This is the team of constructors in Tuntuntarra. Starting from the right;
The pastor gives a prayer most mornings and is also the clerk of works on site. Next is Richard the Batana farmer, which grows here very well and is the raw material for lots of pharmacuitical creams and beauty products. Another thing that MOPAWI are working on is the trade of Batana with companies in Europe. Hence the french woman here last week. He also has some funny T-shirts one of which says "I survived mardie-gras 97" with the catchphrase "what seems to be the problem officer?". I Can't pronounce the next guys name but he has silver teeth and his mum always comes to site and talks to me in Mosquita, and cristened me Powny (red in mosquita).
The guy in the pink shirt is the guy with two wives and 22 children and always takes a break to smoke a rolled up tobacco leaf. Miguel breaks into song frequently, "are you crying?" is what you say in Spanish when someone starts singing. Josue is always trying to talk football and my limited knowlege doesn't suffice, "Crouch-yeah he's English", or, "Tottenham Hotspurs-I've heard of them" [apparently they have Honduran players]. Isais and Kelly are my english students.
The family of constructors are from San Juan Cito near Tegucigalpa. Papa Miguel [sorry photo wont upload] is a reknowned builder in Honduras and is very thorough of the quality of everything, from the materials to the workers - he kept scalding me when I said I wasn't hungry. Miguel his son has worked on-site since the age of 12 and plays a good few tunes on the guitar, he looks a bit mexican too i think. I'm just trying to learn the lyrics to no vale nada la vida. Josue is the youngest and swaggers around working away steadily. In Tegucigalpa they work 5 days 7-4 and sat-sun if they want overtime. Josue spends the rest of the time playing football, pool, drinking a couple of beers and watching tv so pretty much the same as people in Europe. Josue and Miguel have moustaches which is a machitsta thing for respect, but papa Miguel doesn't need one, especially with his Rayban sunglasses. He has another son who works in the US as a mechanic who he hasn't seen for 3 years.
Beside the building is a Coconut field of 40 trees is being created which will start producing in 3 years. Apart from farming theres not much work around Tuntuntarra, its either farming, diving or transport; diving is for lobster and seafood for the Bay islands and transport can be people or goods. The rivers are very dry so its hard to get around at the moment. Its very very poor here and some people just do enough to subside. It's totally disconnected from the rest of honduras; I drove around huge palm plantations to the north in a half day pickup ride from Tocoa to get to the Gracias a Dios zone and theres a huge forest reserve the the west. It seems like another country; different language, food, people and transport. I hope the new building brings more education and money, if I return i'll bring more sunblock.
Now i'm in Puerta Lempira as was sick this last week so decided to go to the hospital after fighting stomach ache in Tuntuntarra. Free healthcare here and good Cuban Doctors so I was pleasantly suprised in the hospital. Puerta Lempira was used in the past as a drop off point for supplies for the Contra's fighting along the Rio Coco an in Nicaragua, which is why its quite developed. The MOPAWI offices are here and internet and a TV in my apartment (i havn't had a TV since January the 6th). I spent yesterday watching Indiana Jones[awesome], Sixth Sense ["veo personas muerte"] and Waterworld. My plan is for next week do a walk with guides of a mountain here if its possible, then go south on another pickup to Guapan across the Rio Coco to Puerta Cabeza in Nicaragua. Then across to Managua and home.
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