Exit Survey
Name: Sarah Anne Jablonski Guagliardo
Site: Cabañas, Copan
Sector: Health
Nicknames: Sarita, Sari, la brazileña, la italiana, la gringuita, Poindexter, Jablonski, Rainman
Biggest accomplishment: surviving.
Biggest disappointment: not actually saving the world.
Biggest regret: Regret? Que es eso?
Biggest fear during Peace Corps: Dying in a bus accident.
Defining Peace Corps moment: Too many to list here.
Things you will miss most: the kids from my street, being part of a community, morning sunshine and afternoon rains, mountains, mangoes, español, reading, Hondu-8
Things you will miss least: manteca, plastic chairs, unfinished cinderblock houses, cohetes, serenatas, and noises of the like.
Biggest Irony: getting hooked on Japanese food in Honduras
Worst illness: roundworm infection- I pooped out a worm that was 7 inches long!
Biggest freak-out: After the bus crashed outside of La Entrada. I saw my life flash before my eyes.
Strangest chisme you heard about yourself: That I am actually a Brazilian doctor that came to Honduras to find a husband.
Most useful things I brought: chacos, ipod, quick-dry towell
Least useful thing I brought: my computer, which crashed the day I got to my site
Favorite activity when bored: writing asinine songs about Honduras
Weirdest thing I did when bored: Once when the electricity went out, a few of us attempted bending spoons with our telekinetic energy. Afterwards we held a séance and tried to summon the Egyptian goddess Isis. Neither activity worked… but the lights came back on!
Favorite Hondureñismo: Vaya pues sometimes pronounced vaya pue or vay pue
Greatest lie I told at my site: That never, under any circumstances, have I ever touched alcohol
Favorite Honduran inquiry: Sarita, ¿verdad que usted tiene sangre latina?
Best Honduran gesture: the simultaneous wrist flip/ chin-up
Favorite CD/song during service: “Sin Documentos” by Julieta Venegas
Song I would be content to never hear again: any Ranchera
Favorite book(s) during service: The Coming Plague by Laurie Garrett, Infections and Inequalities by Paul Farmer, and Collapse by Jared Diamond.
Favorite Honduran fashion: The jeans, tshirt, mustache, cowboy hat ensemble. So creative.
Worst jalón: The one where I fell out of the back of the pickup truck.
Best bus ride: any one on the Hedman Alas
Worst bus ride: this is too difficult to answer. Between the hangovers, chickens, vomiting children, and sweltering heat, it’s really all one big, hellish blur.
Favorite food: la baleada
Worst thing I ate: Consomé-flavored armadillo meat. Yum.
Worst thing I smelled: Nances.
Stupidest thing I did in the last two years: At Ben and Kelly´s house, I had accidentally left the gas stove on after cooking breakfast one morning. Then lunch time rolled around and I went to light the stove and KABOOM! Thankfully no one was injured. But my eyebrows are still growing back.
Untrue fact told to you as undeniable truth: “Fijese que es prohibido por Cuerpo de Paz” - for pretty much anything I didn´t want to do.
You know you’ve been in Honduras too long when…: you are pleasantly surprised to find toilet paper, running water and soap in a bathroom.
I never thought I would…: Discuss my bowel movements so openly and in such vivid detail.
When I grow up I want to be…: a CDC Epidemic Intelligence Officer investigating outbreaks of hemorragic fevers caused by unknown pathogens in the jungles of Africa.... Or a housewife.
If I had to do it all over again I…: would.
Favorite Aralen dream: What's Aralen again?
Favorite Ropa Americana T-shirt: There’s an eighty-year-old campesina from a nearby village that always wears a playboy bunny tshirt. She told me that she “just loves bunny rabbits”!… I didn´t have the heart to explain to her what that little bunny actually means.
Favorite animal story: One morning I awoke to find my kitchen in total dissarry. What could this be? I thought to myself. As I bent down to pick up some books on the floor, a strange black and white twitch in the corner of the room caught my eye. And there it was. My own personal Pepe Le Pew! After much deliberation about the appropriate course of action, I eventually resolved to open all the doors and windows in the house and simply allow the skunk to exit at its own will. But my darling neighbors, being as friendly as they are, popped in for a visit. When I told them of my predicament, Don Moncho immediately charged the skunk with a broom in an attempt to scare it out of the house. And, as skunks tend to do when threatened, it of course sprayed its putrid perfume. My house reeked for weeks.
Best habit acquired: Patience, not being so serious.
Worst habit acquired: Tssssing at people to get their attention.
Thing you missed most from the US: family, friends, anonymity, red wine, good food, stimulating conversation, live music
Thing you missed least from the US: materialism, media
Favorite location in Honduras: 1.my site 2. Ben and Kelly’s house 3. The Via Via
Things you’d wish you had known when you signed up: Two years is actually not that long.
Best advice for Honduras 12: Suck it up, it ain´t that bad.