There is one thing that happened which I can't tell you about until it is official. All I can say is that I am smiling ear to ear and I don't know if I have ever been this honored in my whole life. Bet you are dying to know what happened! Well, you will have to wait until tomorrow, or maybe the next day before I can say more.
I did tell my Mom the exciting news. I figured she is far enough away that she can't blab to too many people. As I was on the phone with her I heard this horrible screeching of brakes and I looked out the window to see a bus go off the road into a telephone pole directly across the street from my house. The front right tire was hanging off the side of the mountain! First the bus driver got out to assess the situation. Then he got back into the bus and backed it up so the telephone pole fell off the front of the bus and landed across the road.
I still had electricity. I went out on my balcony to give my Mom and her friend a play by play of what occurred next. Soon cars and motorcycles came along, anxious to pass but they couldn't because the telephone pole was in the way. A guy started lifting up the wires by hand to move them! I was waiting for him to get electrocuted, but you will be happy to know that nobody died, which is shocking (insert cheap joke drum sound effects here).
After they realized the man couldn't move the wires by himself some other men tried to move the pole. The problem was that even though that pole had been in the ground across the street from my house, the next pole was on my side of the road - which meant the wires cross over the road in front of my house. When they fell, they fell diagonally across the road so there was no way to move them to one side even if they could be lifted.
While the people were trying to figure out what to do about the wires, the bus driver got back in the bus and backed up more. The bus made a horrible grinding noise. I thought something was wrong with the transmission until people started yelling up to me asking me to bring they a bar (like a crowbar). Then they all started yanking on the front fender, counting "Uno! Dos! Tres!" and yanking again. I realized the telephone pole must have dented the fender into the wheel. They needed a crowbar to pry it out. So I told them I don't have a crowbar but I will ask my neighbors. At that point I had to stop the play by play momentarily with my Mom and run over to my neighbor's house.
My landlord wasn't home, but his brother, the ever watchful Gerry, was standing up on his stoop. He didn't have the bird's eye view that I had from my balcony so he didn't realize there was a telephone pole lying across the road. I asked him for a "barra" but he didn't have one. I explained the people needed help. He asked if I know them. I said no but it's a church bus. He said well you go back in your house. Don't go down there. I will go help them.
Ugh. So boring. Lots of excitement so close and I am not allowed to leave my house. At least I have the best view. I walked down the little path below my house in time to catch a man with a crowbar chopping the wires off one side of the pole so he could drag the wires off the road. That was probably the scariest moment of all, watching him chop wires with a crowbar, except for maybe the limbo-ing and tightrope walking. I will tell you about that in a second and you can be the judge.
So the man is down there chopping at the wires with his metal crowbar, until they all tore apart and he could drag them away. Then they still had a pole lying across the road with wires attached on one side. After some discussion an older lady took charge. She told the men to move the pole to the other side of the road and prop it up with a rock.
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| The bus after it was back on the road. You can see where it went off on the right. |
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| The men moving the telephone pole |
The men listened. By this point there were lots of cars backed up and people walking around so the men lined up the whole length of the pole and lifted one end, then dragged it to the other side of the road. They propped it up against the side of the mountain in front of my house. (I don't know if they found a rock as the lady suggested.) There was still a problem. The wires that were attached to the other side of the pole now hung down into the road. Cars were driving by and people were yelling at the cars to stop, but apparently a bundle of downed wires scraping across the roof of their car did not intimidate them. I even saw a man on a motorcycle with a baby in front and a lady on the back duck under those wires. Craziness.
Finally the smartest move of all was when a man lassoed the drooping wires, climbed up the side of my mountain and tied off his rope to a tree, which lifted the wires from drooping so low. But what he didn't realize was that they were still about a foot too low to allow buses to pass underneath.
Oh, I forgot to say it was getting dark and a thunderstorm was rolling in to add to the excitement.
With the road "clear", everyone piled back into the bus except one person. I called my Mom back to tell her about all of the excitement and just as I started to explain I saw a man lying on top of the bus, with his feet dangling over the windshield, lifting the heavy bundles of wire over his body so they cleared the roof of the bus as the bus drove under! I told my Mom, "A man is doing the limbo under the wires while lying on top of the bus!!!" She and her friend agreed life in Honduras is not dull.
Everyone left. It was pouring rain with thunder and lightening. I knew the next bus to come along would not clear those wires. Sure enough a couple of minutes later I heard more bus brakes screeching. This time the bus had those emergency strobe lights mounted on top, both in the front and back, which made the limbo approach used by the other bus not possible because the wires would still get stuck on the light in the back. But never fear. There was a tightrope walker on this bus. In the pouring rain he ran along the slick peak of the bus, guiding the heavy bundle of wires as the bus drove underneath, ensuring they all passed by safely. He slipped once, but the wires kept him balanced, just like a tightrope walker.
That was all my curiosity could take. I retreated to my house. I did turn on my balcony light. Hopefully it will help as the cars pass by in the dark. I keep hearing everyone screech to a halt, even motorcycles, so I'm thinking the wires much have fallen into the road again. However, there is nothing that can be done tonight. I texted my friends who live further up the mountain and warned them to be careful if they pass my house.
Can't wait to share the other exciting news with you tomorrow!
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| My special guest |
