• • • 1. (1) Email from Tegucigalpa (Jul.27, 2002)

(2) Country town Santa Barbara

(3) Esperantists in San Pedro Sula

(4) Email from Santa Barbara (Aug.28, 2002)

(1) Email from Tegucigalpa (Jul.27, 2002)

It was as usual difficult to cross the border from El Salvador to Honduras. I arrived at the border at 10:30 in the morning and the paperwork to leave El Salvador and to get through the Honduran immigration was finished easily. Next, I tried to get the permission of the motorcycle and I had to wait for an hour of lunch break. Even after the lunch hour, the chief of the customs who went to Salvadoran side didn't come back. So I went back to the Salvadoran side to find him, but I couldn't see him. I came back to the Honduran side again and waited for him till 15:30. He was still somewhere in the Salvadoran side, leaving his office for a long time. On the day I went to the border early so that I could enter Honduras in the same day. I was afraid it would get dark if I kept wasting time. After dark, it was supposed to be dangerous around there, because of not the collision against an animal, but a foray by bandits. My habitual "border helpers" told me the paperwork would go faster if I gave a bribe of US$20. To me it meant, as usual, an entrance tax, though illegal. The deadlocked situation was suddenly saved by the 20 dollars. However, the helpers had a hard time. They had to ride a bicycle many times to the Salvadoran border to get the approval from the chief who was still there, each time one of the forms was finished. It was five in the evening after all when the paperwork was completed and I entered Honduras. In addition, I had to pay lots of money - $5 for a Salvadoran helper, $20 for three Honduran helpers, $10 for the Honduran visa (there is a possibility of being cheated by the helpers though), $45 for the importation of the bike, $20 for the bribe, in total $100. As the helpers took care of everything, what I did was only to wait, smoking by the motorcycle. It always makes me tired to cross the international borders around this area with a bike. It was close to dusk when I arrived at a hotel in the nearest town 35 km from the border. The hotel charged as much as $6, but it was hot in the room and the room itself was so small that I couldn't walk around due to the bags occupying the floor, and to make matters worse, water didn't come out in the bathroom.

I came to Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras as if I ran away from both the heat and the relatively expensive hotels where I stayed only for a night each near the border of the two countries. Tegucigalpa is located at an elevation of around 1000 m and the resultant lower temperature makes me feel comfortable. I can now understand the reason why most of the major cities in Central America are located in the mountains. The hotel where I am staying is in the probably most dangerous area in Tegucigalpa, but thanks to its higher charge of $7 it has a safe parking lot on the second floor and the room is spacious, bright and clean, while other hotels in the neighborhood are mostly cheap brothels charging only $2 to $2.5 that don't have any parking space for a bike. Besides, there is a cable TV in this room and even a bathtub in the bathroom. I was told to pay $1.8 per night for the bike , but I got free parking after the negotiation with the owner of the hotel. I have never stayed in the room with a bathtub for the last seven and a half months since I did in the Hyatt and Sheraton in Cancun, Mexico. I was looking forward to taking a hot bath, but the system to supply hot water was and still is out of order. To take a cold shower in a cool room, where even an electric fan is unnecessary, requires some kind of guts. Two days after I arrived here, there was a power cut as in El Salvador. In the border town in El Salvador it happened while I was taking a shower and water supply stopped. Unlike the same kind of accident in the campground of the US, the soap on the body was already washed away, but the face being shaved then was full of soap. I was a little angry because I paid as much as $10 for the hotel. However, when the power cut happened in this hotel, I was watching TV and so I didn't have any inconvenience. The hotel prepared candles. The light of a candle was rather romantic.

I have been having supper at four or five before dusk except in small towns since I arrived at Guatemala City, as everyone told me it would be dangerous to go out at night. As a result, I become hungry at around eleven at night. Against my will, I have to drink vodka of $2 a bottle with water in 500 ml plastic bag of 12 cents every night.

When I came into Guatemala in the last early May, rainy season started in this region of the world. It begins to rain in the evening or in the night almost every day. The other day it rained all day long from morning to night. That never happened before. I believed it would never begin to rain before evening, but I will have to worry about the weather when I leave Tegucigalpa. As it is reported rainy season will be over in August, the worry itself won't last more than a month.

There aren't many ATM's although there are lots of small banks around the hotel. I found only one. However, the maximum money to be cashed is only around $120. As I usually received about $400 each time before, I think it a little inconvenient. Nevertheless, my guidebook writes there aren't so many ATM's in this country.

It seems cybercafes are not so many either. When I made an access to the Internet by telephone last time in El Salvador, I somehow couldn't update my Web site well and as a result I had to pay $11 for the 15-minute usage of the hotel telephone. In a cybercafe in Tegucigalpa I tried to update the only one photo that was not unsuccessfully sent before. But I couldn't make it because the system of the cafe had a protection. Besides, my Internet provider AOL charges for the usage of the Internet in most countries in Central and South America from Guatemala. I am afraid it will be harder than before to find an easy communication means.

I had an idea that in Honduras there are Spanish schools only in two cities, in Copan, which is located in the western border and is famous for its Mayan ruin, and in Ceiba facing the Caribbean Sea, however, I came to know there are more schools in some other cities including Tegucigalpa after checking by the Internet. I visited two schools in Tegucigalpa. One of the schools charges $10 per hour and the other charges less, but $5.5. If I learn four hours a day and five days a week at an expense of 5.5 dollars per hour in the less expensive school, it will come to be $110 a week. In Guatemala this expense of $110 included three meals a day and accommodation. If I learn in the same condition in Tegucigalpa, I will have to pay double. I have been staying here at an expense of $80 a week. Considering this, I think $110 only for the teaching fee is too much. I will try to find a less expensive school on the way to Copan. If I can't, I am thinking about learning by myself. For this reason I bought a grammar book of Spanish the other day. I read some and I remembered the language little by little. But anyway, I will stay longer in Honduras, because I was given the visa and the permission of the bike for three months, and in addition, they can be extended for another three months. I will leave Tegucigalpa in a few days.

(2) Country town Santa Barbara

In the hot spring we visited, there was a 10-m swimming pool filled with mountain water, which has a thermal pool with low temperature on its both sides. I thought the spring with low temperature was better because it was hot around there. I really enjoyed bathing in a spa after a long time. Michael paid the admission fee of 60 cents and in addition, bought me beer. I naturally felt a closer relationship with the same Asian. The "Sakura" was open the following day. Taichiro whom I met after two weeks gave me an impression that he is a reserved person, but in fact keeps a deep love in his mind, which is peculiar to those who have experienced living in a foreign country for a long time. I saw the menu soon and had Japanese noodle with "tempura". The "Sakura" opened only three years ago and so still kept the real Japanese taste, while in the Japanese restaurants I visited in Mexico and El Salvador the taste was a little modified due to the cook's long stay in a foreign land. The noodle with "tempura" was much more delicious than that in a restaurant in Japan. Later I had more Japanese food like fried-meat bowl every day. All the food had more volume and the taste was better than in Japan. And the price was only less than US$4. Concerning food, Santa Barbara is the best place thanks to the "Sakura". The mother of Taichiro is sick and now back in Japan. Taichiro then doesn't live in his apartment, but live in the "Sakura" where his mother lived. The hotel I stayed was a little expensive and I was thinking about moving to another hotel. Taichiro told me he would rent his apartment at the same price as a less expensive hotel I was looking for. His apartment is naturally more spacious than a hotel room. It has a big table and even a refrigerator. A refrigerator in a hot land is very attractive. I could drink cold beer at any time. However, I didn't move to the apartment after all, because the hotel accepted my negotiation to give me a discount. Taichiro pays $54 a month for his apartment. I suggested him I would pay double price of $108 including the expense for electricity, water and gas, if I stayed longer on the next visit. Taichiro willingly accepted it. Taichiro had a good Spanish textbook written in Japanese. I exchanged it with the difficult grammar book written in Spanish that I bought in Tegucigalpa.

One day a young woman came to the hotel to see someone when I was sitting in the lobby. The women in Latin America became more friendly in Honduras. Particularly in Santa Barbara, where there are lots of beautiful women, everyone, including young women, is incredibly friendly and talks to me, a man from Asia, with smiles, probably because of good reputation by Taichiro or some other Asians. Fatima, who came to the hotel, was also very friendly. I talked to her and we soon became friends. I told her I was looking for a Spanish school. She said on the instant, "I will teach you". In addition she told me she didn't need any money. She is 23 years old. She got married when she was a teenager and is now a single mother, which is a usual affair among the women in these countries. She has a 6 year-old daughter. I have met a lot of these women in this trip. Probably the men in Latin America are easygoing or irresponsible, but those women keep living as if nothing happened. In comparison with Guatemala, Spanish schools charge almost double in this country. However, it will be less expensive to learn Spanish here than in Guatemala, if I stay in Taichiro's apartment and learn Spanish from Fatima for free. Fatima told me she wanted to learn about a personal computer. Then, I have a PC. My Japanese PC has a different keyboard, but the system of PC is basically the same. I decided to teach her about PC, while she would teach me Spanish. Probably because people spoke dialects in Guatemala and El Salvador, I didn't understand their Spanish at all. But, I can understand more Spanish in Honduras. Taking this factor into consideration as well, Honduras may be a good country to learn Spanish. Besides, it is possible to extend the stay up to 6 months. I have never been out of the hotels after dark for more than the last two months since I arrived at Guatemala City on the 1st of June, because the local people told me it would be dangerous. However, Santa Barbara is a country town and so it is safe. I left "Sakura" at around 11:00 every night and went back to the hotel, but I didn't feel any danger. Safety is, as is often said, a matter of course in Japan, but it is a thing very hard to get in the countries around here.

Fatima worked for a place like a kindergarten before, but she lost the job and she doesn't work now. Her mother left Fatima and her younger sister to go somewhere. As a result the two children were raised by their grandmother. The grandmother is now 80 years old. She receives a pension of $90 a month, which feeds the four women including Fatima's daughter. More than half of the pension goes to the payment of their house. According to the calculation, the possible expense of this family is, excluding the house rent, less than $1.5 a day. I heard they cannot afford food. They often don't have even bread to eat at home. However, Fatima never shows the dark part of her life and is now dreaming of cooking and selling food at a market. I am now staying in San Pedro Sula, the second largest city in the north of Santa Barbara, to see Esperantists. After leaving here I will go back to Santa Barbara and will lend her $80 to $160 so that she can have a stall in the market. In this country this small amount of money could change the life of a person. I will also pay the fee for her teaching me Spanish, though she told me she didn't want. I have found an inexpensive apartment and a Spanish teacher. I have also acquired a Spanish textbook written in Japanese that I never expected. Besides, Santa Barbara is a safe town. I am thinking about staying there for a longer time to learn Spanish.

(3) Esperantists in San Pedro Sula

I also had a contact with another Esperantist in San Pedro Sula Reynald Lopez, whom Elmer introduced to me before my visit to Honduras. Reynaldo began learning Esperanto in 1998. He came to be a fluent speaker of Esperanto in four years. He is now a delegate to the Universal Esperanto Association. He was originally a surveyor, but he now teaches English. Probably because of this he was quick to learn Esperanto. He is 52 years old and is about the same age as me. It was more than 10 years ago when I started learning Esperanto. As far as time is concerned, I am senior to him. But, I can't speak the language well yet. I feel ashamed of myself. As I couldn't make a contact with Elmer, I called Reynaldo. Because I am not a good speaker of Esperanto, I always feel a little nervous about talking on the phone. I was nervous again even though I had once called him before the visit to San Pedro Sula. Reynaldo answered the phone. I, as usual, spoke in funny Esperanto mixed with Spanish words. However, I made myself understood. Reynaldo came to my hotel after work at 7:30. He wore a card with a green star, the symbol of Esperantsits, on his chest. We talked in Esperanto and in English till 9:00. He left the hotel, saying it would be dangerous if it got late. On the following day Reynaldo came back to the hotel with a young man named Alan to pick me up by Alan's car at past two in the afternoon. Alan is not an Esperantist. When Elmer is in Costa Rica, Reynaldo is the only Esperantist in San Pedro Sula. He told me he always talks to himself in the mirror in Esperanto because he doesn't have any other Esperantist. On that day he had an intention to recommend Esperanto to Alan. I understood his idea well. Except these two Esperantists, Honduras has the only one other Esperantist in Tegucigalpa. In the beginning we spoke in Esperanto and in Spanish. However, probably because of my poor Esperanto, we switched to English later. Alan also spoke English. Alan spoke American English, but Reynaldo, who had stayed in England before, had a British accent though it was not very heavy. I welcomed the English conversation because I speak English better than Esperanto, however, I thought it was a little ridiculous. Alan took us to have soup called "mondongo". Unlike the neighborhood of the hotel where I stayed, the area around the restaurant was a neat residential district.

During this trip I mostly confined myself within a hotel room except when I went out to a nearby restaurant or cybercafe, and so I didn't see much. I went out and saw the different part of a city only when I met Esperantists. I told Reynaldo I wanted to go to a cybercafe. Alan gave us a ride to the downtown of San Pedro Sula and left for somewhere. At the cybercafe where Reynaldo took me, somehow I couldn't connect my PC to their network. I have a disease in which I cannot see other things till I finish one thing once I start it. Being disappointed by me who had been trying to connect the PC in vain for three hours, Reynaldo left the cybercafe. I feel very sorry for him. As Elmer got rid of the telephone from his home, I couldn't make a contact to see him on the weekend. I called him in the office several times from Monday. He seemed to be really busy with work, probably because his company was recently put under the reign of a US company. I was supposed to see him on Monday night, but he couldn't make it. It was postponed to Tuesday, but it didn't work. At six in the evening on Thursday he came to my hotel. I was waiting for him in my room. But, an attendant of the hotel reception told him I was not in the hotel, and he went back, leaving a message in Esperanto. I called him on Friday and we were supposed to see on Saturday, but we didn't. We had exchanged emails dozens of times and I was looking forward to seeing him. I was very sorry about that.

On Sunday we had a power cut all day long in the hotel. On Monday I left scorching San Pedro Sula for Santa Barbara with cool night, expecting to see the two Esperantists again or next time when I would be back to the city someday.

(4) Email from Santa Barbara (Aug.28, 2002)

I came back from the hottest San Pedro Sula to Santa Barbara, the small mountain town with a population of 30,000.

As soon as I arrived in Santa Barbara, I went to see Taichiro at the Japanese restaurant "Sakura". I left the bike with the bags on in the street in front of the restaurant. Taichiro told me to move the bike to his garage, so I moved it. His consideration to prevent the bike from being stolen brought about an unexpected misfortune. The entrance of the garage had an inclination and I hit the lower part of the gearbox of the BMW, which has a low clearance, hard against the iron plate, the lower part of the shatter. The bike also hit the "topes" hard several times in Mexico, but didn't suffer any damage because the "topes" is made of concrete and is not sharp. But, this time the gearbox of the bike had a crack and the engine oil began to leak. In El Salvador and Honduras the "topes" disappeared and I felt easy. Nevertheless, it happened here and was the most serious accident during this journey. There is not a BMW dealer in this country, but in Costa Rica in the south of neighboring Nicaragua. I had the gearbox welded by a motorcar repair shop on the outskirts of the town. It was getting dark when I put the fire in the engine. I felt at ease and went back to the "Sakura". I followed Taichiro's car to his apartment. Previous to leaving Santa Barbara before, I had made an agreement with Taichiro on renting his apartment for US$3.6 a day. The last part of the road to the apartment was an ascending dirt road with lots of big stones. I was really scared when I managed to go up on the heavy BMW in the dusk. I was disgusted by the idea that I would have to ride back on the same bad road when leaving the town. And, the following morning I found the engine oil still leaking a little from the bike! Bad luck. But I had to do something for it. I cheered myself up and rode down the horrible road to go to the shop again. As the leakage was not completely stopped even after receiving another two welds, a plastic coating was finally made to the gearbox. The problem was solved, however I had to waste another half day.

The apartment has three rooms, a kitchen, a bedroom and a room with a table. It is spacious and comfortable. In the bedroom an electric fan is fixed to the wall. However, it isn't useful because it is so chilly in the room at night that I put a thick coverlet over myself. On the contrary, it is hot during the day. The roof is covered with galvanized iron sheets and on the corner of the roof there is a large oven, where tortillas are baked during the day. So the rooms are heated to quite a high temperature. The heat hinders me from sitting at the big table waiting for me. To solve this problem I bought an electric fan for $12. Now I have the best environment for writing my travel stories and emails. Nonetheless, I can't write. About 20 days ago in Tegucigalpa I got an ache in the tip of my little finger of the left hand, the part that is used for typing. Next, the same part of the thumb began to ache. Then, the ache extended to all the fingers of the left hand when I came to this apartment. They ached so hard that I couldn't grab things. I imagined it was caused by over-typing or I was suffering from gout because of over-drinking of the cheapest alcohol. To cope with this, I haven't typed the keyboard for the last ten days. I also stopped drinking. Then I had a side effect that gave me insomnia. It's hard to live anyway. I don't know which countermeasure came to take effect, but now I can wash my body using my left hand as well. However, the fingers still ache when I type. I stopped writing for a while, and so I had time to do something else. I learn Spanish every morning. At night I read Tom Clancy's "Executive Orders" again, which I couldn't do for a long time after I left the campgrounds in the Rocky Mountains. The development of the story became more rapid from at around the page of 1000 and the book finally became amusing. Now I feel I want to read more and don't want to finish reading.

I couldn' t made a direct access to the server of AOL through the LAN of the only one cybercafe of this town, which was succeded in San Pedro Sula. To do this, I spent lots of time in the cafe for three days, and as a result I made friends with a young guy of the cafe. The guy made a call to his friend in Tegucigalpa several times and asked the reason to him for mi. It seems to be necessary that the configuration of one of the PC's must be changed. The friend will come to this town to do it on the 7th of the next month. To have an unreasonable client like me, the cybercafe has to do an unnecessary job. This town is safe for strolling at night. Lots of beautiful women are walking on the streets. This town has a good reputation of having more beautiful women than any other places of Honduras. In addition, all are so friendly that I doubt, "Why?". Besides, there is a hot spring near the town. Further, Taichiro's restaurant serves better Japanese food than in Japan. Even on a day when the restaurant is closed, he feeds me the same food as he cooks for his family. He told me he would serve "sukiyaki" and "mizudaki" to me some day. The only thing I was disappointed is that I wouldn't able to get a motorcycle license anymore in this town. The machine to make a license in San Pedro Sula was broken recently, and so the one in this town was moved to San Pedro Sula. I was wondering if I should take a license or not, because the license of this country is not effective in Japan and the term of validity of the license is only one year for the first time. The international license I took from Japan is already invalid. So, I had a certificate, written in Spanish that I have a proper Japanese license, issued by the Japanese Embassy in Guatemala. However, this is legally valid only in Guatemala. As a license in Spanish may be useful in the further southern countries, I am now thinking about getting a license after all. I hear I can buy a license for $25 to $30. Taichiro is also taking a license. I will go to San Pedro Sula with him in his car the day after tomorrow.