Friday, August 14, 2009


Finally, free time! I haven’t written for a while, so I’ll try to write about everything that’s been happening.
- Ferrias:
During our school trimester break from school, I got together with some friends I haven’t seen since training, and we spent some time relaxing and catching up. I won’t bore you all with tales of the amazing tropical beaches (sleeping in hammocks, amazing seafood, canoeing through mangroves, blah blah..) Also, people seem to get mad if I talk too much about these things. I’m in Peace Corps and supposed to be having a rough life all the time?

- Science Fair:
This has been sucking up all of my time and energy the last few weeks. Becky and I were the organizers of the Southern Regional Science Fair this year. It was certainly a lesson in patience and flexibility. Planning big events here is quite different than event planning in the U.S. First, when you set up meetings, this does not mean anything. More often than not, the other person doesn’t show, or shows up an hour late. Also, when planning a big educational event, all the right people have to be invited in the right order, as not to offend anyone. Figuring out the hierarchy of the local government was challenging, and I am so grateful for another volunteer in the area for helping to invite everyone and tell them about the event. I was so paranoid about messing up and using the wrong nonformal verb tense or something and pissing them off so they wouldn’t come to the fair. Another thing I learned was that just because a person agrees to do something does not mean they will follow through. I had so many last minute cancellations or people who just didn’t show up. So this was all the pre-fair drama.

For the actual event, we had 41 students from 14 different high schools participate. All of the students did projects using the scientific method and made expositions. Each school also did an HIV/AIDS poster, since all of our funding comes from PEPFAR. There were also a few different health organizations that set up booths and a group doing HIV testing. We had a great theater group who did a presentation about discrimination of HIV positive people. Not all of our judges showed up like they were supposed to, but some peace corps volunteers stepped up and helped us out. There were some really interesting and creative projects, I was very impressed. The girl from our school won 2nd place! All in all, I think all of the kids had a great time. They especially liked their certificates (this country is certificate CRAZY - ha apparently Honduras is too, Brenna). One of my favorite parts was the cake cutting ceremony. Not just because it included cake. We had 3 giant cakes. I was at one of the cakes along with 2 of the winners. First, everyone has to take lots of pictures of the cakes with their cell phones, and then, wedding cake cutting style, on the count of three, you all cut the cake and everyone cheers. I just think its so funny and the students all took it so seriously. So! Science fair is all done and it is the best feeling ever and I am very proud of all the work Becky and I and the other volunteers did to make it all happen.