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.

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!¨

Feliz Navidad

Ahhhhhh! It's almost Christmas, and here I am, trapped in Honduras with no one to celebrate it with except a woman I work with, and a couple of strangers I just met yesterday! Besides that, there is absolutely no snow here, I can count the number of Chrismas trees I've seen on one hand, and the feast they are preparing doesn't contain an ounce of eggnog. This isn't Christmas!

Perhaps that's why I have felt so good about the first Christmas ever that I have to spend away from my family. It doesn't really feel like Christmas at all. Especially in the country. Practically no one puts up Christmas trees or Christmas lights. They don't believe in Santa. I think the only reason he is present here is because of comercialization from the States. They don't really exchange presents either. This is actually a custom (although I'll admit I tend to anticipate it more than anything each year!) I think our country could do without. All the comercialization of Christmas and people wrapped up in buying gifts (no pun intended) for their loved ones seems to create such a frenzy and superficial excitement, people seem to forget the real meaning of Christmas.

Now don't worry friends, I am not about to get soft on you and spout off what I believe the real meaning of Christmas is......most of you already know that. I am just saying that there is a beauty in anticipating such a great holiday in a serene, quiet place where it is barely mentioned except at night, when the women of the town go to the church to pray a novena, waiting patiently for the anticipated day. And when the day finally comes, people sit around a table, enjoy each other's company as well as a carefully prepared delicious meal. Afterwards, there is no empty feeling of ¨is that it? Is that all the presents I got?¨ or ¨wow, we've been anticipating this day for soooooo long, and now it's over? Just like that?¨ It actually feels good.

I hope all you guys are having a great time this Christmas spending it with your families! And family, don't miss me too much! I am already missing you enough for all of us. Just enjoy eachother's company, and hopefully we will be reunited for the next Christmas! And I hope you all got me some good presents! Haha, just kidding.......sort of.........

A tall skinny latte, please...this time leave out the flavoring

When I went to coffee shops in the states, I always liked to try new things. I almost never would order the same thing twice, unless I really, really liked something. I supposed that is just part of my personality. I love trying new things. That's one reason why I'm down here in Honduras!

As most of you know, coffee is made of small beans, almost the size of a black bean, which is roasted and then ground into grains, which make a delicious drink. What most of you probably didn't know is that the coffee beans originally grow on trees in small berries that are the shape of blueberries, except that they turn red when ripe. And after being picked, they have a looooong ways to go before they are turned into the wonderful caffienated drink that we know and love!

First, they have to go through a maching that takes off the red outer shell. At this point, they look more like coffee beans than berries. After the shell has been taken off, they usually have to sit out for at least a day, in order to get rid of a filmy outer covering that is left on after the shell is taken off. They are then washed with clean water. During this process, the ¨bad beans¨are taken out. Usually the ones that have some of the outer shell still left on them, or do not have a bean inside the shell. These are separated, and consumed by the locals (which is why, when one goes to a coffee paradise like this where coffee is all around them, it is almost impossible to find GOOD coffee, because all the good stuff is exported, and the locals are left with the garbage). Then, the coffee is left out to dry for hours, sometimes days and days, depending on the strength of the sun. I found out while working here, that drying coffee is an art. There is a certain percentage of humidity that the coffee bean has to have, no more, no less, in order to be considered good. If it is too humid, it can have a sickly bitter taste to it. If it is too dry, it gets bland and flavorless.

The next part is the most simple, but possibly the most grueling. The coffee must be selected. The bad ones separated from the good ones. I have spent literally hours and hours separating coffee with the workers at the house I live in, only having separated about 50 pounds of coffee (about a 20th of the amount of coffee some people have) this is the most grueling, but also the most important, because the company they export their coffee to charges them for every defect the coffee has. For instance, for every 10 coffee beans they find that are black (they should be a pretty golden color), that is one defect and they get deducted the amount they get paid.

After all this is done, the coffee is brought to a warehouse, or in our case, the cooperative office, to be stored before being shipped off. This is the process we are in right now. There are 53 members in the cooperative. That means 53 different people have been coming to the cooperative ¨office¨ to drop off their coffee, weigh it, store it, and have it shipped off to the other side of the country to have it processed so it can be exported. That's right, there is still one more step to go before it can be exported. The coffee beans at this point are still in another outer shell, which needs to be stripped with another, more complicated machine that is hard to find. That is why they have to transport their coffee to have it processed and exported by a larger company.

All this work, just for one simple cup of coffee. Not to mention that all this still needs to be roasted and ground in order to make the drink! It just makes me wonder who the heck saw a bunch of red berries on a tree, and thought to himself ¨hmmm....I think I'll take the shell off of those berries, dry them in the sun, take of the other shell, roast it, ground it, and then make a drink out of it! Oh, yes, that would be delicious!¨

A shout out

I just wanted to give a shout out to my little sis Mary. I just talked to her last night, and she brought me so much joy! I was so happy to see that she is doing so well in college, and getting excellent grades as well.

She also told me about an extremely difficult situation that she just went through back home. The way she recounted the story, and by her reaction I could tell that she had taken the situation with extreme maturity and rationality. That is my sister. She has always been very mature for her age, and especially when unexpected and difficult situations arise, her maturity shines through even stronger. I love you, Mary! And I hope you get a blog soon, so I can start reading it!

Please Pick for me a Rose

St. Terese of Lisieux is one of the most adored and revered saints of the Catholic Church. She lived and extremely humble, simple life away and may have never been noticed so much if it hadn't been for the autobiography she wrote while in the convent, which revealed her simple, yet beautifully passionate faith for the Lord.

Right before she died, St. Terese promised to send a shower of roses down on the earth while she was in heaven. So now, whenever someone prays a Rose Novena to St. Terese, they get a rose. Obviously roses don't just come falling from the sky and into someone´s hands. Rather, they may see a rose on TV, or on a card or even a print on someone´s shirt and be reminded of God´s love. Other stories are more miraculous, like a dozen roses floating by you in a lake, while your boyfriend proposes to you in a canoe (true story).

I will admit that I never was much of a fan of these rose novenas. Maybe because I never had any miraculous stories, only roses printed on shirts, and things like that. And every time that I would get my roses, I couldn't help but wonder if it was just mere coincidence, or I was just noticing roses more because I was praying the novena.

That´s why when I began my rose novena here in Honduras, I was a bit skeptical. Especially because I hadn't seen a single rose since the day I stepped foot in Honduras. They just aren't common here at all. However, I had a feeling one day that I should start it, so I did. Admittingly somewhat half-heartedly each day.

On the fifth day, I got my rose. I had gone to a youth group that is held in the church every Saturday. The only reason I remembered to go, is because I was hanging out outside of a family´s house on the street, when some of the kids passed by going to the group. I still wasn't going to go, as I was caught up in conversation with the girl who lived in the house, but one of the kids looked up at me as she passed, and asked me if I was going. I felt bad, especially since I had talked to them about going earlier. So I went, and sat through a rather disappointing meeting, where they just sat around talking about how frustrated they were that no one ever came to the meetings. No praying was done, no songs were sang, no inspirational talks were given. Nothing. As I got up to leave, I noticed a few older women enter the church and go to the front and sit down, as if they were waiting for something to start. I asked one of the kids, and she told me they were praying a rosary. Intrigued, I walked towards the front, and sat down and began praying with them.

It wasn't until we were about half way through the rosary, when I finally noticed a large vase placed at the foot of the statue we were facing. In the vase were 8 beautiful roses staring right at me. 2 red, and 6 pink. My eyes quickly filled with tears, as I remembered that it was the last day of my rose novena. I had no idea where they came from, or why they were there, but I knew that in that specific moment, they were just for me.