Rodeos, Rivers and Roadtrips...

It has been full speed ahead ever since Izzy and I got back from travelling at the end of January. Being in the house with the family and getting into the groove of Candelaria again has felt great. We only had a week to unpack, rest and get our heads back in the school game and I was so excited because boyyy have I missed my students. However, the first few weeks back here have been jam packed and we have truly never been busier, so much has been happening! It has never felt so good to be home :))

Look at this little cowboy, I mean COME ON!!

The first weekend in February was the annual Candelaria Fair. Apparently there had been cut backs in council funding which meant that the village had to go without its annual beauty pageant, which was fine with me as I could deal with not seeing my tiny students all dressed up in polyester ballgowns and paraded around the central square. Also, knowing what Honduran traditions are like now, I am sure there will be plenty of other opportunities for things like that throughout the rest of the year…. While the village tends to get pretty busy during normal weekends as the market arrives every Sunday, the fair was something else altogether. Every street was lined with stalls selling anything and everything under the sun; someone had set up some sort of Honduran take on a ‘Shoot the Duck’ stand opposite the ferriteria which appealed to all the boys but drove Lety mad as the vendor insisted on incessantly playing Reggaeton at full volume. Tarps straddled the streets, strung from roof to roof to provide some shade, however they were set up to accommodate Honduran height which made it a bit of a challenge for Izzy and I to navigate our way down the road. Days like this provide great entertainment for us as we suddenly become an opportunity for locals to 'practice' their limited English knowledge they have usually learnt from old American movies and so as you can probably guess, they can never say much more than "I LOVE YOU" or my personal favourite, "MARRY ME GRINGA!" How romantic ;))

We spent the morning helping Lety in the shop as there were more customers than usual flowing in and out so she needed all hands on deck. However, it wasn’t long before our younger host brother came in to beg for us to be able to go to the rodeo/jaripeo (bull riding). After a quick call to our host dad Victor, she waved us off and we headed down the road, hand in hand with little Samuelito and Genesis, decked out in jeans and long-sleeve shirts, a feeble attempt to fit in with the cowboys. As Victor's hardware store had provided supplies to help build the ring and was also one of the rodeo’s sponsors, he was there at the gate to meet us and to ensure we smugly waltzed in free of charge - not that the 50L charge would have been an inconvenience. Upon entering, we were faced with a real life rodeo ring with vaqueros attending to the bulls under the watchful eye of the packed stands.

A 'jaripeo' is a form of bull riding predominantly practised in Mexico, but can also be found throughout Central America. It started out as a form of bullfighting where the rider could only win after they had ridden the bull to death, however it has evolved into an activity where the riding ends when the bull stops bucking, a version I am much happier to watch. Candelaria’s rodeo consisted of numerous activities; bull riding, horse riding, cock fighting as well as a segment where middle aged Honduran women in very tight embellished lycra leotards sang and danced, and while Lety disapproved of the ‘casi desnudas’, the local drunks seated in front of us had quite a different opinion, whooping and gleefully cheering them. I wasn’t the biggest fan of the actually bullriding, and was quite shocked to see the cowboys poke the bulls with electric cattle prods in order to antagonise them before the gates opened, releasing the furious creatures into the ring in a now ‘maximised performance’.

Just as I thought it couldn’t get any worse, they brought out the cockerels and set them off, and I was just glad that the fight was over almost as soon as it had started, and that the birds seemed to be relatively alright afterwards. It wasn’t an entirely negative experience at all though. It was lovely to see our students all decked out in their checked shirts and sombreros with their little cowboy boots to complete the look, and being swarmed by children all day was great as it meant that the two English girls didn’t stand out too much, although we were gifted with free ice cream from two grinning locals so I wasn’t complaining. One of my favourite things about the rodeo was the presenter who was wearing an all red and gold charro suit, topped off with the biggest sombrero I have ever seen. He reminded me of the Speedy Gonzalez mouse from Looney Tunes with his exaggerated speech and long rolling ‘r’s which made me laugh - in my eyes, he was the true star of the show.

The rest of the week continued to be just as busy. The new school year has finally begun and so we are back in business! I have never been a morning person so the early mornings aren't my favourite thing, but seeing all the kids again makes them worth it. It was so lovely to see them all again, and to walk into the school grounds to be greeted with ‘MEESSS LOISSSSS! EEENGLEEESHH!!’ melted me. The first week back at any school is always a bit hectic and in a Honduran primary school it's no different. So I tried to ease them all back into the swing of English lessons by spending most of the time playing English games and recapping vocabulary from last year to test what they remember, which left me rather surprised by how much they could recite after two and a half months off. It was also great to see the other teachers again and catch up with them, as well as meet the new teachers such as Profe Eduflo, the new headteacher who we have met before at church, and his wife Profe Dixie who is my new sixth grade teacher; I couldn’t be happier with this as she is so wonderful and truly a breath of fresh air. Another exciting change is that things regarding the English classroom are progressing! Before the school finished for Christmas, there were discussions about investing money into making changes to the English classroom, such as installing air conditioning, redoing the floor, repainting the walls, putting in new windows and a glass door which all sounded incredible, but we didn’t realise that it would actually start to take place as soon as school started up again - how exciting is that! Yes, there is still a lot to be done, but the fact that things have been put in motion so quickly has taken us by surprise as we have become accustomed to the relaxed Honduran mentality of 'mañaaana'. I can tell it will make such a difference not only to for us and future English volunteers but also for the kids as having a designated place for learning English will make lessons so much more engaging and will provide us with a place to store resources as well as give us and what we are doing here a sense of permanence.

Before now, we have tried teaching in the classroom (shown above) but it is so dark and dingy and half of the desks are too weak and unbalanced to use, so we ended up taking a lot of our lessons to other classrooms or outside. I can’t wait for the classroom to be reading - no more resident bats flying around our heads or drawing on the concrete floor! The kids are going to love it.

We met the man who will be installing the air conditioning and after chatting to him for a while, I learnt that he had lived in Washington D.C. for 26 years before returning to Candelaria last year, and is hoping to head back to the USA sometime next year once his visa is approved. It still surprises me when I hear stories about locals going to America; I had always been aware of the migrant caravans in the news headlines back home, but hearing first person accounts of it from people in Candelaria who have experienced it really brings it home. It makes me realise that 'The American Dream' is still very much an ideal that many Latin Americans aspire to, and the lengths to which some will go in hope of obtaining that life is unimaginable. It's hard to hear some of them talk about their time in the USA, especially after Victor informed me that many will purposely omit their deportation from their account in order to portray the idea that they had found what they had gone looking for, but in reality the grass is very rarely greener on the other side of the border. The father of one of my sixth graders was one of the lucky ones who made it across the border, and during his time in New York he was able to learn English to a level where he can hold entirely English conversations with us. Yet this is not the case for the majority of those who eventually return because while living over there, they tend to live with other Spanish speakers and therefore fail to integrate into the English speaking community. However I want to make it very clear, just as Armando made it clear to us, that this is more often than not a result of social exclusion rather than a choice. Despite making up nearly 20% of the U.S population, Latin Americans are still finding it difficult to be welcomed into American communities due to rising levels of racism. I find that the article below encapsulates this sentiment perfectly: ‘Racism, not a lack of assimilation, is the real problem facing Latinos in America’. Speaking with members of this community about this is heartbreaking, and I have so much respect for them being able to share their experiences with us. (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/racism-not-lack-assimilation-real-problem-facing-latinos-america-n974021).

On a lighter note, my second weekend back home was spent celebrating my host brother’s thirteenth birthday. Excitingly, during the summer holidays 'La Finca Don Jorge' had opened - it is a swimming pool and restaurant with small summer cabins with hammocks off to the side. It’s located up on the hill just outside of Candelaria and has the most spectacular views of the surrounding mountain ranges and valleys that we have come to recognise as home.

The kids love having a pool nearby; swimming in the river is one thing, but having a pool on your doorstep is a whole other level of fun. It was a very special day, and gave us a chance to get to know some of the boys’ friends who had come a long. While launching Brittany off my shoulders and frantically escaping Victorito’s sly advances under the water, I spotted Lety taking sneaky photos and smiling, especially as I held Genesis' hand and guided her along the length of the pool. Barely anyone around here knows how to swim, although it doesn’t stop them from trying. Fortunately the pool isn’t very deep and there is a kids section for the likes of Samuel where it's shallow enough for him to paddle without anyone worrying. However the river doesn't have such secure safety precautions, if any, which makes it a very different story. Profe Aminta had taken us to the river with my fourth grade class before Christmas and despite not knowing how to, every single kid was in the water splashing about trying to swim, free from inhibitions and without a care in the world.

I was amazed and proud of their confidence and determination to learn so, just like our day at the pool, I was more than happy to help teach them.

Nothing beats a Honduran sunset :))

The drive home from la finca was good fun, blasting music out the back of the pickup truck accompanied by the occasional ‘FUERA JOH’ from the boys when they were overwhelmed by random bursts of confidence. This is a phrase we have been hearing since our first week in Honduras. It’s a political statement of defiance from the Liberal party against the current President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, who is the head of the National party. Our host family, like many Candelarian families, are Liberals and have been very good at keeping us informed of the current goings-on in government. Many nights have been spent watching the Honduran news and discussing politics, and I have come to realise that international headlines regarding Honduran affairs tend to be pretty accurate. It's true that Honduras suffers from large scale corruption and bribery, drug trafficking and gang violence, none of which has been improved under the reign of President Joh, and a large percentage of the population want him out, which is where the Liberal phrase ‘Fuera Joh’ comes from.

Once back home we celebrated Josue with cake, the 'tres leches' which I have come to love, and finished off the celebrations with the boys wiping icing all over the birthday boy’s face.

Right now I’m sitting outside on the terrace with the kids lying around me. The wifi still isn’t working in the house, and hasn’t been for the last week so we have had to make do with siphoning the wifi from next door and the only way we can use it is if we sit outside on the deck, under the giant satellite dishes.

Victor has his head on my lap and is playing Fortnite as usual, whereas Josue is messing around with my camera, his new prized possession, and Genesis is rifling through my Spotify trying to decided between playing Sebastian Yatra or Dana Paola as I’m trying to convince her that nothing beats Pedro Infante and Jerry Rivera...Oh well, I know I'll never win but one can try x