My room with my host family is almost built. I'm so ready to move in!! It been two months since I've been here and I'd really like to start getting to know my host family! I've been a bit frustrated but have gone to visit with her a number of times. It seems in this culture you just drop in on people. I dropped in a couple of days ago and I brought her some green salsa to show her that I am serious about wanting to bless her family even if I'm not living there. It has been difficult for her to built this room because the rain has been tremendous. It has taken a lot of patience and trust throughout this whole process. I'm learning that many things in life take great patience. The whole sense of Honduran time here has helped me live more in the moment in many positive ways. I usually know that if someone comes over its going mean that we are going to talk until there's not much else to say and we are going to make sure everyone is ready and relaxed before we go do something. Its been different traveling every place I go as a group and changed my sense of independence a bit. I am getting to know many of the Honduran locals and have received special encouragement for my morning runs! Haha.
Its still raining today and it has caused a lot of damage in Honduras. Many bridges are washed out and even the highway to Tegucigalpa caved in. Its pretty scary traveling on some of the buses at times. I was just reading that the Honduran government declared this time a national emergency because 11 people have died, and over 130,000 have been affected by the flooding. Many people are being evacuated in small farming communities, which is devastating because their lives are being uprooted. Also, one of my friends here who attends a local university talked about some of her fellow classmates having nothing because their house was completely flooded. And the rains just don't stop. I heard that we are heading into the dry season but so many people are saying it is uncharacteristically rainy this year. There was also an avalanch in the deparment of Copan which ended up blocking the Coyol River and destroying many houses. Check out http://www.hondurasnews.com/.
Also, there is a presidential election coming up in Novemeber sometime. When I've been in Teguc, there have been various political groups rallying. I don't hear much since I hardly get a paper and no one around Nueva Esperanza seems to care. Here in Nueva Esperanza, the houses have been without running water for 3 months. They finally just had a meeting to get enough money to pay for someone to drill for water. It has taken a lot of community organizing and many people are still unhappy and unable to afford it. However, now that the rainy season is ending people are nervous because they won't be able to use rain water anymore. Hopefully, they will get this issue fixed because the orphanage had been supplying many people with water and we can't afford to do that any more. Water is such a scarce but vital resource. It has been frusterating to be without showers many times and just suddenly have the water be off. Dishes just pile in the sinks and I try to avoid using the bathroom at home. But the tiendas or pulperias (small local stores) carry lots of bottled water to do the important stuff, like keep hydrated and brush your teeth. I keep telling myself its like camp or going hiking for an extended period of time!
I have been enjoying tutoring and teaching physical education in the afternoons. The kids are great and I'm learning to know them more. Many of them have anger management issues and we are implementing a star-system, where they receive rewards if they have behaved. Getting along with co-workers has its challenges, but I am learning to work with strong personalities better.
Please pray for the flooding situation here. It's crazy how much water can do and its so frusterating to see houses and whole roads taken out. At the same time, also pray for the water situation in Nueva Esperanza and that people can work together to solve this situation that will become pretty important soon.
I found a bit of inspiration from Oriah Mountain Dreamer and I wanted to share it with you all. Her work is called The Dance.
"I have sent you my invitation, the note inscribed on the palm of my hand by the fire of living. Don't jump up and shout, "Yes, this is what I want! Let's do it!"
Just stand up quietly and dance with me.
Show me how you follow your deepest desires, spiralling down into the ache within the ache.
And I will show you how I reach inward and open outward to feel the kiss of the Mystery, sweet lips on my own, everyday.
Don't tell me you want to hold the whole world in your heart.
Show me how you turn away from making another wrong without abandoning yourself when you are hurt and afraid of being unloved.
Tell me a story of who you are, And see who I am in the stories I am living.
And together we will remember that each of us always has a choice.
Don't tell me how wonderful things will be . . . some day.
Show me you can risk being completely at peace, truly OK with the way things are right now in this moment, and again in the next and the next and the next. . . I have heard enough warrior stories of heroic daring.
Tell me how you crumble when you hit the wall, the place you cannot go beyond by the strength of your own will.
What carries you to the other side of that wall, to the fragile beauty of your own humanness? And after we have shown each other how we have set and kept the clear, healthy boundaries that help us live side by side with each other, let us risk remembering that we never stop silently loving those we once loved out loud.
Take me to the places on the earth that teach you how to dance, the places where you can risk letting the world break your heart.
And I will take you to the places where the earth beneath my feet and the stars overhead make my heart whole again and again.
Show me how you take care of business without letting business determine who you are.
When the children are fed but still the voices within and around us shout that soul's desires have too high a price, let us remind each other that it is never about the money.
Show me how you offer to your people and the world the stories and the songs you want our children's children to remember, and I will show you how I struggle not to change the world, but to love it.
Sit beside me in long moments of shared solitude, knowing both our absolute aloneness and our undeniable belonging.
Dance with me in the silence and in the sound of small daily words, holding neither against me at the end of the day.
And when the sound of all the declarations of our sincerest intentions has died away on the wind, dance with me in the infinite pause before the next great inhale of the breath that is breathing us all into being, not filling the emptiness from the outside or from within.
Don't say, "Yes!" Just take my hand and dance with me.
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