Art for Humanity

I hope these notes will be helpful not only for those volunteering with Art For Humanity but also for those volunteering with other groups or just simply visiting long term. If you have suggestions for other info that could be added to these notes, just let me know via email. Thanks, Glen Evans founder of Art For Humanity.

One of the legal issues that will apply to long term volunteers that does not effect others is the Visa limitations. Under normal circumstances, when you enter Honduras, you will automatically be issued a visa. It is that yellow paper they staple inside your passport. Don’t lose it.  If you come as a tourist, your visa will be good for 90 days and can be renewed once for 30 additional days. If you come for business, your visa will be good for 30 only days. Because I come as a volunteer, I always come as a tourist. On the airplane, you will be given the documents where you will say if you are coming for business or as a tourist.

We are exploring how to get resident status for our volunteers but we are told it is a long and slow and potentially expensive process. So, it is better to just plan on leaving Honduras for at least three days each 3 or 4 months. You will need to budget accordingly.

If you leave Honduras to visit a neighboring country, BE SURE to get your passport stamped so as to verify that you did actually leave Honduras. Most of the time when I crossed the border into El Salvador or Guatemala, no one would have stamped my passport had I not called it to their attention.

Regarding budgeting for leaving the country, if you are going home to visit family, you can figure what that will cost. But, if you are only going to visit a neighboring country, that cost could be significantly less. Youth Hostel like places in the city or small hotels in villages can be as little as $5 per night. The normal hotel is about $20. In tourist areas, the rates are totally different as are most all hotels listed online. Those hotels cater to people with money. The U.S. franchise hotels in the big cities will be priced about the same as in the States. Bus fares are cheap ranging from 2 to 15 cents a mile. The yellow school buses are the cheapest and most interesting allowing you to mix with the locals.  Many of my initial contacts in Honduras I met in a yellow bus. The executive direct buses are like traveling on a Greyhound in the States.

If you prefer specific teaching materials, we need to know months in advance so we can ship them to Honduras. If you have teaching materials that we can make copies of, that is always helpful.

Housing. There are several options. At this time, there are four private rooms in the Teachers Lodge which has a bathroom with shower and toilet. Those volunteers who are staying for the most time, will have first choice of those rooms. For those who are coming and going regularly, those rooms may not always be available in which case, the student dorms would be the place to sleep. In all likelihood, the student dorms will not be a private room but shared with others. The student dorms have bunk beds while the Teachers Lodge has regular beds. The showers and toilets for the students are in a building near but separate from the dorm rooms. The toilets are flush types. The showers on campus may not have hot water. We are planning some solar heaters but those would produce hot water for afternoon and evening showers. Morning showers would likely be cold.  We are working/planning on producing hot water with the wood cook stoves…but don’t know when/if that will happen.

Regarding food, there is a school kitchen and cook who will prepare your food. If you would like to participate in the cooking, that is fine but not expected.

Washing clothes is done by hand most likely by you. Obviously, if you want to pay, someone will be willing to wash for you.

Regarding electricity, there is enough for minimal usage… small lights in the evening, ability to charge cell phones, laptops, etc. but not enough for refrigerators and freezers. We expect to have a projector connected to a laptop for class demonstrations and watching an occasional movie. We will not have desktop computers because they use too much electricity.

Regarding schedules, we will be as flexible as possible. We expect volunteers will come and go partly because of the visa limits and partly because of personal interests. Some volunteers may want to teach for a month or two and travel for a month or two. Others may want to teach 3 days a week and travel 4 days a week. We will try to accommodate those desire but, that requires a flexible attitude on the part of all the volunteers.

Bus service is extensive and cheap throughout Honduras. For my first year in Honduras, I used the bus for all of my travels. I found it a good way to meet people and experience the culture.

Regarding airports and flights, the two main airports are San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa. The prices can vary significantly from one to the other depending on the seasons, etc. While short term volunteers will want to come into the Tegucigalpa airport, long term volunteers with plenty of time, might not mind and even enjoy the extra hours of bus travel required when using the San Pedro Sula airport. Whichever airport you select, there will be taxis there who know where all the bus stations are to get you wherever you are going. Negotiate the taxi fee before getting in and then let the driver know if you want the economy bus or the executive bus. If you are coming into SPS, all the buses come and go from one large new terminal which is only about 15 to 20 minutes from the airport. From that terminal, there will be buses going to every sizable town in Honduras and all the bordering countries and normally many times a day. That terminal really makes bus travel simple. When I first came to Honduras, the stations to the different towns were scattered all over and often in the most depressed and dirty parts of town. But, from this new bus terminal, one can get a bus to almost anywhere including the neighboring countries.

Getting to the college. When you are certain you are coming, email me and I will send you detailed directions of how to get to our site. It is fairly easy to find. We are somewhat near the main road from Tegucigalpa to San Pedro Sula. Buses pass by probably each 15 minutes all day long. You would exit the bus at Zambrano which is 35 km out of Tegucigalpa and about 190 km out of San Pedro Sula. From Zambrano, there is a local bus that runs several times a day and will take you to within maybe 5 miles of the site. If you pay extra, the driver will likely take you further. In Zambrano, there are also moto taxis that will take you all the way or almost all the way to the site.  On this road, what I say below about hitchhiking does not apply. On this dirt road, everyone hitchhikes and seldom if ever is there a problem.

Hitchhiking is very prevalent in Honduras. It is mostly in the back of a pickup trucks. For much of the poor, it is the normal mode of travel. I would not recommend it. I’ve done a little and never had a problem and I pick up a lot of people along the road but, it is probably wiser to avoid it. At about 3 cents a mile for a bus, unless necessary, I wouldn’t  hitchhike. To email Glen Evans