hn40.

ok, so first and foremost new photos. check em out.

2. im not sure where to start with this entry, and i may not even try. in fact, i may give up on this blog all together for some time. but i doubt it. basically, it was a crazy week. my mom came, we had an amazing time, check out the photos, i wont say anything until you ask me questions.

the coffee competition was awesome, my friends ended up placing as the top three producers, i met some great people (all you awesome cupper guys and gals), and lots of networking. thats all i feel like writing for now. im pretty exhausted so maybe when i get my energy back we'll continue.

life is wild. will explain later. maybe

hn39.

alright, it's been somewhat of a crazy two weeks or so, and it's difficult for me to recount everything all at once, but i will do my best. i guess i can start with last week, when i had what i think to be dengue. now usually dengue lasts about 8 days, is a completely miserable fever type disease, and since there is no cure for it, one just has to tough it out. well, i found myself last saturday, or two saturdays ago, with a fever of 102, body aches like you wouldn't believe (that might be why people call it bone breaking disease), chills, and a general feeling of malaise: basically, i wanted to off myself and get it all over with. that lasted two days, after which everything kind of died down to something a little bit more manageable. now, that's what makes me think, maybe it wasn't dengue, but then again it's kind of exciting to come down with a crazy tropical disease, so if anyone asks, well...dengue it is. i spent about a week in bed, and only got up to get my worms. that's right, worms. they're finally here, eating all my coffee pulp, making fertilizer, having sex, and more or less partying at my expense. let's just hope they reproduce fast enough to make me what i planned within a month. otherwise, some collection agency might show up knocking at the cooperative's door.

and that brings me to the real story.

this week i had an experience, or actually a series of experiences, that made me reconsider how i view a little bit of everything. so i guess it all began on tuesday when i rode ruso into the mountains to a little town called petatillos. the village consists of 25 houses spread out over about 5 km, smack dab in the middle of the buffer zone of celaque, a national park. the people there have been living in such a secluded state for about 50 years, ever since one of the founders decided to buy some land in the mountains. i had been there once before to get to know some of the people, but this time i was coming to stay for a few days to begin research for the project that the community is interested in. now, for your knowledge, petatillos has neither electricity nor running water. so they came to me with hopes of getting a micro turbine project along with a water system done in the mountains, in order to get both at once. and of course, i jumped at the idea. how could i not. anyway, upon my arrival, i was led to the humble home of the pastor where we began to make our plans and set up a schedule of what we would be doing for the next three days. what followed were experience upon experience that left me somewhat speechless. let's make a list:

1. honduran farmer guys, regardless of their ages, are capable of scaling any cliff or mountain, in any direction, a thousand times better than i could ever even imagine. we spent half a day exploring the nearby water source and i think i almost died about 8 times. granted, i am in no shape to be running around a mountain with a machete in one hand and a GPS in the other, but it was definitely exciting. i fell about every 50 yards, sometimes ending up face down in some rainforest plant hoping that i had not split some vital part of me with my newly sharpened machete (which i never even used, dumbass). i slipped in the river, almost tumbled down a waterfall, and lost my pen twice. the hondurans, they just laughed and kept telling me to be careful.

2. really poor hondurans appreciate what they have more than anyone i know. and these people are definitely up there on the poor ladder. we're talking, 1 room houses for families of 8. diets that consist of beans, tortilla, and the occasional veggie (although the pastors wife did make me chicken soup for breakfast today when i left, which i think was probably the first time they had eaten chicken in weeks. i was blown away. yeah that's right, for breakfast). no heat, bathrooms, showers, or TV. these people live with almost nothing, and love every minute of it. we spent hours talking about the park, their mountain, what they have, and not once did anyone say that they didn't have enough. in fact, most of them said that they were blessed, and every day thanked god for what they had been given.

3. really poor hondurans are ready to give everything, time, money, effort, everything to improve the livelihoods of their children. if i had done the same survey that i did there in my town, the answers would have been so different. every single person told me they were ready to sacrifice everything for this project. and they meant it. i think.

4. its amazing what people can accomplish with the little resources they have. and although the poverty that these people live in is almost unimaginable, they manage to accomplish great feats every day. for example, even though most of the adults in the town are illiterate, they built a school for their children with their own hands, and now 25 little petatillians spend all day long reading and writing with a teacher who is paid out of the pockets of the parents. they also organized together and are currently building a brand new church (which i'm not sure i approve of since half the people still dont have latrines and have to shit in the woods, but still), and everyone who works on it is doing it for free.

5. the environmental awareness of illiterate poor hondurans is higher than that of more than half of the united states. even though these people, 30 years ago were cutting down the local forests, burning the soil, using extremely harsh agro-chemicals, and more or less destroying the park they were living in, now their attitudes are completely different. we spoke at length about their relationship with the environment and although they don't know how to write the word, they practice conservation with every step they take. only dry dead trees are used for firewood. no one bathes or brings their dead animals to the water source (yeah they used to do that). no one hunts or kills little birds for fun like they do in my town. they have figured out that if they fuck up where they live, they'll have nothing left, and now they are fighting to protect it.

6. ticks, mosquitoes, and other biting insects love white people. or maybe they love jews. or both. or maybe it has nothing to do with that and just has to do with the fact that i'm not from there. regardless, i got eaten, completely, and now am covered with more red bumps than...well, i don't know, make up your own comparison/simile/metaphor/whatever.

7. religion is an interesting thing. i have never like organized religion, nor do i believe in the creation stories that many religions have, but i still think that there still might be something up there. i have prayed, i have blamed "god" for things, and frankly, i could say i'm somewhat spiritual, or something like that. and honduras is having an impact on me in that respect, because well, everyone here is religious. and its hard to maintain a secular opinion when everyone around you is telling you to accept christ. well, dont worry guys, i haven't done that just yet. but i did spend many hours talking to the pastor about god, and whatnot, and i learned quite a bit. it seems that faith is a very powerful thing. and although i don't exactly believe in miracles, i do believe that a people united in their faith can accomplish extraordinary things. but i guess the point of this little factoid is a little different. my experience in petatillos was a novel one because they were more interested in my jew-ness than anything else that i said about religion. because as you may already know, jews are god's chosen people, and when everything goes to shit with the apocalypse, jerusalem will be saved along with all the jews in there. and the people of this town were totally obsessed with the fact that they had a jew among them, a jew who might provide them with water and light. the pastor even made a point of it during his sermon which he asked me to attend, when he spoke for about 30 minutes about jews, and the whole shebang. and the people thanked me. not for coming and working, yeah they thanked me for that at another time, no they thanked me for being a jew. weird huh?

8. going hand in hand with this religion thing, i learned that there is much in the bible that speaks of protection of the environment. maybe not directly, but definitely the topic is covered. and although i had somewhat known this before, i had never had quotes. and now i do. now i want to get more, and use this as a means to an end. if i talk to farmers who wash their pesticide bottles in the rivers, i can now use the bible to maybe make them reconsider their actions. how can you love your fellow man as you love yourself, if you're making him drink round-up? (i know thats not a direct quote but since i learned it in spanish, well...)

ok, for now that's it. i will add more, if i think of anything else.

hn38.

i think the hardest thing so far about the whole peace corps experience is that little credit is ever given to the volunteers. anyone who's called licenciado here in honduras, or someone who has graduated from university, is talked to with a huge amount of respect. these people are employed as tecnico's, people who come and advise others, almost like consultants. but when we come in, as voluntarios, even though we might all have advanced degrees (in some cases even a master's), people talk to us in a whole different way. its as if with the title "volunteer" we are clueless, with absolutely nothing to offer. but then, why would we be sent here in the first place? what purpose do we serve? and i know, many of you are probably thinking, dima maybe you're looking at this all wrong. maybe its because of your compulsion to always be right and show off your smartness, that's making you act this way. and yes, that very well may be possible. and if so, forgive me, but i think this goes deeper. i think, because i look young, and am not from here, i am considered just some gringo who's trying to get things done but has no real capacity to do so. and you know what, that's just not fair. just because i don't know all the things honduran farmers grow up with, doesn't mean i'm incapable of everything. it definitely doesn't mean that i grew up in a box, with everything handed to me. i have so many fellow volunteer friends that want to print business cards that say licenciado just so that their opinions begin to matter. and what's worse, when our suggestions are logical, scientifically based, and constructive, they are frequently thrown out based on what some other licenciado said a while back, not taking into account that we are equally qualified to make such statements. and whats even worse, those that come to communities as tecnicos often promote technology or projects produced by their companies just to make a sale, instead of thinking about the community, and so their opinions are naturally biased. the thing is, i know i act like a know-it-all, and i need to work on that, but come on, give me some room to function. why ask for my help to organize a project and then tell me what i should do point by point. if you know how to do it, do it. don't tell me how to do my job. and if i need help, i'll ask. and i will always respect your opinion. but its hard to respect someone's ideas when yours dont get the same. thats all i got for now.

hn37.

there's this guy in my community who i always thought to be a little off, in the head that is. i've chatted with him a few times in jalons, at the cooperative, and he never really said anything more than observational statements, and in a way that made me always tend to walk away slowly, nodding in agreement. but after a few times i realized that the dude just never had a real education, and that at least his intentions were good. and today, well he totally gave me a whole new respect for mankind and honduran campesinos. so i get out of this pickup truck at the entrance to my town, which is about 2 k from my house uphill, and it turns out that the guy, let's call him bob, bob was riding in the front. and so we're walking, and i'm thinking, man this is going to be "fun" [that's sarcasm by the way]. we are walking down the hill when we pass this piece of wood in the middle of the road. i don't think anything of it, but bob stops, picks it up, and throws it into the gulley on the side of the road. without a word he continues walking, and i think, well he's considerate. and then he says:

-man, it's really important to be intelligent right?

-sure, i say, of course (i didn't really know where this conversation was going, so i just smiled and nodded).

-because, not anyone would have picked up that piece of wood, and someone could have gotten really hurt. imagine riding on a motorcycle with your amiguito and all of a sudden you slam into that? and some people just dont think about that kind of stuff

i didn't know what to say. i hadn't even thought of that. and here's this guy, who only finished 3rd grade, can't read or write, and he's more socially responsible than i am. it made me feel awesome, and humble at the same time. the funny thing is that the guy recognized that intelligence was the key, that it was something worthy. most people here spit on education, they leave as soon as they can. of the 9 grades available, many only go to 6. and altough, in some cases its for good reason, especially since your family is starving and you're the only one around who can work, but for many it just doesn't hold any appeal. with my amiguito (that's what he calls me, even though he knows my name) bob, i'm pretty sure it was a necessity, so i respect him for it, even though he's a little behind. but although his demeanor does not exhude genius, i can proudly say that i think bob is smarter than me. and i have a bachelors. what do you say to that, rutgers university?

part 2: evangelical wedding

so i was invited this saturday to my cousins huge evangelical wedding, to be held in corquin at the experimental center of IHCAFE (they have two big conference halls, so...) anyway, i was called early saturday to come help out and receive the gifts for the family, which made me feel pretty damn integrated. at around 6pm, when the wedding was supposed to start, i was standing guard by the present cart, waving people into the hall and awaiting the ceremony. only problem is, punctuality is not a cultural norm here, so when the wedding was supposed to start at 6 30 at the latest, it was 7 30 when finally everyone took their seats. except for me. i made a discovery in my attempts to help that kinda blew my mind. so for a wedding of about 150 people, the family had not hired anyone to serve drinks or food. all they did was call one of the aunts and put her in charge of everything. now I dont know if any of you have experience with banquets, but doing that alone (well, not exactly alone, she had 1 assistant, and another aunt came to help) or even in a group of 3, not possible. so i was upstairs pouring champagne into 150 glasses (which is weird because evangelicals don't drink, so that all went to waste), and setting up the tables when the bride and groom were saying their vows. and when the people took their seats, i served them their food. i think i brought plates to def over 100 people. no serving trays, nothing. 3 plates at a time. running around like an idiot. and the people talking to me like a waiter. do i look like a fucking waiter (to be honest, i was kinda dressed like one, so it could have been confusing, but come on!?) i guess its all part of being a volunteer. :p. however, now, my aunts are all absolutely in love with me, i don't think they've seen many gringos do what i did last night. hooray for non traditional integration techniques, take notes all you volunteers that read this. lol.