The Year Mark

It’s a funny thing living in Honduras, or so you have to remind yourself at times. Some days it clicks and some days it don’t. Some months it clicks and some months it don’t. You get up to about a year of service and you start to question whether or not the whole year clicked or not. The truth of the matter is that when I, and most volunteers for that matter, start service we have a better set of language skills than when we arrive to country (lots of classes in training), however it does not make up for the fact that otherwise well educated peoples are rendered looking like 8 year olds for a time in terms of efficacy with the spoken tongue. Also behind are these people in terms of how to manage living in a place they will still not fully understand even after leaving in 2 years time. The language thing gets much better, the state of the country does not so much. Public school classes will still be getting canceled up to 100 days a year due to teacher strikes after I leave, the electric company among others will still be answerable to no one, robbing people by making up usage numbers with no formal system to challenge their business ethics (more to come on this in another blog), there will always be more trash in the streets and burning plastic in the air, Coca-Cola will still be seen by some as a legitimate substitute for milk in bottles for infants and for water by adults, and the country will invariably continue to experience growth in violence in the foreseeable future as the trend has been. I could continue this list for quite some time but I don’t think it would serve my point. What are eye-openers to some become normal to others. I think it is a great lesson on the human condition. We can get used to just about anything over enough time.

The Honduras-fun-facts stated above have all but lost their initial shock value; they literally are every day occurrences. It is not fortunate that these things leave more and more the forefront of our minds, but it is understandable, and serves a great purpose to be aware of. When living somewhere new, perhaps moving from New York to California or Oregon to Alabama, there are obviously going to be some significant changes in surroundings and the way people live. Moving to a developing country is much the same, just to a much greater degree of difference and displacement. The differences are thrown in your face and as long as your eyes are open you are constantly confronted with them. However, in the same way Americans have become ever so incredibly complacent with the status quo of their ever-declining quality of national politics, international relations, public education, healthcare and the like, Hondurans have done so in similar ways. I have grown up in a rich country. I know the privilege of a comparably much more organized society. Other than the images in T.V. and movies from the U.S. and around the world, how Honduras is the extent of the state of things. This is the reality here, and when you grow up with it, as it appears to me, there is a large sense of normalcy instilled. Just as a new generation of Americans is accepting unjust wars and strong-arming overseas, Hondurans expect a healthy amount of corruption in every new government they elect and in many of the largest national businesses; it doesn’t mean they like it, it’s just how things are…right?

Wrong. I have to ask myself what is missing here? As well as what is missing in the United States? I could argue that there is a lack of access to information in Honduras for the average person to get up in arms about the systematic abuse the government and private companies slowly employ against them. The vast majority of people do not have regular access to Internet, and an infinitesimally smaller percentage are using it for research of this nature (email and facebook dominate the airwaves here too). However, there is much larger culture of protest in this country and all of Central and South America than in the United States.

In the United States we have the opposite problem, everyone has seemingly unlimited access to information, and no one is using it to create social change large enough to affect the top. Furthermore there is an incredibly strong force of resignation and ignorance in the United States allowing those above to continue to stretch the limits of self-serving behavior. Widely available, for example, is the information about the ever-sky-rocketing number of untested chemicals introduced into our lives every year. No burden is placed on the companies by the government to test these like exists in the European Union; there is simply too much money involved for our government to “care”. This is how one of the most esteemed nations in the world treats its people, and how it’s people allow it to happen.

I have a very hard time deciphering which system is more corrupted. Which situation is more dangerous? The one where you see the problems, or the one where they are hidden very well from you? I know which one is easier to live in, but that doesn’t make it any more right.

This pole is covered in pig fat and there is money at the top
during my town fair

Utila

Langue Church at Night

Great Thanksgiving

Surgery Day 1

The Best Family in Langue

Where’s the Music At?

There are an incredible number of lessons I have learned thus far in my experience here. However, I think that one of the most lasting changes I have seen come through me as a result of my time here has to do with expectations. As human beings we grapple every day with the word whether we are conscious of it or not. There are an uncountable number of expectations that we take for granted everyday, and with good reason. It is a tool we use to expect things to happen, assuming general truths about the world around us as to not spend all of our mental energy in frivolous activities. It is safe to assume that the sun will rise tomorrow, that a fire is hot, drinking water will rehydrate, and so on. So we create expectations about these things. The problem that eventually faces us is when these expectations are unfairly assigned to things that are not so concrete. It works out for a time, however when one changes all of his or her surroundings the gap between expectations and realities becomes ever more recognizable.

When coming to a new place we almost all unconsciously create images of how we suppose that place will be. What it will look like, what the people will look like, what our relation will be to this new place and 99.9% of the time this image is not the case. Creating this image in our heads is something uncontrollable, expecting a place to be anything else than what exists in reality is, however, controllable. Someone once told me a simple quote that has continued to stick with me throughout my service. “Expectations are pre-meditated resentments.” In approaching my work, and I think much of development work in the world as a whole could benefit from this, I find myself utilizing these few words to deal with a complicated set of emotions. They can be applied to the physical appearances of places, cultural practices, or a number of things. I find it most useful in my work (or lack of it sometimes), and relations therein. It is unfair of me to build up any expectations of how things will unfold if I have not been explicitly clear as to what they are to those I am currently working with. I, and anyone else who does this, sets themselves up to be upset, and to some degree resentful when a given situation does not live up to your internally constructed thoughts of how they should go. Bottom line is that without proper communication it isn’t fair to others, as well as yourself to expect anything more or less than what is presented. It is not to say that I do not still find myself upset when things don’t go well. I do. But, if what goes wrong in my work is due to a communication error, not something external to that, then it is my fault for not properly expressing my feelings and managing them with those of others. I am learning to manage my expectations, knowing that communication and self-discipline to be the keys. There are so many things out of any of our control but the intent to properly communicate and find understanding with others is not. This both simple and profound fact I am learning with great humility as I continue my journey in this world.

To get a little less philosophical, I want to ask…Where’s the Music At? It is a common past time of mine and other volunteers I know to criticize the culture. There is just too much time not to. After a time you get used to a lot though, a surprising amount really. A “regular” shower becomes an indulgence to the more efficient bucket. Burning trash everywhere not only ceases to create such an alarming sensation, but out of necessity you start burning it every once in a while yourself (on a deep level burning plastic will always upset me). I just went a whole day for the first time here without eating any beans, tortillas, or a single egg and it felt just plain wrong.

But what I can’t get used to is this music situation here. If you know me well you know I’m completely obsessed with music. I play, I listen, and I listen…and I listen. I found my ways to get good enough internets every once in a while to download as many albums I can. It works out pretty well and I have my guitar here now and a stereo. But there is plain and simple a complete lack of music culture in this country. As previously stated, expectations can get you in trouble, but come on people. To give an analogy: Imagine that you are listening to the top 20 station in the U.S.; it’s usually 95.5 or something like that. Sorry for those that enjoy it, but it’s repetitive shit and most of it sucks. Now, imagine that new songs don’t appear for VERY long periods of time, so that the same 20 songs keep repeating for 6 months at a time or more. Now imagine that you can only travel in buses that blast these same songs, sit in cars with friends who blast it, go to town dances that blast it. It gets hard to handle. Remember that Shakira World Cup song? Yeah, still goin’ strong. Also, next to nobody plays an instrument, or has any sense of rhythm. They just aren’t taught it; music is not an integral part of the culture here. It has nothing to do with poverty; some of the poorest parts of the world have some of the richest musical heritage. And there are always exceptions. There are oldies. The two biggest cities have places where people dance Salsa and other ballroom dances. The biggest exception I have seen is that of the Garifuna, an ethnic group on the north coast of the country of African dissent with direct roots to the slave trade. But that’s the other side of the country. I cannot deny that there is some Merengue, some Salsa, some Punta (Garifuna dance/music), and the like; but live music is a rarity. There is one town band that plays funeral marches and birthday parties; in terms of instruments picture a very simplified and slowed down jazz ensemble. If I had to ask myself, where’s the music at in Langue? I would have to answer…my place.

Come on over.

February

Busy busy busy! Ever since my office and I started work after the New Year things seem to be humming at a higher than normal pitch here in MAFRON. By higher than normal pitch I mean a gargling noise to that of a more efficient engine. However, the engine is still located in Honduras and tends to break down…but enough with the metaphors. It’s the dry season here. It’s the hot season here. It’s the hot and dry season here and it’s only getting hotter and dryer. I feel mostly acclimated though perhaps only out of necessity. This is the time where most of the outdoor work for Water/Sanitation volunteers occurs. There is not a drop that falls from the sky for months on end so topography studies for new water systems, and construction of all types is taken advantage of during this time. My region recently received a large sum of funds from Spain for water and sanitation related activities so I have been relatively busy out in the campo (field).

There are always pluses and minuses to these situations. Plus: Tons of money all at once. Minus: Tons of money all at once. I explain a little. It’s great there are tons of new projects for water where people have never not had to walk great distances for it. It really is a beautiful thing to live in some of these very secluded communities for some days without electricity or nearly any water, talking about their lives, how the system could help so much. But there are intrinsic problems that these quick funds not only tend to, but almost always ignore. As aforementioned some of these communities don’t have electricity, and it’s very dry here. There are no year long sources of mountain spring water, therefore pumping is the usual go to down here in the south of Honduras. Pumping requires electricity. Without electricity any given community would have to use a generator, sucking up gas that has to be carried long distances, and that people whose only occupation is farming cannot afford. In the long term as well water systems require investment to make them last for 20 years or more instead of 2 or 3. The investments aren’t huge, but organization and funds usually lack in these situations and the system and community eventually suffer for it. But the funds are here they say! Lets build! If we don’t now Spain takes the money away! So we do studies, we design. And the rest gets figured out later…or doesn’t.

This is how it goes a lot of times, not all the time. I prefer to take a bit of a more vested interest in sustainability of projects. For example I’m looking into the ability to put solar energy in one system I’m designing. The state of Honduras would pay for 40% and I have to look for the rest. But it’s a better option for the furthest and poorest communities that won’t receive electricity lines for years to come. These funds I’m working with now can also be appropriated towards building latrines, always a good thing.

Things aren’t all bad, it’s just important to share a few of the realities of working down here. It’s hard to be a part of projects you don’t think will last because you look around at relatively new systems everywhere that are failing. It comes down to a personal view of mine with development that contradicts the international sentiment: too much money plain and simple. There is too much money and not enough follow-up, not enough people on the ground, not enough community members making their own educated decisions. Progress is more than not, on the international scale, measured in numbers. How much was built, how much spent. Timing, education, local interest and investment take the back seat often. Sure anyone can make the case looking around the developing world and say, gosh they need money, however what they really need in my opinion is organization, long-term not short-term investments in capacity building, governments with greater accountability, local government with greater agency. I think less external funds would force the government to allocate resources with greater efficacy, and deter at least a smidgen of the outright monetary corruption that exists here…but I digress

Things are good right now. There is water work, when I am able to get together equipment and time out rides. I’m also branching out to health promoters in the community to stay productive when other work dries out (no pun intended).

Making the most of my time in and out of my community.

Vistas Nuevas

It has been far too long yet again for any kind of update and oh boy has a lot happened. I hurt my knee playing soccer back in September. After initially hurting it I wasn’t able to walk for a couple days. I thought, sure, it’s just a bad sprain. At least I really wanted it to be a bad sprain. So I had some local medicine men work on it, torque it, inflict pain if you will, and it began to feel a little better. So I tried to kick the ball around again and…oops knee bends sideways out of place I crumple to the ground and the reality of a real sports injury sets up shop way in the back of my head. Weeks go by, I keep working. My work at that time was becoming very fulfilling. I can walk just fine but other activities prove troublesome. Hiking is out of the question due to constant stumbles and grimacing pain thereafter. Dancing holds up until I throw a girl the wrong way and the knee gives out. This happened in Tegucigalpa one evening whereby promptly the next day my med-student friend had me in a doctor’s office having it looked at. And the rest so to speak of is history. I kept dancing, because well, Jesse always keeps dancing. Kept hurting myself. Went to a series of doctors visits and an MRI. And the knife came down when a Honduran knee specialist and the doctors in Washington D.C. all determined that knee surgery was not only necessary but mandatory as well…then the knife actually came down.

So I went to D.C. with the absolute fear that I may not return. There are no facilities to do the surgery in Honduras, leaving the country was not a choice. When any given volunteer is medically evacuated they have 45 days to resolve the majority of their issue or they do not return to country and are medically separated from service. So I arrived on a Wednesday night, met my surgeon the next morning, and walked across the street to the hospital and had my ACL replaced with that of a cadavers. Needless to say Honduras one day to surgery in the U.S. capitol the next was nothing short of intense. But it happened. There were a lot of pain meds involved for those first couple days, kind of a blur really. I came out alive though. My time in D.C. was a very big roller coaster of an experience emotionally for me. No one could indicate whether or not it looked like I was on the road to return to service for the first couple weeks after surgery. There were a lot of good days and a lot of bad ones. It was one day at a time for weeks. I spent a lot of time reading on the Potomac river and watching T.V. and week by week I was able to move around and see things farther and farther from my hotel.

Most Med-Evac’d volunteers get paired up with roommates in the hotel where they put everyone in, yes, Georgetown D.C., the ritziest, most nose-up-in-the-air neighborhood in the city. I was not so lucky to have someone to help me out post-surgery. However, there were many other volunteers from all around the world of whom I was able to truly connect with a few. Namely of those were a volunteer from Rwanda, one from Peru who had the same surgery as me only a week later, and a volunteer from El Salvador (you all know who you are and I consider you all my friends for life!). With these and a few other volunteers I was able to see sights, complain and compare knee recuperation and crutch and walking techniques, and talk about our respective experiences and challenges in very different parts of the world.

Weeks after surgery I was told I was on my way to recover in time to get back to country within the 45 day mark. I focused on my knee and on filling my time productively. I did some volunteering around thanksgiving with senior citizens, saw countless museums and monuments, and caught up with friends and family over the phone. I worked really hard at physical therapy and continue to do so on my own today. The results have paid off. I got cleared to come back to country almost two weeks early; earlier then they had ever seen with this type of surgery at Peace Corps Headquarters. I had to take vacation days to stay a couple days extra and see family and friends in Colorado for a few days. But then it was finally back to where I had wanted to be since the first day being back in the country for knee surgery, Honduras.

There were a number of ways I grew from the trip. Being so strenuous emotionally and physically, if you don’t grow you weren’t really there in my opinion. A number of people reached out for me during this time. Barb and Ian and Gavin, you guys are the best. Truly caring, open, and wonderful people. I wish you the best on the rest of your trip and I cannot thank you enough. Everyone that sent a how-are-you from Honduras, even if it was just a sentence, it meant the world to me up there when I was hurtin’ and showed me you care. Friends and family in the States, your conversations and support were invaluable. I became a stronger person in some respects. I was on my own for the most part in D.C., knowing almost nobody, taking care of myself. The states are nice for a vacation from service, but not so much for me under those circumstances. The experience made me realize how much my life right now is in Honduras. I missed it everyday. Everyday.

I came back! I was so high on Honduras for weeks. The air smelt better. Even the burning trash smell. Nothing bothered me. Not the 12,3, or 4 o’clock in the morning rooster. Not the constant barrage of questions about the States, or money, or whatever other completely inappropriate questions some of these kids come up with. Life was grand. I got back just in time to plan a little work for the new year and it was Christmas and New Year and our town fair for the next 3 or 4 weeks. It was a great time to get my fluidity back a bit with the Spanish, settle into my house again, catch up with everyone and the like. More or less that brings me to today. I went to Utila for New Years and caught up with a bunch of Volunteer friends, and my town fair was very amusing. Sure there are details missing all over the place. But that’s what happens when I don’t update this thing very often. Of which I plan to try to do at least once a month. That’s a good goal for the New Year. Other year goals include riding a bull, seeing Nicaragua and Guatemala and the sites of a couple good buddies, and trying to make the most of this full year I have of service ahead of me. There is a lot of work to be done this year.

...Much more photos to come when better internet is found

Let Freedom Ring

Pictures From Field Based Training




Things are a changin’ here in Langue. I was finally able to move out of my host families place and into my own. It has made all the difference in the world for me. I have what I’m calling a fixer upper of a place. Basically it’s a neglected shithole…but it’s my neglected shithole, and with a little work (cough, understatement) it’s gonna be a wonderful place to live. The family I rent from now has become one of the best things I’ve got going for me here in Langue. We are using my rent money every month to slowly make repairs on the house. And come a year or so it should be a pretty awesome place. I’ve already repaired the walls and painted the entire interior of the place, done some plumbing, and tried to clean up the trash dump of an otherwise great back yard complete with mango, coconut, and lime trees; all while working during the week as well. Needless to say it fills up any downtime I care to fill. There are some serious perks to living alone, and where I do in town. First, I live in quite possibly the safest neighborhood in town that has its own water system. Meaning I have water in the morning to late afternoon everyday, at least until dry season. Compared to the rest of Langue who gets water maybe once a week for a few hours to fill up their pilas (open air water tanks) it’s awesome. I’m taking my first showers without a bucket now in Langue. Secondly, I don’t have to operate on a host families schedule anymore. I eat when I want, listen to music when I want, etcetera, etcetera; all of which I took for granted until the first few months here in Langue with the family I was with. I can also entertain visitors like a few good Langue friends or other volunteers whom I can finally show the town I live in as well. I also live just two blocks from the soccer stadium, where I get down 4 or 5 times a week. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, I can truly relax for the first time here in Langue.
Aside from living plenty of other things have been going on as well. I have been to a couple Peace Corps sponsored trainings. The first was a men’s health conference I was asked to attend, even though my primary project is water, where I learned a few methods to better reach men in terms of teaching about HIV and AIDS. I gave a charla (educational talk) to a group of firefighters and Red Cross workers and have decided to make giving AIDS charlas to the local high school a side project of mine for the next month or two. Upon asking a few questions to the kids I play soccer with it becomes dauntingly apparent how in need these guys are in terms of AIDS and basic sexual health knowledge.
The next training I went to was for a program called VOS, which is a peer support network here in Honduras for volunteers. I was nominated by a number of volunteers and basically it is a resource for people to call me, anonymously, about any problems they are facing. I’m stoked about it. It’s a great way to offer support to people who may be having thought of terminating their service early, are frustrated with work or the culture, or any other number of things volunteers go through (it’s a lot).
Work is moving along, though much slower for me at times than even I expect. In all honesty I have nothing to do in the office this morning so I am writing this blog post instead. Productivity! I have some small projects lined up here and there with a few water system designs and some water board work, but its tough to tackle the feelings of uselessness when you have the desire to work and can’t do so. Times like these require one to remind oneself that this is going to continue to happen, many times out of my control, and that it will pass. Additional pep talk material occasionally includes me telling myself I’m not getting paid, but I really don’t like that one.
Asi es la vida. Moving right along. These months are truly flying by for me. I mean summer in the States is already on its way to wind down. Making the most of just about every day I can. Taking in whatever experience presents itself and being as present as I possibly can in any given moment. All the bad experiences come with many, many more good ones. My life is beginning to feel more and more here and not in the states. I miss you all so much, but the actual States I don’t as much. This is a good thing I think.
I would love a letter or anything anyone cares to send me for I have an address down here now…here it is

Voluntario Jesse Hunt
Recomendado a Voluntaria Vanessa Garcia
Correo Nacional
Nacome, Valle, Honduras, C.A.

And that’s about it for now.
Take care all,

Jesse

More pictures from my site and more current events to come...