October 2010: El Mes Olvidado

To be completely honest, I don't remember much about the month of October.  I know you're thinking I'm missing the obvious...Halloween!  Well the truth is that Halloween isn't celebrated in our small, conservative town of Gracias.  In fact, the school will have no mention of it.  The other teachers hosted a small get-together *GASP!*  But other than that, Halloween pretty much went unnoticed.  I actually had to go back into my Facebook to remember what was happening.  Guess it's been kind of like a virtual diary.  I came across this quote as one of my statuses:

"If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay at home.” – James Michener 

I think this is so true of my time here in Honduras.  It would have been so easy to hang out only with teachers who speak English.  But I have chosen to embrace the culture, to learn Spanish, to eat the tipicos.  I want to get all I can out of my experience here.  I have wonderful friends who have welcomed me into their families.  I am blessed by the hospitility of the people here on a daily basis.

I also ran across pictures from an 80's party we hosted in October.  What a fun night!  We all went shopping in the Ropa Americana stores.  For those of you who donate clothing, it most likely ends up in these stores in Honduras and other Central American countries.  We might have had more fun shopping than the actual party.  Check out what we came up with...

And I love Karen's description of Shawn's shorts, "It looks like someone took the intro. to Saved by the Bell and printed it on shorts.

I forgot to mention that from September-October we lost 3 teachers for various reasons.  When we lose teachers, there is no sub to call.  We are it.  So imagine splitting the courses of 2 teachers...it was rough.  Our newest angel, Miss Petra, showed up to rescue us at the end of October.  Overall, October was busy, but not very memorable.