We arrived in Tegucigalpa on 19 April, it has been a long journey since we left from London Heathrow. We went to CEHDE (a training centre) in Santa Lucia after we landed, all of the staff there were incredibly welcoming and we were given a sample of delicious Honduran food. Here is where we would learn Spanish for the next week. Soon after each of us were escorted to the homes of our new families that we’d be staying with for the duration of our stay in Santa Lucia.
I entered their home and my host mother Gloria offered me a seat. Now my Spanish is less than perfect, and the language barrier became apparent. The first thing I mentioned was “Yo hablo un poco Español” to lower her expectations. However Gloria decided to proceed and make conversation, there were many long silences and blank stares shared between us. I was staying at their home with a national volunteer, Dina, luckily she took over the conversation and relieved some of the pressure off me. A little later the neighbours came over and introduced themselves, by some good fortune there was an American exchange student living next door, Josiah, he spoke Spanish and English! The locals had nicknamed Josiah “El Guapo”, which means handsome in Spanish. I am a vegetarian and I had previously tried to explain the situation to Gloria with no luck. El Guapo straightened out the whole thing in a matter of minutes. In Honduras whenever I tell people I’m vegetarian I get strange looks. I asked around and turns out vegetarians are a rare breed in Honduras, for some people I was the first vegetarian they’d met.
The next day was the first day of school again. GCSE Spanish rushed back to my mind, but it was still foggy. This week of learning Spanish was really fun because we also had the opportunity to teach the national volunteers English. There is something inherently rewarding about teaching and learning that I can’t quite put into words. Even though there was a language barrier between my host family, the national volunteers and myself, we got to know each other pretty well. The whole week went by so quickly, and we promptly headed towards Catacamas. It’s rather strange how quickly we all bonded, even though we don’t speak the same language. The UK volunteers and I were quite sad to leave our new friends and family behind, but we are all looking forward to starting our work in Catacamas.
Written by ICS volunteer Pritesh Pankhania
