Churches, Restaurants and Cobblestone

Well, Amy and I are settled in our cozy one bedroom apartment. Everything here is made out of concrete, so our walls are concrete also with a cheery yellow paint job accented with blue striping bordering the baseboards and ceiling. The floors are red clay tile. The town is situated along a hill so the streets are up and down and for the most part either dirt or cobblestone. The streets are narrow, as are the sidewalks, and the traffic can be speedy, especially the three wheeled BMW mini taxis. The cobble can take a bit to get used to when walking in or across the street. We live about 4 ½ blocks from the town square and the open air market where we go for our fruits and veggies. At times there will be music in the town square along with a roaming rooster or horse. Outside the bank are about six police, half with hand held metal detectors and the others bearing their automatic rifles, but they tend to be personable and say hello as we pass by.     

Our walk to the school in the morning is a waker-upper. We have about a mile walk, half of which is uphill. We share the morning walk with many locals either walking somewhere, doing chores or just standing outside their home or place of business. Everyone is friendly and we are really getting to practice our “Buenos dias” or “ Buenas” or “Hola”.

There are many churches here in Copan Ruinas. It is nothing to have two churches within about a 1/8 of a mile of each other. The churches are, I guess you could say, open air churches. The doors and windows are kept open and the sermon and  singing is in the air. There is a church two lots down the road from our apartment. Every morning at 5:30 am, the music begins. It begins again at about 6:oo pm and lasts for about two hours,  maybe a bit more. Oh yes, and on the weekends there is an additional round at midday. Our windows are the horizontal louvered type and are not air tight, nor are the doors, so we hear everything as if we were sitting in the first row. We also have an “open air” restaurant two lots uphill from us with only outdoor seating and last night we had a special treat. Someone was having a party, so there were Mariachis playing until 10 pm. Again, we had a front row seat. We never thought we would be so special.

Actually, we are enjoying our new life here in Honduras. It is a refreshing change. We don’t understand most of the words of the songs, but they are refreshingly different. I guess you could say the air around us is alive with life.