Saving Soles : Remembering my daily life in Honduras

Today I found a shoe repairer next to the entrance of the building Genesis, where I have found myself working for the past year and ten months parked at his new found perch at eight thirty in the morning. A year and ten months, and never have I seen a shoe repairer there. Today just happened to be the day he decided to start something new in this blossoming commercial center we call the bus terminal of Nueva Suyapa. It is hard to know how long he will last; sales are harsh up here, where only the stuck and lazy and those with a certain fascination with localization decide to buy up on the top where it is all more expensive in smaller quantities. But still, members of this commercial center, pertaining of: Doña Martha’s large, pepsi endorsed, where it is hard to find pepsi, taco trailer right in front of the entrance to the Genesis building; a line up of taxis with aggressive and anxious taxi drivers next to it; the cheese man who sells different types of milk products out of the back of a truck out on the corner; Doña Pancha a little to the left of the cheese man, who sells bean tamales, sweet pastelitos and kool aid in a plastic bag; the now booming mini market across the small dirt street that a year ago only sold large quantities of beans and rice; the fruit and vegetable truck in front of this; their competition, which is across from them; Don Paco with his chiclera, fifty yards down from the vegetable truck; Doña Maria right next to Don Paco, who sells baleadas, corn, corn tamales, and if you’re lucky, coffee; have all decided it is worth it to sell near home.

Shoe repairing is not the only trade Ernesto specializes in, as he spent some time in the army, working on cruise ships, doing construction work, trying to sneak into the U.S and various other odd jobs. Having idealized for some time the trade of shoemaker, realizing a shoe repairer was close enough, I begin to inquire of his beginnings.

“This is just my fall back because of the difficult economic and political situation right now, like plan c,” he explains. So this set up, consisting of a wooden table with two drawers filled with shoe repairing gear and a tarp overhead to protect it in this more rain than not season, was the back up to the back up of his trades. I watch as he cuts slits into a little boys school shoe sole, which he follows without pause with string to seal the already glued shoe, providing double protection from the jutting rocks and harsh surfaces Nueva Suyapa is known for. He does this; his studied default, as he talks to me.

“I used to work here about three years ago, I just had a job up in the tourist industry in the North. But with the economy, I had lost my job and needed to find a way to sustain myself.” He moves on to the next step, tapping the shoe with a hammer and placing a wooden block on the inside, pressing on it, to make the glue stick.

“I have had a generally good experience with white people, especially American people.” He places the boy’s now finished product on the ground and moves on to the Honduran women’s all terrain shoe, the high heel. A totally different soccer game, he takes on the challenge with nonchalance.

This simple physical feature that I did nothing to create, my whiteness, inspires openness in him, “I don’t have parents now and didn’t have them growing up, I spent most of my childhood in an orphanage.” He takes out a replacement sole and replacement heel, and begins to cut the new sole to fit the existing shoe. This high heel seemed to have had a particular collision with a considerably large rock.

“It was an American organization, though many of the care taking staff were Hondurans, the people running the organization were from the U.S, and there were many groups that came through pretty often to play with us and stuff. But the person I loved the most, and still love to this day, was the nun who took care of us for a lot of my time there.” The sole for the seemingly beyond hope high heel is now making a comeback.

“She was so beautiful, and I mean her spirit, she wasn’t especially good looking, but that made her seem even more like us common folk, which made her even more likable.” He had applied the glue on both the sole and the heel, and now was doing the block-hammer fusing motion.

“Her Spanish wasn’t that good, she always seemed to stay in the infinitives, but that didn’t matter. She would say, ‘You have naughty, but you not naughty, you wonderful child. Why do that?’ I or the child who disobeyed would try to give some sort of excuse for why we did what many of us children did every day.” He had chosen not to sew this high heel, as it would detract from the style. He instead took out a metal contraption with two metal ends to it that kept together the once separate shoe parts until the glue dried.

“She then would tell us, ‘You better than that. You know I still love you,’ pat us on the back, offer a hug, and sometimes give us candy. I didn’t quite understand why she would give us candy if we were bad, but I always remember her kind spirit trying to understand us, and treat us like we had the ability to figure things out and make the right decisions.” Waiting for this shoe to dry, he worked on the other one, repeating the same actions.

“Being an orphan at an early age, it was my first experience being loved and treated like my opinion and life mattered. It was different from many experiences I had had with adults before and at times after that. I will never forget her and the lessons she instilled in me. I know she wasn’t perfect, and Americans aren’t perfect, and not all Americans aren’t like her, but, seeing you makes me think of her, so seeing you makes me happy.” He now joins the other high heel with its partner and looks for another set of shoes as he stops talking and allows himself to remember.

I walk across the bus terminal to attend to my fourth pulperia run for the day. It is late afternoon, and Doña Pancha has set up her tamale table and umbrella, and offers a friendly, “May you go well,” as I pass by. Doña Maria has set up her baleada stand across the way, and I think about her advanced level of natural business shrewdness. On my way back, the cheese man offers me a sample of cheese, and says the one word he knows in English, butter. Doña Martha states once again that she has baleadas today, with eggs, chorizo and avocado, and I have to deny her with the diet excuse. Behind each of these greetings and humble store fronts are novels full of stories just as colorful and meaningful as Ernesto’s, and his same unflinchable tenacity for their daily repeated expertise.

Good-byes

After swimming with sharks, following turtles, greeting sting rays, topping manatees, howling at monkeys, tempting tarantulas, surprising toucans, mounting thousand year old temples, gazing at the horizon over acres of rainforest, mounting an active volcano, smoldering at the heat which instantly set sticks on fire, viewing the obscure outline of lava and learning from various different indigenous Guatemalans, I landed back in my home of two years, Honduras, this time to say goodbye to it. As now familiar music coaxes me back to experiences had, I think about the things to which I need to say good –bye.

Today I said goodbye to baleadas, my favorite Honduran meal, a flour tortilla folded up with beans, mantequilla, dry and salty white cheese and sometimes eggs and avocado in it. I will very much miss that blend of flavors.

I say goodbye to the vendors on the side of the road, offering street food or vegetables in plenty at a cheap price.

I say goodbye to the unending amount of new fruits and bursts of flavor that
I have been able to awaken my taste buds to.

I say goodbye to the lively bus system, that forever challenges me in how many people they can fit in one school bus, and how many decibels of bassy music the ear drums can handle.

I say goodbye to the laid back mañana attitude, that I have come to know and love.

I say goodbye to a work atmosphere where I can come up with an idea and see it through, granted, that co-workers agree it is a good one.

I say goodbye to the free $100 view I get of the mountainous, sprawling city of Tegucigalpa at sunset.

I say goodbye to collectivos, my new favorite form of fast and cheap transportation.

I say goodbye to hospitality at its highest.

I say good-bye to dinamicas, the best social lubricant in Latin America, as if they needed it!

I say goodbye to futbol as its own emotion that can at least temporarily unite a country.

I say goodbye to high energy alcohol free parties, where you can expect delighted screams, exclamations, roaring laughter, and body language, a lot of body language.
On a more serious note, I say goodbye to the community that has supported me for the last two years, the organization I worked for, MCM and the church I went to, La Reformada; a group of people that believed in me and my abilities when I didn’t, and saw to it that I could fly, so I tried my hand at it. Amongst that group I will say good-bye to specific people who I have come to know and love, Karina and Franklin, my co-worker friends. Fernando, a youth from the community who had become a good friend and Dinora, a local cleaning lady and her two girls who I have come to know and love.

I say goodbye to the clients that I spent time getting to know, who always impressed and inspired me with their perseverance, ingenuity and constant laughter.
I say good bye to the Mujeres Valientes group, who never failed to complete a new project, and see it to fruition, inspiring all women within a stone’s throw to be a part.

I say goodbye to these and many more things, knowing that on the other side of every goodbye is a hello somewhere else. For a long time I have been saying goodbye to all of you, now I am able to say hello, and reignite my life in Chicago. I am looking forward to that, and would love to see you as I settle in. I plan on heading back to the Reed pad for awhile, do odd jobs while I’m looking for a permanent one and spending time with friends and family. Hope this note finds you well, look forward to seeing you soon.

Hospital Diaries : Entry #4

Going along with the theme of struggling to provide insurance for clients, I decided to share a series of pieces on local public hospitals. This is the first one but fourth in the series, be on the look out for the other few.


Entry #4 February 15th 2010

The houses of Libertad 2 took over the community 17 de Septiembre soon after I arrived in Honduras. At its entrance, after you go through the windy walking path abundant with jutting rocks, there is a dirt mound, that appears much like an oversized ant hill, but walk-able. Apart from being anthill like, it is camelback like, after reaching the first hump, one is invited to see the child’s adobe house version of monopoly, assured that the destination is close to being reached. Spanning farther out, this hump showcases an eroded breathtaking view of the city of Tegucigalpa and the mountains that surround it, especially at sunset, right before the giant’s escape aisle is illuminated. As one stands there and watches it, they are unsure whether to stop and admire the view or keep walking to keep their wallet.

As I attempt the same decision the third time this week, I am swooned by heaven’s streaks of smashed mandarin oranges being eaten by the Gods’ over pursed and closed shadows of lips.

“Eladia is sick” swept through Libertad 2 like the dust that signatures it, bringing newly settled neighbors from the downward sloping community to her two roomed dirt floored house. They came in trickles and droves, depending on when the last church service ended. One particular group in the afternoon mustered up all of their spiritual forces and tried to exorcize her, resulting only in a few more people on the ground, and a few more people throwing up, the kind of tranquil environment she needed to heal.

Finding people actually there in the morning usually meant an incident had occurred.

“She was out going to the bathroom, and she just fell down.”

“We found her at her door, lying down, unable to wake up.”

“She got up and didn’t know where she was or what was going on.”

This time she was under another spell, and so I reached for an onion to try to wake her up. It took longer than usual, ten minutes, but her pulse kept pumping and her stomach kept rising. She woke up as she did every time, fighting for air, asking for water and complaining about her heart hurting. Concerned individuals asked if maybe she should go to the hospital again.

Full of papers and medicine, I walked beside her with her cousin as four men from the community carried her in a hammock, owned by one of the women neighbors, up to the camel’s back, and down through the windy path. A taxi was waiting on the clock where the four men readjusted to place her.

She had fainted again, causing more frequent honking, car dodging, and seemingly justified red light running. When we slide into the emergency entrance a whole new set of traffic appears for us to dodge.

“Beef dinners, Beef dinners,” one of them says.

“Taxi, taxi, taxi” demand others.

“My mom is in there, please let me in,” plead yet others.
And the willing to drop his post for a foreign face security guard parts the red sea and allows us to come in, inadvertently letting in a few stragglers.
Once we reach our long awaited destination we began round number one: find a wheel chair or a stretcher, both a rarity in this place. We dodged video cameras and two individuals with blood sticking their exposed flesh to once white sheets on stretchers, wondering if our situation was dire enough to get one, or get attendance at all.

It turned out that one of Eladia’s accompanies used to work at the hospital and was very chummy with a great deal of hospital employees, so was able to find and retrieve a wheelchair quickly. Her being in a semi-unconscious state moved us up the line probably undeservingly at least 10 places. Around us, as we walk into the “restricted” area I notice the cases that have been overlooked: close to clothes on a post that made lifting any part of her body seem a daunting request, individuals curled up on cots clutching their stomachs, blood boiling in its place and turning wounds infected. But there were always more pills and injections to kill the bacteria that the infections caused that of course were at the patient’s expense. This time we were wheeled right into the actual emergency room, not the pre-waiting room or the waiting room to the emergency room, the latter in which we were eventually attended to and dismissed to the mental health hospital the first time we came.

Eladia’s usual vitals were taken when the accidents and strokes of the day were attended to. Another request was put in for routine blood work that two times before came back normal. They stepped it up a bit and requested more extensive work. The doctors gave this stereotypical white philanthropist a prescription for blood collection tubes the third time this week. Marvin and I walk to the pharmacy across the street, once again to buy the basic materials needed to perhaps find out what was wrong with Eladia. This seemed more a daunting task than the possible cure.

Blood was filled, bills were paid, lines were waited in. There was no organization to the laboratory, where we ourselves brought up the vials of blood, we simply opened the lab door and put down the blood, hoping they would discover it. In an hour and a half they claimed our results would be ready. Around are the multitudes who were told the same. The blood lottery begins: family of the punctured all huddle around shuffling through sheets of paper under the title: Hemograma (CBC)and Heces y Orina (Stool and Urine), straining to find the lucky name. After having memorized various names others were looking for, heard the iron count of the child with leukemia and dodged the woman who was vomiting to what she had seen, we left our ad hoc community and presented the clean results to the doctor.

All vitals coming back normal, the next step was to go to the neurologist, who was due to come at lunch time and was still missing at 3pm. When her arrival finally interrupted Eladia’s fainting spells, she first attended to the older women who had trouble lifting almost all body parts, the severity of her condition had now caught the attention of medical personnel, who work on an emergency first mandate. Her inability to clearly answer questions confirmed the need for this urgency.
It was dark by the time we reached the neurologist whose kindness and proficiency simultaneously soothed and inspired confidence. She asked Eladia various questions, told her to lie down on the bed, and started putting square-like nodes on her head. Looking only at the computer with the image of Eladia’s brain in front of her, she said, “Calm down, relax, you’ll be OK.”

Which, after scanning for eleptic activity and finding nothing, became the truth.

The taxi charged $10 to take Eladia and her family this time back to her mother’s house, where the moment she was allowed to enter it and the moment she wanted to finally coincided. She stayed there for over a month where she rested and took natural medicine, which, along with some mental tweaking, for better or for worse, was cured of these symptoms. Now only to cure a myriad of new ones that were popping up due to self proclaimed interference by witch doctors.

In One Accord

Here's a poem I wrote for an MCC retreat service regarding facing difficult situations in the community. I finally decided to put a little form in my poetry:

Isaiah 61:1-4

1 The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
because the LORD has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners, [a]

2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,

3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the LORD
for the display of his splendor.

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.

She came over the other night,
maybe the moon could tell you why;
it carried the tug.

With the fresh new experience
of decaffeinated coffee;
a smile hid her week.

It wasn’t til a nervous spill
caused that shirt sleeve to tear I saw
more than just a week.

She spilled more than just coffee
dropping the denial tendency
to blow his cover.

Odysseus ears became me
unaware of who it came from
or any of how.

She dawned into a Safe Haven
to begin gentle incisions
with more than just me.

When the lame and blind seem unhealed
Regardless of our dire efforts
We must remember

Scroll in hand temple fulfillment
Fire on heads holy anointing
And in one accord

Noche de Paz

My name is Hector. I am ten years old. I sell mandarin oranges at the corner of the bus terminal in Nueva Suyapa. My mom sent me out to work about six months ago when times got tough due to the political crisis and the economy. She makes tortillas out of the house, but, you know, no one’s buying the same amount as they used to. Tortillas are a must but five tortillas per meal is just a luxury, so we all learned to cut back, even in the rich neighborhood, Miraflores, where my mom now sells tortillas.

Ever since I was three, she would get up at four in the morning to make tortillas, well, first to go to the corn grinder to grind the corn. I remember waking up to the sweet smell of the wood burning stove welcoming this morning’s version of fire. There then was the sound of swish swish, splat, intertwined with a puff puff crackle, interrupted by our hen’s cockle doodle doo, it was like my daily wake up orchestra. I guess it’s the entertainment we’ve got in these parts. Instruments are hard to come by here, guitars are the most common. I only know about orchestras because we had the opportunity to go to the pretty theatre down town, Manuel Bonilla for a Christmas concert, and there was what my teacher said was an orchestra playing when I told her I really liked the music. She took the time to explain to me what every instrument was called, because she could tell I really liked it. I had never felt so much of a warm feeling in my belly, well besides the kitchen when my mom was making tortillas, but this was different.

When after the swish swish splat came the clap clap clap, I knew then my mom had progressed to forming the tortillas with her hands. To flatten and ensure roundness she transfers the once small ball of cornmeal from one hand to another as fast as she possibly can, stretching the batter simultaneously, creating a perfectly circular tortilla, consistent with the others. Handmade tortillas are hard to come by these days, plus those ones made of real corn, not the store bought gross maeseca stuff that they press with the Mexican tortilla pressers that create super thin tortillas. Even though my mom doesn’t even have a real wood burning stove, hers is made out of pieces of metal, she has managed to make tortillas of better quality than the average one these days, selling them for four for two Lempiras, whereas those maeseca ones cost five for two Lempira, and for awhile was making a lot of money out of them. But quality isn’t as much valued when full is the aim. Still my mom wouldn’t cave, she is really traditional in that way. In other ways she really isn’t, like she taught me how to make tortillas once and I got pretty good, so sometimes she would let me help her or do it for her when she was sick. It is usually the woman’s job to make the tortillas, and they say that if a woman can’t make good tortillas she won’t be able to find a man, and if a man makes tortillas he is gay. Well, I kind of like making tortillas, and I kissed Maria from class one day at recess and I liked it too, so I think I can like the two together and not be any of those names they call me. I don’t think my mom is one of those feminists, it just came out of necessity. I was the oldest, and she needed help. I started taking care of my brothers and sisters when I was eight, so Mom could go to Miraflores to sell tortillas. I felt proud that she trusted me but scared that one of my brothers or sisters would disappear or choke on something, or I would do something wrong and hurt them. I only hit them every now and then, because I don’t like it when my mom hits me. She can be pretty nice, but when she hits us its like she is another person. Sometimes it is for things I didn’t even do anything wrong, like slip on a banana peel in the road, she says I better watch better, and I wasn’t being careful. Sometimes, when I did something that she considers really bad, like sneaking out to play soccer when she comes home, well she hits me until she gets tired, and it really doesn’t matter where. She has a reason though, I was being mischievous.

The instrument I watched the most was the violin. It fascinates me how different pieces of string put together can make such a beautiful sound, depending on what you do with it; especially knowing that some strings are made out of catgut, that’s disgusting. My teacher told me that, cuz I was asking lots of questions. I never knew adults could like questions, but I guess that is a teacher’s job, to ask and answer questions. What a cool job, I wish my mom was a teacher. When I ask her questions like those ones I had about the violin, cuz I just wanted to know things, you know, she would get angry and say shut up or you ask way too many questions. Sometimes I think I’m smarter than her. I’m in the 4th grade, and I’ve never stayed behind or even had to go through recuperation. She never passed the sixth grade, and she says she wants me to graduate from high school, that would make her proud. But sometimes she just seems jealous or feels stupid or something. Sometimes, when she was preparing tortillas, I would have to help her with math. I would help her and then she would get mad at me, for some little thing I did, even though I was the one who helped her, things like that.

I think my mom is beautiful. She is one of the few women on our block who had the guts to cut and keep short hair, and I really think it looks good on her. It is not really a mushroom cut, but her hair is about that length, a little past her ears, rounded, with little orange rind curly cues to frame her cheeks and forehead. The hair in the back of her head goes a little past the end of her neck, kind of like a boy’s style. She has a wonderful smile, with an off center dimple on her left cheek, that dimple mixed with those curls have given her a long line of admirers, many of whom I don’t like. I think just by nature, I am protective of her. My dad wasn’t that great either, always telling her to stay in the house, and wouldn’t let her sell her tortillas in Miraflores, only from the house, though he never hit her, and he really seemed to love her, he just had a different idea of what a woman’s job was. That seemed to be what everyone told him, so that is what he demanded, and demand he did. My mom was actually the one who left him, I was proud of her for that. That was also pretty nontraditional. She didn’t tell me why, I just kind of figured some things out because I was curious, plus we live in a two room house, and I can basically hear everything that happens in there, so, nicely and badly there are no secrets. I have many a time heard and comforted my mom sobbing either after talking on the phone with my father or just out of loneliness I guess, hard to know. All I know is I cry out of loneliness often, so I guess it is not uncommon.

I have some friends I play soccer with, but the thing is I can’t get out to play very often, what with first looking after my brother and sister and then with selling mandarin oranges. I have a friend who sometimes helps me sell, or competes with me. I don’t mind much that he competes, because I just like him being around. That is how I felt that night with my teacher, but even more so, well I wanted her to stay and answer my questions. She even seemed impressed by them, like I was really smart or something. That was what made me think I was smart. Sometimes, while I was watching the violinist, I would look out of the side of my eyes and catch my teacher looking over at me. She told me she played the cello in high school and college, and kind of misses it, she plays it every now and then these days, but teaching doesn’t allow for it much, you know. I guess I got her interest then.

When I went home that night, I told my mom all about the concert, the violin, the cello, my teacher, the songs, and how much I loved it all and couldn’t stop watching the violinist play, how fast she ran that bow back and forth, how quickly she moved her fingers. More than that, I told her about the music the orchestra produced, how many different sounds I heard at once, and how they all blended together perfectly. I told her about how I could pick out each instrument after listening to them for awhile, but especially the violin. I told her it seemed easy after you got taught the basics. Well, that’s what it seemed to me at least. My mom was more interested than I had ever seen her, she got excited when I did. She told me later she had never seen me like this before, so happy about something. She told me she had always felt bad, me being the oldest and all, having to take on so much responsibility. She said she remembers when I was a baby and we used to play peek a boo, and I would just giggle forever, and when I got old enough to talk, I learned how to say “again” pretty fast, so I would say that over and over again so that she would continue playing peek a boo, or throwing me up and kissing me, so she would. She said she wanted that moment to last forever, but then came the bills and the other children, and soon it all became a responsibility, like the one I have selling oranges, and we lost the fun. That night, the excitement I had about the violin, was fun, she told me. So we stayed up all night and danced like we would on the 24th and the 31st, just the two of us, it was true enjoyment.

My favorite Christmas song growing up was always “Night of Peace” (Noche de Paz or Silent Night). I think I always had some kind of magnetic stuck feeling to the concept of Peace. I always thought that would be so nice, sounded like a nice thought though I’m not sure I knew what it meant. But that night, listening to that violin, piano, cello, bass playing “Night of Peace”, I knew what it meant. It was that warm feeling I felt in my belly, and a break between the chaos of changing diapers and pleading for people to buy my oranges. It’s what I feel after a day of work, with a little extra in my pocket, coming home to a mom, content too, because she has a little extra in her pocket, watching her cradle my youngest sister and softly sing to her. It is the feeling I got dancing through the night with my mom. It is the feeling I felt when I came home Christmas Eve, before all the dancing started, and my mom said she had a surprise for me. It was a perfectly sized, shiny, non cat gut violin. And it is the feeling I get now, bow and instrument in my hand, using my other type of thought to discover where to put my fingers next.

Volveremos

The next time I waited in a long line, which this time, was over 1,000 people long, with cars, once again, learned to park on the side of the road was on Boulevard Morazán, the mero-mero of enjoyment in Tegucigalpa, the night that Honduras qualified for the World Cup finals in South Africa. It was a pulperia lottery chance that all Hondurans were sitting on the edge of their seat, praying, hoping and consulting all kinds of rabbit feet to come into fruition. In typical Honduran style, the Seleccion Nacional that all worshiped and followed even more than a Sunday afternoon service, waited till the last minute to put it all together. But, also in typical Honduran style, they summoned all their already overflowing passion, stored up angst and stress regarding the political crisis and inner adrenaline driven strength and came through. Their entry into the finals was more dependent on the performance of the U.S in their game against Costa Rica than Honduras’ own game against El Salvador, which, even if they won, was not a ticket into the finals. For once, out of their left over table scraps, the U.S showed a little bit of indirect generosity in valiantly scoring two goals against Costa Rica, the last one within minutes of the end of the game tying it up, preventing Costa Rica from getting a win point in the finals, putting Honduras in third place for the Concacaf region, U.S in first and Mexico in second.

When all this was realized, first by the fans, then by the players themselves, there were exponential celebrations throughout the country. In our Nueva Suyapa Genesis microcosm, behavior mimicked that of the players, incredulous exuberance that motivated tears, hugging, jumping up and down in cheers and mutual congratulating. Even the younger ones of the bunch were aware of the feat that had just been accomplished, and fed off the excitement of their elders, who became like children themselves, completely overcome by ecstasy, a rare moment that they decided to take advantage of.

The evangelical stiff erupted in dance to the prophetic song by well renowned Honduran singer Polache, “Volveremos”, for those who had prayed and unbelievingly predicted this moment, including Honduran Seleccion players themselves, it was a spiritual miracle. A halfed country, that jointly lived, breathed and intuned their Seleccion Nacional was one in emotion due to one chance goal at the hand of another.

This unity was apparent on Boulevard Morazán that night where thousands of Hondurans instinctively and immediately drove, motorcycled and walked to celebrate together. Hand slapping, spontaneous cheering started by one group and joined in by many others, various song singing, wearing Honduran and U.S flags, jumping on top and all around arriving cars and trucks, blowing plastic and shell trumpets, dancing, jumping up and down as one were common activities. Many people ran and walked up and down freely on the usually swiftly flowing traffic street to share their joint excitement with fellow countrymen and women. It all concoursed, ironically enough, at TGI Fridays where the Gringos once again dispersed of their sparse benevolence and provided a large tele-screen for the crowd to view their new disputed president congratulate the country and its beloved players as one. All were ecstatic to hear announced yet another holiday at the hands of the current government. Out of the 200 days of 4 hour day classes required by the government, public school kids have had between 80 and 90 days this year, which, on top of the numerous class cancelations due to teacher strikes and curfews, was mandated to end by October 31, to prepare for the upcoming elections. In addition to this, all kids are automatically passed on to the next grade, irrelevant of their skill level, whereas usually all children take a test each year, those who don’t pass it have a recovery period and a recovery test, and those who do not pass the recovery test stay in the same grade. This is projected to strongly hurt especially younger children’s ability to read and write, which will, ten years later, affect the work force and more importantly, further entrench the ditch of poverty in Honduras. A report stated that a year lost in school for a nation could possibly delay its development by seven years.

The country mosh pits together in the night life day bright haven thinking that in the unified jumping and visceral touching they could become brothers again. Back at the Brazilian embassy, the dueling presidents can’t seem to share the sentiment, Micheletti juggling time between the self-appointed elated privilege of congratulating the first Honduran team in twenty eight years for its entry into the World Cup Finals and functioning but not so slick delay tactics once again does not allow for the exhaustive talks to go anywhere. Sometimes I wonder what they spend so much time talking about, focusing on fluff while the most important ingredient is still a stalemate. Seems like a record filibuster.

“If Honduras makes it into the World Cup, well that will be the push Honduras needs to end the political crisis,” the cry of eager Hondurans echoed before the match.
Afterwards, there was no talk of that becoming a reality and yet too much talk that led to nothing.

Incarnation

This morning, before giving a Dharma talk, I was having breakfast with my attendant…I paused and said to him, “Dear one, do you see the cow on the hillside? She is eating grass in order to make my yoghurt, and I am now eating the yoghurt to make a Dharma talk.” Somehow, the cow will offer today’s Dharma talk. As I drank the cow’s milk, I was a child of the cow.

Thich Nhat Hanh, p.117, The Heart of the Buddha’s teaching.

It blows frontal locks,
enters in past other purposed hairs of my nose
and exits on the bottom of my tongue,
like a gleek. As I watch leaves waving
in the trees; a little close. The ones far away
in my sight stayed still. The flag salutes
simultaneously, all by the same force.

The finished swinging children
watch spinning, churning in wonder
observing robotic servants
compared to brute physical
forcing soapywaterandcloth mix
slodging against rippled stone
causing thinned wear, rips, tears
two hours tired; forming forearms
´´Que Rapido!´´
they fascinated.

“The water looks like a waterfall,”
belongs to pictures only;
they settle for sewage streams
that carry my stains to
grey rapids down below;

mimicking

the rivers that pulse through me.

An elevated oversized ant hole is used
as a soccer field. Posts; whatever is available.
One kid’s neon yellow shirt catches the setting sun
drying my and radial neighbor’s hung clothes;
a multi-leveled kaleidoscope.

A man carrying maize as a hat
lunges up one dirt exposed bank
protected slightly by select patches of grass
and even fewer existence of trees,
fruit and wild alike.

Up is a tentative oasis,
marked by cell phone towers;
down: stacked upon glued together
houses wherever an empty space
on the old garbage mound.

“Donuts, Donuts” trumpets to all those
in dilapidated circumference; a mom requests
her daughters presence
across the ditch, echoed
by ten. Birds exclaim to their lovers
about the flowers that fought to vibrant.
Nails aim to create structure,
the foundational rhythm to it all;
“No Woman No cry” provides their soundtrack
to Tegucigalpa's amphitheatre.

A wasp explores the metal fence,
my protective lens
to the dueling mountains:
those visibly untouched
and those turned into poverty’s museum.
The clouds, being no discriminator
floats and encloses around them both,
by heaven’s version of
what flows through my lungs.