Capitulo Tres: Muy Contenta

It is Saturday and I have so much to write but so little time. Therefore please be merciful and understanding about the spelling and grammar errors. Thursday and Friday were our first school days and they were just 1/2 days. The first day crept up so fast that I was hardly prepared and started my mornings lacking basic human necessities such as breakfast, sleep, and clean hair. But God was merciful and my kids are gems. No doubt about it. I am getting spoiled. Unlike gringos, honduran 5th graders are super cute with their big black eyes and lovely skin- even wearing their green tablecloth uniforms they are adorable.
My kids are so sweet and respectful and they all call me "Mees." I'm working on getting them to call me "Mees Cole," but that's going to take time. I wish I had time to write about each of the funny personalities in my class. But all of them are sweet and want my approval and their 4th grade teacher said that's just how they are. After my student teaching experience I feel like my children are angels and my bright, breezy classroom is heaven.
My classroom is muy bonita. I really wish I would have taken a "before" picture so you could see all the blank paint-chipped walls and the furniture in a pile on the floor covered with plastic. Now it's very happy.
The first day of school I made a KWL chart about Miss Cole and the students were trying to think of what they knew about me. One of the kids said "I know you lav Jesus." And I said, "How do you know?" and he said "because you came here and you are teaching us etc." and it was so freeing to just say "Why, yes. Yes I do love Jesus very much." And when explaining the rules I got to read them Psalm 16 about how David said, "Surely your boundaries have fallen for me in pleasant places." We talked about how rules and boundaries are good and  if we didn't have boundaries for a soccer game what would happen? Yes, in his path their is fullness of joy. It's just the best thing ever to be able to start our day with prayer and to not have to surpress/ water down the main ingredient of my life.
Am I rambling? All that to say I love teaching so far.
Last night we went to a loooooong meeting about culture shock and I almost died because I so deperately wanted a shower and a full night's sleep and I have sooo much lesson planning to do. But the 20 min walk home made it worthwhile. It had just rained massively and the night was gorgeous.  I was wearing my favorite dress shoes and rolled up slacks so hopping over puddles and sticking in the mud was particularly charming. really. :) We passed a giant castle on the way cause some rich guy went to Europe and decided he needed his own castle in Honduras. and we passed a field full of bull frogs that sounded crazy, like ducks/car horns. 
Then this morning we left for the market at 6:30 and it was AWESOME. It was all these booths with fresh produce and etc and ahhhh I was in heaven. I bought tons of fruit to make smoothies and ingredients for my maid to make enchiladas (not like Mexican style) and carne asada, and I bought the first of many exotic plants to put in my house. There were also lots of booths with all kinds of strange juices and comida tipica de Honduras.
 My new favorite kind of chips is green salsa flavored plantane chips. oh man. What else? Oh, on Friday the building I was in got struck by lightening. It was SO loud and bright and everyone just stopped and staired at eachother wide-eyed. I guess the computers upstairs were fried but nobody died. Weeeell that's all for now. Time for a large mug of coffee and some intense lesson planning.