I have found it quite easy to interact with the community. Outside of the two other Americans who I see twice to three times a week, almost everyone at Central American Medical Outreach (CAMO) is born and raised in Santa Rosa. From basically the moment I was picked up at the airport everyone has been very excited to show off Honduras to me.
While that has been great and very eye opening, I think it would be foolish of me to say I have fully connected with the local community. For example, on the brigades CAMO organizes to nearby rural areas many of them take place at schools, and as a resident box carrier, my work has quite a bit of down time in the middle of the day, so I mainly just end up talking to the kids at the school. While I would love to say we have much in common, I think there is such a legitimate barrier in life experience (and some language) that it is hard to surmount. And with the Doctors I am working with they have all been amazing, but are incredibly busy due to the healthcare system in Honduras and the demand for free specialists far outweighing the supply. All of this to say a solid 60% of my sustained conversations are about football (or soccer), and the world cup, and only about 5% are actually about life and some of the struggles that come with the healthcare system here.

In the next couple of weeks I hope to have some more substantive conversations about the realities of life here, and where they view the role of international aid, as that is much more complex on the actual ground than it is in theory and writing. Also I have no pictures of my local interactions as it seems odd if not downright immoral to be going for photos in a healthcare setting, so here is a meal I had out on one of the brigades.