Oh, my aching belly.

Living in Honduras can do a real number on your digestive system. Nasty bacteria and parasites lurk on tasty looking vegetables and fruits, just waiting to attack weak-stomached foreigners. I would love to count myself among the stomach-of-iron, “I can eat anything,” human garbage disposal types, but the belly gods had something else in mind for me last Saturday. Perhaps I didn’t put enough bleach in the water when we washed our vegetables last week, or maybe the ice in my fresh lemonade wasn’t not of purified origins. I may never know the culprit in my digestive tragedy, but I was definitely the victim.

Don’t worry. This is not a Halloween horror story (if you really want to know the details of my symptoms, google giardia); it is a tale of post-sickness renewal. Wednesday morning, I woke up feeling better than I had since my arrival in Honduras. It may have had something to do with my ability to eat something other than oatmeal for the first time in four days, but I felt like a new woman.

Things just kept getting better after that. After weeks of waiting, my absentee ballot finally arrived (I requested it back in August) on Wednesday! Initially, it looked like my vote wasn’t going to count. My district requires that all absentee ballots arrive within seven days after the election and it usually takes three weeks for mail to get to the USA from Honduras. Obviously Obama doesn’t need my vote in New York, but there is a hotly contested House seat up for grabs in my congressional district (a republican stronghold) and the democratic candidate, Dan Maffei, needs every vote he can get. Besides that, I desperately wanted to cast my vote for Obama, even if he is a sure thing in New York. Eventually, I was able to find a service that can get letters to the States in eight days and my ballot is now on its way to the Wayne County Board of Elections.

Halloween is not a holiday typically celebrated in Honduras. Locals observe All Saints Day and a few recognize Day of the Dead, but I wasn’t expecting there to be much action on October 31st in Copan. In fact, at the beginning of this school year, Graham’s bosses at the bilingual school gave specific instructions to staff to keep a low profile on Halloween. Upon some investigation, we discovered the root of the anti-Halloween directive. Apparently, a few years ago, a staff Halloween party caused quite a stir when Mayatan teachers were spotted stumbling home (perhaps slightly intoxicated) at 4am on All Saints Day in strange costumes. People in the community, unfamiliar with the much-beloved American Halloween tradition, suspected the teachers of being involved with some sort of strange satanic rituals. Cultural confusion at its best.

Much to my own surprise, I did end up going out with friends to celebrate Halloween this year. There were nearly a hundred Peace Corps volunteers in town for the weekend – a boon for Copan during the low tourism season. The volunteers flock here annually from all over Honduras and Guatemala (some spend 11+ hours on the bus) for a Halloween party at Via Via, a local bar. It was my first night out since I arrived in August (I’m embarrassed to admit) and throughout the evening I had the sneaking suspicion that I’d somehow been transported back to the States. I was celebrating an American holiday, surrounded by twenty-something gringos, and dancing to a band that sang almost exclusively in English. It was slightly surreal, but all in all a good way to celebrate Halloween. Favorite costume of the night: a man dressed as a backpack. He was literally wearing a hiking backpack - legs through the bottom, head through the top. Bizarre, yet somehow appropriate.