This weekend has been very interesting.. We got hints about our site and we worked hard in the gardnen. However, I don't really have any pictures, but when I get into my site in 2 weeks I'm going to take a LOT of pictures to send you because I heard my site is really beautiful. SO, I'm really excited.
Information about my Site-I'll be working with 3 counterparts: A high school, the Municipal Department (Youth Dept.), and a new Tourism Center. The high school wants my to help with art (they want a mural), which is really amazing and at the same time a really big deal because a mural is a huge project where people draw on a large wall...so, I def. need someone with more art skills than I. They also want a basketball team . LOL. Furthermore, they want tutoring in Math and Physics-I really like Math (especially Algebra, so that's great) and they want a choir (SO excited because what they mean by a choir could possibly mean starting out with working on rythmn, which is really cool) and they want me to help with the band (which of course I'm excited about- they only thing is they don't really have trumpets in the band cause they're so expensive). BUT, I can ask for funding for some trumpets from the Municipality Office that I'll be working with.
Then, there's the Municipality Office, which has money right now and they want to start some Youth Groups in the town, which is great! Furthermore, the Tourism Center just started like 2 months ago because the town is SO pretty :) and they want tourists so they've asked me to come in and help them figure out what the town needs. Even though it's not related to youth, they put me there because I have experience in planning/organizing things and I like organizing things! So, I'm really excited. I´M SO EXCITED--2 more weeks before I get to my site. :)
So, about the farming this week...CRAZY! We literally worked hard like farmers making compost and planting all kinds of things-trees, vegetables, fruits, etc. We got so dirty...I took two showers and I got a blister cause we were using machetes, hoes, shovels, etc. and they weren't in the best condition so some of the handles that were wood were rough on the hands. But, it was very informative. We ended up planting avacado, tomatoes, squash, radish, oranges, yuca, etc.
Also, this week is the last week with the school that we´ve been working with in the town nearby. We´re going to have a party to celebrate. We´re inviting all the parents of the students and we´re going to make food and display the art we´ve been working on with the kids the past few weeks and the kids are going to sing Old McDonald and BINGO in English with tambourines that we made together and they´re going to wear their masks that we made together of the animals in the Old McDonald song... I should take a picture!
So, that´s all for now! I hope is well at home-Keep me updated!
Victoria
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Sunday, August 22, 2010
The Week of Teaching
So, this past week, we taught young children in an orpahange (family home) about dental hygiene and then we also taught high-schoolers about sexual education (we did the banana condom thing).
Anyways, so the orphange was called Bobby´s because the owner is named Bobby and he´s actually from the U.S. (AL). He has such a think country accent, it´s really funny to hear him speak Spanish! :) But, yeah, he´s been in Honduras for 10 years and he goes back to the states every once in a while to bring supplies back in a big school bus...he drives all the way to like Chicago and it takes days. It´s incredible! And, he calls his place a family home so that the children can say they came from a family instead of an orphanage when other little kids ask them. He has such a big heart and the children are precious. I held one of the little babies named Miguel and he was so sweet. Bobby told us about their stories and how some of them were like found in a trash can or one girl (9 years) was on the street selling food or something to support her two younger siblings. It was really sad. BUT, then we talked to them about dental hygiene and played educational games with them and gave them each two toothbrushes and toothpaste. It was great!
Also, the highschool...OMG. It was def. interesting showing high schoolers how to use condoms and talking to them about HIV and AIDS. But, all was well. We played games where some of them had to be white cells and diseases, etc. AND, of course we had the banana and the condom where we each (there were 4 of us in the group) had to show them how to use the condom correctly. It was new info. for me too. LOL.
Also, all is going well with my stomach and I haven´t had any diseases! I feel blessed cause we´ve had some Dengue and Malaria going around and of course your common diarrhea. BUT, praise the Lord that all is well with my health. Just trying to eat less sweets and less in general. :)
Also, I went to my first Honduran Birthday party last night and I got to dance and we had tamales...no cake, though. I was a little dissapointed. But, it´s prob. for the best. But, the lady was turning 75 and she´s in good shape!
Furthermore some news from Honduras:
Teachers still on strike...possibly it will last for a month.
Teguz (the Capital) is flooded...like people´s houses are destroyed and a main street washed away. AND it´s still raining a lot here.
But, all is still functioning some way or other. :)
2 more weeks here and then back to my original site for a week near Teguz and then on to my site that I´ll be in for 2 years!!
Love,
Victoria
Anyways, so the orphange was called Bobby´s because the owner is named Bobby and he´s actually from the U.S. (AL). He has such a think country accent, it´s really funny to hear him speak Spanish! :) But, yeah, he´s been in Honduras for 10 years and he goes back to the states every once in a while to bring supplies back in a big school bus...he drives all the way to like Chicago and it takes days. It´s incredible! And, he calls his place a family home so that the children can say they came from a family instead of an orphanage when other little kids ask them. He has such a big heart and the children are precious. I held one of the little babies named Miguel and he was so sweet. Bobby told us about their stories and how some of them were like found in a trash can or one girl (9 years) was on the street selling food or something to support her two younger siblings. It was really sad. BUT, then we talked to them about dental hygiene and played educational games with them and gave them each two toothbrushes and toothpaste. It was great!
Also, the highschool...OMG. It was def. interesting showing high schoolers how to use condoms and talking to them about HIV and AIDS. But, all was well. We played games where some of them had to be white cells and diseases, etc. AND, of course we had the banana and the condom where we each (there were 4 of us in the group) had to show them how to use the condom correctly. It was new info. for me too. LOL.
Also, all is going well with my stomach and I haven´t had any diseases! I feel blessed cause we´ve had some Dengue and Malaria going around and of course your common diarrhea. BUT, praise the Lord that all is well with my health. Just trying to eat less sweets and less in general. :)
Also, I went to my first Honduran Birthday party last night and I got to dance and we had tamales...no cake, though. I was a little dissapointed. But, it´s prob. for the best. But, the lady was turning 75 and she´s in good shape!
Furthermore some news from Honduras:
Teachers still on strike...possibly it will last for a month.
Teguz (the Capital) is flooded...like people´s houses are destroyed and a main street washed away. AND it´s still raining a lot here.
But, all is still functioning some way or other. :)
2 more weeks here and then back to my original site for a week near Teguz and then on to my site that I´ll be in for 2 years!!
Love,
Victoria
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
PHOTOS!!!
This is the kitchen in my house now during FBT.
This is the pila where we wash the clothes and some people use it to wash dishes as well. Those are my jeans...
This is my host mom...my dad randomly took this photo...I´m going to get more official pics of my families later.
This is the living room...the house is actually a nice size.
This is me at the pila hard at work for two hours each Saturday washing my clothes. I don´t mind though cause I just put on my MP3 player and sing. :)
This is the cross at the top of the hill that we climbed to get to the cave!
This is me on the hill after we left the cave! :) A beautiful view.
This is the group that traveled to the cave! That´s not all of us...there are 57 of us in all and 19 in Youth Development (my project). There are three projects in all!
Hope you enjoy the photos!
Love,
Victoria
It´s August!
I´m in an Internet Cafe, so forgive the errors cause the keyboard doesn´t work great. LOL.
School--
So, these days are CRAZY busy because we´re working in schools giving talks and teaching classes. We have groups (there are four in all in my group) and we go to a school nearby that has two classrooms, 40 students, one bathroom (with no toilet paper or water), and one teacher! It´s amazing. But, speaking of schools...the Education Situation here in crazy. Right now, for about a week the teachers in all of Honduras have been on strike which means that the students haven´t had class in a week. This occurs often and it really sad for the students. But, it´s because the government doesn´t want to pay the teachers and they want to privatize the school system and make the families pay cause right now the government pays a lot of the schooling and they´re out of money! It´s really horrible. AND, the children only go to school for like 4 hours a day anyways when the do go to school, so the Education System def. needs to change. But, that´s one reason why we´re here because we don´t get paid anyways so we´ll always show up. lol.
This past week was filled with fun things as usual--
We learned some Honduras folk dances...mostly footwork.
The caves were awesome! Bats, views, random animals on the side of the hill, etc.
We all got together one time afterschool and watched Juno in Spanish and had lots of chips and cookies (as always). Speaking of chips, they have AWESOME fried plaintain chips here...they´re def. my fav... :) And, of course I LOVE the chocolate bananas and the homemade icecicle pops made of fruit juice and chunks of fruit (apples, bananas, watermelon). OMG and they´re all SO cheap. Only like 2-3 lempiras (1 lepmira is 20 US dollars). So, I´m very excited about that situation of course. :)
ALSO, we got to teach students some English, which went really well and then after we gave them some balloons in the shape of dogs that one of the Staff made. SO funny.
INSECTS--
So, I would also like to take some time to discuss the insects here. During movie night (a different one-we watched ¨What Women Want¨in English) all of a sudden one of the girls got up really fast and said there was a huge bug on the floor...now, usually I´m not scared of bugs...but this was no normal bug. I was bigger than a cockroach and it had longer legs that were raised in the front. IT WAS SO GROSS! So, naturally I climed on the chair... then, when I got home one day and was about to do some homework and I was minding my own business, all of sudden something quickly scurries away and I see that it was a cockroach. I SCREAM (cause it´s in my room)!! And then, I like freeze cause I can see it and I don´t know what to do. Then, it runs away and I´m upset cause I didn´t kill it. It´s still in my room. :(
Funny Story---
So, washing my panties here is interesting with a larger family that has two sons (one is 17 and the onther is 22). SO, naturally, I don´t hang my panties outside cause that´s awkard....I put them in my room. But, I haave to wash them. Why is it that everytime I´m washing my panties my younger bro comes over to the pila to get some water!!! SO awkward. I need him to find a better time...like when I´´m washing my shirts. Anways, also one time I was in the bathroom and I saw some panties that looked like mine on the floor of the bathroom and I was SO embarassed so I quickly picked them up and took them to my room. WELL, when I went to wash them I realized they actually weren´t mine!! I think they were my host mom´s. SO, I put them back in the bathroom.LOL
So, yeah...it has been interesing. AND, there is much more to tell...but till next time. :)
Love,
Victoria
School--
So, these days are CRAZY busy because we´re working in schools giving talks and teaching classes. We have groups (there are four in all in my group) and we go to a school nearby that has two classrooms, 40 students, one bathroom (with no toilet paper or water), and one teacher! It´s amazing. But, speaking of schools...the Education Situation here in crazy. Right now, for about a week the teachers in all of Honduras have been on strike which means that the students haven´t had class in a week. This occurs often and it really sad for the students. But, it´s because the government doesn´t want to pay the teachers and they want to privatize the school system and make the families pay cause right now the government pays a lot of the schooling and they´re out of money! It´s really horrible. AND, the children only go to school for like 4 hours a day anyways when the do go to school, so the Education System def. needs to change. But, that´s one reason why we´re here because we don´t get paid anyways so we´ll always show up. lol.
This past week was filled with fun things as usual--
We learned some Honduras folk dances...mostly footwork.
The caves were awesome! Bats, views, random animals on the side of the hill, etc.
We all got together one time afterschool and watched Juno in Spanish and had lots of chips and cookies (as always). Speaking of chips, they have AWESOME fried plaintain chips here...they´re def. my fav... :) And, of course I LOVE the chocolate bananas and the homemade icecicle pops made of fruit juice and chunks of fruit (apples, bananas, watermelon). OMG and they´re all SO cheap. Only like 2-3 lempiras (1 lepmira is 20 US dollars). So, I´m very excited about that situation of course. :)
ALSO, we got to teach students some English, which went really well and then after we gave them some balloons in the shape of dogs that one of the Staff made. SO funny.
INSECTS--
So, I would also like to take some time to discuss the insects here. During movie night (a different one-we watched ¨What Women Want¨in English) all of a sudden one of the girls got up really fast and said there was a huge bug on the floor...now, usually I´m not scared of bugs...but this was no normal bug. I was bigger than a cockroach and it had longer legs that were raised in the front. IT WAS SO GROSS! So, naturally I climed on the chair... then, when I got home one day and was about to do some homework and I was minding my own business, all of sudden something quickly scurries away and I see that it was a cockroach. I SCREAM (cause it´s in my room)!! And then, I like freeze cause I can see it and I don´t know what to do. Then, it runs away and I´m upset cause I didn´t kill it. It´s still in my room. :(
Funny Story---
So, washing my panties here is interesting with a larger family that has two sons (one is 17 and the onther is 22). SO, naturally, I don´t hang my panties outside cause that´s awkard....I put them in my room. But, I haave to wash them. Why is it that everytime I´m washing my panties my younger bro comes over to the pila to get some water!!! SO awkward. I need him to find a better time...like when I´´m washing my shirts. Anways, also one time I was in the bathroom and I saw some panties that looked like mine on the floor of the bathroom and I was SO embarassed so I quickly picked them up and took them to my room. WELL, when I went to wash them I realized they actually weren´t mine!! I think they were my host mom´s. SO, I put them back in the bathroom.LOL
So, yeah...it has been interesing. AND, there is much more to tell...but till next time. :)
Love,
Victoria
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