highs n lows

Coming back from the summer one school year, my friend asked if there were highlights and lowlights... one of my friends immediately said, "Oh yeah! I got both!" as she waved her head around showing us the highlights and lowlights .... in her hair. So, highlights and lowlights of ... Honduras :)

Highlights:

Definitely the staff so far. I am living with three other girls (Shelly, Catelin, and Jennifer); there is a married couple that are living in a house right by the school (Maggie and Tyler); two girls living in town (Raquel and Tabitha) and two girls that we met that are planning to go to La Union and teach (Andrea and Amelia). Everyone seems really nice and eager to jump into things. We've had two days of orientation and some moving around, but everyone seems to have really great attitudes.

My house- I'm in a new house this year and all four of us girls are able to have our OWN ROOM! There's also two bathrooms and a big open area for hanging out. And a kitchen sink inside. !!!! I'll put up pictures soon-ish but right now it's just full of things that we're trying to organize.

The welcome I received- when we were driving up the mountain to start moving into our house, I heard the kids in my neighborhood yell, "MISS VP!!" and they came running up and played in our house :) I love those kids :) It's also been really nice at school with the staff and around town with parents/shopkeepers to see everyone and catch up which leads me to my next highlight....

My Spanish!- Oh man, my Spanish is great! haha. but seriously, I've been doing a lot of arranging and translating and I've been able to do pretty much everything I want. I can have conversations with the people I see and actually understand most of what's being said. Granted, I still stumble over most of my words/tenses or have to ask for repeats but I feel so much more confidence than I did last year so that's been really nice

Lowlights:
The house- so despite this being a new house, it doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be without problems. The outside doors let in water so when it rains, that water seeps into our house :/ Today we got home from school and the toilet wouldn't flush. We have a sink in our kitchen but no real stove (just camping burners). There aren't really any shelves.... but hopefully these things can get worked out or we'll learn to deal with them :)

The Laureles Family- This is actually a pretty low lowlight. The Laureles family is a couple that work at our school and have a 5 year old boy named Nao. Right before I left the States, I found out that Nao had died from the Dengue Fever. He was sick for five days and since his parents don't believe in medicine of any kind, he died pretty quickly. Obviously it was really sad and hard to hear, but then we went to visit and the parents were acting so happy that I didn't know how to react. They have his ashes in a bag that they carry around with them and kept telling me that it was ok because it wouldn't be long before Nao got up again and started running around and playing with the other kids... :( I definitely didn't know how to react to that. Anyway, it was really hard for our little community and the parents are leaving which means we also need to fill two teacher spots pretty quickly before school begins on the 23rd. So pray for all of that- peace for the family, calmness for the students and friends of the family, and good teachers for our school.

I'll be working on my classroom, plans for the year, and organizing my house this next week. Should be busy, but fun!!

also, happy birthday zach :)