High School Graduation and... DONKEY POLO!!!

Qué más hay de nuevo acá?

Graduation, December 2nd

A couple weeks ago I was invited to the town high school graduation ceremony. High school graduation rates are a heck of a lot lower in this country than they are back at home, so it was a pretty big deal for the students. There were some nice speeches and all of the traditional procedures one would expect at a graduation ceremony, though it felt like the whole thing took forever (as with any graduation ceremony). I swear it lasted almost three hours, after starting an hour late. 

When it was finally done all of the students sang a couple celebratory songs together, with the music teacher playing the guitar. After that, the speakers blared a cover of ‘We Are the Champions’ as the students returned to embrace their friends and families and file their way out. A joyous time was had by all.

To cap off the night, I was invited out for a meal with all of the high school teachers at a local restaurant. I don’t know the high school teachers as well as I know the elementary school teachers, so it was a good opportunity to network for a bit. I find that it never hurts to at least make myself more visible in the community.  After the meal all of us made our way to the local discoteca/dance hall. I didn’t do much there, as the crowd was mostly the graduated students (17 and 18-year-olds). There were also groups of people that were both younger and much older. There’s a part of Honduran culture that I have a hard time accepting, which is that it is acceptable for a high-school administrator to dance very closely (and somewhat provocatively) with someone who was still a student 24 hours earlier. But who am I to judge?

Donkey Polo, December 10th

The following weekend I went to go meet up with a large group of volunteers at the feria (a type of fair that each town in the country throws once a year to celebrate their patron saint) in Yuscaran. The big draw: a Donkey Polo competition! It was something I had been anticipating to check of my Honduran culture to-do list for quite some time.

I arrived a little late to Yuscaran after my bus broke down on the way. After a rolling-start to get the bus going again, and a bit of walking, I was still able to make it just in time to play. I changed into shorts since it was raining and I didn’t want to ruin the only pair of jeans I had with me, yet this may have backfired a bit. I was definitely showing a lot of very pale leg as I was sitting on a donkey. Muddy jeans are temporary, but Facebook photos are forever. Oh well.

The match was of Hondurans vs. Gringos. It was a bit of a ‘crap’-show, both literally and figuratively. I say ‘literally’ because there was a bunch of uninhibited donkeys running around. I also say ‘figuratively’ because we stood absolutely no chance against the home team. They were using their own donkeys that they trained themselves and had ride every day, whereas pretty much all of us had never even sat on a donkey before. They don’t really listen, despite all the strange noises we made nor how many times we slapped them in the rear or the head.

My goal at first was to simply make contact between my polo stick and the ball. Upon doing so I considered the event to be a successful one, as my donkey basically just walked around randomly and favored standing still uselessly in the corner. I took a break and let someone else ride, only to get another opportunity on a separate donkey a little while later. This donkey was a little smaller (my feet could touch the ground!), but I was able to steer it by pushing its head in the direction I wanted it to go. Sitting atop my six-legged donkey, I hovered around the offensive side of the court (somewhere just outside of the three-point line, más o menos) where eventually I got my chance… A teammate somehow knocked the ball towards me and I took the opportunity to strike, reaching back with my mallet and smacking the ball towards the goal as hard as I could. The shot rang straight and true, and it flew right into the goal! I got some cheers from the gringo crowd, hoisting my mallet triumphantly into the air with pride.

We ended up losing roughly 41-2, but it was still a great time. After the game we all got off the donkeys and meandered around the court for a bit. As we were standing there a bunch of Honduran kids ran onto the court and we spontaneously started up a soccer match without saying the word. Again, it was Hondurans vs. Gringos (a.k.a. white people; I’m not sure if I’ve defined ‘gringo’ for the folks back home yet). I was mostly preoccupied by trying to not step in donkey poop as we ran around in the drizzling rain, but it was still a lot of fun. As a side note, the Honduran kids were definitely a lot more carefree about where they stepped. After about ten minutes of madness we called the game to an end, and got together for a final group shot. Oh, the memories…

We ended up all hanging out and partying for the rest of night, though I took it easy for the most part since I was feeling a little sick. Thankfully I still felt well enough to stay up and hang out with everyone else. There were a bunch of people there I hadn’t met before, and I had a good time getting to know them a bit. There were also some cool fireworks celebrations in the park, including the Latin-American equivalent of the ‘running of the bull’. This would be the infamous ‘toro’, a slightly bull-shaped mechanism stuffed to the rafters with fireworks. Essentially someone holds it over their head and runs through crowds of people as fiery explosives shoot out of it in every direction. Classic Honduran fun!

Until Next Time…

That’s all for now! It’s crazy to think Christmas is only one week away already, and I’m going to try to write one more post before the holiday. The other day I had a fun field trip to Teguz with a group of teachers in my town, and there were also some interesting celebrations the following night at home after the championship match of the Honduran soccer league. Stay tuned…