amapala

this weekend was our first three day weekend, and the entire group was determined to make the most of it. the majority, including myself, chose to go to the island of Le Tigre, just off the southern coast of honduras. the island is very small, and is made out of a volcano. the tiny village there is called Amapala, and that was our destination. the adventure started as soon as we got to the bus station. no, that particular bus service was not running today. seriously? we went down the street, where we heard there was another station. as we were walking, a bus headed to Choluteca, the final stop of the bus route, passed us in the dirt road and offered to take us. weird. didn’t you need to reserve a seat or something? oh no. no seats on this ride. that’s right, 2 hours standing in the aisle on an old greyhound-style bus. i guess it was normal though. after a second bus (we got to sit for this one), we found ourselves on a misty cement pier, and although the night was a dark blue, we could make out lights on the opposite shore at the base of a huge cone-shaped lump. our boat was a glorified canoe (made out of metal, i think), with an outboard motor, large enough to fit about 15 people. the ocean was warm like a summer pool, and the splashes of water along with speed of the boat was perfect in the humid night. from the dock, we made our way through the quiet town to our hotel, where we had a late dinner and met some germans. before going to bed, though, my friend Karah and i couldn’t resist a midnight swim in the ocean, which at night was as black as ink. the next day, Karah and I got up at 5 a.m. to climb the volcano. the gate out of the hotel was locked, however, and there was barbed wire on top of the wall. strangely, we found a set of keys in the door of the kitchen and one of them opened the padlock. it was still dark, and we quickly realized that...we didn’t know how to get to the base of the mountain. we asked some fisherman who were already awake, but they said we needed a taxi to get there, and that we should wait until it was light, because there were dangerous animals. um. well we followed their pointed fingers to the center of town, where we saw a man sitting with some bags of bread on the corner of a church. we asked him how to get to the mountain, and he said we needed a car, but to follow him. um. but strangely, we did. he led us down the street, and stopped at a house. “aqui.” he opened the gate and started up a tiny, three wheeled vehicle, which we learned lately was an island taxi. for $1.50 he took us on a 5 minute drive to the base. it was very odd, but at least we were there. the climb was very steep and very consistently so. the hike itself was very pretty, but at the top. oh at the top. the central american coast spread out as far as we could see, El Salvador on the left, Honduras in the middle, and Nicaragua to the south, with tiny islands dotting the surface of the grey Pacific. on the top of the volcano lives a solitary watchman, who guards some kind of signal tower. his name was Walter Martinez and we chatted with him.

later that day, we took a truck taxi to Playa Negra, where the sand was black. i finished a book and got tanner and swam a little. there were two guys from Spain who we met there who were involved in development on the island. during the course of the afternoon, Karah and i went out scavenging for food, because we hadn’t eaten lunch after our volcanic conquest. we found a pulperia (which is a tiny convenience store which are everywhere here), hoping to find some fruit or chips or little breads or at least a coke. we saw some banana-like things, but they were plantains, which are not good raw. we made sure by asking the woman if one had to cook them to eat, and she said yes, but also that she would prepare them if we wanted. IF we wanted. oh yes we wanted. asking only $1.50, she made us fried plantains, scrambled eggs, a stack of tortillas, and “butter” which was like a thick sour cream, washed down with a bottle of pepsi. it was incredible. Karah and i feasted right there at a small table, which their family probably ate at, on her own dishes, with her kids giggling at us from outside the door and her pigs and chickens running all around the yard. it was so unexpected and unreal. but there it was.

on the way back to Tegucigalpa the next day, we had a good look at the rural setting which we had driven past in the dark. it reminded me a lot of Kenya actually: dry, sleepy, surviving. a people hesitantly stepping out by inches from their traditions into a developing world, a little bewildered and doing their best on $2 a day.