The View from the Balcony

We Need Jose

2012-01-07T10:57:00.001-06:00

Dear friends, family and other followers of the view, we really need Jose to continue working. The week before Christmas Macho Man had to tell Joche to take the time between Christmas and New Years to find another job, because we probably would not be able to pay him after the First.

Joche reminded MM that the first time he asked for a job, MM turned him down. The second time he came and asked for a job, MM said yes, but told him it would only be for 3-4 months. It has been a little over 2 years. He didn't fuss or say anything but, "Maestro, you gave me a job for 2 years." The unemployment rate in Honduras is between 30-40%

Well, we found a little extra money for this week and next, but that's about it. I just realized I will be getting a small adjustment to my Social Security benefit, and we won't be paying rent at the condo. The electric bill should go down a little, because the wiring here is up to code. but the fact remains, there isn't enough to keep him on full time. About the best we can do is 2 weeks a month.

Two weeks a month is not enough We need Joche. Macho Man isn't as young as he use to be, and he needs help with the heavy lifting, the woodworking, the concrete work, and yesterday, the mopping of floors at the condo. Joche is here from can to can't. Sometimes I even wish he didn't come quite so early.

Joche needs us. He has a wife and a very young toddler to support. The salary we have paid him has allowed him to provide at least the basics for his family. As previously written, he has been an avid learner, a true apprentice, and he will take the knowledge with him from now own. His help is invaluable.

The problem is, how to pay him. I have faith the money will be there as long as we need it. On the other hand, I believe in prayer, and I believe the more people who pray the more effective the prayers. So, all you Prayer Warriors, please pray that we can be creative enough to see a way to provide the means to continue as we have been.

We are blessed.

Casa de Sueños - Quick Update

2012-01-04T18:30:00.001-06:00

A friend reminded me yesterday that I had not posted anything about the house since October, and he was right, October 22nd to be exact. It's not that there was nothing to post. Things were just going so slow that you could not really see the day-to-day progress.

Then everything seemed to just happen all at once. It had been MY goal to move in before Christmas Eve. Note the emphasis on the word MY. Macho Man didn't want to pin moving to a definite date, but I decided I wanted to have Christmas in my own house. So, I just started packing things up and getting ready to go.

Well, I was ready, MM said he was ready, but the house, not so much. We moved in with the kitchen sink set up on concrete blocks, but we do have hot water. The windows have no glass in them, just screens and security bars. So what's new? We haven't had actual windows in over two years. We have two functioning bathrooms, as far as toilets go, and the shower and tub are working in the master bath, but no bathroom sinks in place. Okay, so I am using the kitchen sink to wash my face and brush my teeth.

There are no kitchen cabinets or bathroom vanities, but that's not new either. The baths in the condo have a mirror over the sink, but no vanity; and the kitchen has no cabinets or counter space, just one shelf over the stove and one over the sink. Here I have a big pantry.and for the present a full sheet of plywood set up on two sawhorses. doubles as counter space and kitchen island.

I have plenty of room to work in, so I did. We had our first Nochebuena (Christmas Eve) at Casa de Sueños, and not one person complained about the kitchen not being finished. We just ate and had a good time. Nobody fussed because there are no doors in the master bathroom, just a shower curtain over the opening. Nobody went into the bedroom when someone else was in there.

We did have a Christmas tree, the first in two years, and Christmas decorations. Two of the nieces helped me decorate, and they did a great job. I almost hate to take it down after the 6th. Christmas trees in Latin countries stay up until after Three Kings Day, or Epiphany. New Year's Eve the family here in Trujillo came up and spent a little while. The balcony is a great place to congregate. It is big enough for all ages to find a place and enjoy each other while still being together. Ditto for my birthday yesterday. The only thing missing was the family from Tocoa.

Now it is time to get back to business. Right now my living room and bedroom look like the storeroom at Goodwill or the Salvation Army Store. We have boxes everywhere, and the answer to "Where is _________?" is still, "In a box somewhere.". The good news is, by tomorrow afternoon everything will be out of the condo and into the house. Then Friday we will spend the day cleaning the condo so we can return the keys.

So, family and friends, we are in the new house, and it is ours. It might still be a work in progress, but it is our work in progress. Best of all, it took us two years to get here, but there is no mortgage, IT IS OURS!.

Oh. where are the pictures? In the camera. Where is the camera? All together now....The camera is in a box, somewhere. When I find it there will be a new profile picture. It will be the view from our balcony.

We are truly blessed.

Just What Does a Cold Front Mean?

2011-10-22T19:09:00.002-05:00

Yesterday when I got up, it was cold.. Well, it was cold for us, about 70 F. with a WCF of about 60 F. I was going to write something fluffy, like about how I could wear one of my bulky sweaters, which I did. About how I was wearing sock and shoes and not flip flops, which was true. About putting an afghan on the bed and letting Chico sleep with us, which we did. Then I got serious and decided to write about a cold front means in Central America.

A cold front combined with a tropical depression, combined with the rainy season in Central America means rain, lots and lots of rain. It has been raining for 8 days, and is suppose to continue over the weekend. One community in Honduras reported 36" of rain in 24 hours. That is roughly a quarter of the normal rainfall for the year on the North Coast falling in one day. Here in Trujillo we had a tourist who died yesterday when a flash flood hit the car she was in, washing her out to sea. Her body was found today on the other side of the bay near the port.

The Rio Cristales (Crystal River) is normally a fairly benign river. It is where most of our water come from. A couple of weeks ago we crossing the river and noted it was almost dried up, explaining why we had no water pressure. This was Rio Cristales yesterday

Courtesy Trujillo Noticias

If you remember, last year the main bridge between Trujillo and the rest of the world was washed away. It just reopened last month. Puente La Burra spans the Rio Aguan and in normal times it looks like this.

Courtesy Trujillo Noticias

Yesterday it looked like this.

Courtesy Trujillo Noticias

The Mayor of Trujillo was out yesterday surveying the situation at La Burra, and this is what he found. The road leading up to the bridge apparently was not built on an adequate substrata, and is washing away. Remember this was just opened last month.

Courtesy Trujillo Noticias

In the rest of the country a cold front/tropical depression looks like this:

Courtesy La Prensa HN

A family's home is destroyed.

Courtesy La Prensa HN

A road falls into a ravine, cutting off the countryside from food and other supplies. These people will have to walk pig trails to get to work, school, or just to buy food.

Courtesy La Prensa HN

Communities are cut off with bridges washed away, and who knows when this bridge will be replaced.

Courtesy El Heraldo HN

An official from COPECO, the Honduran equivalent of FEMA, on horseback assessing the damage in an area in southern Honduras. The man in the canoe is delivering potable water, food and baby diapers.

Courtesy La Prensa HN

Unlike FEMA, COPECO uses whatever works to get food and other supplies to victims in a timely manner.

Another tropical depression is waiting off the coast to move in when this one leaves.

How were we directly affected?

The bodega is flooded, and the boxes are leaning precariously as the ones on the bottom get soaked. We will have to repack, but that's okay, because we can use this opportunity to get rid of some stuff we don't really need and check for termite damage.

The rain keeps falling and is so loud at times we can't hear the TV, or each other.

There is no view from the balcony, or at least not the usual view. That should be the sun shining off the bay.

We have a dry, warm place to sleep. We have clean food and potable water. We have electricity for now. Chico thinks he is in heaven, because he can get on the bed, something that is usually a big no-no.

We are blessed!

We're Making Progress - Moving Day is Closer Every Day

2011-09-23T00:24:00.000-05:00

We have reached a point where you can see progress. I like to brag about the workmanship, because although it is exasperating to live with a perfectionist, it can be an asset when you are building the last house you will ever own. You cannot imagine how happy it makes us to know this house belongs to us, with no mortgage, no loan, no debt of any kind..

I guess the place to start is outside. The railings and security bars are finally up on the balcony, and they are perfect. Not quite 'N'awlins lace', but close enough to suit us.

This is the west side of the house from the road. It is late afternoon. The door on the balcony goes into the kitchen. My sink will between the two windows.

The post in the foreground is for the fence. For now it will be strung with barbed wire just to keep the neighbor's horses and cows out of the yard. Jose and Marvin have plastered the colonnade, and it is ready to paint. The walls will have to wait 'til another time.

I took this picture to show how large the balcony really is. The picture explains why the living room is small; we plan to do most of our living out here. Since the temperature hardly ever gets below 72 degrees, it gives us a lot of outdoor living (read hammock) time.

You can see the security bars on the windows. The frames of the windows are made of rosita. Each of them have been planned, evened out, planed, shaped, and put together by hand. Jose learns very quickly, so once Macho Man showed him how to rip the boards he was able to help a lot. These frames are bolted into the concrete about 4 inches and the bars bolted into the frames.

This window is looking into the living room toward the portico door. The picture shows more of the detail of the security bars. Macho Man is working on the screens. He is also working on the doors. Once those are up, we will move in. We can hang the windows after we move in.

We supplied the wood and hired a carpenter to make the door from the kitchen to the balcony. This is the natural color of the wood. The tabs at the top of the door will be cut off before it is hung. They are there so if the carpenter made the door too short you can layer in another piece of wood to snug up the fit. I really like this door.

Lights on the balcony are in, and the wiring is in for the fans. We have carriage lights at the front doors, upstairs and down.

One of two hanging lamps we brought from Miramar. Macho Man hung one at the back end of the balcony on the east and west sides of. This one provides light just outside the kitchen door; the other outside the master bath.

The ceilings are up. We chose knotty pine rather than rosita or mahogany. We want the house to be as light as possible and both the other woods get very dark as they age. To me it is beautiful.

There over 600 boards, 1" x3" x10', in the ceiling. Each board has been worked by hand, first to get it dry because it doesn't come kiln dried from the lumber yard. Then it has to be straightened and the tongues and grooves made. Jose and Marvin hand sanded and varnished each piece before it was hung. MM showed Jose how to nail it into place, fitting the tongues and groves together. Jose and Marvin did a really good job while MM worked on something else..

The master bath. The shower and tub surround are Macho Man's design. If you look closely, all the grout lines and all the decorative tiles line up exactly. There was a lot of effort put into this room. The base cabinets and mirror still need to be installed and I need to paint it.

The grout lines in the tile from the balcony through the house,onto the rear portico, and down the back steps are all in one straight line. I told you Macho Man is a perfectionist.

I am blessed.

Medical Care in the Third World.

2011-09-08T23:12:00.000-05:00

My sister-in-law had surgery today, and I am appalled at what I observed. I am so mad I don't know whether to scream or sit on the floor and cry, or both. I never want to hear another person from an industrialized country bitch and moan about how long they waited in the ER. Don't tell me how the nurse was mean, or the doctor was rude. Just shut up and sit down and be thankful for the advantages you have.

Yesterday we were talking to Sis and she told us that she had been scheduled for admission last evening, but had been asked to come in this morning. There were so many peopled admitted they were putting two patients per bed. Juan thought she was joking. I thought he misunderstood her, so I just told him that if they tried to put her in a bed with another patient we would just bundle her up and take her home. After all, I may not be working, but I am still a nurse. Just in case, I took my BP cuff and stethoscope with me this morning.

Everything was going well until a nurse came out of the OR with a uterus in a jar the family provided. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It seems they have no way of doing the pathology in Tocoa, so my nephew will take it to La Ceiba. It will take a week or more to get the report. Oh well, at least it was in formaldehyde.

The doctor did not come out and speak to the family. Neither did the surgical or the recovery room nurse. My BIL says it is not normal for anyone to come and speak with the family. We were lucky because there were enough nurses/friends coming and going to keep us informed.

About 2:00 PM the nurses wheeled Sis out of Recovery and to her room. Let me stop a second, and add some background. Sis has been a nurse in this hospital for all her adult life, 34 years. Usually nurses and hospitals take care of their own and make room for a co-worker. Evidently not here; or maybe they did and that's why she wasn't sharing a bed.

Anyway, when we got to the room I looked inside and I almost fainted. There were two ladies and their newborns on beds up against one wall, and both babies were screaming. There was another woman on a bed under the windows who was obviously a fresh post-op and on the other long wall was a second fresh post-op and then Sis's bed.

This was not a big room. This room was designed to be a semi-private room and it is a five bed ward. You never put pediatric patients, especially newborns, with adult patients, especially surgical patients. That is a disaster waiting to happen. This, along with the overcrowding, sets the stage for cross contamination.

The gurney being used was probably last used in the industrial world about 1930-40. The bed was so old that I don't remember ever seeing one like it. It was the size of an old gurney, about 25-30" wide. Forget automatic controls; this one didn't even have the old crank at the foot to raise and lower the head. You have to stand at the head and manually lift it. Okay, Okay, call me a spoiled American Gringa. After all, that is just the gurney and the bed.

When the nurses transferred Sis to the bed, they left her flat on her back. Most surgical patient are left with the head of the bed raised at least to about 15 degrees, if not higher. This helps keep fluids from collecting in the lungs and makes it easier to breathe. Not one of the nurses checked for bleeding or even looked at the bandage. No one checked to see if the Foley was draining, which is just as well, cause I didn't see one. No vital signs were taken. No pillows were put behind her to ease the pressure on her back. She wasn't propped on her side in case she vomited. I could go on, but I won't.

While I was building up to throwing my hissy fit Macho Man decided it was time to get me out of the hospital, so he said we needed to go to the hardware store and then home and hustled me out the door. On the way out I was frantically trying to explain to my niece how to get her mother to deep breathe and cough; how to turn her from side-to-side; how to prop her up, etc. I was also begging her to take Mami home and I would come and stay for a couple of days.

It is a shame when a medical system has a mission to provide good care to its users but does not have the equipment or the personnel to carry out that mission. It is a shame that many countries have no set standards of care and no way to enforce higher standards. It is a shame good medical care is not a right of every human being.

Sis is okay for now. I have no doubt she will fully recover and the pathology will be all right.

We are blessed. If we have good medical care, we are doubly blessed.

The Many Views From the New Balcony

2011-08-01T15:10:00.000-05:00

Many of my Internet friends, high school friends, and relatives have asked me to show the view from the new balcony. This is just a small part of the pictures I have taken this year

The house faces to the NE. The balcony is U-shaped and wraps around three sides of the house. The front part of the balcony is 10' x 58'. From there we have a panoramic view of Trujillo Bay, the peninsula leading to Puerto Castilla, where Dole owns a facility for shipping their fruits all over the word. It is the deepest saltwater port in the Americas. Just beyond there we can see a little slice of the Caribbean.

This tree is the neighbor's across the street. Some night I am going over there with a chain saw andd cut the top out of that tree.;-D The city is down below, but we cannot see it.

On the sides of the house the balcony is 4' x 38'. Not very large but large enough to put chairs on, if you want to get away for a few minutes.

Here is the view from the from the west side.

;

The beginning of sunset. You can't see it in this picture, but we can see the bay through the trees. Not much, though, so I am considering a midnight chain saw raid here, too.

From the corridor

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The neighbor was kind enough to leave the bougainvilla on my side of the fence. The rest of the garden is his, but I enjoy it.

From the kitchen window

Now to the east.

Capiro, part of the Calentura-Capiro Nation Cloud Forest Park This is the view from my bedroom window and the corridor. The trees in the foreground are mangoes, but not the kind I like.

From the corridor and my bedroom window. I get teased about being able to pick mangoes from the corridor, and I can with one of those gadgets they make for picking fruit.

And now the back portico.

Calentura with her head in the clouds. The people say she has a headache when she looks like this. Most of the time it means the clouds will drop down to about 2,000 feet and supply the moisture needed by the flora and fauna on the mountain.

Calentura without the the headache. You can see how high this mountain really is. No, I don't love this mountain. ;-0 I just like to look at it. Because this is a national park it can't be built on or destroyed.

The leaves on the trees on our mountains don't change color in the fall, but that doesn't mean we don't have colors. When the trees bloom they can be pink, red, orange, a pale greenish white, and even gold, like this.

We are blessed.

José is sick :-(

2011-07-16T12:18:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, about 1:00 PM, José, our best worker, came and told Juan he was in pain and needed to go home. We took him to his house and gave him L100 (about $5.00 USD) in case he went to the ER. When we called to check on him he said the ER doctor referred him to the hospital in Tocoa because there is no surgeon in Trujillo. Tocoa is about an hour away by car, about two hours away by bus, over some of the worst roads you will ever see.

My SIL, Magda, is a nurse in Tocoa, so Macho Man called her. She says there is only one surgeon on Tocoa, and he is on vacation. The next nearest surgeon is in La Ceiba, about 3 hours by car, 4-6 by bus, depending on which bus you take. I think the best deal is for us to put down the back seats in the Xterra and take him ourselves. We'll see.

When Juan called about 9 PM, José told him the pain was coming back, but he was going to try and ride it out until Monday, when the surgeon gets back off vacation. I am really afraid this young man has a hernia, and I am not sure he can wait until Monday.

If José needs surgery, he will need to stay off work for 4-6 weeks. We will continue to pay at least a part of his salary so his wife and child won't do without. We are trying to figure out how to work around him, so we can continue with the construction. For sure, he will have a job when he is able to return to work.

The next time you want to complain about long waits at the doctor's office, stop and be thankful that you have a doctor close by, not six hours away. If you need surgery, most likely your need can be met at your local hospital. If you need to go to another hospital for treatment, and it is far away, most likely you will be transported by ambulance, not told to take the bus for a six hour trip.

I ask you to pray for José.

Americans are blessed

Another Update on La Casa de Sueños

2011-07-13T16:04:00.002-05:00

We have reached several milestones on in construction since the last time I posted on the subject. We have all but finished the painting. I'm just waiting for a dry day to go do the trim outside. Juan has started making the window frames.

Marvin and Jose have learned to cut ceramic tile and lay them.

Jose learned how to cut the tile to fit around the columns

The finished job on the balcony floor

The real owner of the house inspects the finished job on the balcony floor

The welder has designed the railings for the balcony and for the security bars over the windows.These railings don't come prefab. The welder has to puut together all the pieces so they fit the space exactly nd everything is on center.

We were very pleased with the design the welder produced. The only change is that we want the paint changed from glossy to matte

This is a close up of the medalions. This is a security bar, so the medalions are on every otherd upright. On the balcony railings they are on every third upright.

This is approximately how the security bars on the windows will look

Today MM started laying the tile in the great room.

We laid out almost the whole living room floor last night; played with tile, and moved tile. This pattern is too busy. This pattern doesn't show off the decorative tiles. At 7 PM we said, Eureka, this is it!!!!

We are blessed

A Garífuna Mass

2011-07-13T12:39:00.001-05:00

Last Sunday Macho Man, Don Miguel and my Sister-in-law decided to go to the 6:30 PM Mass at the cathedral. When we got there we found out it was to be a Garífuna Mass. These Masses are held on the second Sunday of every month.

The Garífuna are the descendants of slaves brought from St. Vincent to Central America in 1797 and the local indians. They were off-loaded on Roatan, an island off the coast of Honduras, or were either thrown overboard or were the victims of the shipwreck of two slave ships, actions taken by the British to prevent an uprising against English settlers on St. Vincent. They have retained their Arawak language and much of their African culture. The Spanish forced their conversion to Catholicism but couldn't change their form of worship.

The Mass started with Garífuna music, sung in their own language and accompanied by maracas, tambourines, and wooden drums topped with animal skins, tuned by tightening or loosening straps wrapped around the drums. There was a lot of clapping, dancing in place, and joyful noise. You could not help getting caught up in the joy and celebration. Even the scriptures were read in Garífuna. I was surprised to find that while I couldn't understand the words to the Lord's Prayer, I knew what was being said and could pray it in English.

Father Felipe conducted his homily and the celebration of the Eucharist in Spanish, which I could understand a little better. When the bread and the wine were brought to the alter it was done with dancing, waving of palm fronds, singing, and the offering of bowls and cups made of coconut hulls, bread made from cassava flour. It was truly a celebration!

We were made to feel we were part of the congregation. When the sign of Christ's Peace was given, many many people came to us and wished us La Paz de JesuCristo. When the Mass was ended, many people came to us and expressed their thanks for joining them and asked us to join them for worship in August.

I left worship feeling a spirit of joy and jubilation that is hard to describe. I felt I had neen taught a lesson in the extent of the love of God. My knowledge base was broadened. I came away feeling more convinced than ever that there are many ways to worship and God loves them all.

We are blessed.

My Fourth of July in Trujillo

2011-07-04T16:56:00.000-05:00

Today one of my friends asked if I had seen the American Flag flying from the old American Embassy in Trujillo.. Red-faced, I had to ask where the Old American Embassy was located. When she told me it was close to Johnny Glynn's store, I thought I knew where it was. MM hauled me downtown to find it, and as we approached El Centro, there it was, The Stars and Stripes, fluttering in the breeze. It was so good to see it, and it made me so proud of who I am.

As luck would have, the Flag was flying from the balcony of Mr. Glynn's house. MM has known Mr. Glynn all his life, and I met Mr. Glynn at the grand opening of the new eco-park on Guaimoreto Lagoon. Mr. Glynn made a really big mistake at the grand opening; he told me anytime I wanted anything, let him know. Anybody who knows me well knows I am a history buff; and Mr. Glynn is the man to see about history in Trujillo. .

Mr. Glynn closes his store at 11:30 AM to 2 PM, so he and his employees can have lunch and a siesta. At 2:10 PM I was in the store, talking to him. Thank goodness, he speaks perfect English. He is the second generation of Glynns born in New Orleans and reared in Trujillo. He is one of the wealthiest men in Trujillo, and I really did not expect him to spend any time with me. I was surprised when he invited me into his home and we talked about 30 minutes.

Then he gave me a wonderful surprise. He looked for a copy of a dissertation done by Taylor E. Mack when he was working on his PhD in the Department of Geography and Anthropology at LSU. He told me he has never let anyone take this book out of his house, and he let ME bring it home to read! Me! a person he barely knows. I am so honored.

So, tonight we are going to have hamburgers, potato salad and refritos for supper and watch fireworks on TV. We are going to go to devotions with a group of young people here on a mission trip. And I am going to start reading Ephemeral Hinterlands and the Historical Geography of Trujillo, Honduras, 1525 - 1950, A Dissertation.

I am having a wonderful Fourth of July..

We are blessed

Finally, We Are Painting!

2011-06-24T01:03:00.002-05:00

It finally stopped raining and the painting began this week, after a slow start. Jose and Marvin started on the soffits and are painting the trim and columns that I cannot reach.

I'm pretty sure OSHA wouldn't approve of this maneuver, either. That is Jose hanging over the edge of the house painting the soffits. Marvin is sitting on the roof ridge hanging onto the rope Jose has around his waist.. By about 8:30 we had to flatten a box for him to lay on because the lamina was so hot.

Macho Man and I started on the west side of the house because it is shady and cool in the morning, especially when there is a breeze and there is a breeze most of the time. The paint is a little darker than we thought we had chosen. .. It is still a very Caribbean color and I like it. MM is a little hesitant because it is PINK. He asked Jose how he liked the colors and the answer was, "Casi me gusto." (I almost like it). Very diplomatic, don't you think?

We were able to finish the front of the house and both sides Monday. You can see where Marvin was cutting in the darker color along the top of the posts. It, too, is darker than what I expected, but we'll keep it. These are colors we see in our sunsets almost every evening.

We got this far Wednesday before we ran out of paint. We can't go any further until we can go to Tocoa and pick up more of this lighter color. Macho Man says we may need more of the dark coral.

This is the front. It is easy to see the contrast between the two paint colors up top. We will paint the bottom arches when we get the rest of the paint. That will happen next week.

Wednesday I painted the powder room. Jose really didn't like that color. No, I'm not adding a picture of the powder room. You can see it when I finish it.

This is our bedroom. The boys got to the house early and decided not only to cut in the paint, but to paint halfway down the walls. That made it easy for me to finish this room today. I can't believe I didn't picture of the finished product.

My next job is the great room. I have to pick out the color this weekend so we can get started next week.

The boys' next job is to take this wire and staple it all around the house here.

The screen goes from the top of the wall to the bottom of the lamina all the way around the house. This is to keep the critters out of the attic space whether they have two, four, six, or eight legs, or slither around on their stomachs. The power stapler gave out today, so the boys will have to use the hand stapler.

I don't know how they will staple the wire here, because this is directly over this

But Macho Man says they will use this, with Jose on the ladder and Marvin holding it steady.

We are blessed

The Walls are Plastered, The Water Is In

2011-06-07T23:33:00.002-05:00

The walls of the second floor are plastered, inside and out, front and back. All the columns are plastered. Macho Man says they are ready for paint, so in the next week or so I plan to be over there with my equipment and the paint and get started.

If you look closely, you can see the blocks on the first floor have not been plastered. They will be, but not right now.

Here you can see how smooth this plaster is.

The plaster is put right up against the electrical boxes and the window frames. Jose is so particular about his work that he makes sure that each outlet is perfect and there are few, if any, seams between the window frames and the plaster.

And here is how they get the plaster so smooth. The plaster is thrown up against the wall to make it stick in all the little nooks and crannies, and then Jose takes this 1 x 4 with hand holds cut into it and scrapes the plaster over and over until it is perfectly level. Then it allowed to dry and get ready for paint.

This is the front door, looking into the living room. The front and back double doors will be made of solid Rosita 2x6s.

The window and door frames are all in upstairs and we are getting ready to make the windows. Last week the glass was installed in the arched portion of the windows. The windows will be doubles, in the old Spanish Colonial style. The windows will be made from Rosita 2x4’s. The window niches are 6” deep, but they will be pretty much filled up with windows, screens and wrought iron security bars.

This is very close to what the Rosita will look like with a coat of matte varnish.

We have electricity, at least on the portico and in the living room. We are trying to pick out the wood for the ceiling. The biggest problem with that is we both like the look of bare wood, but in Honduras, if you don’t want to have the termites literally eat you out of house and home you have to use treated wood. The treated wood is a sickly green color, which would have to be painted over. It is also treated with arsenic, which I don’t particularly want to be breathing 24/7. I wish we could afford to buy Rosita for the ceiling, but it is very expensive.

We have water in the kitchen and the bathrooms. So why haven’t we moved in yet? Because we haven’t installed the plumbing fixtures. That will probably happen in the next week or so. By mid-August, si Dios quiere, we will move in and continue working.

I'm told this is the faucet for the hose I will be using to water my garden. Yeah, right. I have trouble walking on a flat floor. Guess who won't be hooking up the hose.

This is Pancho, our watchman. Pancho works 7 nights a week for us, and during the day he comes by if he sees anyone or anything strange on the property. Sometimes he drops by and helps out with the work. We have learned to ask Pancho his opinion on many things. Pancho is about 70 years old, but anyone would be an idiot to mess with him. He has a really nasty looking sawed off shotgun and a machete, and he knows how to use both. Yet he is the gentlest teddy bear you could ever want to meet. Chico likes Pancho, which says something.

We are blessed with the way our house is coming along, and with the friends who are making it possible. Thank you Jose, Marvin, and Pancho. Thank you, Ramirez Family. And the biggest thanks of all goes to my beloved Macho Man, for building my dream house, and doing it so well.

HP IS NOT EXPAT FRIENDLY

2011-05-18T22:30:00.000-05:00

Have you ever tried to order something from the US when you live outside the country? It is not an easy process, especially if that country is in Latin America.

On May 3d I decided to order a new computer and have it delivered to my daughter's house in South Florida by the time we got there on the 14th. I thought this was a pretty intelligent decision, since MM doesn't like taking his computer with him, something about using the SIL's wireless network(?); and I like to stay connected to my world.

I logged into The HP Store, 'cause I am partial to HP products. I found exactly what I was looking for. It was fast enough; it played CD/DVDs and had a writer; it was light; and best of all, IT WAS PINK!!!!! Now, you are probably wondering why I wanted a pink computer. Well, because I live in a land full of machos, and I have a theory that no real macho man is going to steal a pink computer. After all, they haven't stolen my pink drill or hammer.

I customized my new computer, and then began checking out. I dutifully gave them my billing information, which is our Florida address. I also gave them my shipping address, which is my billing address, and the same address they have had on file for ages. In fact, I was logged in to my account at the time

I received a message that my order was declined and to please call them at 1-866...... I went to customer service and found out I could start a chat session, so I did. Almost immediately I got a message that since their computer sensed that my address was outside the US they were terminating the session.

I tried again and as soon as the chat window opened I typed "Please don't end this session. I know I am outside the country, but I need help". The agent came on-line and asked me what the problem was, and I told her. She advised me that the problem was not my credit, it was that they could not accept an order from outside the country, because they couldn't verify it was me. She advised me to call the customer service desk. Cannot do that! you cannot call an 800 number from a cell phone in Honduras.

I was then advised that I should go to the International Desk, and order the computer from there. No, says I, I don't want to do that. First of all, the computer cannot be shipped to the US from the International Desk. Then, there is the problem of the computer having all the programs set up in Spanish, and that would be of no use to me, who speaks Spanglish. Then, call the customer service desk at 1-866...... Huh?

Wait a minute, I am signed to your web site, using the same address and password you have had on record for ages. I am using an American credit card, on an American Bank, which you have had on file forever. I am asking you to ship the computer to the same address as my billing address, again which you have had on file forever. And you cannot verify it's me? WTH!! It was apparent we were not communicating, or he was named Peggy and living in Siberia.

So, on to Plan B. Let me email customer service and see if I can get someone who can help. The email that came back looked like a form letter, restating all the above reasons my order can not be concluded until I call customer service, or have someone in the States call customer service. So, I asked my daughter to call and see what she could do. Nothing, so I decided to take a deep breath and wait until we got here. And I got another nice "thank you for trusting HP, we are sorry....."

I sent another email outlining how dumb it was to say HP could not verify who I was. After all, Amazon.com doesn't have thar problem, nor do several companies I deal with. I gave them a step-by-step outline of how they could set up to be security conscious and at the same time expat friendly. They thanked me for my effort.

Monday night, I called customer service and got a cheery, "Thank you for calling HP. How can I help you tonight." I started to tell her, but decided better, so I just explained the situation yet again. "Oh, Mrs. Ramirez. I am so sorry you have been so inconvenienced. I'm sorry, but we can't ship that computer now. because it has a build date of 5/19, and we couldn't get it to you before you go back You should have called customer service. And, I'm sorry, but we can't ship the computer out of the US"

Here I did lose it, and after a few words, I promised her I was going to put this on FB and I was going to blog about it so that everyone I knew would know just how unfriendly HP was. I told her how many expats there are in Central America, and assured her I was going to try reaching everyone of them. She hung up on me.

I got off the phone about midnight, fired up the SILs computer and ordered another computer. Same credit card; same bank; same billing address; same shipping address. It was delivered before 10AM this morning. It's red.

So, here we are, I am keeping my word. I have posted on FB, and now I have blogged about it. Expats. arise, let these companies know we don''t like it when they are not friendly to us, and we have money.

Update on the Construction.

2011-04-15T19:39:00.000-05:00

It is has been so long since I had a chance to write. I have lots of new pictures of the house. We are to the point that even though Macho Man is working every day it is hard to see his progress. I try to only go to the site on Saturday, because then I can see how much is done during the week.

You can see that the front is really shaping up. It still needs the banisters upstairs and the finish coat over the blocks. All of that open area in the ceiling area will be closed in with heavy screening to keep out insect, bats, birds and critters. Oh, and the windows and doors have to be installed.

The back portico. You can look all the way through from the back to the front door. Jose has finished the plaster coat on the back portico. It is ready for paint but that is not going to happen until the rest of the house is ready for paint.

Scaffolding and ladders, Honduran style. I don't think OHSA would approve. You can see that the sewer pipe is in and the pipe to the septic tank is being buried.

I took this so you can some idea of how tall the entrance doors and windows are. Macho Man is about 5"9" tall.

This is the rosita the window and door frames are made of. I think it would be foolish to do anything other than varnish it.

The door and window frames will be attached with 4" nails to the blocks. Nails will also be driven through the frame into the notches and the notches filled with concrete. Somehow I don't think they will go anywhere.

These doors have their frames. The bracing comes down when the concrete is cured. These are the doors to the laundry and the pantry. The door to the outside enters a corridor which goes to the front balcony on the second floor. Yes, it has a view, too.

I know y'all think I am obsessed with the septic tank. I guess I am, for two reasons. The most important is we can't move in until we have water, electricity, and sewage. The second is, I have never seen a home-made septic tank.

In the top picture, in the lower center, you can see two large black spots. These are rocks, big rocks. These rocks are so big there was never a question of digging them out. Marvelous Marvin to the rescue! Marvin and his trusty sledge hammer got into the pit and banged away on those rocks until they were even with the wall.

The center shows the masonry work. Every wall is plumb and every block is in its place; and much of the time the mason was balanced on the scaffolding or on the ladder.

The bottom picture shows the framing for the top, which will be poured in place. I don't have a clue how you would pump it out if you needed to get to the bottom of things. ;-D

We are making progress poco-a-poco, but we are making progress. We couldn't do it without José and Marvin, and we surely could not do it without faith.

We are blessed.

Florida Visit, Part II

2011-03-16T19:27:00.000-05:00

This has really been a productive trip. The basic medical check ups were good, although I may have to make a quick trip back in a couple of months to finish up some procedures. We have been to WalMart, Walgreen's, and Home Depot. Coming up tomorrow is CVS, and yes, the Salvation Army Store.

We bought fans for the upstairs of the new house, lighting fixtures, plumbing fixtures, and paint samples. Tomorrow we get the hot water heater. We bought razors, shampoo and conditioners, hair color, clothes, and as many other things we can't get in Honduras as possible. Throw in canning lids and rings, doggie treats, spices, OTC meds, napkins, and much, much more.

We have had a wonderful time with our children and the Grandbrat; we visited Macho Man's former boss, Don Armando; and my sister comes tomorrow. I had a chance to talk to my brother this morning. We had a very good lunch today in little Havana with the two girls. The only problem with Latin restaurants is they put too much food on the plate, and it is so good you clean your plate (Gro-o-o-o-an).

Tomorrow we are going to figure out what we need to ship and what we have to take in the plane. We definitely will ship more than we carry. We went by Rapido Cargo today, and they will send someone to pick the boxes at my daughter's house, ship them to Puerto Cortes, process them through Customs, and deliver them to our door in Trujillo, all for $.70/lb. How is that for service?

We have had five days filled with love. The companionship and family closeness has been inspiring. There has been no bad weather. We have had no accidents.

We are blessed.

Florida Visit, Part I

2011-03-13T23:01:00.000-05:00

We finally got to Ft Lauderdale yesterday at about 6 AM, only to find our US phone has been deactivated, so we had no way to call and let the family know we were on the ground. Thank goodness they figured it out and came to get us. I am really glad because it was so cold you could see your breath.

Last night I got to snuggle with the Grandbrat while we watched a movie on TV. I haven't done that in a long time and it was so familiar and so wonderful. She's not the little darling she was, but she has grown up to be an outstanding, beautiful teenage girl who will continue to blossom into a beautiful, outstanding woman. And, no, I'm not the least bit prejudiced.

We went to Mass this morning and it was so nice to hear Mass said in English again. I can follow the Mass in Trujillo, but not as well as here in the States.

Today is my 24th wedding anniversary and the children took us to 15th Street Fisheries, my favorite waterfront restaurant in Ft. Lauderdale. It had warmed up enough we could sit outside and enjoy the free boat show that goes up and down the intercoastal everyday; everything from dinghies to mega-yachts and even the occasional water taxi.

Tomorrow we start shopping, going to the doctor, going to get our taxes done, and some other running around. It will be a little hectic for a couple of days, but then we can slow down and draw a deep breath.

We have a roof over our heads, food in our stomachs, clothes on our bodies, and family who loves us. What more could we want?

We are blessed

We Have a Roof!!!!!

2011-02-22T17:42:00.000-06:00

We have a roof!! It is such a great feeling. To celebrate, we had the first, but not the last, barbecue on the balcony. What a great day Sunday was!!

Macho Man, Pablo, Marvin, Jose, and two others actually started this project on Saturday, but it rained really hard and they didn't get much done. Sunday morning we woke up to a glorious, bright, sunshiny day and back to work they went. Here is what it looked like Saturday morning.

The boards laying across the rafters are what the men are using for scaffolding. Pablo, my brother-in- law, is the one in the Honduran Safety harness. It consists of one heavy duty extension cord wrapped around the waist of one person, with another person holding on to the other end. It works. Pablo fell and would have hit the ground from about 25' feet up if he hadn't had it on. OSHA would have shut this down a long time ago, if they had anything to say about it.

Sunday morning was so beautiful that the crew was working in overdrive.

After the guys were a little over half way through, we fired up the grill and my sister-in-law Chena cooked us a stupendous barbecue. We had chicken, beef, beans, tortillas, chips, and Pepsi. My niece, Jeisy and my grand niece Nicole, were there to celebrate with us.

Chena is cooking tortillas on the grill, and heating up the beans while Jeisy plays with Nicole. If anyone went away hungry, it was their own fault

Then it was back to work. The guys got all the lamina up on the trusses and screwed down in a couple places. MM, Jose and Marvelous Marvin have been up on the roof yesterday and today putting in more screws. They should be finished by tomorrow.

We never could have done this job without all the help from MM's family and friends. It almost felt like an old fashioned barn raising. They sure did eat a lot over three days, but it was worth it. :>D

We are blessed

The Trusses Are Up, the Roof is Next

2011-02-10T16:40:00.000-06:00

The trusses, ceiling joists, etc. are up!!! Hooray!! Hurrah!!!

These are the ceiling joists and trusses before

These are the ceiling joists and trusses after

MM calls this wood San Juan Chin. It is a very hard, dense wood that termites do not attack. That is very important here in the tropics. Termites can destroy a property in a very short time-space. Once this wood dries you cannot nail it without drilling a hole first.

This is the roof system from the ground

If you are wondering why so many pictures of the trusses, it is because I am so very, very proud of my little Honduran Honey Bun and Marvin and Jose. These are not prefab, machine-made structural components. Macho Man is a Master Carpenter, but all his adult experience has been on cruise ships and yachts, not houses. Marvin and Jose are getting a lot of OJT. The three of them have constructed the roof support system with a carpenter's square, fishing line, hammers and nails, and a table saw. Yet, look how precise it is all put together, how perfectly aligned it is. It is truly magnificent. It is a work of art.

This is my new roof, before. The after pictures will come next week. My BIL is going to try to come next week and bring some helpers. If they come it will certainly speed things up

These are my door and window frames, and even my doors. Part of this may even become part of the ceiling. The wood is Rosita. It has a beautiful grain. It is another dense, heavy hardwood. Once you get a nail into it, you can't take it back out. It is also too hard for termites to chew.

This house is truly a house built out of love. To me, not even the Taj Mahal is more beautiful. The best part is that when it is finished, the house is paid for. It cannot be foreclosed on. It cannot be repossessed. It is ours. Thank you, Macho Man.

We are blessed.

We Are About Ready to Dry It In

2011-01-06T18:03:00.000-06:00

I haven't written anything lately about our construction because we lost a lot of time due to two weeks rain and then the holidays. Macho Man was doing some work, along with Marvelous Marvin and another of the faithful crew building forms for yet more bigas and columns and the molds to go over the windows and doors on the second floor; and pouring concrete whenever there was a break in the rain. Things are going on well enough that you can began to separate the different rooms.

Marvin is carrying cement through the back door to fill in the short biga on the left. The forms for the other two have not yet been put up. This holds up the roof over the portico. The ends of rebar that are sticking out of the biga in the background will eventually be bent down and attach the roof to the biga. The octagonal wooden form on the left is where MM will have to break through the wall to make a window in the half bath. Okay, so I forgot to plan a window there. Who cares? ;-P We're fixing it, aren't we?

This is looking toward the west end of the great room. This is the kitchen. The door on the left goes out onto a corridor that goes to the balcony on the front of the house. MM miscalculated the height of the windows so they now have another round of blocks to accommodate the counter space and the backslash. The door on the extreme left, with the scaffolding over it, is the pantry. I am so looking forward to pantry. It will also have a place to put my pots and pans so that I don't have to lean over to try and wrestle a frying pan off a lower shelf in a base cabinet. YEA!!!

This is the west end of the great room. The square door on the right leads into the Master Bedroom.

This is the master bath. The shower goes in this corner and the tub will be next that. We do need to put two more layers of block in that window, or the neighbors will have a show whenever we take a shower. Yes, this is another error, but we are not doing so bad when we have floor plans by someone who never drew a plan in her life and a man who has never build a house by himself.

This is the view looking through the back door to the front door. No, no, I am not talking about Miss PittyPat. She is looking at the view from the portico, her beloved mountains. As I have said many times, it is all about the view in Trujillo.

We are going to Tocoa tomorrow to pick out lamina for the roof.

We are blessed.

We Are Blocked in By Angry Protesters

2010-12-10T20:26:00.001-06:00

It has been raining for several weeks now. The campesinos have disrupted life in Colon while protesting that a bridge that was washed out several weeks ago still has not been fixed. They protest by taking over all the roads, including the back roads leading to a town, and cut off all traffic. What causes this type of protest? The campesinos feel, and rightly so, that this is the only way they will be heard.

Macho Man says there is no gasoline in Trujillo. That makes three days now and the taxistas are unable to pick up fares. Buses cannot travel between here and Tocoa, the nearest town of any size. It also means that no fresh produce was delivered yesterday, so the produce market is pretty much empty. The bread trucks cannot get through, so there is no bread. The dairy delivery trucks......well, you get the picture. MM just came from the market and the grocery store. He says there is very little to be had, even rice and beans. The citizens of Trujillo are angry. They say the campesinos have kidnapped Trujillo and are holding her for ransom

There are semi's from Dole lined up for miles on either side of the road block. If they are there too much longer you can expect to pay more for bananas, pineapple and other tropical fruits. Dole uses Puerta Castilla as its biggest port in Central America, and the trucks headed this way are loaded with perishables.

The ambulance from our little hospital cannot get to Tocoa or La Ceiba and we have no ICU, orthopedic surgeons or other specialists, nor the ability to take care of trauma. There is no CT scanner, no MRI, no NICU nor many other things you expect in a modern hospital. There certainly is no air rescue. The government has promised in the past not to allow the campesinos to tie up the roads and take cities hostage, but the government knows this could get very ugly very quickly. They are not doing anything right now because the Human Rights inspectors are coming tomorrow.

Courtesy La Prensa
Campesinos blocking the road to Trujillo

Human Rights would love to report that Honduras abuses the rights of its citizens. They will not report that soldiers and police officers are facing a large group of men armed with rifles, shotguns and machetes, along with big sticks and rocks, and have not made any type of aggressive move.

I don't know where this is going, but I hope it will be resolved peaceably. That is not always the case.

I will try to write about the construction and post some pictures this week end.

Please pray this will not end in bloodshed.

We have food in the house. We are blessed.'

Update:

This morning the Army and the National Police broke up the blockade. It ended very peacefully, with the campesinos jusst walking away. The government is going to set up a permanent post at the entrance to the back road to prevent this from happening again. That means that everyone going that way will be stopped, and if they don't like you, your car will be searched. That's OK by me. I would rather spend a few minutes telling the police who I am and where I live, than to have people blocking the road so that we cannot even get food into Trujillo. The people here deserve better than that.

There was no bloodshed, so we are blessed.

I Believe in Angels

2010-11-11T16:27:00.000-06:00

I believe in angels. I am sure they are sent to us by God to protect us, and sometimes they are sent to us by the prayers of others. What happened last week makes me believe in angels more than ever.

Last Sunday I found a white feather on the staircase going to the third floor. We have no birds in the house. We don't have feather dusters, feather pillows, or down comforters, so there is no logical reason for that feather to have been in the house.   I picked it up and said, "Thank you, Lord, for the gift of this angel" and then forgot about it.

Tuesday, Macho Man decided it was safe to take down the 2x4 supports to the form for the terrazzo, and then take down the 1 x12 boards that make up the form. You can see pictures of those here.

MM did not like the way the crew was removing the supports, so he went over to show them a safer, better way to do this. Well, it turned out to be a lesson in how not to take down supports. All of the 2 x 4's and a lot of the 1 x 12's, which were studded with long nails, fell in on top of him, completely burying him underneath.    He says his first though was, "I am going to die, right here and now." Then he thought, "No, I can't do that, not now." Thank goodness he was in one of the smaller rooms.

Part of the crew started scrambling to dig him out, while others were running to the neighbors for help. The neighbors turned out in full force with blankets, wet towels, ibuprofen, and anything else they could find to bring they thought would help. These are people with little or nothing, but they will share what they have with those who have need. Not only do I classify these as angels, but they truly live their Christianity.

When my sweet little Honduran Honeybun surfaced, the score was  boards = 0; Macho Man = 1 split lip, 1 goose egg on his head, and 1 cut on his hand where one of the nails brushed him.  We both believe God's heavenly angels were there to cover him when the ceiling fell in, and God's earthly angels were there to get him out of what could have been a very serious situation.

Thank God for the angels, and if you are one of those who prays for us, please don't ever stop.

We are blessed

Hallelujah, The Second Floor Terrazzo is Poured!!

2010-10-22T16:14:00.002-05:00

I have been promising this would happen 'soon' for a long time The holdup has been the weather. We have not had a single dry day since September 23 and there have been torrential rains since then.

The professional man who was going to supply the materials and manpower for the job told us it would take forty hours with 30-35 men and we would have to feed the men every 3-4 hours. After figuring out the costs, MM decided that it was cheaper to rent a small mixing machine and hire our own manpower.

Monday the 18th, Macho Man made a command decision that it was now or never, even if it was raining. When he got to the site at 4:40 in the morning there were about forty people waiting to start work. MM and our usual crew, along with about thirty day workers, started pouring cement. They did in about 10-11 hours what the professionals said would take 40 hours nonstop. And they did it cheaper.

These poles are holding up the form for the terrazzo. Before we can start pouring each of these poles must be equidistant from each other and perfectly straight; the rows must be absolutely straight; and they must all be exactly the same height. The form for the terrazzo has to also be level, with no cracks between the boards, and the conduits for the electricity and water have to be in place. Before the pour, every room on the first floor must have these poles in place. They will hold up a little over 2000 sq ft of concrete poured 5" thick.

This is the cement mixer. Quite a bit different than the big cement trucks we are use to seeing. You can believe this was filled many times Monday. After filling the mixer and getting the mix to the right consistency, it is poured into wheel barrows and taken up to the form to be emptied and spread, then finished with a trowel to get it level

.

The red flex pipes are for the electrical lines. The white PVC pipes are the water lines. You can see the form and the rebar for the floor. You can also see the rebar for one of the columns in the background. The columns around the house are what tie the first and second floors together

The oblong box with no rebar in it is to keep an opening in this spot for the staircase. The boards are for the wheel barrows to travel over to take the cement where it needs to be.

You can see here where part of the pour has already been completed and smoothed out. Because of the rain, everything had to be covered with tarps, cardboard boxes, cement bags and anything else that would keep the rain off the cement.

This is lunch break. My sister-in-law, Cheyna, cooked chicken and rice . We provided Pepsi by the liters. They seemed to enjoy it, since there was nothing left when they finished. Look at the faces of these men. These are not boys, even though most of them are between 17 and 25. They were there Monday morning at 4:30 AM and they worked in pouring, cold rain most of the day. Not one of them walked off saying it was too hard a job. They didn't want to take a morning break or a lunch break until they were done.

Pablo and some of the crew

Getting a little bit of a break

This is what happens when the boss's wife tries to back up in the rain, goes off in the ditch, and hits a big rock.

This is what happens when there are 30-35 men on the job who know they have been treated well and that they are going to get paid at the end of the day; and the boss's wife backed into the ditch

So, now we wait until the cement is cured and we can start laying block again. We can do a few little things on the first floor. We can also do some grading so that we can see where the gardens go. It is not time for the little house to go yet, because we still need it to store supplies and tools in.

We have had a great work crew, even the temporary help. The economy is very bad, and there essentially is no work. When there are rumors of work being available, the people will come to you. We have people every day come and ask if there is anything they can do. The word is already out that Macho Man runs a tight ship, but that he also pays on time and he treats people like humans.

We are blessed.

Customer Service in Honduras - Not

2010-10-20T22:31:00.000-05:00

I wrote once before about how long it took Claro to come install the satellite dish. here I did not tell you much about long it took them to come fix it after we lost the signal.

To make a long story short, we called them the first week of June because the World Cup started the 10th of June. Nothing is more important to a Honduran than the World Cup, unless it is when Maraton is playing against Olimpia.. Every time we called, they told us they would be here within the next seven days. The seventh day finally came the 13th of October

Macho Man missed seeing his games, which made him very depressed. He doesn't like going to his father's house to watch them, because Don Miguel likes to talk and Juan and Lito like to scream and yell at the game, pretty much like we yell and scream at our favorite teams. His children say their father could talk if he was under water, and that is probably true ;-D.

Almost a month ago my washer went kaput. Some kind of seal broke and I ended up with all the water, soap, bleach and softener in the load on the floor, and it was a large load.

We called the store where we bought the machine and told them the problem. The owner said, "Please be patient with us. The technician has to come from San Pedro. Because your machine is still under warranty, only a GE technician can fix it." Then it was, "Oh, he didn't make it last week because the bridge between Tocoa and Trujillo is still out, but he will be here Tuesday. And he is our technician because the GE Technician can't come". Huh?

Tuesday came and went. Of course he didn't make it because a bridge between Tocoa and Trujillo is still not repaired. Then we found out he was coming on a motorcycle because they don't fix your problem the first day. They make a service call, diagnose the problem, and then they come back and fix the machine, after the part is ordered and received. The next day. Not!!

Macho Man called the company and they assured him the technician would come today, Wednesday, at 8:00 AM.. This is Wednesday 8:46 PM, 11:46 PM EST, and guess who hasn't shown up. Guess who won't answer the phone, because when he looks at his caller ID, he doesn't want to have to tell us another version of the truth. I told MM to call them back and tell them his wife is running around naked because she doesn't have any clean clothes.

Thank God for sisters-in-law. Chayna came today to wish MM Happy Birthday and went home with two loads of work clothes. Guess who will be washing clothes tomorrow by hand.

We are still blessed.

Things I Have Learned From Being on Water Restrictions

2010-09-06T16:17:00.000-05:00

I talked about water restrictions last Thursday but I really did not know just how restricted it would be for us. The water company said they would turn the water on from 6-9 AM and from 2-7 PM. They lied! They lied! THEY LIED!!!

The water might come on somewhere between 6 and 8 AM and it goes off at 9:20 AM. It might come on at 3PM. and go off again in 15 minutes, and repeat that cycle until 7 PM, but you never know exactly when that 15 minutes will be.

There is very little water pressure, so little it can take 20 minutes to fill the tank on the toilet. Even when the water comes on, we are on the same line as the hotel. Of course, they get first dibs on the water, and Rufina starts washing clothes and linens; Miguel starts filling the leaky pool; and we have no water, just the sound of the water trying to push the air out of the faucet. Saturday, they were nice enough to stop everything until we could get a shower, but, it ended up being a bucket bath with cold water. There was not enough pressure to fill the hot water tank nor to supply the shower.

I have learned some things. I think I said I had learned pila etiquette, which means you don't put anything in the clean water. The clean water gets scooped up with a clean bowl and poured over whatever you are washing or rinsing. When you are throughyou scoop up a bowl for the next person, who might need to wash his hands, because you don't want him to put his hands into the clean water.

I can now take a bucket bath in less than two minutes using less than one gallon of cold water. The average 8 1//2 minute shower in the USA uses 17.2 gallons of water. Have a teenager? Ever seen him/her take and 8 minute shower?

The average American, if he lets the water run while he brushes his teeth, wastes 2 gallons of water a day. We have learned to fill a 20 ounce glass and both of us can brush our teeth and leave some for the next morning.

Today we had to wash a load of MM's work clothes. It took six 5 gallon buckets of water for each cycle and MM had to carry each of those buckets up two flights of stairs. That is 12 buckets of water, 60 gallons. We hooked up to the hotel's outside faucet, because we had no water.

If you take your bath late in the afternoon, you can use the same clothes the next day. Then you put the shirt in the dirty clothes basket and wear the pants again the next day. Except Macho Man. He is allowed to change shirts twice a day and pants every day, if he has been working on the house.

Baby wipes are great for wiping down if you have no water. They are refreshing, really, and they take off makeup better than anything else I've tried. I like the ones with aloe the best. They seem to moisturize the best. And you don't feel sticky.

If you go swimming late in the afternoon, you may not be 100% clean, but you feel clean. The hotel will let us do that. They even told us to bathe in the pool, but I have dreams of them turning on the aerater and mountains of soapsuds flowing all over the place.

The toilet does not need to be flushed every time it is used. Unless you like lugging 5 gallon buckets around.

If you get up in the morning every day, and you turn on your faucet and get water, you are better off than much of the world. If that water is clean, you are even more blessed.

The biggest problem we have is that the crew is still mixing cement, and that takes water, lots of water, and in the next two weeks, when we start pouring the terrazza we will need even more.

Imagine this, my Honduran Macho Man was carrying a bucket of water in one hand, and a Coleman lantern in the other, muttering, "There is no water. There is no electricity. What I am doing in Honduras?'.

http://www.allianceforwaterefficiency.org/Residential_Shower_Introduction.aspx
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_water_is_wasted_brushing_teeth

We Have Water Restrictions

2010-09-02T18:39:00.000-05:00

As of today, we are on water restrictions. My friends in the US think water restrictions mean don't water the grass. Water restrictions here mean we have no water, except at certain times of the day. For now we have water from 6 AM - 10 AM and again from 2 PM - 7 PM. This could change. I have seen it when there was water from 7 AM to 10 AM then from 7 PM to 10 PM on alternate days. I have to plan my day carefully, so I have water to cook, wash clothes and do dishes. Macho Man has to get his bath early.

My friends in other parts of the country have been fighting torrential rains and flooding recently. In Colon we have had no appreciable amount of rain since maybe June, when a couple of tropical storms blew through. I have commented several times that the North Coast gets 144 inches a year, so it seams unreasonable that our river would run dry, but it is drying up. We only have rain during the rainy seasons, and then it can rain up to 12" of rian per hour. During the dry season it is exactly that, dry, except for the humidity.

In general, the rainy season in Honduras runs from May to November in the interior and from September to January along the north coast and Bay Islands (with a chance of severe storms any time of the year).

Hurricane Season is from August to November; direct hits are uncommon, but are devastating when they do come. Remember Hurricane Mitch. It stood off the Bay Islands for four or five days and did millions of dollars in damage, and took any lives, even on the mainland.

I wish I had known about the water restrictions earlier today. We haven't had water except occasionally for the last two weeks. It means we keep 5 gallon buckets of water in the bathrooms and one bucket in the kitchen for the dishes. It means sometimes a quick shower and sometimes no baths at all, just using baby wipes. Certainly, there has been no hair washed in several days. Anyway, today about 9:45, I noticed we had water, and good water pressure, so I decided to get in the shower, take a bath, and do my hair while I had a chance.

I lathered up twice, rinsed, and applied the conditioner, and the water went kaput. It is now 4 PM, the water is on, but just as I started up stairs about 2:15 PM, the woman who cleans for me came, so I still have conditioner in my hair. Oh well, my hair needed a deep conditioning anyway.

We usually sit on the balcony and enjoy the view from about 5:30 PM to about 7 PM. Now we will have to eat and wash dishes during that time, so we will have to sit on the balcony during the late evening hours. At night we can see the lights from the village of Rio Negro, the stars, and occasionally a cruise ship or a container ship with lights blazing, so we still have a view.

We have a roof over our heads, and even though there is no glass in our windows, we won't get too wet. We cook with propane, so we won't go hungry. We buy water by the five gallon jug and we have three jugs, so we won't be thirsty. The bedroom will stay dry, unless there is a lot of wind, so we will be able to sleep comfortably. We have Coleman lanterns, so we will be able to see at night.

Ironically, there is a big rainstorm coming down the mountain even as I type. It won't mean an end to the water restrictions, unless it rains 24 hours a day for several days. Then the people along the rivers and in the mountains have to watch for flash floods and mudslides. Sometimes the bridges get washed away by the torrents of water coming down off the mountains. That means Trujillo is cut off from the rest of Honduras.

We are blessed.

Another Trip to La Ceiba

2010-08-31T17:25:00.000-05:00

We made a quick trip to La Ceiba last week that wasn't that quite as quick as we expected. Macho Man and Chico both needed to see their doctor, and Chico needed a spa day because he was having multiple bad hair days. I had to renew my green card.

As usual, we stayed at the Hotel Paris in downtown La Ceiba. As usual, their staff was wonderful and very attentive. The room was comfortable and we were able to walk to most of the places we wanted to see. We also found a restaurant down on the beach, El Asador, where the menu was limited to four large entrees and several side orders and fast food items. The food and the service was very good. We will go back.

Macho Man had two full days of tests and doctor visits, and other than a minor infection seems to be in good health. We have to go back in two weeks for followup, after a course of antibiotics.

Chico got a clean bill of health; a good haircut and a pedicure, plus had a two night sleepover.

My trip to Immigration was quick, about 20 minutes, and not so bad. The man in charge was very knowledgeable and efficient. He stayed late through part of his lunch break, to get us taken care of. That includes Juan having to walk two blocks to the bank to pay the fees. You don't pay for anything in Honduras at the place you owe it, you get a ticket to show how much you owe; you go to the bank and pay it; then you go back and give the official the receipt saying it is paid. He then gives you whatever document you applied for.

On the advice of several friends I found two fabric shops within half a block of the hotel. Only in Honduras, but fabrics and sewing notions are not sold in the same place. We were directed to a shop that supposedly had thread, needles, etc. Ha! it did have about 4 spools of thread in the primary colors, but nothing to match the material I was looking at. No zippers, some bobbins, but not in the size I need, etc, etc, so next trip I will have to look again.

On the way home we stopped at our friend, Dan's, beach house. It is to die for. What a view and what a beautiful, well arranged, comfortable home. Oh, and what a view. Just ocean as far as you can see, and almost deserted beach. They only have three or four neighbors. Dan and his wife are good people. And we got a lot of new ideas for our house, like AC in all the bedrooms, and electrical outlets in the floor in the living room, to give more options for arranging furniture..

I will have more pictures of the construction next week I hope. I am so ready for the second story to start taking shape.

Building the Dream - Continued

2010-08-19T17:36:00.002-05:00

If the placement of the pictures look funny, don't blame me. I have been trying to post this for four days, and Blogger will not let me arrange the pictures the way I want them arranged. They changed something right in the middle of me doing this

We are getting closer and closer to being able to start the second floor. The window and door openings on the first floor are done and you can really see what the front of the house is going to look like.

The rebar in the foreground will become

part of the columns on the veranda.

This is an arch for the veranda. There will be

five or six of these, I don't remember, across

the front. They form part of the support for

the balcony

Remember that big mound of red clay? Well, it is gone now. Marvin has been busy with his shovel and has leveled it out to the height of the retaining wall. Now you can see where the portico will be on the back side of the house. The portico will be about 12 feet wide and 7 feet deep. There will be two steps up from the drive to the portico, then one step up into the house. The portico will cover the back door on the first floor becausee it spans the area between the house and the retaining wall. I call this area the most; sometimes the ditch

This is where the portico will be.

Marvin leveled this with a shovel.
Probably a ton of dirt, moved by
hand!

Did someone say OSHA?

Not in Honduras;-)

Now some pictures of why this place will be so perfect when we finally get moved in. I call them the view from the balcony.

See That little patch of darker blue by the tower in the left middle?

That is the Caribbean, and we will really be able to see it

when the balcony is finished.

All these pictures were taken on one night from the balcony of our condo

I am so looking forward to sitting on my balcony whenever I want, especially at sunset. I don't need Key West.

We are blessed.

Funny Things That Have Happened Lately

2010-08-12T23:15:00.001-05:00

Funny things do happen around here.

We have a cow that comes to a field next door to us to graze. I don't know if she needs milking or what, but she moos all day long. It is not a sweet little m-o-o-o. It is a gigantic M-O-O-O-O that can be heard for miles. Yesterday she was at it again, until I yelled, "Will somebody put that poor cow out of her misery!!!". Almost as soon as it was out of my mouth I heard gunshots, then complete silence. I sitting there then saying, "Not that way, Lord. I really didn't want anybody to kill her." All of a sudden, she moo'd again and I felt better, until I heard more gunshots and she got quiet again, very quiet. This morning, she was at it again, so I guess they just scared her enough to shut her up.

Tuesday I was going to fry some tajados (fried plantains) for supper, I peeled my plantains and sliced them up, got out the frying pan and the grease, at least I thought it was the grease. I put the plantains into the frying pan, and when I checked them, they just didn't look like they were cooking right. Then I noticed that the grease looked funny, and finally I smelled the vinegar. Vinegar and vegetable oil come in very similar jugs and I guess I had mine too close together.

Then there was the day I was working at the computer when it became a 'no hay (no aye)' day and the electricity went off. I went into the bathroom and found out it was a double no hay day. No water and no electricity. So, I decided to go downstairs and do a load of clothes. I actually had the clothes in the washer, the soap added, and the softener in the dispenser before it dawned on me I wouldn't be doing laundry, not that day, anyway.

There are the little things that keep you sane, because when you are laughing, it is hard to get lost in your mind.

We are blessed

ADDENDUM: We don't keep many sweets in the house, and the other day I decided to dig out the ice cream maker. I got all the ingredients and put them in the refrigerator to get cold. I grabbed the fruit and mashed it up. I thought they smelled a little funny, but I was in a hurry. Before I started the machine, I tasted my concoction and decided the problem was Ididn't put enough vanilla in, so I added another tsp. of vanilla and started churning it. The outcome was very sweet and vanilla, but taqsted strongly of plantrains. It won't be my favorite.

The First Floor Walls are Almost Finished!!

2010-08-04T16:06:00.000-05:00

No, I didn't run away from home nor join the circus, regardless of what you may of heard. I did take a little break. We are in the summer rainy season, and it has been a monsoon around here. You cannot pour a lot of cement in the rain, although they have tried. Here are a couple of pictures of what 15 minutes of rain can do.

The walls are almost up for the first floor. We have about three more rounds of block, then another biga, and then they can pour the terrazzo for the second floor.

With the forms for the arches over the windows you can really start to see what the house will look like on the outside. Macho Man built all the forms himself. As I have said before, some people complain that Hondurans are lazy. Ours work from can to can't, even in the rain. Marvin was told to go home the other day, and he asked if MM was leaving. When told, "No." he said, "Then I will stay as long as you do, Maestro."

The rebar here is part of the biga. The columns will be extended and cement poured around them. This cures for a while, and then the biga poured. This ties everything together and gives the walls strength.

The rebar here has had its forms built and the cement poured. Notice the crosses on the forms. There are many of these crosses along both sides of the form. They are tied together and hold the wood in place so that the weight of the cement does not cause the forms to bulge, or even collapse. MM says the cross shape is an accident. I prefer to think they are a sign of the blessings that have been given to us.

Things will slow down a little until we can get the terrazzo poured. We have decided to have this done by a professional company. They will need forty continuous hours to complete the work, and we have to feed them 5-6 times a day. It would take us a week mixing the cement by hand.

So, the blessings continue to pour down upon us, and the walls continue to go up.

Not a Good Way to End the Week

2010-07-22T23:52:00.000-05:00

This week started off okay, then on Tuesday evening it started to start a downhill slide. First. while I was just finishing up supper, the chimbo went empty. For the uninitiated, a chimbo is a 40 lb propane tank. We use propane to cook. The spare chimbo we always keep was empty because we forgot to fill it when it gave out the last time. Macho Man took the empty chimbo to get it filled on Wednesday and brought it home about 6:00 PM. When he tried to hook it up, the valve was screwed up and the regulator would not go on. I suggested we go down to El Centro, but MM decided he was too tired. I threatened him with cold sandwiches, and when that didn't work I decided to get creative. It was the first time I ever cooked a complete meal in the microwave and rice cooker. It turned out not so bad.

Today MM hired a man to come and clean up the yard at the new house, particularly the mangoes that have fallen off the tree and started to rot. We also had to cut weeds and make sure there was no standing water, because we have an epidemic of dengue fever. Anyway, about 30 minutes after the man started working, he had a grand mal seizure.

At lunch, when MM was telling me about his morning, he was so proud that he moved the man into the shade, and when the man wouldn't wake up, he and the man's brother started CPR. Silly me, I asked, "Was the man breathing?"... "Yes." "Did you check his pulse?"...."No." "Macho Man, you don't do CPR on a live person, i.e., who is breathing and has a pulse." "Oh."

Then, this afternoon, it was my turn. I was going to the new house to take pictures of the progress we have made. There is a narrow little red clay road through a residential area just before you get to the site. I always go very slow here, because it is just in front of a school.

I saw some children playing, and I saw a little girl on a bicycle, so I slowed down even more. Thank God!. Just as I thought I had passed everyone safely, I heard a big BANG, and when I looked in the mirror, there was the little girl and the bicycle on the ground behind me. My heart stopped.

I got out of the car, and retired nurse that I am, I began a trauma check. Then her father showed up and started screaming at me about why I didn't slow down when I knew there were children playing. I told him I was going slow, and that is why the child wasn't hurt. When he finally realized the child was not hurt, and that I was just as upset as he was, we parted as friends.

Never underestimate the Honduran grapevine. By the time I got to the site our watchman, who happened to witness the whole thing, had already informed MM that the child lost her balance and hit me, and that I was very upset about the whole thing.

When I got myself under control, I started to take pictures, and the battery in my camera was dead. I wanted to start crying.

When we have times like these, I try to find the silver lining. It wasn't so bad that the chimbo was empty. We had food in the house, and I have a rice cooker and a microwave, and the electricity was on. It could have been worse.

The man MM hired hired had a seizure, not a heart attack or heat stroke. He can survive a seizure. It could have been worse.

The child was just frightened, and had a skinned knee. We both survived. It could have been worse.

I can go back tomorrow and take my pictures, and this weekend I can do my post on our progress. It could have been worse.

We are blessed.

The Walls Are Going UP!!!!

2010-07-12T18:39:00.001-05:00

Yes, indeedy, the walls are going up. I haven't written lately for any number of reasons, but the main one was the girls being here. In the meantime, Macho Man and the gang have been really busy.

The foundations are in, the biga solera is laid, and the masons are laying block. The biga solera is a continuous, 10"x10", band of concrete over a rebar cage that is laid on top of the foundation. This goes around the whole house at the foundation level and again when the second floor is poured. There is also a biga that surrounds the house at the top of the windows and doors on both floors, and again before the roof goes on. Did I mention the house is natural disaster proof?

Building the biga solera

Now that walls are pretty much in place for the ground floor, it is easier for us to see the layout of the house.

The picture on the left is the downstairs gallery; the man walking on it is near the front door. As you come in the front door, the two guest bedrooms and bath are on the right. Macho Man's office is on the left. The large area in the center is a great room. The center and right hand pictures are the house from the back. The back door is between the two men in the center picture. The picture on the right shows the cistern and the bodega (storeroom).

There is a retaining wall around three sides of the house. It serves as a walkway around the lower level of the house and it gives access to the back door. This walkway is 4' wide and will be gated on both sides of the house in the front. Right now we are calling it the moat. It has weep holes every few feet close to the bottom and to the middle. This allows the ground water to seep through rather than push the wall down. Turning the blocks sideways to make the weep holes was my idea. They are backed with gravel rocks and sand to keep them from getting clogged with clay. There will also be a French drain about every 15' along the walk. (Don't forget, we get an average of 142" of rain a year.) We will be catching rainwater for the cistern in the house and also for one outside to use for irrigation during the dry season. There will be a dry creek from the open ends of the moat wandering across the property to help with drainage. We surely don't want to drown the neighbors.

Right through the center of the first picture below you can see a green fishing line.stretched across the house. This is the level of the second floor. Macho Man kept wondering how he kept losing his fishing line, because it would be in place one day, and gone the next.

This next picture is the solution to the mystery of the missing fishing line. Much of this nest is made with it.

So far the building is pretty much on schedule. We have had no major injuries. The workmen are great. We are blessed.

Building the Dream - Continued

2010-06-04T18:59:00.002-05:00

The foundation is almost completely dug, and the columns are being set, even as I type. At least, the rebar skeleton of the columns are being set. These columns go in a hole four feet deeper than the foundation. They are about 18 ft long, and the rebar does not come pre-fab. They are held in place by a couple of feet of concrete, then large rocks are put around them and pushed down into the wet concrete and and more concrete poured up to the level of the foundation. The rocks cannot touch each other, the rebar, or the sides of the hole. After they are all set the gang will build a wooden frame around each one and fill it with concrete. After the concrete sets, the form is removed and the columns are kept damp for few days.

These are our cement mixers. We have used several hundred bags of cement by now, and it has all been mixed by hand, fifty shovels of aggregate to a bag of cement. The cement and aggregate are mixed together until fully mixed and then water, by the bucket, is poured in and the cement mixed until it is a slurry. The blue barrel holds the water.

This is our "cement truck" ;-D. That's Marvin filling the hole around the base of the rebar. The rocks in the trench will become part of the foundation. We will use a total of about 1,200 bags of cement, . The columns being set now will go up through the floor of the second level and the 2 ft of rebar that are not in the concrete will become part of the column that goes up to the roof. The extra rebar on the second level will be twisted around the base of the trusses and tie the roof to the house. This house is hurricane proof, mud slide proof, and earthquake proof, or so I am told.

Here are some of our gang. Honduran men love to smile for the camera, and they will always fix their hair and clothing before they will let you take the photograph.

Who is that handsome man with the chain saw? Why, it is Macho Man!!! Macho Man forgets that he is not as young as our other workers, and he comes home wringing wet and so tired he just wants to lie on the floor. I told him that he should remember he is the Jefe and he needs to sit under the mango tree and direct what is going on. He disagrees. He says he has to set an example, and also make sure everyone is working where, when and how he wants them to.

Under the mango tree - break time.

We freeze water in the big soda bottles to provide cool water for most of the day. That is Marvelous Marvin with Macho Man

The office of Ramirez and Company - inside the little house Macho Man built about 40 years ago.

We have been truly blessed. We have a good, hard working crew. It has not rained. The materials have arrived on time. Macho Man sprayed the property so the chiggers and ticks are mostly gone.

Building the Dream

2010-05-21T18:16:00.003-05:00

I know most of you are wondering if we really are going to build a dream home here in Honduras. After all, I have been talking about it ever since we got here, then posted nothing about our progress. Well, here is what you have been waiting for.

This is the property before the bulldozer came

We broke ground last week, but before we could get the bulldozer in Macho Man and his helper, Marvin, and whatever family he could round up, had to move most of those rocks have been bragging about. Now, these rocks are another thing Honduras has with Georgia.....our rocks are not some soft old rock you can split easily. Our rocks are pure granite. These rocks have to be dug up, broken up, and moved by hand.

Macho Man and Marvin working on the rocks

You will see piles and piles of these rocks, and when you see a new surface, that rock has been broken up with a pick axe and a sledge hammer. Some of these will be used in the foundation. The ones with the flattest surface will be the parking area and walkways. I hope there will be enough to build the fence, too. Some of the boulders will be left in place, because we can't move them.

Last Thursday the bulldozer came. They worked Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. The driver was so good at what he does that we will have to back fill only a less when we do the foundations. I commented on Face Book the other day that Honduras and Georgia have red clay, chiggers and ticks in common. Here is the proof of the red clay.

Once the excavation was complete, Macho Man and his helpers starting leveling off and marking where the foundation will go. They did the leveling with a long, clear plastic tubing and water. First they put stakes in all the corners and along the sides, and then, somehow they filled the tube with water and were able to mark the levels of the foundation. They measured horizontally, vertically and cross-ways. MM said they were off less than 1/4th inch.

Macho Man and Chico inspecting the work yesterday

Today we have five workers out at the site digging the foundations with shovels. MM as been tying rebar, getting it ready to put in the columns that go every 10' around the house. They are 6" square of solid concrete with a 1/2" rebar circular reinforcement the entire length of the column. These are not decorative; they become part of the walls. The columns help make the house hurricane and earthquake proof.

Let me say a word here about Marvin. Macho Man found Marvin when he was working on my SIL's house and offeredd him a job. Marvin is 17 years old, and he works literally from sun to sun, and sometimes later. He is on the job by at least 6:30 a.m. and he has to be told to go home at night. He also has to be told to take a lunch break. While they have been busting rocks, Marvin has started a fire under a rock and then come back later at night to pour cold water on the rock so it will split. He is a blessing.

I will be doing more on this as we progress. In fact, I am going out tomorrow to take pictures from today's work.

Surprise, I'm Back!!

2010-05-03T18:16:00.000-05:00

I cannot believe it has been over a month since I posted anything, me who always has something to say!

We made our trip to the States. We had a pleasant surprise when we did our taxes. For the first time in the 23 years we have been filing jointly, we are actually going to get a refund, We did the doctor appointments, amd that was all good. We visited my sister amd my aunt and uncle in central Florida, and we spent precious time with my daughter, her husband, and the Grandbrat.

The first thing we noticed that we missed was sitting on the balcony in the morning amd watching the iguanas play while we enjoy our coffee. I was really amazed at myself because I missed the tranquility of our life here. I even missed the condo with no glass in the windows.

While we were standing in line at MIA getting checked in, I looked up amd there was Elisa amd the Grandbrat. Elisa said after they dropped us off, the Grandbrat was crying so hard she had to turn around and come back to the airport. They stayed with us until we had to clear security. It is a shame to love a child as much as we love Victoria. Even Chico was glad to see her again.

We are going to the property tomorrow and stake out the footprint of the house. Juan will finish up the estimate and submit the plans for the permits. Hopefully we can break ground this month. I will be posting pictures of the progress we make while building.

Life is good, and I am blessed.

Claro Came Today

2010-03-30T18:18:00.000-05:00

It is Semana Santa (Holy Week) in Honduras. Yeah, I know, it is Holy Week wherever people are celebrating Easter or Passover. Holy Week in Central America is somewhat different than most of us Norteamericanos are used to observing. Here, it is almost a national holiday. Almost nothing gets done during Holy Week, except going to the beach and partying. Many people get the week off.

This morning, when I got up it was raining cats and dogs, so, first I just lazed around in the bed. I got up for coffee that my loving Macho Man made for me. I thought I would make the bed later. I decided just to put a housecoat over my night gown and not get dressed until later. No need to get gussied up, right? After all, it is Holy Week and there is a monsoon going on outside. Nobody in there right mind is out in this. Then I got busy checking email.

I was playing yet another game of Spider Solitaire, when MM came dashing through the door to my little room and said, "Claro is here!" Right behind him are three strange men, who have just now walked through my bedroom, into my GTH room, and caught me at my computer with my nightgown on, my hair uncombed, and no makeup, and my bra thrown across the cedar chest, where I left it last night. MM did throw the covers over the bed and put the pillow shams in place

We have been waiting almost four months for Claro to show up and install the satellite dish. MM has called them every day to find out when they were coming and every day he has been told a different story, but consistently they have said:
(1) We have no way to contact the installers.
(2) We cannot give you the telephone number to our home office.
(3) The installers will just show up when they show up.
(4) Maybe next week.

Why today? Latin Americans have some strange misconceptions about American women, and most are not very flattering, so I try very hard to avoid embarrassing Macho Man. I keep the house straight. I don't wear shorts in public, except at the pool or the beach. I don't drink from a can or bottle in public. I try to be pleasant to everyone. I don't laugh too loud, or talk too loud.

Boy, did I blow it today!!!

BTW, the installers forgot the bracket for the satellite dish, so I still don't have TV. They will be back tomorrow, sometime, maybe.

Road Trip to Novillo

2010-03-27T21:56:00.001-05:00

Yesterday Macho Man took me on a road trip. This one had a purpose. I have an Internet friend, Jennifer, whom I wanted to meet in person and become "real" friends. I knew Jennifer and her family have milk cows and I wanted some fresh milk to make cheese with, so that was another reason for going.

Jennifer agreed to let us take some of her valuable time, and believe me, her time is very valuable. You see, not only does she live on a farm in rural Honduras, Jennifer has eight children of her own, and two that belong to her husband from another marriage.

To say that Jennifer and her family live out from town is an understatement to say the least. The directions are something to the effect of 'turn at the intersection between the pink house and the pulpuria, go about 10 minutes, go down the hill and cross the bridge and then cross over the little ford.......We found her though, without any problem.

What a great family!! Did I mention that eight of the ten children were at home? Did I mention that the six youngest ones are stair-steps from about age seven down to about one year?

What a great Mom! The two oldest children are teenagers. They are polite, with great manners. They helped with the younger children, and carried on intelligent conversations. I phrase it this way, because so many teens today can't say three words, without saying "like, you know", or really murdering the English language in some way.

The six younger children were all friendly, outgoing, and very loving. They are extremely well behaved for their ages, and again, those beautiful manners.

Jennifer and I got along as if we had known each other for ages. She is a very kind, outgoing, generous young woman. Nana, you did a great job of raising her. And, Nana, I got to rock Lara almost to sleep. Be jealous!

When we started to leave I had about 8 liters of milk. Jennifer had asked if I wanted some green bananas, and I said sure. I didn't realize she meant a whole stalk of bananas. Plus, she threw in a big bunch of chatas, a kind of banana that you cook with. When I asked her how much for the milk, she told me to put my money away.

Friends are always a blessing.

Two Sides of Honduras

2010-03-23T17:59:00.005-05:00

This is Honduras, or at least the Honduras that the developers, real estate investors, and tourist guides want you to see. It is beautiful. I love it. It is the only thing you will see if you only go to the resorts or to the gated, gringo compounds.

Honduras is a country of marked differences, from the tropic heat of the North Coast to the moderate and sometimes cold Western Mountains. We have sunsets that are some of the most beautiful in the world...Sorry Key West, but it is true. We have some of the best diving you will ever do off the Bay Islands and Los Cayos Cochinos, better even than the Caymans in my opinion.

You can live in a metropolitan area, and have almost all the amenities you find in the US. You can live in one of the old colonial towns which are very picturesque, and show the influence of Spain. You can even live among
ancient Mayan ruins dating to 900 B.C.

This is where I live. This is considered upper middle class housing-upscale housing. We have what is listed as a third bedroom and bath. It is actually the maid's quarters.

This is my Sister-in- law's house. This is middle class housing.
She lives here with a daughter, and sometimes another daughter and a grandchild.

This is subsidized housing. These little houses are two and three bedroom with electricity, water and plumbing. They cost $10 - $15K USD. The Honduran Government backs the loan. It must be paid off in ten years. This is how many Hondurans are able to buy their own home.

This is my neighbor's house up the mountain. Can't find him? I made it easy for you. It is that little brown blob right in the middle of the picture. This house is probably somewhere around 10' x 12' and has a thatched roof. It is made of mud packed into interlaced tree branches, bamboo, or whatever can be used for lathing. It is a casa de tierra, a house of earth. There is no running water and no electricity, no plumbing. The kitchen is outside, and probably only consists of a fuego, which is like a BBQ pit covered with piece of sheet metal and it is wood-fired; and a pila, which is a concrete sink with two sides. One side holds the clean water, and the other is dirty. The clean water is carried from a nearby creek in buckets. You never allow anything dirty to contaminate the clean water. If there is a pila, the lady of the house uses it to wash dishes, clothes, and children. If there is no pila, she goes to the creek and beats the clothes on the rocks to get them clean.

Then there is this. A small village of this. Many small villages of this. Again, no water, no electricity, no indoor plumbing. No outhouse, just a latrine. These are probably squatters, because Honduran law allows squatters to take land that has not been used for any purpose over a number of years. The casa de tierra is actually the better deal, because it does keep out the rain and some of the heat and cold. There are actually families living here, The Honduran government says a family is three adults and two children. Most families are much larger. This is the reason the Castro/Chavez Socialism/Communism model can easily take hold of a country, by promising to take land from the rich and give it to the people living in places like this. The countries who profess to be democratic, especially those in the Western Hemisphere, need to take action, or the wolf will be at the door.

Honduras is a country of approximately 8,000,000 people. The median age is 20.3, but most of the population is well below that. According to the CIA World Fact Book about 36% are un-or underemployed, nearly 60% of the population lives in poverty. and of those employed, only 20% are employed in industry. The rest are almost evenly split between agriculture and services. We have a very young population ready to come into the job market, and virtually no jobs.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ho.html

The minimum wage, after is was raised 61% last year, is L5,500 ($290.70) per month. Many people work for less because they have to, some because one whole area of the country was exempt from the raise. The canasta basica, the basic grocery cart, contains contains 30 items. As of 2008 it costs L4,309 ($324 USD), and it has gone up since the increase in the minimum wage, and the recent political turmoil.

So, what can be done to change this? I believe the answer is in education. The school system here is deplorable. Children are not taught to think logically and strategically. Last year, the children only went to school 100 days, due to a teacher's strike. The teachers strike for just about any reason, and the only ones to suffer are the children.

As expatriates, we cannot change the system. What Macho Man and I have decided to do is mentor a child. This child is a family member. We will see that he gets an education. We will probably do some home schooling. He wants to learn English, so he can talk to me, but that may be because I buy him chocolates. ;-D We will try to make sure he learns to make his own decisions, not based on propaganda, but on facts he can document for himself.

I am blessed. I am very rich compared to most Hondurans. I have potable water, electricity most of the time, enough to eat, and a roof over my head. If I am not my brother's keeper, I am at least his helper. I keep remembering, "Even as you do for the least of these my brethren." I don't believe it is optional.

Clearing Up Some Misconceptions.

2010-03-21T17:14:00.001-05:00

I had another article planned for today, but it will have to wait for another day. This one is brought on by some comments I have received recently.

1. Sleeping under a mosquito net in Honduras is a necessity, not a sexy, romantic decoration. It especially not romantic at 3: AM, when you have to fight your way out to go to the bathroom.

2. We did not move to Honduras to avoid paying taxes. The IRS insists that we pay taxes no matter where we live or where we earn our money. My Social Security is taxed, even though I paid taxes on the money before it went to Social Security.

3.   We did not lose our rights as US citizens when we moved to Honduras, not even the right to pay our taxes. We are allowed to vote in any Federal election, either by absentee ballot from our former State, or by absentee or personal ballot at the American Embassy in Tegucigalpa. Florida allows us to vote in State elections by absentee ballot. Not all States allow this.

4.   I have no problem being a Democrat and a Catholic at the same time. I guess this was referring to the abortion issue. I do not condone abortion. It would never have been a choice for me. On the other hand, I do not think I have a right to force my beliefs on others. I also do not believe we can legislate morals.

5. Here comes a sticky one. I do not believe in socialized medicine, but I do believe in a national insurance program. I believe that health care is a basic right, not a privilege for those who can afford it. I don't believe anyone should die because they have no insurance. Before you start throwing rocks at me, go to http://www.factcheck.com/ and see how many lies have been told about the bill before Congress, on both sides of the aisle.

6. Here comes another sticky one: I do not believe in being soft on illegal aliens, but I do believe we need to make legal entry to the U.S. affordable. My husband came to the U.S. legally. It took us almost a year to get his green card, and three years to get his citizenship.   It was very expensive. We were lucky because we both had good jobs and were able to pay. It cost us another $10,000 to the State Department to bring my Honduran children to the States.   That was 1989. Today, it costs more that $20,000 for a family of four, very hard to come by when you are working for about $200.00 USD per month and the basic foods for a family of five cost approximately $330.00 USD. That's a subject for a later blog.

This year we went in the opposite direction and I now have my Honduran green card, only it is blue; and cost a lot less.

7. I am not a bleeding heart liberal. I am actually pretty conservative.

Why We don't Kill Our Teenagers

2010-03-10T16:45:00.000-06:00

I have been blessed with exceptional children. That being said, there have been times I would have gladly pushed any one of them down a flight of stairs and told God they fell.

The oldest son is Daniel. Daniel is my American child, born to me and my first husband. Definitely one of the good things that marriage produced. He is a long distance truck driver, based out of Omaha, NE. His wife and family live in Miami. He is father of three, grandfather of five. He started early ;-D. This post is not about Dan.

My daughter is Elisa. She has been mine since I married her father almost 25 years ago. Elisa came to the US when she was not quite 14, did not know a word of English, and had been abruptly informed that she was moving to Miami to live with her Papi and his new wife. She graduated high school with honors, went to college and obtained her master's in child psych and special education. Elisa now teaches special needs children in the Broward County School System, getting them ready for mainstreaming into the system.    She is the mother of one of the Grandbrats. She is an American citizen. This post is not about Elisa.

Then, there is Alex. Ah, yes, Alex. Alex is Macho Man's son from his first marriage, and he has also been mine for more than half his life. He is a Gunnery Sergeant in the USMC. He has done his time in Iraq. He is the father of another Grandbrat. He is an American citizen by choice.    This post is about Alex.

Alex was 15 when he came to live with us. In Honduras that meant he was a man.   Of course, to me, the Gringa, also referred to as 'that woman', he was an adolescent child. You can imagine the conflicts this brought about. The first years he was here, he would tell anybody that asked that he hated the US; he hated Miami; he hated the food; he hated the schools, but most of all, he hated me. Alex was my gang wannabe.

Alex and I fought over his long hair. We fought over his pants hanging down so low they were in danger of falling off, and being so baggy the entire family could have fit in them. We fought about what time a teenage boy should be in for the night. We fought about his choices for friends. You get the picture.

Thank goodness, as we both grew older, we came to really love and respect each other.

Last night we were talking to Alex and he said the most incredible things to me.   He said he wants me to know I am his real mother. He said that he really regretted that when we were still in the States he had not called us more often. He said, "Now that you are in Honduras, this country feels so empty!".

I am so glad I did not push him down those stairs!

Today is a Wonderful Day

2010-03-08T14:01:00.000-06:00

Today is a wonderful day in Trujillo. When I look outside the sun is shining, and even as high up as we are, you can see how clear the bay is. The wind is blowing at about 5-10 kph and is cool. In fact, it is cool enough to need socks on my feet, which is really cool for me.

I found two of the mosquito nets. They were the ones for the single beds, but I have one spread out over our bed, and it will work for now. No new mosquito bites for the last couple of days, so my irritability level is down tremendously. Macho Man is happy about that.

Our tickets to the States are bought and paid for, and yes, they are both round trip. We will be in Florida for 10 days. My son-in-law is receiving an award from the Hollywood (Florida) Police Department for being Officer of the Year, so that's a good thing. We will be getting our taxes done, not so good a thing. We will also be seeing one of the Grandbrats, so that is a wonderful thing.

The other Grandbrat is having her quinceñera in California, a good thing. Unfortunately, we can't attend, so that is a sad thing, but we will be thinking about her that night. For those of you who are not familiar with quinceñeras, that is an elaborate party which is a combination of a 15th birthday party, a debutant party and a right of passage. It is very important in the Latin culture, and I am so sorry we cannot attend this one. It is when a young Latina is recognized as no longer being a child, but a young lady. Good for you, Grandbrat! You deserve a beautiful day.

IN MEMORIUM

2010-03-01T14:16:00.004-06:00

Sarah Josephine Griffin Chapman

31 July 1918 - 28 February 2010

My Aunt Josephine died yesterday morning. She was 91 years old. This was not unexpected, nor was it a bad thing. I admired my Aunt Josephine. There were times we were at odds, but I never stopped admiring her courage and her tenacity.

Aunt Josephine was an amazing, strong woman who lived an extraordinary life on her own terms. She even managed to die on her own terms, in her own home, in her own bed, with people she loved and who loved her around, some of whom only she could see.

Josephine was born outside Americus, Georgia, a small farming town in Southwest Georgia. After graduating from school in Americus, she went to nursing school at the University of Alabama, Birmingham and joined the U.S. Navy Nurse Corps.

She served during World War II in North Africa and in Italy. She was assigned to the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo, Cuba in the mid 1940's. While there she had an unfortunate accident which ultimately cost her her left leg below the knee.

Josephine was the first amputee ever called back to active duty by the Navy. She was recalled to serve at the rehabilitation hospital in Oakland, California during and after the Korean War, to teach young servicemen to walk with artificial limbs. I was told that when a patient said "I can't.", she would pull up her skirt, show her artificial limb, and say, "Yes, you can. If I can, so can you."

And she could. She could bowl, she could dance, and she could ride a bicycle, One of my earliest memories of Aunt Josephine must have been when I was about six. Santa brought me my first bicycle, and
Aunt Josephine decided to show me how to ride it. She could pedal the bike forward, but she had not yet mastered backpedalling, and as a result, had not mastered the art of braking. Her artificial foot slipped off the pedal, going through the spokes on the front wheel, and she hit a tree. Didn't stop her, not for a second. Back onto the bike, and that day we both learned to ride it.

After her second time retiring from the Navy, Aunt Josephine and her husband, Kenneth J. Chapman, moved to Atlanta. Josephine worked as a civilian nurse at St Joseph's Hospital when it was still located in downtown Atlanta. Uncle Ken died in 1993, and she lived alone, and later, with a caretaker until her own death.

As I said, an amazing, strong woman who lived an extraordinary life on her own terms.

Rest in Peace Aunt Josephine. I will miss knowing you are here, and that you loved me.

An afterthought: My Great-Grandmother Sallie died when she was 85; my Grandmother, Ruth Pennington, died when she was 87; my Mother, Kathleen, was 87; my Aunt Josephine was 91. Do you suppose Macho Man really knew what he was saying, when he said, "Until death do us part."? When I am 87, we will have been married 44 years, half my life, more than half his.

I Want to Go Home - Atleast, Today I Do

2010-02-25T14:16:00.001-06:00

I want to go home. Today, I really want to go home. Home to Miami; home to my granddaughter; home to somewhere life is somewhere near normal as we know it, I want to buy my old house back. I want central air and heat, so if I am cold, I can set the thermostat to heat, and if I am hot, I can set it to cool.

I am tired of being eaten alive by mosquitos and itching so bad I can't sleep. I want a real drugstore, not a farmacia where they don't even carry Benadryl, much less cosmetics, lotions, toothe paste, hair color, and anything else I might need. I don't want to travel three hours to get to Wal-Mart. I want a cable installer who comes within a reasonable frame of time, not mañana. We all know when mañana comes. In our case, in over two months mañana has not yet arrived.

I want to be able to have my computer fixed by someone who doesn't reformat my hard drive to fix a minor problem with a program, then lie about it. Of course you uninstalled the version of Vista that was on my computer, you ....., the version of Vista you re-installed speaks Spanish, not English, and it is so old I will be dead before I can install all 72 of the updates it is missing. Of course you uninstalled my Vista, you idiot! Otherwise, where is all my email, music, genealogy records, etc., etc, etc.?

I know I signed on for all this, and tomorrow, I will feel different, but today, I want to go home!!

I Want to Cry!

2010-02-24T20:45:00.002-06:00

I have been without internet service for almost three days now. The problem started with Claro, and when I tried to fix the problem, I really fixed it good. I fixed it so good, Macho Man not only took the modem to Tocoa today, but he took my computer, too. This was at my insistence, since I didn't want Claro to say, "Well, it works with our computer." I wanted to be sure it worked with my computer.

Of course, it worked on Claro's computer, and when they tried to make it work on my computer, of course, it didn't. So off to the computer doctor. Now, those of you who live in Honduras can see this coming. When Macho Man got home, he is grinning from ear-to-ear. "Honey, I'm home. You have internet again! And I got your computer fixed!". Yes, indeedy.

Apparently Computer Quack decided rather than to fix the one problem Claro said we had, he would just reformat my hard drive and reinstall Vista. I now have programs I never had before, like Windows for Kids, which would be just fine, if we had kids; Norton, if I liked Norton; you get the picture.

What I don't have are any Internet Favorites; personally installed programs, like PCStitch; or my music. No screen saver or background that was mine personally. No sound card installed; and the versioin of Vista he installed is so old, there are a minimum of 71 updates available. Worst of all, and what had me sitting in the middle of the floor screaming "SUGAR!! SUGAR!! SUGAR!!!, gone is 9 years of genealogical research and the two programs used to collect it.

I know, I know, I should have backed everything up, and I am hoping the backup I did before we left the States will recover most of what is missing. But, why would Computer Quack delete all my programs without even asking if he needed to back anything up?

Oh, and by the way, now my computer speaks Spanish rather than English. This in spite of the fact that Computer Quack assured MM he reinstalled everything in English. That I can fix, to some degree.

Another BTW... Claro says it is impossible that my internet connection is being directed through Guatemala, even though MM explained that we had been told by the bank, Amazon.com, and several other places that this was the problem we were having originally when we tried to do business online. I just looked at Google, and sure enough, I am connected to Google.com.gt.

Oh, well, back to Tocoa tomorrow, not that I expect to accomplish anything.

Road Trip to La Ceiba, Day 2 - What We Found and Where We Found It

2010-02-23T00:02:00.000-06:00

I have already mentioned that we stayed at the Hotel Paris. This is one of the older hotels in downtown La Ceiba, right on the Park, and central to almost everything. The hotel is in the process of remodeling, but we found it to be clean and comfortable. The staff was exceptionally polite and helpful. There was security on the premises, and a secure parking lot.

We had a room on the ground floor, pool side. There is a bar at poolside, as well as a very nice restaurant, where you can eat inside or out. They have a beauty shop on the premises, as well as conference rooms and free wireless internet.

This is the pool area. The bar is in the background. We found it to be a very relaxing place to sit and have a drink, and we were also able to get our dinner brought to this area. The bar is a full-service bar. The restaurant has a very extensive menu. We both had calemari, Juan's was a la diabla (in a hot sauce) and mine was fried. We had a baked potato and salad. It was all good, and not expensive at all.

Who is that handsome, dark-haired man walking by the pool? Why, it is Macho man! To his right is the restaurant, where we had supper, and where we had a very relaxing breakfast before starting out for the day.

The first order of the day was to find some 3x5 index cards, which we did, at Casa De Los estudiantes on Avenida San Isidro. This little place has all kinds of paper good and school supplies.

Then, on to Pais, which is the Honduran version of Wal-Mart, and is actually owned by Wal-Mart. Pais is just down from the central Park. It is a large store, with wide, comfortable aisles that I had no trouble getting the scooter through. The store was clean and the employees were helpful and polite.

I thought I had died and gone to heaven. They had almost everything I was looking for. I found Hershey's Cocoa. I found bay leaves. Rachel, take note and strike these from the list. Pais had a nice meat market, but we were going to try another place, so didn't buy from here. There was a good assortment of cheese, even sharp cheddar. And whipping cream, real, live whipping cream. Their bakery department had a variety of baked good. Juan bought caballitos, a gingerbread sort of cookie, shaped like a little horse.

After we left Pais we headed over to a carnecería that was recommended to us has having meat 'bien blandisimo' (very tender). As most of you know, finding a tender piece of meat has been a big problem for me, so I really had my hopes up. So, here it is!

Carnecería Express. The sign says, on the left, "Fresh meat, and for Exportation ". On the right it says "Experts in Special Cuts" This place is located on Avenida 14 de Julio, between Calles 16 and 17, two doors down from where I had my spa day.

The store was clean, with no bad odors and no flies. The cuts were recognizable. The butcher did not touch the meat with her bare hands. The meats are mainly from Olancho, but the American style cuts come from Zamorano Pan-American Agricultural School. One of the sausages we bought was also made at Zamorano.

We bought a tenderloin large enough to cut into eight 3/4 - 1" filets and a piece left over that will make a nice roast. We also got six T-bones, about 1/2" thick. We added six smoked porkchops, each 3/4" thick, and two different types smoked sausage, one spicy and one mild. All of this ran us about $55 USD. We loaded all this in the cooler, covered it in ice, and off we went to meet Pablo and Magda, my in-laws, for lunch.

After lunch we made a quick turn through the MegaPlaza Mall, which looks like any other mall in the US. They even have my favorite shoe store, Payless.

Then it was time to go pick up Chico and head home.

UPDATE on the Meat: I am proud to report that the meat is, indeed, blandisimo. We had a couple of the filets Sunday night, and they were so tender and juicy. Tonight we had smoked pork chops, black beans and rice, and the pork chops were great. Definitely worth a 3-hour road trip to La Ceiba

Can't Post a Comment? This may be the solution.

2010-02-21T22:36:00.000-06:00

I've had three people tell me they cannot post comments on the View. I finally got what may be the answer. In order to post a comment, you must be a 'registered user'. That just means that you have been verified somewhere as not being a spammer. If you log in when you post a comment, it will post, even if you use OpenID. You already have an OpenID if you have AOL, Yahoo, myspace, google, flickr, worldpress and a host of others. You can go here http://openid.net/get-an-openid/ and set up your account.

People, I need your comments so I know what I am doing right, and what I am doing wrong. It would also help me if you signed up as a follower. I have 14 followers now, and that is encouraging.

Road Trip to La Ceiba, Day One - The Spa Day

2010-02-20T16:59:00.002-06:00

We finally decided to brave the rain Thursday and drive to La Ceiba, and our prayers were answered. The rain stopped for the road trip, then started up again after we got to Ceiba.

Chico says everyone should wear a seat belt while traveling in Honduras. He never goes anywhere without his seat belt. It keeps him from falling out of the car, or landing in the floor after a sudden stop.

Our first stop was at the office of Dr. Higinio Calderon, the vet recommended by several members of Honduras Living. The best recommendation came from Chico himself. Sometimes Chico is a little slow to make friends, especially with men, so we were really impressed when he immediately made friends with Dr. Calderon.

The vet was very accommodating. He looked over the medical records we brought and did a cursory exam. No problem that we just walked in unannounced, nor that Chico needed a spa day the same day. Again, no problem when Chico ended up needing to stay in the Hotel Calderon for the night when the Hotel Paris would not allow him to share a room with us.

Dr. Calderon says he can fix the international health certificate and the exit papers we need when we leave the country with 24 hours notice, although he would rather have a week. He does not open the Ceiba office Wednesdays and weekends. The clinic is located on the street just before the DIPPSA Super 7 on CA 13 going toward Tela and San Pedro.

Next on the To-Do-List was to find the place Macho man needed to go to get the Xterra officially registered in Honduras. When he was satisfied he could find the place again, we went to look for Rumors, so I could have my spa day while he took care of the car.

Rumors was recommended by a member of Honduras Living. It is located on Ave 14 de Julio, between Calles (streets) 16 and 17, across from Nicole Imports. Sorry, Americans, but this how you give directions in Honduras, as there are very few addresses as we know them.

Owners, Nolvia and husband, René, speak English and are so very nice. The shop is clean and well maintained. Nolvia is the stylist and René takes care of the business. The first thing René did was offer me a choice of gourmet coffee, tea, juice, or water. He was very clear that the water was bottled, and the drinks and ice cubes were made with it. I did have to ask for warm water for my shampoo, but that detail was take care of immediately and cheerfully, no questions asked other than was it warm enough

I was greeted at the door by Miriam, a sweet little pixie, who is learning English. Since we both speak Spanglish, we got along just fine. The word 'shampoo' does not come close to describing what she did. After we got the water warm enough, and while I had shampoo in my hair she massaged my scalp for several minutes. After she rinsed out the shampoo, she applied a deep conditioner, covered me with a plastic cap, and we were off to the pedicure station.

I was given the most luxurious pedicure I have ever had. After the usual soak in warm water and basic pedi, Miriam started a routine of massage alternating between Dead Sea salt and minerals, then lotions. She applied a hot paraffin treatment, then more massage.

After the pedi, we went back to the shampoo station, washed out the conditioner, and I got another scalp massage. By this time I was purring like a kitten and convinced I wanted to take Miriam home with me.

Then, I went to Nolvia's station. She did not even flinch when I told her to take off about 4". We discussed a style and then she gave me what I think is the best haircut I have ever gotten. It is a classic bob done with a razor. This morning I brushed my hair and it just fell into place. That is a rare occurrance for me. Unfortunately, Macho Man finished his business before I could get to the facial and the full massage, but we will be back every 4-6 weeks so there is still time.

Nolvia recommended a carnecería (butcher shop) that she says is the best. The meat comes from Olancho, which prides itself on the quality of its meats. I will have more to say about that in Day 2.

From here we went to get Chico settled in for the night, then to the Hotel Paris to settle ourselves in for the night. We had a couple of good margueritas out buy the pool, then a good dinner, also poolside. I actually got to watch some TV; and we slept without any mosquitos trying to eat us alive.

Oh, happy days!!

This and That

2010-02-17T12:35:00.000-06:00

We were planning a trip to La Ceiba today. That is our closest large town, and is the third largest city in Honduras. It is about a three hour drive. Instead, I am at home watching the rain come down in buckets and Macho Man is down in El Centro, seeing about his father. The weather was just too bad this morning to be driving on a mountain road in the rain, especially with the way some Hondurans drive, and the condition of some bridges when it rains. We will try again tomorrow.

I read in the Miami Herald that they are expecting a cold front with chill factors in the 30's in Miami-Dade and Broward counties tonight. That means it will be cold here tomorrow through the weekend. I get to wear my boots without looking like an idiot!!! or at least, like an idiot to the people here.

I was looking forward to this trip, because while MM was getting the car registered I was going to enjoy a spa day and get the whole works. It really is time for a haircut when your Hispanic husband tells you so, and he has. I really wanted to come home with some nails. I had to take mine off when I couldn't find anyone here to do the fills. I was looking forward to the facial, massage, pedi,etc. Oh well.

Chico was going to have a spa day, too. He really wasn't looking forward to his. He likes most of the grooming, but hates the bath; forget the manicure, that is not going to happen without sedation. It was also going to be a get acquainted visit with the vet, as we have no vet in Trujillo, and the vet in Tocoa takes care of livestock, not pets. We are going to use a Dr. Calderon, who comes highly recommended.

< Patty and Macho Man >

Blessings.

It's Starting to Look a Little Bit Like Home

2010-02-16T22:48:00.002-06:00

Most people know we had a little problem getting our belongings out of Customs. A little problem? A little problem? Try over two months of near nervous breakdown. And this time, most of the problem was not the fault of Honduran Customs. Most of the problem was due to the unprofessional practices of the mover in Miami. It still hurts to even think about.

But, on the afternoon of February 5th, we saw the most beautiful sight in the world. This truck. Loaded with our things

Coming down this drive

To deliver our belongings.

Actually, the truck was the second most wonderful sight. The first most wonderful sight was.......

My Car!!!!! I was running around like a maniac, yelling "¡Mi Carro! ¡Mi Carro!" I was kissing my car, and saying, "Oh, thank you! Thank you!" Now, before you think I had completely lost my mind, we thought we might have to donate this car to Customs if they did not release it soon. We were being charged $70 USD/day storage in the port, because they could not release our belongings until they could clear the car, and they could not clear the car because we could not produce the original bill of sale. Seems the Title, issued by the State of Florida, was insufficient proof we owned the car free and clear.

Then the fun began. The men began to unload the truck. About 200 boxes or loose items. After the boxes came the furniture, and that was when we realized we had a major uh oh. The furniture would not come through the doors, much less up two flights of narrow stairs. "Oh, what to do! What to do!" Good thing Macho Man is a professional carpenter/man of all trades. Remember how I complained the windows have no glass? Well, it was a good thing this day because we had to.......

You guessed it......Remove the window. The men climbed up on top of the truck and started passing things up and over the balcony wall and through the window. No mean trick, I can tell you. Check out the man's shirt.

Now that we are getting settled in, it is starting to look like this

And we just had Juan's family over for supper on Saturday to celebrate.

It's still a work in progress, with lots of boxes to go through again; and things we are storing in the spare bedroom because there is no place to put it; but it sure is wonderful to sit on our own furniture and sleep in our own bed. Oh, and eat at a table rather than off our laps.

What a blessing!

My Cositas Arrived Yesterday

2010-02-05T19:44:00.000-06:00

For those of you who don't speak Spanish, cositas translates 'little things'. Actually it was big things, like my car and a truck load of furniture. We haven't seen any of our things since November 13, so yesterday was like Christmas.

Today we have been unpacking boxes, deciding what stays upstairs where we live or stay in the downstairs bedroom, which we have turned into our bodega. The bodega wins, because we have very little room for furniture.

I will write again on this, but tonight I am just too tired.

Trujillo - Markets and other places

2010-01-25T11:24:00.006-06:00

Trujillo is a small town on the North Coast of Honduras, and as one guide book put, "Folks, Trujillo is the end of the road." It is quite literally the end of the road on the North Coast, except for the dirt road that goes to several little Garífuna villages. Christpher Columbus first set foot on Cental American soil at Punta Caxinas, or Cabo de Honduras August 14, 1502. The first Catholic mass in Central America was said on that date. The modern history of the town dates from 1524.

Trujillo is built in the typical Spanish Colonial style, around a park, surrounded by the military, Forteleza Santa Barbara; the church, La Catedral de San Juan Bautista; and the government, now the city hall and the police station. I can't find my picture of the church so I will have to add it later.

The Fort of Saint Barbara

The Park

The Government Buildings

This is one of the main streets in Trujillo. It goes around the park. Yup, those are cobblestones. The white building is a grocery store.

This is the produce market. This cute little boy is working in his family's stall. This child is so smart he can total up your purchases in his head, and make change without a cash register. If he doesn't have the change, or a plastic bag to put your stuff in, he will run down the street toget one. The other day I ask for tomatoes and he wouldn't sell me the ones he had because they were no good. Then he gave me two perfect bananas to make up for it. When Juan went back the next day, the good tomatoes had not arrived, so he bought one anyway. When he got home, there was a bell pepper in the bag, too. Check out the size of those carrots.

Hondurans love their cell phones. The white things in bags are garlic. Those are fresh beets up by the cabbages. There is another child in the background working with his family. Every one is expected to pull his own weight to help the family survive

This young lady is probably about 16, but she works every day in the market. There are two kinds of sweet potatoes on her left side. Just by the sweet potatoes are some brown things with white edges showing. That is yucca. Juan doesn't like yucca, which is good, because I am allergic to the raw yucca. Cabbages are a staple in the diet. None of these vegetables are coated with wax or other preservatives. They are not picked green and shipped to the market.

This is Wal-Mart, Honduran style. These stores line every steet in El Centro. Then you have street vendors who line up along the streets under makeshift tents and sell everything from fruits and vegetables to DVDs. We can buy videos for about a dollar and a half, and some of them have not been released nation wide in the US. You find this same set-up in the larger towns, too. "Tico" is a cell phone provider. When you see that sign, it means a place you can go and 'charge' your phone. Cell phone service is not by the month, it is by the minute, which is why people send a lot of text messages. My fingers don't move fast enough

This is a street in a middle class-upper middle class neighborhood. Yup, those are still cobblestones.

This is the street in front of two of my sisters-in-law's homes. This is a middle class neighborhood.

Suyapa and Azucena have the better view. That patch of blue at the end of the street is the bay.

Monsoon Season

2010-01-11T18:02:00.000-06:00

Rio Aguan - La Prensa

It is definitely monsoon season in Trujillo. The rain has not let up one bit since my last post. Sunday morning about 1 AM we were duct taping sheets over the windows in the bedroom, trying to keep out the wind. Then the electricity went out for a little over 24 hrs, just coming back on this afternoon. There is no water, because the city had to shut it down to avoid contamination.

Last night we slept under a bedspread and two afghans, in all our clothes. For once, Chico did not get fussed at when he jumped into the bed.

Chico - Self-proclaimed watchdog, faithful companion, and now foot warmer.

Sooooo. We have food and potable water, and each other. Chico is willing to sleep on our feet. We are okay with each other. My favorite verse in the Bible is, "And it came to pass." And this, too, will pass.

The Weather and Other Things

2010-01-08T17:44:00.002-06:00

I took this picture yesterday, because it was the first time we had seen the sun since New Year's day.

Looking over part of Villa Brinkley

The whole week before yesterday it looked like this:

Trujillo Bay through the rain

Or like this...There's about another 1,000 ft. of mountain behind that cloud.

Road up to Calentura

That's what it looks like today, too. And it will for the rest of this week and part of next. That's because we are about to get our 6th cold front in two weeks. A cold front here almost always means high winds and rain, and we really don't need any more. The Rio Aguan is already out of its banks, and it won't take much to bring the bridges down.

Bailey Bridge between Trujillo and Tocoa

Courtesy La Prensa

And here is why we get cold when it rains for days:

The windows, no glass just screen, on the 2d floor front of the Condo, with complimentary windows on the back. Makes for good ventilation and a nice breeze through the house when it is clear and warm, and a strong wind chill when it rains and the wind blows. And the wind always blows.

It is still worth it.

Returning Citizen Jumps into Honduran Politics - (sort of)

2010-01-08T16:52:00.001-06:00

I have long told Macho Man that he needs to run for mayor of Trujillo, so something could be done about the nonexistant infrastructure in some neighborhoods, ours included. He has always declined and said, "No me interesa."

The road from where we live to down town

(and it is relatively good, compared to the street we are building on)

How things change! Last night he attended a meeting of our patronado. A patronado is a bit more than a homeowner's association, and a little less than a special taxing unit. The meeting last night was in regards to the trash pickup and also individual landholders who do not clean up their property, or who dump their garbage in the street.

Trash is supposedly picked up the second and last Sundays of the month. They pickup the trash, but sometimes they are not so tidy. The fee is 55L a month, about $3 USD. The patronado wants to make it mandatory to be a member, so more pickup days can be added

The problem with the trash on private property was settled by deciding to clean up the involved properties this Saturday and bill the owners. If that is not successful, then the leaders will file a complaint with the City of Trujillo against the landowner. Now, that sounds like an American homeowner's association, doesn't it? I wonder how much Don Juan Ramon had to do with that.

At any rate, he got home last night very happy. He now thinks it is very important that we attend all the meetings and that he participates in the running of the patronado. He may run for mayor yet.

Blessings My Father Left Me

2010-01-02T13:16:00.001-06:00

This post is one I have been thinking about for a long time, wondering just what to say. I have decided to just let it speak for itself. This is about my Father, and our relationship. I am not talking about my beloved Daddy. That is a post all of it's own. I am talking about the biological factor in my gene pool, Richard.

Richard Nathan Stone, Sr.

March 1921 - April 2009

I jokingly say that for the first years of my life I thought my Father's name was DamnYankee. That's all my Grandmother ever called him. I was almost grown before I knew that was two words, and it was not his name. Some of that was his fault. Richard decided about a week after I was born that he was not father material, and he left. The marriage was officially over before I was a year old, and so, apparently, was Richard's interest in his first born.

For the next 62 years of my life, except for a one day visit when I was 21, I never saw him. His abandonment went so far as to cancel a trip to his mother's house when he found out I would be there. I was 15. I can tell you that I am the poster child for why the most precious gift a mother can give her daughter is a Daddy who is part of her life..

"Any male can be a father. It takes a special man to be a Daddy." Unk.

In November, 2005, the week that my Daddy died, I received an email from Chet Stone saying he had seen a post on a genealogical message board asking about descendants of George and Anna Stone of Ohio, and he thought we were first cousins. We are.

After a few months of emails, Chet asked me if I had any contact with "Uncle Dick", and my answer was, "No, and I have no interest in one .". He persisted that I needed to contact my father, and I finally told Chet I felt that I had a brother, and probably a sister, out there somewhere, and I was willing to contact them, if he knew how. He did.

In April, 2006, I went to Talmo, Georgia to meet with my father and my brother, Rick. It was scary. I have to admit, I stayed in a motel, just so I would have a bolt hole if things did not go well. They did.

We had a long 'sit down', and came to the conclusion that we could not change the past, just the future. I was very clear that I could never call him Daddy, because I had a Daddy, and it wasn't him. I finally realized that what happened in 1943-44 was not my fault. I could see that he was not the cocky, dashing young Army Air Corp pilot my mother married; he was just a sick old man without much time left. I found out I not only had a brother, but a beautiful sister.

In 2007, Pop came to Daytona Beach to live with my sister, Pam. She was kind enough to let me visit several times in Daytona, and to let me bring him to Ft. Lauderdale for a couple of weeks at the time. We took the opportunity to get closer. What a blessing! I would not change a minute of this time of healing.

In April, 2009, Pop's health deteriorated to the point that he had to be put in hospice care. I went to Daytona the weekend after Easter, and after seeing his condition, decided to stay a few days. Early Monday morning, Pam received a call that we needed to come quickly. When we got there, Pop knew us, if little else. He did tell us that there were angels in the room, and he was not afraid. He died with a daughter on either side, holding his hands, praying for his journey ahead.

My father left me with a deeper understanding of the peace forgiveness brings, not only to the one who is forgiven, but to the one who forgives. He gave me an opportunity to heal old wounds. He acknowledged me as his daughter. He gave me a sister and a brother. He brought sunshine, after years of darkness. He was a blessing.