Pure and Noble Heart

Around 3:30 pm on a Friday, Sonja, a fellow employee of ASONOG, came and collected me from my office .  Like most events taking place here, I was completely oblivious to the fact that my workmates were going to have a Father´s Day celebration that afternoon.  Information sharing here takes mysterious forms.  You probably won´t receive an email.  The message gets passed on by word of mouth, and when these mouths speak fast, informal Spanish among themselves, I usually don´t get the message. Furthermore, I think that the events aren´t planned any more than 24 hours in advance, ever.  Along this same vein, CUSO-VSO just mandated us to go out and buy an emergency supplies kit*, that includes a battery powered radio.  If there´s ever an emergency where I have to listen to a frantic radio announcer telling us that there´s a countrywide 24 hour ´stay in your house´order**, or impending hurricane, or that the Americans are invading, I´d better also pull a Honduran friend out of that emergency kit who will drag me to where ever I need to go and explain more slowly what I need to do, because garanteed, I won´t understand the instructions.

Every nation ridicules other nations, and all are right.

 - Arthur Schopenhauer

The abundance of cell phones and Blackberrys was one of the first things in Honduras that countered my preconceived ideas of what this place would be like. This place has suprised me in lots of ways so far, and I want to share some of these with you below.

I wanted a donkey, I got worms instead.

Originally my posting as a food security advisor was going to be in a very small, rural community in Western Honduras. Upon hearing this, I had made big plans before I left Canada to scrimpt together some of my volunteer honourarium and get myself a donkey. Nothing fancy, just an "A to B" model burro.  His name was to be "Toyota", or alternatively, "Vamonos" (Let's Go).  I arrived, and as we were warned in training could happen, plans had changed, and I was now to be stationed in the much less rural, larger centre of Santa Rosa de Copan.

Oliver Twist Surrealism: Visiting the Orphanage

Every Wednesday afternoon, my neighbour and good friend Mirian, visits one of the orphanages here in Santa Rosa de Copan.  She goes with her own children and a couple of her friends.  I asked to join her this week.

It's an orphanage for children aged 5 years and under.  As we walked through the door, we were rushed by the children.  They came running to receive hugs and smiles and some much needed individual attention.  They had never met me before, and yet, some of them were instantly crawling up into my lap. At one point I opened up to their love and to mine, then I got scared.  This is too hard.  A protective crust enveloped my heart, but recognizing it in time, I willed myself back to the love.