1. Eating exclusively with my hands
As anyone who has traveled in Central America (or Langley Park, MD) can tell you, Central American food is mostly finger food. Almost all of the typical dishes here can be consumed with nothing more than your hands and a tortilla (this includes most soups, which often feture large chunks of meat still on the bone, or still unpeeled plantains). Thus for the past year and a half, any meal I have consumed outside of my home (or those of other PCVs) has been eaten with my hands and tortillas (you are often given a fork, but it is pretty much relegated to the job of a makeshift cutting implement, so as to break your food up into pieces small enough to manhandle into your mouth with your tortilla). Somehow I don’t see this style of eating goving over well in fine dining establishments in the states (and I’m also guessing it will be hard to get tortillas at said restaurants.)
2. Wearing Chucks to work
When I got my acceptance letter from PC Honduras, it came with a list of clothing items we should bring, and they tended towards the formal side. Being the naïve aspiring volunteer that I was, I took them at their word and packed to the list (I even brought a blazer). Well it turns out that the before mentioned list was a load of BS (pardon my French). The most dressed up I have ever seen anyone at my mayor’s office is a dress shirt tucked into jeans, with cowboy boots (more on that later), and on an average day, most of my male coworkers are in knockoff Hollister (which is like the hottest brand ever down here) T-shirts and polos, with jeans and tennis shoes. Thus after the first few days of being hilariously over dressed, I settled into a rotation of checkered snap-down western shirts, jeans, and beat up old Chuck Taylor All Stars. And quite honestly had I been assigned to somewhere in Choluteca (the southernmost department, and by far the hottest place in the country), I would probably just show up a work in gym shorts, flip flops and mesh basketball jerseys (because honestly you can play most things like that off as just something that we crazy gringos do.) Sadly I have resigned myself to the fact that in no job I want in the states will this type of outfit be acceptable, so I am making sure to enjoy it while it lasts.
3. Having ridiculous facial hair
Now most of you who know me, know I am an aficionado of ridiculous facial hair, and made my share of questionable shaving decisions in the USA. So it will come as no surprise to you that I have been experimenting with beard options down here in Honduras as well. What I have come to realize, however, is that when I return to the states I will probably be in the market for my first real (grown up person) job. And I know I don’t have much experience working in offices, but I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that they are not big proponents of old-timey bartender mustaches that connect to your sideburns or facial hair that makes you look like a Spanish conquistador. So as a result of this revelation I have decided to dedicate myself to growing extra ridiculous facial hair in my remaining time here. This is great because, here people already stare at me so a little added facial hair is hardly of interest. I have also decided that I need to grow a serious mustache at some point before I return, since here mustaches are a sign of manliness and maturity (whereas in the USA they are a sign of being a power tripping State Trooper, a 70’s porn star, a child molester, or a dirty, dirty hipster).
4. Playing with/ picking up strange children
In America (thanks the upstanding organizations, like the Catholic Church and Penn State football program) we have a serious fear of sexual predators. This, coupled with our general fear of strangers, means that it is no longer acceptable to talk to strangers kid or pat them on the head. Here in Central America you can pretty much play with any kid you run into on the street and have pretty free license to kiss and hold other peoples babies (including the babies of vague acquaintances or complete strangers). Hell, sometimes this is forced upon you (though this happens to women more than men). On crowed busses for example, it is common place for a woman who is standing up, due to lack of seats, to pass off a baby to a woman who is seated, even if they don’t know each other (here it is also culturally acceptable to not give up your seat to pregnant women and the elderly, though admittedly it seems like a good 50% of the female occupants of any bus are either pregnant or holding babies). So I better get all of my playing with strange children done here, or when I get back I might have trouble explaining to the police that, despite my mustache, I was just trying to be friendly with those kids.
5. Throwing toilet paper in the trash can.
For any of you who have not traveled outside of Europe and the USA, most countries in the developing world still do not have a good system of indoor plumbing in place (in most developing countries there are actually more people with cell phones than people with access to indoor plumbing). And for those of us in developing countries who are fortunate enough to actually have indoor plumbing; it is not so well pressurized as to allow us to flush toilet paper. Thus we are forced to keep a special waste basket in our bathrooms to collect “soiled” toilet tissue. Those of us in rural towns without real trash pickup, have to take this toilet tissue into our back yards and burn it (as you can imagine, burning “soiled” toilet paper is no picnic). Thus after over a year and a half here in Honduras, I am well conditioned to putting my toilet paper in the waste basket rather than flushing it down, and am pretty sure that when I get back to the states it will take me a little while to break this habit. Soooo, any of you who are going to have me in your homes soon after my return, I would just like to offer a heartfelt apology in advance for putting my soiled toilet paper in your trash can.
