Roasted Chicken & Fading Laundry (Oct. 12/09)

Success! At long last we had our Thanksgiving dinner. After yesterday's fiasco ended with sandwiches and rum, we decided to give our roast chicken supper another go. Isaac, Ally, Shona, Kevin and I crammed into our little apartment and, after three and a half hours, we had a delicious meal...that was devoured in eight minutes! It was soooo worth the effort! Besides, I think it was the first time we've had proper veggies since we've been here. I'm really not joking when I say I think we might end up with scurvy if things don't change soon!

Dinner was a great end to a wonderful day. I've been doing our laundry by hand (there is a washing machine on site but only the maid's may use it...and you have to pay them to do it), and today I noticed I had some missing clothes. I'd already done 80% of the laundry and this perplexed me. Having arrived while the maid was changing the sheets earlier, I handed her a tip and left. She must have misunderstood my gesture because, about a half hour later, the missing clothes returned ready for the drying line....smelling strongly of bleach...even the coloured items. Whoops!

After that discovery, Shona and I decided to hit up Carreon in Coxen Hole...think Wal-Mart with less class. Yup...picture mesh pants in neon colours and lime green shirts proclaiming "Blondes don't pay cover." Snazzy. Pulling ourselves away from the endless array of plaid, we made our way up the street where we found a Bojangles Chicken & Biscuits. It's really strange to see a few American restaurants mixed in with Honduran culture. Once we had our fill of fried chicken we ambled up the road to the grocery store where it was meat packing day. It was a site to see cow ribs still fully intact making their way up the aisles in shopping carts. Shona literally almost fainted when a cow's tongue slipped through a hole in one of the bags!!

And so life continues on this strange little island of ours....this morning I woke up at 4 a.m. unable to contain the swelling delirium of dreams crowding my mind. I stumbled onto the balcony and landed in the soft spools of the hammock. The air was thick with salt and heavy lidded clouds burgeoned with the weight of water. For once, my breathing wasn't laboured with thick humidity and my skin didn't prickle with kisses from the sun. I fell into an ocean of warm, nonsensical dreams remembering my life before its kismit connection to this electric place....thankful for all that was, all that is and all that will be.