Erin Miller

Dan arrived May 30th. He came to Honduras to bring me home. He arrived in San Pedro Sula and before he could even set his bags down, we grabbed a bus to La Esperanza so that the good-bye parties could begin. We stopped by one party the evening Dan got in. The rainy season began just days before Dan’s arrival so going out meant darting between puddles and arriving always soaked at your destination. Hay dos estaciones en La Esperanza, un del polvo y un del lodo. (There are two seasons in La Esperanza, one of dust, and one of mud.) I prefer the dust to the mud, even though the rains did bring city water and mean that we could stop using the trickle of water from the mountain behind my host family’s house. When it is dry in La Esperanza, there is unreliable electricity because a hydro-electric plant provides the power to the town and sometimes the dam runs dry or there is a small amount of water and the lights dim and microwaves won’t work for days on end. However, during the rainy season, power is also unreliable because the above-ground lines will fall. Dan says that the power cut several times, “always to my amusement.” And the truth is, that even after four months, I was always amused as well when the power went out. There is something mysterious and innately hilarious about not having power.
We began Dan’s second day in town with a trip to the market, one of the most beautiful sights in La Esperanza, to pick up some last food donations for the women in the albergue. Then we went to the hospital in time for the diabetes club meeting (which was scheduled for 9 and began punctually around 10). The club members had organized a surprise going away party for me. The president of the club, head nurse from the operating room, and even the director of the hospital gave speeches thanking me and the other volunteers for our work. The club members had promised to teach me la punta (a traditional dance of Honduras) but everyone got too shy, so instead the volunteers demonstrated the electric slide. (The idea was to demonstrate that dancing can be good exercise.) The celebration was complete with sugar-free cake (quite the accomplishment in La Esperanza) and diet pepsi. After the diabetics party, Dan helped me bring in some final food donations and give my last “charla” at the Albergue. The nutrition program at the albergue is continuing. A new peace corps volunteer in town has agreed to continue the project at least until a new albergue is constructed, which should be complete within the next year (or so). I have secured funding to bring food in every other week for the next year and for now the volunteers in town are pooling their own personal money to bring food in on the off week. I am working on getting a system set up through an official NGO to accept more donations and will post about it when it is up and running.

market in La Esperanza

last diabetes club charla

the president of the diabetes club presenting a diploma de agradecimiento

me with the club members
Dan and I took Friday morning off to relax, visit the market, drink coffee, and play scrabble and dance (alone, together) on the roof of our hotel. It was an amazing day. Friday night my host family through me a small going away party. The food — including tropical fruit shish kabobs and a going-away cake made by the other two volunteers living at the house — was terrific. And, of course, we played the balloon game. Dan and I left La Esperanza on Saturday. I nearly cried as the bus pulled out of town and was glad to have Dan by my side. Everyone in town kept asking me when I would return, and I genuinely hope to go back soon.

ADIOS ERIN

Dan and I at my good-bye party

balloon game begins

balloon game championships

last shot of La Esperanza

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Not much terribly exciting has happened during the last week. But I have been getting requests for updates from my little corner of the world, and I figure describing a more or less average week might help any possible future volunteers get a better idea of the routine of daily life here.
The problem with trying to describe my daily activities here is that I am often filled with a sense of surrealism. I see so many things everyday that are so far outside my understanding that I stop noticing them. I don’t even blink when I see a donkey-pulled cart flying down a hill much to the thrill of the man driving it and feel the dust coat my sunscreeened skin and fill my mouth so that when I touch my teeth together they grind over the dirt. I see bulls and horses walking unattended down the streets or being pulled behind men and boys riding bicycles. Currently, whole fields are being purposefully torched to prepare them for planting and the valleys are filled with smoke. Everyday, I walk past a talking parrot (even though he usually won’t talk to me). This week I saw a child digging through the garbage in central park. And much to our dismay, our house hasn’t received a single drop of water from the city in five days. Surrounded by these things it makes it easier to understand that if you set a meeting for 9, people will show up around 10, and if the meeting has miraculously started already, they will walk in and noisily introduce themselves, and give a hearty “buenos dias” even in the middle of a speech. It makes it easier to believe that if you are sweating when you get in the shower, your heart might just stop, and that you can go on a walk to look at holes in the ground that go on infinitely without ever reaching a bottom.

the field across the street from our house on fire

burnt fields
So, here it goes, my week:
Monday
Monday morning at the hospital I updated by diabetes club poster so that it had the date for the next club meeting on Friday. I did my usual rounds in the pourperio, talking to women who have recently given birth and are waiting to be discharged home. I talk with them about family planning, breastfeeding, and infant nutrition. Then I went out to the Albergue to check in on the women and see how many there were this week. Once I was back in the center of town, I bought the food to give out at the “charlas” at the albergue on Tuesday at the market .Then I went to my favorite Internet cafe in town to eat a piece of chocolate cake cooked by a North American woman and attempt to maintain my so-called real life. I actually had some time to read the news and was amazed at the hammerhead shark that gave birth to a pup that had no paternal DNA. Read about it here if you’re interested. I had a relaxing lunch at the kiosk in Central park for approximately two US dollars.

baleadas, the Honduran vegetarian speciality.
And I spent some time in the afternoon relaxing, reading, writing in my journal and thinking about my place in the world. Monday was a hair-wash day, so I took my first shower in mountain spring water, because Monday was the first day that our house stopped getting city water. La Esperanza is in a bit of a drought and because I live so far out from the center (about 2 miles) the water always cuts at our house first and we are usually one of the last houses to get it back. About three months ago I went on a hike with my host mom around the mountain on the back of the house. She saw a bit of water dripping out of the ground and asked me to take a picture of it. She said she wanted to bring the water back to the house. I thought she was crazy. It seemed like too little water to make any sort of noticeable difference. But I took the picture and transferred it to her computer for her. Apparently, since then, our yard worker has been working on tapping and transporting the water to the house and the crude system was put in place Monday when the water stopped. Since then, the mountain water, direct from the ground, as been the only water at the house. It seems clean, and I swear it gets my hair cleaner than it has ever been. But I have forgotten twice and brushed my teeth with it. I’m hoping for the best. That drizzle of water from the mountains has provided enough water for all ten people who bathe at our house to take baths, enough to wash about 8 articles of clothing each, and sufficient water for cooking and cleaning. The pump stops being able to pull it up around 7pm, but the tanks fill over night and we have water starting around 5 in the morning. I am just a tiny bit worried that when Dan gets here he will find me smelling like a lake.

my shower head
Every night I eat dinner with my host family in an effort to work on my Spanish. Dinner generally does not vary much from 2 corn tortillas with mantequilla, half an avocado (often a Honduran avocado, but on lucky days its an imported one from Mexico, which have a much nicer flavor), a scrambled egg, red beans (whole or refried) and due to my continual insistence and once in protest actually chomping down a raw green pepper from the fridge in a search of vitamins, a vegetable.

my host family’s house
Tuesday
Tuesday we gave the food to the womenat the albergue and went through our educational presentations. The peace corps volunteer who is going to be taking over the project for me watched another round of “charlas” and the high school students that I have been working with gave their own presentation on HIV/AIDS and performed a condom demonstration on a platano. The condom demonstration was very well done and probably an important addition to the discussions as my mention of condoms is usually the first time the women at the albergue have ever heard of them.

The high school students giving their talk on AIDS

Condom demonstration
Afterward, I again completed my rounds in the pourperio. And went through my usual routine of going to the Internet cafe and finding lunch. In the afternoon I worked on spending an independent donation I have received from England. Tuesday night all of the volunteers met up at our usual bar, El Fog’n. Dan calls it my “cheers bar” and that is a pretty accurate description. We always go to the same bar and it means that there will always be someone there that you know, and if you are looking for someone in particular, you know where you can find them. I have never lived somewhere where everyone went to the same bar every evening and I have actually really enjoyed it.

El Fog’n
Wednesday
If I have a full week in La Esperanza (I haven’t been traveling during part of the week) I usually take Wednesdays off to go building, which provides a nice break from the mental and theoretical work of the hospital and I like to think that it helps build some poor excuses for muscles as well. However, feeling the pressure of my last full week in La Esperanza, I took Wednesday morning off to store up on some Honduran-style zen and spent the morning sleeping in (until 8:15) and drinking coffee and reading my book (currently, 100 Years of Solitude) The book took me awhile to get into but I am enjoying it now and find it incredibly appropriate given my current location in the world. I was assigned the book in high school, and I am not particularly ashamed to admit that I was never able to get through it then and barely skimmed the book, reading just enough to get As on the tests. The mystical realism has an appeal to me here. Then, as per usual, I went to the Internet cafe and ate a light lunch while watching the first half of the European soccer championships. In the afternoon we went to finish getting a second coat of paint on the ceiling in one of the operating rooms. We traveled to the hospital in what I have discovered is one of the best ways to get around here — the back of a pick-up truck, for free.

Wednesday night, you guessed it, we went to the Fog’n. I was a bit hungry and was able to order one of my favorite Honduran foods at the bar, an anafre. An anafre is a warm bowl of refried beans and quesillo served with tortilla chips.

an anafre
Thursday
Thursday I gave the shorter of my two talks at the albergue and again did my rounds in the pourperio. I also confirmed plans for the diabetes club the next day. I went to the Internet cafe, yet again, and spent the afternoon working on spending the donation I received (a post about that will follow shortly). After spending some time reading, writing and thinking at my host-family’s house, we went to…one of the other volunteer’s houses for his 30th birthday party. (ha ha, you thought I was going to say the Fog’n.) The party was a complete blast (as Honduran birthdays usually are). We played one of my favorite games in the whole world (right up there with broomball and kickball) where you tie a balloon to your foot and go around trying to stomp on everyone else’s balloon and guard your own. I actually won the second round when my last competitor accidentally hit his own balloon with the point of his cowboy boots. We also played banco caliente (musical chairs) and finished the evening (after putting just a splash of rum in the bottom of our glasses full of Coca-cola) dancing under the Honduran night sky.

one of the greatest games ever
Friday
I led the diabetes club meeting and gave my usual diabetes talks. We also elected officers for the club so that it is more able to continue without my support once I leave. We also checked everyone’s blood sugar with some of the donated glucometers my parents brought. And we decided, as a club policy, that club members had to come to four club meetings before they could receive their own peronsal glucometer. Then I did my rounds and headed towards the center to make Dan and my hotel reservations at the nicest hotel in the center of town for next week. I headed toward the Internet cafe after a walk through the market to buy strawberries (50 cents a pound) and bananas. However, when I got to the internet cafe, the power was out, so that was that. I went home to spend some time relaxing and taking a nap in preparation for an evening full of good-byes (it was many volunteers’ last night in town) at the good ole Fog’n. Before my nap though, I did some washing in the pila. I love pilas and using them to do my washing. I find rubbing things along the wash board to be very meditative. Thankfully, one of our housekeepers does most of my washing in order to prevent me from using an embarrassing amount of water. I love that you can wash just about anything you can imagine in a pila. You can wash not only clothes but bags, shoes, dogs, and I am not ashamed to tell you that if I were to live in Honduras forever, I know where I would wash my baby. (Only on warm days, of course.)

La Pila
The good-bye parties (partidos) were a general blast and for some inexplicable reason the Fog’n had a 2 for 1 special on tequila, which kept the night interesting.

La Esperanza, L to the E
Saturday.
I slept in later than usual (perhaps due to the 2 for 1 tequilas), until about 9:45. Ate a pancake, drank strong Honduran coffee while reading my book and came to the Internet cafe to do some writing on my blog.
Sunday
We are planning to go on a walk tomorrow to see holes in the ground that have no bottom. The official explanation for the holes is that there is no explanation for them. However, rumor has it that they were chimneys for volcanic gases, and that seems to make sense to me.

a hole that goes to the center of the earth


view from the hike to the holes

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So I know there has been a ridiculous amount of time between entries. I would like to try to claim third world extenuating circumstances, but the truth is that I actually sort of managed to get busy; and it has my host family incredibly worried about me, “Erline (they cannot pronounce my name without putting an L in it) tiene que descansar, est’ cansada.” (Erin, you need to relax, you’re tired.) Hondurans are very serious about taking time off to relax. If I work more than three hours straight, “Erline, debe ir a la casa y descansar, estaba trabajando demasiado.” (Erin, you should go to the house and relax, you have been working too much.) I wonder how well it will go over with my Columbia professors when I explain that I didn’t finish an assignment because I spent three hours working on it and then had to go relax.
Last week I had the honor and the pleasure of getting to drag my parents all over the country. They arrived in San Pedro Sula (one of my least favorite cities in Honduras, could be accurately described as the industrial armpit of the country, located at sea level and inland, it’s hot, muggy, crowded, and expensive). I checked us into Hotel Bolivar — riding in an elevator for the first time in three months — check. (I maintain that elevators really are kind of weird and scary.) It was only thirty dollars a night and it had hot water. First completely warm shower in more than three months — check. The sheets and towels were slightly below my mother’s standards. Blowing chunks in Honduras — check. San Pedro Sula has always sort of made me want to barf, and this time I did actually succeed in spewing, though I think it was actually more than likely due to the virus I got from my ex-housemate right before she left. So I spent Sunday morning lying in bed complaining that I was surrounded by doctors and no one could do anything to make me all better.
I rallied in the afternoon though and lead my parents to Tela on the express bus, which was less than four dollars a person, though very overcrowded and pretty hot. Tela is a delightful coastal town full of character. My parents decided that between the sheets at Hotel Bolivar, my vomiting, and the bus ride down we deserved a bit of pampering and put me up at the Telamar resort — very posh, and the location of my second and third warm showers in Honduras. I took my parents on my favorite guided tour though my favorite national park in Honduras. We did get to see howler monkeys from the boat and they had a lot to say about us being there, especially when we revved the boat’s engine and sent them into a frenzy. The tour also included some terrific snorkeling. It took my dad a while to work is way into the deep water because he was still scarred from his last snorkeling expedition during our cruise two years ago. That time, the guides had sent us out into an incredibly strong current and once we had realized that the visibility was too poor to make snorkeling worth while and tried to get back to the boat, we almost couldn’t make it back. We even sent up signals for the international sign of distress, but we couldn’t quite remember what it was and our guides were too busy jumping in and saving everyone else. My grandpa had also snorkeled on that trip and once my dad and I had clawed our way onto the boat, finally caught our breath and stopped shaking we looked around and realized that the only person that wasn’t back yet was my 80 year old grandfather. We saw him swimming close to the boat and motioned for him to return. He steadily swam back to the ladder and climbed up (flippers still on). Once he had gotten up the ladder, in his flippers, he spit his snorkel out and said, “sure were some pretty fish.” That story causes my mom to remind me that I come from some very good stock. Anyway, no currents this time and once my dad finally got out there we had a great time looking at the tropical fish and examining two buried cannons left over from the peninsula’s days as a pirate hide-away. We also saw a huge barracuda, which I found slightly discomforting. Our guide explained, “Those ones do bite and when they are camouflaged like that it means they are about to attack.” I thought it was a good time to head back to the beach for lunch.

Mom and I waiting for the bus to Tela

Mom and I waiting for the jungle tour

Dad returning from the jungle tour.

Me with pretty trees used for firewood and drums
After two days relaxing by the beach we headed back across the country to La Esperanza, where I kept my parents “United-states-busy,” according to my mom. As soon as we arrived in La Esperanza we rushed to my host-family’s house for a special dinner. Wednesday morning I took them out to Yamaranguila to the home for girls to do some well-checks. Mom even got to answer some questions about chagas (I had warned her to study up on it.) We returned to La Esperanza in the afternoon and in the few off hours we had, I showed my parents to my favorite smoothie bar and Internet cafe, where my dad tried one of the famous brownies. A North American woman cooks deserts for the Internet cafe to sell. When she saw all of us North Americans in there she made us brownies. The old Honduran woman who sells them at the Internet cafe came up to me, “Tenemos brown! Tenemos Brown!” (We have brown! We have brown!) I was a bit confused until she showed me the chocolate-chip filled deliciousness. They have since become a staple in my Honduran diet. Dad enjoyed them too. In the afternoon we went to the INFA center, the daycare in town for children with only one parent. My parents checked out the kids as their parent’s came to pick them up. My parents got a small taste of some of the illnesses of poverty that effect kids here. They did some great work though giving out some donated amoxicillin, diaper rash cream, and toothbrushes. They did have to refer one case of gangrene to the hospital and realized we were a bit short on anti-lice and anti-scabies medications. My parents had so much fun that they had at least one of the peace corps volunteers who came to help us translate thinking she wanted to be a doctor by the end of it. We went to see some local traditional dancing Wednesday night and my parents had so much fun they could barely stay in their seats. My dad spent Thursday seeing pediatric neurology patients at the hospital and working on convincing two other peace corps volunteer translators to go into pediatric neurology instead of saving the world. My mom and I anxiously tried to get a system going and keep it on schedule. Dad did change the drugs for one kid with generalized epilepsy who was still seizing a couple of times a day and prescribed Ritalin to about 10 students. Rumor is that the families have actually managed to order the Ritalin from Tegus (the capital city) and I have a feeling that La Esperanza will have much better students in the coming months. On Friday my parents watched me work and helped me with the diabetics club meeting. They had brought about 30 donated glucometers to give to the club members and we had an adventure trying to figure out how to use them all and then teach the diabetics to use them in Spanish. I think our highest reading was 276, dad looked at him and shouted, “And we have a winner!” Hopefully the glucometers encourage a better level of diabetes control. Then my parents watched me give the food the the women at the Albergue and deliver some quick versions of my chats on nutrition during pregnancy, birth control and breastfeeding. I realized giving the talks how much I enjoyed my work there talking and laughing with the women. I find it so rewarding when a woman who is having her second child is thinking about having the sterilization operation after giving birth, or a woman who is just having her first child blushes, shrugs and tells me that she is going to plan with the depo injection. I am working on getting everything set up for this program to continue once I am gone and have made some good progress. I hope to have a somewhat sustainable system (that is not dependent on me) set up by the end of this week.

Mom doing well-checks at the home for abused and neglected girls

All of us at the home for girls

Dad examining a severely malnourished one and half year old at the INFA center

Raulito

Dad cleaning a wound

New toothbrushes!

Me at the Albergue

Women laughing at the Albergue
On Friday I dropped my parents off in San Pedro Sula because I didn’t want to make them travel by themselves, and because my mom bribed me with a night in the Hilton. Getting my taxi driver to chase down the bus to San Pedro once the bus had already pulled out of the station in La Esperanza –check. The driver pulled in front of the bus so that it had to stop and the bus drivers jumped out to help us with our bags. I thanked the other woman in the taxi for letting us chase down the bus and she said not to worry because she thought it was exciting. As the bus employees helped to get our bags underneath the bus my dad began unzipping his small backpack off his larger bag. The bus people stared at him confused but when his small backpack came off they laughed hysterically at the handiness and high-techiness of my dad’s bag. I think it made their day as well as my dad’s. I enjoyed the best shower yet at the Hilton. I sent my parents off on the airport shuttle at five in the morning and I slept in, took a nice warm bath, and enjoyed a morning full of zen watching CNN and eating strawberry-peach waffles in bed (ordered from room service and put on my dad’s credit card). I spent last night in La Esperanza trying to get back into my old routine. I jumped in the shower for a quick freezing cold wash after having been on the buses all afternoon. I got my hair well lathered up just in time for the water to quit. I guess it figures that in a country with such unreliable water and electricity one would eventually get caught soapy in the shower. Filling a bucket of water from the pila in my towel — check, and I think the site made our housekeeper’s night.
I am going to spend the next week getting my projects set up in town to run without me and anxiously waiting for me boyfriend to arrive.

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So, after my last post on my adventure in Costa Rica, I felt like it would be a good time to discuss some of the work I have been doing here in order to convince everyone that I am not just sitting in hammocks and swinging through canopies.
Along with my work at the Albergue, I have also started a Diabetics Club. I knew almost nothing about diabetes before I got here, but the lab director mentioned that there was a large need for educational charlas on diabetes at the hospital. So I did some web research, made some posters, and now we have a group of about 30 diabetics meeting each week at the hospital. I primarily discuss diet and exercise, and we are going to bring in guest speakers such as doctors, nutritionists, psychologists, microbiologists, etc. to speak to the club. One of the nurses at the hospital has taken an interest in the project and is volunteering her time to come to the meetings and help organize the club. She will make sure that it continues once I am gone. Only one of the 30 club members has her own glucometer. The other diabetics must come to the hospital to get their blood drawn and checked any where from once a month to once a day. There are some people working on getting some glucometers donated to the project, and I bet they could use some pictures, so here they are.


The roof on the hospital leaks, and therefore, there are water marks all over the ceilings and walls of the hospital. The hospital was considering trying to repair the roof, but they have decided that they will likely expand the hospital by building vertically, which will, eventually, fix the problem of the leaking roof. However, a temporary waterproof roof has been donated to the hospital to put over the operating rooms to prevent water-born bacteria from growing on the walls and ceilings in the operating area. So, the hospital needed someone to repaint the ceiling in the operating room and we have been working on it over the past couple of weeks. They still need some more work, but I think the pictures are worth it, just for our outfits.


The work at the Albergue continues to go well and I am working on finding some way for the project to continue once I am gone. Thank you all again for your donations to that project.

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Much of the work that I do in Honduras involves educating women about possible birth control options. I tend to begin my “birth control spiel” by asking women how many children they have, followed by asking them how many they want in total. It is often the first time that these women have ever been asked to think about how many children they want. It’s the first time that someone has posed the subject as a choice. The women get confused and don’t know how to answer so I usually volunteer something like, “For example, I want three children. But the mother of the family I am living with here thinks that is too many. Many women only want to have one or two children.” The women usually laugh at this. They ask me how many children I have now. I respond that I do not yet have even one child. They ask me how old I am, and when I answer 23, they are shocked and confused. “Why?” they ask. I tell them that my boyfriend and I use birth control because we are not ready for children yet. I tell them that I wanted time to travel here to work with them and that I still want to go to another two years of school.
The other day, when I explained this to a group of women in the pourperio (the area in the hospital where women recover after giving birth) one of the women sat up and said, “You could still have a child, you could just do what everyone here does and strap him to your back and go about your traveling and studying.” Everyone got a huge laugh out of this. I explained that I understood that was how women did it here, and that I admired their strength, but that for me, it would just be too difficult. Children can be a lot of work, and women should decide how many they want to have, and when they want to have them.

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