Fumigation

 Christmas in Honduras seems very similar to Christmas anywhere with Christmas trees, lots of lights, and nativity scenes. The big difference to me is the weather which is much warmer than what I am used to in December. The annual Christmas party for the Ranch employees was held yesterday afternoon with music (including karaoke), a nice dinner, and lots of raffle gifts. The volunteers got more than their fare share of raffle winnings with a TV, crock pot, blender, and food processer. The volunteer house will be in great shape for movie nights and other fiestas. The only thing missing from the festivities was any type of alcohol 😊

 

Christmas Tree in Allen's Hogar

We found out last week that our home (San Vicente) is scheduled for fumigation this morning. Apparently fumigation is done a couple of times a year to keep the mosquitos and other annoying insects at bay. This means that we have to put away or cover anything in the common spaces that we don’t want to have to clean later. The clean up was all done after the Christmas party which ended at 7PM since the fumigation was scheduled for 8AM the next morning. It was amazing how quickly this preparation actually occurred. I should have taken a before and after picture! In less than an hour all the food on counters and tables plus much of the food in the drawers was removed/secured along with all the pots, pans, dishes, glasses, etc on the shelves. Only the food in the refrigerators stayed where it was.

Having your room fumigated was optional and I left that up to Allen since he has a lot of stuff compared to me. Plus it doesn’t appear that our room has a serious bug problem. Allen opted to get our room fumigated and decided that we should put everything on our bed in the middle of the room and cover it with a spare sheet.  Since we needed to sleep in the bed first, all of this preparation was done in the morning before 8AM. Luckily, we wake up with the sunrise at about 5:45AM so had a couple of hours to prepare. As with many things here, the fumigation time was changed to 2PM without notification so hence we only had two hours (from 4 – 6) to clean the common spaces in time for a party that was planned at 6PM with the Security Team. This party was in gratitude and appreciation for the constant vigilance that the security team provides for the ranch.

 

Preparation for Fumigation

After Cleanup

All in all, the last few days have been a bit of a rush, but as Allen says, “It’s no different than any other week.” We were also given the activities for the rest of the year so it appears that we will not have much extra time. So you will know the reason if I don’t get any more blogs posted this year. If that is the case, we want to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

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