Yes I actually work!

It recently occurred to me while talking to a friend on the phone, [She strait up asked are you actually doing any work] that I haven't actually dedicated any time here to say what I'm actually doing work wise here. Of course I'm working, sometimes 6 days a week. I guess that I haven't dedicated any time to it , because I didn't know if anybody would actually find it that interesting, and I kind of felt like once I wrote about it, its like a one time shot and I could never write about it again. But I am assuming I'm wrong on both accounts, so here goes...

Wow this is way harder to explain then I though I have written and erased like 5 times now, maybe this was the real reason I was avoiding writing this. As I explained earlier (I think) I have 2 counterparts is with a NGO which is a Guardaria and the other is with the school district of Choluteca my contact being the superintendent.

My schedule is supposed to be I work with the Guardaria Monday through Wednesday and the Distrital Thursday and Friday. That has not actually happened yet in the 2 months that I have been working here thus far. Stuff changes here daily, and you have to remind people of stuff 50 times and that does not mean that its actually going to happen at that date or time.

You can see how this might be a little wearing on a control-freak, workaholic like myself ;) To help myself deal with this problem each month I compile a list of things that I have actually accomplished. It especially helps on those days that I go into the office and I'm not sure what it is I am accomplishing in that moment. Its not like being a full time teacher and knowing you are going to teach something specific and measurable each day.

So Here's What I have actually done so far (Sorry that some is in Spanglish & Spanish- and Im not really up to translating)

Month: October

Accomplishments/Quantifiable work

·         Presentation / introduction (about me, PC, and future collaboration activities): all of the asistentes tecnicos, 3 sub meeting of asistentes (around 60 principals/directores), all the teachers at the guardaria

·         Hand washing charla-  whole group at the guardaria (7-17 year olds) 2 presentations to kinder classes at the guardaria.

·         Autoestima/ self-esteem  charla- 3^rd through high schoolers  (yo merezco curriculium)

·         Merienda escolar & Redes educativas- assisted presentación escuela rural

·         Training: center based instruction- guardaria teachers

·         Translation- of letters for sponsors (guardaria)

·         Flood relief- assisted passing out supplies and wrote formal report and documented damage to send to sponsor organizations (video, photos, report). Guardaria

·         Disaster response plan (World Vision, UNICIEF, Distrital) Translated checklists for emergency educational kits, helped create action plan for kit implementation, tech support.  

·         Attended science fair at local high school (Distrital)

·         Participated on Choluteca birthday parade (Distrital)

·         Facilitated games during canceled class rain days

·         Red de Mujeres- taller de género (attended)

·         Attended training and helped with multiple presentations on the “ley de tranparencia”

·         Attended and observed 2 meetings of the Choltueca Comite Civico

·         Yo Merezco-  began program, co-teaching lead presenter on Wednesday

Supported other volunteers requests for resources and information on teaching methods

November Work

So Far

·        Capacitaciónes:

1.     Pistas de implementación de centros de aprendizaje  y Oportunidad de crear materiales

2.     Como identificar estudiantes que necesitan ayuda

a.     Ideas para evaluar las necesidades y practica

b.     Escuchando

c.      Lectura

d.     Escritura

3.     Usando el data de los evaluaciones para desarrollar metas y actividades para mejorar

4.     Introducción de uso de computadoras: funciones básicas y usando el data show

·        Yo Merezco

o   Clase de abstinencia

o   Clase de autoestima

·        Attended: Capacitaciones sobre el nuevo censo de docentes y el nuevo sistema de digitalizar data de graduación. Asistí a presentar información en una junta de un asistente técnico

·        Entrevista en canal 27 sobre becas y mi trabajo en Choluteca

·        Presentación de becas semillas para jóvenes y un sesión de apoyo de llenar las formas

·        Asistí en una brigada dental con asistentes de distrital (2 doctoras) presentación de salud bucodental, practica de cepillar los dientes y un tratamiento de flúor.

·        Presentación de cepillar los dientes practica y tratamiento de flúor en un jardín de niños (yo sola = sin doctoras)  

·        Presentación: Becas semillas para docentes (ppt)

·        Asistió sellando miles de diplomas y certificados finales en el distrital

·        Translaciones

o   Cartas para estudiantes, y maestros para/de padrinos

o   Correos electrónicos y informes a ONG quien apoyan la guardaría

 The most clear and consistent thing that I have been doing is a weekly teacher training at the Guardaria, and a abstinence class with 5th and 6th grade girls. So when I have down time at work I am usually prepping for these two activities. Once the new school year starts in February I am supposed to start with English teacher classes which will add lots of work and I hope consistency as well. More details to come about that later.

As for other stuff that has been going on. There has been a flood of celebrations going on aka lots of cake: Host mom's birthday, host mom's finance's birthday, host aunts birthday, confirmation, graduation, wedding...

The top 3 ways to know you are at a wedding in Honduras (taken from my recent experience) 

1. The invitation says a start time of 6:30 but the bride doesn't actually enter the church until 8:15

2. You are asked to carry your chair from the church to the reception. Then scramble to get a table (no assigned seats)

3. The wedding party [bridesmaids & groomsmen] are the servers (they bring you dinner and drinks and collect your trash).

Yeah this stuff would NEVER go down in a American wedding

Here's some party pictures for your enjoyment!

                                                                Birthday Party Games

                                              Host mom and Host sister @ Wedding reception

                                      Cutting of birthday cake (strawberry cream, super yummy)

The extended family at host mom's fiancees birthday

The good, the bad and the ugly

Well where to start...

First of all I have been in site for about and month and a half now, and I have to say that I think the pace of life here in Honduras is a good change for me. I am way less stressed, not thinking about writing research papers, or grading math tests, or IEP meeting paperwork, or creating a decent looking holiday bulletin board in time, or preparing my students for a high-stakes standardized test. I no longer always feel like there are never enough hours in the day and walking around extremely sleep deprived. This is not to say that I'm not working hard and I don't have stress here, its just that the pace is different. To give you a more proper visual whenever I went hiking with friends I was always at the back of the pack, here I am constantly having to slow down for people to catch up with me.

Maybe a good organizational tool for this post would be the good the bad and the ugly.

first THE GOOD:
I recently had a visit from one of my Peace Corps bosses which went really well and was productive. She came to meet with my family, and make sure my home life situation was kosher. I got a good report from my family and I was able to voice my concerns about housing in the future. She also met with my 2 counterpart bosses and they actually sat down together for the first time and I have a tentative schedule and I have a better idea of what I'm going to be doing for the next 2 years! YEAH!

I got to go to my first official quinceanera. Which was a really big fancy deal, I am talking wedding style. One of the teachers at the NGO daughters turned 15 (think batmitzfa meets sweet-sixteen meets wedding). Damas= brides maides, tiara, tulle, lights, fireworks, expensive flower arrangements, a cake with a fountain in the middle- not kidding. Here's some pics to prove it:

The ceremony

 The dinner

  The cake

One of the most interesting things was the fancy dinner, they eat a lot of meat in this country I mean a LOT for example this was the dinner they served : Pepsi (always the need to consume lots of Pop here), potato salad, then Two large pieces of steak, a sausage, huge chicken leg , and a kabob of 6 shrimp, yeah you read correctly 5 different types of meat on 1 plate for each person this was not a check which entree you want thing. Ohh Honduras you will never understand vegetarianism :)

I went on a Halloween weekend beach trip with some fellow volunteers, to an island that is here down south only about and hour and a half away. Two buses and and a boat ride later we were at the island of Amapala. Which is dormant volcanic island. It is basically local people, most of the year although it has touristic potential, kind of a hidden jem feel. So we spent a nice weekend, enjoying the beach, the ocean, and had a bon-fire with smores! Pics:

More good stuff is I got MAIL! Delicious homemade chocolate cookies, and lots of other great stuff! Thanks Mom, Reb and Margaret!

I met a JICA (Japan's version of Peace Corps) volunteer who is really nice and also lives here in Choluteca, she is a math teacher training

The Bad
There are no more BAGELS in the city of Choluteca which is very BAD. I went last weekend to the only supermarket that imports frozen bagels (a dutch brand) and they don't have them anymore :( Probably because I was the only person in the whole city who eats bagels with cream-cheese, but seriously taking away this small pleasure, of my favorite/normal breakfast food ahhhh. Soo tired of beans and tortillas.


I was doing a presentation/training for the teachers at the NGO, I had prepared a really good power-point presentation and activities based on  them looking at the slides, and what happens in the exact moment I am going to start that's right the power goes out ahhhhh, which was bad because I had to totally change the order of my presentation, and verbally do stuff that there should of been a visuals for. It happened again when I was printing scholarship information at the school district, right in the middle half printed and the electricity didn't come back until several hours later. Oh well that is just one of the bad things about living here really really unreliable electricity. 




The Ugly
So on the Amapala trip, I was in a mototaxi accident and came out with some really ugly scratches on my leg that are still in the process of healing and a really funky ugly rash on my arm and chest from the bushes that we ran into. The whole experience was a bit ugly, but thank God nothing serious happened.

 This is what a moto-taxi is

Poverty this is the "ugly" that is everywhere and is so hard to see. Seeing daily people living in homes made out of sticks and garbage bags, seeing kids in school with out shoes and their teeth literally rotting in their mouths, getting approached by 80 year old women asking for money, or a Dad with his son asking me to give them money to buy groceries at the supermarket. It is heartbreaking to live surrounded by this poverty.

Also justifiable as "ugly" is this frog that I found on my bathroom door, who knows how he got there. But he's the kind of ugly that grows on you and your eventually like "oh how cute" :)

I miss you all and want to hear from you soon!

Em