The little things

Time has been good here, running as normal, at least as normal as normal gets. I go to school and help with Kinder, or anything else that needs doing. Classes are good, and the school has settled into a nice rhythm. There are always interesting things happening. The kids continue to amaze me. One day last week the bus had to leave an hour early because of a strike that was supposedly going to happen and possibly take over the bridge of the highway so that no one could cross. Since we were early, I watched from the window of the bus as one of the girls, Norma, crossed the river carrying not one, but two of her family members across, barefoot while fighting against the current. She must have feet of steel in order to do that. I have difficulty crossing on my own barefoot because of all the rocks that constantly jab into my feet.

The new play set at the hogar is finished now. It's quite something to watch the kids fly down the slide and then keep going because the concrete in front kind of slopes down to the next classroom. Danerous? Just a little. Supposedly there is supposed to be a fence built in front but we shall see. Fresita got really sick for a little bit. I think she had worms and all of the sudden she became listless and wouldn't eat. I got so worried and we eventually took her to the vet. He kept her for a few hours, gave her some medicine, didn't charge us money! and now she is on the recover path thank goodness. One of the little kittens wasn't so lucky :( She also got sick and didn't make it. The poor thing was so cute, even as you could tell she was fading, she was still purring. The other four seem to be alright. Not perfect because they have some sort of bowel movement problem but they are running around and okay. I just want to deliver them all safe to the kids, and ready to be good pets.

Carlos and Moises had a bit of a fight the other day at the hogar. It's strange how quickly things can turn from play and joking, to pure hostility. They were working on some homework and apparently Moises farted and then put his hand as if to grab it and rub it in Carlos' face. Well Carlos wasn't too keen on that, and since he had scissors in his hand he decided to reach over and gash Moises' leg. After that they  made a move as if to start hitting each other, but luckily Kenedi was there and took a slug on her arm for the team, broke it up and then I stepped in, grabbed them both and tried to sort it out. Moises seemed to kind of shrugged it off, but Carlos was shaking with anger. That kind of took me back, because I still don't see how that could have set him off so badly. I decided he needed to walk it off and try to get himself under control, so we went for a stroll around the block. He wouldn't say much but he looked better at the end of it. I still feel like there must have been something more, but who knows.

Carrie and Britta are here! It's so exciting and we're having fun. I hope they are enjoying themselves. I went to San Pedro Sula on Friday with Cristy. We stayed with Lenner (her brother and nicest man in the world) and went in the morning to get them. Unfortunately I slightly mixed up the times of their arrival so we left late to pick them up. On our way over, we had a bit of an incident when the hood came up and hit the wind shield and completely cracked the entire thing. It was an enormous bang and thank god we were in a semi deserted street or that could have been a problem. We continued on and finally got to the airport to pick them up. Me, Carrie and Britta headed back with a friend of Cristy's to Ceiba while she stayed to get the wind shield fixed, so here we are safe and sound. We went to the hogar the first day, and as we walked in Cherlin took one look at Britta and a mischievous smile lit her face and she tells me all sassy like 'I knew she was coming!'. Britta hadn't told Cherlin, and I'd only mentioned that a surprise was coming. She had then guessed what it was and I denied it, but the two of them really are inseparable. On Saturday the rain foiled our river plans, so we went early to the Hogar to help decorate for the fiesta. The Hogar looked really nice, and Zoe face painted almost everyone. There were lots of little tigers running around. The program was good and the food was nice, and it was my favorite to just dance around with everyone after. I got to tell them about our 5 30 wake up call which they were thrilled about, but they seem to be hanging in there. They are on miscellaneous job duty, which includes organizing the library, painting and covering books. I think they're enjoying it.

On Sunday we hiked to an amazing waterfall, on Monday after school we hung out at the river with 23 kids, and today we went rafting on the river. So beautiful, and such amazing days. Yesterday I was in charge of all the kids, and wore my voice out yelling to not jump off rocks, not bathe naked, etc. etc. I wasn't too stressed though. And today was beautiful. Drifting down the river with the sun and friends and everything. Amazing. So I'm enjoying myself a lot. I'm going to miss so many things. Actually mostly the kids. I love them. So thats it, same old story :) lots to look forward to!