Brigades, Seattle, and the Move

So I have been pretty terrible about writing on my blog the past couple of months. It is such a time commitment to make myself sit down and write about what’s been going on, especially when I spend many days in front of my computer at the office.

The past two months have been really busy and I have been all over the place. At the end of August, I spent some time on brigades. I had the opportunity to go on one day of a medical brigade for the first time.

The group was from Loyola University of Chicago and their doctor was a volunteer doctor who currently lives in Haiti. They found him through some doctor’s association that paid for his trip. The students said that they did not realize he was a doctor when they picked him up at the airport because he was standing in a corner singing and dancing with his headphones and wasn’t wearing shoes. He’s definitely not your typical doctor. He went to medical school in Arkansas. After graduating, he decided not to do his residency in the states and went to Haiti to help people following the earthquake. He has been there for a over a year living in a clinic and has learned criole. I had the opportunity to translate for him and the students at the diagnosis station of the medical brigade.

During a medical brigade, the students and GB coordinators set up medical clinics in various communities with several stations, one is triage, one is a diagnosis, dental, pharmacy, and the “charla” which is the education aspect which teaches people basic health and hygiene concepts. I had never translated in a medical setting before, so I learned a lot of different medical vocabulary.

The community clinic that day of the brigade was in Pajarillos, which is one of the communities my program, microfinance works in. The members of the Caja Rural were all there helping with the medical brigade. Most of them are members of the Basic Sanitation Committee (in Spanish is called the CSB/comite de sanitacion basica), which is a group of leaders in the communities that Global Brigades Water and Public Health team train to be representatives in their community for educating others on human health. The CSB was all there with the polos GB had made for them helping with the brigade. It was so great to see them working together alongside our staff and students to help their community.

After the clinic was done for the day, Alex , the microfinance technician came and we had a meeting with the Caja Rural about their grain purchase from the community.

As I had mentioned in an earlier entry, one of the problems in the communities is that they have to sell their crops through an intermediary called the coyote. The coyote gives them a very low price on their crops. In Pajarillos, the Caja has accrued enough capital to be able to use their own money to purchase corn directly from community members for a fair price, thus bypassing the coyote. Pajarillos in particular has a meeting house in the center of town that was built by community members and students from the states. They have also purchased the land next to the house where they are building a pavilion like structure to be able to store the corn in what are called silos. Silos are large storage bins that can preserve the corn for 3-4 months. After storing the corn, the Caja can sell it during the off season and get a higher price for it. The money they earn from selling the corn is reinvested back into the Caja and used for other similar community investments or to continue giving out more loans. Its been really interesting not only learning the financial side of my job but also about agriculture, something I did not know much about before.

The last week in August, I went on a Public Health brigade with Northwestern University and Lower Columbia College (a small community college in Washington) in Zurzular, where to my dad’s surprise I sawed, mixed and carried cement, and helped build a concrete floor. During a Public Health Brigade, students build an eco stove, two concrete floors, a water storage unit with a faucet and purified water called a pila, and a latrine (toilet). In order for the families to have their projects in their homes, they are responsible for preparing the home prior and purchasing some of the supplies, such as cement. They are also responsible for paying for 20-25% of the project, which is about $100. This is a lot for a family who may typically live on that amount in one month. The Cajas Rurales in the communities provide loans for the Public Health projects. The families are able to borrow the money from the Caja and pay it back oer a 6month-1year period. So far the payback rate has been near 100% with a few late payments. The reason for requiring the families to pay this amount is so that they take ownership for the projects. In the past, donating projects was unsuccessful and the families chose not to take care of them.

I really enjoyed the Public Health brigade and felt very useful being able to do the physical labor and also helping translate. The students work alongside local masons, where they are able to complete all 4 projects by the end of 3 days . Its pretty amazing! These projects reduce several health problems that were being seen on medical brigades. The eco stoves have a pipe that force the smoke from the stove to be released outside of the house, which reduces respiratory problems such as asthma and pneumonia. They also do not burn as much wood, about half as much as prior. So, the families spend less time traveling to collect wood every week, only needing to make the 4-5 hr trip once every two weeks. The latrines provide a sanitary way of using the bathroom versus prior to where the families would go in the woods or in the fields. Prior to the Public Health brigades going into a community, water brigades must install the water system. In Zurzular, prior to having a water system, the nurse at the health center reported 10-15 cases of diarrhea in children under 5. Following the completion of the water system, there were none. Fresh water has nearly rid the communities of water related illnesses and also parasites. So the pilas, have a connection to the water system so that they have fresh running water to drink, wash dishes, clothes,etc. Finally, the cement floors are much cleaner and easier to take care of than in the past where most families had dirt floors. The dirt floors also created dust which contributed to respiratory problems and also had bugs which carried chagas disease.

Another aspect of the Public Health Brigade is education. The Northwestern/LCC group was assigned the topic “water and the body” to teach to the elementary students in El Zurzular. They worked first to teach the CSB who then explained the concept to the children. It went relatively well considering it was the first time that the CSB taught a Public Health education lesson. Overall, I really enjoyed the brigade and also was able to talk with students a lot about Public Health’s relationship with Microfinance.

The week after the brigade, I traveled to Seattle for the Global Brigades Student Leadership Conference. The conference was great and I was able to meet some of the students that are coming on microfinance brigades this winter. We had a breakout session where we talked about everything happening with microfinance in Honduras and they asked a lot of really great questions. I had never been to Seattle, which is a beautiful city. On the second of the conference, we took the students on a boat cruise around the harbor which was really great. I also had the chance to meet some of the GB staff that lives in Panama and Ghana. It is so nice to be able to put a face to all of the people that we email and have conference calls with.

Following the conference, I flew home to Ohio to spend the week with my family and work from home. My brother also flew in from Colorado. It was so nice to have the whole family together and be able to see our other relatives. With my dad’s family spreading out all over the US, me being in Honduras, my brother in Colorado, it is going to be more difficult to have everyone together.

Since returning back to Honduras from the states, I have been getting really busy preparing for the upcoming winter brigade season. We also moved to a new house outside of the city. It is another adjustment, as now there are 22 of us living together in a very large main house that has a back apartment with some other bedrooms. Everyday a bus comes to the house to take us to the office and back home. It’s quite humorous seeing 22 gringos get on the bus everyday. I feel like I am back in elementary school.

A man named Kevin and his wife and baby live on the property as well. Kevin takes care of the outside of the house and has been very helpful with the transition. He is only 20 years old and married with a baby, which is pretty common here. Except, most people just have children and are not married. Kevin also has two of the smelliest dogs I have ever met. London, is a Rottweiler, who we call tripod because he has a broken right front paw and he limps around. The other is Stanley, who is a Bassett hound who is constantly crying and barking at us. He is really sweet but so smelly, no one wants to pet him. Tyler, the architecture brigades lead, gave both dogs a bath the other day and now they smell better. These dogs may seem sad but they are actually really lucky, compared to the other skinny stray dogs in Honduras. Most dogs have no homes, are starving, and get kicked for bothering people. Its really terrible..

There are going to be 7 universities coming in the last two weeks of December and first 3 weeks of January for my program, which is double what we had last year. I like being able to correspond directly with the students and also being able to talk with the communities to prepare them for the brigades as well. I have been able to get out to the communities quite a few times to talk with some of the Caja members about preparing education workshops for the brigades. They have given me some great feedback and I will be able to better prepare the students for coming down. We are going to be bringing brigades to a new community called El Canton starting at the end of the February. The men starting the Caja in El Canton are really motivated and wanting to learn and help grow their community economically. I am really excited to work with them over the next year.

We also found out shortly before the conference that El Zurzular, the coffee growing community that I worked in on my first brigade in March is going to start packaging their coffee through a distributor in the northern part of the country and selling it in surrounding communities and potentially in the states. A previous Global Brigades volunteer and student from Marquette University started a non profit called Buena Vida Coffee where they work with local farmers in Honduras to package and export coffee to sell in the states as a fundraisier for Global Brigades students. We hope to be able to make Zurzular coffee one of the brands that they sell.

Zurzular is also going to be getting electricity in January! The local government is working with Global Brigades and the Caja Rural to facilitate the project providing electricity to the health center, new school and the families of the community. The Caja is communicating with families that want electricity and also collecting the initial payment and will also be collecting the monthly electric payments from the families. This is really exciting for this community as they have been isolated for so long.

This last couple of weeks like I said have been busy and also a transition living in a new house. There is not a whole lot to do in Santa Lucia where we now live. The center of town is quaint and safe to walk around which is nice. I am working from a teteria, which is a tea house that has great teas, desserts, and hummus. We are also close to a tourist town called Valle de Angeles, where we take students brigades. Yesterday I went there with some girls because there was “feria” which is a fair. We had some good food, draught beer, and just walked around. It is nice to be able to do things outside of the city and get some fresh air. It has been adjustment in terms of nightlife and transportation but we are starting to figure it out. There are two cars we have to drive on the weekends but only 5 drivers. Figuring out a process for using the cars is difficult but we will eventually come up with a more efficient system. This week I am planning to get a lot done as I am thinking about going to Belize for a 5 day visa renewal with Katie, my new roommate and Nicole, a medical advisor.

Pulhapanzak

I have gotten a little behind on my blog the past couple weeks, so I am going to make this entry kinda short. The past two weeks here have been super busy, as Global Brigades hosted its first Student Leadership Conference of the year in Chicago this weekend. I spent the last two weeks preparing for student workshops and also we had our group advising team training two weeks ago. So far I have been learning a lot and been able to apply a lot of the skills that i learned by being involved with student organizations like SIFE (Students in Free Enterprise), especially when it comes to fundraising.

This weekend, since the majority of the 25 US staff were in the states, 6 of us girls traveled 3 hours north to a quaint town called Peña Blanca where there is a lake called Lago de Yojoa. After a quite comical bus ride filled with about an hour of terrifying Honduran clowns making fun of us for being "gringas" and a man selling natural medicine, we arrived in Peña Blanca.(Yes all sorts of interesting people appear on bus rides in order to make some money or get tips for entertaining you throughout the ride).We stayed at a beautiful finca (farm), which was more like a resort, that was in a tropical forest like setting. Yesterday afternoon, we went to a national park called Pulhapanzak. There are lots of outdoor activities such as zip lining, kayaking, horseback riding,etc. Erin, Christie, Rachel, and I went on a guided tour behind the waterfall. Our guide named Carlos has been hiking behind the falls for most of his life and has been giving tours for over 4 years. He assured us we weren't going to die or get carried away in the current.

Last night, we went to a brewery that is owned by a guy from the states which also is attached to an inn. After waking up so early that morning, it was nice to just talk and have a good meal and great beer. Beer is not the greatest by the can or bottle here. It was refreshing to have beer that actually tastes good.

This morning, we left Peña Blanca by 6:30 and conveniently arrived just in time to the closest town called La Guama to catch a bus back to Tegus. We even were greeted on our bus by a woman with freshly baked pastries stuffed with pineapple. They were a great way to end our trip back to the city.

It's amazing to see the way hundreds of people live and work here just to afford basic necessities to survive. So many men,women, and children live their lives by riding buses from town to town trying to sell baked goods, clothing, or entertainment to passengers. I feel so lucky to have never had to worry about where i would sleep or how I would eat for days on end depending on my daily income. For many people, not even just in Honduras, their life is continuous work. Oftentimes, they are working simply to get by, feeding their families and keeping clothes on their back. They will never have an opportunity to travel, shop for fun, or go out for a nice dinner.

This afternoon, I was able to return to our apartment in Tegus to spend the afternoon cooking with my friends and having more than enough food to feed all of us. We are very lucky to have not only our own families that love and support us but also our new Global Brigades family that we can share this experience with.

My Computer (Non) Disaster

The past couple weeks have been pretty eventful. Two weeks ago, I returned to Tomatin to help Alex with the monitoring report for the agricultural store there. I had told Roberto, the president that I would help him with his English and had planned to spend an hour of the visit doing that. When we arrived at the meeting, 14 members of the Caja were there and wanted to participate in the lesson as well. They actually got a chalk board for me to write on. It was pretty funny since I had never formally taught English before. I taught them basic phrases and words and also some microfinance related vocabulary. They were not as interested in knowing financial terms and began asking me about food. Everyone was more attentive than usual during the class and very appreciative. In addition to teaching English, we were able to get all of the current information and book balances with their agricultural store, which is running perfectly!

As I had mentioned prior, women's involvement can be difficult. In order to increase that involvement, we made a recommendation to the women of Tomatin that they should be in charge of all of the operations with the agricultural store with some supervision from the men. They liked the idea and hopefully next time we return will have more women involved with the store.

Most of the products the communties purchase for their agricultural stores are from the closest larger town but often the products are pretty expensive. Alex found a distributor in Tegucigalpa that sells fertilizers and pesticides much cheaper and has recommended to all of our Cajas that they purchase their products at this distributor. Currently Zurzular and Pajarillos are doing this and Tomatin will do the same. In order for the community members to get to the city, they typically get a ride from a friend has a car to a nearby town where they then take a bus into the city. However, two of the Caja members from Pajarillos rode their bikes down an extremely rocky road from their community to Cantarranas (neighboring city) which is about 2 hours away. Imagine riding a bike 2 hours on a rocky road?! Incredible!
Once they arrived in the city, Alex drove them back to Pajarillos with their products (and their bikes).

This past week was definitely a bit of emotional rollercoaster. I recently started going to an aerobic dance class owned by a man named Carlos who spent some time studying dance in Costa Rica. He and his Canadian girlfriend teach classes that are somewhat like Zumba- a combination of salsa, reggaton, and bachata-typical latin dances. They have classes all day --usually. I started out my day on Tuesday waking up early to get to a dance class at 7 before work started. I had a cab pick me up my apartment and take me there and arrived about 10 minutes before the class was supposed to start. I waited until 7:15 and no one arrived, so I had to call the cab and have him return to pick me up. It was slightly frustrating because I had confirmed with Carlos at the class the night before that there would definitely be a class that morning. He told me when I went to class later in the week, that if they do not have enough people coming they cancel and he usually calls the regular students that attend. However, since he did not have my number he could not call me to notify me. It wasn't a huge deal, but definitely an inconvenience having to pay for a taxi both ways when i could have just woken up an practiced yoga for free on the porch.

After returning to the house, Daniel (who we call D strong because his name is Daniel Truong) one of the staff asked me to go to a cafe to work that day since the power/internet had been pretty inconsistent the past couple days and we were not able to be too productive. So Daniel, Frank, and I went to the French cafe which has a really nice atmosphere, and great internet and food. After spending most of the day inside, i decided to relocate to the patio where Frank and D strong were sitting and didn't bother to tighten the lid to my canteen since i was just moving locations quickly. As soon as I set my computer on the table where they were sitting, i inadvertently placed my canteen near D strong which was unfortunately right next to my computer. D strong moved his hand and accidentally knocked my canteen of water all over my keyboard. The moment the water hit my computer, the screen went black. I convinced myself that since battery doesn't function for longer than 10 minutes without being plugged in, that it had gone black for that reason. After talking with my brother later that evening, he told me that was probably a bad sign.

We immediately left the cafe and returned to the house where I submerged my computer in rice. I left it in our living room in rice for 2 days and since there are always tons of people in and out of that area my computer was decorated with random things, including the tiles from banagrams arranged in different sometimes inappropriate sayings.

However, after a few days, miraculously my computer still turned on! Then Frank and I spent about an hour removing each key of my keyboard and plucking out the rice from underneath with tweezers. Since the incident, I feel that liquids are still out to get my computer. i am currently using the interenet at Denny's, which is surprisingly extremely nice, has great service, bottomless coffee, and pretty good vegetarian options as well. i was holding my cup of coffee trying to keep it away from all hands and potential accidents. One of my friends and GB staff, Jen was sitting next to me and bumped my arms nearly spilling coffee on my computer but just missed. Then, Danny got up from the table and shook it nearly spilling coffee on my computer again. Not to mention, the night before the water disaster, I also spilled tea on the edge of my keyboard. Needless to say, my computer has almost been destroyed several times this week. So i am going to be extra careful until i return home in September for a week. I am considering buying a Mac as this computer does not run as well as I need it to for my job.

Other than my computer incident, this week has been good and productive. Yesterday, I went to Parque Aurora, a really beautiful park about 1/2 hr from Tegus, with Katie, who is the new Research and Evaluation lead for GB. She lived here 2 years ago in a city called Comayagua, which is also a surrounding area of the city. She taught English at a boys home called Horizontes al Futuro, and we went to the park to spend the day with the boys from the home. The home is run by a Spanish monk named Don Goya and they have several volunteers that come from Europe, the US, and Canada. The boys range in ages from 3-21, some are orphans and others have parents but are unable to take care of them. Many of the boys have been through some extremely traumatic experiences where they have been addicted to drugs, been part of a gang, and even killed people. They need so much and it is so sad but at the same time heartwarming to see how happy they were yesterday at the park and their relationships with the volunteers and staff that work for Horizontes.

The park was really nice. It had a pool, horses, a lake with canoes, and ducks roaming around.I played volleyball/soccer with some of the boys and talked with one of the older boys named Hugo. Hugo is 20 and has lived at Horizontes since he was 8 years old. He is really bright and happy despite all that he has been through in his life. He wants to go to college to study computer programing and English. We were talking about music and how that listening to the lyrics in English/Spanish can help you learn the language. I told him that I had a hard time understanding reggaton because it has a lot slang and I said like "caliche", which is what the street-talk/slang is here in Tegus. He told me that he used speak caliche when he was on the streets as a kid, and didn't like to remember those times. I felt bad for mentioning it but at the same relieved that he no longer has to live that life and that he has so many more opportunities living at Horizontes.

After returning home late afternoon yesterday, we had a dinner with our entire US staff of about 25 people. One of our staff, Sam left earlier this morning and we had a nice evening together talking, eating, and watching a video that we had made for her.

This is such an incredible group of people to work with, and everyone has become so close during their time here. Even though it is challenging living with 15 people, I feel very lucky to be surrounded by people with similar interests and the same passion for life, work, and helping others.

The Work Week

This past week I started to notice my work load pick up the most since I have started working with GB. It has been good because I have been getting into a routine. Most mornings I wake up early to do yoga which I am so grateful for. Since I cannot get out too much to walk around during the week, yoga has been the perfect way to start or end my day since I do not need much space to practice. It is also nice because there are few other staff members that also work up early to exercise in the morning and sometimes we will all do yoga together. It is a good way to motivate each other to get moving early.

I also have been eating breakfast everyday, something that I rarely did in college. Usually I was scrambling to get homework done and get my books together and bringing a granola bar or toast with me to class. Its nice to sit down with a group of people in the morning and talking while having breakfast and coffee before starting work.

Michelle, the director of student affairs and also my boss arrived last Thursday, so we have been having several meetings concerning program development and the upcoming student conferences in Chicago and Seattle. I have also been working with the education coordinator to create a curriculum for the education aspect of the Microfinance Brigades.

I was originally supposed to be going to the Chicago conference in August but was informed last Friday that I would be going to Seattle in September instead. I was pretty upset because I had planned to meet my parents there and also visit some friends that I have there. I voiced that the Michelle but since the board ultimately makes the decisions and is paying for me to go, I do not really have a say. I am excited to go to Seattle since I have never been there. I am going to fly to Ohio for a week following to see my family and work from home. So everything always works out in some way.

This past week, like I said was busy. I took on some other tasks outside of my own microfinance program development and advising roles. GB's website and student resource page need lots of updating, so I have been workin on that. I have surprised myself with my ability to make charts and graphs pretty easily in excel and being able to update the website without too many problems. Usually technology challenges me with things like that.

On Thursday, I went to visit the new community called Guaricayan that the Microfinance team is starting a new Caja in. There were about 25 community members that attended our meeting that are interested in being a part of the Caja, about half of them women, which I was pretty excited about.(see *Machismo below) Usually it is difficult to get women involved with the Cajas here because they feel their main role is to work in the home cleaning, cooking, and taking care of their children and husbands. In Guaricayan, we had several women answering questions and excited to become more involved with the Caja. Actually in other countries where microfinance institutions are present, such as India and AFrica, they will only lend to women because women are more financially responsible than men. These institutions have a greater percentage of women who pay back their loans than men. I am interested to see the growth of Guaricayan and how it develops differently than the other Cajas we work with.

Another interesting aspect of GB's microfinance is its relationship with the Public Health (PH) Program, something I did not fully understand before working here. Public Health's brigades work one week in one family's home installing a floor, eco-stove (which creates a pipe that allows smoke to be released outside instead of inside of the house), a pila (pool for washing with a faucet with clean water) and a latrine for waste. Prior to Public Health's involvement, the Water Brigades installs the water systems that allow the families to have clean drinking water. For GB's brigades to work with a family, that family must raise 20% of the money themselves in order to have the students provide the remainder of the funds to do the project. Many family's choose to take a loan from the Caja in order to pay that 20% and then pay it back over an extended period of time.

Normally when we start working in a new community it is in conjunction with PH, like in Guaricayan.PH encouraged Microfinance to get started quickly which we have been , but this past week one of the Honduran staff informed us that PH no longer will be working in Guaricayan. It created some tension and frustration amongst the staff. Since the PH program lead was out of the office last week, we will be meeting with him this week to figure out all of the details.

Overall, the week was productive and fun. There were more staff who ended their contracts this past week and new staff arriving. So everything has been constantly changing and I have been getting to know new people which is fun!



*Machismo is something that exists in all Latin American countries. It refers to men as being "macho" and the dominant gender in society. This is why when you may visit a Latin American country and notice the men cat calling women on the street or just seeing women as inferior. Luckily I have not experienced the cat calling as bad here in Honduras as I did in Argentina. However, in the rural communities men do not feel that women should have the same role in household in terms of making financial and other life changing decisons. After speaking with Hirel and Daisy, who are the two medical students working on GB's Community Health Worker (CHW) program just for the summer, I was told some pretty horrendous stories in reference to machismo. Before I do that, let me briefly explain the CHW program because I feel it is one of the many reasons why this organization is sustainable.

**GB got started only with Medical Brigades, where student groups come to Honduras to set up medical clinics and provide pharmaceuticals and basic medical care. In order to perpetuate the program between brigades, Hirel and Daisy started the CHW program. They trained women in several communities to be able to provide basic nursing care such as vaccines and routine checkups and also to be able to distribute some medicines. Hirel and Daisy have heard so many traumatic life stories from the women they have gotten to know over the years. In reference machismo, nearly all of the women they have trained have been raped or mistreated in some way. One woman gave birth to over 20 children and got pregnant again. With her most child, she had serious complications during labor and needed to go to the hospital. GB staff were present and told the husband that she was going to die if she did not go to the hospital because she was bleeding out and unable to push the baby through. The husband refused to take her to the hospital, so the mother of the woman giving birth stepped in and pulled the baby out. Luckily, after several days of bed rest, this woman recovered, but there are many other women who do not survive a traumatic birth such as this one. Many of the men in the communities see that their wives have been able to manage giving birth to 4-8 children without going to the hospital because they were lucky enough to not have complications. In emergency cases, they still do not see it fit to take their wives to the hospital to receive proper care.

Amapala and some other stuff...

Last weekend, a group of ten of us traveled to Amapala which is about 3 hours south of Tegus on the coast. We got lucky that one of the drivers from GB has his own "busito"or small bus/large van and we all paid $20 to have him drive us there and back. We actually had to be dropped off in Coyolito and take a boat called a lancha from there to get to the island of Amapala. The whole island is actually a volcano, which we intended to hike but no one was ever willing to hike early enough in the morning.

After arriving to the island of Amapala, it took the ten of us about an hour to decide which beach on the island we would stay at. We finally decided on Playa Negra where we stayed at the only hotel on that part of the island. The hotel was pretty nice with a pool and beach access but definitely not the cleanest place I've ever stayed.

That afternoon, we spent at the beach and walked to a small restaurant owned by a family that was pretty much in the sand directly on the beach. There was no menu..the only option they had was a big fish or small fish. Since I do not eat fish, especially with the eyes and skin still attached, I asked the waitress if there was any vegetarian options. She was super nice about it and brought me eggs,beans, and tajaditas-which are plantain chips.(*see Vegetarianism below)

It was incredible to be sitting right on the beach and having the option to swim in the ocean while waiting for our food. Even the chickens that most likely they use for food and eggs were wandering freely in the sand. The little chicks were so cute! As you can see in the photos...

After a day in the sun, our group ventured into the center of town to find a place for dinner. We ended up at a fried chicken place, where I resorted to the only vegetarian option of french fries. After dinner, just a few of us ventured to the only club in downtown Amapala, Hey Mister. There was a really great mix of music playing throughout the night and we actually met some French Canadians who were living nearby working in a community. I attempted to talk with two guys but there was quite a language barrier. The little Spanish they knew was difficult to understand with their accent and then they would occasionally say some words in English and then in French. However, they were all very nice and it was kind of fun attempting to decipher what each other were saying in three different languages.

The second day was pretty much just a beach day. We ventured to another beach called Playa Grande where we again ate at a restaurant that only had fish or shrimp. The woman who was our waitress and also a cook offered to make me beans rice tajaditas and avocados. While we waited nearly two hours for our food, we swam in the ocean. I played catch using a coconut with the little boy who's parents owned the restaurant.

Something I have enjoyed living in Tegus and also during my first trip out of the city, is that I do not feel like a tourist. Since Amapala and Tegus are not marked top tourist destinations, I have felt very much a part of the local culture-with the exception that everyone stares at me when I go places-as I cannot blend in at all. In Buenos Aires, I was able to blend in much easier. After I told one of the GB staff that I learned Spanish in Argentina, he thought that I was from there. This made me feel pretty good about my Spanish.

Sunday night, we all hung out at the hotel and attempted to get snacks or food of some sort but there was literally nothing so we just finished off the little food we had brought. Monday morning we woke up early to catch a few hours at the beach and then headed back to meet our driver in Coyolito.

Since it was 4th of July, we were very lucky to have the day off. So when we returned back to Tegus around 2:30 we made typical 4th of July food and grilled on the roof of the apartment. I made black bean burgers for myself and Alex, who is the other vegetarian in the house. Unfortunately it rained as soon as we moved all of the food upstairs. Being the rainy season, that was expected, so we put up a tarp and ate underneath it.

The rest of the week was pretty busy with meetings and office work. My boss, Michelle arrived on Thursday as well as two other advisors. So we are working on training a little bit this week and getting to know each other. This weekend a bunch of the staff as well as some Honduran friends and staff went out for one of the old advisors' "despedida"-farewell/goodbye. We went a place called El Patio which was a karaoke bar...pretty entertaining.

Yesterday afternoon, Fabi, who is the girlfriend of the HR director/Program Lead for Water Brigades, Ben, had us over for lunch. Her mom made sopa de mariscos-seafood soup. She was afraid to make something vegetarian for me,so she said to me "this is your home" and opened the fridge and allowed me to make my own food.I wasn't really expecting because the day before she told me she would make something vegetarian. I can understand that vegetarian food is pretty uncommon here, so I was fine making my own food. Next time, i will make a dish to bring and share it with everyone.

Today, Danny, the microfinance program lead, the new medical advisor, Nicole, and I ventured to the American school to play ultimate frisbee with some people from the US Embassy. We arrived there and the security guard let us in once we told him why were there, but there was no one there playing frisbee. We ended up walking around the school which was really nice and in a pretty cool neighborhood. Once we were leaving, the guard then proceeded to tell us that they played this morning. Why he didn't tell us that when we got there, I'm not really sure.

This week should be good. Two medical students, Hirel and Daisy, that are here for the summer, are going to take me to a Honduran vegetarian place. FINALLY!



*Vegetarianism doesn't really exist here in Honduras. So I usually have to explain that I do not eat any meat-including chicken and fish. When I visited Tomatin a couple of weeks ago, the wives of the Caja members wanted to serve Alex, my co worker and I lunch -which included fish.I was going to accept whatever they served us because I would have felt rude to refuse to eat something that they had to work so hard to prepare. However, Alex interjected and told Roberto, the Caja president that I was vegetarian and didn't eat fish. They women were so sweet and offered to make me beans and eggs. When I returned the second time they remembered that I didn't eat meat and again offered us lunch and made me fried yuca. Yuca is a potato-like vegetable and is sooo delicious! Its so amazing to me that the people in Tomatin who are definitely one of the poorer communities we visit and yet are so willing to offer us a food. Explaining to Roberto that I was vegetarian partially for moral reasons was somewhat difficult because I know that they do not mistreat the animals they eat in the communities like they do on factory farms in the US.

So I have been here in Tegucigalpa, Honduras for just over two weeks now. The first couple pictures that I have included are the view from the patio on the second floor of the apartment I live in. We live across from a convent which is sometimes comforting to know due to the somewhat dangerous part of the city which we live in. However, don't freak out the apartment is completely gated and safe. You just have to be careful walking the half block to get a taxi, just like most cities. My first two weeks have been good so far but always easy. Living in a house with about 14 other people whom I work with can be difficult, especially when everyone tries to cook meals at the same time. The office is located on the first floor of the apartment where we have the option to work from our computers, but generally everyone spreads out throughout the house. Global Brigades (GB) is going to be moving us to most likely just outside of Tegucigalpa, where we will hopefully be living in 2-3 separate houses, making it a little easier to not be on top of each other.

Work has been really great so far, and I'm learning alot. For those of you who do not know, I am a program advisor for the Microfinance team. Take a look at what we do. I just recently updated the projects section..
. Global Brigades brings down students to Panama, Ghana, and Honduras from all over the states and even Europe to do sustainable development projects including: Water, Public Health, Medical, Dental, Environmental, Business, Architecture, and Microfinance.

The Microfinance Brigagdes (MFB) work with the community bank, or Caja Rural. GB seeks out leaders within rural communities in Honduras that are trained to operate the Caja's daily operations such as accounting/book keeping, planning community meetings, and maintaining an agricultural store. Since the communities rely heavily on agriculture, the Cajas in all of our communities have opened the ag stores where community members can purchase fertilizer and herbicides without having to travel to the nearest town (can be 2-3 hours away). If that person doesn't have the money to purchase the goods during planting season, they can out a loan from the ag store and pay it back following the harvest season.

During a brigade, students visit families within different communities and discover their personal aspirations, financial background, and knowledge of the Caja. At the end of the week, the students a party/meeting where they promote the Caja and discuss who they are going to allocate their Community Investment Fund (CIF), which is $100 of each students program fee. Students can do a variety of things with their CIF such as allocate it for loans, individual businesses, or savings accounts.

Since there are no brigades for microfinance this summer, I am working with Danny, the program director and Alex, one of the Honduran staff who is our driver and also a financial specialist. I have visited three of our communities-El Zurzular, Tomatin, and Pajarillos which all have very different Cajas. The first visits we were conducting monitoring reports to discover their current loan circulation, savings balances,etc. You can view all of the documents I am about talk about on the Projects section of the link I included.

One of the first photos of me is with the Caja members in El Zurzular.
The following are from Tomatin and Pajarillos. Right now we are working to create a database of community members to find out their current income and spending and their area of work. This way we know which students to send to homes during brigades. We are also working on doing spotlight interviews with community members who have possibly benefited from the Caja or plan to join. The advantages of the Caja are that they have shares and receive dividends at the end of the year and they also get a lower interest on loans. In some communities, the Cajas have increased membership immensely like in Zurzular but have accumulated little in savings. But in Tomatin, they have less members but a great increase in savings.

So far, I am learning a lot in terms of Spanish finance related vocabulary and loving visiting the communities. I still haven't corresponded much with students since its summer and there also aren't any MFBs until December.

This past weekend, I hiked with some of the staff to a waterfall outside of the city. As you can see by the pictures it was beautiful!

THis weekend, we are going to the beach in Amapala which is about 3 hrs south of "Tegus" since we have 4th of July off. It will be awesome and will have more to say after that!