Week 1

This post is a week late due to internet issues.  Lots more to report from last week - next post will be up tomorrow, all being well.

  I left Scotland on Friday morning, left the UK on Sunday, and left the Western world on Monday.  Our first stop in Honduras was a town outside the capital (which is Tegucigalpa – try saying that after a cerveza or two).  We stayed there until Thursday with the other Progressio ICS team in Honduras, whose placement is in the Olancho province, east of us.  We had our in-country training together, which consisted of a series of talks and workshops.  The kind of thing they covered ranged from the social/economic/political context of Honduras to creating dynamic community workshops to a UN security briefing.  Some were absolutely fascinating; some were like being back in school.  Definitely came out having learned more about the country and the role of international development here.

  It was sad to say goodbye to the Olancho team on Thursday, but off we went to Siguatepeque to  meet our partner organisation (Red COMAL) and our Honduran counterparts (9 young volunteers from the communities we will be working in).  We learned more about the work of Red COMAL and our role within that.  If all our projects work out, we will be doing very varied and hopefully interesting work.  A lot of what we do will be raising awareness and helping to survey the needs of the rural communities, so we may not see direct results, but it is sure to be a very valuable experience and will certainly contribute to the aims of the organisations and programmes that we will be working with. 

  On Friday, we travelled to the town of Gracias, Lempira; our hometown for the duration of our time here.  Between the seven of us, we have two little houses next door to each other.  The two boys (Jolyon and Daniel) and two of the girls (Lola and Francesca) are in the smaller house and our team leader (Anna), Antoinette and I are in the other house.  It is a slightly odd arrangement, as only our house has a proper kitchen, but 2 days in we are already settling in to the open-door, two-house lifestyle.

  We don’t have washing machines, so hand washing it is.  And no oven.  But we (usually) have running water, which is (sometimes) warm in the shower, and we have flushing (when there's water), indoor toilets and tiled floors.  I really, really cannot complain.  We are living in comparative luxury.

  Gracias is a nice town.  It was once a colonial capital, so has some lovely, crumbling architecture and there are insane views down the valleys and up to the mountains.  The climate here means everyone can mill around outside more or less all the time.  During the day that is.  We are, after all, in Honduras.

  We will be starting our proper work this week, so it will be an interesting, potentially frustrating and very educational week!  Hasta luego.

Ellen xx