The Little Things

I guess I win the worst blogger ever award. I've never been much of a writer. Anywho, everything is pretty much the same here. I thought I would share a bit about life as a PCV. Life here is a series of random occurrences. Last Friday, for example. I had a youth group meeting in the afternoon. We did an activity to encourage diversity. I put a post-it with a symbol on it on the back of every kid. They could not see their own but they see those of everyone else. Then I simple said organize yourselves. Of course they put themselves in groups by symbols. Triangles here, circles there. But a few kids had random symbols that didn't fit anywhere so they were left out. Then I pointed out that I did not say how they should organize themselves and there was no reason for them to exclude anyone. Next, we talked about what we should do for Mother's Day. We're going to put on a short program with dances and songs by some of the kids. To be figured out better, later. Lastly we did an English activity. I gave each person an activity in Spanish to perform, running, dancing, jumping, etc. Of the other kids, the first to name the action in English would get a point on our point board. Which completely started as bribery, a way to keep them interested and showing up. Now I realized today it can be both incentive and remonstrance. Sometimes they like to try to get a rise out of me by using bad words in English. Every time they do it now it is a lost point. I have so much respect for teachers. Those were all of my planned activities for the day but that was not sufficient (according to them). So we played the local version of London Bridge which ends with tug-of-war. Then duck, duck, goose. I often feel twenty-four going on ten here. Then they tried to trap me in the Health Center to try to get me to sing any song by Bon Jovi, Bryan Adams, or Troy Bolton (a character from High School Musical, this was coming from the nine year old and I managed not to say I'd rather kill myself) in English. I managed to escape but not before treating (or punishing) them with a few choruses of We Are the World. It's hard to resist that much begging. Do I have an explanation for this? Not really.
Another thing I cannot explain coherently to all of you. We recently crossed international borders for Wendy's. Yes, the restaurant with the pig-tailed girl. We were all dying for a Frostie. It was during Holy Week, Semana Santa, when very little work gets done all throughout Central America. Most people go to the beaches and we heard they are miserably crowded so we decided to go to Tegulcigalpa, capital of Honduras and get Wendy's. Our own little Harold and Kumarian adventure. Managua has many food chains but it is lacking both Wendy's and Chilis so we conquered both. Life is definitely the little things.
I wanted to say a big thank you to United Methodist Church in Dayton. A collection was taken at Easter for a project in La Mora and your generosity is overwhelming. The sports equipment that was collected at Christmas is being put to good use. I keep all of the items in my room and they knock on my window whenever they want something and then return it by nighttime. The ideas for the donated money at this time are a library/youth center and school gardens to improve nutrition. I'll do my best to keep you updated on our progress.