Conference and curfews in Copan

By now many of you will be aware that there is chaos in Honduras right now. Exiled President Manuel Zelaya has found his way back to Tegucigalpa and is holed up at the Brazilian Embassy. The interim / defacto / golpista government has responded with what seems to be to be alarming overkill, breaking up protests, shutting airports and borders and putting the entire country under a 24 hour curfew. While this is supposedly for the protection of the citizens, those same citizens are suffering as people can’t work and can’t get food. Businesses are suffering. News reports are conflicting and it is very hard to get an honest report here. What I do know is that the whole situation is causing significant suffering for the ordinary people here, and the longer the power-hungry leaders in Tegucigalpa continue to refuse to negotiate properly, the more they will suffer and that breaks my heart.

As a family the situation is causing some difficulties but we are quite safe. I am supposed to be at the conference on Honduras starting tomorrow, and I will, but it has been shortened and will be small as conferees may not be able to get here. Luckily we came early, before the return of Zelaya, as Ruth (my sister) was visiting and we wanted to show her Copan. However it wasn’t so lucky for her as she arrived in San Pedro Sula to catch her flight home just as all airports were closed. She is still in SPS, holed up in a guesthouse and waiting for the first plane out.  Luis, Maya and I were planning to be in Copan until Sunday anyway so don’t really feel trapped here (and it is a wonderful place to be trapped anyway), but we are hoping and praying things resolve enough for us to get home to Zamorano early next week.

Here in Copan the streets are quiet, but the curfew has not been enforced so we are able to get out and about (and I am able to do my work and blogging from a sun-drenched rooftop cafe!). I am enjoying the relaxed pace here, and the personal and cheerful service from businesses who are so grateful for my custom, but I would far rather things returned to normal as quickly as possible. Honduras, and Hondurans, can’t afford this shut-down.

We made it to La Ceiba!

This is a long planned research trip which had been delayed due to the ongoing political crisis.  Given that things had been more or less normal and I needed to get on and get some research work done, we decided earlier this week to just go.  Of course, as soon as I had made the plans, booked accomodation and scheduled interview appointments we were warned that the unions and pro-Zalaya faction were organising strikes and roadblocks for later in the week. After a very late night on Tuesday revewing our plans we finally decided to go Wednesday and attempt to get all the way to La Ceiba before the strikes started on Thursday, a decision helped by a changed interview date in the SPS area (we had planned to stop there for a night or two en route).

It proved to be a good decision – we made it and did avoid some disruption on Thursday – but also a bad one, it was a looong trip with a small child and very tiring – it took us 9 hours of driving, 100km of road works, one forced detour through the countryside, 2 broken bridges, 2.5 meal breaks and 5 toilet stops before we finally made it to La Ceiba. But it was good to get the North Coast, and get started on the business of this trip, gathering data for my research.

Of course it’s not all work.  Today we took a drive to Sambo Creek, where we ate seafood, and Maya was able to have her first splash in the Caribbean.  She as convinced it would be cold (and that there might be sharks!) but it didn’t take her long to realise it was not a kiwi beach… it was nice and warm and only a light shade of brown (lots of rain here yesterday). In the next few days we’ll be sailing over that water to Roatan, where she and Luis can spend all the time they want in clear blue water, while I keep working (ok, yes I’m sure I’ll have a few swims myself!).

We are of course watching the political situation carefully.  At the moment all the action is near the Nicaraguan border at Las Manos, ironically not too far from our little casa on the hillside but far away from where we are now.  I think we made the right decision after all.

Life goes on

My family is worried.  Back home in New Zealand reports of the coup in Honduras are filtering through, along with images of protests and clashes, and warnings against unnecessary travel to Honduras.  It’s a surreal experience being here, aware of the events taking place not far from where we live, yet carrying on with life as usual.

Politically the country is still in a stand-off.   The international community yesterday gave the coup leaders 72 hours to reinstate Zelaya or face sanctions.  Zelaya initially stated he would return today but now seems to be waiting for the 72 hours to pass before making a move.  The interim government has declared Zelaya will not be welcome here and, amongst those who have a voice anyway, it is clear much of the population does not want him back either, although both pro and anti- Zelaya marches and protests continue.  So most of us wait.  No-one really really knows how this will play out.

Of course this tension and political unease in the background has an impact on daily life.  We don’t have a TV but listen to the radio, and read newspapers, blogs and twitterers online.  We have prolonged discussions about the situation, and are constantly reassessing our plans taking into account the political events each day.  But the reality is that life goes on.  I go to university.  Maya and Luis spend thier days playing on the porch, going for walks to collect fruit and swimming in the pool.  The people around us also carry on as normal, the workmen next door rebuilding another little casita, the staff and students at the university all still working.  The pulpurias (small dairy-like shops) are open, as is the local supermarkets and petrol station.

All appeared normal in Tegucigalpa on Tuesday when we finally took a much needed trip to the supermarket and to have a look at a few cars (we are reliant on others for transport at the moment but are looking for a car of our own). People were out and about on the streets as usual, and the malls and supermarkets are all open. The only evidence of the political strife was a handful of soldiers on the road into town, and a small, peaceful pro-Zelaya march (about 300-400 people I would guess) passing by the mall.

Our biggest worry so far is the potential effect of trade sanctions.  Already there are rumours of prices rises in some places.  We are well stocked for rice and beans, and have a whole fruit orchard to enjoy but it is a concern when we really still are here on a student budget.  It is even more of a worry for the 60% or so of the population who are poor.  Petrol shortages are also likely as Chavez cuts the flow of Venezuelan oil to Honduras, and our neighbour has already experienced significant difficulty filling his car in Tegus. earlier this week.  While I’m not sure if it is linked with the political crisis, I have also had difficult accessing my Visa and NZ bank accounts from the ATM we usually use, the message stating that my istitution was not connected to the bank at this time. I’m hoping that is just a normal ‘travel in Honduras’ related issue otherwise we’ll be very short of cash for a while – although the Visa works fine for normal in store payments so we won’t starve.

The other impact this crisis is having is on my planning.  I should be well into making plans and appointments for my research trip to the North Coast later this month, but have put it on hold until things are a little clearer.  At the moment things are safe, and people are travelling normally, but the threat of the escalation of violence exists and if so, we will be happier and safer on our mountainside than on the road.  It isn’t a big deal except that it delays the data collection, but I do have my supervisors permission to stay home and make chocolate cake should I be unable to travel!

So, life goes on.  We wait and see.  We eat, sleep, work, swim… and hope and pray this passes quickly and peacefully.

Home in Honduras

After a month of organising, packing, travelling, holidaying (vacationing) and settling in we are now officially, properly here in Honduras.  This trip is a little different to our past visits here. We have a home, I have an office, and we are working on getting a car. Simply having a home base and a kitchen makes life in Honduras a lot easier, and we feel we have hit the jackpot with our little casita (pictured).

We found the house through a client of a friend of ours here last year.  At the time we looked at it last year it was an empty concrete shell which the owner was planning to finish and furnish for rental.  We took a risk agreeing to rent it before seeing the final result but we are very pleased.  It is slightly upgraded traditional Honduran style – tile floors, painted concrete walls, concrete kitchen and cold running water.  But it is comfortably furnished, has a coffee maker and hot shower (shower head water heater) so I’m happy.  It also helps that it is on a small farm surrounded by mango, orange, lemon, mandarin and avocado trees, and banana, coffee and corn.  It is very quiet ( a small miracle in Honduras), very safe and absolutely beautiful. The only problem at the moment is transportation, we are reliant on others for rides or it is a long walk to the main road for buses.  Hopefully in the next week or so we will find a car, and we’ll be properly mobile again.

We have arrived here in Honduras just in time for the big news of the year, that is of course the (rumoured? currently underway? attempted?) coup in Tegucigalpa.  I’m not going to go into detail in this post (that would be a whole post of it’s own… La Gringa has a good one here), my feeling is that while I can’t really see any sort of good outcome for the Honduran people, I also do not think it will escalate into the kind of violence seen in this region in the past.  We are very safe where we are, all is quiet and life goes on as normal.

While mindful of the potential for civic and political unrest, I am continuing with my research plans.  I am lucky enough to have been offered office space at a nearby (and respected) university, and am making the most of both the facilities and the contacts.  Over the next few weeks I will be meeting with people around here and in Tegucigalpa, then in late July will be taking the family to the North Coast for another round of interviews and a few days on the beach in Roatan. Apparently fieldwork is supposed to be rough and challenging but political instability aside, so far I think I’m going to enjoy the next few months.

After a month of organising, packing, travelling, holidaying (vacationing) and settling in we are now officially, properly here in Honduras.  This trip is a little different to our past visits here. We have a home, I have an office, and we are working on getting a car. Simply having a home base and a kitchen makes life in Honduras a lot easier, and we feel we have hit the jackpot with our little casita (pictured).

We found the house through a client of a friend of ours here last year.  At the time we looked at it last year it was an empty concrete shell which the owner was planning to finish and furnish for rental.  We took a risk agreeing to rent it before seeing the final result but we are very pleased.  It is slightly upgraded traditional Honduran style – tile floors, painted concrete walls, concrete kitchen and cold running water.  But it is comfortably furnished, has a coffee maker and hot shower (shower head water heater) so I’m happy.  It also helps that it is on a small farm surrounded by mango, orange, lemon, mandarin and avocado trees, and banana, coffee and corn.  It is very quiet ( a small miracle in Honduras), very safe and absolutely beautiful. The only problem at the moment is transportation, we are reliant on others for rides or it is a long walk to the main road for buses.  Hopefully in the next week or so we will find a car, and we’ll be properly mobile again.

We have arrived here in Honduras just in time for the big news of the year, that is of course the (rumoured? currently underway? attempted?) coup in Tegucigalpa.  I’m not going to go into detail in this post, my feeling is that while I can’t really see any sort of good outcome for the Honduran people, I also do not think it will escalate into the kind of violence seen in this region in the past.  We are very safe where we are, all is quiet and life goes on as normal.

While mindful of the potential for civic and political unrest, I am continuing with my research plans.  I am lucky enough to have been offered office space at a nearby (and respected) university, and am making the most of both the facilities and the contacts.  Over the next few weeks I will be meeting with people around here and in Tegucigalpa, then in late July will be taking the family to the North Coast for another round of interviews and a few days on the beach in Roatan. Apparently fieldwork is supposed to be rough and challenging but political instability aside, so far I think I’m going to enjoy the next few months.

The flu, and other recent happenings

wI am home with the flu (non-swine variety I am quite certain, but miserable enough) and thought this would be a good opportunity to do a blog update.  I realised it was an even better idea once I noticed that I hadn’t updated this since New Years.  Perhaps I should just redirect this site to my Facebook page or Twitter feed as these are updated on a daily (or several times a day!) basis.  For the moment I will keep this blog as I know some friends and family are not plugged into Facebook or Twitter, and because this is a family space rather than just me.  I also plan to be more diligent once we are in Honduras again

Yes, we are off to Honduras again, for another, longer round of PhD fieldwork.  We plan to leave in the first week of June, although we haven’t booked yet due to  a slow travel agent and constantly changing ticket prices (with the swine flu paranoia airfares to LA and Central America have been dropping fast).  We will be there for six months this time, and have found a home, office space and a kinder for Maya in the Zamorano valley, near Tegucigalpa. I’ll tell you more once we’re there!  

In the meantime I have been plodding on with my PhD work, and in March had a successful confirmation (see my research website for more info and updates).  Luis has finished one more paper for his degree.  Unfortunately he has had difficulty finding work, not helped by his limited availability as he needs to look after Maya when she is not in childcare, and because I am taking him out of the country for 6 months this year.  He has however found a niche assisting some of the Latino community here with computer problems (he’s quite the techie now), doing radio shows and playing with a local Latin band.  Both Maya and Luis have ad this nasty flu also, which has made the past 2 weeks a little miserable.

Maya is growing fast, and loves being our “little big girl”  Don’t ever call her a baby!  Check out some of her favorites on her blog.

 

Luis makes the cover of our local newspaper - performing with a Latin band at the Festival of Cultures in March.

It’s a New Year!

And it’s 5 days old already. We had a lovely few days with family at Ohope Beach over Christmas.  It wasn’t perfect beach weather but some brave souls (and little excited ones) were able to go swimming, and there was plenty of sandcastles and the occasional boat trip.  Christmas was incredibly exciting for the small gaggle of little girls there, lots of presents, lots of food including a crazy chocolate fountain and over-decorated gingerbread house, and all the aunties around all at once!

However the holidays are now over and today we are back into routine.  Maya went to childcare, I went to university (mostly to sit in fount of this computer screen and read blogs- which lead me to remember I should be updating this one but really didn’t add anything to the PhD process) and unfortunately Luis stayed home with a stomach bug (although that’s not exactly part of the routine!). 

So what will this year bring for our little family?

Obviously I want to make significant progress on the PhD- I need to complete the university confirmation procedures in February which means finishing the proposal and literature reviews, and then get into the data collection.  This will require about 6 months in Honduras, as well as significant amounts of online research.  By the end of the year I’d like to have the data collection completed, analysis underway and be thinking about some serious writing.

This means another year of hard work and travel.  It also means another year of changes and potential instability for Maya and makes things tricky for Luis.  He is looking for work, but given the economic climate and our travel plans he is not having a lot of luck.  However he is enjoying being able to spend a lot of time with Maya (as primary caregiver when she’s not at childcare), and working on computer and other projects at home and in the Latin community.  He’s also been able to host a few radio shows and is becoming a popular DJ in amongst Latinos here.  

So it will be another busy and challenging year.  I’d like to say I’ll blog more and keep you up-to-daye but I say that every year and it never happens, so we’ll take it as it comes.

Merry Christmas!

We’re off to Ohope Beach tomorrow, joining the family there for a kiwi beach Christmas. Maya is so excited. It’s the first Chirstmas she’s really understood and been able to get into it. It’s so much fun to watch and makes Christmas so special.

Anyway I must get back to cleaning and packing. This is just a quick note to say Merry Christmas to all my friends and readers. I hope to ’see’ you back here in 2009!

Ummm… we’re home

 

And have been for nearly a month.  As you can probably guess from the quiet on this blog it’s been a busy month.

It has been a month of celebration- Luis got his NZ citizenship and became a Kiwi, we celebrated 7 years of marriage and I had a birthday.

It has also been a month of hard work.  Starting to transcribe the interviews from Honduras, writing and presenting a paper at a national conference and trying to re-write the literature reviews and proposal for my confirmation in February ( PhDs at Massey are only provisionally registered for the first year and must complete a set amount of work and present a confirmation seminar before being given full candidate status).   Luckily Maya has settled well back at her childcare centre and Luis has been feeling well and is able to take on much of the rest of the weekday care.  This of course I  often feel hugely guilty but also immensly grateful for.

So onwards to Christmas.  The tree is up, we have been to one Christmas party, and missed one party already, have another two parties this week and I have to work out how to stretch an insanely small amount of money out for the Christmas shopping.  I’m not quite sure how I’m going to fit Christmas into the budget or my workload but we have a very excited 3-year old and I don’t think we’ll get away with having a quiet one!  

Luis becomes a NZ citizen!

Luis and Maya get settled on the plane.

Maya has her turn at the piñata at a Latin American Christmas party.

Crisis in Honduras

The rain which has bothered us since our arrival in Honduras last week became more than a nuisance. A tropical depression (number 16 apparently) dumped massive amounts of rain across Honduras and, as could be predicted in a heavily deforested country, has resulted in devastating landslides and widespread flooding, The damage has been compared to Hurricane Mitch, although with the death toll somewhere around 30 the mortality rate certainly doesn’t compare.

Here is some of the news-

Floods, landslides imperil thousands of families in Honduras

Flooding in Honduras Forces Mass Evacuation

Video of floods (You Tube)- in Spanish but the pictures say all.

We have been safe and (mostly) dry through all of this. It did give us some concern last week due to road damage, and will likely again as more rain is forecast this week and we need to travel to San Pedro Sula later in the week in order to do some interviews and then fly home.  However the hardest thing is knowing this is going on, it’s heartbreaking to hear daily of people loosing homes, and worrying to think about all the crops lost and infrastructural damage that will plague this country for months (if not years) after the international community forgets.

Collapsed hotel on the road Danli-Tegucigalpa road. We travelled past here last Thursday. On spotting the collapsed building we heard several people on the bus saying "Amen" and "Thank the Lord". We later found out it was a by-the-hour hotel. (photo from Reuters).

Just a few ants…

We have just engaged in battle with the biggest ant invasion I have ever seen.  Driven out of their nest by unusually large amounts of rain, they had clearly decided our room was the perfect warm, dry place to make a new one, or at least to evacuate to.  Luckily I came back to the room after dinner and caught them before they started climbing onto walls, tables and the beds, but the floor was swarming with thousands of determined little ants. Half an hour of strong detergent and wet mopping, and a towel jammed under the door to prevent re-invasion, and hopefully we can sleep in peace, but truth be told, I’m a little nervous.

We are currently in El Jicarito, staying with friends.  Things here are a little more basic than we are used to in NZ- a simple concrete room, outdoor toilet and cold shower, but the friendship is warm and the price is right (given the bombing of the NZ dollar since we arrived here) and until the ant invasion I was quite ok with it all.  We have been here nearly a week, and are planning to leave tomorrow for Danli to visit Luis family.  I have encountered significant numbers of ants there in the past but all outside (concentrated underneath the bird cage!) so not too much of a worry!

We had a good four weeks in Copan Ruinas.  I had a wonderful Spanish teacher and enjoyed taking some time out to do something a little different to thesis work, and to get a feel for Copan.  I think I made some good progress, although for some reason on this trip I seem to be having some difficultly “tuning in”.  Maybe it’s the accent, maybe it’s just that I need to practice more, but I am still finding it a challenge to move beyond basic conversation.  Maya is also quickly picking up some Spanish, learning new words every day- and she is much less shy than her mother at using them (maybe I could learn something there).  She was able to join a local preschool (kinder) for a couple of weeks and quickly made lots of new friends.  She absolutely loved it, and in turn they loved her.

The conference went really well and I made lots of contacts both personal and for research.  I guess that’s one of the advantages of doing research at a networking conference! It was exhausting however, and I was very happy we had decided to stay on in Copan for a few more days after the rest of the conferees left, both to relax for a bit and to be able to do good interviews with some local conference participants.

During our stay in Copan we were also able to take advantage of some of the tourist attractions, visiting a butterfly farm and a bird park, and a horse ride to a Chorti village, and Luis and Maya joined a kinder field trip to the Mayan ruins (I had an interview scheduled that day so had to give it a miss, but have visited them in the past).  Maya really enjoyed these adventures, particularly the horse ride!

We left Copan just over a week ago, staying a couple of days in San Pedro to break the trip and to sort out an internet connection- a wireless modem and 3G cellular chip that is allowing me internet access here in Jicarito.  We did have some problems getting the account activated and the connection is a little on the slow side but it is pretty amazing to be connected here.

It is now getting late.  I am trying very hard to put the visions of a swarm of ants in my bed out of head and am going to get some sleep.  Really I am.