Daily Life vs. When Papí comes

A normal day in my life here consists of me waking up with howling dogs and squawking birds. I stumble downstairs to turn on the water, then stumble upstairs and into the shower where I begin my battle with the small ants. I take a quick cold shower, shake the ants out of my clothes, and go downstairs where my host Mom has cooked a breakfast big enough for 2 people. It takes me 30 minutes to eat the food, drink a large glass of ice cold oatmeal in sugar water (I have learned to like it), and talk with my host mom about a million different things. I am usually eating secretly killing ants and she is usually talking non stop. She wears old clothes, or sometimes only a large shirt and rarely leaves the house. I am always still listening when the doorbell rings, signaling that I have to run upstairs, brush my teeth, and run downstairs to meet the girls waiting at my door to walk to school.

On the 30 minute walk to school I finish killing the ants in my sandals, watch for thieves, chat with Calvin students and begin sweating. I then go to class. In linguistics class I thank God for the air conditioning, kill ants crawling out of my books ,and draw on the pages. In sculpture class (with Honduran students) I sweat constantly, laugh hysterically at the flamboyant professor and learn so much about the difference between a Honduran class and a US class. I usually have no idea whats going on but when I ask the other Honduran students, they have no idea as well ☺ Such is the life in Honduras.

I eat lunch at the Cafeteria and usually order a Baleada (tortilla, beans, and cheese). I sit outside on the campus, do some homework or sketches and meet new people. Depending on the day and if its raining (it usually rains hard around 4:00 pm and at night), I either walk home or go to the library to study for a while. On the walk home I sweat even more because it is mostly up hill and my books always seem to weigh more. I enter my house and get bombarded with an excited 4 year old wanting to play every game she owns. I walk into the living room and sink into the couch, tired from a long walk. I then try to do homework with a 4 year old copying my every move and drawing all over my homework. I play memory with her or dominoes with the Bananagram pieces with my brother (by the way scrabble/banagrams is almost impossible in Spanish because the words use so many vowels).

I eat a large supper and then wash the dishes by hand and chat with my brother or host Mom. My host Mom is very worried about me leaving after 5:30pm because it is dark, so I watch Munecas de la Mafia (Mafia Dolls), take a long needed shower, kill the ants in my bed, and fall asleep to honking horns and loud neighbors.

However, when Papí comes home, the world changes. I met my host Dad for the first time this weekend. He is a rather small, short man who rarely talks. He is very serious and when he talks he hardly opens his mouth and has a thick accent. To the kids, it is like Santa Claus has entered the house. My host Mom wore nice clothes, makeup, and high heels (she becomes a Diva). After he arrived, we went directly to a huge mall (similar to the mall of America) that had a tiny theme park for kids. My siblings only had to say “Papí, I want this!” and out came the money. We went out to eat at 2 different restaurants, and then to a Kariokee bar until 1:00 am. (The fear of being out a dark vanished and my host Mom turned into a night person).

We slept in the next morning until 10:00 am and then left again to go a nearby city named Valle de Angeles, where Papí bought bracelets, toys, candy, and drinks for everyone. I found it quite amusing because the man rarely talks. My sister said “Papí look! I want that!” and he says “mmmm” pulls out money and buys it. What a different and exciting weekend compared to my daily life. We never ate inside the house and I tried and saw more things in 2 days than I did the whole first month. My host Mom says that he usually stays for 8-15 days, but he has a lot of work on the farm right now so he is leaving tomorrow already. I am curious to see what it looks like when he stays for 8-15 days.