Tracey in Tela

Glenn with Tracey at Macaw Bird Park, Copan Ruins.

Today we said goodbye to a very special person.   We got to know Tracey, our Pilates teacher just several months before we left for Honduras.  She was fascinated with our stories of Honduras and before we could say Jack Robinson, it was all arranged for her to share our house and teach dance at Jeannette Kawas Bilingual from early October to the end of term.  That was quite a challenge for Glenn and I because we'd decided that we weren't going to share with any volunteers this time around in Honduras.    We are so glad we did change our minds.  Tracey has been an inspiration to us in many ways and had made a huge impact on our life, on the students in our school and everyone who has come into her life in Honduras. 

We picked her up in La Ceiba after a week of scuba diving on Roatan and we talked non-stop for the next 2 hours bus ride to Tela.  She loved our house as soon as she saw it and didn't mind the bikes leaning against the wall in the lounge and the mould on the bare concrete walls of the shower.  

Our unappealing bathroom

She found the noises outside kept her awake at first, but she put up with it all with never a complaint.  

Two days after she arrived, she went swimming with Glenn at the Tela beach.   Her bag was stolen with her new camera along with her expensive imported pants she'd brought specially to teach dancing .  Rule number 1 when you are travelling in developing countries.  Never take anything valuable that you don't want to lose.   That was only the start of Tracey's mishaps.   An ear infection she had picked up scuba diving caused her problems for the next 3 weeks but cleared up after several doses of antibiotics.   Next there was a parasite in her stomach but that soon cleared with some vile tasting tablets.   All these things would have sent me into a snivelling mess, but not Tracey.   She never stopped talking about the positive things in her life and how lucky she was to be in Tela with Glenn and me.

Tracey cooking the tea and instructing Glenn at the same time.

Tracey had planned before she came to torture us with  rigorous pilates routines and soon had Glenn and I on a strenuous program of pilates, walking (me) and swimming and bike riding.   In fact she never stopped.  Have you done your Pilates Sally?   And what about you Glenn?   She became known as Madam Lash!

We bought a router so we could share the internet.  

Glenn and Tracey at our new blue plastic table while I'm cooking tea.

Tracey quickly became a very close friend to us both.    She and I finished school early this day and had coffee at the beautiful Maya Vista Restaurant on a hill that overlooks Tela.  Of course she and I walked up a very steep hill to get there, but it was worth it as we could finish up with luscious French crepes spread with chocolate and cream.

She became an immediate hit with the children at school.     Here she is with a very special secondary student, who had calipers on her legs and has great difficulty walking but is very bright, and cheerful and speaks perfect English. 

The children loved their dance classes with Tracey and she had wonderful Latin talent to work with.   There was dance fever in the school.with children changing out of their drab school uniforms into the sexiest dance clothes whenever they could.   Some of the boys objected at first to taking off their shoes but she had everyone of them comforming and performing exotic routines in a very short time.

Everyone loved Tracey with her blond hair and her tall ballerina body.   When I walked with her down the street, I used to pretend to myself they were all looking at me, but really I knew it wasn't the truth.  Men would stop and stare and then help her with anything she needed.   She truly was a film star.

Tracey on crutches.

All wasn't good for Tracey.   A robbery, a parasite and ear infection were only the start of her troubles.   After a wonderful day in a cave with a river and hot springs in the mountains a puff of burning hot steam spurted out at her foot just as she was crossing the river for the last time.   She had first and second degree burns just below her ankle, causing her agony at first and then even worse, when the wound became badly infected.  Luckily she had really good medical care with 7 daily injections in her posterior and strict instructions not to put her  foot to the ground.  

She tried to take classes for a few days as she hopped across the classroom, still with a smile on her face but finally she succumbed to a week off school.   Her biggest complaint of course was she couldn't do pilates, swim or even ride a bike.

 A week before school finished, when she still had trouble putting her foot to the ground she was in total charge of the end of year Christmas concert with every class from Grade 1 to Grade 6 putting on a n evening performance for the parents. It was brilliant, the stars being Glenn’s 5th Grade class, who would have definitely won first prize at any eisteddfod.

Grade 1 children performing the bumble bee dance with Tracey leading from the side.

The Tela beach at sunset.

For the last weekend Tracey was in Tela and still walking on crutches we took her to a disreputable disco that just happened to be open on the Sunday afternoon.   At least she could watch people doing her most favourite thing in the world even if she couldn't do it herself.   After the disco we moved along the beach to a probably safer part of Tela where people were swimming in the water and watched this amazing sunset.

We toasted our last few days with Tracey.

We'd been wondering for months what had happened to Pizzeria Rome that had been open across the road from us when we'd first arrived.   Jose, the owner had disappeared and gradually the business had folded up Each day Jose's daughter arrived with her baby and appeared to be very busy.   No more tasty American pizzas were being made so our easy Sunday meal was no longer available.  

We discovered another pizza place in the centre of town with the same name and had a meal there to see if this was Jose's new place. It wasn't and the meal was not good.   But we did have fine Chilean red wine!  It was served to us in large paper cups.      Tracey put up her foot on the back of my chair  to ease the pain and her crutches on the floor.  If you look closely you can see the nasty red burn mark.

Tracey's bad luck did not finish there.  On her final night in Tela, we went to another popular high class discoteque with Vanessa for a meal.   The price was astronomical, like Hobart prices.

Tracey was the only one to have fish soup.   After we got home she vomited so violently for 3 hours that  Glenn and I sat on the pavement at 2am hoping for a taxi to come past so we could take her to the hospital.   Fortunately she came to the end of her vomiting before any taxi arrived and lay exhausted on her bed, on her side, and went into a deep sleep.   We went to bed with our door open and the light on, hoping she would alert us if she got worse.   We would have had to walk to the hospital for help if she'd needed it because we couldn't get anyone to answer their phone.   Tracey was rather seedy the next day but she fortunately recovered fully by the end of the day. 

I don't know how all these things could happen to one person, and a really nice person at that in such a short time. But I do know they way she handled it all was incredible and certainly helped to form a very strong bond between the three of us, a thing that seems to happen frequently in this wild country of Honduras. Tracey has gone to Cuba now and then will be returning to Australia, a new person to the one that arrived in Honduras only 3 months ago.   We're going to miss her deeply but we do know she is not going to be far away from us in Hobart when we finally head back home ourselves.

The Big Feria

  

The big day of the school Feria was on the 27th November.  It's so long since it happened, but I think because the experience was such a culture shock to me, that I couldn't bring myself to writing about it on the the blog.    But I think the photos tell the story of how spectacular the day really was. When Glenn and I walked into the school on the morning of the show, we discovered the feria was bigger than Ben Hur.   In other words it was a huge event and only 2 weeks for preparation.  Neither Glenn or I took part in the work, I was not well with a bronchial infection, couldn't understand anything the Spanish teacher wanted me to do and Glenn knew he wasn't needed.

My classroom was a show all of its own.   The Spanish teacher, had stripped my classroom and filled it up like a museum with a beach with real sand, a wooden bridge that stretched right across the classroom, potted palms, posters and a fishing net stretching across the ceiling decorated with fish.  Nothing had been done by the children.  The teacher had stayed at school until 10.30 the night before with her daughter, 2 of my students, and a mother.   They all worked like slaves from 12am.  I helped for a couple of hours but anything I did just wasn't good enough for the Spanish teacher who had her own agenda.  She spoke to me so rapidly in Spanish, most of the time I couldn't understand a single word she was saying.  It was good for my students though because she frequently asked them to translate for me when she needed something.

                                                                                        

This is one of my students who worked  without stopping  until 10.30pm.

Some of my girls were made guides for the day and learnt all their lines by heart. Every visitor who came into the classroom politely listened to their  accounts.

The boys in typical male Latin behaviour relaxed around the tables or posed on the bridge.

This student did a brilliant job as a guide.   She's relaxing on a park bench ( still in the classroom) for a few minutes before the next visitor comes.

A couple of my rogues on the beach.

There was a brilliant display of traditional Honduran folk dancing.

These are the Garifuna dancers.    Their ancestors came from Africa and they are now famous for their wild, rhythmic and exciting dancing, the original punta dance.   It was brilliant to watch.

Here are some of the secondary students in their bamboo thatched huts they'd built showing the wares of

their Honduran province.

Grade 3 children dressed in the traditional Mayan clothes representing the ruins at Copan.  They're learning young on how to appeal to men!

Some of Glenn's Grade 5 students are here displaying the traditional foods of their province.  The visitors were given the different foods to taste.

The day was a huge success as far as publicity goes.   The television crew where there with their cameras and the school was shown on the news for a few minutes that night.    To us, the children in the classrooms did no schoolwork for 2 weeks and discipline went out the window.  We were told that it was very important to put on a big show like this because if we didn't, our school would not look good in our district and we wouldn't get the student numbers to keep the school running.    It's all about public image here in Honduras!

Oh Dear! My Filling has Fallen Out!

I was in a severe state of nervousness,  I'd lost a filling and a piece from one of my front teeth.   I was not at all keen to receive dental treatment in a developing country.

Vanessa  kindly offered to take me to her family dentist in Tela this morning.   The dentist doesn't make appointments and it was best to get there by 8am. The trip didn't start off well, I'd put the piece of paper with Vanessa's new phone number and the address of the clinic in the bottom of my school bag and couldn't find it when we were due to go out the door a 5 to 8.  I had no other way of contacting Vanessa or finding the clinic.   Fortunately a more thorough search of the bag retrieved the details.  

Glenn and I caught the next cab into Tela and with a few more phone calls later the cab driver managed to stop outside an electrical shop with the same name as the dental clinic.   We were right next door  to the dentist and I was very pleased to find Vanessa. waiting there for us.   Bless her heart, she'd driven in to meet us on her motor scooter. 

The dentist hadn't arrived at 8.15am so we sat in his waiting room while Vanessa and I fended off the maurading mosquitoes.  Vanessa was the first to be bitten and I was still untouched.   In comes the dentist aged in his mid-fifties in his white coat and white trousers.  He owns a restaurant as well as being a dentist and had to look after that before he came to the clinic.   He told to sit in a rather old dentist's chair which reminded me of dentist visits in the 1950's in Australia.   The room was basic, painted white, with one fan directed at me which worked very efficiently.  For once, I wasn't sweating, probably because the temperature was only in the high 20's at 8.30am and that was a good start for the day.

Vanessa complained bitterly to the dentist about the itchiness of the insect bite on her leg and the dentist directed her into the nearby toilet cubicle where she sprayed her legs with alcohol. I was the next to be bitten.  The dentist looked closely at the spot on my leg, rubbed it a bit and sprayed some of the same alcohol on that as well.   He then prodded Vanessa's stomach telling her disapprovingly that she'd lost weight and then got down to the matter of my tooth.   After looking closely into my mouth he muttered some  Spanish words into my eyes, pointing at both my top and bottom teeth.  I understood the words 'orthodontist' and 'palette' and noticed by his chewing actions that he was referring to my habit of grinding my teeth at night.   I think he was telling me I needed a mouth guard to stop me grinding my teeth at night. Vanessa interpreted a little for me and told me the dentist could speak perfect English.

I was starting to feel quite confident and enjoying the chatter going on between Vanessa and the dentist.  I  could see he knew what to do with the tooth and it wasn't going to be a major operation.    The dentist prepared his own amalgam, filled up the cup for washing out my mouth, answered his phone and still did a good job with my filling.  For the first time in years, I didn't receive an injection in the gums and  there was no pain in the whole procedure.  He kept asking me if there was any pain and I'm sure he would have stopped drilling if there was.

We were completely finished in less than half an hour and the total cost was $30!  The last time I'd had a filling in Hobart it had cost $160 and I'd only got a slight rebate from my health insurance.

It's now hours later and the filling seems to be perfect.  Perhaps all the modern dentistry we have at home is all a con to make us pay more for treatment.  I wish I'd known about this dentist when I had tooth-ache in Honduras five years ago.  I waited until I got home to Hobart, lost the tooth and still have an ugly gap in the side of my mouth.

Vanessa told me the dentist has a nice big house and a flashy car but is certainly not a millionaire.     I will not hesitate to have any more dental treatment if I need it in Honduras.   

Thanks so much, Vanessa for being so helpful and taking me to an excellent dentist in her free time and making us so content to live in her beautiful country.

Doctor's Visit and School Fair

I've done really well healthwise until now, but have now succumbed to another dose of bronchitis which I suppose comes with the colder weather we've been experiencing.  It's been getting down to 21`C at night.  'Oh, no!'  I can hear the Tasmanians crying.  ( facetiously of course!)   Still something good and interesting always comes out of all problems.   I was taken to the doctor's last night at a clinic called El Buen Samaritan.

Vanessa was very kind, borrowed her brother's car and drove me into Tela.   The clinic is lovely and clean and reminded me of the doctor's surgery in the early 60's in Tasmania.   It's was all clean and bright and open, no televisions and brochures to make more money for the drug companies and the female doctor was so sweet.   The nurse took my blood pressure with an antique machine while the rubber pressure bulb using for inflating the band around my arm kept coming off.  Finally she managed to get a reading, which of course was very good.  

The doctor was wearing a pink apron with pictures of Marilyn Munoe all over it in keeping with the era.  She diagnosed a throat infection and a lung infection by looking down my throat with a good flashlight and using the stethoscope decided I had laryngitis. Not much money in pathology testing here!    I had to have one injection which was bought from the chemist outside and given in my buttock by the nurse.   ( It was a clean needle and syringe, I promise.)  I was also prescribed some antibiotics and some more cough medicine, the same as I had before which had no effect whatsoever.

I'm not feeling much different today but coughing much less.  I just can't talk much with such a crackly voice.

We are having an Honduran travel expo at school.  It's being called 'Feria', which means festival to make, firstly, the school look good and then the Hondurans love their country, second.   Any presentation like this involves total neglect of all school discipline, everyone is encouraged to make as much noise as they can and more, including the teachers.   All normal routines go out the window. 

I've had to sit in with the Spanish teacher who spent 2 whole 40 minute Spanish sessions organising the food for the day which the children are going to eat while the boys yelled, slid around the room, made paper planes and giggled.  My evil looks did nothing to change the situation and the boys just continued their behaviour.   Every now and then I would hear my name being mentioned and the kids would tell me what I had to do in the artline, but I couldn't do anything because there are no materials to use.   The children have to go out and buy whatever we need with money they get from home.

We are into the second week of preparations now, the first week was only noisy in the Spanish lesson, now it's noisy everywhere in the school and all lessons have ceased.   I was only at school on Monday when it rained all afternoon, Tuesday, I went to school and found I had a new student, a boy who's been deported from USA.    When the other boys were poking each other with umbrellas and running around the room and I could hardly get a sound out of my throat first thing in the day, I decided it was time to go home. 

Glenn came home early on Tuesday and Wednesday to keep and eye on me and today, it's been decided there's no school for the children while the staff continue preparing for the fair. The children take all their work home and get their parents to do it better. Glenn and I just couldn't get any information on what we had to do with the children for the fair and the more questions we asked the more we got ignored or fobbed off with very unhelpful answers.   We're definitely in the way.  It's really hard and stressful for us to stand back and watch the Honduran teachers work their butts off while we do nothing.

Tomorrow is the big day, starting at 7 am, finishing at 1 pm.  It's going to be a big event with the local television channel coming to photograph the students being tourist guides in their classroom dressed in traditional clothes.   I do hope all the hard work makes it a great success for the school.

Punto Izopo

We decided to have a quiet weekend in Tela.   We wanted to go on a boat ride to the beautiful beach of Punta Sal but as there was the possibility of a hurricane and rough seas we decided to go kayaking in a mangrove swamp at Punto Izopo.    Our guide Mark proved to be great fun and full of jokes as soon as he picked us up in his mini bus for our tour.   We were the only people in the group.   Fortunately the mini bus was a four wheel drive because the road was really rough.     The guide kept apologizing because the had to walk part of the way because the bridge was down.  It didn't worry us and added to the adventure. We walked passed a huge mansion and a half finished high wall.   The owner of this 'beach house' is now being challenged in the Supreme Court by the Garifunas, the indigenous people in the area for stealing their land. 

Tracey's the fit walker in front.

                                                                     

 These two Garifuna girls  rowed us across the river in a very leaky rowing boat for a small fee.  

Next we stopped at a hut belonging to the National Park where we saw a photo of Jeannette Kawas, ( the name of our school).   She is famous for saving the large national park, Puntal Sal to the east of Tela from developers, who wanted to clear the forest and  build holiday apartments   Sadly, she was murdered before she got a chance to see the results.  Kawas was a friend of the owner of our school, Graciela Bueso.

This was beautiful calm river, the starting point of Glenn and my first kayak trip in 42 years of marriage!

Tracey shared her kayak with Mark, a very experienced kayaker.

We got a really close look at this baby alligator and then another one further into the swamp.   As Mark said, 'Where there are babies, the mother will be waiting close by.'   He also gave Glenn and I careful instructions on how to paddle under branches and not sway to the side.  He warned us how the kayaks can flip over so easily.

                                                            

We followed Mark into narrow streams where the water was so black you couldn't see the bottom.   Mark told us how he'd watched a jaguar come right out onto the edge of a branch of one of the mangrove trees and the English tourist he was with didn't even have a camera with her.   I was so glad I had my small camera with me tied to my bouyancy vest so I wouldn't lose it and could get so many good photos.  It was amazingly beautiful and peaceful and so quiet with only the sounds of the paddles and birds.

Here we are getting really good with the paddling.  Mike then told us we had to go under a branch that was less than a metre above the water.  He went first with Tracey showing us how to do it without leaning to the side. I leaned back as far as I could and then....

...disaster struck!   The kayak flipped, I went in first and Glenn next.   All I could see was blackness.    Tracey didn't care.   All she did was take photos!

Here's the offending log we had to slide under.

The mangrove roots made a good resting point.  Here I am soaking wet, but warm.    The water was so black you couldn't see a thing.   I lost my hat which I didn't like, my prescription sunglasses stayed on my head, my cheap watch survived the drowning but my camera, inside my vest was saturated and hasn't worked since.   I got some lovely photos which were still on the memory card.   Luckily the aligators were too well fed by the bass which we frequently saw jumping out of the water.    Mark told us only  3 of his customers had ever flipped into the water.   

We finished off the day at a little Garfina village, Triumfo del Sol by the beach where we had a fish lunch  and  were entertained by these delightful children.  There were no hurricanes all day and it didn't even rain, but it was great adventure.  And Glenn and I are still talking to each other.

A typical day in Honduras

This news is now a month old but I thought I'd put it on the blog anyway.

October 12th

The day started well.   Tracey was being very positive about her ear infection and was keen to go for a swim, using my swimming cap and ear plugs to keep her ears dry.   I stayed at home for some alone time and Glenn and Tracey went off to the beach on their bikes.   Glenn took his backpack for his towel, hat and sunglasses and Tracey her new bag from Guatemala.  I had a lovely restful morning until 11am when Glenn came rushing in the door, mumbled something very quickly and told me how both their bags had been stolen from the beach.   They'd left their bikes locked together around a pole on the beach.

Unfortunately Tracey had been watched as she took a couple of photos and put her new camera into her bag. before she had a swim.   

Glenn and Tracey came out of the water and sat on the beach for less than a minute.   When they turned around their 2 bags had been stolen!

There was no-one to be seen on the beach and the only signs left by the thief were footprints.   Tracey lost a special pair of track pants ideal for teaching dance at school, her  new camera and bag and my ear plugs, Glenn lost his new prescription sunglasses and the key to the lock for the bikes.   A couple of men nearby were very concerned about the theft and insisted they would look after their bikes until they came back.   That meant a frantic taxi trip to the house to get the key.  Luckily their bikes were still there when they got back.

We decided to go out to tea after the shocks of the day and joined the crowds in Tela.   It was the night of the big soccer games.  United States was playing Costa Rica and Honduras was playing El Salvador.   If Honduras won against El Salvador they could be in the World cup but only if United States beat Costa Rica.   The suspense for the Honduran players must have been horrendous and they beat El Salvador by only 1 goal.   They didn't find out that Costa Rica had drawn with United States until they finished the game.    This meant they were in the World Cup.   After all the horrible publicity there'd been with the political situation, there was at last some good news for CNN to report about Honduras.   Tela went mad with excitement with long lines of cars filled with supporters carrying banners, trumpets etc and very emotional people driving erratically around the streets of Tela.    Apparently in Tegucigalpa, the capital, the crowds were very emotional and grown men were crying in the streets. 

The next day was declared a national holiday for all of Honduras.     It was the first time Honduras has reached the World cup for 30 years.   Meanwhile the political situation continues to be ridiculous.   The American government has been against the ousting of Mel Zelaya all along.  President Obama has supported Mel all along, even though he's a good friend of Chavez from Venezuela, both leaders with communist beliefs.    The United States senate party, after 6 months of condemnation against Michelletti, has now come out into the open and stated that Mel was replaced legally, he had committed crimes and misused government funds for his own purpose.  

Meanwhile there have been no tourists in Honduras for 6 months and most of the hotels are empty.

A Hospital Visit

Yesterday, we met our friend, Tracey, pilates teacher and housemate at La Ceiba.  She'd just spent a week at Roatan enjoying paradise and scuba diving.    This morning at breakfast she happened to mention her blocked ears once too often and as Glenn and I both needed out blood pressure checked this was a good time for all of us to visit the local hospital where we could see a doctor.  I dragged Tracey and Glenn screaming behind me to the nearest taxi and we started on our journey for the day. 

It was quite a hastle driving through the maze of witches' hats and blocked gates to enter the hospital grounds but the taxi driver managed to get through with the help of all the attendants sitting, watching and calling out directions and we were dropped off at the front door of a reasonably modern building in much need of a paint job.   It was 8.45am in the morning and all the seats in the air-conditioned waiting room were taken up by a mottley selection of at least 30 poor people all in much more need of attention than us.   However, we joined the queue lined up at a glass and barred window where there was a sign that said we needed birth certificates or some form of identity.   Tracey was the only one of us who even had a credit card, we'd left our passports at our house and we had fun spelling out our names and giving details in Spanish to the 2 people at the desk behing the bars. When we couldn't remember the correct word they would throw in a few English words to help us out.   We returned to our seats and as I observed the dirty floor I was very hopeful that none of us needed serious medical care.

We then found a chair to sit down, expecting to have to wait hours but it was only half an hour before I was called in to have my blood pressure checked.   Meanwhile we observed the other patients.   There was beautiful couple in their mid-fifties, the man in a terrible amount of pain who couldn't sit or stand for long.   His wife soothed him, massaged his back while he held onto her like a baby.  He was probably a worker who'd injured his back while working. The love and care she showed him was wonderful to observe.

I was beckoned into the surgery of a young female doctor who checked me very efficiently and found me to be in good health with no blood pressure problems.   Glenn was prescribed antibiotics to clear up a cough he'd had for 3 weeks and Tracey was also prescribed antibiotics for the start of an ear infection.   Tracey had both Glenn and myself as interpreters but also managed very well with her Spanish after only 2 weeks of intensive study in  a language school in Antigua, Guatemala.   Our doctor had studied English and could read very well, wasn't happy about speaking the language but gave us the Spanish words we didn't know.   It was a lovely, friendly visit.

We were then sent outside the building to an office, where they asked our ages, to pay the bill and then to the chemist, still in the hospital grounds who turned out to be the father of 2 of my students and was very pleased to see us.   As he chattered away to us, Tracey muttered, I hope he's concentrating on those tablets he's putting into that bag.   None of us were charged for the visit because Glenn and I were 'third age' patients and it was too hard for them to work out a bill for Tracey even though she is young enough to be our daughter.

We then scrambled into another taxi and were back at our house in Venecia by 10.30 am in much shorter time that we would have taken in any medical clinic in Hobart.  Both Tracey and I were sorry that we couldn't take any photos to record the experience even though we both had our little digitial cameras in our bags!

Independence Day

In our previous 2 years in Cofradia, even the thought of Independence Day in Honduras has been enough for us to spend more time in Australia or United States but this year it turned out differently.   The dreadful marching and worst still the drumming practice that had gone on for weeks before the event in Cofradia were all cancelled due to the political coup, the risk of demonstrations and the threat of HINI or Swine Flu.

We were asked to be at school on Monday the 14th of September, the day before Independence Day at 7 am.   We were happy with this because we were to finish at 10am and we had the rest of the week off.   Hardly a soul was at school by 8am and I only had 5 girls and 1 boy out of my 16 students.  We hung around in usual form waiting for something to happen.  

Glenn hanging around under the shade of a tree.

Shortly after 8, action started to happen.   The Pepsi Company arrived with a large tent for shade.  It was already in the 30's in the middle of the courtyard where everyone was going to sit.

The secondary students.

Various students put on presentations about Independence Day, several small students gave heart-rending speeches, the Honduran national anthem was sung and the secondary students put on a short play about independence.  

Miss Independencia

Miss Independencia was announced with much pomp and circumstance while she  paraded in a beautiful long dress and sash in front of the school.  This is something I can't get used to in Honduras as this sort of cattle parade went out so long ago in Australia and certainly isn't an important part of any event.

Miss Calix and the Grade 1 teacher.

The high achievers in each grade on the Honour Roll were presented with their blue and white handsewn badges in each grade.    Each badge was carefully pinned onto the shirts of the children by their class teacher with the help of the director, Miss Calix and various teacher assistants.

Photo Opportunity!

Proud parents captured the badge presentations of their little darlings in Grade 1.

My best students!

Diego was my only successful boy student to get an award.   He came to school with his mother and was totally bored without any of his friends to cheer him along.  All the girls are delightful students but the boys are sometimes a handful.   Nothing very serious though.

                                 Diego looking bored but very handsome!    
                                

A prep student.

The prep boys are the only students to wear these shorts with braces.  I think they look gorgeous, all sweet and innocent in the uniform.    It's a pity they have to grow up!

Here is someone's little brother enjoying the entertainment.

Once the presentations were over, Glenn and I were free to go.  The rest of the staff had to go to another staff meeting to have more discussions about where they were going for their staff luncheon on Thursday.   We were out the door as quickly as possible, to catch a bus to La Ceiba.   We were off to the island paradise of Roatan for 4 lovely days of holiday.