Welcome Home, Gringas. [CAT2016: Honduras]

Our entire trip was planned around one event-- CEE high school graduation. Come hell or high water, or a 12 hour bus trip turned into a 15 hour bus trip, we were going to be at graduation. 

Almost two years to the day of our dramatic, tear-filled goodbyes to the town and the people that we had grown to love, we were back in Siguatepeque.

Although I have been to Sigua since leaving, I hadn't been back with someone who had lived the experience with me. I'd been back to Sigua, but I hadn't been back to my Sigua. Having Sarah there made it feel like we were reclaiming the Sigua that we once knew and loved-- even if only for a moment.

Of course, our first stop was for baleadas at Norberta's. I'm not even going to pretend it wasn't.

We weren't able to fit everything in to our short time in Sigua (lookin' at you, Foster fam), but we made sure to make a trip up to the Children's Home. After laughing with them every day for two years, it's hard to hug them only once a year. Honestly, I think my kids in Honduras taught me way more than I ever taught them. 

After hanging out with some of our little Hondurans, we spent the evening hanging out with some of our big Hondurans. And yes, we always look this glamorous, thank you for asking. Graduation was great because we were able to support the students in a very important moment of their lives, but we were also able to spend dinner catching up with some of the other teachers who made our years in Honduras bearable.

I've said it once (in this post, in fact) and I'll say it again. There's something to be said for seeing the same people every day for two years and then suddenly, not seeing them for an entire year. There's something more to be said for being able to jump right back in to those friendships-- especially when you're speaking two different languages.

There are a couple of things that I could always count on in Honduras. Getting KOBS ice cream after baleadas, an upset stomach after said baleadas, hearing the commerical for the grocery store as it was blasted from the speakers of a passing truck, getting carsick on the way home from Comayagua. Among these "certains" was the certainty that it would always be raining when I went to Lago de Yojoa.

Seriously. There could be a 0% chance of rain and not a cloud in the sky upon arriving to the lake and, never fails, it would start raining at some point while I was there. And I went to the lake fairly frequently.

This trip didn't disappoint either as it started pouring while we were there. The good news is that, since we were there during rainy season, it was generally pretty sunny during the day, but slammed by rainstorms in the late afternoon/ evening. We were able to snag a great hike at Panacam with beautiful views of the lake AND some acrobatics at Pulhapanzak before the evening rain.

There's never enough time spent in Sigua. My heart will always be longing to return the second that I leave the city limits. But for a brief moment in time, I was able to recapture some of the goodness that made up two crazy, yet wonderful years in Honduras.