I love libraries

I forgive anyone in advance for not reading this and just skipping to the pictures. It's probably what I would do.

I've put off writing about my new job up until now... but here goes. I work for Biblioteca Flor del Saber, a community supported library in our marginalized community called Flor del Campo. From our house I walk up some stairs, over a dirt road, up a windy little alley and down a windy little alley, down another dirt road and then I'm there at the beautiful iron gates of the library - twisted into vines and flowers and pretty things.

My first two months I spent on various projects: I organized the literature section alphabetically and did an inventory of books so that we could find books according to author and also check if we even have said book. The library was originally organized using the Dewey Decimal System, but within each major section the books were in no apparent order (they were actually in order by size, but no order that helps find a particular book). Eventually I hope we can get the whole library organized and inventoried, but the collection has over 4500 hundred books so it will take awhile. My co-workers Ivonne and Carolina and I also work together to put up monthly murals with information about national holidays and people of interest. We also help patrons and attend to requests for homework help. The library is a great resource but unfortunately kind of under-used, so we're also working on ways we can promote the library by hosting community events and doing more school visits.

Yesterday was my first day of teaching English classes - we're offering one free class to youth ages 12 - 18 in the morning and one for adults ages 18 and up in the afternoon, Tuesdays and Thursdays, for six weeks. I forgot how much I love teaching! I procrastinated, of course, on the planning; but I really enjoyed teaching and am looking forward to designing the rest of the course. It's fun to have total teaching freedom and the liberty to direct the class any direction we want to go... I'm going to type up all my lesson plans and materials to hopefully use for future classes.

I love the library. I love how beautiful and quality it is, and the fact that this amazing resource is smack dab in the midst of an impoverished neighborhood, and that kids and adults have access to this wealth of books and a computer lab. The downside is this: the organization that donated the books and materials and got this whole thing going, a private organization called the Reicken Foundation, was based on the wealth of one family. And that family lost most of their money in the market crisis recently, leaving the 50+ libraries they founded in Honduras with hardly any support. My two co-workers haven't been paid since January (that's right... January), and we haven't had Internet service in that long. It's a daily struggle for them to remain motivated as the questions of how they'll pay rent and feed their kids become increasingly difficult and pressing.

As an MCC worker, my rent, food, and all life's necessities are taken care of. I literally have absolutely no financial concerns, and I find myself taking that for granted, something that embaresses me when faced with the needs of my co-workers. One of them broke down in tears just yesterday worrying about how they were going to put food on the table. I've given and lent some money, but also don't want to get into the long-term habit of supporting the people I work with, people that SHOULD be receiving salaries. So what should I do? I know what Dorothy Day would have done... she would have emptied out that savings account in Goshen and cooked up meals for everyone on a daily basis. I'm just not that cool, or giving, or trusting. I struggle with what I really think people of faith are called to do and the daily shortcomings when that call is more than we can handle, or not what we want to hear.

View of the library facing the front door. Looks like Ivonne is straightening up.

Literature section. It's really a great collection.

Ivonne explaining about the global warming

Carolina demonstrates how the ozone layer is like an umbrella over the earth, shielding us from the harmful rays of the sun. I didn't get this on photo, but later, Ivonne cuts a big hole in the umbrella and Carolina sticks her hand through the hole... you can just feel yourself getting skin cancer.

The sixth graders attending the Earth Day talk were floored by this news, and vowed never to pollute the earth again.

I'm not sure why everyone is hugging.

Ivonne, me, and Carolina in front of our April mural, with the children's corner off to the right. I am a giantess.

Birthday fiesta!

I was skeptical, but Amanda had no worries that everyone would fit into our tiny house for our joint birthday party. We threw a pizza fiesta for friends, church people and neighbors to celebrate the passing of another year. Some people showed up to see what gringo pizza was like, others were just really curious how we decorated our house. No matter the reason for coming, the party was a success, and a reminder of the joys of living in a close-knit community. We're not sure of the count, but there were around 30-35, and only two couples we had never met.

We continue to learn new things about Honduran culture. Apparently only brothels use Christmas lights during the year. Thanks for the tip, Tina! No wonder there's always a line outside our door at night.

See our party photos here.

* Note: Due to photographer's oversight, our good friends Kathy and Virgil did not make the album despite the fact that their help with the party was indispensable. Thanks, Kath and Virg.

Our house was full.

The Cantor family, who gave us this wall hanging.Escarlet ready to bake her pizza creation.

All of our birthday presents.

I like birds

As Amanda mentioned in a previous post I have recently become enamored with -- or obsessed with -- birding. I'm not sure what it is, exactly, but I would not be as fanatical about it if it weren't for Virgil Troyer, MCC Disaster Response Coordinator, and Birder Extraordinaire. Actually, I also owe much thanks to my father-in-law, Ralph Lind, for buying Amanda and I a pair of incredible binoculars; and to my mother-in-law, Brenda Janzen, for gifting me an exhaustive Central American birding book. Thanks! I think what I like about birding is that it's a low-impact, low-equipment hobby that involves lots of reading, research, and careful observation.

I've compiled a really nice list of birds in the last 6 months, which I will not reprint here, but hope that in the next year I can add many more, including the elusive and beautiful Resplendant Quetzal.

Here are a couple of pictures from our team retreat near Lake Yojoa, taken at Finca Las Glorias.

A Ferruginous Pygmy Owl. Virgil and I spent at least half an hour tracking this guy through the woods, listening to his call and trying to answer back. Apparently my imitation was convincing. He flew right up to us, sat on his perch and had a nice long conversation.

The Belted Kingfisher. I took this picture through Virgil's awesome spotting scope. (If you want to get me another optical present, Ralph...)

First Rain!

It started slowly with a few drops and then gradually grew into a great, pounding rain. Andrew made some hot pinol (a corn based hot-chocolate-esque drink) and we sat out on our plastic chairs on the porch and watched the rain come down, washing the dusty trees and plants clean and sweeping the accumulated garbage down the gutters. I love rain! I just love it...especially after the hot dry season months, when you think it might never rain again here and everything is dry and brown, thirsty for water from the sky. We've been told that before the climate started changing here and the weather patterns were more predictable, the first rains of the year always came during the first week of May in Tegucigalpa. Our friend David went as far as to say they always came on May 3, every year, like clockwork (although I find this hard to believe... I mean, what about leap year?) It is very comforting to think that, this year at least, we are getting off to a normal start. I can imagine farmers all over will sleep a little easier tonight, and the city water board can rest assured that the water supply did not run out before the first big rain of the year, as predicted by the pessimists. It's starting again! The tinkling on the tin roof! Gotta love it.

The view looking up the stairs from our porch. We're happy that whoever designed this staircase included a little river to channel away the rushing rainwater.

Enjoying a hot cup of pinol.

This was a couple of days ago, but I thought I'd put it here anyway. Amanda cleaning out our pila, otherwise known as our mosquito farm.

Semana Santa

I want to give a little belated report on our lovely Semana Santa, or Holy Week, the week leading up to Easter.

Our dear friends Paul and Charity decided to spend the first part of a belated honeymoon visiting us (along with mutual friends Ben and Joy who live in another part of Tegucigalpa). We bussed up and met them in San Pedro and spent a day and a half showing them around our old, very hot, stomping grounds. We then bussed back down to Tegucigalpa to show them our new casita and impress them with the number and variety of ant colonies flourishing here. Next on the agenda was a day-long hike through La Tigra national park and overnight stay on the other side, near the little town of San Juancito. After exploring another little town nearby the next day we got back to San Pedro and all six of us crammed into our house for the night so we'd be ready to bus to Comayagua the next day - the first Colonial capital of Honduras, a town noted for its Semana Santa celebrations.

We arrived expecting large crowds of people... only to find the town nearly deserted. It wasn't until evening that people started coming out of the woodwork, and shortly after sunset there was a re-enactment of the Last Supper in front of the Cathedral overlooking the central park and town square. That was followed by a procession, one of several during the next few days. The real excitement started around midnight when local families and business and various groups started the 9-hour process of creating alfombras, or carpets, from dyed sawdust, sand, and other natural materials. This creative marathon was the result of months of planning; we got up early to see them putting on their finishing touches. The art was incredible - I don't think I've been so excited in months and I think it was just all that creative energy in the air. I took a lot of pictures but the ones here are my favorites - a lot of the photos are of the artists themselves because that's what I found the most exciting - seeing how families and groups worked together to produce the carpets. Shortly after the carpets were completed, they were destroyed in a blaze of glory. The "blaze" coming in the form of Jesus (and several young apprentice Jesus's) carrying crosses, followed by altar boys swinging incense, several priests, and a big float with Moses and the 10 commandments, Elijah on a flaming chariot, and Jesus carrying the cross, all being hefted by about 20 young guys wearing robes and hoods that made them look creapily similar to KKK members. I'm still not quite sure about the symbolism there - we asked several people since our return and nobody seems to really know what's up with the capes. That aside, it was an impressive scene and we followed it through several stations of the cross. I was moved by this massive religious display, so unlike anything I've seen in the states.


Still to come: an update on my work on the library and la vida here in Flor del Campo. We are planning a big homemade pizza fest this Sunday afternoon to celebrate Andrew's birthday on Monday. I have discovered my favorite pizza topping combo: carmelized onions and roasted red peppers. Oh yes. We are hoping to shock and awe all of our neighbors, and see how many people we can fit into our little house.

(In case you missed the link to our pictures above, you can see more of our pictures here.)

Creating a more just society

I've had a nice long break from blogging, and am ready to return in full force! Maybe I wasn't inspired because there wasn't much going on. We're still in the honeymoon phase of our move to Teguc, so I'll try to take advantage of the shiny new veneer on our MCC experience and talk about my new job at the Asociacion para una Sociedad Mas Justa.

Here's the link to the Spanish site.

ASJ is an organization fighting within the Honduran justice system to create a fairer playing field for some of Honduras's most marginalized citizens. The work at ASJ focuses on labor rights, land rights, monitoring the use of public funds, alternative news gathering (www.revistazo.com), and providing low-income people with psychological and legal aid.

For now, I'll talk briefly about land rights and labor rights.

This last week was actually a very big one for ASJ. Two years ago one of their labor rights attorneys, Dionicio Diaz Garcia, was murdered by two hired assasins who worked for a private security company. Dionisio worked to defend the rights of security guards who had suffered labor abuses. A couple of weeks ago the two men were convicted, and last week they were sentenced to 21 years in prison (the maximum is 30). This represented a major victory for ASJ. They aided the prosecution in investigating and compiling a case against the murderers, and advocated internationally for justice to be done. In Honduras, many officials are afraid to convict people, as they are afraid that they themselves might be killed in retaliation. The intellectual author of the crime has yet to be prosecuted. On one hand, this victory sends a message that impunity won't be tolerated. On the other hand, I think ASJ hoped that two men who killed a human rights lawyer who worked for the poor would get the maximum sentence.

ASJ's labor rights work focuses mostly on security guards and cleaning company employees. Both of these types of companies tend to have the worst labor abuse records (failing to pay minimum wage, not giving time off or vacation days, firing people without fair cause) because they often hire people who have very little education. They take advantage of Hondruas's high unemployment rate (I heard that it was 25%) and threaten to fire employees when they demand the rights offered to them under Honduran law. But the owners of these companies tend to be well connected and very rich, earning themselves a certain amount of protection from the authorities and the government. ASJ is going up against some powerful people.

On the land rights front, ASJ is working alongside various community leaders who are trying to get fair titles for their land. The land titling process is messy. Often times various supposed land owners claim ownership of the same parcel, and there are few good surveys and records in many of these old communities. Many neighborhoods started as squatter villages and gradually became more formalized. ASJ helped write a new Honduran law that allows the government to take ownership of a community where land ownership is in dispute, and allow the people living there to pay into an escrow account. Once the courts decide who the owner is, the owner gets the money in the account, and the community members get the titles to their land. In Cofradia, a community near San Pedro Sula, three community leaders have been murdered by assasins hired, most likely, by supposed land owners who don't want what the land to expropriated. ASJ is helping to investigate the killings (despite the fact that the police are ignoring the crimes), and continues to help other community leaders who are receiving threats. They also continue to aid leaders in expropriating the land, though the government has been slow, despite pressure from the World Bank and international NGOs. The fight is long.

Otherwise, ASJ is involved in a host of other activities. The Gideon Centers, located in some of Tegucigalpa's poorest neighborhoods (including Flor del Campo), offers psychological and legal aid for a fee of $.50. This is the only service of this nature I have ever heard of in this country. Legal cases include labor abuses, child support, proof of paternity, spousal abuse, etc. They deal with many of these in a holistic way, tending to not only the legal case but also the person's mental well-being.

The mission of this Christian organization revolves around the idea that people of faith are called to advocate for the rights of the poor and marginalized. In many cases the strong laws in Honduras are not enforced, and uneducated people from poor communities have few advocates, or may not even know what their rights are. We are called to work within the system to change laws, or to enforce existing laws, to ensure that the "least of these" is taken care of. There is danger involved, but Jesus said that Christians would be hated by the world.

It looks as if I will be involved in advocacy in the Cofradia land rights case, and a whole host of communications and public relations activities. I've only been there two weeks. Here is a video that we just posted of a Honduran cleaning woman telling her story. All I did was put in the subtitles in Windows Movie Maker, but at least it is an example of some of the advocacy work we do.

On a lighter note, here is the view of our community out of the porch window.


And Amanda doing the laundry.

In the heart of the flower of the field

Here we are in Tegucigalpa! We moved in a week ago last Thursday, to a colonia called "Flor de Campo." But wait, rewind, first a short update:

February was FULL, hence the lack of blogging. We were very busy hosting the annual food, faith and justice learning tour for youth through the Canadian Food Grains Bank for two weeks. We didn't take many pictures ourselves but as soon as we get some pictures from the participants we'll post them for your viewing pleasure. Right after they left, Andrew's parents and youngest brother Zach came to visit for one full week and we had a lot of fun showing them around Copan, the Tela beach, and cramming into our apartment when we were in San Pedro. Zach had the pleasure of sleeping in the laundry room. The Clouse trio left on a Sunday, and we had until Thursday to pack everything up and clean our apartment for the last time. That week was very bittersweet: some good friends from La Iglesia Central Menonita, where we've attended for the last year and a half, hosted a dinner for us on Monday and sent us away in style with some singing and a blessing that reminded me that we will still have friends there despite being four hours away in a new and yet unknown city. I was surprised at how sad I was to leave our apartment that had become home; we got kind of choked up saying goodbye to David and the other construction workers that work on the apartment next to ours and Dobie, the watchdog that Andrew has been keeping tick-free since November of last year.

So last Thursday we packed it all up in a big truck that Darrin, our boss, arranged to transport us to our new home and took off for the capital city and a new adventure... 6 hours and one fried fish lunch later we unpacked everything, carrying it from the narrow street above our house down the cement stairway that leads to our front door. We quickly realized we needed to downsize, as not all the furniture from our apartment fit into this tiny little house that we now call home.

Andrew by our front door. This was taken from the steps above. The stairway leads down to the street below us.

Our porch and clothes-washing center. The view to the right looks out over the neighboring colonia. The basil plant to the left fell shortly after taking this picture. Apparently I wasn't as smart as I thought.

Our bedroom and home office.

Living/dining room

We named this gecko Choco after his apparent fondness for chocolate chips.

This move represents a very big change... we went from a nice big apartment in the center of San Pedro to a very small house in a colonia on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa. A "colonia" is generally quite different than barrios in the middle of a city - they are almost like small towns within themselves and generally more crowded and lower-income than centralized areas. I am already missing luxuries like running water every day (water comes every other day for about 12 hours) and daily garbage pick-up (we still haven't been able to figure out when the garbage truck will come - our nice new neighbor Sandra promised she'd call us when it does). I'm honing my washing-clothes-by-hand and waging-war-on-ants skills. BUT, we are also already enjoying what a neighborhood like this provides. Here are some new novelties in list form:
1. NEIGHBORS. They are everywhere and everyday we meet more people who are curious about our presence. It's great. I love it.
2. A nearby church community. We will go to the small Amor, Fe, y Vida church - the night of our arrival two women from the church came with their daughters to greet us; both brought dinner. We ate plato tipico AND spaghetti and chatted. A few minutes later 6 other people from the church showed up to greet us, so there were 13 of us in our little living room - more people than we ever had in our apartment in San Pedro.
3. Freshly made tortillas just down the stairs, four for 1 lempira. Last night we had some confusion when we ordered 12, and instead of twelve tortillas we got 48 (for 12 lempiras). While they were preparing them I kept thinking "man, SOMEBODY ordered a lot of tortillas..."
4. Pulperias, or small in-home stores, are everywhere, so we don't have to go to the supermarket to get most things.

We miss our San Pedro friends a lot, but are adjusting to a new way of life. We are enjoying the weekend after our first week of work at our respective jobs... and there I will leave you all hanging. Details about said new jobs to follow.