Protests

I got home early today. Didn't even make it to work. My coworker called this morning to say that she needed to change our plans and she would meet me at 1:30 at the office where we would ride together to one of the communities to teach the Strong Family Program.

Since I had the morning free I made breakfast for Fany, went to the gym for physical therapy, and called a friend to see if she wanted to meet for lunch. She works for the same organization, but in a different program so I rarely see her.

We went to lunch in a little plaza frequented by college students as it is directly across the boulevard from the University National Autonoma de Honduras (UNAH). The salads were delicious! It's tough to find a good salad here so as two North Americans, accustomed to eating our veggies, we talked about how we often get cravings for a good salad. We could make salads at home, but washing veggies is a pain in the neck when you don't have potable tap water - especially lettuce with it's nooks and crannies.

As we left the restaurant my friend said, "Why is traffic driving like that?" We were on a boulevard with four lanes going in each direction. I was focused on the far right lane because a car had almost hit me twice. However, in the left lane all of the cars were driving toward us on our side of the boulevard!

Traffic in Honduras is crazy. You see lots of things that would never happen in the US. Cars drive in the wrong direction on four lane highways if it means they will get to their destination faster. But this was a whole line of cars all driving toward us. It was outside the norm of craziness.

I hoped to take a quick right and get off the boulevard, but as we got closer to the intersection I saw it was blocked with tons and tons of police. My friend was still focused on the traffic driving backward so I told her to look. There were more than 50 and I couldn't see them all. They appeared to be huddled in a circle on the side of the road and into the side street where I wanted to turn. We decided we could still go straight and take the long way around.

Then we realized the road was blocked ahead. All of the cars were turning around in the middle of the street and driving back against traffic in that far left lane. It was the only way out.

So, I turned around in the road and headed back in the wrong direction. It was actually a short cut for us to get back to the office, so it turned out fine. But we were curious as to what was going on.

She went back to work and I waited for the car that was to take me to the parenting class. My car was scheduled for 1:30, but others had been waiting since 1:00 due to the chaotic traffic two blocks from our office.

I called my coworker. She had come from a different direction and already half way up the mountain with her driver. He offered to come back and get me, but I didn't want them to have to make two trips with the roads so crazy. She said I should just head home.

When I got home I was telling Fany about what I saw. We turned on local news. The situation had escalated quite a bit. I didn't see any police. The military had come with a huge tank-like truck. Students from the university had been protesting the death of Berta Cáceres. She is a Honduran environmental activist who was killed on March 3rd, 2016 for standing up to large businesses who want to exploit natural resources. The students protested today rather than tomorrow because not as many people attend school on Fridays.

The military men were lined up outside of the school with shields and gas masks. They are not allowed to enter that university because it is autonomous. Only the university's privately contracted police are allowed to enter. Students burned tires in the road which is a common practice here because a tire will burn for a long time and is impossible to move. The students locked themselves inside the gates of the university. From inside they threw rocks at the military police. The military police threw tear gas at them and sprayed water from the tanker truck. The whole scene was quite a mess. Both directions of traffic were closed. My friend and I got out just in time.

The US Embassy was closed today because of the protests. They sent out an email warning everyone yesterday afternoon. This weekend it will be wise to stay home and avoid flying rocks, teargas, and overturned cars.