martes, 22 de enero de 2008

A night on the top of the world

I know my little sis Sarah already wrote about this night, but I wanted to be able to write it from my perspective:

One of the last nights Sarah was with me, we were suddenly approached in the park we were sitting at by two older men. They began chatting with us, and we soon found out that they knew some of the same people I knew from the area, including other Peace Corps volunteers.

At one point in the conversation, they asked me what I had studied in the University. My major being Theology, I always hesitate to tell people this answer, I'll admit. Perhaps it is because I don't like to be judged right away as someone extremely ¨religious¨ however they may define the word (although I probably am by many definitions). Or perhaps it is because my spirituality is something very personal to me, and I don't like it to be announced to strangers right away. Therefore, when they questioned me, I answered hesitantly. However, when I gave them the answer, both their eyes widened with joy and excitement, and one of them exclaimed ¨wow, I've never spoken with a theologian before!¨

Immediately, one of the men asked me and Sarah if we would like to go to the top of the belltower of the Cathedral. From there, we sat chatting about mundane things for a bit. But before long, the chatter turned into heated discussion of the theology of the church, and its position in the world as well as its obligation to help the poor. The discussion started with one of the men questioning me about old theologians I had studied. I could tell that this subject was something that had been on his mind for a long time, and had been dying to get it off his chest. I sat there for almost an hour, discussing the beauty of the doctrine of the Church, the obligation it has to help all human beings, and even compared Catholicism to Buddhism. All the time, with my broken Spanish and perhaps simple worded arguments due to my lack of vocabulary in the realm of theology. But despite this, I felt that every time I gave an argument, they looked at me and listened with a deep respect that I was almost taken aback by.

As the conversation died, I looked out the window over the city, thanking God for such a beautiful night. I was able to delve into the souls of these men, seeing what was important to them on the absolute deepest level, and even was able to help them a little bit to understand, perhaps, the teachings of the Church and Her role in the world. All because I had majored in Theology. It is at times like that when I know that even if I never continue with my degree, it was worth studying just for that moment.

viernes, 18 de enero de 2008

taxi drivers continued.....

I decided to split up the funny stories blog so as not to make it one long exhaustive one. Here is another funny story about taxi drivers. You either love 'em or you hate 'em.

The night we got to Tegucigulpa, I found out about 15 minutes after getting out of the taxi that I had accidentally left my wallet sitting on the seat of the cab, which contained 2 debit cards, some money and both my I.D. cards. I was devastated. Not only was I afraid of losing tons of money, I knew that I would have to spend the majority of the next day figuring out what to do and getting a new I.D. card.......and my meeting started at 8 o'clock the next day.

Hoping to get there at at least 10 in the morning, I rushed to the Peace Corps office the next day and asked them what to do. First, they had me go to the police office and write a report, and then to another place to take pictures for my I.D. This of course, took until about 11 in the morning. Knowing that the meeting didn't end until the afternooon, I was still rushing around at least get there for a little bit of the meeting.  Sarah and I then climbed into a taxi that took us to the immigration office.

Our taxi driver this time was a character, who, during the entire 20-minute taxi ride, told us stories of the time he spent in the states, his Puerto Rican lover that he left in the states, but still seemed to be in love with, and the farm he grew up on in Eastern Honduras, where everyone owns a horse and at least 2 pistols.

As I stepped out of the cab, the few moments of joy and relief I had gotten from chatting with the cab driver quickly vanished. I opened the doors to the immigration office, only to find that the woman had gone on luch, and I stood waiting there for at least a half hour. By time I left the office, I was basically at the end of my wits after so many people who had cut in front of me (lines apparently don't exist here), the ridiculous amount of time it took to do EVERYTHING, and the apparant disinterest of everyone that I HAD A MEETING TO GO TO!!!

The taxi drivers who were parked out front of the office, just like the ones who had been in the front of the mall, were sure in for a treat! As soon as they gave me the price, I began arguing with them, saying "Don't give me that! You are screwing me over and you know it, you all know it! It is NOT that far from here to where I'm going!" As the arguments escalated, my voice got louder and louder until I was practically screaming in their faces. Finally, I threw my arms up, and walked away, planning on walking down the side of the highway until I found someone who would take me at the price I asked for. This time, I left Sarah standing there awkwardly, apologizing to the taxi drivers for my behaviour saying, "she's had a loooooong day." After walking barely a block, we found a taxi driver that would take us for a whole 10 Lempiras less than what the other ones offered us ($0.50). Although not the price I was hoping for, I was satisfied and hopped in the car. As we drove past the mob of taxi drivers I screamed and made vulgar guestures at them in my anger. After about a minute of silence, Sarah burst out laughing saying "Lizzy! You were acting like a crazy woman!" I couldn't help but join in here laughter, replaying the recent events in my head. "Those damn taxi drivers.............."

Funny Stories with Sarah and Liz....and taxi drivers

The other day, my mother told me that she and my older sister Theresa were laughing until their cheeks hurt talking about the huge differences between me and Sarah, who just left today after a 2 week long visit, and how ridiculous we might be traveling together.

This can't be further from the truth. In fact, we got along the entire time we were there. Haha. Just kidding, mom. Here are a couple of silly stories from our trip that, if it had been turned into a movie, would be a great comic success.

One of the first days that we got there, I had to go to a meeting in the big city, Tegucigulpa, which always scares me out of my wits when I wander around there alone. We got off the bus at a mall, the safest option for me, and decided to roam around the mall a little before we took a taxi to the house we were staying at for the night.

As we were leaving the mall, a herd of taxi drivers bombarded us, asking us where we wanted to go. We told them, and they told us they would charge us a ridiculous amount that I refused to pay. I began to argue with them, little me standing in a circle of taxi drivers who were all giving me the same price and weren't backing down, even though they knew they were screwing me over. I was being stubborn, and tried to keep arguing, when Sarah stomped off the other way, sick of standing there and making a scene. I didn't want to leave, because I didn't want to lose the fight, so I stood there for a while, before I realized my little sister was leaving me there to fend for myself.

I ran after her screaming, asking why she had left me. We then began to argue fairly loudly at each other as we were walking down a dark path from the mall to the main highway. In the middle of our screaming match (okay, maybe we weren't screaming, but we sure were  pretty furious at each other), a police man came up to us and asked us where we were going, and that we shouldn't be walking there alone at night. We told him where we were trying to go, and he seemed more than happy to help us. He even walked with us down to the highway to get us a taxi at a fair price. As he was walking us down to the highway, he began to ask us questions about ourselves in a fairly flirtatious way. At one point, he pointed out to us his fancy motorcycle that he gets to ride around on every day for work. We both looked at the motorcycle and exclaimed "oooooh!" simultaneously, then quickly exchanged big grins, holding back our laughter. As we approached the highway, his fellow police officers looked at him with wide grins as if to say "how did you get these lovely gringas to talk to you? You tiger, you!"

As we got into the taxi and rode away, we doubled over laughing at the absurdity of the night. "What a clever way to pick up girls!" We exclaimed to each other. But the best thing was that we were best friends all over again, and had forgotten completely about our little tiff we had gotten into, thanks to the friendly police man.

lunes, 7 de enero de 2008

Sarah

This is the first of probably at least a couple of blogs in honor of my little sis Sarah! Because she's coming to Honduras today! Actually she's already here, and is either in the bus right now coming towards me, or lost somewhere in the big city. I hope to God it is the former, but would not be surprised at all if it's the latter.

Watch out Agua Fria, here comes my little sister! And we are going to do some serious......uh.......I forgot the word....damage? Is that right? I am becoming so enveloped in the spanish language, I'm forgetting my hip english phrases! Oh, well. I suppose that's all for the better anyways, right (I can just imagine my older sister right now laughing hysterically at my 40 year-old lady vocab.....she always said I was a 40 year-old trapped in a 22 year-old's body!)

ps-I just wanted to say thank you to my good friend Angela for the package you sent me! I was so happy to get it, I almost cried! You are so great, and I miss you sooooooo much!!!!! I am also still waiting for your package, Aunt Mary Ellen! But I will definately let you know when I get it!

What would Smokey the Bear do?

The other day I had come back to my house to get ready to cook lunch, when to my surprise I found that the electricity had gone out. Actually, this wasn't a surprise at all. It was the third time it had happened that day, and about the 6th time that week. Unfortunately, when I went shopping for a stove, I did not know this little fact about our town. Therefore, I had bought an electric stove, which I can only use about half the time here, since the electricity goes out so much!

So I decided to be adventurous, and instead of having peanut butter crackers for lunch (thanks mom for sending those!) and cook on the wood stove the family I live with has. Now, I have always wanted to be a boyscout (yes, that's right....a BOYscout. They are the ones who actually go camping and learn real things. I remember being in girl scouts and to my extreme disappointment, learning nothing but how to make pot holders) and loved to go camping. But I have never claimed to be an expert on building fires. In fact, I am pretty sure I never have built one in my life, or even come close to attempting.

So I thought to myself ¨I'm here in Honduras, where most of the women cook on wood stoves. I should definately take a stab at it!¨ So I entered the room where the stove was, and saw that there were still glowing cinders inside it, from the previous fire that had been made. ¨It's my lucky day!¨ I thought to myself ¨this should be a cinch!¨ Well, boy was I wrong. About and hour later, after about 10 matches and 20 old tests from my english class, I had finally gotten a small fire started. By that time as well, I had gotten ash stains all over my clothes, and my eyes were filled with tears from the enormous amount of smoke that blew in my face every time I tried to lite the logs on fire (about every 30 seconds, I had to run out of the room and close my eyes in order to get rid of the sting from the smoke).

Finally, almost 2 hours after I had started this entire extravanganza, I sat down to a horribly unsatisfying meal of bland beans, hard rice, and cold tortillas (at this point, the peanut butter crackers were much more tempting to me). While taking my first bite, as if it had been a mean trick played on me by God, the lights came back on. Looking down at my ash-stained jeans and almost revolting meal before me, I grinned widely thinking to myself ¨now THIS is why I joined the Peace Corps!¨