Preaching, teaching and beaching

Nearly two weeks after arriving in Honduras we're beginning to feel pretty settled in, although every day we still find ourselves saying "I can't believe we're actually here" and it's weirder still knowing that we're not leaving anytime soon.   We've written bucket lists for where we want to travel to in Central America in the year and also everything we want to achieve, ranging from celebrating Robbie Burns day with the children at Miqueas to learning to cook Honduran meals to finding out about the politics and history of the country.

As much as I want to keep these posts short, there is so much to write about so here's some of the more interesting events of this week-

1.Last Sunday, Innes, Gaby and I attended church with Melody and Jacob and the older children, which is something at home I have never done. 97% of the Honduran population are Roman Catholic and Christianity plays a large part in people's lives here. We were made to feel very welcome and enjoyed the hymns and service in Spanish, although as the service focussed on the Christian definition of marriage it certainly contrasted with many of mine and Innes's own beliefs and with what is considered normal in British society. Our eyes had been opened.

2. We also went into San Pedro Sula with Melody and Jacob to do a big food shop at the Honduran version of Costco - shopping for 40 is no walk in the park. What we saw of the city was very, very, very American with a lot of fast food chains, big malls and shops. In fact I didn't like the city very much and it felt weird being in what was pretty much identical to our Costco shopping amongst the middle class people when a high number of Hondurans live below the poverty line of $2 US dollars a day.

3. On Thursday morning we taught our first classes at the local school and it was a great success! Although the schools are required by Honduran law to teach a lesson of English a week to all the children, this school has never been able to do so as there are a lack of teachers and as a result none of the teachers or pupils knew a word of our language. Communication-wise this provided an interesting challenge to us! However when planning the lessons we had prepared some spanish phrases so we got by ok. I am teaching the 1st-3rd grade classes and we began with head, shoulders, knees and toes and related activities. Despite preparing for the worst with class rules and discipline methods all the children were excellently well behaved and seeing the smiles on their face when they showed me their work or singing the songs was really rewarding. It felt really good to be making a difference and if these children only learn a small amount of english with one lesson a week for a year, it may give them an important head-start when applying for jobs in a country where a knowledge of english in increasingly desired by employers. One thing for sure is that we will really look forward to our mornings at the school due to the inspiring commitment and eagerness the children show to learn!

4. On friday, Innes and I carried out our first activities with the youngest group of children at Miqueas 6.8, aged 2-5 and even if it was only duck, duck, goose, ball games and making paper chains of people we felt pretty proud as with all children this age, their attention spans are extremely short. The children here are so much fun to work with and we're looking forward to starting our proper schedules tomorrow. We also took part in the singing session which takes place each week with all the children, Tia's and the parents and Innes and I felt very moved as all the children sang their hearts out to the lively Spanish Christian songs. I've also really enjoyed being able to play football with the older boys and am hoping to do some proper training with them at the football pitch later on in the year.

5. Yesterday we took our first proper day trip in Honduras to Tela, a town on the Carribean coast, which is 1 hour from here on the local bus. This cost 35 lempiras each way (£1 get in!) and if I thought journeys on the 201 seemed boring before, they've paled even further in comparison with this route. We travelled through the mountains with stunning views, dangerous over-taking, watching people ride by in the back of pick-up trucks and seeing vans piled high with fruits we've never seen before. Travelling by local transport felt both "wow how adventurous" and also as if it was a completely normal thing to do. In Tela we met Ellena and Jessie, two of the Project Trusters who are working at a school there and it was great to hear about everything they've been up to so far and to get shown around the town and the beach. The beach was gorgeous, the sea was warm and the sky was blue. Palm trees and small restaurants with hammocks lined the top of the beach, it felt truly exotic! Spanish music was playing whilst we sunbathed (a mistake, I got badly sunburned) and we also walked by lots of stalls selling cool jewellery. It was particularly nice that everyone around was locals, I think the vibe would have been very different it was full of tourists. I think it's safe to say we'll spend a lot of our weekends here!

6. This afternoon we went across to see the little house that Innes, Gaby and I will move into in September. We love Melody and Jacob's company but are also looking forward to having a garden and our own kitchen. We're hoping to get hammocks to hang outside, chickens (eggs are one of our main sources of protein since meat here is expensive) and Gaby wants to build an outside oven that all the locals have for us to cook baleadas (tortillas) and pizza on. The previous volunteers here planted pepper plants and herbs which is cool and there is an avocado tree in the garden and a tree with weird green fruits like oranges. The garden is currently weeds, weeds and more weeds so this is another big project to fill our time!

I think this pretty much sums up the main events of this week! Hope everyone at home is well and good luck to all my friends starting uni soon!