Wait, what? It doesn't snow in Honduras! You're right. However, since Monday afternoon, the entire country has been on a curfew. Originally the curfew was to go from Monday afternoon to Tuesday morning, but it has since been extended several times. Right now it is lifting tomorrow (Thursday) morning. Everything has been closed/canceled because we are not supposed to leave our homes. So we have all the freedom you get when you don't have to go to school during the week with none of the fun stuff to do. To help pass the time Monday night, Gabrielle and I made some piña coup-ladas and played dominos with one of our neighbors for hours. Today I have been boning up on Honduran politics. Many of you have asked me about the current political situation, so here is a brief overview of the political happenings in this country leading up to today:

As many of you may know (or remember) Latin America was not exactly the poster child of politcal stability for a long time. In the midst of bloody coups and violent revolutions, Honduras managed to keep its nose clean. For the past twenty years, they were the most politically stable country in Central America. In the 1980s, Honduras became a democratic nation (again, I think). The constitution passed approval in 1982, and is the same constitution in effect today. Article 4 of the Honduran constitution states "The alternation in office of the President of the Republic is required. Violation of this rule constitutes the crime of treason." Article 237 states that a Honduran president is allowed to serve one four-year term.

Fast forward to November 2005. Mel Zelaya is elected president. He was a pretty popular guy, but not overwhelmingly so...he won the vote by 4%, which was the smallest margin in the country's history. He was a member of the Liberal Party of Honduras, and he took office in January of 2006. His popularity began to drop shortly after taking office. Earlier this year, Mel proposed some amendments to the constitution. There were several changes he wanted to make, but the one that has received the most attention is one that would allow a president to be re-elected for an indefinite number of terms. If you look back to Article 4 of the constitution, you will see that this constitutes treason. So Congress, the Supreme Court, and the military all told Zelaya they would not back him if he continued with the vote.

Mel continued with his plan for the proposition. Since Congress would not hold a vote for it, he decided to hold a Constituents Assembly on June 28th. A couple days before the vote, the ballots were flown in to the capitol where the military siezed them and destroyed most of them. Mel managed to snuggle some out and was planning on moving forward with the vote. The Honduran constitution is very long, and I was unable to find a copy in English, so I haven't read all of it yet. According to many of the people here that I have spoken to, this is the part where Mel ceased to be the president of Honduras. Apparently the Honduran Constitution does not allow for an impeachment process. Congress and the Supreme Court held emergency sessions, determined that according to Constitution Mel Zelaya was no longer the president, voted Micheleti in as interim president, and decided the safest course of action would be to fly Mel out of the country.

This is what you read about in the papers as the wild and crazy military coup. Although in real life, the military was only following orders from what they believe to be their true authority. I don't remember what the article number is, but the Constitution does state that no Honduran citizen can be exiled or something along those lines. arg, I wish I could find it. So forcing Mel out of the country was an unconstitutional act as well.

After a couple months of shenanigans, Mel is back. This past Monday, Mel somehow made it back in the country and took refuge in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa. The country has pretty much been on lockdown, and I don't know anything more recent than that, really.

The current government is not recognized as legitimate by many (or really any?) other world leaders. As a result of their refusal to reinstate Mel, Honduras has been removed from the OAS and has been denied aid from the US and Europe. This year is an election year (Mel's term would have been over January 6, 2010), and apparently the newly appointed official is not going to be considered legitimate either, as a result of this craziness. Now, I am clearly not an expert on politics in general, much less Honduran politics. But in my opinion, Mel Zelaya was removed from power according to the Honduran constitution. And although he was removed from the country, which I think was an unconstitutional act, I don't think that means he should be reinstated. I also think it's quite a load of crap for foreign governments, namely the US, to say that Mel Zelaya needs to be reinstated in order for democracy to be upheld, but then say that they will not recognize any new president elected after the new regime. Sadly, I don't think this is about democracy anymore. But I will say that even if it means I am labeled as a golpista, I support Honduras. My two cents.

Gabrielle (my neighbor/coworker) and I went to Tela a couple weekends ago. Tela is a small town a couple hours east-ish (I think?) from San Pedro Sula, and it is right on the beach which is the large basis for its appeal. :)

Technical difficulties have prevented me from communicating in any sort of consistent manner with many of you, and I am so sorry for that. Things have been sorted, and I am back. SO...if you called or emailed and I haven't responded, please bear with me. I promise I am not ignoring you!! In my break from technology I've done some fun stuff around here that I will catch you up on as well very soon. I love you guys, and you have no idea how incredibly excited I am to be able to talk to you again!!

Tonight I was hit with a wave of homesickness. Not for the places, because I love it here, but for the people. I did laundry after school today, but I got distracted by supper and forgot my last load out in the washer. Old habits die hard holding on, I suppose. It isn't inconvenient for anyone else, because I am the only person in the building who uses the pila. But I didn't want my clothes to sit out all night in case it rained.

When I walked out the front gate, there were families everywhere. People on their patios across the street. Kids playing soccer in the street. Some people sitting around their dinner fire, eating and playing guitar. I felt so lonely.

As I was rinsing out my clothes, I happened to look up at the sky. San Pedro Sula is a pretty gross town when it comes to garbage and pollution. The sky is usually so dirty, there are no visible stars at all. Not even the 3 that you can see in Dallas. But tonight the sky was so clear, and there were stars everywhere. It was so beautiful. A few minutes later, clouds covered up pretty much everything again...I think it might rain tonight. But it was the perfect reminder that I'm never alone, even though I miss you guys. Just thought I'd share. Thanks for listening.

:snaps::

Hello, hello, and welcome to my home! :)


This is my apartment building. It is brand new and very melon colored. There are eight apartments in the building, four downstairs and four upstairs.







If you turn either left or right at this gate, it will take you down a walkway to a patio area at the rear of the building. The walkways are gated, so you have to have a key to get in them. The main hallway is also gated, as you can see here. You have to use a key to enter and exit the building. Walking through this gate will get you to...









...this hallway. My apartment is #4, the second door on the left.











As you walk in the front door, you see the kitchen on the left.












The kitchen comes complete with a lovely view of the cinderblock wall with barbed wire topping. In the states, it would look like a prison. Here it looks like safety. And also a prison.

If you walk straight through the front door instead of turning left, you walk into the bathroom. It's pretty standard...although it didn't come with any hardware, such as a towel rack or toilet paper holder, which just seemed odd. Little things like that, that I assumed would be here.

A right turn at the front door takes you to my boudoir. The windows in my bedroom look out onto the patio I mentioned at the very beginning.

The patio really isn't a patio so much as it is the laundry area. Yes, my apartment did come complete with a washer and dryer. And yes, that is a picture of me standing at the washer, holding the dryer. There is a laundromat down the street that I can take my bigger pieces of laundry to, but this is where most of my stuff gets done. By me. While I work on my tan.

So there you have it. There is a guard post outside of my building, where a man with a machete sits all day and keeps an eye on our street. There will be a picture of him when I put up pictures of my neighborhood. He has terrible taste in cheese, but other than that he is a good person. As you can see, there it isn't very big. To those of you who were promised couch space, my apologies. There is room for an air mattress, though. In the air conditioned part of the apartment, even. So don't let the lack of couch discourage you from visiting!

Just a quick public service announcement while I am on break at school. I was unable to write this yesterday because I was really angry, and I didn't want to write anything that would be inappropriate for mixed audiences. Now that I have calmed a little and written a strongly worded letter...just so you are aware, Spirit Airline is the WORST airline in the history of flight. Unless their target demographic is people who don't like knowing that their flight schedule has been changed or canceled. Or people who like sleeping on airport floors. Or people who like crappy customer service. Then I guess they are doing really well for themselves.

So we've reached the 2.5 week mark. I have settled into things pretty well (I think...) and apart from the occassional difficulties that come with not being fluent in the local language, it's going really well. A girl from North Carolina came down the week after me. She has moved into the apartment down the hall, and she is teaching the science courses I was going to be doing before I got bumped up to chemistry. Not only is it nice to have a neighbor who is fluent in English and in a similar situation as myself (she doesn't speak much Spanish, nor does she know anyone down here), her arrival helped me see how much I had adjusted to life down in the Honduras thus far.

This weekend I was blessed enough to be able to come to Georgia for a cousin's wedding (CONGRATULATIONS CHRISTIE AND REID!!!!!!) Not only was this a wonderful opportunity for me to soak up time with my family, I was able to relish in some of the simple pleasures that one doesn't get to partake of in a third world country:


HOT SHOWERS
Although this may sound like a bold claim, I am willing to state that heaven probably feels like a lukewarm shower after running around all day in 90+ degree temperatures. It is more refreshing than a cool breeze through the open window of your un-air-conditioned car during 5:00 rush hour on Central Expressway. Those of you who were able to experience that joy with me may find this impossible, but believe it. As a person who normally enjoys turning her bathroom into a sauna during shower time, I never thought I would say that I would enjoy a lukewarm shower. But although it has become a very enjoyable part of my daily routine, there is still something to be said about a ridiculously steaming hot shower. I don't think there are hot water heaters in Honduras, even in very wealthy homes. In order to get hot water to do my dishes, I have to boil water on the stove. And in order to heat my shower water from cold to lukewarm, I have a state-of-the-art electric shower head.

I don't think it is quite as glorious as the one Anne got to experience in Guatemala. But something about bathing in water that is shooting past exposed wires really gets me going each morning. At the top of the shower head is a switch that allows you to choose the water temperature. The choices are cold, sort of cold, and lukewarm. In a moment of daring, I messed with the switch one day. The result was really cold water and a sizzling sound that has discouraged me from any further water temperature experimentation. I am still curious about what the little tail thingy at the bottom of the shower head is, but I haven't quite picked up the courage to mess with it...yet. I will keep you posted.




MILK


This picture, along with many like it (why must you love milk, Chris?!) have been a stumbling block for me these past couple weeks. I casually browse pictures of family and friends, and I am repeatedly bombarded with pictures of Chris chugging milk. Cold, delicious milk. Electricity is very expensive, and refrigerators are an additional expensive luxury down here. So there are many people who have neither. In order to provide milk to the entire population, something is done to this marvelous liquid that allows it to be stored unrefrigerated. I don't know exactly what this process is called, or what all it entails. What I do know is that the end result is a nasty, putrid beverage in a blue cardboard box. I have had a difficult time finding uses for it. It can be used in cooking without compromising the integrity of the dish. At least in pancakes and mashed potatoes. Not that those dishes have a whole lot of complexity. And it gives an interesting, kind of nutty after taste if you use just a little in your coffee. My dad insists that it doesn't taste too bad if you get it cold enough, but I don't think I'm willing to experiment enough to find the appropriate level of cold that will negate the grossness. PriceSmart sells cases of soymilk, which is a tasty milk alternative. However, at the end of the day, sometimes a girl just wants some lactose. And looking at pictures of friends guzzling it down makes me feel a burning, jealous sensation I never thought I would feel about an animal by-product.



TAP WATER
Yes, folks. This weekend, every time I brushed my teeth I rinsed my toothbrush off with tap water. When I went out to restaurants I ordered water, knowing it came from a tap, and I was able to boldly consume it without fearing severe gastrointestinal consequences. Ice isn't bad here. At least the ice that I have tried. Our first full day here I unwittingly turned Dad and I into guinea pigs to test the effects of ice from PriceSmart on the American bowel. It was sheerly out of force of habit that I filled our cups with ice at the soda fountain. He didn't look super excited when he took a sip of his drink and discovered ice from unknown origins in his cup. But I haven't gotten sick yet, and I don't think he did, either...so...at least we know that ice from PriceSmart is made from filtered water. And knowing is half the battle.

Tomorrow I will take you on a photo tour of my apartment building. And I will bring my camera to school, too, so there will soon be pictures of what my room looks like, and the campus for those who haven't seen pictures of it yet. Tomorrow is the first day with students, but not the first day of classes. There are a lot of changes at the school this year, so we are spending the first two days with our homeroom class discussing all the changes and giving them a chance to adjust before jumping into academia. We'll see how it goes. :)


To address some questions and comments:

There is a taxi that takes two other teachers and myself to and from school. The driver's name is John, and he is really nice. I like to refer to him as my driver, because it makes me feel fancy and important. If I need to go someplace outside of work that is too far to walk to, I give him a call. There are many taxi companies, but something I learned pretty quickly is...addresses don't mean much here. Everything is done by landmarks. There are very few street signs, and the majority of the ones I have seen are too covered in graffiti to be legible. So...if I were to call a taxi, I have to give them directions using landmarks (which I'm not very familiar with yet) instead of street names (which I'm not very familiar with yet, anyhow, so it doesn't really matter). The major landmark that I use is called El Palenque. It doesn't exist anymore, but it used to be an arena for cock fights before they became less popular. And I think illegal. If I call a cab, the first thing I ask is if they know where El Palenque is. If they say yes, I give them directions. If they say no, I stutter a little before I hang up the phone, because I don't know what to say to them yet. It is really just easier to call John. There are a couple mini-supermarkets, a laundromat, pool hall, restaurant, gym, some pulperias (convenience stores, kind of, minus gas pumps) and a drug store within walking distance of my apartment. Anything else requires use of a taxi. I will take you guys on a tour of my neighborhood soon as well.

Mama- Yo sólo compro pollo sin zapatos, porque tiene mejor sabor. :)

John- I'm sorry...I don't speak Spanish. I LOVE THAT MOVIE! Are you copying down subtitles?

JJ (and anyone else curious)- My mom asked me if I buy my chicken without the shoes. She and my dad used to live in Spain, and every time she bought chicken at the butcher he would take a whole chicken, chop off the head and feet, and then wrap it up in a little package. This didn't do much to encourage her appetite, but she didn't speak Spanish, so she asked a friend how to get just the body. Her friend told her to order "pollo sin cabeza y sin pies". Mom got mixed up, and ordered her chicken "sin zapatos", which means without shoes. I find that chicken without the shoes has better flavor...