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Two months have passed at the lake. My bicycle has been used as a furniture with my back-rack as a bookshelf and my handlebars as a hanger for muddy clothes. Its worn out  tires have been waiting to be replaced, but the postal package from Sweden containing all the spare parts and road maps has been delayed because of the storm. I have therefor been waiting here for weeks. Being stuck in a striking place while meeting friends, hiking volcanos, reading books, practicing yoga and enjoying an atmosphere that makes me want to linger even longer.

I have continued to study Spanish in a green garden with a tea cup in my hand and a lake view in my sight. My focus however, have been on verbs that bends in all directions and nouns that has a gender of choice. Spanish sounds so sweet when it comes out of my teachers mouth and so strange when it comes out of mine. While learning more of the language I am also learning more about the region. The conversations across the classroom desk concern just as much climate issues and environmental problems as complicated grammar. My teacher is the type of person who picks up rubbish by the waterfront after work. And after the disastrous storm he brings his shovel to move out a landslide from a few houses. I get to borrow a shovel and follow suit. So, during a couple of weeks I replace my yoga lessons and volcano walks with some upper body exercise as I am digging out the mud from a family living room or carrying somebody’s firewood that used to be part of their roof.

My postal package eventually arrives from Sweden and I say a sad farewell to San Pedro de Sula, the only place during this journey which has become familiar to me. I will miss all the digging guys in the landslide and the old man in the little window in town who shakes his hand with all the passers by. I will miss the fruit lady at the market who calls me sister and the  girls at my favorite waterfront cafe  where I always order the same. I am so very attached to this lake. It is a sorrow to leave it, but there are so many joys ahead. My bicycle will soon be a vehicle again and I will roll away on new tires while following new maps of Central America to unfamiliar places.

Peace

/Hanna

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