October 13th 2009 9:15am
Friday October 9th
Work on Friday was filled with interesting conversations. I don´t know why, but everyone in the office seemed to have some specific topic to broach at different points throughout the day. In the morning, I spent most of my time discussing my views on homosexuality with Cristian and Heidy. They seemed very surprised by my love, acceptance, and support of the gay community, and had a lot of questions about if that conflicted with my wanting to be a pastor. I responded by explaining how that was an essential part of my wanting to be a pastor was trying always to continue in the path of openness and acceptance. Cristian came around to at least understanding my point of view, if not also questioning her own a little bit, but Heidy seemed kind of frustrated with the opinion I held.
At lunch, it was the young people (Betza, Edgardo, Heidy, Cristian, and I) and Patty, and we very quickly jumped into discussions on boyfriends, girlfriends, dates, marriages, kids, and tons of relationship advice. When we had finished eating, we continued to discuss relationships for at least another hour before returning to work. Slowly but surely, I am starting to participate more and more in the conversations at lunch, which I love.
Right before the end of the work day, I got an email from Patty inviting me to her birthday party next weekend. I was very flattered especially because the party is not open to everyone in the office. Patty can´t afford to invite everyone, so she is trying to keep the party quiet and only invited Betza, Edgardo, and myself. I am very grateful for the invitation.
Friday evening, I didn´t feel much like going to the Bible study, so I decided to stay at home. I made some chicken noodle soup, and read some more Hemmingway before falling asleep early.
Saturday October 10th
I woke up at 5:00am on Saturday because I had to get ready for THE BIG GAME! After the first Honduras futbol game that I watched with Freddy, we decided that we were going to go to the game in San Pedro Sula against the United States. A few of his friends wanted to go to the game too, so we had bought tickets, borrowed a van, and were ready for my first World Cup Qualifying Match.
By 5:30, the van pulled up to my apartment, I got in, and we drove off on the road to San Pedro Sula (SPS). Freddy, Sedoc, Vincente, Omar, Dario and I left when it was still dark out when we left, and we wound our way out of the city and up through the mountains. I couldn´t sleep because I needed to watch the winding roads to keep from getting sick.
We stopped outside of Comayagua for breakfast, and enjoyed the most nutricious foods that Dunkin Donuts has to offer. As we continued down the road to SPS, I watched the early morning sun peek over the ranges. The very tops of the mountains were kept hidden by clouds, but the sunlight breached the upper sections of the mountains, and sent shadows cascading down their slopes. It was a beautiful drive.
Outside of Comayagua, I began noticing a lot of little huts, no larger than an office cubicle set up on what appeared to be farm land. Sedoc explained to me that these were squatters trying to obtain land for their own. He told me about how the police go into these little hut villages at night and try and burn them down, but the squatters always come back. After about seven years, the land is theirs to do with as they please, either to farm or to sell. The explaination was brief, but intruiging to me.
We finally arrived in SPS around 10:30am, and we promptly checked into the hostel where we were staying. After we got settled into our rooms, we proceeded to a local eatery called "Pecos Bill". It reminded me of something you would see at a beach, as the restaurant was located up in the midst of several palm trees.
We ate lunch and sat around watching some of the earlier futbol games on TV for a while before heading back to the hostel to rest for a while before heading to the stadium for the game. I had just pulled the sheet off the bed and was preparing to get in when Cente (short for Vincente, pronounced Chen-tay) burst into the room and turned on the TV. The stadium was already filling up, which meant we were late.
It was close to 1:00, but the game didn´t start until 8:00. We all got dressed very quickly and were out on the road to the stadium as quickly as possible. Due to some traffic, and a stop to get money out of an ATM, we didn´t get to the stadium until close to 2:00. There were huge lines of blue and white waiting around, but when I asked if they were in line to get tickets, I found out that they were in line to get into the stadium.
Friday October 9th
Work on Friday was filled with interesting conversations. I don´t know why, but everyone in the office seemed to have some specific topic to broach at different points throughout the day. In the morning, I spent most of my time discussing my views on homosexuality with Cristian and Heidy. They seemed very surprised by my love, acceptance, and support of the gay community, and had a lot of questions about if that conflicted with my wanting to be a pastor. I responded by explaining how that was an essential part of my wanting to be a pastor was trying always to continue in the path of openness and acceptance. Cristian came around to at least understanding my point of view, if not also questioning her own a little bit, but Heidy seemed kind of frustrated with the opinion I held.
At lunch, it was the young people (Betza, Edgardo, Heidy, Cristian, and I) and Patty, and we very quickly jumped into discussions on boyfriends, girlfriends, dates, marriages, kids, and tons of relationship advice. When we had finished eating, we continued to discuss relationships for at least another hour before returning to work. Slowly but surely, I am starting to participate more and more in the conversations at lunch, which I love.
Right before the end of the work day, I got an email from Patty inviting me to her birthday party next weekend. I was very flattered especially because the party is not open to everyone in the office. Patty can´t afford to invite everyone, so she is trying to keep the party quiet and only invited Betza, Edgardo, and myself. I am very grateful for the invitation.
Friday evening, I didn´t feel much like going to the Bible study, so I decided to stay at home. I made some chicken noodle soup, and read some more Hemmingway before falling asleep early.
Saturday October 10th
I woke up at 5:00am on Saturday because I had to get ready for THE BIG GAME! After the first Honduras futbol game that I watched with Freddy, we decided that we were going to go to the game in San Pedro Sula against the United States. A few of his friends wanted to go to the game too, so we had bought tickets, borrowed a van, and were ready for my first World Cup Qualifying Match.
By 5:30, the van pulled up to my apartment, I got in, and we drove off on the road to San Pedro Sula (SPS). Freddy, Sedoc, Vincente, Omar, Dario and I left when it was still dark out when we left, and we wound our way out of the city and up through the mountains. I couldn´t sleep because I needed to watch the winding roads to keep from getting sick.
We stopped outside of Comayagua for breakfast, and enjoyed the most nutricious foods that Dunkin Donuts has to offer. As we continued down the road to SPS, I watched the early morning sun peek over the ranges. The very tops of the mountains were kept hidden by clouds, but the sunlight breached the upper sections of the mountains, and sent shadows cascading down their slopes. It was a beautiful drive.
Outside of Comayagua, I began noticing a lot of little huts, no larger than an office cubicle set up on what appeared to be farm land. Sedoc explained to me that these were squatters trying to obtain land for their own. He told me about how the police go into these little hut villages at night and try and burn them down, but the squatters always come back. After about seven years, the land is theirs to do with as they please, either to farm or to sell. The explaination was brief, but intruiging to me.
We finally arrived in SPS around 10:30am, and we promptly checked into the hostel where we were staying. After we got settled into our rooms, we proceeded to a local eatery called "Pecos Bill". It reminded me of something you would see at a beach, as the restaurant was located up in the midst of several palm trees.
We ate lunch and sat around watching some of the earlier futbol games on TV for a while before heading back to the hostel to rest for a while before heading to the stadium for the game. I had just pulled the sheet off the bed and was preparing to get in when Cente (short for Vincente, pronounced Chen-tay) burst into the room and turned on the TV. The stadium was already filling up, which meant we were late.
It was close to 1:00, but the game didn´t start until 8:00. We all got dressed very quickly and were out on the road to the stadium as quickly as possible. Due to some traffic, and a stop to get money out of an ATM, we didn´t get to the stadium until close to 2:00. There were huge lines of blue and white waiting around, but when I asked if they were in line to get tickets, I found out that they were in line to get into the stadium.
We strategically plotted the best line to get in before finally choosing one around the back of the stadium. If a baseball game starts at 7:10, I try to get there by 6:45 at the earliest. We were at the stadium six hours before the game, and were late. The lines themselves were free forming, and didn´t follow any sort of path or direction, which led to lines getting jumbled up, confusion, line jumping, and bribes to get ahead in line. It was nuts.
One man tried to tell me that he was an American citizen (if he was, he had the thickest Honduran accent I have ever heard), and that I should let him in to stand with me because we were both Americans. I told him that he would have to wait in the back of the line just like everyone else, and he started telling me that I was not an American. Real Americans put other Americans ahead of Hondurans. I was happy to defy that stereotype, but sad that it existed in the first place.
We got into the stadium by 4:45, and I was told that seat numbers really meant nothing in futbol. Part of that may have to do with how there weren´t any seats actually, just huge concrete stairs where you would sit. We had apparently paid for some good seats, but ended up five or six rows from the field, at what would be roughly the 10 yard line. I thought the seats were fantastic, but apparently, the higher up you are, the better you can see the whole game, and my friends weren´t that happy with where we were.
It was three hours before game time, but the stadium was already packed. They played lots of music, and everyone in the stadium would dance and sing, getting excited for the game. At 5:00, paratroopers dropped out of a helicopter and landed in the stadium. At 5:30, the wave started. I couldn´t believe it. There was continued entertainment and activities to watch all the way up until game time.
In our seats, I was getting some mixed looks from people who weren´t sure why the American was wearing a Honduras jersey. After Cente put some face paint on me, people seemed more trusting of my preference for a Honduran victory. Both Honduras and the US needed the win to qualify for the World Cup in South Africa, but the US was much closer to qualifying than Honduras. If I lived in the US, I probably would not have even known that the game existed. I was definitely rooting for Honduras.
Gradually people accepted me as a Honduras fan, and around 7:30, the women behind us who had been dancing, started pulling on my shirt to get me to dance with them. I decided to take a play out of Ryan Turner´s playbook, and go ahead and dance. I was a little surprised with myself, because it wasn´t something that I would typically do, but it was a lot of fun. All of the people in our section turned around to watch the Gringo dancing with the Hondureñas. At that point, they were sure that I was rooting for Honduras.
The game started at 8:00, and I can only describe futbol games as the Rocky Horror Picture Show of sporting events. Certain events in the game elicit certain responses from the crowd. When the opposing goalie is about to kick the ball, everyone whistles. When the opposing team has control, certain horns are blown. When Honduras has the ball, other horns are blown. Certain chants are yelled for corner kicks, even certain things are thrown when a player is fouled.
After the first half, the score was 0-0, but both teams had missed an opportunity to score. The second half was significanly more exciting. Honduras scored the first goal of the game, and everyone in the stadium erupted. I was jumping up and down, Omar and Freddy were hugging. Dario sat down and buried his head in his hands to keep from crying. Some of women around us did cry. From that goal, we seemed unstoppable. Everyone was on their feet yelling and shouting and - The US scored within the next five minutes to even the game up 1-1. Then they scored again. 1-2. And again. 1-3. A nearly impossible deficit to overcome.
But Honduras wasn´t done yet. With only 12 minutes left in the game, Honduras managed to land another goal! But it wasn´t good, because of an offsides call. I had never seen so much garbage thrown onto a field before at a game. Some bottles hit some players and coaches. With 10 minutes left, Honduras scored a goal that counted, and the score was 2-3. With only a couple of minutes left in the game, after a corner kick, a player was fouled inside of the box, which meant a freekick, which is as good as a goal. We were going to tie the game! Everyone went wild...until the Honduran player missed the goal.
The entire country was devastated.
We walked back to the car in silence. No one wanted to talk about the game. Everyone was depressed. We went back to the hostel and slept.
Sunday October 11th
Sedoc and I woke up around 7:00 and ate breakfast at the hostel. He was still upset about the game, and so he talked the other guys into going to the beach for the morning to try and have a little bit of fun so that the whole weekend wouldn´t be ruined.
Puerto Cortez is about 45 minutes away from SPS, and we got there around 9:30. We spent the morning at one of the public beaches on the Carribbean Sea. The water so blue, and the white sand was georgous. We played in the ocean for a while, and I dug my traditional beach hole before everyone decided that the waves weren´t big enough, and that we needed to go to Tela instead. Monday was a national holiday, so no one needed to go into work anyway.
Tela is another city on the northern coast of Honduras, but due to a lack of a more developed roadway system, we had to drive back to SPS and then out to Tela. We didn´t get to the beach until close to 5:00, but the sunset and the waves made the drive worth it.
Cente knew some hotel owners in Tela, and we were able to stay the night for free in the hotel Puerto Rico. We went out that night to one of the bars on the beach, and finally talked a little bit about the game, and about the weekend. It was a lot of fun, and we didn´t get to bed until close to midnight.
Monday October 12th
Sedoc and I were awake earlier than everyone else, and we headed down for a walk on the beach. It was hot, but with the breeze floating by, the walk was very nice.
We left Tela around 10:30am, and didn´t get back to Tegucigalpa until close to 6:30pm. Between construction, stops for food, more stops for food, and an hour long stop for lunch at the largest natural lake in Honduras, the trip took a long time.
I fell asleep very early last night, as I was very tired from a long weekend in the North.
Happy Birthday Daniel
One man tried to tell me that he was an American citizen (if he was, he had the thickest Honduran accent I have ever heard), and that I should let him in to stand with me because we were both Americans. I told him that he would have to wait in the back of the line just like everyone else, and he started telling me that I was not an American. Real Americans put other Americans ahead of Hondurans. I was happy to defy that stereotype, but sad that it existed in the first place.
We got into the stadium by 4:45, and I was told that seat numbers really meant nothing in futbol. Part of that may have to do with how there weren´t any seats actually, just huge concrete stairs where you would sit. We had apparently paid for some good seats, but ended up five or six rows from the field, at what would be roughly the 10 yard line. I thought the seats were fantastic, but apparently, the higher up you are, the better you can see the whole game, and my friends weren´t that happy with where we were.
It was three hours before game time, but the stadium was already packed. They played lots of music, and everyone in the stadium would dance and sing, getting excited for the game. At 5:00, paratroopers dropped out of a helicopter and landed in the stadium. At 5:30, the wave started. I couldn´t believe it. There was continued entertainment and activities to watch all the way up until game time.
In our seats, I was getting some mixed looks from people who weren´t sure why the American was wearing a Honduras jersey. After Cente put some face paint on me, people seemed more trusting of my preference for a Honduran victory. Both Honduras and the US needed the win to qualify for the World Cup in South Africa, but the US was much closer to qualifying than Honduras. If I lived in the US, I probably would not have even known that the game existed. I was definitely rooting for Honduras.
Gradually people accepted me as a Honduras fan, and around 7:30, the women behind us who had been dancing, started pulling on my shirt to get me to dance with them. I decided to take a play out of Ryan Turner´s playbook, and go ahead and dance. I was a little surprised with myself, because it wasn´t something that I would typically do, but it was a lot of fun. All of the people in our section turned around to watch the Gringo dancing with the Hondureñas. At that point, they were sure that I was rooting for Honduras.
The game started at 8:00, and I can only describe futbol games as the Rocky Horror Picture Show of sporting events. Certain events in the game elicit certain responses from the crowd. When the opposing goalie is about to kick the ball, everyone whistles. When the opposing team has control, certain horns are blown. When Honduras has the ball, other horns are blown. Certain chants are yelled for corner kicks, even certain things are thrown when a player is fouled.
After the first half, the score was 0-0, but both teams had missed an opportunity to score. The second half was significanly more exciting. Honduras scored the first goal of the game, and everyone in the stadium erupted. I was jumping up and down, Omar and Freddy were hugging. Dario sat down and buried his head in his hands to keep from crying. Some of women around us did cry. From that goal, we seemed unstoppable. Everyone was on their feet yelling and shouting and - The US scored within the next five minutes to even the game up 1-1. Then they scored again. 1-2. And again. 1-3. A nearly impossible deficit to overcome.
But Honduras wasn´t done yet. With only 12 minutes left in the game, Honduras managed to land another goal! But it wasn´t good, because of an offsides call. I had never seen so much garbage thrown onto a field before at a game. Some bottles hit some players and coaches. With 10 minutes left, Honduras scored a goal that counted, and the score was 2-3. With only a couple of minutes left in the game, after a corner kick, a player was fouled inside of the box, which meant a freekick, which is as good as a goal. We were going to tie the game! Everyone went wild...until the Honduran player missed the goal.
The entire country was devastated.
We walked back to the car in silence. No one wanted to talk about the game. Everyone was depressed. We went back to the hostel and slept.
Sunday October 11th
Sedoc and I woke up around 7:00 and ate breakfast at the hostel. He was still upset about the game, and so he talked the other guys into going to the beach for the morning to try and have a little bit of fun so that the whole weekend wouldn´t be ruined.
Puerto Cortez is about 45 minutes away from SPS, and we got there around 9:30. We spent the morning at one of the public beaches on the Carribbean Sea. The water so blue, and the white sand was georgous. We played in the ocean for a while, and I dug my traditional beach hole before everyone decided that the waves weren´t big enough, and that we needed to go to Tela instead. Monday was a national holiday, so no one needed to go into work anyway.
Tela is another city on the northern coast of Honduras, but due to a lack of a more developed roadway system, we had to drive back to SPS and then out to Tela. We didn´t get to the beach until close to 5:00, but the sunset and the waves made the drive worth it.
Cente knew some hotel owners in Tela, and we were able to stay the night for free in the hotel Puerto Rico. We went out that night to one of the bars on the beach, and finally talked a little bit about the game, and about the weekend. It was a lot of fun, and we didn´t get to bed until close to midnight.
Monday October 12th
Sedoc and I were awake earlier than everyone else, and we headed down for a walk on the beach. It was hot, but with the breeze floating by, the walk was very nice.
We left Tela around 10:30am, and didn´t get back to Tegucigalpa until close to 6:30pm. Between construction, stops for food, more stops for food, and an hour long stop for lunch at the largest natural lake in Honduras, the trip took a long time.
I fell asleep very early last night, as I was very tired from a long weekend in the North.
Happy Birthday Daniel
alan, i just want to tell you that i love you to pieces, i love the things you write about, and i love being able to read updates from you :) you're in my prayers ♥
ReplyDelete