Shower in the Rain

On Saturday David came down to the living room in our house with the bar of soap from the shower. He turns to me and says "I think I'm going to shower and wash my clothes!" And by that he meant a shower outside in the rain. It is now the rainy season and we can expect a rain late in the day. Lately it has caused the power and water to go out. So after hiking in the morning with me and a few friends David was ready to shower. The lack of water and power didn't stop him because it was beginning to rain hard outside. So way to be resourceful. We each showered outside in our little patio area, David washed some clothes and I did the dishes all with the rain water. Not the most clean but hey this is Honduras.

Speaking of things that happen only in Honduras... Today at school a student brought a BB gun to school to "give" to a friend. They had it out during recess apparently shooting at a bee's nest. In the states this would most likely lead to suspension or even expulsion. Only in Honduras would the kids get off with a warning.

Well, only a few more days left at school. It is getting harder and harder to keep the students' attention. The teachers are starting to check out too as we look forward to the things that come next in our lives. We still don't know yet exactly what we will be doing. So far the plan is to return to Seattle and stay with my mom until we find a place to live and hopefully jobs.

Here are a few pictures from some hikes lately. David has been trying to place some geocaches. Here is one he did a couple of weeks ago at a waterfall. He is hiding the cache and you can see it in the third picture if you look closely.

May

Well we feel like time is flying by. We have less than three weeks of school left and can feel the students (and teachers too) losing focus. We've been hiking on the weekends, watching many bootlegged copies of movies (oh yeah we saw the new X-men movie before it even came out in theaters), eating out at our favorite (cheap) restaurants and playing cards with other teachers. Copan is definitely a small town and we love it but will be ready to have a little variety.

The school had a mother's day celebration the Friday before Mother's day. Each class presented a song or poem or dance for the mothers.
Hard workers setting up for the event. The tent in the background was for the students so they wouldn't have to sit in the sun.
David being a caballero and walking all the mothers to their seat on the pine covered walkway.
Here the moms are watching the program as kids are running wild.
They had many of the home ec. projects on display and then were given to the moms. Here are the frames my students made. They are really cool and they embossed the metal themselves. However they worked on these for about 4 months which in my opinion is WAY too long for a project like this. (I don't teach that class)

And as a tribute to our favorite internet cafe I thought I'd post this picture. Ever, the waiter/cashier/barista made this for us. We had to take a picture. It is nice to know locals and get special treatment.

Rain!!

Loud thunder, strong lightning and intense rain. The rainy season has begun. Each day now in the afternoon you can year the thunder and feel the sky about to open and dump all the excess that it has. We are happy to be past the dust stage and on to a more refreshing, cool time of year. We now have to plan our afternoon outings so that we can be inside when the rain starts up. The best part however about this kind of rain is that it soon lets up and the nice weather returns. As I write this the rain pounds right outside.

Ahhh. May in Honduras.

Gracias

This weekend we went on yet another adventure. This time it was to a town called Gracias that is about 4 hours away from Copan. The town got its name from the conquistadors who were hiking through the mountains looking for a place to settle and they came upon this flat land and exclaimed "Gracias a Dios" Thanks to God that we found this land. It was nice to see more of Honduras since usually our trips take us into Guatemala. We left Friday morning and arrived in Gracias around midday. We found a reasonable hotel and dropped off our stuff and then headed out to see the town.
First stop, Choco-Bananos. A must have and for only 10 cents each you can't beat them.
We then went to tour the old military fort. It was beautiful and from there we could see out over the whole town.
From there we went to see the churches in town. Gracias was the first capital of Central America and played a big part in the history of Central America and Honduras as well. For that reason there is a big Spanish influence there.
We took a break for some licuados or "smoothies". I ordered my favorite drink Limonada which usually means cold fresh lemonade. As I took my first sip I noticed the container of CountryTime Lemonade on the shelf. AHHH I was so dissapointed.
On Saturday we took a moto-taxi or Tuk Tuk out to the Aguas Termales or Hot Springs. These hot springs are infinitely better than the ones in Copan and the entrance fee is half the price. We spent the day there enjoying the water. David and Zach perfected their back flipping abilities.

Digging Holes

I had one of my favorite teaching moments this week. We are reading the book "Holes" by Louis Sachar in my class. I highly recommend the book if you haven't read it or seen the movie. It is about a boy who gets wrongly accused of a crime and has to go to a sort of correction camp where they have to dig 5ft holes every day to "build character." In reality they are helping the warden look for a treasure.

Anyway, we were reading it and I asked my students how long it would take them to dig a hole with a 5ft diameter and 5 ft deep. They commented that it would be easy. Then I had an idea...we would try it out. Back behind the school are trails and barren land. They have exactly 12 shovels at the school and 2 picks which is a perfect number for my 14 students. My plan was to put them in 2 groups and have them try to dig a hole. I expected them to try and then get frustrated and give up after 10 minutes. To my surprise they LOVED it! So instead of spending 1 part of a day digging holes we spent 3 afternoons working out in the sun. I couldn't believe it and was laughing when I could use "hole digging" as leverage for good behavior. They knew I would take it away from them and make them go inside if they weren't working together. They even worked really well together and encouraged everyone. Also, everyone worked which is a change from their group projects in class. I think they learned just as much from that project as from anything I can do in the classroom. Also now they can identify with the book

My favorite question was... "Miss what are we going to do when we finish these holes" And I responded "Dig more holes of course" What I find most surprising is that no one asked my why we were doing it. I would have told them...to build character.
One group making use of the pick. Notice Kency taking control. She was the most skilled at digging in this group.