One of the largest goals of the Peace Corps on a global level is to deal with the prevention of HIV/AIDS. (Honestly, I didn’t want anything to do with this. I even said during my initial interviews, I don’t want to go to Africa, because I’m sure that’s what most the work will be dealing with.) Being a Business Adviser, I thought I would get off without having to touch this subject. But, of course there is always something that happens, takes your plans, throws ‘em out and you are forced to change your mind. That is certainly what happened in my case. When Alicia first got to site her counterpart and her had some different ideas of what work was to be done and she seemed a little stressed out. I too was feeling a little down because my work had slowed down, so I suggested we do a whole month and just dedicate it to the HIV/AIDS charla. That way we would both have work to keep us busy, we would both be practicing our Spanish and she would get involved at the schools she may work with anyway as a Youth Development volunteer.
To get ready for this we had to brush up on our “Ya Te Diste Cuenta” (Loosely translated: Have you already realized? Don’t ask me about the name…I didn’t translate it to Spanish!) manuals about how to teach the charlas. (Because this is a global PC initiative we’re all required to give the charla during our training. I did mine back in April and Alicia’s had been even more recent.) It was only slightly confusing because they had issued an updated version of the manual between my training class (H16) and Alicia’s (H17). Being the highly intelligent college graduates that we are, we were able to figure it out. Having the differences straightened out, we sat down made a list of the materials we would need and how to get them. Luckily the mayor’s office has a fund for HIV/AIDS education and we were able to request the funds from him. We bought sheets of large poster paper, markers, masking tape, construction paper, had copies made and were on our way. After taking about two days to prep the materials and practice up on the Spanish specific to the charla, we were ready to start.
Our first day we were going to the high school where I’d already given my business charlas and were scheduled to present to the III de Ecologia. As we got to the school and spoke with the director she informed us things had changed and we would instead be giving the charla to the III de Commercio. That was super exciting news because those were exactly the kids who I’d worked with before and they’re a great group! I was right, the charla went very well, the kids were well behaved and we even modified the presentation to have Q&A at the end instead of a game that’s normally played. Day two was presenting to another class, this time about 40 of them and they were little demons, but I think it’s a numbers thing. The following week we were at the elementary school working with five classes of about 40 6th graders. Due to that age we went over the course of three days and did an hour a day with each class, therefore five hours a day! After the 6th graders we went to work with some junior high kids at yet a third school and taught the 9th and 8th graders. Our last day was scheduled to be with the 7th graders, but that was before the teachers went on strike again. So for all those presentations we taught around 300 kids. Needless to say that in a city of at least 25,000 we’ve still got lots to do next year, but this year we did pretty well I’d say!
Now on to the social life and why October was truly AMAZING! My birthday fell in this month and all the new friends in my life made it truly wonderful. The coolest of all is that my friend (and fellow PCV) Lauren came down to visit me all the way from the North Coast. This is so special because she pseudo-surprised me and traveled really far (about 12 hours in bus) to get here! Showing my site to another PCV and having her meet all my in site friends was really exciting. Everyone got along and it was a grand ‘ol time. While Lauren was here my local friends threw me a birthday party in typical Honduran style, carne asada and tajadas (plantain chips). Oh, and they made me dress up. Hondurans are very into clothes and looking good. It kinda cramps my own personal style, but when in Rome…While Lauren was here we went into Tegucigalpa to visit the mall and I was able to pick up a graduation gift for my host sister who is soon graduating high school. We enjoyed some US style food and coffee then came back to my site again. The actual day of my b-day was almost crashed by a call at 10AM from my counter part telling me I needed to be in a meeting that no one had told me about! I had to go and suffer through until lunch when I was able to explain to them that it was my b-day and I had friends from out of town visiting, sorry no can do! My counterparts being amazing, completely agreed and sent me on my way telling me to stop back by the Alcaldia (City Hall) at 5PM for cake. I’m loved! :)
I showed up for cake at the Alcaldia with Lauren and Kathleen in tow. (Kathleen is a Protected Areas Management volunteer who lives in a rural community about an hour from my town. She’s also awesome!) Typically for birthdays in the Alcaldia we all pitch in and buy a cake that way. I have a feeling they used petty cash or the Vice-mayor just bought the cake for my b-day since he was the one who told me to make sure I was back by 5PM for the cake. (See, really loved!) Honduran tradition, like many Latin countries, involves trying to smash the b-day girl’s face into the cake. Most people realize that these days, so it has morphed into swiping the icing off the cake and proceeding to smear it all over the b-day girl’s face. Needless to say, they got me in the Alcaldia. Not too bad thank goodness! Honduran frosting is different from that in the US. It’s not light and airy. It’s denser and much stickier. Post cake at the Alcaldia we went to dinner at my friend’s house and took the leftover cake to share with them. When we got to round two with the cake my Honduran friends were not as forgiving with the frosting as my colleagues in the Alcaldia had been and at the end of our battle I was literally wearing a mask of frosting. Oh well, I suppose the more frosted you are the more loved you are, right? ;)
The last b-day celebration for the month involved a special dinner in Tegucigalpa with three of my other Peace Corps buddies, two of which also had b-days in October. We splurged HUGE and went to an amazing sushi dinner. For four people we dropped about L. 1,400 on this dinner. If you convert that to USD it turns out to be around $73. Not too bad for a sushi dinner for four people back in the US right? Let me briefly explain how much a typical Honduran meal out would cost here in my site. For example, today at lunch I had two baleadas (tortillas with refried beans, eggs, queso seco and mantequilla[mantequilla is like an odd combination of sour cream and butter, when heated is liquid and cold is about sour cream texture, slightly salty]) and a liquado (milkshake) for L. 38 ($2). Just analyze that for a little bit and you can see how much we really splurged on that meal. It’s also interesting to see that some people in this country live in Tegucigalpa and eat like this regularly, while most are poor and live in the areas us PCVs are in and can’t even afford to eat what I did at lunch today. Anyway, random side note. I also used that time in Tegucigalpa to buy the ingredients for my Thanksgiving dish: green bean casserole with cream of mushroom soup and French’s fried onions! (Yes, Tegucigalpa really is mini-America in the good part of the city.)
I believe this post is sufficient for my b-day. I’ll include the details on Steph’s visit and Halloween in my next post!
Hasta la proxima vez…
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