finger flaps & lip pointing.

I am not exactly shocked by the cold bucket baths, cockroaches, stray dogs, or unpaved streets of Honduras…these things I anticipated encountering. But there are many things in Honduras that slightly throw me off, including:


1) MANTEQUILLA: ever since Elementary School Spanish, I thought this word meant butter. Well, I was highly mistaken and there is no such thing as the butter we all know and love.

To explain, if you were to mix sour cream, a little mayo and plain yogurt and let it sit in the sun for a few hours, you would have a mantequilla-like concoction. It comes in a plastic bag and is put on everything from refried beans to fried bananas.

I have learned to love the stuff, but I do miss real butter.


2) PIROPOS: another word for catcall. These can be heard from moving vehicles (cars, motorcycles, buses), bicycles, classroom windows, rooftops & treetops; coming from mouths of men, boys, girls & babies. They use Spanish phrases, any English they know (“hey baby,” “my love,” “honey,” “I want to %uck you,” and occasionally the numbers one through ten), kissing sounds, sucking sounds, hissing sounds and finger-flaps (to be explained later).

I probably get an average of 29 per day, depending on the amount of walking I do. Sometimes I feel like my dress is tucked into my underwear or my shirt is see-thru. Then I realize all it takes to receive one is to a) be female or b) be male with long hair.


3) PILLOWS: the average pillow here is equivalent to two bags of itchy cotton balls stuffed into an oversized pillowcase.


4) RECYCLING: does not exist in Honduras.


5) TRASH CANS: also non-existent.

To get rid of the trash, make a pile of it in the road or in the river if there is one nearby then light it on fire. The smell of these fires resembles that of burning stray animal hair.


7) ROPA AMERICANA: these are stores comprised of the rejects of the thrift stores of the US.

The life of these clothes consists of being:
a) purchased by an American and passed down until there is no more use for it and it won’t sell in a garage sale or is too ugly to give away.
b) sent to a thrift store.
c) overlooked by all thrift store shoppers because they are so ugly.
d) shipped to Honduras and sold in Ropa Americana stores.
e) purchased by Hondurans for real or Americans as a joke.

So, pretty much, thrice rejected clothes. They are fantastic!

The greatest part is that Hondurans usually have no idea what the English logo on their shirt says. I saw a woman in the grocery store wearing baggy faded black leggings, no makeup, hair in messy side bun, with a shirt that said, “ALL DRESSED UP WITH NOWHERE TO GO.”


8) GRASS: when you can actually find some, it is just not as green and does not smell right.


9) FINGER-FLAP: I can’t even explain this, so I will post this video:

courtesy of Becky from Wat San

10) LIP POINTING: Apparently, it is rude to point with your fingers. And because it is not in a Honduran’s nature to do anything discourteous, they instead point at things with their lips.


11) MACHETES: These are used for just about everything and by just about everyone. For instance, I saw an 8-year-old boy chopping grass with a machete the other day.

Machete is also slang for the word penis.