Honduran Specialties #1 (click here to comment)

In an effort to cover some of the more minute details of our life down here in Honduras (read: hopefully not too boring for you all), Anah and I are going to start documenting some of the day-to-day aspects of our life. Some interesting, some funny, and probably most of them downright bizarre.

Today, we'll start with a "bizarre" one.

Honduras is a country with a little crime problem. Suffice to say that the police presence is around, but rarely doing much of anything. Major US cities usually have the sounds of police sirens, which we usually translate to believing they are moving about chasing suspects, arresting individuals, and responding to the citizens' needs.

I have never heard a Honduran police siren since moving here. I saw them arrest somebody for the first time two weeks ago (although that was hauling a guy off a van for no apparent reason), but other than that they are good at one thing only: check points.

Every once in a while a trio of officers will park their truck (no cruisers) and place a pair of traffic cones in the middle of the street. Seemingly with no rhyme or reason they will flag down a vehicle for "document" inspection. Think the sobriety check points in the states, but without the public's well being in mind.

I've heard that if you don't have the proper documents the officers will write you a ticket, which you can either clear up with a bribe (probably the whole point of the exercise in the first place) or pay the actual ticket at the police station. The rule is that the police will take your driver's license and keep it until you pay the ticket.

Problem (for the police that is) is that its cheaper to go to the DMV (the Honduran equivalent) and get a new license than it is to pay the fine. So Honduran police, lacking a computer system to check who has paid and not paid, sit on tons of licenses and empty pockets. The only reason not everyone just skips the ticket is that the Honduran DMV is like the one back in the states only IN HONDURAS so imagine what that is like.

The whole point of the story is that the police set up a check point this afternoon and Anah and I walked past it on our way home from the gym. The police, per usual, flagged down a brand new Toyota Tundra to check its documents.

As the officer was looking at the driver's papers, the passenger of the vehicle (a middle-aged woman) rolled down the window and THREW A BUNCH OF TRASH OUT INTO THE STREET. Given that that is not normally acceptable behavior at all (Mom, remember that time you scolded that one woman for littering?), it was especially shocking to watch this woman do this in front of the officer.

It was one of the more US-to-Honduras-disconnects that we had had in awhile. Its easy to understand somethings, but the blatant nature of this offense was a HONDURAN SPECIALTY.

- Dan