Hi,
okay, so the family have arrived WOOO. basically we got ourselves a car...which proved to be difficuly seeing as the blooming rental company didn't have the car there that we had organised. we had to make do with a pickup, our luggage hanging out at the back of the car unprotected. i wanted to sit on the back as a guard but FANCY THAT, the parents said no. mwahaha....
luckily the luggage was fine. we drove to cofradia briefly to pick up my stuff and to speak to ben about the best way of driving to la ceiba, as i didn't know, i'd only ever gone by bus so i couldnt remember the turn offs etc. mum thought it was like an hour to ceiba...oh how wrong, it's like 3.5 hours ahha. so we had to drive through the night. we DID however get the most epic baleadas everrrrr from baleadaladee (baleada lady who makes da neeeeatest ones) for dinner, plus homemade mangojuice. yum.
we drove and finally arrived in ceiba after having to endure a few potholes in the road that literally came out of nowhere. we were going to go for a drive around ceiba to find some accommodation that mum had found, but decided to sack the idea cos we were all shattered. we had to sign into a pure expensive hotel for one night. was definitely a nice experience for me!
the following morning we woke pretty early to stephen telling us we were late. mad dash and we were out of the hotel, for stephen to realise he hadn't accommodated for the daylight saving time, so we were early ahaha. arrived at the galaxy wave ferry terminal, mum and stephen took the car back to the dealer in ceiba. tom and i hung around the ferry port while grandma sat inside. was nice to be able to finally talk to him, we hadn't done much chatting since their arrival.
we took the ferry over and arrived on the island, got a people carrier to our accommodation that mum had organised... an actual appartment/wooden house on the beach of sandy bay! :)
we flooded in, i was checking it out, it looked amazing. John, the man in charge, took us around the rooms. i thought we were all in 2 rooms - there were like 2 double beds in some rooms, a single and a double in others, so i thought we were sharing, but NO. turns out we were all getting our own room, grandma in one, mum and stephen in one, me in one and tom in the other! there was a lovely decking area on the elevated porch of the appartment, and our own kitchen/dining area complete with a bookshelf full of games, books, jigsaws, magazines...! they were obviously used to the realllllly boring days that the island holds. when it rains, for example, the beach isnt much fun, and the bars/clubs are closed most weekdays...so what do you do?! sit in and play monopoly with the family as was the case for me one night. just for the record, we all got totally MASHED by stephen's incredible command of the game. i guess that's what happens when you download the game for your phone and spend every waking minute on it eh? TOUCHE. blub.
so we settled into the island. i took a trip to marlin's hotel, the place i stayed at eastertime...she had let me off paying the cost of my accommodation so that i could get back to my old placement asap, so i made it my priority to shoot down there and give it to her, im sure she never expected to see it again!
aww what a wonderful greeting 'LOOK AT YOUUU, you've lost so much weight!!' guess i was pretty chuffed to hear that ;) she welcomed me with open arms and gave me a piece of her LEGENDARY sweet potato cake. it is to die for.
we chatted and caught up with each other, she was so grateful to see me, she wasn't concerned about the money at all! it was nice to be welcomed back with so much love and smiling happiness, i remembered why i loved Roatan so much... :)
i headed back to sandy bay to be with the family. it feels like a blur now... i see them there, i remember them being in the flesh, standing in the kitchen, on the dock, out at the pier... they really were actually definitely 100% HERE. jeez.
speaking of the dock, we did a fair bit of snorkelling while we were there. it was awesome, i saw some pretty amazing things there, baracudas, parrotfish, starfish, angel and butterfly fish, squirrel fish... it was amazing. saw a fair amount of dory's from finding nemo too ahah.
the snorkelling was amazing though, we got the equipment free with our accommodation, some kayaks too, so stephen and tom did that a couple of times. i snorkelled out with mum, she claimed that i talked to the fish in the water... i actually did, don't ask. we swam through the shallow coral, through tunnels, with schools (i am SURE it is a school of fish, though kevin insists its shoals. i think we're both right), around all the types of marine life. we swam deep into the coral, the water level getting shallower and shallower, until you pop over on shall piece and all of a sudden the greatest expanse of water is infront of you, too far to see more than ten metres of clear blue infront of you... caves of fish and shellfish and anenomies (sp?) and bigger fish swimming around below us, i saw a parrotfish that was literally about half my size. thats a blinking massive fish by the way. i was like WOAH.
we met John before, the guy who kinda manages/owns the place. he owns a bar too, and some other rooms. he liked to drink and was pretty hilarious on certain occassions at the bar ahaha. i THINK it was his wife, Sue, who ran the bar. she was hilarious and great. attended to our eeeevery need, whipping a new salva vida in place of the empty ones before we could even ask her, entertaining us with her funny chat. she was a character, so hard to describe. she seemed to think she knew what she was talking about a lot, but didnt REALLY know, which made her seem kinda cute. she was adorable, a really lovely person to have met on the island. she was great to chat to when you just wanted to chill and have a nice wee laugh :)then there was Angie, who i had met at christmas time up at the oasis pool bar, she spilled my beautiful cocktail all over the floor and gave me 200 lemps to cover it haha. she couldnt remember me of course, she was completely trollied on new years eve :P so she worked a couple of days at the bar, she organised a bingo night with the other people staying in their accommodation, from texas. keen divers they were.
anyhoo, thats the intro. more to come!
love Jen xxx
Monday, 12 July 2010
Wednesday, 7 July 2010
and THEN....
hey :)
okay so we returned from Belize, and Ian was on his what to NY where he works in a summercamp, so cool, think i might do that next summer?
and by this point laura had gone also. kev was getting ready to leave in a couple of weeks, and we realised that we needed to get some souvenirs! lets just say we were a great shopping team, got some awesome bargains and one of a kind items...was really great! we got all sorts, honduras football gear (which reminds me, we went to see the football in the city!) shirt, scarf, mugs, towels, keyrings all sorts. looking cool, kev got a bandana ahaahhahaa.
the shopping was great, i'm really excited to come back and give out a couple of presents from Honduras! :D
and then... the family were coming out. i'd been waiting for this day for sooooo long. when all the things were going wrong i'd been wishing for this day. even when things were going right i was dying for them to come out, to experience the amazing things i have the privilege of seeing. i was so excited to see my mum, to thank her for all the wonderful things she's done for me since i got here...for supporting me through EVERY single thing i came to her seeking help with... i grew to appreciate her, and to admire her. she's my MUM for goodness sake! i no longer have that 'i know everything' idea. i now know that my parents are people i need to learn from too. i know stephen's going to have a feild day everytime i come to him seeking some advice or help of one kind or another... hopefully both of them will look forward to seeing a change in my supporting and helping them... :)
i couldnt wait to see my grandma, though i was pretty worried about how she would cope with all the crap that goes on in this country...knowing all the while i'm sure she would LOVE it! i couldnt wait to see Tom again..to see the brother who has grown into such a cool guy, see how he's changed in the last 9months...so much.
the only problem was that they were late in arriving. delayed flight. shite.
but eventually i saw them walk through a space in a room far to the back of the building, through a tiny split in the mottled glass. i then stood there for about 20 minutes...as per usual.
i moved to the end of the exit for the people arriving. i waited a few minutes and then MUM'S HEAD CAME BOBBING THROUGH, looking over the crowd, mouthing the words 'where is my baby'
i quickly waved her over, and of course she started greeting, as usual haha. she looked so beautiful. so safe.
grandma came marching out, chin high and called my mum back in cos she'd managed to fail at some kind of security nonsense. the other 2 weren't out yet.
i hugged grandma, who looked a little shocked, and i felt HUGE beside, as always, my wee grandma.
mum, stephen and tom came trooping through the doors and it was wonderful to see them. tom was so much taller than me now, goodness sake...and stephen looked just the same as always, blub ;)
it was nice. what a nice introduction to my family coming on holiday to see me. it went better than i'd ever imagined!
i'll write all about our trials and tribulations travelling through Honduras soon, i promise :)
love, jen xxx
okay so we returned from Belize, and Ian was on his what to NY where he works in a summercamp, so cool, think i might do that next summer?
and by this point laura had gone also. kev was getting ready to leave in a couple of weeks, and we realised that we needed to get some souvenirs! lets just say we were a great shopping team, got some awesome bargains and one of a kind items...was really great! we got all sorts, honduras football gear (which reminds me, we went to see the football in the city!) shirt, scarf, mugs, towels, keyrings all sorts. looking cool, kev got a bandana ahaahhahaa.
the shopping was great, i'm really excited to come back and give out a couple of presents from Honduras! :D
and then... the family were coming out. i'd been waiting for this day for sooooo long. when all the things were going wrong i'd been wishing for this day. even when things were going right i was dying for them to come out, to experience the amazing things i have the privilege of seeing. i was so excited to see my mum, to thank her for all the wonderful things she's done for me since i got here...for supporting me through EVERY single thing i came to her seeking help with... i grew to appreciate her, and to admire her. she's my MUM for goodness sake! i no longer have that 'i know everything' idea. i now know that my parents are people i need to learn from too. i know stephen's going to have a feild day everytime i come to him seeking some advice or help of one kind or another... hopefully both of them will look forward to seeing a change in my supporting and helping them... :)
i couldnt wait to see my grandma, though i was pretty worried about how she would cope with all the crap that goes on in this country...knowing all the while i'm sure she would LOVE it! i couldnt wait to see Tom again..to see the brother who has grown into such a cool guy, see how he's changed in the last 9months...so much.
the only problem was that they were late in arriving. delayed flight. shite.
but eventually i saw them walk through a space in a room far to the back of the building, through a tiny split in the mottled glass. i then stood there for about 20 minutes...as per usual.
i moved to the end of the exit for the people arriving. i waited a few minutes and then MUM'S HEAD CAME BOBBING THROUGH, looking over the crowd, mouthing the words 'where is my baby'
i quickly waved her over, and of course she started greeting, as usual haha. she looked so beautiful. so safe.
grandma came marching out, chin high and called my mum back in cos she'd managed to fail at some kind of security nonsense. the other 2 weren't out yet.
i hugged grandma, who looked a little shocked, and i felt HUGE beside, as always, my wee grandma.
mum, stephen and tom came trooping through the doors and it was wonderful to see them. tom was so much taller than me now, goodness sake...and stephen looked just the same as always, blub ;)
it was nice. what a nice introduction to my family coming on holiday to see me. it went better than i'd ever imagined!
i'll write all about our trials and tribulations travelling through Honduras soon, i promise :)
love, jen xxx
Saturday, 3 July 2010
anyway
hey :)
so that was the end of the river rapids trip...
next stop was just the part where i got mugged. it seemed like such a non-event that i forgot to tell my family about it until about a week later!
i was just walking down the street, minding my own business when some guy crossed from the other side and walked right up to me, put a knife against the right side of my stomach and said 'dinero'
i threw my money into his hand and continued 'celular?' and i said 'no tengo'
he pulled the blade back and continued down the road like nothing happened.
and that was the end of it! the amount of money taken was 5Lempiras, or 15p, or 25cents.
HAHAHAHA, oh dear.
that was a couple of days before my friend laura was to leave. after the event i walked a block further and she opened the door to let me into my house in such a panic, i'd obviously sounded a little stressed by the way i'd said 'Laura, open the door please'... she looked at me, my knees and hands were shaking and i was a little panicky, and she asked me what happened....away out to the road she ran, to see what was going on but the guy was nowhere to be seen. thank goodness, i didnt really want to see him again!
a few days later we were leaving to go to belize, to renew our visas...my especially (it was over a month out of date...typical.)
Laura was leaving a couple of days into our trip, so we were going to miss the last day of her time in cofradia...she'd been here for well over a year. the night before we left, Laura and i stayed up and talked and just hung out before she left. i was really sad to be losing her, she was a big part of my life here in cofradia :( so we all sprinted up to the park at about 4am, and i didnt sleep that night so i had my packing done for the time when we were leaving. a little late...perhaps, but I PROMISE i'm working on it :) we all wandered, zombiefied by sleep, to the park... Laura's house was a cutoff road, one block down from the park. she left us to go to hers...our bus arrived, and we stood there, kevin ringing her, and she yelled 'im coming' so then there was the epic arrival/farewell scenario where laura comes up to our stop and we all get to hug her and say bye and do all the crappy emotional stuff, and then our bus came, again. we squished onto the back, and waved bye to her. that was the last time i saw her in cofradia, and honestly i dont expect it to be the last time i ever see her, i intend to fly to NYC party with her, as i always did :)
anyway, laura left, and here we were on our way to belize. i think it might be important to refer, again, to the fact that my visa was out of date. we headed to the northern border of honduras with guatemala. i crossed that border undetected, and we headed out to the other side. there was a building to our left which was just CALLING my name...and we walked over. of course they noticed that it was over a month out of date...
let's just say that with a good bit of co-operative acting by Kevin, Ian and myself, i managed to squash the fine down to the lowest charge... 2,750Lempiras... 134 dollars or thereabouts. its was better than the next charge up which waas over $200!
i paid, relieved and yet again a little poor, in Guatemala. we took a boat from guatemala to punta gorda, Belize. kevin and i had a shot of driving the boat, it was awesome! our captain was super cool, he drove me to the visa office on his motorbike hahah! when i say captain, the boat could have no more than about 16 people in it at any one time... but it was cool :) super speedboat type thing.
arrived in punta gorda, where LO AND BEHOLD, ian's bank card stopped working. I couldnt check my bank balance without the internet and here i was with guatemalan Quetsalez (or something), Honduran Lempiras, but no belizian dollars. blast.
kev used the internet, i checked my balance and luckily, i managed to lift a fair amount to carry me through the trip. relieeeeffffff. we took a bus from punta gorda up to dangriga, another garifuna town. there was also a large population of chinese people which we weren't expecting! their food was awesomely good though :D
we stayed in a REALLY creepy hostel kinda place, owned by some old woman who looked like the Hunchback of notradame, only fatter. she was really weird and spoke english in a french accent. she wanted to charge us a mint, i tried to get her to lower her amount but NO, she didnt want to. so i was like pffft i dont like this place and she was like 'well go somewhere else then' and i was like aw crap. i just got owned by her! the other places were even worse! so we ended up in this room, with a triple bed, a double bed and a single bed.
we slotted the beds together and ended up with some MASSSSSSIIIIVVEEEE bed. seriously we were totally on like our own double bed within this massive bed! teach her a lesson....pah.
so we stayed there, got up the following day and headed to the dock to travel to one of the TINIEST islands ever, called tobacco quay. it was soooo small. walk for 5 minutes from shore to shore in every direction! we took the ferry to this little island, crawled off and explored. we hired a tiny little cottage hanging over the shore. it was so picture skew (picturesque...)
we hired $5 snorkelling gear and headed out. it was so beautiful, and this was the first time i had snorkelled since i was really young! and in the middle of the caribbean, i was in for such a treat! :D
saw all kinds of fish, angel fish, butterfly fish, DORY fish haha, starfish... and a barracuda which opened its toothy jawz if i got too close... :P
we headed back to shore, got showered and sat around with some bacardi, and a little of ians vodka :) we drank merrily and danced like loonies to all the songs we remember from the UK (yes, ian lived there for a while just recently, he knew allll the same song as us!) and we had such a good evening, i met a few girls from the US who were on their last night after about 3 weeks of marine biology study... so cool!
the following day, we headed back home. it was a short but sweet trip!
that night we arrived at the border crossing between guatemal and honduras...about 8 oclock...
of course, there were no buses, and taxis were RIDICULOUSLY expensive, in UK prices! we were told that there is a little town just beyond the border with a couple of cheap hotels. we watched the sky get darker and darker, so quickly as we were surrounded by mountains, and headed out into the night :)
we started walking down the cutoff road (after walking for about 20 minutes up and down the main road, we forgot to take the turnoff...) and it was literally PITCH BLACK. i couldnt see my hand infront of my face it was so bad, no moonlight whatsoever.
i spotted a little house to our right. i headed to the door, knocked and called in spanish. a man called out WHO and i replied...' ehh, jennifer?? we're afraid of the dark! hahaha...' and he called out to wait and we waited. he arrived and he offered to walk us up to the town, he was heading up there anyway. i chatted to him about hotel prices, english, whether he's scared of living where he does, how long he's been there...all that jazz..in spanish! :) very proud times in my life.
we headed to the hotel, i negotiated with the man...in his lounge/house/office. he said they had no rooms and we could sleep on the floor. it was cheap. he would bring us matresses...
i was a little on the short side for money, so i said fine. the boys said they'd see! he brought out all the stuff, i stood my ground and said i'd stay. he put the matress on the floor of the office. i still said FINE and stayed. eventually a pile of 20something honduran guys came in and filed about 6 each into the 3 rooms around me. i got up and the boys were like GET OUT ahhaha and so we all left and said sorry we didn't want to stay anymore!
we walked out and wandered through the town towards the otherr hotels we'd heard of...everyone was full :| like, EVERYONE. we were standing infront of someone's open style house/bar thing, and headed over to get some light. there were about 4 old men who were totally wasted and downing shots like noones business. (shots of guaro, its like 'alcohol' in general, and shots are like dixie cup sized! these men were taking like 3 gulps per shot. i thought i was no lightweight but seriously, this would put SCOTLAND to shame...almost) ;)
we spotted a younger guy, he started talking to us in english with an american twang, though his vocab wasnt that great, we could understand him pretty clearly. we stayed at the bar chatting to these people for about half an hour, waiting for a taxi to come and take us into the main town with more hotels. yeah, the car never came.
Michael was the boy's name. he invited us to stay at his house on the ACTUAL borderline, there was noone but him staying there. he bought us all a beer (apart from ian who was sleeping in the hammock at the bar hahaa...) and kev and i talked with him. we agreed to stay at his, and thanked him.
we traipsed up to the crossing in town, his pal came along with a truck and we sped up to the border on the back of his pickup :)
we passed the police, crossed the border and took a small turnoff to a tiny little newly built house. we walked in, there was a double bed and a single on the floor, Michael said he'd sleep on the couch. so me and ian ended up crashing on the double, kev on the floor (ian definitely doesn't fancy me. he's gay) :)
we woke up the next morning and headed out, michael was already tending some horses, and then we marched back along the border, got the bus, and arrived back home in cofradia!
that will do for now. more to come shortly :)
love yaaaaaaaazz xxx
so that was the end of the river rapids trip...
next stop was just the part where i got mugged. it seemed like such a non-event that i forgot to tell my family about it until about a week later!
i was just walking down the street, minding my own business when some guy crossed from the other side and walked right up to me, put a knife against the right side of my stomach and said 'dinero'
i threw my money into his hand and continued 'celular?' and i said 'no tengo'
he pulled the blade back and continued down the road like nothing happened.
and that was the end of it! the amount of money taken was 5Lempiras, or 15p, or 25cents.
HAHAHAHA, oh dear.
that was a couple of days before my friend laura was to leave. after the event i walked a block further and she opened the door to let me into my house in such a panic, i'd obviously sounded a little stressed by the way i'd said 'Laura, open the door please'... she looked at me, my knees and hands were shaking and i was a little panicky, and she asked me what happened....away out to the road she ran, to see what was going on but the guy was nowhere to be seen. thank goodness, i didnt really want to see him again!
a few days later we were leaving to go to belize, to renew our visas...my especially (it was over a month out of date...typical.)
Laura was leaving a couple of days into our trip, so we were going to miss the last day of her time in cofradia...she'd been here for well over a year. the night before we left, Laura and i stayed up and talked and just hung out before she left. i was really sad to be losing her, she was a big part of my life here in cofradia :( so we all sprinted up to the park at about 4am, and i didnt sleep that night so i had my packing done for the time when we were leaving. a little late...perhaps, but I PROMISE i'm working on it :) we all wandered, zombiefied by sleep, to the park... Laura's house was a cutoff road, one block down from the park. she left us to go to hers...our bus arrived, and we stood there, kevin ringing her, and she yelled 'im coming' so then there was the epic arrival/farewell scenario where laura comes up to our stop and we all get to hug her and say bye and do all the crappy emotional stuff, and then our bus came, again. we squished onto the back, and waved bye to her. that was the last time i saw her in cofradia, and honestly i dont expect it to be the last time i ever see her, i intend to fly to NYC party with her, as i always did :)
anyway, laura left, and here we were on our way to belize. i think it might be important to refer, again, to the fact that my visa was out of date. we headed to the northern border of honduras with guatemala. i crossed that border undetected, and we headed out to the other side. there was a building to our left which was just CALLING my name...and we walked over. of course they noticed that it was over a month out of date...
let's just say that with a good bit of co-operative acting by Kevin, Ian and myself, i managed to squash the fine down to the lowest charge... 2,750Lempiras... 134 dollars or thereabouts. its was better than the next charge up which waas over $200!
i paid, relieved and yet again a little poor, in Guatemala. we took a boat from guatemala to punta gorda, Belize. kevin and i had a shot of driving the boat, it was awesome! our captain was super cool, he drove me to the visa office on his motorbike hahah! when i say captain, the boat could have no more than about 16 people in it at any one time... but it was cool :) super speedboat type thing.
arrived in punta gorda, where LO AND BEHOLD, ian's bank card stopped working. I couldnt check my bank balance without the internet and here i was with guatemalan Quetsalez (or something), Honduran Lempiras, but no belizian dollars. blast.
kev used the internet, i checked my balance and luckily, i managed to lift a fair amount to carry me through the trip. relieeeeffffff. we took a bus from punta gorda up to dangriga, another garifuna town. there was also a large population of chinese people which we weren't expecting! their food was awesomely good though :D
we stayed in a REALLY creepy hostel kinda place, owned by some old woman who looked like the Hunchback of notradame, only fatter. she was really weird and spoke english in a french accent. she wanted to charge us a mint, i tried to get her to lower her amount but NO, she didnt want to. so i was like pffft i dont like this place and she was like 'well go somewhere else then' and i was like aw crap. i just got owned by her! the other places were even worse! so we ended up in this room, with a triple bed, a double bed and a single bed.
we slotted the beds together and ended up with some MASSSSSSIIIIVVEEEE bed. seriously we were totally on like our own double bed within this massive bed! teach her a lesson....pah.
so we stayed there, got up the following day and headed to the dock to travel to one of the TINIEST islands ever, called tobacco quay. it was soooo small. walk for 5 minutes from shore to shore in every direction! we took the ferry to this little island, crawled off and explored. we hired a tiny little cottage hanging over the shore. it was so picture skew (picturesque...)
we hired $5 snorkelling gear and headed out. it was so beautiful, and this was the first time i had snorkelled since i was really young! and in the middle of the caribbean, i was in for such a treat! :D
saw all kinds of fish, angel fish, butterfly fish, DORY fish haha, starfish... and a barracuda which opened its toothy jawz if i got too close... :P
we headed back to shore, got showered and sat around with some bacardi, and a little of ians vodka :) we drank merrily and danced like loonies to all the songs we remember from the UK (yes, ian lived there for a while just recently, he knew allll the same song as us!) and we had such a good evening, i met a few girls from the US who were on their last night after about 3 weeks of marine biology study... so cool!
the following day, we headed back home. it was a short but sweet trip!
that night we arrived at the border crossing between guatemal and honduras...about 8 oclock...
of course, there were no buses, and taxis were RIDICULOUSLY expensive, in UK prices! we were told that there is a little town just beyond the border with a couple of cheap hotels. we watched the sky get darker and darker, so quickly as we were surrounded by mountains, and headed out into the night :)
we started walking down the cutoff road (after walking for about 20 minutes up and down the main road, we forgot to take the turnoff...) and it was literally PITCH BLACK. i couldnt see my hand infront of my face it was so bad, no moonlight whatsoever.
i spotted a little house to our right. i headed to the door, knocked and called in spanish. a man called out WHO and i replied...' ehh, jennifer?? we're afraid of the dark! hahaha...' and he called out to wait and we waited. he arrived and he offered to walk us up to the town, he was heading up there anyway. i chatted to him about hotel prices, english, whether he's scared of living where he does, how long he's been there...all that jazz..in spanish! :) very proud times in my life.
we headed to the hotel, i negotiated with the man...in his lounge/house/office. he said they had no rooms and we could sleep on the floor. it was cheap. he would bring us matresses...
i was a little on the short side for money, so i said fine. the boys said they'd see! he brought out all the stuff, i stood my ground and said i'd stay. he put the matress on the floor of the office. i still said FINE and stayed. eventually a pile of 20something honduran guys came in and filed about 6 each into the 3 rooms around me. i got up and the boys were like GET OUT ahhaha and so we all left and said sorry we didn't want to stay anymore!
we walked out and wandered through the town towards the otherr hotels we'd heard of...everyone was full :| like, EVERYONE. we were standing infront of someone's open style house/bar thing, and headed over to get some light. there were about 4 old men who were totally wasted and downing shots like noones business. (shots of guaro, its like 'alcohol' in general, and shots are like dixie cup sized! these men were taking like 3 gulps per shot. i thought i was no lightweight but seriously, this would put SCOTLAND to shame...almost) ;)
we spotted a younger guy, he started talking to us in english with an american twang, though his vocab wasnt that great, we could understand him pretty clearly. we stayed at the bar chatting to these people for about half an hour, waiting for a taxi to come and take us into the main town with more hotels. yeah, the car never came.
Michael was the boy's name. he invited us to stay at his house on the ACTUAL borderline, there was noone but him staying there. he bought us all a beer (apart from ian who was sleeping in the hammock at the bar hahaa...) and kev and i talked with him. we agreed to stay at his, and thanked him.
we traipsed up to the crossing in town, his pal came along with a truck and we sped up to the border on the back of his pickup :)
we passed the police, crossed the border and took a small turnoff to a tiny little newly built house. we walked in, there was a double bed and a single on the floor, Michael said he'd sleep on the couch. so me and ian ended up crashing on the double, kev on the floor (ian definitely doesn't fancy me. he's gay) :)
we woke up the next morning and headed out, michael was already tending some horses, and then we marched back along the border, got the bus, and arrived back home in cofradia!
that will do for now. more to come shortly :)
love yaaaaaaaazz xxx
Friday, 2 July 2010
well well well...
hey guys. my BAD. i want to keep writing this blog and im so sorry i've not been doing such a good job of it.
what's happened lately...
a) school ended
b) went to jungle river lodge
c) got mugged for 15p
d) Laura left
e) went to belize
f) souvenir shopping
g) my family came to visit
h) kevin left
i) looking out on the next month...the last month
so yeah, the school year finished...and with it, came exams!!
i prepared exams in almost all subjects for my kids: english writing, listening, speaking and writing, mathematics, art, pe...
they did them over the course of a week. there were students that i KNEW wouldn't put their all in...naughty little munchkins like Cesar, Raymundo etc. Cheeky wee boys, but so adorable. the life of the class (i feel like i have some type of relatino to these kids...anyone reminded of my school years??)
they did all of their exams...a LOT of marking for me, and a lot of filing too...getting to know how the system worked in CBS...it was an experience! nothing in comparison to the 5 months prior to my being here...
had an awesome time with the kids, doing football and sports on the last day, dancing, eating icecream and having a great time. i got a couple of videos of them, they'll go on facebook as soon as i have a good enough internet connection :)
so that was the end of the year...it was great! all the kids were so relieved! as were some of the teachers of course :)
we smooshed past the few days during the summer that we didnt have anything planned just hanging out at the rocks, the swimming pool and going through to san pedro every so often. the rocks was like our second home :) other times we would go through and visit our friend Laura, or Terry...sometimes we'd just sit with ben and william and talk nonsense. ian became a closer friend over these few weeks.
[incase we dont know... Laura (aka the smuggler) was an ex volunteer from New Jersey, part Honduran also, and she lived just near the park. i used to tutor her nephew and that was held at her house every 2nd day, so we spent a lot of time together (the boy was always late. everyone on honduran time...typical!) listening to music, talking nonsense, joking about, talking about our problems. it was amazing. i'd not really had the chance to make a real friend in Honduras since i arrived as my old towns didnt really have much in the way of english speakers, and i never thought i would have the time or ability to make a good friend in the short time i had in the country... so i really got close to Laura and i know we'll see each other again in the future. THANK YOU! :)
Terry is the man who built the rocks, and is currently building his own place just near by. he's married to Dunia who is a really lovely honduran woman. she makes awesome bread! terry used to be in the vietnam war and has a lot of stories to tell.
Ben is the owner of the rocks, and william is his 15 year old son.
Ian is a volunteer from canada, the Science teacher. he was a great friend and a really entertaining character, he always managed to make me laugh. BWEN ASSSSSS!!! (his accent while articulating Buenas...)]
one weekend we planned to do some white water rafting up in La Ceiba - The Jungle River Lodge. the party consisted of JEN KEV WILLIAM and IAN. we took the bus early morning to La Ceiba where we took a cab to Banana Republic (linked to JRL) and booked ourselves in for hostel stay at JRL and some white water rafting :)
the water rafting was amazing :) i had to dress up like a complete tube of course, but it was a good look. red is so my colour.
the course instructors were super cool too, good english, good banter! it was a good experience :) we got a couple of drinks in in the evening, and we jumped off the cliff into the water (not in that order...) so many times, it was so awesome, pure exhilarating in the dark :)
the following day we trekked all the way up a mountain to a waterfall... it was SO BEAUTIFUL. amazing, cool water (which i drank, my bad? i wasnt ill though!) but it was a pure great work out, it was amazing to see and it was such relaxation! amazing...the trek back could have been done without, i was seriously lacking agua...
but yeah, v good times!
will write more soon i promise, LOVE XXX
what's happened lately...
a) school ended
b) went to jungle river lodge
c) got mugged for 15p
d) Laura left
e) went to belize
f) souvenir shopping
g) my family came to visit
h) kevin left
i) looking out on the next month...the last month
so yeah, the school year finished...and with it, came exams!!
i prepared exams in almost all subjects for my kids: english writing, listening, speaking and writing, mathematics, art, pe...
they did them over the course of a week. there were students that i KNEW wouldn't put their all in...naughty little munchkins like Cesar, Raymundo etc. Cheeky wee boys, but so adorable. the life of the class (i feel like i have some type of relatino to these kids...anyone reminded of my school years??)
they did all of their exams...a LOT of marking for me, and a lot of filing too...getting to know how the system worked in CBS...it was an experience! nothing in comparison to the 5 months prior to my being here...
had an awesome time with the kids, doing football and sports on the last day, dancing, eating icecream and having a great time. i got a couple of videos of them, they'll go on facebook as soon as i have a good enough internet connection :)
so that was the end of the year...it was great! all the kids were so relieved! as were some of the teachers of course :)
we smooshed past the few days during the summer that we didnt have anything planned just hanging out at the rocks, the swimming pool and going through to san pedro every so often. the rocks was like our second home :) other times we would go through and visit our friend Laura, or Terry...sometimes we'd just sit with ben and william and talk nonsense. ian became a closer friend over these few weeks.
[incase we dont know... Laura (aka the smuggler) was an ex volunteer from New Jersey, part Honduran also, and she lived just near the park. i used to tutor her nephew and that was held at her house every 2nd day, so we spent a lot of time together (the boy was always late. everyone on honduran time...typical!) listening to music, talking nonsense, joking about, talking about our problems. it was amazing. i'd not really had the chance to make a real friend in Honduras since i arrived as my old towns didnt really have much in the way of english speakers, and i never thought i would have the time or ability to make a good friend in the short time i had in the country... so i really got close to Laura and i know we'll see each other again in the future. THANK YOU! :)
Terry is the man who built the rocks, and is currently building his own place just near by. he's married to Dunia who is a really lovely honduran woman. she makes awesome bread! terry used to be in the vietnam war and has a lot of stories to tell.
Ben is the owner of the rocks, and william is his 15 year old son.
Ian is a volunteer from canada, the Science teacher. he was a great friend and a really entertaining character, he always managed to make me laugh. BWEN ASSSSSS!!! (his accent while articulating Buenas...)]
one weekend we planned to do some white water rafting up in La Ceiba - The Jungle River Lodge. the party consisted of JEN KEV WILLIAM and IAN. we took the bus early morning to La Ceiba where we took a cab to Banana Republic (linked to JRL) and booked ourselves in for hostel stay at JRL and some white water rafting :)
the water rafting was amazing :) i had to dress up like a complete tube of course, but it was a good look. red is so my colour.
the course instructors were super cool too, good english, good banter! it was a good experience :) we got a couple of drinks in in the evening, and we jumped off the cliff into the water (not in that order...) so many times, it was so awesome, pure exhilarating in the dark :)
the following day we trekked all the way up a mountain to a waterfall... it was SO BEAUTIFUL. amazing, cool water (which i drank, my bad? i wasnt ill though!) but it was a pure great work out, it was amazing to see and it was such relaxation! amazing...the trek back could have been done without, i was seriously lacking agua...
but yeah, v good times!
will write more soon i promise, LOVE XXX
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