Back in the Swing

Sorry it has been a few weeks, again. Leaving my phone in the taxi from dropping Mom and Dad off at the airport turned out to start off a rough week. I bought a new phone the following Monday, it sucked to have to spend the 500 Lempiras but I got over it. Wednesday afternoon the new phone was stolen. Yes, less than 48 hours later, I was out a phone, again. It's been an unneccessarily long and complicated process obtaining another phone. Don't ask, but finally I have a phone and a way to communicate again! Trying to find transportation for my baseball team without a phone was difficult. Although I have a Honduran counterpart coach, I asked him to take care of the transportation while I was on vacation. Of course, I came back to the answer "no hay transporte". Luckily, after several trips to the mayor's office, many phone calls (the few days I had a phone) and more than one rejection, Friday afternoon, we found transportation big enough to take the baseball team and coaches to the Regional game on Saturday morning. I have no idea how my Dad coached my teams all those years. Coaching is stressful! Game day didn't start off as smoothly as I would have liked. We left late, forgot the uniforms, my two best players failed to tell me (or even know themselves) that they had turned 13 and were unable to play. In a way, it was a blessing because my Honduran coach saw the consequences. No, kids who are 13 or 14 cannot play! It is the rules, we have discussed this! No, the other team will not have any 13 year olds, I promise. We squeaked out a win against the newly developed but tough team from Juticalpa. They took the early lead but when 10-12 year olds playing baseball, the game can change at any moment. I was relieved when the game and the week were over.

This past week was much better. Back to school and organizing the projects I plan to start after Semana Santa (Holy Week). Although it takes 2 days to get a list of teachers and the number of kids in each class, things seem to be coming together and I should have a few regularly scheduled projects each week. Somewhat of a "regular" schedule, will be nice. I have a break from the school next week for Semana Santa but after that I hope to get up and running with all my projects. We'll see. Until next time... Here are few more photots from Mom and Dad's trip. And yes, Dad and I are at the top of the temple (Tikal). [First 3: Antigua, Tela in Chichicastenango, Tikal]