S.A.G.

S.A.G.= Student Annual Gathering

This is where I was for an entire week. Last Tuesday (the 24^th) at 4:30 AM we packed up all of our 7^th-10^th graders on a big yellow bus and headed towards the capital, Tegucigalpa. Every single year, all the Abundant Life Schools (there are 6 of the schools, all in different cities) meet together to have competitions against one another. I was brought along as a chaperone for all the girls, and I also coach the volleyball girls.

4:30 is too early to get on a bus and drive through the mountains. By the time we had reached paved roads, three of the students had thrown up into plastic bags; I was swallowing hard forcing myself to not ask for a bag myself. Once we were on the paved roads it wasn’t so horrible. All the students except for the 7^th graders have been to S.A.G. before, so they weren’t too crazy!

I was really looking forward to seeing the dynamic of all the other students from the different schools. With most of our students coming from low-income households and being on scholarship to study, I was curious to see what the other schools were going to be like. Our school is unique, the other schools do not have as many, if any, students who are on scholarships.  

Once we reached Tegucigalpa at 11:30, S.A.G. started right away at the Abundant Life School. The event on Tuesday afternoon was the girls and boys basketball tournament. Coming from Northwest Iowa, I know what good basketball looks like….and this was not it. A week before we left for S.A.G. I played basketball with our best girl player and a couple of the boys. I felt like the biggest champion in my life; they thought I had such skill in basketball. All the while I kept remembering I didn’t even make the freshman basketball team! This can give you just a little preview of what their games were like. But to their credit, basketball is not an important sport in Honduras, unlike futball. I thought our girls tried their best and I was proud of their hard work!

While watching the girls play basketball I watched all the other schools arrive at the Teguc school. It was so interesting. The first thing I noticed is that everyone was so HUGE! All the students were bigger built, and they had TALL students. Students were as tall or even TALLER than me! This is a rarity; I am taller than every single one of our secondary students. Jake explained to me that our students were all from Lenkin Indian descent, so that is why they are so small.

That evening we had the opening program for S.A.G. The first night was also the singing competition. Before the opening program started, I helped my two girls get dressed and ready to sing. I helped them put on their make-up. I thought I was putting on a normal amount of make-up, in a pretty normal way. They looked in the mirror and gasped, “Wow, Miss. How did you learn how to do this?! Wow, I look so beautiful!” People in La Union do not wear make-up, this was not a normal, everyday look for them. I was happy to make them feel all made-up for the occasion.

It was interesting to listen to the singing competition. Whenever a school had one of their contestants enter the stage ONLY that school was cheering them on. The school you were from never cheered for anyone else. Maybe if they were really talented they got a few claps from different schools, but that was about it. A little preview of how the entire week would be.

After the program was over we got back on our bus and headed towards the camp where we were staying for the week. But of course, nothing in Honduras goes according to plan. Our students were hungry and wanted to stop at McDonalds to eat, so we did. At this point it was 10:30 and we had been up since 4 in the morning. We didn’t arrive to our camp until after 11:00. All of our girls stayed in one huge room. It was a large cinder-block cell. There were metal bunk beds 3-high with one thin mattress. The girls went to bed fairly quickly, they were tired from our long day!

I slept well, considering it felt like I was sleeping on a block of wood. I couldn’t believe my ears when the first alarms started going off at 4:00 AM. I couldn’t figure out if this was for real…but it was. My girls started taking showers and getting ready!!! And of course each one had an initial scream when they stepped in the shower because it was so ice cold. At 5:30 one of my girls shook me and said, “Miss, you need to get up and start getting ready!!” I don’t know what was sadder: that they had to wake me up and tell me, the chaperon, to start getting ready, or that they started getting ready at 4 and we didn’t need to leave until 6:30. It is beyond me how it can take you over two hours to get ready!! I got up at 5:30 and was ready before 6. After the first day they realized I didn’t need to be woken up early haha. 

Wednesday morning we spent at the school. We watched a physical competition; boys did push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, etc. Also there was a basketball shootout for boys and girls. The best event that morning was the academic competition. Each school had a team of 4 people. They all sat up on the stage around a table, and each table had a button with a light bulb. The judges asked questions and the team who hit their button first could answer the question. I know our students were so nervous, but they did really good! I was so proud of them. They ended up getting third place. The Teguc school of course got first place. This was also a reoccurring theme throughout the week.

Before lunch I was talking with one of the American Teguc teachers and he told me the secondary students haven’t had class for the last two weeks. Every day for the past two weeks they have been practicing for S.A.G……. hmmm well no wonder they were winning every single event!! How can you even compete against that?

After lunch all the schools drove to the Honduran Olympic track. It was amazing how horrible of shape the track was in, my elementary track was nicer than this. Nonetheless it was still a track, still able to run on it! And run my students did. They placed first in almost every single running event of that day! If they didn’t place first, they got second. La Union dominated every single event! I was such a proud teacher. Having small, fit students really helped us take the win!

Late that afternoon all the schools drove to the camp in the mountains and the girls from Tegucigalpa moved into our room. Our girls warned me about the attitude the girls had from Teguc, but nothing could have prepared me for how they acted. One of the Tegus girls looked at me with disbelief and said, “Ella es la maestra?!” Which means, “She’s the teacher?!” My girls quickly advised me to ignore everything they said. Well, if you know me at all, you know I have problems keeping quiet when someone is offending me. But I bit my tongue.

We stayed at the camp from Wednesday afternoon until Saturday afternoon. During those few days there were multiple competitions. There was a Sudoku challenge, current events cross word, origami contest, timed rubik’s cube race, futbalito (futball on a basketball court with a smaller ball), comedy night, battle of the bands, spelling bee, Bible verse trivia, speeches, I could go on and on. There were so many different and unique events! What amazed me more is that there were students who excelled in each of these categories! I was blown away by all the talent I saw this past week.

On Thursday afternoon we had our volleyball tournament. It didn’t go as well as I planned. I had a great rotation set up that we practiced over and over, with one of my players being a libero.  Just as our first game was about to start I told the judge which number my libero was. As the whistle was blowing for the game to begin she informed me, “She doesn’t have a different uniform, she can’t play libero.” What?? Excuse me?? I totally forgot the libero has to wear a different shirt, and since this is Honduras, I didn’t realize they would be so strict about the rules. So my libero had to play all the way around. Once my girls realized the libero couldn’t rotate out they got really nervous and didn’t know what to do. I felt so bad for them, I really felt like I let the team down. I was disappointed in myself as a coach. We lost the first game 15-5 and lost the second game 15-11. After that we were out; a little bit of a bummer. I really do think these girls can do well in volleyball. Our school also only has up to the 10^th grade since it’s newer, so the other schools have older girls who have been playing for longer. I know my girls will continue to improve, and next year I know they will do even better!

My favorite event to watch of the week was boys and girls futball. It is absolutely amazing to see what they can do with a futball; I was speechless while watching them. This is definitely a sport that they all naturally excel at. It is funny, because to me basketball or volleyball comes natural but if you give me a futball I’ll embarrass myself. That is not the case with my students!! The boys sadly lost their first game, but our girls made it to the championship against Teguc. The game ended with a tie 3-3, so there was a shootout. Almost 20 girls participated in the shootout until someone messed up, which happened to be our girls. They were pretty bummed to lose, but they still got second. Once again, they are a young team and they can only go up from here!

The biggest drama over the entire week was the breakfast, lunch, and dinner line. Students would budge in front of other students, which caused some people to stand in line for an unnecessary long period of time. The other American teachers and I decided to do something about this “budging issue”. We monitored the line; any student who budged was sent to the waaaaaaaaaay back. You would not even believe the kind of attitude I received from students!!!  Some students laughed at me directly in my face. Some students told me “No, I’m not going to move, sorry.” Some students rolled their eyes, turned their backs and kept standing there. Other’s who I knew spoke fluent English only would respond to me in Spanish. I was in such disbelief at how much disrespect all of the students carried with them. You can about imagine how much attitude I let them give me until I laid it into them. At some points I literally had to dig my nails in some boys’ arms to get them to move out of the line. No joke, 2 minutes later they would be budging again. By the end of the week I was sick of patrolling the lunch line, sick of disrespectful students, and sick of being looked at as the strict teacher.

But I have to say, my La Union students had such an amazing attitude the entire week. Every teacher from other schools commented on how respectful and nice all of our students were. I was so proud of how well behaved all of them were! As I chaperoned the girls throughout the week, I was blown away by all of their maturity. I kept remembering when I was that age, and I wouldn’t have come even close to how mature all of our girls are. Each of them were so responsible, so caring, and so aware of the big picture of S.A.G. The reason for their awesome behavior is because of their amazing relationship they have with Jesus Christ. I was taken aback at how strong their faith was! It was refreshing to see such young girls so certain about their faith, and to have a personal relationship with Him. I felt honored to be their chaperone for the week!

And once again, I could not be more thankful as to where I am this year. Out of this whole world, La Union is the only place I would want to be. God has given me this amazing, life-changing experience. I have a deep love for all of my 3^rd graders, and after this week I have bonded with secondary students. I know when I go back to the United States I will meet special people, and I will have love for all of my future students. But I also know all of these students here in La Union will forever have a special place in my heart.

That is why, it seems impossible for me to say goodbye to everyone in just 40 days. I can’t imagine my life without them.  They have made such an impact on how I live, and I hope this stays with me as I go back to the United States. As most of you know, I am not coming back here next year. After a LOT of prayer, I felt as though God has other plans for me! It turns out he did. I accepted a Specialist position with Hanford Christian in California. This is bittersweet, I’m obviously more than excited to move there and start my new job, but I’m also going to have a difficult time leaving this special place. I am trying to give my students as much love and knowledge as possible with the time that I have left. My students keep asking, “When are you coming back??” and I truly hope it will be soon. I promised myself I need to see these children’s faces again, there too special not to! Just see for yourself.. 

Craziness!! 

So many reasons to smile :) 

What a stud... 

Happy Birthday Jicxon! 

EXCITED birthday girls! 

We made monsters for art one day.. "Cry Girl"

Pictures

Here are some pictures from my family's visit, El Salvador, and days at school 

Megan teaching my class

Outside my house

Out to eat with my family in Roatan

                                                                     Crazy students!

On a hike with my students

Gorgeous view of La Union

Megan and my dad playing futball

Showing some stickers from the U.S.

Sisterly love! 

La Union 

Last sunset in Roatan

Here are some pictures from my travels to El Salvador:

Surfing: first and last time trying that. 

Visited a volcanic lake 

Beautiful sunsets! 

Have to keep the bugs out somehow..

Here are some pictures from random school days: 

The Limbo has become a popular game! 

Life as a teacher when you have no where to put your materials...AHH!! 

So much energy after recess one day

                                                 We made paper airplanes for art one day

Hope you enjoyed!

Sharing My World

I had been anticipating my parents’ and Megan’s visit since they day I came back to La Union from Christmas vacation. It became easier to live here knowing in the near future my family would be joining me in my adventure. How quickly their visit sprang upon me! Before I knew it March 28^th was here and my parents and Megan were flying into Honduras.

My students were PHSYCHED for my family to be here, it was their topic of choice for weeks! My parents and Megan planned to get into La Union at 6PM on a Wednesday. The entire school day was filled with anticipation, my students and I could not WAIT to see them!! I rushed home after school to tidy the house and make a batch of cookies and an egg-bake for breakfast in the morning (I didn’t want my parents to starve here!). I was trying to rush through both recipes before my family arrived; Gayle and I were running into each other, all of our dishes were being used, food covered the countertops. Meanwhile, I started to have a trickle of students show up at my house! They all wanted to see my parents just as badly as I did. Nearing the arrival time of my family, Gayle and I managed to finish both recipes, we had washed all of our dishes, and I had 8 screaming children running around my house. I have never seen my children so crazy before!! And trust me—they are crazy. They were doing flips on my tile floor, punching each other, throwing candy across the living room, using our huge butcher knife to cut onions, taking full BITES out of the onion, and all the while screaming at the top of their lungs.

Finally, I watched as Ablin (their chauffeur) drove up the hill towards my house. My students got into position, holding a frying pan full of candy. It felt so great to hug my parents and Megan…they were FINALLY HERE!! It was so strange to see them in my every day setting. They walked into my house with my students screaming “WELCOME TO LA UNION!!!” and throwing candy at them. Thank-goodness my entire family loves children as much as I do! 

After I showed my parents around my house, they rubbed off (almost) all the dirt from their face, and my students had shown them every trick in the book, we headed for dinner. I took them to our only “restaurant” that we eat at in La Union called El Comedor. Almost every little eatery is called El Comedor in Honduras. Since the power was out for all of the day before, the chicken was not edible; we opted for some baleadas ricas instead. I couldn’t really tell you if my family enjoyed them or not, they were too busy sleeping at the dinner table!  I think I even heard my dad start to snore. I felt so bad for them; they had all been traveling for almost 24 hours straight with no sleep.

On the walk back to my house I asked Megan how the ride to La Union was. I had been so nervous for them; riding on the dirt tracks straight up the mountain is not the most comfortable ride! Megan told me, “It was actually fine, it just felt like we were driving to the end of the world!” …Tell me about it!

Back at our house, we crashed and went to bed. I was lucky enough to share my twin bed with Megan for the next two nights! But it’s not like that is uncommon..we’re used to it.

The next morning we were up early and were walking to school by 6:40AM. I was so excited to bring them to school and show them more of my everyday life! It was fun to walk through the streets and have my family look at the town for the first time. Everything for them was new, exciting, different, and culturally opposite while I am used to walking through poverty-stricken streets.

Once we arrived at school it was a non-stop Tom, Helen, and Megan celebrity day. My students ADORED my family and were overJOYED to have them in the classroom. During morning devotional I thought my eardrums were going to shatter they were singing so loudly. They poured their hearts out into EVERYTHING they did on Thursday. Every two minutes it was, “TOM, watch me do this! TOM look what I wrote!! Helen, play this with me!! Megan, look at me!! TOM!! TOM!! TOOOMM!!!!” Of course my dad was the star of the show. For some reason, kids love love love my dad. Always have, always will..there’s no use trying to compete with him, he’ll always win the popularity contest with children.

Some of my students would start to ask absolutely ridiculous questions just so they had a question so that my family would turn their attention to them. It was absolute mayhem. I tried having my mom and dad play a spelling game with them; that was sensory overload. Any time my dad or mom got an answer right they would scream at the top of their lungs… “YEAH!!!!! YES TOM!! TOM IS THE BEST!!! TOM!!!” Even the principal had to come to our classroom to tell my students to quite down! I couldn’t even control their excitement. My students wrote them and read out loud letters welcoming them to La Union and asked a few questions. The most popular question was “What is more beautiful, La Union or the United States?” One of my students wrote in his letter, “Thank-you for your daughter. She is very beautiful and I am very happy she is my teacher.” My eyes welled up at that one!

During recess my dad played futball with all the boys in the class while the girls surrounded my mom, Megan, and I. My dad must have impressed them during their futball matches, the boys came back from lunch break with an even more adoration than before! Their little hearts were broken when my dad and mom went back to my house after lunch to take a nap. Every 10 minutes they asked, “Where is Tom? Why your parents go to your house?” Thankfully Megan stayed at school which satisfied their attention needs. They found out they got the same reaction out of Megan when they tickled her as when they tickle Miss Van Dyke.

By the end of the day my energy was completely wiped out. I couldn’t believe the amount of energy my kids produced the entire school day!! After school I took my family up to the cross where there is a beautiful look out of La Union. We were up there just as the sun was setting over the mountains; one of my favorite parts of the day! My family was in awe of the pure beauty I am surrounded by! Once again, I was overjoyed to share my life with them.

We climbed into bed early that night; the students had worn us out!! We woke up Friday refreshed and ready to go. Thank-goodness my students were not as crazy on Friday. I think they were so exhausted from expending so much of their energy the day before! Some of them could barely keep their eyes open during class.

Megan took over my Language class and taught them the difference between Can and May; she was a natural. I enjoyed watching someone else’s attempts at getting my students to understand! During lunch we all went down to the futball field and played with all the boys in my class. This time I got to witness first-hand the love all my boys had developed for my dad in just these two short days. They were constantly vying for his attention, impressing him with their mad skills. At one point, my dad was standing still on the field and one of my little boys walks up to my dad, reaches up, and holds his hand. It brought tears to my eyes; this little boy had never experienced the great love of a father. His father is not a very kind person, and it is very apparent he shows no love in the household. Having my dad there showed him love from a man is possible. It made me so happy my boys got to see what a loving and involved dad looks and acts like. But at the same time it breaks my heart that all my boys do not have dads more like mine. I am so blessed to have a dad who loves me and shows his love to me. 

Towards the end of the day my parents had a surprise to hand out to my students. Each of the boys were given a nerf-football and all of the girls were given a jump rope. All of them also were given bubbles from my brother Greg’s wedding. At this point I let the mayhem take over; there was no point in trying to control the class anymore! Thankfully they settled down for a few minutes to take some pictures with my family.

I couldn’t believe how sad I was to see my parents and Megan say goodbye to my students. It felt so amazing to have them with me in the classroom; I didn’t want to see them go! I also know my students were very sad to see them go, they kept asking, “When are you coming back?” My eyes (again yes I know) were tearing up as each student said goodbye and walked out the door. I think part of it was my family was foreshadowing what I have to do in just two short months. It is hard to fathom how in the world I am going to leave them!!!

That night a teacher made a dinner for my family and then we went to play volleyball with the 10^th graders. The next day we headed out for our vacation in Roatan, which is an island off the coast of Honduras. Our travels to Roatan is a whole different story in itself…I’ll spare you the 30 minute long story. We spent the next 3 days relaxing, sunbathing, and eating in paradise. It was exactly what we all needed!

Wednesday I had to say goodbye to them and it was not easy! I really did not want them to leave me, I felt like I wanted to hop on the plane with them! Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad I have two more months here, but it isn’t easy to see your family leave.

I was so happy and so thankful for my family’s visit. I loved sharing my little world with them!! I am so thrilled someone got to see where I live, where I teach, what my students are like, what my every day schedule is like. Now whenever I tell them, “ugh I feel so dirty and the water’s off..all I want to do is take a shower!” they will completely understand how I feel.

My students are still asking about them this week, they are quite concerned about when they will see Tom again. I told them now it’s their turn to visit the United States, and they need to promise to attend a university there. They said it sounded like a perfect plan. 

(I tried adding pictures to the blog, but the internet isn't working well enough..I'll upload them sometime soon!) 

Lost in Translation

When you combine a mix of a teacher whose first language is English (who doesn’t speak Spanish) and student’s whose first language is Spanish (who are beginning English-language learners), you are creating a recipe for translation mix-ups. This happens multiple times every day in my classroom.

 In the beginning of the year the frustration of this consumed me. How are my students supposed to know what I want from them if they cannot even follow simple directions?! How can I effectively discipline them if they cannot understand which behavior I do not like?! I could go on and on… and I know my students could too! How are we supposed to learn when our teacher can’t answer our questions? How do I ask for help when I don’t understand? etc…etc…etc…

I not-so-quickly learned to let go of the frustration and find the hilarity in it. You should see the lengths my students and I go to in order to understand each other. The kinds of faces and actions I whip out in my classroom should never be repeated…they are completely embarrassing but necessary! So far this year I have gotten on the floor acting out crawling, used my wooden ruler pretending it was a microphone, and have done the most impeccable replicate of an octopus moving by jet propulsion.

Over the past few weeks I feel as though I haven’t stopped laughing in my classroom. Here are a few of my favorite “lost in translation” stories.

Shrunken Girls

As you may have seen in my pictures, all of our students wear a school uniform. The boys have grey pants, tucked in blue shirt, with a blue tie. The girls have a plaid blue skirt, a tucked-in blue shirt, and a neck tie. Lately, some of my girls have been feeling a bit lazy and haven’t been tucking their shirts in. Last week I decided they couldn’t come into my classroom until all of them had their shirts tucked in. The boys were quite pleased. They were so filled with pride; they started bashing on the girls looks.

“Miss they look very bad with their shirts no tucked in…very bad.”-Carlos

“Yes, they look like those men in the street.”-Wilson

“What men in the street?” –Miss Van Dyke

“You know, the ones who drink a lot of cervezas (beer) and then they cannot walk. They all look borracho (drunk)!! What is that called Miss?” – Wilson

My face turned completely red with embarrassment. At the time I didn’t know what barracho meant, but I could give a pretty good guess! Under my breath I questioned the meaning saying.. “Drunk??” Apparently I did not say it quiet enough because Wilson picks up on it right away saying “Shrunk!! They all are shrunk!!” Then multiple boys pick up the word, they all point at the girls and say, “Miss! They all look shrunken! They all look shrunken!” At this point the girls are getting VERY angry at the boys and they start yelling, “I no look shrunken! I no look shrunken Miss!!” Some of my boys are giving quite good impressions of how drunk men walk, while I’m quickly trying to calculate how to handle this situation. By the time I gain control of my classroom the girls are starting to find the boys “shrunken” impressions pretty hilarious. I sat all of my students down and had a serious talk with them (while holding back a laugh) about how we do NOT talk about drinking in the classroom, and we do NOT call other students drunk. I also had a long talk with them about drinking, what it does to your life, and why they will never become one of those “shrunken men in the streets”. This education was giving them a different life than the majority of the men in La Union. Even though I do think they got something out of our talk, they were still giggling at the end of class from Wilson’s shrunken man act. I have to admit I shared a good laugh over this after the students left for the day.

I should explain something, just so you don’t think I’m a horrible teacher talking about drunken men in my classroom. Drinking is an interesting topic in La Union. Having a glass of wine or a beer with dinner just does not happen here. You either are an alcoholic, or you do not think/talk/touch alcohol for your entire life. Most people go by the rule that if you touch alcohol, you are a sinner and you are going to hell. But for some reason, men on Sundays are exempt from this rule. I’m not kidding, almost every man (unless he is at a church service) drinks heavily on Sundays. I will plan out my Sundays so that I don’t have to walk all over the town; the less drunk men I run into the better. The streets are filled with drunken men falling over, laughing uncontrollably, and saying incomprehensive words. A lot of these men are the fathers of my students, the grandfathers of my students, and even the brothers of my students. These are the examples they have to look up to. To them, seeing a drunken man on the street is hilarious or entertaining, not a sad oddity. So, although it may shock you they are talking about being drunk already in the 3^rd grade, it is part of their culture, their upbringing.

 Jicxon the Brilliant

One of my students, Jicxon, is definitely one of my top students. Whenever I struggle with translating I always call for his help. He has a real gift for language; he can pick up words like no other child in the class. Having a brilliant child in the classroom is more than helpful. The problem is Jicxon also knows he is brilliant, and he isn’t shy to boast about it! Even though I am happy for his help, sometimes it is frustrating when I’m trying to figure out the translation and he pushes me aside and says, “Just let me do it Miss.” It becomes a matter if I am really smarter than this 3^rd grader or not!

One day Jicxon raises his hand, “Miss Van Dyke, I have a great idea! I want to share it with you first. Then can I please say it to the class in Spanish?” Although there are literally a handful of times I let him translate, I was feeling nice that day so I gave the ok. He told me “Can you give us the answers to the questions, and then we can go outside and play a game?! Now in Spanish…” He translated it into Spanish.

What happened next brought a smile to my face and tears to my eyes. All of my students, INCLUDING my lowest students, looked at Jicxon, rolled their eyes and said “Yo se, Jicxon”, which means “I know, Jicxon.” They knew what he said to me the first time around. They understood every piece of English that came out of his mouth!! They didn’t NEED the translation, their English is good enough! Jicxon’s pride was pushed back a few levels, which he could use. Both Jicxon and I were surprised by the improvement of the class, and I could not have been more proud.

Bad Influence

A few weeks ago my students were practicing the dance for fiesta tipica. They were practicing their dance during music and social studies, both classes I do not teach. One day after they had finished practicing I came into the room and decided to ask them about this special dance. I asked them, “What is the name of the dance called?”

“It’s called la punta!” –all the girls shouted at me.

“What? I didn’t understand what you’re saying,” I told them.

“LA PUNTA Miss!” they clearly said. I should have left it at that, but I didn’t. I wanted to make sure I heard the word correctly, so I repeated it back to them. But instead of saying PUNTA, I left out the N. Just in case you aren’t up to speed on your Spanish (like me), I had said a very, very bad word in Spanish. In English this is a 5 letter word that starts with a B. And of course I did not repeat it quietly; I had shouted it back to them. You should have seen their faces!! First there was a 10 second shock of complete HORROR. I thought some of my girls’ eyes were going to pop out of their heads. Some of the girls looked at me in complete disgust; a teacher just openly SWORE in the classroom! Some of the boys started to nervously giggle, unsure of how to really react.

I looked at all of them and asked, “What did I say?? Did I say something bad?? I don’t know what I did! I’m so sorry, what did I say!?”

Once they all realized I had no idea that I had just sworn, they all started BURSTING out with laughter. One of my girls literally fell off her chair, one girl choked on her spit, and another boy tooted they were laughing so hard. Miss Van Dyke swore, and there could not be anything more hilarious. After apologizing a million times and correctly pronouncing the word puNta, my students started to settle down. Once they were sitting down again, my shy little Emerson raised his hand and said to me, “Miss Van Dyke, you are a bad influence!” What could I say, they used their spelling word influence in perfect context and he could not have been more right! My students will still sometimes tell me, “You are a bad influence, for you say bad words Miss!” I will never live this one down.

 

Hey Hell!

It is only ONE MORE WEEK until my parents and Megan arrive in La Union! I am filled with excitement and continuously remind my students how many more days. The other day I brought my students over to group to make sure they would be prepared for their visit. I told them all about my parents, Tom and Helen. I showed them a couple pictures, talked about what they do for a job, etc. I wanted to make sure my students would be able to call them by name when they walked through the door. So, like always when we learn new words I had my children repeat after me. I told them, “When my dad walks through the door you need to say ‘Hello Tom!’” All my students started giggling and said, “Like Tom and Jerry Miss!!” I don’t know where they learned about Tom and Jerry. After they recovered from their giggling fit I said, “Ok when my mom walks through you need to say ‘Hello Helen!’” We practiced saying each of their names a few times.

Once I thought they got it I decided to quiz them, “What are you going to say when my dad walks through the door?”

“Hi Tom! Hi Tommy!” –3^rd grade

“What are you going to say when my mom walks through the door?”—Miss Van Dyke

“Hi Hell!!” –3^rd grade

This time MY eyes were popping out of my head, “No!! No no no no no don’t call my mom Hell!! You never ever call someone hell..hell is infierno.” They first gasped and then bursted out in laughter. They made sure the add the EN after Hel from then on. 

Then I introduced them to Megan. I explained that she is 3 years older than me, she lives in California, and she is ENGAGED! They all got excited when I told them the last bit of information. They had all kinds of questions about her boyfriend. It didn’t take long for the questions to turn to me, “Why you no have a boyfriend Miss? Why you no married yet?” I tried to explain that I didn’t want to have a boyfriend, especially when I live in La Union, but they did not understand. “Why no have boyfriend in La Union?” In these situations you just need to stop answering questions and redirect the conversation.

Needless to say, it IS only a week until part of my family visits me!! I keep walking through the streets thinking I can’t believe in a week they’ll be walking WITH me. I can’t wait to share my life with them.

Hope you enjoyed my few favorite stories from the past few weeks. My students give me so many reasons to smile every day I am here!

Lights Out!

Last August when I first arrived to Honduras, I purchased a fan. This fan was most likely my best investment I have made all year. In the beginning of the school year I was so thankful for this fan because it was smoldering hot; without my fan I felt like I couldn’t breathe! Now that it is a bit cooler, I am still ever so thankful for this little black fan. Every night when I crawl into bed (after checking for bugs of course), I lay there and hear all the dogs barking, church bells ringing, herds of cows running past, roosters crowing, etc. But all these noises are drowned out by one little switch on my fan. It’s almost a guarantee that a good night’s sleep is possible as long as I have my fan…almost.

Monday night I was having a bad night of sleep; I had decided to save all my thoughts for the middle of the night. My sisters upcoming wedding, plans for next year, my parent’s and Megan’s visit to Honduras, all of these things racing through my mind. At least I had my fan to drone out all the noise from outside. Well at 2:00AM that all changed…the power went out. When the power goes out at night two things happen: everything becomes pitch black, and everything becomes eerily silent (minus the dogs and roosters of course). You have got to be kidding me I was thinking. I sighed with relief when 10 minutes later my fan came alive and started circulating air again. But that was short lived; the power went out for good two minutes later.

The rest of the night I spent tossing and turning, willing my ears to shut all the outside noises off. But that was no use. I heard at least 8 different dog fights, probably over 100 different roosters crowing (at all hours mind you..what happened to roosters only crowing when the sun comes up?),  and buses driving past my window at the wee hours of the morning. I never realized how precious my little black fan was until Tuesday morning rolled around and I felt more tired than the night before. Don’t worry about it, it’s only one night, the power will come on this morning, I reassured myself.

There was no electricity for our standard breakfast of eggs on toast, so granola, honey, and peanut butter it was. We ate breakfast with the front door wide open to let some light in; our house doesn’t let much natural light in, and it’s impossible to see without electricity. Gayle and I packed our lunches for the day; chicken noodle soup…the power would be on by noon to heat it up in the school microwave.

When there is no electricity time seems to escape itself; everyone is running behind, and school never seems to start on time. My students get hyped up when the power goes out, it’s something new and exciting. Our school’s bell system is down when the power goes out; Yessi, our school secretary, walks up and down the hallways ringing the old fashioned, hand-held bell to inform us when each class period is over.

By 10:00 I was getting nervous, we still had no power and Gayle and I only brought our chicken soup for lunch. The worst part about not having power is never knowing when it could come on. At any second your classroom lights could flicker the rest of your day can go back to normal. I was waiting for that moment to happen, wishing it would happen before lunch…but it didn’t. I reaallllly didn’t want to have cold chicken soup! Gayle braved it and ate a whole bowl-full; I thought I was going to be sick just watching her choke it down. I opted for delicious packaged cookies. Nothing like having well balanced meal of vanilla chocolate crème cookies for lunch!

The rest of the school day went great, but the power never turned on. It is amazing how much school work you can get done without any power. I had so much grading and planning to do, and I easily got it all done on Tuesday! I had no internet to distract me. In a way it is kind of nice because I don’t need to worry about responding to people’s e-mails, uploading a new blog, researching lesson plans, etc. I have a pretty legitimate excuse for being unresponsive.

After school I slid on my rain boots and prepared myself for the walk home. It had been drizzling all day long; the streets were sloshed in mud, all of my clothes felt damp, and the cool mist seemed to creep its way deep into my body…I was chilled to the bone. After too many close calls of face-planting into the knee-deep mud, we had made it home. All I wanted to do was take a nice hot shower…but that of course was not going to be on my agenda; there was still no power. We discussed what we were going to do for dinner. There was nothing in our house that didn’t need to be cooked. No packaged meals that don’t require heating on the stove. But I was not about to have a bowl of cold chicken soup. We decided to ask our neighbors if we could use their kamal (an outside wood-burning stove) to make some tortillas and heat up our chicken soup.

Gayle forced me to ask the grandma to use it since I need to practice my Spanish. I get so nervous speaking Spanish to the grandma…especially when Gayle is around! First of all, even if I DO know what to say to the grandma, by the time I have the sentence out of my mouth I’m so proud of myself that I just spoke a successful sentence that I’m not prepared to hear what she is saying in response to me. Second of all, the grandma speaks a kind of Spanish I have never even heard before; she slurs and blends all of her words together, making it very difficult for me to pick up more than 3 words every sentence. Gayle even struggled understanding her at the beginning of the year (and that’s saying something). THIRD of all, I hate speaking Spanish in front of Gayle. If you KNEW the kind of expert Gayle is at speaking Spanish…everyone, I mean everyone, is always impressed at how fluent she is. I’m not kidding this girl knows everything! So imagine how ridiculous I sound when I can’t even put a full sentence together, and here standing next to me Gayle can not only say the sentence perfectly, she can put an intelligent spin on it. I get so shy and embarrassed around her. EVEN though she always tells me, “I’m not going to judge you!” I can FEEL her mind working whenever I start speaking in Spanish, her mind correcting every grammatical error. So much pressure!!!! I also think the family finds it humorous whenever I try speaking to them in Spanish; they quizzically look at me and then turn to Gayle and answer MY question.

BUT I successfully asked the grandma to cook over at their house! She brought Gayle and I behind their house to the outside stove. Gayle had previously learned how to make tortillas, but I hadn’t. Sanovia prepared the flour and water and began giving me my lesson.

                1. Make sure your hands are wet

                2. Grab a small amount of dough and roll it into a ball

                3. Start patting the dough into a tortilla shape

                4. With your fingertips on both hands, start pushing out the dough to extend the tortilla WHILE

                    turning the tortilla in a circle (by far the hardest part)

                5. Stick the tortilla on the kamal….and vuala you have a tortilla!

While Sanovia gave me a lesson the grandma, another aunt, and Gayle watched. They told me my tortillas were ok but a little bit disfigured. I’ll take that! The aunt was watching me in absolute disbelief. Finally she asked Gayle, “So… you don’t make homemade tortillas in the United States?” Gayle laughed and said “No, we definitely don’t do that.” She looked confused for a minute and then said, “Then how do you get tortillas? You never eat them?” At this point Sanovia steps in and says, “Oh no, in the United States tortillas come in bags. They are pre-made and then put into bags, and that is how they sell them.” The aunt looked so amazed, she had never heard of such a thing!  While Gayle and I sat there feeling like complete idiots…yes we are insufficient, we don’t even know how to hand-make tortillas!

After the tortillas were successfully made (mostly by Sanovia) and the soup was nice and HOT, we were ready to eat dinner. I was pretty happy the power didn’t stop us from making a great meal! But now if only the power would come back on….especially before bed so we could a) shower, and b) sleep with the fan on. Well that wish didn’t’ come true. I HATE going to bed if there is no light on in my room; it terrifies me to think of all the bugs crawling around that I can’t see. Some people say ‘out of sight out of mind’—that is so not true. Come live in La Union for a week, and then you will definitely KNOW that you need to check your bed before crawling in it. If a tarantula is out of sight, well that is pretty unfortunate when the power goes out; there is a good chance I could put my hand on it, or step on it, and then it would bite me and I would die (yes, that seriously goes through my mind).

I checked as best as I could for bugs with my iPod, but there was only 20% battery left on my iPod and I needed to save that just in case I needed a light in the middle of the night. My computer and my phone were dead, so I couldn’t use those to shine any light. I slept equally horrible on Tuesday night, the dogs and roosters drove me awake once again. By morning I felt like a crazy person; I now had 2 horrible nights of sleep, my iPod was now dead as well, and I hadn’t taken a shower since Sunday evening. BUT there was nothing I could do about it; everyone was in the same situation as me…no need for a pity party!

My students were psyched the power still hadn’t come on. They were supposed to have a science test, but I had to keep postponing it since there was no power to make copies. I told them on Wednesday if there was still no power at the end of the day we wouldn’t have the test on Thursday. Mr. Perdomo had heard that the power wasn’t going to be on until sometime on Thursday. A WHOLE OTHER DAY WITHOUT POWER, I was for sure going to have to shower in the freezing cold!

With only an hour left of the school day, my lights flickered on. THERE WAS POWER!!!!! I was screaming for joy!! My students on the other hand REALLY didn’t want their science test. Fabiola quickly ran over to the lights, shut them off, and said to me, “Miss, there is no power again!” J

I was finally able to charge all of my electronics, check e-mails, and go home and take a nice, steaming hot shower! I never felt so clean. Gayle and I couldn’t have been happier to cook a meal on our own stove. And I finally knew I would get a great night of sleep with my precious fan.

It is just funny to think about how when I was a child and the electricity went off I was SO excited! No power?? This is awesome!! Now I see things a little bit differently. Power is a privilege. We are so blessed in the United States. We never worry about having electricity, we don’t need a wood-burning stove outside for back-up, we wouldn’t even THINK about taking a cold shower. We have everything we need and more! It is amazing what God has given us, the abundance of gifts he’s showered upon us. Living here has made me appreciate everything and made me realize how good I have it in the U.S.

So today, if you have washed your dishes not only in warm water, but in a dishwasher, give thanks to God. If you have made your eggs on the stove, your toast in the toaster, and gotten your milk from the cold refrigerator, give thanks to God. If you have brushed your teeth with water you know you won’t get bacteria from, give thanks to God. If you have made yourself a cup of coffee with a flip of a switch, give thanks to God. He has blessed us with so many things that we should never take for granted.