Leaving Honduras

This morning we slept in.  When I got up, I spent time working on devotions and the blog...waiting for Bob and Alina to wake.  Bob got up and showered and then I decided to shower myself.  When I was done, Alina and I headed down to breakfast to find Bob already down there.  Our plane left at 1pm, so we weren't in any hurry this morning...in fact, we took extra care to make sure everything was packed just right.  Alina and my things for our overnight stay in Atlanta would be in one suitcase and Bob would take the other suitcase with him.

The hotel got us a private taxi to take to the airport, however in doing so, we ended up paying about 3 times the price that a normal taxi would charge which was very disappointing.  Considering that we didn't have much Honduran money (Lempiras) left, this will be a mental note for next year...NO private taxi.  At the airport, I went to the newspaper stand (which I've been doing every year for the past 8 years) to buy one of each of the newspapers.  I typically give these away to my Spanish students if they earn the highest score on the exam.  I purchased the 4 major newspapers for $37 Lempiras (about $1.85 US dollars).

Once in the airport, we headed to check our suitcases.  We realized that Delta has now incorporated the $40 per person country departure fee into the cost of their flight, which saves us the time of standing in a separate line to pay it as well as makes me realize that the actual flight itself was really $40 less than what I paid.  That ended up being a real time-saver and money-saver for us!  After checking the bags, we headed upstairs to check out the souvenir stores and snack on some fruit before going through security.  I got my backpacked checked by security, but no tarantulas (like I heard had happened last year with a member of the Maryland team).  We waited at our gate until it was time to board.  Our flight was about 3 and 1/2 hours to Atlanta and we arrived to the Atlanta gate at 7pm.

LoriAnn and Alina leaving Tegucigalpa (do you see Bob waving in background?)

Leaving Tegucigalpa

Heading above the clouds

Flying over Cancun, Mexico

Coming into Atlanta

Coming into Atlanta

Right when we got off the plane, we realized that those with connecting flights had to head through customs in one direction, whereas those who were staying in Atlanta (we had an overnight stay) had to head through customs in another direction.  So we said goodbye to Bob who was flying all the way through.  Getting our suitcase and going through customs went well and quick.  We had to call our hotel to figure out how to get on their shuttle bus to get to them, but even that went smoothly.  We met a man on the shuttle that was from Dallas, TX who called us "normal people" when he found out we were from Wisconsin (he had guessed we were from MN).  Alina didn't quite get what he meant by that, but I did.  There was a KFC 2 blocks from the hotel and then we were in for the rest of the night.  We called home from KFC, but continued to talk to Noah all the way back to the hotel and then while sitting in front of the hotel.  That was pretty much our day...welcome back to the USA!

The Capital - Tegucigalpa

This morning I showered and threw the first of two loads of bedding into the washing machine (less to do for the girls who come in and clean the room after we leave), got the last of our clothes out of the dryer, then made some coffee for the morning and went to do devotions.  I didn't really have time to type and upload any blogs I had missed from not having internet, so that will have to wait until I get to the capital later today.  When Bob and Alina woke up we rearranged the suitcases so that Alina's and my backpack would fit into the suitcases since many people here were concerned with us getting robbed/attacked on the way to the bus station since we'd have "so much luggage".  I have always taken the bus back to the capital since it costs less than $3 per person, but I guess volunteers just don't do that anymore due to safety issues and, I'm guessing, their lack of knowledge of Spanish and Latin culture.

When we were all packed, Bob headed off to say good-bye to the Big Boys and get his hat signed while I headed with Alina to say good-bye to the Small Girls, the Medium Girls, the Big Girls, and all those at the Toddler House.  When we got back to the room, Bob was waiting outside for us on the steps since I had the key.

We left at 8am (saw Wade on the way out, so gave him the key to our room to get back to Andi who is the volunteer coordinator) and headed on our walk into Guaimaca.  We had 2 suitcases and 2 small backpacks (with the big backpacks tucked away inside the suitcases), and I had my purse.  On the way we decided to stop by Glenda's little store.  Glenda (if you haven't ready my blog in past years) is a lady who has a store out front of her house with vegetables and fruits.  We usually buy from her every year, but it just didn't work out this year.  She was sitting outside so we chatted for a bit, long enough for a dog to walk by and pee on my suitcase (ugh, sigh) and then said our good-byes and let her know we'd be back again next year.  The walk to the bus station was mostly on dirt roads, so as usual, one of the wheels on the larger suitcase broke.  This will be the suitcase that stays down in Honduras next year!

We got on to the bus, but since the larger suitcase wouldn't fit underneath the bus, we had to pay for an extra ticket (4th passenger) since the suitcase would have to occupy a seat.  So the total cost was $220 Lempiras...roughly $11 US dollars, for a hour and 45 minute ride in a nice air-conditioned mini-bus back to the capital.  Not too bad.  We arrived into Tegucigalpa and got a taxi to take us to the hotel. putting us at our hotel at 11am.  Our room was on the 8th floor, and the only thing above us was an exercise room with really nice equipment and running track on the roof.  I have never seen a hotel with this extensive of an exercise room!  The hotel had a pool and a private exit/entrance with security guard to the mall next to it.  We headed to the mall and Bob decided he wanted Pizza Hut for lunch.  When we got back to our room, I started working on my blogs when we got a call from Doris who was outside our hotel waiting for us.  I had sent text messages to the unrecognized numbers that had been calling me the past 3 days simply saying "we should arrive at our hotel by 12:30 if you'd like to come and spend time with us".  I figured if any of those were Doris, she'd know which hotel and who was messaging since we had talked the week before and I had given her that information.  If it wasn't Doris, there are MANY hotels in Tegucigalpa and I wouldn't have to worry about my safety.  I never got a response from any of the 3 messages I got, but we were SO excited she came!  She brought her friend Kenia with her (safety).

Left to Right: Alina, Doris, LoriAnn, Kenia

View of Tegucigalpa from hotel roof

Hotel fitness center on roof

Hotel fitness center on roof overlooking Tegucigalpa

Hotel fitness center on roof overlooking Tegucigalpa

Left to Right: Doris, Alina and Kenia

Hotel pool and whirlpool

We chatted with the girls for quite a while in our room and showed them photos of Noah at Disney World this summer and of the kids on their sports teams.  Then we showed the girls the 9th floor exercise room, track and balcony, and the pool on the main floor, then walked over to the mall to take them to eat at TGIFridays.  We had the left-overs boxed up and sent them home with the girls.  When we got back to the room to drop off the left-overs, Alina gave Doris the bag of items she had bought for her back in the States...a really nice dress, shoes, necklace, earrings, make-up kit and nail polishes.  Doris started her studies at a cosmetology school last week and said she had to purchase a make-up palette and nail polishes (white, black, gold, silver)...so Alina's gift was just what she needed at the right time, since she didn't have the money to purchase those school supplies!

We decided to end the afternoon by taking the girls to see a movie at the mall.  The Fantastic 4 was playing.  We didn't realize that there were no English subtitles to the dubbed over Spanish (poor Bob), but good thing he knows comics pretty well and was able to understand most of it by his knowledge of comics and superheroes. When the movie was over we went up to the room for the girls to gather up the left-overs and the bag for Doris and then we took them to the main floor for the hotel to help in getting them a taxi home.  It was already dark out and we figured that this would be MUCH safer than taking a city busy home.  We waited for the taxi and then said our goodbyes.

When we returned to the room, Alina and Bob headed to bed for the night.  I ended up watching a movie since I was still quite awake from all of the action of the day, before finally falling asleep.

My Last Complete Day at Emmanuel

Alina finally felt a little bit better to come along with me to the Toddler House.  There were no veggies to cut this morning, so we just watched the television with the children in the 'comedor' (dining hall), and watched a really pretty moth for a bit until it was time to eat.  Karla, who is usually in charge of the Toddler House, had the day off; but it seemed that all of the teen moms were able to work through this and they actually got breakfast and cleaning done early...AND got to school early!  I'm guessing it's because they didn't take the extra time to do their circle devotions.

Beautifully colored moth

Big Toddler Girls

Zelenes with her Big Toddler Boys

Jeremias (striped shirt) praying before breakfast

Marisela with her Little Toddler Girls

Ana and Alina with the Little Toddler Boys

Vilma sitting down for breakfast with her Little Toddler Girls

I walked to school with the girls since it was my last day teaching reading.  Rachel will be taking over for me, so she was with me again this morning.  I worked with the first 2 students since she didn't meet them last Thursday when she shadowed me and then she worked with the rest as I watched her.  The very last girl, Skarlett Michell let Rachel know that she would not see Rachel on Thursday.  When Rachel asked why not, Skarlett said that she'd be in Tegucigalpa.  Almost every day a few children have to go into the capital for their annual doctor's appointment.  I knew that there were 2 going into Tegucigalpa on Thursday for their appointment, so I asked her if she had an appointment and she said, 'yes'.  We found out later in the afternoon that Skarlett had run away from the orphanage after lunch with 2 other girls...so I guess that was the REAL reason that she wouldn't see Rachel on Thursday.

When the reading classes were done, Alina and I headed to the 'tienda' to get the internet stick from Carmen and then I headed back to the room to finish my last letter to one of the orphans here at Emmanuel.  We sorted through laundry and began to bag up a lot of our clothes that we brought down to wear down here for the last time, as we would leave them down here.  We tend to come down here with very full suitcases (this year we had a 3rd suitcase of all of the donations that Alina had received from her birthday party) and we leave with fairly empty suitcases.  Actually if you count Bob's suitcase, we came down with 4 suitcases and will only be leaving with two!

We headed to the Toddler House to serve the last supper this year and then help put the children to bed.  I gave each of the children a passion fruit sucker that I had bought in town and then gave the moms a Mexican chili-coated mango sucker.  I left Zelenes with a big bag of my clothes, my shampoo and conditioner, an almost full huge bottle of lotion and a bag of 40 chili suckers, and also gave her the note I had written for her.

We left early tonight so that we could get ALL of the last of the donations (soccer balls, badminton set, last pair of shoes and all of the clothing) out to their respective houses.  Each spot that we stopped was SO grateful for what we were leaving with them.

We spent our last hour before going to bed with the Karen, Lucy and Michell in the big girls yard.  Karen and Lucy hadn't eaten much supper since the 'tia' (night lady) had said she'd bring in a special dish for them.  Unfortunately she forgot to ask permission (which is MUST), so she wasn't able to bring it.  Alina mentioned to them that Bob had cooked a really good dish with eggs and vegetables for supper and that there were tons of left-overs.  I still hadn't tried it, but was more than willing to let the girls have it to eat.  Alina and Karen walked over to our kitchen in the dark to heat it up and bring it back.  They came back with the bowl and 3 forks and couldn't stop complimenting Bob's AWESOME cooking!  Lucy said she had never had anything that good in her life!  We chatted a bit more before saying our goodbyes, giving Michell the note I had written for her, and then headed back to our room to get a good night's sleep for our trip to Tegucigalpa tomorrow.

No Internet

This morning went a little more slowly for me since about half-way through the day yesterday I realized that I had used up the gigabytes I had purchased down here.  Technically if the days had expired first, I'd have internet usage through the last day I am in Honduras.  Perhaps it's all of the pictures I am posting this year online.  There is a girl down here who works in the 'tienda' named Carmen who knows how to add days, weeks, a month of time/gigabytes to the internet stick, but unfortunately she headed into Tegucigalpa (the capital) today and wouldn't be back until late.  So I would have to put off posting blogs for a while.

Alina was still sick, so we told her she needed to stay laying down and resting all day today - no exceptions.

My morning routine at the Toddler House stayed the same: cutting vegetables, taking the children to the 'sala' so that the teen moms could have their circle devotions, serving breakfast, and washing dishes.  I walked with the big girls to school to encourage them and say good luck since their mathematics exam was today.  I knew it was going to be difficult.  When I got back to the house, the children were in the 'sala' since the door to the toys storage room in the 'chosa' was still broken.  The 'sala' got very loud this morning since it is a lot smaller than the 'chosa' and keeping kids couped up that long is not an easy task.  It is the rainy season and had been raining on and off all morning, so going on a walk was out of the question.

We served lunch around 11am, I washed dishes and then headed back to my room to begin writing good-bye letters to a couple of children down here.  It is very common that the children write you on your last day here, so I figured I would need to get a head start since there were at least 3 letters that I needed to write.  We were still making sure Alina took her pills every 3 hours.  At 2pm I headed back to spend an hour with the toddlers before serving supper, doing dishes, and then helping Ana with showers.  After showers I headed home once more to give Alina another pill and then returned to the Toddler House to spend my last night helping Ana study for the mathematics part of her college entrance exam.  As I was working with Ana, Carmen came over to visit Lourdes.  I gave her my internet stick and she said she'd get it back to me tomorrow morning.

La Tienda

This morning began with devotions and my 'cafecito', followed by updating my blog.  Little did I know that I would use up my gigabytes today and I wouldn't be able to blog again until 3 days later.  Alina got sick overnight, perhaps due to our walk back to the Toddler House in the rain last night.  She ended up with a pretty high fever, headache, stomach ache and vomiting.  We decided it would just be best for her to stay in the room and not go to church with us and we alternated ibuprofen and tylenol every 3 hours to try to get the fever to go down.

Bob and I headed to church this morning, checked on Alina afterward and then headed to the Toddler House to take my little Alejandra, Nikoll, Jeremias and Alina's little Chino to the 'tienda'.  Unfortunately the toddlers had already headed out on a walk, but Ana let us know that they should be walking around by the tienda at some point before lunch.  We waited and waited and waited, and finally they came.  Since it was so close to lunch, we decided that rather than just a snack, we'd get these 4 a plate lunch and a snack to take with them.  Each kiddo got 1/2 of a hamburger (they're pretty large) and some french fries, along with a soda and some chips.  Alina stopped by for about 10 minutes, but her fever started to go up again so we let her know that she should rest.  We walked the toddlers back to their house as the other toddlers were finishing up since it would be nap-time immediately afterward.

From left to right: Alina, Chino, Alejandra, Jeremias, LoriAnn, and Nikoll

Bob and I walked back to our room to check on Alina whose fever was still pretty high.  We let her know that she should probably sit the day out, although this would be the only day that we'd be able to take children to the 'tienda'.  We made sure she had plenty of liquid and took her next set of fever-reducing medicine and then headed out to get the 2 big boys - Christian and Luis David.  We gave them each a soccer ball and they were both very excited to have it.  Bob even kicked the ball back and forth with Christian for quite a bit before he got pretty sweaty and/or tired.

After walking them back to their house, we headed back again to check on Alina and to grab the gifts for the big girls.  Bob reiterated that she should stay laying down, but as we were about to leave the big girls yard with Michell, Yensi and Coco...Alina came walking down the road.  When she got to us, I said to her, "mule"...it took her about a 1/2-second and then she smiled and replied, "nag".  Alina and I had just watched 'A League of Their Own' before coming down here if you didn't recognize the lines.  We had a great time with the girls at the store and were there for quite some time before Alina started to heat up once again.  We got her home around 5pm-ish and then I headed to the Toddler House for the remaining 2 hours to help Ana, Deisy and Karla with their math.

Left to Right: Yensi, Michell, Alina, Coco

Clockwise: Coco, Yensi, Michell, Alina

Left to Right: Michell, LoriAnn, Yensi

Left to Right: Yensi, Bob, Michell

Alina, LoriAnn and Coco

Michell, Alina, Coco, LoriAnn and Yensi

Alina and Michell