Khristmas and Fireworks

It’s been far too long since my last post. I apologize and vow to do better.

Now that that’s out of the way, time for an update…

Lenny and I went with the eleventh grade students
to serve and have a special Christmas celebration
in an impoverished village nearby

December in Honduras was strange. There was no snow, only mud, mud and more mud. Christmas music was not playing incessantly from every available speaker. Gaudy decorations were few and far between (although they were much more prevalent than classy decorations). I did not see a single commercial or sign for Christmas sales or Christmas shopping or Christmas anything. It was very odd.

People in our rural mountain village celebrate Christmas with a big family dinner on Christmas Eve and a late-night church service, and then Sunday is just a relaxed day spent with family, blowing up fireworks.  (They do this for all special occasions – birthdays, anniversaries, finding a lost pig, etc. Usually in the middle of the night. Usually in the park right next to our house. And it usually sounds like a Wild West gun fight.) There might be fireworks galore, but there are no presents; most families here do not have the extra money for luxuries like gifts. For the most part, people here have missed the dreadful commercialization of Christmas. It’s beautiful (except for the fireworks).

Lenny was very excited to take our students
Christmas caroling through town; they were excited
to light fireworks during the caroling
- kind of a new fusion tradition!

When we arrived in the US a few days before Christmas, I felt seasonally disoriented, and I didn’t like it.  Don’t get me wrong; I have rarely been so happy to set foot on American soil and indulge in the luxuries of clean water and fast internet and cheeseburgers, but I instantly was aware of Christmas feeling tainted.

The shock wore off quicker than I would like to admit. The truth is I had missed the decorations (not including those tacky inflatable scenes; the world does NOT need any more of those), as well as the Christmas music and the holiday snacks.  As I contemplated my strange mixture of feelings, I realized that I had missed the constant reminders that Christmas was coming, because in Honduras, sometimes it was hard to remember that Christmas was even near. Life mostly goes on as usual. But I didn’t miss the chaotic hustle-and-bustle of Keeping Up with the Kommercialization of Khristmas.

Lenny and I with a 3-day-old lamb
at our school's Christmas program

As I contemplate the far off reality of celebrating future Christmases, I hope to adopt a more Honduran version of the holiday. Less commercialized, more focused and simple. A more soulful celebration that the Light of the World has come into the darkness. Now that I think about it, I might even throw in a firework or two. It makes perfect sense. 

Adaptable Me

If there’s one thing that we are being forced to learn in our Honduras living it is adaptability. And if you know me, there are few things I love more than making a plan and sticking to it. However, life in a developing country is teaching me that planning, although it has its value, is not all it’s cracked up to be.  I am learning to plan less and “go-with-the-flow” more often (just reading that still makes me grimace).

Let me give you a few examples of times when my well-developed plans have been forcibly abandoned.

Enjoying the biggest waterfalls in Honduras.

Last night we were supposed to play in a volleyball tournament put on by the local public high school. We had created a teachers team and were excited to show off our mad skills to the Honduran youth. We gathered at the park right outside our house to walk up to the school together. Within a minute of us all meeting up, the town’s electricity suddenly went out. Within a minute of the electricity going out, an unexpected deluge of rain drenched us. At which point we had a team huddle and decided that since the volleyball court was outdoors and was lit by electricity, we should abandon our plan and run for cover.

Len and I tried to adapt to rowing on Lago de Yojoa.
That never happened, so we hired a rower. :)

Lenny and I were not too upset about this arrangement since by the time Friday night rolls around, we are typically exhausted, and – speaking for myself – I don’t want to see any school-aged children for a long time, even if we are spiking balls near their heads. So we happily hopped in bed and began watching a movie on my laptop, with the rain continuing to pound on our roof. All of a sudden, the sky opened up and an indoor waterfall formed, landing right on…Lenny’s crotch area. Without warning, his shorts were soaked, our bed was soaked, the floor was soaked. Soon there was a straight line of mini-waterfalls all across our bedroom, as the seam between two of the sheets of tin roofing had decided it was sick of holding out the water. We quickly scrambled to relocate our bed, try to save some of our electronics (my Kindle might never recover), and put buckets, garbage cans, pots and pans all around to catch the water.

Me, adapting to the joys of traveling in Copán Ruinas.

We spent a good hour trying to mop up the water from what Lenny now affectionately refers to as “our kiddie pool,” and so we were forced to adapt to another unexpected moment. Oh, did I also mention that the electricity was still out during this whole time, so we had the immense pleasure of dealing with the indoor rain guided only by our head lamps? I am now aware that this was probably a good thing, seeing as all the exposed wires of our sketchy electricity set-up might have roasted us. And if you are wondering, the electricity is still out… We are adapting…

Some other recent adaptation learning moments:

Lenny, adapting to being sick
while traveling

• Last weekend we went to Copán Ruinas to explore the Mayan ruins and get away from La Unión for awhile. On our way back, the first of four buses we needed to take back home left ten minutes EARLY (this is a Latin American miracle), and left Lenny and me behind, while all our friends were already on board. Let’s just say we were flexible and have now become experts at navigating the Honduran chicken bus system on our own.
•  On our final bus home last weekend, a very, very, very drunk man started causing quite a ruckus at the back of the bus, where Lenny and I were sitting. Suddenly Lenny turned around to see the crazy man waving a gun in the air, to which Lenny said, “Woah, woah, woah!” and motioned for him to take it easy. I then started pleading with God to spare our lives, and in my head I began repeating over and over, “Lenny, don’t be a hero,” hoping he would read my mind. Luckily we survived, and I do not yet have to adapt to life without Lenny.
•  I have recently planned some awesome videos and/or PowerPoint presentations for my classes, and have then had the power go out, leaving me without any back-up lesson planned. I am now an expert at coming up with new lessons spur-of-the-moment. You may start referring to me as Ms. Adapatability.
• One of my least favorite forms of adaptability involves showering. If it rains (which it does a lot right now, since we are at the pinnacle of the rainy season), the water that is siphoned off from some river up the hill and comes out of our showerhead turns brown. I don’t mean a tad-bit brown (it’s always a little brown); I mean mocha latte brown. I mean “you will be dirtier after taking this shower than you were before” brown. Even when the water is somewhat clean, it can turn off randomly. You can be in the middle of a shower, and the water just stops. And one of my personal favorites, the electricity also goes off without warning. Which, when showering, means that the bathroom becomes pitch-black and the contraption that heats the water in the shower head stops working. Dark and freezing. Not my favorite combination.

I like to think that all this adjusting and adapting is actually making us better people. I can pretend all I want that I am in control of what happens in my life, and yet it is a foolish illusion. At any and every moment, I have very little control over anything.  I think this is one lesson that God really wants to hammer home for me this year. “Your plans are not in stone, your life is not your own, I am on the throne.” (I seriously did not even try to make that rhyme. I am just that amazing.) J

Cheers to another day of holding our plans loosely!

-Kara

The Circumcision Discussion

It’s hard to believe that we have already made it through three weeks of teaching. I think I underestimated how exhausting and time-consuming each weekday would be, but I’m slowly adjusting to the many demands of the job.

People have been asking me if I am enjoying teaching, and my responses vary greatly depending on the day. I can have one exhilarating day, where I feel like I am at my best and the students are as close to their best as teenagers get and where I think, “Teachers have the best job in the world.” And then those days are typically followed by days that I now label as “Days When the Battle Is Being Won by Someone Other Than Me.” Those days are filled with students who won’t listen, students who don’t care, students who are lying, students who are sleeping, students who are cheating, students who have gone over to the dark side… Ugh. Those days I want to quit. There are some classes where I have literally thrown up my hands and said, “Fine. You guys obviously don’t want me to teach you this concept, so you must already know it. So go ahead and do problems #1-749 for tomorrow. Good luck, you little [insert mean name here].” (Those moments are not me at my most Christ-like.)

For those who don’t know, I am currently teaching the following classes: 7^th grade Math (Basic Mathematics), 10^th grade Math (Algebra 2), 11^th grade Math (Geometry), 8^th grade English/Language, 7^th grade Bible (Life of Jesus), 9^th grade Bible (1 & 2 Samuel), and 11^th grade Bible (Life of Jesus & Christian Living). It’s quite a handful, especially when I have no curriculum for any of the Bible classes. And I have recently decided to throw out the 11^th grade Geometry curriculum because it is completely worthless. (What kind of idiots would think it’s a great idea to make 90% of the content of a math book all about proofs?!) Which means I get to not only take on the role of teacher, but also curriculum creator, all without the aid of a library, my home stash of notes and books, or a reliable internet connection. At times it is very overwhelming.

But then the Days from Hell are followed by those in which two students get 100% on their geometry test and one student asks where he can learn more about the historical context of Jesus’ life. Plus there’s that one student in seventh grade who understands almost no English but he’s so earnest and adorable and I just want to put him in my pocket and carry him around with me.

And then somewhere mixed in with the horrible moments and the amazing moments are these awkward/funny moments. Here are a few: 

• Every time the 11^th graders see Lenny and I together, they start chanting, “Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!” Whether he kisses me on the cheek or not, total chaos always erupts.
• After a week of teaching, I found out that I had been calling a few students by names they had completely made up in their first-day introductions. That explains the many chuckles and snickers I received every time I spoke their names (which is not that uncommon since some of these kids have really difficult names to pronounce – I mean, you just try to pronounce Sahera (emphasis on first syllable, silent h, roll the r) without completely butchering it. Lenny has taken the opposite approach and just Americanizes their names so that Sahera becomes Sahara (like the desert, and nothing like what her name actually is).)
• The eighth graders (my most challenging by far) somehow come to class every day with a new type of weapon that they claim they “need!” for art class. Here are the things that have shown up so far in just that class: sewing needles, knitting needles (one of which got a boy in the eye, who proceeded to start bawling), razor blades, large butcher knives, wrenches, saws, gasoline (which somehow spilled all over the floor). I seriously need to have a chat with the art teacher.
• There is one 7^th grade boy who obviously has a crush on me. He makes up ridiculous questions to ask me and calls me Ms. Beautiful. Um, thanks for the compliment, Victor, but please stop with the staring.
• My eighth grade homeroom classroom, which has greeted me with a huge puddle almost every morning for the first three weeks, finally got its roof fixed. In the middle of my eighth grade class. They literally took the roof off first thing Monday morning while I was attempting to teach the little buggers. Everyone was screaming because stuff was falling from the ceiling and it was deafeningly loud, and, well, it wasn’t the best learning environment. But now I have a new roof and no puddles. Hello, silver lining.
• And for one of my personal favorites, the circumcision discussion. It came up in both my 11^th grade and 7^th grade classes as we talked about Jesus being dedicated and circumcised at the temple. 

11^th grade version first:

Darwin: “Um, Miss, what is circumcision?”

Me: “Wait, you don’t know?”

Darwin: “No, I really don’t know.”

Me: “Seriously. Are you messing with me?”

Darwin: “I really don’t know.”

Me: “Swear to me that you do not know. If I find out you are lying, I am taking five points off your final grade.”

Darwin: “I really don’t know what circumcision is!”

Me: “Does anybody in this class know?!”

Class: “No, we don’t know.”

Me: “Okay, I guess we’re doing this. Circumcision is when you cut off the foreskin of a penis.”

Class: [shock and awe, followed by a long list of questions] “What?! Why would they do that?” “Did God tell them to do that? Why?!” “Do people still do that today?” “Do just babies get circumcised or grown men too?” “Do they numb you first?” “Where do they do this? Who does this?” “Is it better to have a foreskin or not?”

10 minutes later they had all the information I could give them about circumcision. They were all traumatized, as was I. And I learned that people in La Union obviously don’t circumcise their boys. Ignorance really is bliss sometimes.

7^th grade version:

Me [taking the preemptive strike this time]: “Do any of you know what circumcision is?”

Class: [blank stares]

Me: “It’s when you cut off the foreskin of a penis.”

Class: “What’s a penis?” (Their English is not very great yet.)

Me: “Um, it’s the body part that only boys have.”

Boys in class: [All grab themselves and start jumping up and down, screaming.]

End of discussion.

There have been lots of laughs and awkward moments already, and each day is its own unpredictable adventure.  But I’m grateful for this new experience and the many ways that it is forcing me to grow – in patience, in contentment, in grace, in perseverance, in wisdom, and in who knows what else is yet to emerge.

- Kara

Questions, Questions and More Questions...

It’s hard to believe we’ve already been in La Union for one week. Right now I am sitting outside at the school, enjoying the emerald mountains that completely encompass us here. We’ve been busy preparing our empty classrooms for the start of school – working with very limited resources to try to create an aesthetically pleasing learning environment. But then we gaze out the windows and find our attempts at art and beauty pale in comparison to the subtropical world around us.

Lenny and Brooke (one of the other new teachers) so excited about lesson planning

But enough distant gazing for the moment… Back to reality. We have already spent a few days trying to create a theme for our classroom (Lenny’s is sports; mine is rock stars!), using scissors, construction paper and lots and lots of masking tape. I have run into a few delays in this process, as my particular classroom somehow attracts all the rainwater in the area. I guess holes in tin roofs will do that. Supposedly the largest holes have now been fixed. We are now on to lesson planning, which in itself is quite an effort. Lenny and I each have seven distinct classes to prepare for, and our brains are suffering from a bit of numbness at times, as we try to relearn everything we’ve forgotten (and some new stuff – I mean – who uses words like subtrahend and minuend these days?). We are hoping to be prepared enough to take charge of our classes once Monday arrives and school officially begins.

Me, working hard on the class schedule that has to be displayed in every classroom

Life outside of school is mostly about surviving and adjusting. We have been busy trying to figure out the necessities of life, which means we’ve had to ask lots of questions (which means Lenny looks at Kara and then Kara attempts to reach deep into the darkest crevices of her brain to try to recall words that haven’t emerged in years…). Here’s a random sampling from our recent questions (and the responses we’ve gotten):

Q: You said there was a queen-sized bed waiting for us. Is this supposed to be queen-sized?

A: Yes, this is the biggest bed we’ve ever seen in La Union.

Q: What do we do with our garbage?

A: Burn it. Or pay someone to burn it for you.

Q: What’s on the menu today? And how much does it cost?

A: Baleadas (like every day). 10 lempiras. (Baleadas are the most common food here – pretty much a tortilla filled with eggs, beans, a really sour cheese and sometimes avocados; 10 lempiras is about 50 cents.)

See that little blue building in the middle? That's our casita! 

Q: Do you have any chicken for sale here?

A: Yes. Here you go.

Q: Well, I just want the chicken breast. Do you sell the chicken in parts?

A: Yes, here is half a chicken (with some quills still sticking out).

Q: Oh, okay. Thanks?

Q: Where are the rest of the books we need for our classes?

A: We don’t know. They could be here next week; they could be here in a few months.

Q: Okay, but school starts next week!

A: Yes, you’ll be fine.

We have definitely had many interesting questions arise (and even more interesting answers), and we are still figuring out what life here looks like. The most basic things take a lot of effort.

This is the road we walk along for twenty minutes every day to school

For example, we had the other American teachers over for “Family Dinner/Game Night” (yes, we brought Settlers of Catan to Honduras), and in order to make that happen, we had to find chicken and rice, identify recognizable vegetables from a few veggie stands, clean them in purified water (with bleach), cut them, cook them with very limited pots, pans and utensils, pull out quills and bones and seeds and pits, serve the food, then clean all the items again, and let them fully dry so as to make sure any bacteria in the water died. Phew. It was hours of work, for something that would have taken 20 percent of the time in the US. Such is life in La Union.

Slowly but surely, we are figuring things out. My brain feels a bit like a sponge – soaking up an overwhelming amount of new information. I am definitely looking forward to the day when we have more answers than questions. Although, who knows if that day will ever come? For now, I guess my job is to learn to be okay with all the questions, while also gracefully accepting the unexpected (and sometimes unwanted) responses.

 -Kara

Croaking Roosters and Motorcycle Shopping

We made it. We’re here. We didn’t miss our flights or get lost. We didn’t become one of the countless murder victims in San Pedro Sula. We didn’t bail at the last minute. We are really, actually here.

On more than one occasion, Lenny and I have looked at each other and said, “Is this really happening? Can you believe it? We’re really here.” The blur of packing up, saying goodbyes and transitioning has left us unwilling or unable to fully grasp the fact that we now live in Honduras. But then all of a sudden we look up at the lush mountains surrounding us, or we wake up to the “croaking roosters” (as my City Boy Husband calls them), and the realization just hits us, leaving us a little shocked, even gasping for air.  This is our life now: croaking roosters and mountain peaks.

View of Gracias from Hotel Guancascos

It’s been hard to take it all in, largely due to the flurry of activity that has accompanied our first two and a half days in Honduras. After flying in to San Pedro Sula on Sunday afternoon, we met up with the other American teachers and somehow arrived safely (with all the luggage piled incredibly high on the top of our minibus) in Gracias, Lempira, where we settled into the hotel that has housed us for the last few nights. Monday quickly filled up with trips to the Tigo cell phone shop to get cheap, tiny phones and a detour at the bank to set up Honduran bank accounts. The line to enter the bank went up the street and around the block, and just to get in the bank we had to get approval from three security guys with guns in hand. Thus commenced one of those moments of “Um, we live here?”

Fuerte San Cristobal

Monday afternoon we hiked up to the ruins of San Cristobal Fort and then later headed to some local hot springs nestled in a beautiful gorge. We played some volleyball there with the other new teachers, watched the sunset in all its mountain splendor, had dinner (during which we experienced our first power outage) and then spent awhile relaxing in the hot springs and enjoying a remarkable array of stars, a sight not easily seen in our former, NYC life. We even got to observe the remnants of Tropical Storm Ernesto as we watched the lightning strike the more distant mountain peaks. We had another incredulous moment of “Are we dreaming this, or is it really happening?”

Today we headed up to our sister school here in Gracias for all day teacher training and orientation. School mission, expectations, code of conduct, and so on were all covered, and it felt good to start planning for the type of classroom experiences we hope to create. We filled the late afternoon with some grocery shopping and also some motorcycle window shopping (during which I had other epiphanies that this new crazy life – a life of stocking up on peanut butter and pasta sauce and considering the purchase of a motorcycle – is really our life. Who would have thought?).

Tomorrow we will spend the first half of the day finishing up with orientation, and then we will head to our town, La Union, a two and a half hour drive farther away from civilization. It is then that we will really first meet our new home. We are eager to get there, if only for the chance to catch our breath and savor the realization that our life has drastically changed. Honduras is now our home. Although we can hardly believe it, we really do live here. It’s not a dream. This is our life. 

-Kara

The Great Exchange

"Humans are designed to seek comfort and order, and so if they have comfort and order, they tend to plant themselves, even if their comfort isn't all that comfortable. And even if they secretly want for something better."  -Donald Miller, Quote from A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

Twenty-three days. Twenty-three. And then things change. Drastically.

We are exchanging our comfortable life in New York City for what promises to be a less comfortable life in rural Honduras. Gone will be the luxuries of hot showers, paved roads, Broadway shows and movie theaters. In fact, the contrasts between the Big Apple and our new home in La Unión are quite daunting. Check it out.

NYC: 8,244,910 residents (according to 2011 census data)

La Unión: Approximately 6,000 residents

NYC: Boasts more than 20,000 restaurants, over 200 of which will deliver food right to my doorstep

La Unión: Has no restaurants, but does have a few street vendors serving local fare

NYC: Is easily accessible by air, land or water, due to its many highways, waterways and three international airports, one of which is only a 7 minute drive from our home

La Unión: Is five hours from the nearest airport and is two hours from the nearest paved road. Only one dirt road winds through the mountains in and out of town.

NYC: Sea-level and pretty flat

La Unión: Almost a mile up, rugged and mountainous

NYC: Safest big city in the US, with less than 7 homicides per 100,000 residents

La Unión: The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime recently ranked Honduras as the most dangerous country in the world, with 86 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, and San Pedro Sula (our closest urban center) is today the world’s most violent city, with 159 murders per 100,000 people

NYC: Has more billionaires than any other city in the world; average household income in Manhattan is $121,549; 9.8% unemployment rate

La Unión: 50% of Honduras’ population is living below the poverty line; unemployment stands at 27.9%; Average income is around $1,600 a year

I could go on. There are an unending number of differences between life in NYC and life in La Union. Many of them we won’t even know until we get there.

So why do this? Why give up a comfortable life with a solid income, working for two powerful NYC institutions* to become teachers in a small, rural school? Why take a 93% pay cut? Why exchange the culinary wonders of Queens for rice and beans? Why this? Why now? It makes no sense.

The truth is that we’ve felt an internal nudging to leave the comforts of home and immerse ourselves in another culture for awhile now. Having pursued graduate studies in International Development Studies at GWU, I have been interested in an intentional overseas adventure for years. And more recently, Lenny too felt a tugging on his heart.  When we were both offered jobs at Vida Abundante School in Honduras, we felt confident that things were falling into place for a new phase of life.

But that probably doesn’t answer the “Why?” question with much satisfaction. This type of life change seems counter-intuitive, counter-cultural.  Yes. True. Therein lies the answer. We wanted to do something counter-cultural, something surprising, something completely different. We wanted the opportunity to learn from another culture, to embrace simplicity, to rearrange and solidify our values. We wanted to be disrupted. We wanted a Great Exchange.

You see, in spite of all the amenities (or maybe because of them!), it can be hard living in NYC, or anywhere there is affluence for that matter. After awhile, the longings for comfort, for power, for success, for luxury start to rub off on you. And - in my experience - before you know it, you’ve become someone you didn’t want to be, with a frenzied lifestyle in service of those longings. Something unhealthy becomes top priority because it’s a gateway to quenching those desires. All of a sudden you've become that self-important person who is most concerned with the restaurant that will have the pleasure of hosting you for Sunday brunch or the cute, sparkly sandals that you simply must have or that trendy apartment in Chelsea that would be just perfect for you, all the while becoming more unaware of or removed from the plethora of needs abundant in any urban context.

And over time I have realized, as Donald Miller mentions above, I “secretly want for something better.”

So I have decided to exchange the pressures of this lifestyle for the challenges of another one. I am trying to look our longings straight in the eyes and say, “No, you don’t control me.” Comfort, I am willing to give you up in order to experience life more fully. Success, I want to reshape and redefine you so that you are aligned with kingdom values. Power, I fling my longings for you to the side so that I might better live a life of sacrifice and simplicity. Because this is the way of something better. This is the way of Jesus.

If you’re like me, this type of confrontation is best met with radical action. Because there’s always another episode of Breaking Bad beckoning you and me to stay curled up on the couch. And always another jacket that would look totally awesome with that one outfit.  I believe in my head and in my heart that there’s more to life than this. It’s time for an exchange. Twenty-three days…

-Kara

*I recently left my job at Redeemer Presbyterian Church, ranked the #16 most influential church in America, partly because of the prestige of its superstar pastor, Tim Keller. Lenny is wrapping up his job running the political affairs division of NYC’s Dept of Education, the largest school system in the country, including more than 1.1 million kids, 1,750 schools, and a $24.4 billion annual budget.