My First Hot Shower

Day 123:

Today I had my first hot shower in Honduras. Turns out there is at least one working electroducha in this country, and it's in Siguatepeque. The water was really hot, not just warm, and it felt good. But honestly, I must be losing my mind; it's not really all it's cracked up to be. I'm not sure if I would pay money for a hot shower. No, take that back. I'm not sure I would pay very much money for one. But ask me again when the offer's on the table and we'll see. Time to start a new streak of cold showers.

Roadtrippin' Honduras

I was going to title this entry My First Hot Shower, but as you can see it’s not. Once again, my hopes for a hot shower were in vain, but this isn’t just a tale about dashed dreams for warm water, nor is it about anything particularly spectacular. It’s just another day in Honduras filled with memorable moments. However, this tale happens to hold a few more of those moments than others. Allow me to recount to you the story...

The first sign it was going to be a long day was when I received a wakeup call at 6:30 am asking where I was…

Wait, I’m getting a little ahead of myself. First of all, the Gold Cup for soccer is happening right now (mostly in Houston, I believe). The U.S.A. lost to Panama a couple weeks ago, but had another chance Wednesday night in the semi-finals to play them again. With about 15 minutes left on the clock, the U.S. team scored the first and only goal with an assist from Donovan, one of our well-known World Cup players. Final score: USA – 1; Panama – 0. The U.S.A. team will move on to the finals against Mexico this Saturday. Unfortunately, Honduras lost to Mexico in overtime during the following game, which means it’s going to be hard to find a crowd to watch the U.S. v. Mexico game with me.

So, while watching this game with my coworkers, we were discussing our travel plans for the following day. We were headed out to investigate some coffee processing plants in the department of Comayagua. Now, it’s not exactly close, but we were planning a day trip. We weren’t sure if we were going to go by bus or car; and if by car, which car. I left after the first game to head to another friend’s house and they said they would message me with the details so I would know when to wake up. This leads me to my wakeup call where I left off.

You know when someone calls you and wakes you up and you try to sound like you’ve been awake all morning and you’re trying to pretend like you know what’s going on? Yeah, it’s like that – in Spanish. I run in to take a quick shower. Of course, there’s no water, but luckily I remembered to fill the bucket last time. So I take my quick bucket bath (I don’t think anyone takes particularly long bucket baths, so it seems redundant to say quick, but nonetheless), I throw on some clothes and rush out the door to meet my counterpart at the cooperative. We get into the farm truck and head for San Pedro Sula to meet up with our guide to the fincas. How to describe the truck… well, it’s great if you want to drive 10 mph to your farm that’s 20 minutes away and it’s a dirt road with lots of pot holes and no traffic. However, if you want to drive to Honduras’ economic capital and biggest city, you’re probably better off taking something more suitable for traffic and parallel parking. It’s a rather large vehicle, there’s two-and-a-half seats for three grown men, the windows don’t roll up, 5^th gear doesn’t work, the engine doesn’t heat up and the brakes overheat. Plus, there’s no emergency brake, and did I mention it’s a manual? Onward and upward! Note to self: need to give a charla on investment, maintenance, and depreciation of assets.

Long story shorter, we get to San Pedro and meet up with a guy from the coffee machine fabrication center. He’s going to take us (in his much newer SUV w/ AC) to look at some coffee processing equipment they’ve installed so we can see the machines in action. We just bought one of these machines for the cooperative and it’s in the process of being installed along with a solar-powered (solar panel) coffee dryer, the first of its kind in Honduras! We’re just one step away from having the machine that turns coffee directly into 500-Lempira bills. But I think we’re close. I’ll try to get an entry up that explains the entire coffee process for those of you who are interested. You’ve heard coffee companies saying “from the tree to the cup”? I’ll even tell you how it gets on the tree!

So now we’re five grown men in four-and-a-half seats, but we have AC, and our driver is now a guy from the city who knows how to use 5^th gear. (I can now check off my list driving over 100mph in Honduras). We head out to the biggest lake in Honduras, Lago de Yojoa (no translation), which lies at the intersection between 3 departments: Cortés, Comayagua, and Santa Barbara. Lots of driving is involved, and now we’re mostly navigating mountainous dirt roads through beautiful coffee fincas and forest. We drove through the protected area around the lake and the road ended right at the water. And on the other side, you can see the road continuing. Fortunately, there were ferries waiting to take us across. We took ‘Miss Pamela’ for a 15-minute ride to the other side where we continued our driving, but not before snapping some gorgeous shots of the lake. And honestly, after zipping through traffic on the freeway, driving across the lake on a ferry, and climbing these pot-hole-filled dirt road switchbacks, I feel like I was in an SUV commercial.

We drive around to look at roughly the same machine at three or four different fincas, and all the coffee farmers seem to love their investment. It does what it’s supposed to do and it does it well. So we’re feeling good about our recent investment, and the guy were with from the fabrication plant is a standup guy who really knows these farmers and knows the other kinds of equipment people are trying to sell them. Some of the companies are from Costa Rica or Colombia, or wherever. And what makes this an even better investment for the cooperative is that these guys are in Honduras, so not only is the assistance always there for us, but we’ve also made an investment in the Honduran economy.

OK, this basically takes all day and it’s raining and dark by the time we start our 3-hour trip back to San Pedro Sula. I didn’t mention all the bouncing that took place in the mountain due to the pot-holes, fallen tree limbs, and whatever else was lying in the middle of the road because it seems normal now, but there was a particular bounce that really slammed the chassis down. It left a slight dent in the tire at the time, which turned out to be a fatal event for that tire. We lost said tire about 8:00 pm on the side of the highway. Luckily nothing terrible happened, it just went flat and we pulled over. And now I can check off changing a flat tire at night on the side of the highway in the middle of Honduras… in the rain.

We get back to San Pedro safe and sound and at the last minute decide we’re too tired to make the other 3-hour drive back to Subirana, so we stay the night in a hotel. This is where I was lured in to thinking I would get my first hot shower here. I went straight to bed dreaming about what that shower would feel like in the morning. One of the other guys got up before me and took the first shower – a good 20 minutes. I was in the bathroom as soon as he got out and went for the shower. There were 2 handles, this was a good sign; one for hot, one for cold. I turned the hot-looking handle and water came out. Hmm… it’s not that hot, room temperature at best. Maybe they mixed ‘em up. I try the other. OK, that water is definitely colder. I cranked the other one back on and was just thankful for the nice pressure I had. I thought about asking the other guy if he had hot water for his shower, but then decided I didn’t really want to know. Breakfast and several hours later, I finally made it back home and now I’m taking the rest of the day sitting on a comfortable bed, not sharing with anyone, and it’s not being driven up a pot-hole-ridden incline!

And in other news, I’ll be starting the World Map project soon with the 7^th, 8^th, and 9^th graders; a 3m x 6m mural on the front of the elementary school. Should be great.

Meanwhile, I hope you all enjoy the pictures. And don’t forget, I always love hearing from you through comments, emails, letters, packages, whatever. Enjoy your paved roads, and be sure to check your tires.

Taking a Break

In case it hasn’t been clear thus far, Honduran culture is different from American culture. Part of my job as a PCV is to share those differences with you all, just as I share bits of American culture with the people here. The cultural differences I’ve alluded to (or haven’t yet) regarding work are true, especially in a small town. Being on time, working hard, keeping company time and personal time separate, and taking breaks are all included in these differences. This point on keeping company time and personal time separate works both ways. I’m currently listening to my office compañero telling a story about being at church or playing soccer on a Sunday and being asked to come in to the office to do some paperwork. By the way, they do work Monday through Saturday in this office.

Now you can know all of this information before entering a different culture and then spend nearly three months learning about these differences and even experiencing them to a degree, but culture has this way of ingraining itself into you. You may want to change these aspects; you may even need to change them, but for some reason it doesn’t make a difference.

In reading through some Peace Corps material about culture before arriving in Honduras, the distinction between culture and personality was made. A person must first understand the culture of a people before being able to appreciate the individual differences that make them individuals within a culture. That is to say, if you understand the overarching cultural norms, you can begin to distinguish what makes someone an individual apart from those norms. There are more finite levels as well; including family culture that distinguishes a person in addition to the community culture. And understanding a culture takes time. Understanding a person takes a lifetime. And understanding myself…?

This last week was Student Week, whatever the heck that’s supposed to mean. I think the subtitle is Spring Break #2. I was thinking about the last time I had a vacation. Even though I’ve been moving around and seeing cool things and having lots of free time, that doesn’t exactly constitute a vacation for me. I realized I haven’t really had a vacation in a long while, at least since I started training. Granted, we’ve had days off, but like I said, it’s just not the same. So no school, and I need to get reset my perspective. It’s good to do that every so often so you can come back and appreciate what you have. So I called up a friend on the North Coast and took a couple days to spend relaxing on the beach. There was also some work involved, and though I don’t want to further perpetuate the Cuerpo de Paseo (Traveling Corps), I think it’s important to explore and understand the different parts of Honduras. But here I am, even now defending my free time! My American work ethic constantly hounds me for any time spent unproductively. This is the part that is so difficult to change.

I’ve been here a month to the day and the question nags at me: What have you done? I’m not sure how to answer myself. I think maybe it’s best that I don’t. But rather that I take a deep breath, let down my defensive instinct, and revel in taking a break. One of the reasons I love being here is the relaxed culture. I hope it grows on me more and that guilt will fade away. Things happen slower in this culture, and I really have accomplished quite a bit as far as integrating into a community, developing a routine, understanding a community’s needs and desires.

I’m recalling a sermon I once heard, talking about our time off as a well-deserved reward vs. a starting point. Are we striving through the week to “earn” ourselves the weekend, or do we operate out of a place of rest through which we can move forward with the week? I think that’s an important question for every person.

So, American culture, I know you’re there waiting to ask us what we’ve accomplished, threatening to bring guilt if our answer is insufficient. 

Well, I don’t have an answer for you. I’m at the beach.

Back to Basics

Titles are a popular thing in Honduran culture; Profe, Doctor(a), Ingeniero(a), Pastor, etc. Now it might be that they really respect one’s position or that remembering their title is easier than remembering their name. I think in the States is seen as arrogant or superficial to introduce yourself with your title when you first meet someone, and even then you would only call the teacher ‘Teacher’ when it was your teacher. In Honduras, having a University degree bestows you with the title Licensiado(a). It’s not very popular to call someone Licensiado, but technically this would be my title here, so I probably should be introducing myself as such. Fortunately for me, my host dad is quick to introduce me as Licensiado en Finanza. This keeps people from thinking I’m just a vagabond or hippie, however it presents another problem. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t feel like a 4-year degree made me an expert in any given financial topic. In fact, accounting was a large part of my degree and I’ve always tried to avoid it. Key word: tried.

I might just be the only one technically “qualified” to work in finance in Subirana, so it’s back to the basics for me. My current project is automating the coffee cooperative’s accounting system. Automating is easy when it’s already correct. But what fun would that be? I’m finding even the basic accounting I can recall is coming back to me, though slightly jumbled. Now the Latin culture may bend the definition of punctuality and the importance of time, but in finance it makes a huge difference. Let’s talk for a minute about timing of payments.

If you make a payment on your car loan, it’s pretty important that the financing company document that date on time, and not say, 6 months after the fact. Why? Because you don’t want to be paying interest on that old, larger amount, you’d rather be paying interest on the new smaller amount (or no interest at all!). Well, the math does seem to get a bit more complicated as you start to talk about timing issues. Currently, our one and only formula is as follows:

Principal * Interest * Time (days)

                   360

The way the accounting is set up now is very basic, and easy. It’s easy to automate something like this, but with Excel we want to know more information in order to make formulas that work for every contingency. It’s got me second-guessing myself about accounting, but we’ve got plenty of time to figure it out. And in the meanwhile, I’ve got to pretend like I learned something with my finance degree. Next post, I’ll get a little more technical about how accounting works in Honduras. I'm gonna go brush up on the accounting I tried not to learn all those years.

Licensiado Adán signing off. You stay classy, U.S.A.