Mud, Guatusas, and Socialism

For the four or five people who actually read this blog (two of them being my parents), you’ve probably already heard most of this. I tend to forget just about everything, and can only remember a handful of stories at a time, repeating them over and over to whoever will listen. So if this all sounds familiar, just give it a quick scan and go back to facebook.

Back in December, another one of the missionaries, Kevin, and I, went home on vacation with one of the Honduran staff here at the Farm, Dynia. She lives in Patuca, a town on the southern side of the country, not far from the border with Nicaragua. We hopped on a bus from Trujillo at 5am, and for the next seventeen hours fought  dirt roads in the heart of the rainy season. About three or four in the afternoon, the bus finally fell victim to the forces of nature, and all fifty or so of us had to get off while they called a front end loader to pull it out of the mud. For the next hour or so, this strong piece of Caterpillar engineering, with tires balder than Samuel L. Jackson’s head, attempted to pull us out. Meanwhile we’re standing in the rain, wondering whether or not we’ll make it there before midnight. At one point, another car came up, got stuck in the mud as well, and being the gentleman I am, decided I would help push it out. God, having the sense of humor that He does, repaid my good deed with mud being slung all over my jeans and nice shirt from the spinning tires. But then again, maybe I should’ve seen that one coming… By the time the Cat is able to pull the bus out and we made it to town, the moon was starting to rise. We finished the adventure with a half a mile trek through mud up to our calves and suitcases over our heads, and Kevin falling over every five minutes, before eventually reaching Dynia’s house. The town had no electricity and the house had a dirt floor, but I have never felt so welcomed in someone’s home. I think they killed half the chickens they owned in order to serve us meat at every meal. Some might say, however, that Dynia’s uncle, Mando, was the most hospitable of all. Mando is a farmer, and our time in Patuca coincided with the beginning of the corn harvest. Kevin and I woke up one morning, had a breakfast of chicken, beans, and five or so corn tortillas, then walked over to Mando’s house to see what his family was up to. His wife was grilling some corn, and we eagerly accepted the invitation to eat an ear. It was delicious, and so they offered us another. Now it’s a little rude in latino culture to turn down a gift when offered, so we obviously said, “Yeah, we’d love some more!” Then they offered us a third. “Great!” we said through slightly gritted teeth. By now my stomach is starting to rebel. Then a fourth. “Uhm… eh… well… okay,” remembering that other than a priest back in the 90s, we’re the first white people to ever come to this village, so we better make America proud. Then a fifth! At this point I’m not sure if this is called hospitality or a sick joke, but finally we said we’d take it with us so we could eat it back at Dynia’s house, secretly planning to ditch them somewhere in one of the patches of knee high mud. I, personally, didn’t want to see corn of any sort for the next year, and Kevin literally became sick. I think he was still puking up corn a few days later…

       Their humble abode.                         Dynia cookin up some good chow.               Backdrop of their house.

 Another exciting thing that happened around the same time was that I became the proud owner of a baby guatusa. A what? A guatusa! In English they’re called agoutis, but since you’ve probably never heard of that name either, we’ll just stick to the Honduran term. It’s a rodent, kind of like a mix between a guinea pig and a rabbit, and weights around ten or twelve pounds as an adult. The story is that one day, I was talking to my friend Marcos, one of the Honduran maintenance workers, and we were discussing how people down there often have wild animals for pets. So I told him that if he ever found a baby animal while he was out hunting in the mountains, to bring it down for me. And a few weeks later, I’m the proud owner of a baby guatusa. She was definitely very latina and very sexy, so we named her Shakira, and made a cage for her. She eats just about any fruit you can find, a few vegetables, and loves nuts. She’s actually the only known animal that can open a Brazil nut! (yeah I don’t know what that is either) But since I’ve been on vacation back in the states,

Shakira with her game face on.

the other volunteers have found out she loves Cornflakes more than anything. I bought a cat leash here in the states, so soon I’ll be able to take her around the Farm, to class, and to morning prayer. I’m pretty sure St. Francis would’ve loved to have a guatusa with him in the chapel during prayer, so I don’t wanna hear any complaints from the nuns. No doubt Shakira will be a faithful friend to the volunteers for many years to come. In fact, they say guatusas can live for twenty years in captivity. But then again, I just might smuggle her back to the states with me.

The last part of this blog has a different tone. At the risk of sounding like a self-righteous young American who’s spent time abroad, I’d like to throw out some thoughts I’ve had lately about material poverty. I’m giving fair warning through, my dad’s been calling me a socialist for a few weeks now, so if you don’t wanna hear my idealistic rants, you should go now. Spending time in rural Central America has made material poverty a very real concept for me. Instead of the poor being starving Africans on tv or people I heard about at mass, the poor are the kids I have in my English class, or the friends I’ve made in the surrounding communities. I know that there are kids in my classes who go without meals, or that eat meat once every blue moon. One of my good friend’s family members recently got very sick, and the family had to sell two motorcycles and a property they owned to pay for the treatment. Another friend is planting as much as he can on a little bit of land beside his house, and fishing when possible to try to put food on the table for his large family, now that he doesn’t have a steady job. I met a lady in one of the mountain villages who walks five hours roundtrip to town a couple times a week to wash clothes for a woman there. I asked her why she doesn’t take the bus and she replied, “I only get paid 100 lempiras (5 dollars) each time, and the bus tickets would cost 40 (2 dollars).” Sick people often come in our clinic without the money to pay for the treatment they need in a hospital. And here I am with money in my bank account, wondering if helping these people out would be “sustainable,” or if I might need that money for retirement some day. I don’t give because one day I just might need that money, and I’ll be glad I saved it. But the thing is, they need it today. All my life I’ve heard the stories about Jesus telling the man who had fulfilled all of the commandments to give everything to the poor, or the woman in the temple who gave the only two cents she had, and I’ve thought to myself, sure I’ll give, but first let me get a house, a car, good health insurance, a healthy 401k, some investments, and enough money to go out with my friends on the weekend. Then I’ll give a few bucks to feed the hungry. But since I’ve had sustainability on the mind anyways, one thing is for sure: my type of lifestyle is certainly not sustainable. The whole world cannot live like middle class America, the earth simply does not have enough resources. Therefore, because I am financially and materially secure, someone else will live in poverty. Not everyone can be rich, one has to be a result of the other. I did a quiz online, and based on my salary when I worked on cargo ships, I was of the richest 0.5% of the world. Sure I call myself middle class America, but I’m certainly not the middle class of the world. The stereotypical “good Christian” avoids the big three: alcohol, drugs, and sex. But when I look at the gospels, Jesus seems to do a lot more talking about the rich and the poor than he does about these. Maybe for the past twenty years I’ve just conveniently skipped over the parts that threaten my comfortable lifestyle.

So what is the answer to global poverty? I’m not sure. Should I forget the retirement fund and give all my money to others? I dunno. But I do think it is a question that we ponder far too little. And if I had happened to be born in rural Uganda, Bangladesh, or Honduras, it would definitely be something I’d think about far more often.

Ok, dad, that’s the end of my socialist rant for today.

It's Not November Anymore, But Maybe Still Interesting...

Tied in a hammock strung from the ceiling. This is normal.

The month of November has a notorious reputation here at the Finca del Niño. Whenever I came in the front door of the volunteer house this past month, complaining about something, the replies normally sounded something like, “Well, it is November after all...” For one reason or another, that month seems have a corner on the market of exciting events here. Not all of them necessarily bad (although some definitely are), just things that get your heart pumping and your blood flowing. So for this blog entry, we’re gonna do a quick rundown of some of the more notable events that got the adrenaline flowing in November.

Number one. Honduran presidential elections. Back in 2009, Honduras decided to make its most recent big break into the world spotlight by staging a coup d’ etat, ousting then current president Mel Zelaya, letting the military control for a while, having an interim president, and eventually choosing the conservative Porfirio Lobo Sosa, or Pepe Lobo for short. Lobo, by the way, means “wolf,” in Spanish, so electing him was for sure a good choice. It would be like if our president was named Obama Sabertooth-Tiger. Legit. Finally, we might get some respect from North Korea... Anyways, in the past few years, most people would probably say Honduras has steadily gone downhill. Not to say that life was rosy before, or that it’s the president’s fault that Honduras is struggling, but I haven’t heard anyone lavishing praise on the current government. Unemployment is raging, petty crime is high, and it can now claim to have the highest murder rate in the world. Beautiful. So everyone’s been pretty invested in these elections. The problem is that this “everyone“ includes the gangs, the drug traffickers, and every sort of low life looking for money and power. There were eight political parties with a presidential candidate this year, and five of them newly formed this year. One of these candidates also happened to be the wife of the president who was ousted in the coup a few years ago. Surely she just happened to have her own political ambitions, right? Every week in the newspapers there was some new ridiculous story. One drug trafficking gang says they will kill one of the candidates if they don’t pull out of the race. The daughter of the ex-interim president (that took power after the coup) had her car shot multiple times as she’s driving down the street. A candidate vowing to make a huge military police and claiming, “I will do whatever needs to be done to return the peace to the people of Honduras.” That doesn’t sound like Hitler or Mussolini at all. One candidate claiming the supporters of another are going to vote early on election day, then take to the streets and harass and threaten the people so that they won’t go to the polls. One candidate claiming  that if they don’t win, they won’t accept the results, and take to the streets rioting. Candidates for mayor or department representative have gone into hiding or have fled the country after threats on their lives.  You know, just normal, everyday stuff. So on November 24^th, the day of the elections, we were all listening to the radio to see what would happen. And by a miracle of God, things went rather smoothly. There were no full out riots, no huge claims of fraud (although there were definitely a few floating around), and at least for now, no murdering of presidential candidates. The conservative candidate received the most votes, and barring something crazy, will be taking office at the beginning of this next year. So with that being said, here’s to change, and to the next four years being better than the last.

Number two. La Gran Inundacion de 2013, or the Great Flood of 2013. Rainy season in coastal Honduras is supposed to be three months of semi constant rain, starting around mid October and lasting through the winter. But this year it didn’t start off so strong. A few clouds, a little bit of rain, but nothing worth writing home about. And by the end of November, we were starting to wonder if this “rainy season” would ever come. Well it did, and it came with a vengeance. The Tuesday night before Thanksgiving, around 9:00, it started raining. And it rained pretty good. It then continued to rain Wednesday, accompanied by heavy, heavy winds. It also rained Wednesday night. And Thursday. Thursday night. Friday. Friday night… Catch my drift? For more than 72 straight hours it never stopped raining. Rivers that normally only have a few inches of water going over them at the crossings, rose up to three feet or more. The ocean was muy enojado or “very angry,” as they say down here, and rose up to where the waves were lapping up into the walls of our chain link fence. Three of the older children that work in town got stuck there because they couldn’t cross the rivers, and ended up staying at the house of one of the Finca school teachers until the rivers went down. A Mitsubishi truck tried to be brave and cross one of the rivers, but underestimated it’s power, and got swept several hundred yards downstream before running up on the shore, giving the people inside a chance to escape out the back window mostly unharmed. Full grown, gigantic trees got blown over. The first of which just happened to come down as I and another volunteer were directly under it… Wednesday morning we were walking back from the beach back to our house when suddenly we hear the cracking of limbs behind us. We look up to see a huge Nansi tree slowly coming down right on top of us. We take off running for our lives and jump on the front porch of our house as the tree crashed to the ground, not fifteen feet behind us. I think I might have accidently taught the kids some new words that day, as I was screaming expletives at the top of my lungs. Trees weren’t the only things falling either, as many of ours and the neighbors crops got blown to the ground and ruined. I planted a few plantain trees next to our house about a year ago, and I have religiously water and fertilized them as if they were my own children since that time. In the matter of a few hours of wind, the tallest, most beautiful one, which was just starting to put off a great cluster of plantains, was broken in half like a matchstick. Honestly though, I have little to complain about, as some of our neighbors had entire fields of crops destroyed. By the end of Friday, large portions of the Farm were underwater, and we even had to put sandbags around the door of the food storage room. The school, the front gate, the storage building, one of the houses, and the yucca crop all had several inches (in some places six or eight) of standing water. Tree limbs everywhere. All kinds of trash washed up on the shore. I believe the Farm has never been dirtier in my time here. But I must say, it was a really impressive storm. Driving rain, howing winds, crashing trees, threats of flooding, swept away cars, and running for your life. I must say, I’ve been waiting a year and a half for one like that. 

Lots and lots of water...

Number three. La despedida, or the leaving of the old class of volunteers. Every year around this time the oldest class of volunteers returns to their respective homelands. As I decided to extend and do a third year, the class that left was the class that I came into the Finca with. Some will be looking for work, some heading to graduate school, and Kevin just plans to sit on his couch and watch TV for a couple months. But when they left a couple weeks ago, it definitely left an empty feeling around the house and around the Farm. We’ve had 19 volunteers in total for the last couple months, and now we have 11. It’s a big change. For me personally, my best friends and closest confidants here at the Farm were in that class. One story I’d like to share, that I will always remember from my time with them, was one night about a month back. It was a Monday night, and we had just recently done our annual volunteer house talent show, which normally includes, singing, disco, interpretive dance, and bilingual rapping. Most of us were sitting around in the living room afterwards, still playing a few songs on the guitar. Throughout the past year, another volunteer, Erin Lucia, and I would often play together. Since I can play guitar but sing like a frog, and she can sing like an angel but not play guitar, we made a good combo. With Erin leading the vocals, me on guitar, and the rest of the community forming the chorus, we laid down some great renditions of Hootie and the Blowfish and Jack Johnson. Then, as we were doing a real inspiring version of American Pie, the electricity goes out. Pretty normal down here, so all that really meant was that the night just got more romantic as we lit up some candles and kept singing. Eventually we moved on to some praise and worship songs. As we played How He Loves by David Crowder, something special could be felt in the air. I closed my eyes and listened as the voices flowed together with the guitar, just like old dance partners, each one knowing exactly the others next step. I felt surrounded by the music. Enveloped by it. It was coming forth from me, joining with the other voices, and wrapping all around me. We were in the presence of intense beauty. In the presence of God. In 6am morning prayer every day or Tuesday night rosary, I often don’t feel the presence of God. But that night, surrounded by some of the finest people I know, being part of some of the most beautiful music I’ve ever heard, I felt closer to God than I have in quite some time. As the song finished, we all sat in silence for a while. The only noise was the sound of the strong ocean waves pounding against the shore. Even nature joined in the chorus. 

David, Haydee, and I watching a parade in the Finca.

So with that though fresh on my mind and heart, I bid adieu to the class of 2013, and wish all of you the best of luck in the future. And if you get the urge to come back to your old stomping grounds this next year, we’ll be here waiting for ya. With a poorly functioning government and life threatening rain storms, but also with a lot of good times to share.

One last note, not related to anything above in any way, but something worth sharing. By the end of 6^th grade English class this year, we were getting a little bored with new vocabulary and practicing the “to be” verbs, so we decided to make a Bob Marley music video. We haven’t signed with any record labels yet, so I’m still free to show the video for free. Click on the link below and check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3TRf0_vHj0&feature=youtu.be

Love, Joy, and Sunsets

Welp, it’s mid October now, and that means there’s a lot of movement going on down here at the Finca. The school year is wrapping up, a group of volunteers are getting ready to leave, and a new group of missionaries have just showed up. All of the volunteers that came at the beginning of 2012 (myself a little later in April of 2012), will be heading home in December. I decided a little while back, though, to go ahead and stick around for a third year. At the beginning of this year, I started the discernment process of whether to stay or to go, and decided to go ahead and stay. Basically for two reasons. The first is more logical, tangible. There’s a big push in our organization to strengthen the vocational program for our kids, and since I’m the volunteer in charge of this and have a lot of passion for it, I’ve really latched on to it. I knew if I was only going to be here for one year under this position, nothing sustainable would happen, so I decided to hang around for another year.

Photo by Father Mark. Angel David making tortillas.

 

The other reason is a little more lofty. The first year here was one of the hardest years of my life. It was that way for a lot of different reasons, but one of them was because of my relationship with the kids. I came to the Finca expecting to form deep, lasting, loving relationships with the youth, filled with meaningful conversations and a lot of fun. But it didn’t feel that way very much at all the first year. Often the older boys would scowl when I walked by their house, for seemingly no reason at all. I would try to start a conversation with them and they would answer with one word or just walk off. That certainly didn’t give me the feeling of a deep connection, that was for sure. It felt like more of a battle a lot of the time. And the more I began to understand the Finca and the lives of the kids, the more I began to understand why they reacted the way they did. These kids have a lot of reasons to be angry. Their family might have left them or abused them, they were taken from their homes, maybe passed around the Honduran system for a little while, or maybe came directly to the Finca. They got here, lived in houses with nice caretakers or house parents, and met the volunteers and the nuns. But every year or two the house parents and volunteers left and new ones came, and the cycle continued year in and year out. This affects a child. I grew up with loving parents, constantly supporting me and helping me, and there were still plenty of rough times. These kids had everything taken from them. Their home, their family, and their freedom. They get here, and it’s a nice place, but people come, and people go. And that leaves them with the feeling that they’re pretty alone in the world. That no one really loves them enough to stick around. And that can make them pretty bitter. Pretty unsure how to love others, and unsure how to accept love. They make bad decisions, hurt others, and hurt themselves. It’s a very different environment than anything I’ve experienced before. But I think God brought me here specifically to see that. To learn what it means to love a very beat down, broken population. And learn how to accept love from them. And as I sat there thinking about whether or not I should stay for a third year, I felt like I still had a lot more to learn about love. That God still had a lot more to teach me; That he wasn’t done with me here yet, and that I was gonna need a little more time. That this experience in the Finca is very unique one, and one that could teach me things about love that I couldn’t necessarily learn in other places. So here I am, learning a little more, day by day, until December of 2014.

I made that decision to stay a third year, during my vacation back to the states this past March. And after a

Independence Day Parade.

little time to reflect, I came back to Honduras refreshed and ready to get back to work. Part of that work includes fifth grade English class. The fifth grade class in our esteemed Saint Peter Catholic School, has a little bit of a reputation. They’re known to be a little wild, wreck a little havoc, and take teachers to the end of their rope. As much as I’d like to say I’m a young, hip, inspiring teacher who can harness their energy in positive directions and get them excited about and engaged in the English language, that wouldn’t really be true at all. I have to admit I’ve raised my voice more than once or twice in class this year… And the wildest, loudest, can’t stay in his desk, and blatantly disrespectful one of them all, we’re going to call Pedro, has been the target of my glaring looks and raised voice more than most. Pedro’s a small, wiry, wild-haired kid with the energy of a monkey trapped in a barrel. And as soon as I got back from vacation, my first day back in the classroom, Pedro was bouncing off the walls as usual. I probably yelled at him a bit, and made him stay a few minutes after class. I walked into class the next day, though, and I’m embarrassed to say that I was pleasantly surprised to see Pedro’s seat empty. I let out a little sigh of relief, and went to the chalkboard to start writing, but I couldn’t find any chalk. The class eagerly told me the chalk was in the cupboard, surprising me that they were even somewhat excited to see what I was going to write on the board. I walked over to the cupboard, opened the door, and, well, didn’t see any chalk. What I did see, however, was my little friend Pedro, curled up in the second shelf of the cupboard, laughing his head off, thoroughly enjoying that he had duped me again. As short and wiry as this kid is, and as many wild and crazy things as he has done, even I was surprised that he could twist his body into that small crevice in the cabinet. But this time, I didn’t yell at him, and I don’t even think I made him stay five minutes after class. This time I think I laughed actually. He’s a real wild child and normally just makes me mad, but that was pretty funny.

Our community of volunteers is a big group of readers, so there’s always a couple of good books being passed around. One that has been passed around for a few years now, is a book called Awareness, written by a Jesuit priest from India named Anthony De Mello. It’s not incredibly well known, and not very long, but very provocative, and makes you question a lot of your commonly held beliefs. At one point he talks about the Kingdom of God, and how if we stopped worrying about what heaven will be like, and started worrying more about how we can bring His kingdom here to earth, we would do a lot more good in the world. Later he talks about being aware of and really taking in the joys of life. The beauty of a flower, the song of a bird, the taste of good wine, a good conversation with a friend. That if we could take in the full extent of the sight of a beautiful flower, the joy we would pull from that would bring the kingdom of heaven into our lives. A few weeks after reading this, I was sitting on the porch of one of the houses watching Yadira, our pudgy two and a half year old, youngest member of the Finca community play with a coloring book. She was scribbling on it as usual and having a grand old time. At first I thought she was just making a mess of the book, but then I began to watch her a bit more closely. She would take a crayon, strike it on the page making a short mark, stare at it inquisitively, and then burst into uncontrollable laughter. Every subsequent mark was followed by ten second of laughing and screaming for joy. Just the mere act of being able to create color, and put it on a sheet of paper, brought her the most intense joy, the most intense laughter. When Jesus said we must be like a child if we are to inherit the kingdom of God, maybe this is what He meant. If I could look at a color, the beauty of a single color, and my ability to take part in the creation of it, and let it beauty fill me with uncontrollable laughter, maybe then I would be able to feel the joy of the kingdom of heaven here on Earth. Maybe if we all saw the world a little more like Yadira did, we would all understand a little more what the kingdom of heaven on earth could mean.

For the end of this blog post, I’d like to leave you with a few stanzas of one of my favorite poems. It’s called The Invitation, written by Oriah. 

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

Here’s to one more year at the Finca. One more year to learn about love. And one more year to see the world as three year old would.

Kevin and I took the older boys camping on top of the tallest mountain outside of Trujillo. This is a view from the top. Pretty nice sunset...

And one more thing. A group of high schoolers came down this summer to spend some time with us, and one put together an incredible video about life at the Finca. Check it out, it describes us pretty well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVb4lPHYAas&feature=youtu.be

GGGGGGGGOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Practicing for the big leagues.

This is what I was shouting back on the 6^th of February in a small restaurant less than a mile down the beach from the Finca. And I was wasn’t alone either. There were about 4 or 5 of us American volunteers there watching the US vs Honduras World Cup qualifying game. Yeah I know, it probably seems a little strange that I’m watching a soccer game and getting excited. I mean, it’s never really happened before. Football, baseball, basketball. Yeah, sure. Heck I even got pumped up over Olympic swimming and gymnastics more than I did soccer. But when you live in Honduras, a country where the people think soccer is the only sport that really exists, you started getting sucked in. So there were all were watching the match between the motherland, sweet America, and our current home, Honduras. But we weren’t alone. Virtually every kid from the Finca, along with a good number of the house parents, and even one of the nuns, trudged down the beach to watch this epic showdown. Virtually every school and place of business in the country shut down that afternoon as everyone headed for a tv to see if the pride of Honduras could take down the big bad US. And as American scored that first beautiful goal, I started licking my lips. You see, at least a few weeks before the game, I had already started running my mouth. “Hey Carmen (a 24 Honduran care-taker on the Finca), if you’re so confident in your Catrachos (slang for Hondurans), why don’t we just bet on this game,” I smarted off. “Okay, let’s do it,” she says. “A three liter of Coke then.” “Consider it done.” And we shake on it. I mean, how could the US lose? We were considered a much better team than the Hondurans, and throughout the history of the two teams playing, we virtually always won. I was pretty sure I’d be sipping my three liter and bragging to everyone I could find by the end of that game. But sometimes things don’t turn out like you plan… Just a few minutes after I jumped up and yelled goal, every Honduran in the place erupted into cheers as Juan Carlos Garcia flipped around backwards and scored on a bicycle kick. Oops. Well that’s not good. But so what, no way we’re gonna lose this. We’re America. However as the second half of the game continued, the combination of Central American heat and great Honduran footwork proved to be too much for the US to handle, and as the minutes winded down I watched in horror as Honduras punched in another goal and finished the game in a 2-1 victory. And man was everyone excited. Kids jumping up and down, yelling and screaming, and threatening to grab me and throw me in the ocean was just the start. The next morning I had to drive to town to pick up the Honduran school teachers, and for the whole 20 minute drive back they had to retell the story of the game, as if I had forgotten it. That whole week kids were constantly coming up to me and asking me what the score of the game was. “Uh, sorry guys, I forgot,” was normally my reply. As I walked through the neighboring village one of the men asked me if I needed a shot of whiskey to help drown my sorrows, and while it might have actually helped, I passed. And of course, as I promised, I had to buy Carmen her three liter of Coke, which I’m sure she thoroughly enjoyed while replaying that bicycle kick over and over again in her head. 

While soccer is one of the most storied traditions of Honduras, the volunteer house at the Finca has a few of its own customs, although they’re a quite bit stranger. Probably one of the most infamous is the rapid loss of weight among male volunteers. That’s right, if you wanna lose weight, just head down to Trujillo, Honduras, start on the strict diet of rice, beans, and tortillas, and the pounds will soon start falling off. No one can really say exactly why, but basically all male volunteers drop at least a few pounds during their time there, and most drop quite a bit. So while we were sitting around discussing this in the kitchen one day (really thrilling conversation, I know) I thought to myself, why don’t we really put this nonsense to an end and have a weight gaining competition. So I discussed it with Kevin #1 and Kevin #2, the other two male volunteers in the house, and we decided that for the next fifty days, we would stuff ourselves with every parcel of food we could find and see who could pack on the most pounds. The winner could have their choice of an entire chicken and three liter of coke, or a huge jar of peanut butter, both very coveted prizes. And off to the races we went. For the next fifty days we literally ate everything we could find. If there wasn’t much lunch in the volunteer house one day, we would sneak off to one of the kid's houses and beg them for any leftovers. In fact, for quite a while there I had a steady stream of 3 o’clock snacks coming from House 4. And by snack I mean an overflowing plate of rice, beans, tortillas, eggs, vegetables, and possibly a chicken leg if I got lucky. I supplemented my meals with an extremely unhealthy amount of soda, and Kevin #2 supplemented his by doing 3 sets of push presses with the 25 lb steel door to our outdoor oven each night. We even got to take advantage of the Christmas and New Years feasts during our competition. But soon the fifty days began to wind down, and while my pants still fit, I was confident that I had tucked away a couple extra pounds and could come away with a victory. Even at the midnight cut-off before weigh-in, I ate a quesadilla, a plate of rice and beans, a couple protein bars, five eggs, and three quarters of a liter of water (which was what I assumed was the maximum I could drink without having to pee in the middle of the night). So there we were, Kevin, Kevin, and myself, at 6:45 Sunday morning, one by one taking our turn with the scale. And the results? Drumroll please… Kevin #2: +1.5 lbs, Kevin #1: -6 lbs, and Harrison: -1 lb. Wait what. After all that, only one of us was able to pack on a measly 1.5 lbs, while Kevin #1 and myself both lost weight? Pitiful. Absolutely pitiful. So the tradition of emaciated male volunteers continues, and I’m looking for a big jar of peanut butter to buy.

"Working"

Just about the time our weight gaining, or rather weight losing competition was ending, another important period was ending at the Finca. Winter. However, winter in Honduras has a little different meaning than winter in the US. There’s no snow, there’s no ice, heck, I don’t think the temperatures ever get below 60. But what they do have is rain. And lots of it. In November and December, I think I could have counted the number of days we didn’t have rain on one or two hands. Some days a little, some days a lot, but pretty much every day there was something. And while that may seem like a little bit of a downer to us, winter is the most joyous time of year for the kids. But not because of the rain. For them, winter means no school. Because of the problems constant rain can cause, the three month break from classes happens from November to January each year. At the Finca, however, winter vacation entails more than lying on the beach or playing soccer all day. It entails work. Each day, all of the kids 11 years and older work at least 3 hours. Work spans all sorts of things like chopping wood, raking leaves, painting, cleaning the school, and distributing food to the different houses, just to name a few. They get a break for Christmas and break for New Years, but other than that, they’re pretty much working. And each day while they work, they’re awarded points based on how hard and how quality their work is. Over time these points add up, translate into money, and at certain times the kids can go into town and buy little things, with the idea being that they learn how hard work pays off, and the harder you work, the more you can gain. So one day I’m sitting down talking to one of the girls about all the points she’s accumulated and what she wants to buy. “Well, after working hard all winter, it looks like you’ve got about 150 Lempiras (Seven dollars) to spend in town this Friday. What do you think you’ll buy?” I ask her. “Hmm,” she thinks, “Well what would 5 chips and 5 juices cost?” I’m sure I gave her a blank stare. I mean, I’ve seen kids spend their money on some pretty dumb stuff before, but this one might take the cake. She works hard all winter break, and wants to spend her money on a bunch of junk food. “I think that would take about all the money you have,” I say, hoping she’ll change her mind. “Okay, then I think that’s what I’ll get.” Well... Okay… At least she’s young. Maybe she’ll get a little smarter as time goes on. But then, right before I walk off, it occurs to me. She has four brothers and sisters here at the Finca. She wanted to buy chips and juice for all of them. She wanted to spend her entire savings from that winter just to buy a little snack for her brothers and sisters.

I think the idea of founding the Finca was for the adults to teach the kids what it means to be loving Christians in a rough place like rural Honduras. But more often than not, I find, they are the ones teaching me what real love looks like. Logically speaking it’s rather dumb to blow all your cash on chips and juice. I think when I was a kid I was always saving my money to buy the next big toy that came out or the next football card to add to my collection. But that was me thinking about me. Me loving me. And that’s not how Jesus loved. Jesus loved wrecklessly, even foolishly by our rational American standards. He roamed around Palestine with his friends. He lived homeless. He didn’t turn stones into bread when he was hungry in the desert. He turned water into wine at the party at Cana. He loved others wrecklessly. Foolishly. Selflessly. Purely. And here I am at 25 years old, a volunteer missionary, being taught that lesson by a 12 year old. 

Kevin #1, myself, and the older boys doing a little swimming.