Gringo time

About a week and a half ago Eulalia told me she was going to go to the Centro de Saludin Itzapa to pick up some papers. I remembered that I had some friend from the language school in Xela that were volunteering at a bike/bike-machine shop called Maya Pedal. I went with her to Itzapa, asked a traffic officer where the bike workshop was and surprised my buddies. I surprised myself too. I was buzzing with excitement and minor symptoms of culture shock. All of a sudden I was eating vegetarian food, listening to classic rock, playing with bikes and speaking slag-ful English. But it was oh so good for me to have some friends.
I spent the whole day there and we planned a weekend together in Antigua set to take place the following weekend.
It was my friend Antonio's birthday on Friday so we all met up on Thursday evening at a favorite little guesthouse called Casa de la Estella. We ate delicious pupusas, drank some beer and just enjoyed each others' company. Nick and Sarah (some great new friends from NC) were heading to Honduras Saturday and invited me to come along. The bus fare was $7 and the ride was only 5 hours so I figured, why not go to Honduras for a day?
We left at 4am Saturday morning and arrived before noon. It was hotter than Hades and we were a little dazed from lack of sleep and sluggish from the heat. We found a cheap place to stay and walked by a plaza filled with white cowboy hats attending a May Day celebration. We mostly just napped and chatted and then I left the next morning and returned to Calderas.
I was in serious need of friend and freedom time but in some ways it made going back to slop-paced country life without friends real hard. But it was worth it.