Friday, September 10, 2010

Buses


It has been a few days since the last update. We are still here! And still having countless priceless experiences. Let me tell you about our little, well what was supposed to be little, excursion on Monday.

Diana and I, as well as our friends the Vinlands, are going to be heading to El Salvador this upcoming Wednesday for the Central American Independence holiday. This will be my first time back in the old country to visit the friend and family community of Diana’s childhood. I am sure I will have much to report after that trip!

So after doing some research on the internet and asking around the school, we decided that we would get bus tickets from the Tica Bus company. It is a charter bus trip that is about 6 hours and costs 15 dollars each way. We had received multiple good reviews for this company through word of mouth, so it seemed like the way to go. The decision was made. We would head to the hotel mentioned on the company’s website that was the only vendor of Tica Bus tickets in the city. Yes, that is right, of course you cannot buy tickets online, because that would be way too simple for Honduras. And yes, in a city of nearly one and a half million people, it would make sense to have only one vendor on the other side of downtown from us. Despite these small inconveniences we decided to set out right after school on Monday to buy our tickets.

Being experienced riders of the bus, having a whole four or so rides under our belts, we decided that we would save a ton of money and take the bus to our location, as opposed to a taxi. The money collector on the bus assured us we would make it to our destination by 4:30, because the travel agency closed at 5. It was only 3:40 or so, and we figured this was probably correct. We boarded the bus. As it would turn out, we had boarded the slowest bus in all of Honduras, in the 30 minutes we were on, it did not go faster than 5 mph. No joke! We were still far from our destination 30 minutes into the ride and decided to bail. We hopped off the bus while it was still in motion leaving a stop. (Not too dangerous because if its snails pace.) During this process someone yelled at us in English that we were crazy kids who were going to get killed jumping off the bus.

After bailing, we caught a cab that got us to the travel agency 5 minutes before closing, which turned out to actually not be in the hotel listed on the website, but next to the hotel. That was just another stressor added into the mix. Once at the travel agency, we figured it would be a quick purchase. An hour and a half later, a trip to the bank to find out my card is blocked, a trip back to the agency to discover that I didn’t need to go to the bank, and the travel agency’s computer crashing, we finally had our tickets in hand. El Salvador here we come!

Lesson learned from this event: Everything takes at least three times longer here in Honduras. (I should have known this by now after multiple 2 hour plus meals!) Sometimes this is a pleasant thing, and other times an unbearably frustrating thing.

(The picture I included is of me at my workstation.)

1 comment:

  1. Great story of another adventure in Honduras! Can't wait to hear about the trip to El Salvador. Wonder if it will be a 6 hour or a 12 or more hour trip? Shall we place bets?

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