*Updated* Semana Santa (Holy Week)

According to this article written in La Prensa, about a million flocked to the beaches in Honduras. It's what happens every year. The country basically shuts down and everyone floods to the beaches, the pools, the resorts to get away from it all. Prices are increased and higher security is set to keep things running smoothly, including the red cross.

I haven't posted about this yet, but Papa had the idea to have a little food stand on the beach at Puerto Cortes. He got a permit which the city gave to him along with a permit to sell beer and Pepsi products. I have not heard from him yet as to how things went. We decided that we should not talk for the last 3 days because he was going to be too busy over the weekend, it being the busiest time. He is a determined man and a hard worker so I can imagine that things are okay...but I'm anxious to find out how everything went!

I found a few articles on La Prensa, a Honduran online newspaper that talked about the weekend. Sounds like a crazy time with a LOT of drinking going on. Here is an article about that. 27 million beers consumed is the estimate. That doesn't include liquor. Check out other articles here & here about how the holy week went if you can read spanish. I had to translate using the Altavista Babel Fish translation tool :O).

The photo above is from the beach where Papa was working. He says, "it's like a sea of ants" when describing the beaches during semana santa.

*UPDATE -4/10/07

Unfortunately the weather took a turn for the worse this past weekend. The image above was probably from Thursday which was the last and only good business day for Papa and all the other beach vendors. I talked to Papa Thursday night before bed and he was excited about the good business days ahead. A storm ended up coming through on Thursday night and things never got much better after that. Friday was slow due to overcast weather and then a cold front came in on Saturday which kept everyone away from the beach. Papa said he was cold, and it had to be for Papa to say that since he's like a walking furnace most of the time! Everyone lost money and Papa's stand didn't take as big a loss as some of the others who invested a lot more money. He got great feedback on the food he was selling and his employees all worked very hard...but in the end. It was a loss. I'm sure there were many valuable lessons learned though. I'm proud of him for working so hard and giving it his best effort. A loss is never easy, but there's got to be wins and loses in life.

Water Blogged

Busy Busy
There has been so much going on these days that I'm having a hard time sitting down to write. I've been busy trying to get papers in order to bring to the Honduran consulate next month in Chicago. I've requested April 25th-27th off work to make this trip. I am packing the kids into the car along with a dear friend and we are driving to Chicago to stay with another friend who lives there so Sister Sprout and I can go off and see the consulate and begin the process of applying for residency in Honduras. Pray that they don't deny me or say I'm missing something!

Rainy Days
So the weather is finally taking a warmer turn. We even broke 80 degrees this past Monday. That was such a teaser for summer. But now the rains have started and just like they say, the rains will bring the green and the flowers that we desperately need after a dead and gray MN winter. My dad's tulips are starting to sprout in the front gardens and every day little Brother Sprout walks by and points out the "babies" as he calls them because they were explained as "baby flowers". Now they are just "babies" to him and he's so excited to point them out every morning and night when we walk past. They grow a little every day so I enjoy watching him discover things about the earth this way and at some point I'll have to explain they are no longer "baby flowers".

Speaking of rain, it's an understatement to say that it rains a lot in Honduras. It can be quite scary for some when the rains come fast and furious. Here is a news article about a recent rain in Honduras. heavy rains It killed two and left 25,000 missing. I don't really understand what that "missing" means. Not sure where they get those numbers from? And where do they all go when they are missing? Probably just made camp somewhere trying to stay dry. I haven't seen any further reports about these 25,000 missing so I'll take it to mean that everyone found their way home once they could cross whatever waterway was blocking them.

Water Topics
Did you know that it was World Water Day in Honduras a few days ago? I didn't. My favorite Honduras blogger wrote a great article about it here.

Also a water equipment company in Minneapolis has offered up $4.6 million to help a state in Honduras with getting clean water. This will be helping about 220,000 Hondurans have access to safe and clean water solutions. I can't remember what the percentage of population in Honduras is that doesn't have access to usable water, but it's actually quite high when you look at the number of people living in rural communities. So this company is taking on the challenge. Check out the news article here. Kudos to the hometown!

Everywhere we went while in Honduras, we didn't have an issue with the water. I've read that the water can be turned off if the demand is too high or it can be rationed and only on for a few hours a day or even only turned once a week or less!

But the question now is- will we have water in our new home?? Papa went to a town meeting on Sunday morning in Copan asking the city counsel to allow us to have access to the community well water. We were denied. Turns out the counsel men are comprised of mostly farmers or people who are only interested in helping the farmers. The community well water is cheaper than the regular city water and is un-metered. Not sure how they can get away with that, but it's a small town and they have figured out how to make sure only the select have rights to this water line. So Papa will have to go back another day and ask another group of men about getting city water. I also don't know what the difference is in the water other than the price and the fact that the well water is un-metered. I'm assuming that most of the water in the town is from the city and as yet, I haven't heard of any issues with the water.

I think I'll go take a bath now.