Torches and Exercise and Half-Days

This weekend I cooked my first-ever pot of beans. And they turned out delicious. They were red beans, which I assumed meant that they were kidney beans. I have yet to get that confirmed, though, which means they might be mystery beans. The beans were a very welcome addition to my diet. Unfortunately, though our fridge is set to the highest setting, it doesn't really keep food cold - just moderately cool. This means that everything spoils extremely quickly in the heat and humidity of Honduras. After approximately six meals of great beans, I had to throw out the remainders this morning.

When I was preparing to come to Honduras, I came with the realization that I likely would not be able to maintain my home exercise routines, due to the heat, setting, and scheduling. But on Monday, prompted by other volunteers, I started exercising. A little bit. Monday was a half-day at school, so in the afternoon I went on a run with two volunteers. To put it mildly, it was hot out. We ran through a poorer part of town I hadn't yet seen, across a gorgeous stream, and into a forested agricultural area. It was beautiful. And sort of hot. We ran through the middle of a herd of cows walking down the road, past horses, chickens, and wild dogs. By the time we got back and realized that the house was out of drinking water, the sweat was very real. We bought several bagged waters and tried to cool down for the evening's events.

Monday night was Día de las Antorchas, or Day of the Torches. Hearing of the torch parade, I had asked the other volunteers what it was all about. No one seemed to truly know, and said it was just a celebration of children. I went along with it. Unfortunately, my run from that afternoon was scheduled just a little bit too close to the time of the parade. I showed up at the parade still sweating off my run profusely, despite my cold shower and time spent standing directly in front of my fan.

The torch parade was amazing, and if I hadn't had to steer my children straight along the road, it would have been breath-taking. Every school in Cofradia - and it turns out there are lots more than I thought - attended and carried a different color torch. The littlest students, some of them my own, had trouble carrying their torches. They'd stick their empty arm out in the air to balance themselves, or would simply waver their way down the street. The torches would swing and droop just as much as the kids, and I still can't believe that no one caught on fire, despite dozens of collisions. As the night got darker and darker, the torches appeared brighter and brighter, until the street was illuminated by a parade of torches. I loved it. We plodded pretty slowly along the short parade route, finally reaching the town square where everyone quickly dispersed. I headed to go buy a delicious fried taco filled with chicken and vegetables. Now that I think about it, it was kind of like a Honduran egg roll. Actually, it basically was a huge egg roll.

 I found out on Tuesday morning, from Dulce, my Honduran classroom aid, that the parade was about knowledge and learning. The torches represented torches of knowledge and were meant to celebrate the opportunity that children have to learn. Apparently all across Honduras torches were wavering through the streets for Día de las Antorchas. I thought that was fantastic.

But back to the exercising bit. Tuesday night, my roommate, Liz, and I decided we would start doing workout videos in the large empty courtyard of the volunteer house. We set up a Blogilates video next to a fan and proceeded to sweat hard for the next 15 minutes. It was hot, dusty, and the video kept stopping to load on the spotty internet connection. But we loved it and plan to do regular workouts from now on. Next time we'll use speakers so that we can actually hear what Cassey (the instructor) is saying over Liz's unbelievably loud fan. We had planned on yoga tonight but that fell through when we were too exhausted. I'm a little worried about the lack of yoga mats on our concrete courtyard for the future, however.

Today was Día del Niño, or Children's Day. I had been told that the day was mostly about fun, games, and food. It would also be a half-day. I spent the morning decorating the school with balloons and streamers, alongside the Honduran teachers. Students then arrived and the piñatas began. Each grade had a piñata, so throughout the day piñata after piñata was cracked open by each class, producing a wriggling mass of children scrambling on top of one another for the copious amounts of candy. After piñatas came the games and presents. Then the food. Oh the food. A mother of one of my students had made an enormous pot of arroz chino, basically the Honduran take on Chinese fried rice. It was incredible. Accompanied by Pepsi and a white bread roll, this was followed by popsicles and then cake. To top off the event, each student was given a goody bag of candies and then released to run around outside. I can only imagine what tomorrow will bring, what with the sugar crash.

I've been here for almost a week and a half now. And though I'm still not quite sure what I'm doing here, all is okay.