Sunday, May 31, 2009

Yes....I´m alive

On Wednesday I woke up a few hours after going to bed.....exhausted from having an 8pm English class with 20 high school teachers. Of course, as soon as class was about to start, a torrentual downpour began thus delaying the start of class. When you´re teaching in a brick building with open windows and a tin roof, its hard talk over the rain. So all I could do was wait until it subdued a bit. At first I didn´t know what was going on...drowsy from sleep and remembering the heavy rains I thought it might be the wind. Then logic set in. The entire house was swaying, outside the earth was roaring...we were experiencing an earthquake. I didn´t ever think that Honduras had them....until I was visiting in Anahiem and talking to a former co-worker who told my old roommate Nick that we sometimes get earthquakes from the volcano San Miguel in El Salvador....which geographically is fairly close to where I live. About 50 miles. We had assumed that this one came from there. It wasn´t until a little later in the morning when I went to Deyvis´s house to see the news that we realized how strong it was. 7.1....that´s a big one. We felt it pretty strongly where I live which is furter south and near El Salvador, I can´t imagine what it was like for my compañeros further north. Luckily there wasn´t any real damage where I live and everyone here is safe. Deyvis´s found a new crack in the house and their house in Tegus also recieved a few, but things are just the same.

Besides that things are going well. Just got back from the states last week and had a good visit. It was good to see people. It wasn´t too strange to be home, but we´ll see how if feels in another year and a half when I come back for good. I do miss a lot of things about the US but at the same time I was ready to come back to my boyfriend and dog. And good tortillas.....yummmm.

So now that I´m back I´m finally starting to get rolling on some projects. I currently have 3 English classes going with the teachers in my community. Two level 1 classes and one level 3. I really enjoy doing those classes. I always drag my feet on the lesson planning and feel like I don´t want to go, but once we get started I have a blast. Especially with my high school teachers, which I have about 20 of in class. They´re all laid back and like to joke around. I just hope they stick with it. They´re looking for more pronunciation and to improve the little that they know. These classes are designed to teach teachers to teach their students. Honduras has started with the requirement that all students must be taught English starting in 4th grade. Which is great, but its hard for the teachers when they don´t know any of it either. So in the HS, I´m glad they´re attending, but its not specifically designed for them. They´re welcome to attend, but I´m just afraid they´ll get bored or expect something else from it.

This week I´m also starting a program that teachers kiddos the first steps of managing money/business basics. We´re doing it with 4th, 5th and 6th grades. It might be a little advanced for the younger ones, but we´ll see how it turns out. Also, I´m helping out the 7th, 8th and 9th grade teachers with an HIV/AIDS/STI session. And....we´ll be starting a Colgate dental health program with the kindergarden class. All this is happening at my centro basico which is located about 45mins walking from where I live. I just hope that the work will keep up.

So all in all things are all right. Still bored sometimes. Starting to train Lola a little better...trying to get her to run with me, but if she can just walk nicely I´m happy. It seems like when I want to run I´m almost dragging her as she just wants to sniff around. Then when she´s ready to run I´m tired. Or she goes waaaaay too fast for me. Deyvis says he´ll be taking her out more. He can run faster and a lot further than I can. He´s currently training for a competition at the end of July. A 9 mile race I do belive. Its through the University...and if he wins he gets to go to Panama! He won last fall, but at that time the universities hadn´t been connected to do something outside of Honduras with the winners. Something with the Centeral American Olympics or something. Hopefully he´ll win so we can take a trip to Panama in the fall!

That´s the majority of what´s been going on. I hope all is well and that everyone there is having a great time! I look forward to seeing everyone in the fall of 2010!

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