Internet in Honduras?

Turns out they have Internet cafes in Honduras now too. The irony can be found in the fact that Internet is available here now and so many other "necessities" are lacking...is quite ridiculous to say the least. This coming from an individual who has both Internet and pretty much all the other "necessities" that I could ever want/need. Anyway, here is an update of the happenings thus far during my trip.

We arrived Monday, around noon, to Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Upon landing and going through customs we hurried to grab our luggage and catch our ride to Catacamas. Once everyone was in the cars and about to head out I was asked to exchange some American currency for some Honduran limperas. This is when I discovered one of the first reasons that I was supposed to be on the trip as the only male. After receiving nearly $240.00 in cash, mostly $20's and $10's, I was escorted around the corner to deal with 2 or 3 Honduran men (not to mention the 4 or 5 other men who were working nearby shining shoes) to exchange currency with. Just for the record, twenty dollars gets you 277 limperas, trust me, I know very well now. Needless to say, my mind and heart were both racing.

During our 3.5 hour car ride we stopped once or twice at some roadside stores to get snacks, drinks, banana bread and "coca" amongst other things. About 45 minutes before arriving in Catacamas one of our cars was dealt a flat tire. Hooray, I discovered the second reason I was on the trip as the only male. Amanda asked me to stay with the driver of the car, a 55 year old Honduran man (Spanish speaking only, of course) while two other Honduran men went to retrieve another tire. Awesome. So the rest of the group loaded into one car and I stayed behind with the Honduran man. Alriiiiiight. Every single Spanish vocabulary word that I knew was used within the first 45 minutes of our 3 hours together. To make a long story short, it started pouring rain, we got another tire, we got drenched while putting the tire on, while jacking the car up the jack actually slipped out from underneath the car and almost fell on the old, Honduran man, we secured the jack(which isn't the same as car jacks in the states)and finally got the tire on. Then me and the old Honduran man drove into Catacamas and met up with the rest of the group.

That was Monday.

Tuesday was more or less an orientation of Predisan, the medical clinic that the nurses were going to working at several days. We also got to go to an orphanage on the outskirts of Catacamas. It was an ophanage for physically and mentally disabled children. This is the same orphanage that my parents and two of their good friends visited while they were here a short time back. My parents insisted that I tell Amanda that we needed to visit the orphanage when we got a chance, so I did. I won't go into it much because writing it on here won't do it justice or give you anywhere close to the idea of what this place or these children are like, but I will say that it has been my favorite thing on my trip so far. Which is tough to say because I really would like it if places like this one didn't have to exist, but they do. I have more to say about this place and these kids later, so there will be more to come at a later date...just a teaser.

Wednesday morning we got up bright and early, thanks to the hundreds of roosters going nuts, at 5 a.m. and headed to the mountains. The nursing students were going to a clinic located 3 hours up, around, and into the mountains to give physical assessments, check blood sugar levels and alot of other technical things that I don't know much about. We stayed the night in the mountains at a small camp about halfway back down the mountain. Thursday, yesterday, morning we traveled back down the mountain about an hour and stopped at another clinic and the nursing students did much of the same as they did at the previous clinic. During most of this time I played with kids, talked to our drivers and these two young boys, Timothy and Samuel, who were our interpreters. They are brothers and were a huge help to us and alot of fun too. Because of previous trips to Honduras I was well aware of the fact that wherever the "gringos" go, the kids will follow because they know we carry goods, candy. I came well prepared this trip because I planned on being the only one who knows to bring candy, for the most part I was right. I now have two nicknames in Honduras, the "candyman" and "Justin", as in Justin Timberlake (long story). Oh yeah, after the first day at the medical clinic in the mountains we were taken to the river to clean up/swim. In spanish the place that we swam is called, "The Devil's hole". Hmmmm. Samuel and I were pretty much the only two that got in. There were also two little boys that were swimming nearby and they joined us is a cannon-ball contest. I will post pictures of these two boys later but just to give you an idea of what one boy looked like, we called him Mogley. He had on a little speedo. He was really funny too. When I asked him what kind of animals live in the river he said, "serpentes, pescado y cocodrilo". Even if you don't know spanish I think you can figure out two of the three of those animals. If not, let me help....that's snakes, fish and yes, crocodiles. He started laughing though, probably when he saw my facial expression, and said he was "being funny" about the crocodile part because they only live further up the river.....great.

Today, Friday, the nursing students are working at Predisan. It is located about a mile and a half from where I am staying at Amanda's house. So, because I can't really do much "nursing work" I decided to walk back to Amanda's house and see if I could locate her son's bicycle to use to go to the Internet cafe. Which brings you up to date. This afternoon we are going to one of the schools to play games with the kids, introduce a Bible verse and implement a game that relates to some aspect of living a Christian lifestyle. Tomorrow we are going back to the orphanage I mentioned earlier to take them some gifts and to spend the afternoon playing and interacting with them.

If you have been keeping up with my previous blogs you know that I don't edit, proof-read, or spell-check much before I post....but I have a feeling that because of the length of this blog, some of you spell-checking, grammar tighty's are going to freak with this one. Have fun and I will update when I can....