We lived in the state of Gracias a Dios, which is better known as La Mosquitia (the Mosquito Coast - although NOTHING like the movie).  After flying to the capital Puerta Lempira, you have to get into a tuk-tuk (named after the sound they make) which is really an overgrown canoe, and cross a number of lagoons which takes two or so hours on a good day.  You have now arrived in the lovely lush town of Cauquira (cow-keer-ra {with a Spanish roll on the r's}).  Cauquira is really a road about 8 miles long, close the coast, and people live on either side of it.  The houses do cluster along the road, making even smaller villages, although the map only says Cauquira - if that.  We lived in what was known as Cauquira Central, right the middle of those eight miles.

I was a private teacher for a medical missionary couple there, working for the Reformed Church in America.  Ed was a doctor, Gill was a nurse, and Elizabeth (EB), Danny and Robby were their children.  They ran a clinic there, and my apartment, which doubled as the school was above the clinic.  Along with teaching EB, Danny, and Robby, I also did the dinner dishes, experimented with baking bagels and pita bread, and taught English as a Second Language to some people in the village.  Since we only lived about a twelve minute walk from the Caribbean, beach combing was also a very important part of my daily routine.

Oh yes, the turtles ... Robby just turned one year old a few months after I first arrived in Honduras. Learning how to talk brought a few interesting pronunciations from him - as you can all imagine.  One such utterance was a word sounding something like turtle, when he was talking about me.  Say it with me now - Turtle, Cheryl, Turtle - You can see how that became my nickname there, can't you? The problem arose when people in the village asked me what the family was calling me.  I would explain Turtle, and then say Tortuga, as it is said in Spanish.  They would ask why Turtle.  When I would say that it was because Turtle sounds like Cheryl, they would get lost, as Tortuga obviously sounds nothing like Cheryl.

Although I studied Spanish all through school, starting in fifth grade, eighth through twelfth grades, and a year and a half in college, I certainly didn't ever think I would ever put it to practical use. Cauquira is actually a village of 2,000 Miskito Indians, and although Miskito was their first language, Spanish was all of our second language.  I became proficient in speaking Spanish in a third world country, in even the most remote and underdeveloped part, so consequently I may not be so proficient indeed.  However, now I yearn to speak Spanish, and do so whenever I get a chance!