los días

I have no concept of time.

That's a half truth.

I get up around 6 A.M. Sometimes I purge myself of dust using a stream of ice-cold water that pours unsteadily from a dirty white PVC pipe onto my shivering naked body. I watch the sun begin to illuminate the hazy mountains through the cross-hatched, wire mesh square that serves as the bathroom window.

I arrive at school just before 7 A.M. my kids loud and bright-faced.

7 to 7.40 A.M : Social Studies. I find it a bit ridiculous that my Honduraños students should learn about the 13 colonies or the Boston Tea Party from a norteamericano social studies book. So I choose to teach them current events and world geography.

7.40 to 8.20 A.M : Matematica. Perimeter = l + l + w + w, so why does the book find it necessary to break something that already works so perfectly and simply. But no, here comes the distributive property of multiplication saying P = (2 x l) + 2 x w). Area is measure in square units. And a unit is a yard or an inch or a kilometer. An area cannot be 64 square units. This is a problem.

8.20 to 9 A.M : Science. Experiments and labs can be very difficult with no supplies. How do I explain this? Illustrate that? Creatively.

9 to 9.20 A.M. : Recreo. If my kids have behaved well, they will receive the whole 20 minutes. Hopefully Saida (Zai-duh) or Mr. Marco will not ring the bell on time.

Clang.

9.20 to 10 A.M. : Reading. Comprehension is pretty good if I can get them to sit still long enough to read a story. Pronunciation is okay. Writing is more difficult. Ask them to express an opinion or finish the story with an imaginative ending... they'll often straight-forwardly answer the posed questions meant to stimulate thought and shout after 2 minutes of scribbling, "Mister, Mister! I'm finished."

"Let me see." They never use punctuation. No capitalization. No quotation marks. "Have you learned about punctuation? You know, periods, commas, question marks."

"Yes, yes. I know Mister."

"Can you use them please?"

The second round of corrections is marginally better. The next two periods are a break for me.

10 to 10.40 A.M. : 8th Grade Science. Atomic bonds, chemical equations. I'm relearning alongside them, but at least I pick up it up quicker. Plus I have the luxury of the teacher's edition. Something I don't have 10.40 to 11.20 A.M. : 7th Grade Science. It's not so bad though. How difficult can teaching evolution be, especially when several students are wary that dinosaurs even existed because the bible says the world is not old enough. They'll tell me this but could care less about having a discussion surrounding it.

11.20 to 12 P.M. : Language. J101 - Grammar for Journalists might be coming into practical use during this period. Still it's quite simple for any native English speaker even with the explicit terminology thrown into your lap.

12 to 12.30 P.M. : Almuerzo. Kids get to eat on time if they were good and have finished their work. Let's hope that bell rings late again so I can enjoy the sun outside of my dim classroom lit only by a single florescent bulb.

Clang. Clang.

This part of the day varies.

12.30 to 1.10 P.M. : Can often be art. Trying to do projects related to science or social studies can be like pulling teeth. Some kids eat it up. Others refuse, drawing motorcycles, cars or skateboards. I don't think there is a single skateboard in San Marcos let alone a patch of ground able to sustain one. A word about projects. Some kids dawdle and won't finish for days while others are done in a blink. Make them do more.

1.10 to 1.50 P.M. : Can be Health or Spelling. But Spelling often blends in with Reading or Language, so we do more Health. Pathogens, noninfectious diseases, diabetes, and heredity are impossible to pronounce.

Some days we go to the library, a small building down the road containing a jumbled array of books and magazines. It's next to the campo, a field where we sometimes play or do fisica.

1.50 to 2.30 P.M. : Can be study time or extra word like vocabulary lists for upcoming tests. It can be games about South American capitals or the spelling words. As long as they're competitive. No one cares who wins. The only requirement is competition.

Here's where timelessness begins.

You realize in Honduras that there is absolutely no way you could accomplish everything you'd like to do in a day. You cannot set an agenda for yourself as you would in the United States. Instead, you set a few goals for yourself and try to achieve those. Such as: We have nothing to sit on. Buy two sillas.

Or: Buy cleaning products and scrub everything in sight.

Then as soon as you think you've got the machine up and working, something goes wrong.

Example: Lock on front door no longer works so side door is taped open with a cinderblock behind it holding it shut. Get lock fixed.

Or: Electricity stopped working 24 hours ago while all the neighbors have it. It's a problem with our house. Get electricity fixed.

Or difficulties arise in what seem like simple tasks: Buy boards to build shelves with the cinderblocks you bought 10 days ago. Still unaccomplished at this point as finding someone who actually has decent sized boards is harder than expected. Or el dueño is NEVER in his ramshackle shop and his workers tell you to return at 6 P.M. Which is tough because time means nothing once you're outside of school. You don't wear a watch. Don't have a mobile phone.

The days meander lazily. Planning for school. Jogging dusty mountain roads. Buying fruit from Jorge's stand where his mother gives us a good price on the best bananas around. Searching for veggies in the mercado as dirty-faced children badger, "¿Que busca?" Wash laundry in a bucket. Try to use the internet once a week. Continue the never-ending search for the things you need in your house. Discover San Marcos and the hills around it. It's mostly uphill in every direction.

Today you could smell the fermenting coffee waste on the wind. This mix of decaying mulch and sewage runs through most of the waterways around here. Repulsive.

Aim to get to bed early and read a book. Relax. It's usually the only time all day.