My Birthday :)

    Sorry this blogpost is a week late! I was having technical difficulties. I'm having a great last few days here, but I'll have to catch up on those later. 

    I had an awesome birthday week. On wednesday I got to skip school and go to Tegus to buy dresses for me and Rosa. She needed a second dress for her graduation dinner, and I needed one for her prom night. It was hard for me to find a dress, even in Tegus's big malls. The Honduran brands didn't fit right and the American brands were incredibly overpriced! But I found a grey strapless one that worked okay. Rosa found a pretty cream-colored chiffon dress.

    I was glad we went to Tegus because it also gave me an opportunity to get a small present for nicole-- her 18th birthday was on Thursday! I went over to her house after school with my backpack stuffed with beauty supplies: she had designated me as her stylist for the occasion, and I was happy to take the job. I straightened her normally curly hair, shaped her eyebrows, did her makeup, and instructed her to wear a dress. She looked fabuous.

    I had such a fun time at her party! I'm finally comfortable around all my classmates and I didnt deel awkward for a second. 

    Friday I had a party as well. Since my birthday was on saturday, Nicoles family and mine (who are good friends) decided to have a dinner at the fanciest restaurant in town. I think it was called El Todito. We had salads and trays stacked so high with chicken, steak, pork, and sausage that I was surprised our table managed to eat them. Everything was delicious, and then we had cake! Afterwards Nicole slept over at my house. We painted each others nails and listened to music and watched movies and ate cake for breakfast and it was great! But she had to leave for her cousins house the next morning, so she couldn't stay for my (second) birthday party that Cesia arranged. 

    Cesia showed up at my house around two and pretended she had an egg. She had been telling me all week she was going to crack eggs on my head on my birthday, because thats a tradition here in Honduras. I screamed and locked myself in the bathroom but she told me she was joking so I cautiously came out. She presented me with a giant, beautiful birthday card. "Read it!" She demanded happily. "Read it all! I wrote easy spanish so you would understand!" And I did! It was laced with sentiments such as "I love you Gringa!" And "I'll never forget you!" I gave her a big hug and then she offered to do my hair. After I was all ready, we called her taxi driver and went to Kenia's house. 

    Cesia had invited 10 or so people to go to La Princesita with us, but only Nidia and Kenia could make it. I didn't really mind, small groups are fun too. They treated me to a giant Baleada-- the ones at the Princesita are three times the normal size-- and a piece of cake, which we promptly stuck 17 candles into. They told me they had been practicing Happy Birthday in English so they could sing to me. I had mentioned I knew the song in Chinese, and they wanted me to teach them. After they had sung happy birthday to me in both chinese and english, I blew out my candles. There wasn't enough cake to push my face into (another honduran tradition), but they flung frosting at my face. This turned into a bit of a food fight, and needless to say, we were getting some pretty strange looks at this point. What would I do without these girls? 

     Cesia presented me with another beautiful card from all of them, and then we left. I thought I was going to go home, but Kenia and Nidia were going to a concert, and they invited me to go with them. It was a "Battle of the Bands" concert with a bunch of bands from Honduras. I was surprised by how good they were! I only got to see a little of the concert because it started late and I left at 9, so I spent most of the times hanging out with classmates and friends of Kenia's, and it was really fun.

    I sort of feel like I had a party that lasted all week. People kept asking me if I was sad that I wasn't home for my birthday, but I honestly wasn't. I feel so blessed to have such great friends here, they made me feel so loved and special and I had an amazing birthday. 

    On sunday instead of having church, our church had a Garage Sale, and I got to go help out. I love garage sales! And this was the garage sale of my dreams: all of the clothing and everything was under a dollar and oh-so-very-vintage. But of course I couldn't shop, because I don't have room in my suitcase. So I stayed far away from the 1 lempira bin (the DIY possibilities!) and focused on helping out. I'm good at these things, and I think I was a lot of help. One of these days, I'm going to go vintage shopping in a third world country. That would be rad. 

Here's a picture of my friends with a hobo.

Tela!

    Last weekend was fun, but this weekend was fantastic. I initially didn't know any of the AFSers I was going on the Tela trip with, and I knew that they all knew each other and that they were mostly Italians and Germans, and so I was worried that they would just speak Italian and German and I would be the odd one out. But I was completely blown away by how friendly and welcoming everyone was! Everyone was so fun and open, and everybody spoke Spanish and English so we could all understand. After the first day, I felt like I'd known everyone for years.

    On the bus I hit it off with one of the Belgian girls, Lore. We talked for most of the bus ride to Tela and then ended up in the same room. When we got to Tela, we ate lunch and then headed for the beach! It was so wonderful to talk to people while wading in the cool clear waves and watching the sunset. I thought I was the only American, but there was actually another one! He was a volunteer; not a student. I should have been able to tell right away by his accent and the way he laughed at my jokes, but I hadn't been expecting to meet any so I was surprised when CJ told me he was from Chicago. It was great to talk to a fellow American, I think being abroad for a while has really made me aware of my culture and what traits I have that are uniquely American. Fun fact: Hondurans hate it when we refer to ourselves as "American", because technically they're Americans too. But since we're too lazy to refer to ourselves as "We That Come From The United States of America", we're sticking to "Americans"...at least when talking to each other.

    That night, as well as the following morning, we had orientation-activities, it was all basically the same stuff I had done the former week in Copan. We talked about our feelings, the "positives and negatives" or our experience, etc., etc.

    On saturday, after our orientation activities were finished, we were free to do as we wanted. I started out by going on a little boat tour with a few of the other students, and it was really nice. We took off from the beach in a little motor boat and entered into a quiet little lake not far from the shore. I didn't understand a lot of what our tour guide was saying, but it was beautiful.

                                     

    After that, CJ and I and two other girls, Anja and Berenice, and I decided to go and find "Pastelitos", beacuse he had been raving about how much he loved Pastelitos and I had never tried them. Even though "Pastelitos" sounds like "little cakes" they were, in fact, nothing like cake, but rather a kind of bready fried thing with chicken inside. He said they usually had a kind of relish inside as well, but these ones just had chicken. They were really good, but did not replace the special love in my heart for Baleadas as promised. 

CJ and his Pastelito

                                     

    After that, Anja and Berenice and CJ and one other Italian girl-- I forget her name already but she was really fun-- and I took a long walk on the beach and talked. When we came back, I hung out with CJ and Lukas, a boy from Germany, and we sat on the beach and talked some more. We talked about our experiences as foreigners and had some really great conversations/debates about controversial issues such as religion and abortion, which was wonderful because I really love good debates and I haven't had one in a really long time.

Lukas

     That evening we had dinner and walked through town. We winded up going to a discotec, which was fun although we had a curfew of 11pm, so we were pretty much the only ones at the discotec. Nobody goes to discotecs before midnight! The discotec had an interesting theme that night, and there were all these guys dressed like monsters. 

I danced with one of these guys.

    Our curfew ended up being a good thing because we had so much fun hanging out outside the hotel afterwards. We engaged in quite the bit of silliness-- somehow we ended up with a pineapple that we all wanted to eat, but we didn't have a knife. So this happened:

Lore and Amarilda doing the honors

    And then more 2am silliness ensued.

    We left first thing the next morning for home. Why so early? I was sad to go because I probably won't see any of my new friends again.
    Monday I had to leave school early because I had a stomach ache and felt horrible. It's wednesday, and I'm still sick, although better than I was yesterday. yesterday I was throwing up and couldn't keep food or liquids in my stomach. I've been sick before, but I think what really worried my family was that I wouldn't eat, so they took me to the doctor. She gave me a bunch of medicine and told me to eat soft foods, I think I might have gotten food poisoning or something. Despite having been here three months, I feel like my body's still not adjusted to Honduras. I've gotten several headcolds and stomach malfunctions and viruses. I hope I get better quick, because it would be terrible to miss out on the class trip to Copan this weekend!

Prom shopping, mass, and awkward goldfish

Giovanni, Rosa, Emily and Me in Tegus

My little friend who lives in my closet

    This week has been sleepy. Last Saturday there was another Tallier project at school, but I didn't end up going because my family was going to Tegus to look for a prom dress for Rosa. My host mom, Rosa's Aunt, Rosa's little cousin Emily and Giovanni and I went to a few stores and Rosa picked out a beautiful pale green satin floor length gown. Here, if you want to buy clothes of even considerably good quality, you have to go to Tegucigalpa. I was coached to tell the shop owners that we're from Tegus if they ask because apparently if you tell them you're from outside they show you the worst dresses-- haha! Tegus really is like a whole different country. 
    Even though you can find good clothes in Tegus from American and European brands, the prices are outrageous. They charge at least twice as much for any given article of clothing, and they hang cheap fashion chain brands like Forever 21 and H&M in boutiques along with designer. I'm going to Rosa's Prom, too because it's not really a dance but more like a formal graduation party. I didn't realize until after our shopping trip that I'm supposed to buy a formal dress too-- I thought one I brought was nice enough, but I showed it to my host mom and she said it wasn't. Shoot. Item # 345,678 I really should have packed...hopefully we'll go to Tegus again sometime in the next three weeks because the thought of trying to buy a formal dress in Comayagua makes me shudder. This experience is really making me realize what a diva I am.
    Another event coming up is the mothers day celebration at our school...I'm a senior, and apparently we're the entertainment. We're all supposed to either sing or dance...everyone's dancing, but I'm white and I can't dance, so that's not happening. Everyone wants me to sing-- I don't really get stage fright singing in public, but the main problem is that I have no idea what to sing. It's so hard to find a song that's good for mother's day. Also, it's hard finding opportunities to practice since I feel self-conscious about the fact that the whole neighborhood can hear our household activity. Not that the neighbors don't deserve it for blasting their mariachi music late into the evening, but still. I could always play the Bewildered Exchange Student Card and get out of it. 
    Today I got to experience my very first Catholic mass, which was slightly more exciting than Lab class. We just sung and prayed and chanted things. I was scolded very publicly for not singing along, but I was like, "I don't know the words, dude, what you gonna do?" Actually I just smiled awkwardly like I didn't understand and the service went on. There was wine and bread present, like at protestant communions, but instead of everyone taking some like we do, only the priest drank the wine and ate the bread. Haha. Okay. 
    The only other abnormality in my week was having to talk in front of my class today. El director, Senor Carlos, decided that I should take a turn doing the morning chapel like everyone else, but he decided instead of having me talk about God he wanted me to give a speech about myself "to practice my spanish". My classmates Mirta, Kevin M, and Nicol teased me about it all week, saying "Remember, Kaiti, on friday you have tu momento religioso" with an evil glint in their eye, and then laughing like the voyeuristic fools they are when I squirmed with dread and discomfort. Awesome. I just babbled about my hometown, my family, and my school for a minute and I must have made a lot of mistakes because everyone kept laughing. Afterwards I asked if anyone had any questions, but they just stared at me like a bunch of awkward goldfish. Ugh. 
   I still haven't had my compañeras over to swim, because every time we plan something, a test or something comes up and they have to study. Most of the people I talk to are from the other class, Secretarios, and they have to study even more than my class does! Most of them rarely get more than 5 hours of sleep a night.
    Tomorrow I have another school project, my class is doing some sort of volunteer work. I'm not really excited about going to school on Saturday (again) at 7:30 in the morning, but at least it will be a much-needed opportunity to hang out with my classmates. 

We Ain't in Kansas Anymore, Toto

Things I'd Rather do With my Uniform Skirt Than Wear it Daily:

1. Donate it to the homeless to use as a tent

2. Use it as kindling for a bonfire

3. Feed it to Simba, the dog (he thinks my shoes are delicious, so it's not a far stretch)

4. Send it back on a time machine to the 60s, where it should rest in peace forever.

5. Hack it to pieces with a battle axe.

True story: while I was trying to upload this picture, my computer spazzed out and I had to restart it four times. Even electronic equippment can't handle the ugly.

Horrid uniform and crazy classes aside, I'm adjusting pretty well. Some other things I'm getting used to:

1. Food. The food here's great, but it's just so different from what I'm used to at home. I've found myself dying to taste something familiar...at a low point last week I walked to the convenience store in hopes to find a snickers bar or something American, but the only chocolate I could find was this random arabic cookie, which I passive-aggressively shoved down my face. So not the same. Globalization, where are you when I need you?!

Upon a trip to Wendy's, I was thrilled to find that, although the menu looks nothing like its american counterpart (no chili!) they have Ceasar salad. Yes! Something familiar! So I ordered it, but when it came, I was disappointed to find that there was no actual ceasar dressing included in the ceasar salad. Instead I got "Avocado Ranch". Well, at least there was good old Parmesan cheese, right? Nope. It was The Honduran Cheese. At least it was a salad.

At school for breakfast we have all-honduran options-- tacos, popusas, churros, and soda. I ordered Popusas last week, and the lady handed me a bag with my popusas drowning in three different types of salsa and...no fork. Or napkin. I turned to Nicol and said, "How do I eat it?" She cracked up and said, "With your hands, silly!" Uh, really?

So I went to the store with this idea in my head that I would purchase American sandwich ingredients to bring to school. So I went to look for cheese. But all they had was The Honduran Cheese and this frightening-looking limp yellow stuff that was being marketed as "American Cheese". So I went to get some deli meat, hoping I would find turkey or something. No such luck...all they had was ham, chicken, and ham AND chicken-- gross! I finally settled with PB&J, which thankfully they had the ingredients for. I do love trying new foods here, though, more on that later.

2. Bugs. As I started to write this, there was a bug crawling across my shoulder, which I pinched off and discarded. A few weeks ago I may have been more phased by this, but there are so many here that I've gotten pretty used to them. I've gotten countless mosquito bites, there are these tiny black crawlers everywhere, and cockroaches half the size of my fist scuttle across the living room floor. Luckily I've never been that scared of bugs, so it doesn't bother me too much, but it's something worth mentioning.

3. PDA. Personal space is not as much of a concept here in Honduras. It's hard for me to follow who's dating who at school, because everybody is touching everybody all the time. Boys I've never seen before in my life will kiss my cheek, hug me, put their arm around my shoulders, or grab my waist or hips (and, oddly, are more comfortable doing so than actually talking to me). The first week I was like, BACK OFF, MY FRIEND, I HAVE PEPPER SPRAY! but I'm used to it now. Typical scenario:

I am walking with so-and-so, and so-and-so stops to greet her boyfriend. Boyfriend kisses so-and-so's cheek, then hugs her, then boyfriend kisses MY cheek and hugs me. Why, hello. Nice to meet you too.

School tomorrow!!!

In Honduras, everything is hot. The days are hot, the nights are hot, the food is hot, the coffee is hot, the people are hot. But the showers are consistently, inexplicably freezing COLD! At orientation they warned me that I probably wouldn't have hot water, but luckily, the water here is room-temperature, at best, warmer than it was at the hotel. The days here are so hot that I don't mind too much, but it's just another thing to get used to.

Yesterday I tried my hand at using the Pila for the first time. The Pila is a rather brilliant clothes-washing contraption designed to use the smalled amount of soap, energy, and water as possible. Since the plumbing in Central America is inconsistent, the basin stores clean water and it has a bumpy board you can scrub your clothes on, and drainage around the sides. You pour water on to your clothes, scrub some soap on, and then as soon as you pour more water on it washes all the soap and dirt off of the board and you can squeeze it dry and hang it on the line. As I washed my clothes, I tried to think Honduran thoughts and not be bothered by the fact that a turtle lives in my source of clean water and my delicates will be hanging on a clothesline, flapping in the wind for all the world to see. I felt very cool and eco-friendly, and I'm started to think that those hemp-wearing, can-recycling, dreadlock-rocking hippies in Bellingham are all hypocrites and they should move to Honduras and see what green really looks like.

When Sra Ortega came home we had a dinner of cheese-filled tortillas and what appeared to be pickled onions and peppers and cabbage or something, and it was really good. I think they were called Popusas? Something like that. I also found out that I will, indeed, be attending Instituto Marista La Immaculada, and today my host mama was kind enough to take some time off of work to take me to the bank, and to coffee, and to buy some things that I need for my uniform. I had been kind of excited to get a uniform, because it saves me from having to decide what to wear, but my uniform is absolutely heinous. All of the uniforms that I have seen around town have been pretty cute: blue or beige pleated knee-length skirts, high socks, mary-janes, but mine consists of a below-the-knee brown skirt, a white blouse, white ankle socks, and black pleather oxfords. For PE I have to wear a white t-shirt and long brown shorts made out of the same material as the skirt. Blech. I got two skirts, two shirts, two blouses, two undershirts, two pairs of socks, a pair of shorts, and shoes for under $1300 lempiras, which is less than $65US, so yeah, stuff here is cheap. I'm still glad I have a uniform and everybody at the school will be dressed in the same horrible outfit I'll be dressed in, so I suppose it's a silly thing to be vain about.

Tomorrow I start school! I'll be wearing jeans for the first week or so until my skirt is done being made, but maybe I'll put up a picture of my uniform when I have it. Maybe.