Ranch Fashion

Ranch fashion is an interesting concept and I am constantly surprised at the different types of clothing and accessories that I see wandering around the ranch. The children here are very isolated from the rest of the city and as a result really don’t know what the outside world is wearing. Also, they only have a limited amount of clothing to work with. However, they are very proud of what they have and have developed their very own fashion statements and strut around the ranch like they are the coolest thing around. Here are some of the more amusing trends:

1. The most prevalent and, in my opinion, the most odd trend is the wearing of one glove. Not a leather glove, but those cotton one size fits all gloves that we all wore in high school. Both girls and boys alike don the one glove for every special occasion. During the activity, the glove always travels because there are not enough to go around and sharing is common.
2. Another trend that has made its rounds throughout the world, but seems to be permanently stuck on the ranch is the popped shirt collar. Only the “coolest” boys can pull it off and pop it every chance they get.
3. Usually it is those boys that pop their collars that also have a mountain of hair gel to get that perfectly spiked hair. Sometimes, they even use baby oil because they haven’t been able to secure some real gel.
4. The next fashion is more common with the younger boys on the ranch. As in every country, these young boys follow everything the older boys do, and this fashion statement is based on that concept. The older boys, who have been able to go to the city with the little money they have, typically carry a central american style messenger bag. Because the younger boys don’t have the opportunity to go to the city to purchase these bags, they mimic the style the best they can with bags they find on the ranch. This usually involves a little girl’s purse. It is so amusing to see a 7 year old boy proudly sporting a little pink Barbie purse slung across his body.
5. As everyone knows, a style that has made a recent comeback in the US and Europe is the skinny jean. Many of the kids here have skinny jeans (probably originating from the first time they were popular) but they are not allowed to wear them to school because they have uniforms. In an attempt to make their uniform pants “skinny” the older kids tuck them into their white tube socks.
6. The next fashion isn’t something that the kids do intentionally, but by default because they don’t have many nice clothes. Clothing is a very important part of special occasions in Honduras and the ranch is no different. Whenever there is a celebration on the ranch the kids bring out their best clothing. So, they iron their best shirt, put on their nicest pants and shine their nicest shoes. The catch is that the “best” of everything doesn’t necessarily match, but that isn’t important.

Inmaculada Concepcion

Every night from 6-8 pm and every other weekend, I pass my time in the hogar (home), Immaculada Concepcion. This is the place where all of the 15-16 year old girls live. During the selection process, I narrowed my options down to the hogars San Francisco (7-9 year old boys) and Enmaculada. I chose Enmaculada because I really enjoyed the girls and I thought that they would be better for developing my spanish. Unfortunately, most of these girls moved up to the next (older) hogar the weekend after I was assigned to them. In addition, the girls from the hogar Hermanas de Jesus, moved up to my hogar Enmaculada. During the selection process, the only hogar I was sure I didn’t want was Hermanas. AHHH!

Well, as it turns out, the girls are totally growing on me. Also, this is the best place to develop my spanish because they try to trick me into saying dirty words all of the time, so I am learning a lot. Seriously, most of them help me a lot with the words and phrases that I am unfamiliar. Tonight they told me that they all really like me, which is a big surprise since most of them ignore me a lot of the time and I have only been working with them for 2 weeks. However, one thing I have learned since being here is that these kids warm up to people very fast and feel that they have good relationships with people they have only known a short time. This is nice for those of us here to help them, but concerning for the time when they are out in the “real world”.

This past weekend, I spent Friday night and all day Saturday with the girls. On Friday, we organized the performance they planned to give at the talent show, which was the Saturday night activity. Of course this was a dance to a popular reggaeton song. I left the hogar at 8:30 and the girls were still working on the choreography. As some of you may know, I was a pretty good dancer back in the day (LOL) and participated in many talent shows including an NKOTB contest at the local mall J I would have offered to dance with them, but I don’t think I am ready to show off those skills to the entire ranch yet (however, I had no problem getting’ down at the house party with the volunteers following the talent show; gotta start slow and work my way up). When I returned to the volunteer house, we decided to have a “Fiesta Americana” with the Spanish and German volunteers. This included a watermelon, a bottle of vodka, a bunch of beers, a picnic table, Honduras’ version of solo cups and a ping pong ball that I borrow from one of the girls in my hogar. We spent the night infusing the watermelon with vodka (to be used at the party the following night) and teaching the Europeans how to play beer pong. It was a great time and we set the bar high for the future “Fiesta de Espana” and “Fiesta de Alemania”.

Saturday morning I arrived at the hogar at 9 am, after the girls finished breakfast. There was a group of girls going to work at the “represa” (river/pond swimming area) and I joined them not having any idea what we were doing there. As it turns out, our terrible, horrible job was to gather dirt into large bags and haul them (about 15) back to the hogar garden ( probably about ¼ mile) with the use of only 2 wheelbarrows. The icing on the top of the cake was the constant drizzling rain throughout the day. I couldn’t believe that anyone expected these girls to do this difficult physical labor in the rain and even more surprising was their willingness to participate. We filled each of the bags about half way and loaded up about 4 bags per wheel barrow. This left about 5-6 bags that we had to drag down the rocky path back to the hogar. Because of the unlevel ground, the wheel barrows tipped over about 5 times each. The girls just kept loading them back up and trying again. This chore was made even more effective by the fact that most of the bags had holes in them, which got bigger as we dragged them along, leaving a trail of dirt behind us. I think we probably arrived at the hogar garden with half the amount of dirt that we started with. I was a sweaty, muddy mess by the time the job was done, but I figured that counted as my workout for the day, so I wasn’t too unhappy. Also, the rest of the afternoon involved playing hangman with the girls on my electronic dictionary, which was pretty fun.

The talent show took place on Saturday night and was supposed to start at 7, but like everything else, it began about an hour late. It probably took about 20 minutes just to get all of the kids to quiet down enough to get the show started and that quiet attention lasted only about 2 acts. However, the show was great! The best was 5 year old Moises who dressed in baggy clothes and rapped to a reggaeton song. I couldn’t believe he got up there in front of everyone at the age of 5 and didn’t miss a word. My girls performed their dance half heartedly and it was obvious they were not prepared, but nobody seemed to care. I stayed at the show until my girls performed and then cut out with all of the other volunteers to go to a house party on the ranch. We ate the watermelon we had slaved over the night before, sat around the fire, listened to music and played “games“. The night lasted a pretty long time and ended with a couple rounds of limbo, which made it obvious that it was time to go home.

Sunday was my day off and I took full advantage, by sleeping in until about noon and then dragging myself to the hammock with my book to read and nap the rest of the day. It was wonderful!!

First Salida Weekend

As an NPH volunteer, I am responsible for working as a PT every day during the week and then 6-8pm in my Hogar Mon thru Thur nights. I have to work with the kids in my Hogar every other weekend for a day and a half. I can choose whether I want to work Friday night and all day Saturday or Saturday evening and all day Sunday. All of the volunteers are divided into 2 groups for their Salida (off) weekends.

We got our assignments last week and this was my first weekend off. I am in salida 1 and am pretty happy with the group. It is kind of important since these will be the people I can travel with on my off weekends. Brooke and I requested to live in separate rooms so that we can have the same weekend off. (They prefer that roommates have different salidas so that everyone gets a room to themselves almost every other weekend) So, the 2 of us traveled all the way (45 min) to Tegucigalpa for the weekend. We decided not to go too far since we still don’t know much about the city we call home. We left the Ranch on Friday and spent 2 nights in the Granada Hotel, which is located near the center of Tegus. It is a hotel that is pretty bare bones, but very luxurious compared to the Ranch. The rooms are all white walled with white sheets and no bed spread. The luxuries include the TV with cable and movie channels, a clean toilet that flushes normally and most importantly, a hot shower. All of it is totally worth the $10 a night.

Although we had some ideas of things we wanted to do and see, the goal of the weekend was just to walk around Tegus, get lost and find our way. We did just that on Friday evening. We attempted to walk from the hotel to an Argentinean restaurant that we had heard was very good. We didn’t find it, but did run in to some of the hotels and restaurants we had read and heard about. We accidentally ended up in the center of the city at a Chinese restaurant that was in the guide book, so we trusted that we were getting decent food. When our dinner arrived, we were very amused with Brooke’s fried rice, which was stacked like a mountain and spilling over the edges of the plate. I think the entire Ranch could have been fed with that plate of rice. When we left the restaurant, we took the rice with us so that we could give it to one of the many people begging on the street. Unfortunately, we didn’t see anyone on the way back to the hotel so we left the box of food sitting on a park bench. The next morning there was no sign of the food, so I am sure someone enjoyed it.

On Saturday, we did a little shopping in the center on a pedestrian street called the Peotonal. It isn’t exactly boutique shopping, but there are some good cheap stores and coffee shops. Afterwards, we took a collectivo (cabs that take a specific route and cost 10 lempira - about 50 cents) to the Multiplaza Mall. Brooke and I discovered this place a couple of weeks ago and we have declared it to be our Mecca. It is the only place that resembles the US in anyway and we can pretend we are back at home. (I am happy being here, but at times, it is nice to have a little taste of home.) As is common practice, we did a lot of shopping and probably spent more money than we should have, but that was all part of the “home” feeling. We went to TGIFridays and drank Margaritas to complete the American themed day. I also ran in to Liz, a girl from my language school in La Ceiba, who is volunteering at a different orphanage near Tegus. It was so great to see a friendly familiar face.

After dragging all of our bags back to the hotel, we set out on another mission to find the Argentinean restaurant. This time we were better prepared with a map and very shaky directions from the hotel receptionist. After walking in a few circles (and passing 2 sushi restaurants…jackpot!), we arrived at the restaurant just in time to eat before they closed at 6 pm!? (Guess they don’t have much of a Sat dinner crowd.) After all of the work we put in, we had pretty high expectations and I must say they were met. The food was different from our every day beans and rice and had a lot of flavor, which is something we crave after being at the ranch.

So, after eating dinner at 6:00, what were we supposed to do with ourselves for the rest of the night? Well, we continued our exploration of Tegus with the goal of finding a nice pub/bar where we could have a couple drinks. After talking to several people on the ranch, it appears that this is a highly desired thing and impossible to find. We did find a restaurant near the center, Maya Duncan, that had a good crowd and VERY loud live music. As we searched for a table were we might be able to hear each other talk, we ran into a group of volunteers from the ranch who had been vacationing over the previous week. What luck! We joined them for drinks and traded contact information so that we could meet up with them later. After drinks, we rested at the hotel for a bit and then headed out to join the crowd at a bar/club called El Castillo. The best part of the night was meeting a lot of new people including a group of Hondurans who have become really close with some of the volunteers. It is still very difficult for me to communicate with local people, so the conversation was sparse, but I had a great time anyways.

Sunday morning was a little rough, and we slept in as long as we could. We headed out at about 11 and decided that what we needed was Pizza Hut. This is crazy considering I really don’t like Pizza Hut in the states, but here it is a completely different story. The big draw is the salad bar. It is so rare to find good salads here and a little bit dangerous to eat them because of the dirty water. The last time I ate at a Pizza Hut here, I didn’t feel very well for about 24 hours, but now I feel like my stomach is a little bit stronger, so we went for it. It was delicious (my standards are so low, ah!) and I was relieved that I felt fine afterwards. Before heading back to the Ranch, we hit the grocery store. This just added to all of the junk that we had to carry back with us, so we just stuck with the necessities (you know, cookies, brownie mix and cereal). Getting back to the Ranch was a pretty big relief. I was finally able to go for a run on the trail (it was raining during my free time throughout the week) that circles the ranch. The view is so pretty and it is so relaxing. It was the perfect way to finish the great weekend.

Rancho Santa Fe Accomodations

Life here on the Ranch is very basic, but for the most part comfortable. I am living in a dorm room with all of the new female volunteers. There are 4 of us in a room filled with bunk beds and a large bathroom. There is a lot of dust, spiders, webs and the occassional cockroach. We sweep almost every day and are planning to get a can of raid to kill the bugs. When we arrived, we were given sheets, blanket and a pillow. The sheets are cheap and feel like sandpaper. I brought my own sheets, but it is good to have another set to use while mine are drying. We are all able to have a bottom bunk bed, which is great since alot of dust and dirt falls from the ceiling onto the top mattresses. The mattresses are increadibly uncomfortable and sink under my weight straight through to the bed frame. I have three mattresses on top of each other at the moment, which makes it a little bit more comfortable. I initally chose the bunk closest to the bathroom, but had to relocate after the frame broke while I was sitting on it. I haven't eaten anything since (just kidding mom:)

The bathroom is the most "interesting" part of life on the ranch. The tank of the toilet has a faucet over it and we have to turn it on to fill the tank before pulling the rope on the side of the tank to flush. Also, the plumbing is so bad that we are not allowed to flush toilet paper, so there is a trash can next to the toilet for the paper. Gets pretty smelly, ewwww.

When the old volunteers move out in the middle of February, we will move in to our permanant rooms, which everyone swears is much better than the dorm room. These rooms have 2 single beds, a closet, desk and private bathroom. Some of them even have hot water showers! I can't wait to finally get settled into my room! This will be luxurious after living in the dorms.

Thank goodness some group donated a washer, so we no longer have to hand wash our clothes. (This is a recent upgrade). There are still a line of sinks with hand washing stations if needed. There is no dryer so we have to hang our clothes on lines around the courtyard of the house. There are always a bunch of clothes hanging around.

The house has one kitchen, which everyone (about 20 people) share. When there are that many people using one kitchen, it is impossible to keep it clean. We all have chores and it is cleaned at least twice a week, but it doesn't last long. There are always bugs and I have seen a few roaches creeping around on the floor. Everytime I move the coffee pot or toaster a group of bugs come running out from under. The stove and oven function fairly well, but the oven door doesn't stay shut and we have to prop a chair against it to keep it closed.

I guess this all sounds a little rough, but it really isn't so bad and the commraderie in the house makes it all easier. Also, we only spend one year in this situation while the kids spend their life this way. And it is usually much cleaner and more comfortable than wherever they came from.

Arrival at Rancho Santa Fe - Tegucigalpa

So the 7 hour bus ride from La Ceiba to Tegucigalpa (Tegus) was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be. I was prepared to spend most of the trip reading and studying my spanish. However, I never opened a book. I was consumed with looking out the window at the countryside and various living conditions. It was very eye opening. The road was lined with huts, shacks and cement block homes flanked with Hondurans of all ages. Everyone was dirty and sparsely clothed. The kids were playing soccer and running along the busy highway. I don’t think I saw any with shoes. The terrain was mostly mountainous and I prayed for my life as the bus sped around every corner in the drizzling rain. (Ahhhh!) Surprisingly, I made it to Tegus alive. During the trip, we stopped at a rest stop for food and a bathroom. During this stop, it became obvious to me that I was on a different bus than planned. I had boarded the bus at the Cristina bus station in La Ceiba as instructed, but the name on the bus was Kamaldy. As we departed the rest stop, I noticed another bus with the name Cristina on the side. Hmmm, that could be a problem on my arrival to Tegus.

So, I arrived at a bus station in Comayaguela (a section of Tegus). I searched for anyone that may be looking for the only white girl getting off the bus. Nobody was looking for me. After everyone had left the station, I attempted to call Cate, my boss. The call would not connect. If this had been my first arrival in Honduras, I would have freaked out, but after a month of missed meetings and late arrivals/departures, I was barely phased. After a very rough conversation with the station attendant, I learned that I was not at the Cristina bus station where I had told Cate I would be arriving. Eventually, my phone rang and Laura, the person responsible for picking me up, asked where I was in a slightly panicked voice. I explained the situation to her and luckily the boy driving the car knew exactly where I was. So, it all worked out in the end.

I arrived on the Ranch in the evening, so I wasn’t able to see any of my surroundings. I joined the other volunteers in San Vincente (our housing) and dropped my things in the dorms where I will be living with the other new volunteers over the next month. There are a total of 6 of us (4 girls, 2 guys). Ule is an older woman from Germany who will be working as the visitor coordinator. Ana (Brooke) is 23ish and just graduated from DePaul in Spanish and French. (She is originally from Valdosta, GA) She will be teaching English to the older kids. Vincent is 19 and from Germany. I guess he is doing some sort of mandatory service here for the year and will be the PE teacher at the school. Ben is 23ish and from North Carolina. He has been working in Guatemala for the past few months. I believe he will be working in the social services department. There is one other new volunteer, Marta, from Spain, who is a nurse and will be arriving this weekend. Everyone seems very nice and it is great to have Ana here to reminisce about Chicago.

Orientation is going to be 2 weeks filled with speakers and visiting the various homes on the ranch and in Tegus. The day typically begins at 8 am with a 2-3 hour lunch break and ends at 8 pm when we return from the hogars (the homes where the kids live). One objective during this time is to chose the hogar that I will spend the rest of the year helping out and building relationships with the kids. We will be visiting all of the Hogars in the evenings over the next 2 weeks. At this point, I am leaning towards San Francisco, which are the 8-10 year old boys. However, I have really enjoyed all of the homes and could be assigned to any of them.

Before leaving the states, I received a lot of information on the Ranch through brochures, packets, videos and my friend Hilary, who worked here in the past. However, nothing could have prepared me for what I have seen. The Ranch is an amazing place full of extremely caring adults and hardworking kids. It is amazing to see how the kids care for the ranch and everything on it. It seems they are always doing chores and they clean their living areas several times a day. It is very strange to see 7 and 8 year olds washing their own clothes by hand, which they do almost every day. They have very few possessions and take pride in what they do have. However, they are acutely aware of the things that they don’t have and constantly ask to borrow or to be “gifted” the personal things of the volunteers. It is difficult to say no, but we have been told that it is forbidden because obviously we can not give something to every child. Another strange phenomenon is that, although these kids have everything they need, they tend to rummage through our trash for any desirable objects we may have thrown away. We even have “special” trash cans for those things we may throw away and don’t want the kids to see. For example, beer cans, liquor bottles, cigarette boxes, etc.

Today we visited the agricultural area of the ranch. Almost everything we eat is produced on the farm including all of the vegetables, fruit, chicken, eggs, milk, etc. The kids help out with the farming as well. Each of the homes has an area where they are responsible for growing fruits and vegetables. They give half of their crop to the ranch and half is for them to do with whatever they want. We were told that they will typically try to sell it to us. It is like the Rancho Santa Fe girl scout cookie time :)

Whale Sharks!

First of all, thank you for all of your comments. I love reading them and I am glad that so many people are enjoying my stories.

Things have been pretty steady here in La Ceiba. I have school in the mornings, study in the afternoon and hang out with the ever changing gang at night.

I went back to Utila last weekend and stayed at my usual hotel on the Cays. I was able to stay Friday and Saturday night, which was a lot of fun. The hotel was full, so there were quite a few people to talk to and it is alway interesting to hear of the different experiences they have had. The type of person who visits Utila, and especially this particular hotel, is typically very adventurous and most of them have been backpacking their way across Mexico, Central and South America. I have learned so much about travel just by talking with these people.

On Saturday, I did 2 fun dives and was very proud that I have finally figured out how to control my buoyancy and can now fully enjoy all that the ocean has to offer. I saw many cool fish and underwater creatures, but still have not seen the sea turtle that I am seeking. However, the day was not a failure because instead of a sea turtle, I got to swim with whale sharks!!! It was amazing. After our first dive, our boat driver, Louis, rushed us back into the boat and we were told to take off our tanks and get ready with just our masks and fins. He took off in search of the whale shark, which I guess is easy to find because birds are circling around the area. We spotted him and on Louis´command all slipped into the water where the whale shark swam right by us! It was huge! I would say it was the same size as our boat if not bigger. After losing sight of him, we dragged ourselves back onto the boat and went off to follow the shark. We swam with him 2 more times, each time getting closer and closer. On the final time, I was first in the water and was able to postion myself directly over the path of the shark. He went right underneath me. I had to hold my arms close to my body to keep from brushing up against him. It was very thrilling!

We spent Saturday night at the Cay View resteraunt as usual having dinner, drinks and dancing.

On Sunday, I decided to hangout at the hotel and layout on the dock all day instead of diving. It was a beautiful day and there were plenty of people to talk to on the dock. At the height of the day, I slipped into the water with my swimming goggles and did some laps between the dock and nearby island. It was great to swim again and a very enjoyable workout. It was very different from swimming in dark, cold Lake Michigan. I was able to watch the fish swim through the coral underneath me. There were even some small fish that brushed up against me. I never quite got used to this and freaked out each time. Of course, the day wound down and I had to take the ferry back to the mainland. Again, I was very sad to leave. Hopefully, I will return someday.

Well, this is the end of my time in La Ceiba. I will be moving to Tegucigalpa on Saturday to begin my job. Hopefully, I will a lot of new adventures to share with everyone.

Ano Nuevo

First let me introduce the new characters (students) who arrived at the spanish school this week. First is 3 guys from San Francisco, Mike, Kevin and Ike. They are medical students from San Fran State and are here for 4 weeks during their winter break. Also arriving on Monday, was Paula, who is a woman from the states (not sure where). There is also an older man from Korea and another from San Francisco.

The first surprise for me here was the introduction of gifts this week. My house mother was wrapping small gifts all week and by the end there was a small collection under the tree. Christmas seems to have carried over this week and the radio and stores still played Christmas music most of the time. On New Years Eve, the women in the house spent all day preparing food again with the wonderful aroma of Casaba filling the air (mostly garlic, mmmm)

The school sponsored a party for all of us at the house next door to mine where one of the instructors, one student, Katerina from Denmark, and a past student and volunteer at the Jungle School, Christine from Kansas all live. They did a great job with tables and chairs set up in the yard, a cooler and a DJ. The house mother cooked a delicious meal of tomato salad, potatoes, rice and chicken. There were many people of various backgrounds and we all had a great time. Also at the party were Christine’s brother, his wife and their 2 small children. They arrived last week and have rented an apartment near by because they plan to stay in La Ceiba for several months to learn spanish and do some volunteering. They are even thinking of enrolling their 3 year old son in a bilingual pre-school. It is amazing how mobile and resourceful many of the people that I have met are.

At midnight, there were many fireworks, kisses and feliz nuevo ano wishes. The party continued well into the night, but I returned home to see what my family was doing in celebration. I was a little disappointed because I obviously missed the majority of the celebration. However, Dunia, Edgar and Marcela were winding down in the family room. I presented them with the small gifts that I had brought from home: a 2009 Chicago calendar, some Franco chocolates and a Ghirardelli bar. They seemed to enjoy the gifts and were very grateful. There were hugs, kisses and new year wishes all around. I retired to my room and watched a movie, but Marcela (who is my age) stayed up for several more hours and had about 6 friends join her at the house to celebrate. When I left my room briefly, I saw them sitting on the couches talking and drinking coffee (a little different than my typical celebration).

Right now, I am eating breakfast and watching the Rose Bowl parade with Edgar, which Dunia has put on the TV. I am planning to go to Humfrey’s house to watch football for the rest of the day. I can’t wait! The guys from Cali talked about joining us, but not sure how we will all get in touch.