The 4th Grade is famous!

Last week, my 4th grade students skyped with another 4th grade class in Middleton, Pennsylvania. We had paired up through the guidance counselor at the school in Pennsylvania who is an alum of Mazapan School. She was looking to do an interactive activity with students from her school so they could learn more about a different part of the world. We ended up becoming pen pals with this class and my students wrote a few letters back and forth before we had our skype session. It lasted an hour long and each student got to talk with their pen pal one on one for a few minutes to ask them some questions. The cool thing however was that the local newspaper ended up writing a piece on the activity! Take a look...(click on the image to make it bigger)

Dangerous Drought

We are going through an extreme drought right now since we haven't seen any rain for the past 2 months. The town is starting to ration off water and we have been in and out of water for the past week. Today I was taking a shower and was in for literally 3 minutes before we lost all water, and this was after we hadn't used any water for about 10 hours! Our cistern didn't fill up over night like it usually does. The town lets the water come on from 12-4 AM usually since there aren't as many people using water but I guess that didn't happen last night.

It's crazy to think we are starting to go into "survival mode" and really be careful with the water that we have. I washed all of our dirty dishes in a bucket the other day and I had to finish washing my hair this morning with a bucket of water we had filled up for emergencies since I had just put conditioner in my hair :) Hopefully we will get some rain soon because things are starting to get insane!!! Cross your fingers for us....

Carnival and La Esperanza

Ken and I experienced our first Carnival this past weekend. Although we didn't stay in town for the BIG event on Saturday, we did get to see a few "Carnivalitos" and I celebrated it with my students at school too. It was crazy to see how the town prepares for over 600,000 tourists for this one event! People plan on coming to La Ceiba way in advance to experience the food, music, floats, and parties of Carnival.

On Thursday, my entire school day was devoted to our "carnivalito". We started the school day off with a parade where each class had a different theme. Some classes were "bikers", "princesses and heros", "pajama lovers", etc. It's tradition that the 4th grade class is the body of this huge dragon and 2 seniors carry the dragon head. My kids were so pumped about it and couldn't wait to get underneath the sheet. At the end of the parade however they were so tired and hot from being covered that the couldn't wait to get out of it!

After the parade, each class held a different game or activity that the students could partake in. They ranged in ticket prices and it was basically just a free for all. The kids brought money to school and bought whatever tickets they wanted and went at it. The biggest seller was the "Haunted House" that the 11th graders were in charge of. It happened to be right next to the 4th grade and I was lucky enough to hear screams, loud music, and plenty of kids leave running for 3 hours! It was good business for the Cake Walk though which is what I had put on. It brought back so many memories of the Family Fun Nights at Forest Hills and how Britni would always win 2 or 3 cakes and I never would win any! I had a few kids who probably played at least 7 times trying to win something...finally they both did!

Thursday night Ken and I ventured to the neighborhood of El Sauce which had a large carnivalito. It was full of people and it was really hard to walk at certain points. There were about 6 streets closed off in this neighborhood and within it were 4 large stages with live music and tons of street games and vendors selling food and drinks. We decided to play a BB gun game where we needed to hit little figurines. We got 4 BB's for $1! We hit 3 of the 4 targets and won little trinkets. All of the stages were having punta dance contests, the typical garifuna dance that is popular hear in La Ceiba, and it's always fun to watch. With so many people though we had to be careful not to get anything stolen out of our pockets. The entire time Ken and I basically held onto everything we brought in our hands. Unfortunately, Jenna's boyfriend got his phone taken out of his pocket and he didn't even notice it right away. These people are pros I tell ya. It was a good thing we weren't staying for the big event :)

Friday was a holiday so Ken and I both had no school. With our friends Jenna and Brian we headed to the small town called La Esperanza. It was about a 5 hour drive from La Ceiba and it was on the other side of a mountain range. The weather was dramatically different than Ceiba as well which is one of the reasons why we wanted to go. Not only did a rain for the entire day yesterday, something we haven't seen in 2.5 months, but it was also 60 degrees compared to the 90 we've been experiencing! It was amazing! We rented this little cabin about 20 minutes outside of town with a beautiful porch and a kitchen where we could make our own meals. There was also a sweet old school park outside our cabin with metal see-saws, slides, and swings. The town itself was bigger than I originally thought with about 7,000 people. It had huge markets that sold things from cowboy hats and belts to shoes to fabrics to fireworks as well as large farmers markets that had the freshest produce. There was also an amazing view from the top of this hill that over looked the entire city. It was very peaceful and a great place to relax as we hit the finally few weeks of school.

On our way back to Ceiba today we stopped at the Taulaube Caves which are right by Lago de Yojoa. These caves have a lighted walk way of about 400 meters and they continue to go for another 12 kilometers in the dark! It was very cool to see and a neat place to take a break after driving a few hours. We explored on a few of the dark paths and looked at all of the crystals forming on the ceilings. We luckily didn't see any bats flying (or hanging) overhead.

Now we are back in La Ceiba and just relaxing as we get ready for work tomorrow. The warm weather is taking some getting used to again since we had slept under blankets and wore pants for the last few nights. Ken has 2 more weeks left at Santa Teresa and I have just one week left with my students. Soon enough the school year will be over and we will be on our next adventure....to the island of Guanaja!

P.S. We've been trying to upload a bunch of videos from Mother's Day, Earth Day, Easter, and a few other things we've done this spring but for some reason it's not working...hopefully soon you'll get to see them :)

Melting.

It's soooo hot here!

The sounds of hiking in Pico Bonito National Park

During Ken's parents visit, we went hiking in Pico Bonito National Park. Take a look and listen to see how loud these cicadas are!

It's Almost SEMANA SANTA!!!!

The weather continues to be absolutely beautiful day in and day out and we are inching closer and closer to Semana Santa....aka SPRING BREAK! This is our last week before our much needed week long vacation and we couldn't be more ready. Over the past week and a half, we have been going, going, going. I guess this isn't any different than normal for us be we are looking forward to slowing down and relaxing for a bit.

Ken and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary last weekend by going out to get Sushi...at the only sushi place in town (imagine that!) and out to the movies. Ken wasn't too keen on going to the movies since there weren't too many options but he was in a good sport and decided he would go anyways. On a side note: There are only 2 movie theaters in town, both showing only 1-2 movies. These usually aren't new releases either and have been in theaters in the states for the past couple of months. Our choices last weekend happened to be "The Switch", "Number 4" (IN SPANISH), or "The Rite". None of these options were really that good but we did end up seeing "The Switch" which was pretty good. (Ken even admitted this!) We love going to the movies, as many of you back home know, so it was great to go instead of buying dvds on the street and risking a 50/50 chance that they'll work. While we were there, we questioned why we didn't go more often. If we were in the states we know our immediate reaction would be that movies are just too darn expensive and it's really not worth it anymore. However, here in Honduras, a movie ticket is $3 (at night!...only $2 for a matinee) and concessions range from $1-3. Overall, we spent $10 for 2 tickets, 2 waters, and 2 candies....not to shabby.

Our work week was pretty typical with the busyness of grading papers, finding solutions to the many dilemmas of our students, and finding time to plan for the coming weeks. I was surpried to find out on Tuesday that I was going to finish up my residency paperwork and be one step closer to getting my residency card which will be incredibly nice!! Ken and I also went to the nursery and picked out some flowers to put into some pots which looks really nice on our porch. Ken had gotten me one potted plant for our anniversary and we went back and got a few more now.

Yesterday night was our friend Jessie's baby shower which we hosted at our house. We had all of our friends, my coworkers, and some of Jessie's past coworkers from another school in Honduras over for a get together. It was potluck style where everyone brought a piece for the meal and it turned out great. She was so thrilled to have the shower and it was a really fun night. Today Ken and I are just relaxing and cleaning up from last nights shenanigans. We are on the porch now enjoying the breeze and the warm weather before calling it a day. Ken and I are getting very excited for our next visitors, his parents, who are arriving this Thursday to witness all of the festivities in Honduras for Easter. It should be a good time :)

Long time no see!

Let me start off my saying how sorry we are that we haven't written in awhile. As we all know life gets busy and we don't want to have to take the time to sit in front of a computer screen and type up messages during our week nights after work or after our long adventurous weekends! We will definitely try to get better at that because so much has happened in the past month that we want to share with you. We happen to be making a homemade pizza at the moment and while its in the oven I thought it would be a perfect time to let you all know how we are doing in La Ceiba.

March has flown by and we have no idea where its gone. Just after our last blog, my dad and his girlfriend Kasia came down to La Ceiba for a week. It was wonderful to have some visitors and of course to see some family. During their visit, we were able to tour a little bit of Honduras and head southwest of La Ceiba to Lago de Yojoa...the only lake here! It was absolutely beautiful and it was an excellent weekend get away spot. We rented a car and road tripped for just about 3.5 hours (when it was supposed to take 5...thanks Dad for the super driving!) and spended Saturday-Monday here. The hotel we stayed at looked over this massive lake surrounded by beautiful mountains. Also, the weather and climate is completely different from the hot and humid La Ceiba. It was drier and much cooler which felt amazing. I actually wore long sleeves in the evenings which was a huge change from the 95 degree, sweatbox I'm used to at night.

There was a great waterfall just down the road from the river where we were able to actually hike down and under the waterfall into this little cave to hang out for a bit. It was definitely scary having to walk under the pelting water with your eyes closed, head down, and breathing only through your mouth as the guide took you along, but it was sooo worth it. On our way back from the waterfall we stopped at D & D Brewery, one of the few breweries in Honduras, where we enjoyed some apricot, amber, and stout beer (clearly the apricot beer was the best...right Dad!) and the best burger I have had abroad...EVER! We also went out onto the lake for a morning of bird watching with Malcom, an Englishman who has devoted the last 3 years to living in the area and taking these daily tours with visitors. There are LOADS of different types of birds that live along the lake and from what Malcom said, we saw/heard over 60 different bird species in the 4 hours we were on the lake. I doubt that Ken and I even realized we saw that many since we were mostly just enjoying the views of the lake and playing around with the binoculars, but I can say we did see some BEAUTIFUL toucans.

We also went on a canopy tour and to the natural hot springs down the road later on in the week. The ziplining was the best that I have done so far (I only have Costa Rica to compare it too!) but Ken and Dad agreed that it was the best they had ever done as well. There were 18 lines, one of which was 1 kilometer long!, and the view from atop the hill was breathtaking. It was also great that we were the only ones because we were able to get from one pit stop to the next so quickly and just keep on going! Graham, you would definitely have been thinking about how to make ziplining from the Sears Tower to Purdue possible after this!!! Ken even started talking about how to zipline from work to home...it was that great. The hot springs were so relaxing and the volcanic mud gave your skin a nice, smooth feeling afterwards. The hot springs were so crazy too because you could see the volcanic waters running down the side of the mountain and mixing with the cold, cold water of the river in this one pool. The top of the water was hot and the bottom of the water was cool. It made the temperature bareable :)

I also took my 4th graders on another field trip to the beach. This time we focused on Earth Day, and in honor of our Mother Earth, we did a BIG BEACH CLEAN-UP! Jessie (the 3rd Grade teacher) and I had been teaching our kids little things they could do to help save the earth and it was the big finale to the lessons. The beaches in Honduras can be really pretty and also really dirty and our kids found that out quickly! While we were able the beach, our kids picked up over 15 full trash bags of garbage in a half-mile radius. We picked up a lot but unfortunately there was still a bunch. I know however this experience will stick with them because they have been spotted around school picking up more trash! Also, Jessie and I have been working on a mural in the center of our campus in honor of this beach clean-up that we are finishing up this week with our signing ceremony. We painted a beach scene and our kids used their hand prints to make the palm trees. It turned out super cute and our students are so excited to say they have something that will last a Mazapan for years to come.

Ken left for his Visa this past weekend and headed to Guatemala with our friend Jake. They took Chicken Buses the whole way and learned just how true the name can be. In one instance they were in a mini-van that seated 10 people and 23 people were crammed into it with 1 person even sitting on the roof...plus there were chickens in peoples laps!! They stayed at Lago de Izabel which is just over the boarder and he said it was beautiful. It was a relaxing weekend and he was able to read, sight see a bit, and even get out on the lake in a small row boat. Who said renewing a visa wasn't fun! In the mean time, I stayed in La Ceiba and cleaned the house, did some laundry, baked lots of goodies with the girls, had a BBQ on our new grill with some friends, and bought a new T.V.!!! SURPRISE KEN!!! We finally have a t.v. that is bigger than 10 inches :) I also ventured to the meat market and was able to buy some new cuts of meats to try. So far, we have tried the porkchops which were really good but super fatty unfortunately. Oh well...its still better than the meat at the super market.

Other than that things have been great for us here. It has gotten incredibly humid over the past few weeks and we now have a heat index of 98 degrees on a daily basis. It is impossible not to sweat just here writing this blog! I'm definitely not complaining though since it just snowed in the Midwest. At least the sun is shining every day and I have air conditioning in my classroom! I think it would be impossible to teach with 30 kids without it. We hope things are going well with you back in the states and we can't wait for you to all visit. Ken and I are getting excited for his parents to come for Easter Break in a few weeks and before we know it the school year will be over! Only 6.5 weeks to go!!!