Copan

My thighs and my abs are incredibly sore, but today was a fun day!

We started our day by visiting the historic Mayan ruins here in Copan. They were beautiful, and anytime I think of an ancient civilization creating such an amazing piece of architecture without machinery or modern tools, I am baffled. We had a great guide, Oscar, who did a wonderful job of explaining things about the history and what we were seeing.

After our tour of the ruins and the museum, we stopped at Jim's pizza. Jim is from Ohio and makes amazing pizzas! I really have enjoyed the food here, but wow, that pizza hit the spot!

Most of the group had signed up for horse ride through the surrounding areas. I was very excited, despite the fact that I can't remember the last time I was on a horse, it was hot, and I was stuffed from the great lunch. Our horses were calm, relatively small, and we had many handlers walking along beside us. About ten minutes into the ride it started raining, and continued to rain for most of the trip. This, I must say, made the whole thing even more entertaining.

We stopped after climbing a huge hill at a Chorti (direct Mayan decents) village. The poverty in this village was even more than we had seen before, but the worst part was all of the begging children. I remember that from Egypt and Rome. I remember how much I hate the feeling that it evokes inside me. I was worried when I came to Honduras that I would encounter that everywhere, but I really hadn't until today.

Well, as I mentioned, it was raining and we had gone up a huge hill. What I forgot to mention was how steep, muddy, uneven and rocky this road was. I must admit, I was quite terrified going back down. I probably overexaggerated the leaning back (hence the sore abs), to ensure I did not fall forward. Also on our way home my "slow and steady" horse decided we could do some trotting (hence the sore thighs). Oh! And on our way back into town, I saw a Hondurian wearing... an Auburn t-shirt! I smiled at him, pointed at his shirt and yelled, "War Eagle!" I'm sure I just sounded crazy, but he was nice enough to smile back and give me the thumbs up. It was a great afternoon, full of laughs.

Next, we went to another Chorti village, but one where Heifer had been involved. Although the poverty was still overwhelming, no one was begging. It is truly amazing how Heifer can teach such dignity and sustainability.

We listened to one of the leaders of the village talk for a long while about all of the struggles he had been through in order to get his small piece of land, cinderblock home and few livestock. Though this man had been robbed, stabbed and unjustly jailed, he was still full of hope and pride. He was telling us that there had been some disagreements in the village, I believe it was probably from people reluctant to change. However, he explained it as being, "sometimes we don't value what we have." I felt oh so spoiled and oh so selfish as I looked at his humble home, shoe-less family of eleven, out-house and lack of crops.

After dinner, it was time to type the journal. In Houston, we drew names to put us into the buddy system. Each pair was responsible for one day during the week. Tiffany and I had today. We were determined to do something different than just typing the events of the day, so we had a lot of fun with the photo journal that we created!

A group sat around telling stories and sharing laughs for a long time. I think the laughing made my stomach even more sore. I was tired, but knowing that I only have one more day with these amazing people-I just couldn't tear myself away.