’s way and we should be prepared with extra water, food, etc. Then last night they said that Tegucigalpa was already getting rain and it looked like there was a lot of flooding there. So we were a little panicked yet decided there’s not much we can do about it so we had a hurricane party last night. The rain started at around 3pm yesterday with a light drizzling but never got any worse. Then it stopped at about 8pm last night…wow, what a hurricane. We weren’t bummed, we just felt let down that a hurricane would have no wind and about 5 hours of drizzling. However, we were misinformed. Tegucigalpa was not hit with rain yesterday morning, it was hit yesterday afternoon and into today, just as we have been. The rain started again at 9pm with a drizzle. I suppose it’s slightly heavier rain than Seattle can expect in December. So it’s not terribly hard yet there was talk about canceling school. At 8:15am this morning Norma (Honduran administrator) came into my room and asked to speak with me for a second. She said that the school was closing under order of the Department of Education. Kids from Santa Rosa were bussed home at 9:30am and from here in Copan at 10am. As us smart Americans left school we were just as excited as the kids! No school! Relaxation! Fun! It’s just a drizzle! Why are these fools closing school?!

Then one of us talked to Norma who informed us that back in ’98 Hurricane Mitch was the same exact way. There was no hurricane that hit the Copan area. This area was devastated by a long, sustained drizzle, which the ground cannot support and it caused a lot of flooding. But still we didn’t necessarily understand. It’s now been over 24 hours straight of rain without any let up except for about one hour last night. We walked down to the main river in town to check it out and it was at least 2 meters higher than it was this weekend with no sign of slowing down. We past a corn field that was completely flooded and destroyed. We stared past the national police/guard who had closed the bridge at the other side of the water. We just hiked up that hill this weekend, but the entire path along the river, which was at least 2 if not 3 meters above the river was completely covered in water. As we walked to the river we crossed a little river of water crossing the road no more than a quarter inch deep. We were there for 20 minutes or so and when we left the water was about half an inch to an inch deep. It’s amazing how such a constant, steady drizzle can devastate everything around here!

I’m excited that we don’t have school tomorrow but I’m worried for many of the people around here who live by the rivers and streams. We are safe here in Copan Ruinas, but how many villages lie along the river that have already been damaged? They say to expect rain at least until noon tomorrow…yikes…


(Thursday morning) The rain has stopped! Woo! I haven’t seen the river yet today, but the rain stopped around 2 or 3 last night. Part of me is bummed because we will most likely have school tomorrow, but at the same time I’m also relieved that damage will be kept to a minimum and we can get back into the classroom. Maybe they will still decide to cancel school tomorrow, that would be ok with me, it’s like the best of both worlds. One more day of rest and no rain to keep the floodwaters rising.:)

First days of School

The start of school has been SO LONG! After the first day I was wondering why in the world I came down here and why I ever thought that teaching science, math, and computers to middle schoolers was better than first grade. I’ve never been a teacher and classroom management was not a top skill of mine. However, I talked to Susan on Monday night and that gave me a lot of good ideas for classroom management. Then I also talked to Tyler and some of the other teachers to gather even more ideas. I was pumped for the second day! After Tuesday I was plotting, “now, when I told them I would teach all year does that mean I have to stay all year? What if I claim there is a visa problem at Christmas and I can’t come back into Honduras?”

The kids were a terror and I was just about ready to quit on the spot. I talked to Emory right after school about science class (which is the cause of most stress) because we have one flask, one graduated cylinder, and a semi-broken balance. Sweet lab set-up for 26 7th graders, eh? Emory said that he finds reading out loud in class to work well with the students because they can practice reading comprehension, pronunciation, and science all in one. What a deal?!=) That lessened science stress a little. Then I was panicked about computer time. I have 26 7th graders, 14 8th, and 9 9th graders to occupy for 2 hours per week each in a computer lab with 3 medium speed working computers and a slow one that doesn’t really work. I talked with Norma (Honduran administrator) about the possibility of either getting help with that class or making it into a study hall time. “Our students are behind in math,” she tells me. So it looks like we will be spending 2 extra hours per week on math when we can, otherwise reading silently or working on other homework.

After more talking, preparing, and strategizing I was ready to implement my plan of action for classroom management with a zillion 7th graders. It started out great today! Until the school closed, that is. I’m now not so worried about teaching and gaining confidence daily to keep kids from playing soccer in the classroom. I can’t put a finger on what exactly I changed today, but the kids were more responsive and I am ready to face the students when school opens up again. Yay teaching!

Teaching change!

After all this switching there has been one last switch as of yesterday (Tuesday). I’m no longer going to teach first grade! I’m so happy about this! I’m not going into the library, but I have the second best possible job. I’m teaching 7th and 8th grade math, 7th-9th grade science, and then 7th-9th grade computer courses. We only have about 7 computers and so far I’ve only gotten about 3 to work. We only have connections for 3, tomorrow I’ll try to mess around with the cables and power to move things around and be able to work all 7 computers at once. There’s only once class each for 7th, 8th, and 9th. Which means that I will see the same students in several classes throughout the week. This is excited, but it also means that I have a lot of work! Ty is switching to teaching 7th-9th grade English/literature, 9th grade math, and then 7th-9th grade art. It’s perfect for him! Perfect for me! And perfect for the two of us to work with the same students. We are the only English speaking, foreign born secondary school teachers. Students have a variety of other classes which I can address in a later blog when I have more time. I’ve spent quite a while on this computer already and I need to get out and talk to some people as well as eat dinner! I’m darn hungry! Just thought I should update ya’ll about this latest change, which should be for the better, and should also be for good! WOO! Apparently the 8th grade class is also a little behind, as well as the 9th, or something like that, so I’m excited to challenge these students and encourage them to learn and expand their brain power as well as their self-esteem, self-confidence, world-view, etc! This is going to be a great year!=)

My Way or the Not Correct Way

I’ve discovered that many times down here in Honduras there is one way to do things correctly. It’s not unfounded, there really is a best way when it comes to a lot of things down here. For example, washing clothes…Tyler and I decided to get some laundry done by hand this afternoon. We went out to the “pila” as it’s called and tried to figure it out. I had to ask the little girl next door to show me how to wash my clothes. Let me tell you, there are few things in life more humbling than asking help from a small child on something so simple as washing your clothes. I’m sure she’s thinking, “who in the world doesn’t know how to do this?!” She’s probably been working with the pila for the better part of her life.

Anyways, I get it figured out more or less. Fill one part with water, then there’s a place to scrub the clothes on the “ribs” of the pila with soap. Then take a pitcher and pour water over the clothes, washing it off, then hanging it up on the line to dry. So I start filling it with water and out pops the other neighbor. He asks if we have soap and I tell him, “yes.” So naturally he tells us to hold on a second and runs back in to grab us some soap. The soap here is “better” apparently than ours. As it turns out, the soap smells really good, gets dirt out amazingly well, and even gives our clothes super powers! Ok, that last part is a lie, but the soap is amazing. We cleaned our dirty clothes with dirty water and amazing soap and the result was really good smelling and clean clothes, who knew?

I wonder how many more things we will run into down here that we don’t do correctly. I used to get frustrated by their ignorance to think that a Honduran could possibly know a better way to wash clothes by hand than me, the smart college educated American. Ha, isn’t that a funny mindset? At least I find it to be now that I’ve learned better than to act like I know what I’m doing when I’ve never in my entire life washed clothes in a “pila.”

Copan At Last

Couple days down….lot of days to go. That’s how I’m viewing my time here thus far. It’s not because I’m loathing the days and counting down, it’s because I’ve been having such a good time and seeing all these great possibilities that could pan out that I’m excited to have a lot of days left.

I came down here to work in the library, but apparently this never works out. Emory talked to me the first night and said, “Zach, we need you to teach first grade.” Of course, why not!? I haven’t been preparing for this or anything. I haven’t been talking to librarians, or buying books for the library, or thinking about library projects. Instead I’ve been sitting around thinking, “what if I teach first grade this year? I should prepare.” Ok, that was my slightly bitter side at the change of plans. But really, I’m going with the flow and this is the way that it’s going to happen. How much good would I do refusing to teach this class and saying that I’m only going to work in the library? Apparently this will be at the very worst a one month stint. Emory has a friend coming down the start of October and then I’m off the hook and into the library. I’m excited about this change though, really, I am. Don’t believe me? Trust me, I’m very excited. The other first grade teacher, in the other class, is a recent graduate of the University of Oregon and was an education major. She’s going to be a great resource to help with lesson planning.

Tyler and I are planning on using this weekend to explore the city. Find out some church service times in the area, check out the library, get some random stuff for the house, and relax. Oh to relax…it’s going to be a good thing.:) For now I’m writing this on Friday night and it’s really late. And by really late I mean 11:20. Everything in town closes at 9pm and people get up between 6 and 7 every day. So…to bed I go! Good night!

Address

Do to popular demand...so to speak...Here's my address for the year. Believe it or not, this is really where they say to send it. No numbers, no street name...just as this is.

Zachary Assink
c/o Escuela Mayatan
Copan Ruinas, Copan
Honduras, Central America

And that's it...pretty nifty, eh?! I promise that I will even write back to people.:)

Another Visitor?

I leave on Thursday at 12:55am! Oh my gosh! I need to start packing! Actually, I did start packing today. I'm going to be so prepared for this. I've got my intro to TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) textbook, gauze bandages, fingernail clippers...what else do I need? Oh, one change of clothes, three left shoes, air soft gun, pocket knife...yah...I'm going to be so prepared for anything.:)

I'm looking forward to my living situation. I'll be rooming with my old roomate from Fox, Tyler, with a gentleman that lives down there named Jorge. Here's the Jorge connection: I went to Honduras with my Spanish prof last year and found out about Mayatan School. I then applied to Mayatan school and my Spanish prof (Viki) introduced me to Megan who taught down there for 2 years. Megan then introduced me (via e-mail) to Jorge, a friend of hers that she met while teaching down there. I don't know many details but I'm definitely getting more and more excited with each passing hour as my flight gets closer to leaving.

The not so exciting thing is that Tyler and I will be leaving Seattle at 12:55am or something like that...boo! We fly straight to Houston, then from there to San Pedro Sula, Honduras around 11:30am or so. Not bad, it's less than a 12 hour trip to there, but then we have about a four hour bus ride to Copan where we'll be living.

Well, this "another visitor?" business...I was at two of my best friends' wedding last night and met two of their friends from college who are planning a biking trip from El Salvador to Costa Rica. They have plane tickets already leaving in October and getting back the end of November. I told them they should probably come through Copan and stay with us, or at least visit. That'd be pretty sweet. Tyler and I (I'm putting words in his mouth) are super excited about any visitors since we will be able to share our lives with some people and they can see and experience what we'll be going through every day. So if you want to visit Honduras, take a number and send me an e-mail.:)

Expressivisming

That would be said just as it's spelled...expressive-ism-ing...do you ever have those moments where words don't really describe what it is that you want to say? I have those moments quite a bit, but it seems to happen less often as I get to learning more Spanish and some phrases in other random languages. Believe it or not though, things fall short of description in any language, not just English.:) Anyways...I have this phrase that I learned down in Brazil in May that I love!

Eu vo sentir saudades [A-oo vo sen-chir saw-oo-dah-gees] - Literally translated it's something like "I'm going to feel nostalgia." But really it's a rad Portuguese term for saying I will miss you. Saudades is also a word for love that is not really translatable into English. So it's much more than just missing somebody, it's like loving, missing, and feeling nostalgia for time spent together with somebody. Who says "I'm going to feel nostalgic!"? Now that's just ridiculous.:)

Brazil (debrief)

After our time in Cananeia we made our way up to Rio de Janeiro for debriefing time. I dreaded the trip and just wanted to stay in Sao Paulo because I wasn't feeling well, but somehow God's plan tends to be greater than ours. My best friend from high school, David, spent his two year mission down in Rio. I recognize that I only spent one day there, which is roughly 1/730 the amount of time that he spent there, but I could gain about that much of a glimpse into what his life must have been like down there, which is about 1/730 more than I could before. I just talked with him today and I'm so excited to hear more about his time and know a little of what he's talking about. So this is a good thing that we went to Rio for debrief instead of staying in Sao Paulo (p.s. the Pope was in Sao Paulo the first couple days that we were there, but no, we didn't see him among the 890 billion other people in the city).
In debriefing we went over a lot of different questions about our team, our time in Brazil, and our re-entry into the U.S. I thought a lot about how this trip has changed me, or has it? The end of Motorcycle Diaries (movie) has a quote in it, "I am no longer me. At least I am no longer the same me as before." I don't feel this way after Brazil. Brazil has been another layer in my life that I am thankful for, and it has helped to shape me and my world view, but it has not sent my life in a new direction. This is both good and bad I suppose. I now have a great love for all of Latin America, not just those who speak Spanish.:) I now recognize what it's like to spend a couple weeks somewhere where I don't speak the language, to worship God in Portuguese. The church is a great body of believers all across the world and I got to experience this in Brazil. However, I don't know if I will ever go back...What if I don't?
Some times I'm not sure what my purpose was on the trip. Then I realize, my purpose is God's purpose...my purpose is to show love to all around me...not just the cute children with adorable smiles.=) Thank you all who haave read up on my time in Brazil to gain a little understanding of what it was like. I don't want to brush off my time in Brazil and say that it has no impact on my life...but at the same time I want to recognize that this has not been the single most impactful moment of my life either. None of this would have been possible were it not for everybody who supported me in prayer and financially. I hold you all dear to my heart and no matter where God takes me in life, you will all be with me.=)

Brazil (week 3)

This was the hardest week and for that reason I've been delaying in writing about it...we spent Friday-Wednesday in the city of Cananeia. It's a fishing village on the coast near the border between Parana and Sao Paulo (for your geography buffs).
We arrived at 2pm on Friday, got settled into our upstairs loft area for the week when it started to rain...and rain...and rain...Dan was pretty sure it would last forty days and nights, but luckily this was the one time on the trip he was wrong. First, our accomodations, we were in a 2 bedroom, kitchen, dining/living room, and 2 small bathrooms. This is where we all slept, ate, played games, picked our noses, and whatever other activities went on. Rain in Brazil (at least Cananeia) is a different concept than the Northwest. We go out in the rain, because if you don't you will waste away in your house. However, in Cananeia you stay inside until the rain stops. It rained from 5pm on Friday til mid day on Sunday...can you say stir crazy? We couldn't work on the dock as planned, we couldn't have a Sunday morning program like we hoped, we couldn't even explore the yard of the house because of the rain.
Some things transpired that were mainly a result of cabin fever (I believe) and people just needed to find some alone time and private space. Finally Sunday night we went out for church and it was great. People were super friendly, we sang some songs, introduced ourselves in front of the church, and two people shared testimonies (Ryan and Andrea). Monday was clear and we started to work on the dock. By noon I was exhausted and felt a little sick so I layed down to nap a little. Except for a half hour break for lunch I napped until 6:30 that night! It was the start of the never-ending soar throat, cough, and crummy feel. As we all sat around in this cramped house bathing in each others sickness I became beyond ready to leave for our next sight. We left Wednesday and I slept through most of the bumpiest bus ride I've ever been on as we went back to Sao Paulo for the night.
Our time spent in Cananeia was one of the most challenging times as I struggled with a sense of helplessness, useslessness, sickness, and just being fed up with how much sickness was spreading throughout the group. My poor buddy lost her voice! Sorry Katie! There are good things to take away from the week, such as the hospitality of the family who lived below us and cooked for us despite us only working one day on the dock. Or seeing the love that they have for their four year old child who has some sort of developmental disability. Or how about the fact that God can use you despite the rain?:)

Brazil (Week 2)

This week was spent in Sao Paulo and started off interesting...I felt like junk...I didn't have a sore throat, fever, runny nose, or any of that, it's like I just had the aches and pains of the flu with nothing else going on. It's not too much fun.
While in Sao Paulo we worked with Ministerio Restauracao (Restoration Ministry). This is a ministry that goes into favelas (slums) and runs some ministry programs. They have what they call a day center in each favela. Pause, I should define this term for you so you have a slight idea of what I'm talking about...

Favela- A slum in which poor(er) people congregate and build houses from anything between cardboard and concrete. They rip power and water off from the city so that they don't pay for it. Favelas are run by the drug lords and there is no chance of success in life without working for them. Most people in Brazil don't go into the favelas because "it's too dangerous." Those that live in favelas don't even count as citizens of the city, they are nothing...nobody...nobody cares about them, nobody loves them, nobody wants to be them...nobody even thinks about them. Can you gather why Ministerio Restauracao is so important?

In each day center kids gather to eat breakfast or lunch, sing songs, learn Bible stories, and participate in other activities that involve anything but drugs and illegal activities. Their goal is to get kids hooked on God before they are hooked on drug dealing...sound like a fun job to anybody? It's not at all fun sounding to me if I'm being honest. I was exhausted every day at 5 when we were done. Each morning we woke up I had to peel myself out of bed and search for a little energy before charging into the day for more skits, songs, crafts, and soccer.

I just want to highlight two things about this week, Fifi and the favelas. First off, these favelas. Anybody seen City of God? It's super depressing and sad, don't watch it without expecting lots of violence and lots of violence coming from kids and directed at kids in the favela. I saw this before I left and thought, surely this is a little blown out of proportion. No...I promise you this is not. I know that short terms like this don't get the full picture, and I don't pretend to know it all, but I believe this movie is an excellent portrayal of life in the favelas. The people at Ministerio Restauracao helped us gather the true feeling of the favelas. By this point in the trip I could manage basic conversation with the kids. These convos solidified to me that the Ministry was not just exagerating.
Kids in these favelas are not hopeless despite the situation. They are only poor because we call them that, they are hopeless because that's how we would feel in that situation. These kids don't know the extremes that we do, they only know their life. These kids were filled with love for God, with a hope for tomorrow no different than us, and with a joy that is undescribable. That's what I want to highlight about the favelas, the joy and contentment of these families in spite of their situation. It's amazing...and humbling.

This brings me to highlight number two of the week...Fifi. What's Fifi? No, who is Fifi? He's a 17 year old guy that lives in the slums. It's his nickname, kinda funny to me, how is that a cool nickname? Kinda sounds girly to my American ears. Let's face it though, he's got a cool nickname!:) He lives in a favela near the main center for the Ministry and has been attending there since he was 7. Now he helps out a couple hours per week and he tagged along with out group one day to help with the kids. Mostly he played soccer and smoked us up beyond all belief with his friend Rafael.:) He has gotten the chance to attend school and is trying to get into a university for next year (school starts in February or so and runs til November or so). He used to have 9 brothers and sisters, only 6 are still alive. The others fell victim to the drug trade in the favela. His dream is to play professional soccer one day in Brazil, he's had several try-outs for teams but never made it. If this doesn't work out, he wants to work with computer web programing some day. He's a talented, gifted, loving, and amazing individual.
I never felt more connected to anybody this whole trip than I did with Fifi from my limited interactions with him. He showed me why I am down here, for encouraging and loving people. I am in Brazil for the people. I am a relational person and I come alive when I meet people like Fifi. I thought I should share this story with you.:)

Brazil (Week 1)

So how was it? That's the question that everybody wants to ask. Some do, and you get a response such as fine, good, great, mixed, interesting, etc. Just depends on what one-word answer comes to mind first. Others are a little more timid and aren't sure if it's ok to ask. It's ok, I'm like the latter of those two people. I want to know, but I don't want to ask. I think that by asking, if we are truly interested, we give that person complete reign of saying it was great or it was crappy. It's kind of intimidating really, this person could unload on us...by reading this I feel that you give me complete reign...=)

I more or less filled you guys in on the week here with a brief e-mail, so I will break it down in the following favorites:

Cultural experience:
We went to a pizzeria one night and it was amazing. I can't describe the pizza well, but it's just crust with toppings. No sauce, and these aren't the typical toppings. There are regular dinner pizzas such as sweet corn, beef stroganoff, etc. The best part though are the sweet pizzas for dessert! There's grape ice-cream, chocolate (regular and white), chocolate with strawberries, bananas with cinnamon. It's amazing! The waiters continually come around asking if you want a piece of whichever pizza they are holding. Wow...it was pretty freaking sweet! We got a chance to go later in Sao Paulo also, but by then most of the group was sick and our intake was down significantly...

Language to speak while in Londrina:
Well, there's the Irish missionary, he's pretty great. His names Nigel and we get to learn phrases such as "give it a wallie!" Which he says when he's trying to say, "put your back into it." He also asks you questions like "how's she cuttin'?" Apparently the correct answer, if all is going well, is "full of the blade." Oh Nigel, he's great, I love him. Then there's British Dan...he's a 20 year old guy down there for 6 months to help around the camp. He mainly gives us the joy of talking in an American accent while we talk in British ones. He's better at it than we are, (both American and British accents). I'm not sure why that is. His humor took a while to catch on because as he put it, "a lot of times I could tell a joke and none of you will even notice." Then there's the Portuguese, oh yes, the Portuguese...we'll cover that later.

Service project/job:
We sort of partnered up with Webb Idiomas (an English school) for an all day camp on Saturday and a week-night class on Wednesday. I thought it was going to be one of the most boring and least eventful weeks for this reason, but I love the English classes! This is a good thing since I'm teaching them next year.:) We got to meet all sorts of people from all over Londrina who ranged from broken English to near fluency. It was great to meet all of these people who were so interested in getting to know us because we spoke English. They could practice with a native! After all these years of studying Spanish, is this what all you native speakers have felt like around me?=)

Lesson/challenge/random:
We seemed to be sitting around a whole lot and the group was doing a lot of bonding. I can't put my finger on it, but I was not feeling so into the bonding this first week. I was a little sick perhaps, a little adjusting to the new culture, a little bitter finding out that Portuguese actually does sound more romantic than Spanish, I don't know what exactly it was.:) However, that's how I felt. Towards the end of the week Nigel asked me as I was working by myself on painting a window...he said, "Zach, I noticed that you tend to be working a lot by yourself. All of the group is working together, but whenever I see you you're by yourself a lot. So I'm curious, why did you come here?" Wow...I thought...I'm about to get grilled and embarrassed by the Irishman...However, we had a great little convo about it. I told him that basically I am here for the Brazilians, I'm not here for my team. My team is great, and I love all of them, but ultimately what I came to do was make an impact on the lives of the Brazilians and encourage the missionaries down there. I didn't go to Brazil to get close with Americans, I believe that's a by-product of the task at hand and will come along later. He asked if I was interested in missions and I told him not really...I think that we both have a similar view about missionaries who serve no purpose, which in our opinion a lot don't serve one other than God. Now, I realize I may have just stuck my foot in my mouth, so let me explain this in the next paragraph. (you can skip it if you don't want to hear it)
A lot of missionaries seem to go to Londrina, Brazil or Madrid, Spain or wherever else in the world to preach the name of God. I have a news flash, God is already in all those places and chances are most people have even heard about him. We are living in the information era where kids in Favelas have MSN messenger! Trust me, these kids and these people have heard the message, but few have experienced it. We are called to show Christ's love, not just preach it. It's great to be a missionary and I value each one of them. How awesome would it be though to one day not need international missionaries? What if we woke up tomorrow and other nations had enough of their own leaders trained in the church that instead of us sending missionaries to lead them we sent missionaries to learn with them and serve them. I highly value the missionary who is a dentist, nurse, engineer, teacher, etc. who simply serves the people to show them God's love. Does that make a little more sense now? I hope so.

Alright, back to the Londrina week, this is about all I have to say about it for now. If you have questions about those things fire away. I believe that I am slowly learning the value of God's church, not the human church which has drawn boundaries and lines we resist crossing. We are all one body and one people, one church called to love and serve...what a privelage.:)

First Reunion Speech

Graduation has come and gone. I spoke last night at First Reunion, which was just a gathering of graduates and our families. I don't know what others thought, but I enjoyed my speech.:) Here's what I had to say last night...

I would like to share a story with you guys about a gentleman who was looking for a job. He was offered a position at the local zoo. They told him they had recently lost their gorilla. If he was willing to put on a suit and impersonate an ape he had a job. While it wasn’t terribly authentic, a job’s a job. Things were great as each day he perfected his gorilla act and became a prime attraction at the zoo. One day he got a little carried away swinging from tree to tree and he swung right into the adjacent cage, landing face to face with a giant African lion! The man reflexively screamed for help. The lion urgently whispered to him, “shut up, you idiot, or we’re both out of a job!”
This gentleman in the ape suit was simply pretending, just faking it for the general public. He was so caught up in faking it that he didn’t even realize everybody around him was also just wearing a mask, or in this case a full body costume. He was lost in the shadow he created.
I had an interesting conversation with my former roommate over Easter break. We talked about living in the shadow of our roommates. I revealed to him how no matter what I have done I always feel my roommates are one step ahead of me on the scale of creativity, of insightfulness, and of all around awesomeness. However, this is not always a negative shadow to live in. It has taken me on amazing adventures over the four years as I have discovered my true identity in Christ.
My freshman year the adventures were ridiculous and fairly limited to my floor of Ed 2. There were the crazy pranks, poker nights, and the infamous Bible study second semester on the Song of Solomon.
My sophomore year the adventures were infinite as we celebrated life throughout the year. We celebrated each home run of fruitball, each successful run on the office chair down the Beebe hill, but more importantly we celebrated community in prayer every night. Some of you stopped by that year and blessed us with your presence long enough to color a picture that was placed on our wall.
Junior year came around and things changed after spending first semester in Spain. I began to feel out of place and disconnected, as I couldn’t possibly impart to anybody the impact of that semester on my life, faith, and friendships. In a large sense this feeling of disconnectedness has not left me ever since then.
Coming back to the story of the man in the gorilla suit, that is who I have been for the past couple years of college. It’s been fun, no doubt, and I have spent time away from the general public without my suit on, but for the most part I lived in this suit. I have since learned that the greatest bit of knowledge can be summed up by the famous scholar Dr. Seuss: “Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is youer than you.” I have not learned this in class, I have learned this from you guys, my classmates and friends. I’d lie if I said those outside the current senior class never made an impact, but I thought that I’d throw in a sappy line about “the great senior class.”
Every summer that I have gone home and left my closest friends I have realized how amazing you all are here at Fox, even if there is a feeling of disconnect sometimes. I don’t think that I told you how amazing you all are enough. I wish that we had all skipped a few more classes and just sat in the quad together doing crossword puzzles or something awesome like that. Now that we are graduating it’s going to just get harder to stay in contact and sit in the quad together. If any of us ever felt disconnected while either here at Fox or home during the summers how much more will we struggle with this disconnection once we’re graduated? Please don’t become disconnected from your friends and don’t hide inside a costume. I have learned while at Fox that friendship is far too valuable to let fall by the wayside.

Copan or bust!

I recently heard back from the Mayatan School in Copan and found out that I need to be down there by August 20...WOO! I can't believe that it's almost here, anybody wanna come along? I have a really big suitcase, here's the application if you would like to apply to be stuffed in my suitcase:

Name:
How's your Spanish:
How do you feel about working in "my library":
How are you at cooking:
Would you mind giving me back rubs:
Can you do my laundry:
Anything that makes you qualified:

This is a highly sought after position here.:) To give you a bigger picture of what it is that I will be doing, I'll be organizing the library, cataloging all the books, reading to the little tikes, substituting when any teachers are sick or MIA, and helping out with the preschool classes. All this for the sake of living in Latin America...*sigh*...

Greg, I'm sorry...

Greg, I apologize that I wrote that one in Spanish, but I promise that if even just for you, I will write in English from here on out.

I have to do this just once

Just once...una vez...es todo que quiero hacer. Llevo la mayoria de mi vida estudiando espanol, quieriendo hablar como si fuera mi lengua. Pues una vez quiero escribir en espanol para que sepan el amor que tengo. Dicen que la belleza queda dentro de si mismo, pero el idioma no tiene donde poner su belleza. En unos meces voy a Honduras, y voy a dejar a mi mundo atras, el mundo que he conocido por mucho tiempo. Tengo amigos aqui y temo que me van a olvidar. No quiero que me olvides, te ruego que me recuerdes, que me escribes, que aun me ames. Pues....si entiendes esto, gracias por leer "mi primero" aqui. Tengo que seguir escribiendo en ingles porque algunos que me aman no hablan espanol, yo se, es dificl creer.:) For those that don't understand but tried to make it through this, thanks for trying, you're loved for your effort.:)