Honduras..... We arrived in Roatan an island about 60 miles north of the coast and as we stepped of the plane we were smacked with a blast of hot humid air tinged with the smell of the ocean and you could taste the salt in the air. The customs were handled by 4 ladies who seemed to be totally bored with the jabber of tourists and the tedium of the seemingly endless lines of people who had the forms filled out wrong, the wrong forms filled out, or even no forms at all. As pastor Kruis got thru customs he was immediately grabbed by one of local bellboys and simply had to point at our bags and they were wrestled from the conveyor belt and placed on a large luggage cart. Once we had all the bags they were ran thru an X-ray machine that may have been used in an old Jack Palance sci-fi movie. As the bags exited the X-ray machine, they were dumped in a pile for the travelers to sort thru. Our negotiator, Pastor Kruis, them wrangled us 2 cabs for 7 men and a mountain of luggage, somehow we all fit in the cars and luggage fit in the trunks of 2 1985 vintage Toyota corollas... As we left the airport amid the honking of horns and the squealing of tires, we were treated to a fast and scary ride thru the country side to get to the ferry landing. All the men made it as well as the luggage (slightly worse for the wear). We purchased our tickets and proceeded to wait for the ferry to depart. We ate an empanada type snack filled with beef or chicken, pretty tasty....... We then watched the Olympic soccer match between South Korea and Great Britain relaxing talking and sleeping. As the time came to board the ferry, which was very modern and clean, and we got underway, I went to stand outside in the midst of the salt spray reliving my days at sea (Man I miss the being at sea......) I went inside and fell asleep listening to my music, disco music, just woke up in the ferry as it was pulling into the dock. Got our luggage and met two guys from the mission who loaded our luggage and we took off to the mission . Oh man, such a different culture here. There are no traffic lights, the policemen carry full automatic weapons, even the guys giving our luggage at the ferry were packing pistols...... Got to the compound and found a huge mango and avocado tree on the site, I took pictures of them. We have 1 1/2 hours till dinner. Just made my bed, tempted to lie down, but I'm afraid I won't wake wake up... One of the guys in our team wanted to go to a local store to look around so Mike one of interns and I went on a walkabout to explore a little bit of the neighborhood. We went and found the local "Pulpiria", kind of like a Circle K without the Circle. Turns out my buddy was looking for some chewing tobacco. I don't think he is going to have much luck finding it. After the fruitless tobacco search we went to the local soccer field to watch some of the local soccer clubs play. According to the locals they were wearing the Honduras and Brazilian jerseys reenacting the latest Olympic game between the two rivals that played today. In the Olympics the Hondurans lost 2-1, but on the local field, the Hondurans won 3-1!!!!!! The fans and players were very happy that the brazilians lost on the local field. After the soccer match we walked back to the dorms and ate nachos, (chips, hamburger, tomatoes macho cheese. Salsa and sour cream.) And all the water or Gatorade, or tea you could drink. After we ate dinner, we were given a do and donts of living in honduras, a couple of the interesting ones were we are not allowed to pet any of the dogs we saw running around some of them were quite mangy looking bit some of them were quite cute. The other strange rule was we can not flish anything but human waste down the toilet. Including toilet paper! After using the paper we had to place it in the trashcan! Kinda gross. After dinner all 7 of our team found ourselves back in the eating room talking and basically being friends. At 8:57 I went on to the roof to look at the moon as Josie and I agreed to do. I noticed that the 3 moon sweepers had pushed the stars to the lower left side of the moon. (Brave the movie, reference). As we were sitting on the roof, I noticed that I started to itch in my armpits, behind my knees, my groin area, and I noticed that my lips were swelling as well as my eyes. I told pastor and we went to the intern who is sleeping in the building and she called the pettingils (the missionaries) and while waiting for assistance I looked a bit more at myself i saw I was developing hives in all the places I itched. Erin the nurse, doctor, carever extraordinaire came over and gave me a shot of 50mg of Benadryl because I was having an allergic reaction to something, she also put me on zirtec and a steroid to help my breathing. I went out like a light woke up several times to go the bathroom (which is a wonderful necessary function down here.).
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