Church, Translated

“Church” translated into Spanish is “iglesia,” a delicate word that makes me think of stained-glass windows, or maybe icicles. Though the Conquistadors got off on the wrong foot in Latin America, massacring millions in the name of the God of love, they left behind more than their language. In their wake they built cathedrals of astonishing beauty.

Sometimes on Sunday nights, I go to Mass with my Honduran mother. The sanctuary is breathtaking, with ornate paintings and a gilded altar. But when the priest speaks, his voice is carried away to the high ceilings, or lost in the people murmuring the prayers along with him; and I don’t understand.

It’s a little easier at the Evangelical churches. They’re recent imports. Ten years ago, Protestants were almost invisible – now they’re close to 40% of the population. Their churches are smaller and poorer. We sit with a dozen or two others on folding chairs and listen to the pastor preach in her booming voice that I still don’t always understand.

In the sanctuary, in the folding chair, I stand when the others stand and sit when the others sit. I try to steal glances from the coveted few hymnals to sing along with songs I don’t know. I bow my head when we all are led in prayer. What’s left when you don’t understand the words? Letting a wave of rapid and devout Spanish pass over me I realize that at the heart is Jesus – or it’s nothing.

I’m not used to feeling lost in church. The church was my third parent, my sixth sibling, or maybe just a doting great-aunt who had me over twice a week and spoiled me with toys and candies. And along with the root-beer-barrel candies that they must have bought in bulk in the 1970s because they were ancient and sticky and as abundant as the loaves and fishes, I grew up with the taste of the Christian language in my mouth.

Going from my Baptist church to my Christian Reformed college, I hit a little lurch. It was like moving to England where I could make myself understood, but I couldn’t quite figure out which were cookies and which were biscuits, or stop myself from giggling when someone said “loo.”

I learned that when the Scripture reading’s done, the reader will say, “This is the word of the Lord,” and I’ll say, “Thanks be to God.” I learned the subtle art of hand raising, which is usually on the second chorus right as the guitar drops out; and I learned that when you shake each other’s hands you say, “Peace be with you,” unless you want to be extra earnest, in which case you grasp a hand in both of yours and simply exhort, “Peace!”

With this under my belt, I was prepared to tackle the “iglesia.” I may not understand the homily or the main points of the sermon, but when someone takes me by the hand and offers, “Paz,” I can figure it out. But as the people rush around me and snatch the hymnals that I reach for, I realize how much less I’m learning without the Spanish language.

My mind wanders when it isn’t caught by words. I count the gilded ceiling tiles. I wish that someone would come over afterwards and explain to me what everything means. And picking at a string in my dress with my eyes accidentally open because I didn’t realize it was a prayer, I realized two things:

First, if someone wanders into your church who doesn’t speak your language well, they’d greatly appreciate your help. Printed sermons are phenomenal, but outlines work. The words to unfamiliar songs are essential. Ask if they have any questions. Be patient enough to answer them. But second, and maybe more relevant to our churches back at home, “Church” itself can be a language.

Is it hard to believe that not everyone knows “Awesome God” or “Amazing Grace”? That people may not know a VBS from the NIV? If Church isn’t their native tongue, they might not. And while they may have learned enough about “Jesus” or “love” to get the gist of the message, when the message is on reconciliation or tribulation or sanctification without an explanation, people can leave without any better understanding when they walked in.

Jargon can also be dangerous. It lends itself to empty prayers. It’s easy to say things automatically that you don’t really mean, disguising a lot of nothing in stained-glass wrapping paper. But it’s more than that. This jargon can seem like the password to a secret club, where inside everyone sounds like each other. The truth is it should never be about sounding more like each other. It should be about sounding more like Christ. Being fluent in “church” should never be a prerequisite for being welcome in one.

The goal is not simplicity of thought, but simplicity of purpose. And this purpose is not potlucks or discernment or love offerings – it’s a gospel that transcends language barriers. When the pursuit of Jesus Christ becomes the focus of the Church, there might be very different accents; but in the end, regardless of the language in which it’s spoken, “church” translated will still be church.

The Blind Leading the Blind

In Honduras, football is sacred. And I’m not referring to that silly, showy sport with all that padding and goalposts. I’m talking about nothing but a field, a couple nets, and a ball that you actually kick with your feet. When Honduras plays, the country’s on holiday. Men, women, and children wear their jerseys and when the games start, the streets empty as people pile into each other’s houses to watch.

I was buzzing with excitement too, though I couldn’t define a fault or a penalty if you asked me. I was like a kid asking how to say “goalie” and “field” and “announcer.” We sat on little folding chairs in a room with a dozen friends who pressed against the television, listening with all their might. When the announcer roared or we gasped in disbelief, sometimes they turned to us and asked, “What happened?” because none of them could see. We found ourselves guessing because we couldn’t understand the rapid stream of Spanish words and thus we watched, our parts together making a whole.

My friend Anna and I first visited the blind school with our class. It’s an organization dedicated to providing life skills and vocational training for adults, many of whom become blind later in life and must relearn how to do the things we take for granted – like ride the bus or dress themselves. They study music, massage, computers, braille, and carpentry. It’s one of the most highly-regarded schools in the area and people come from all over for the two-year program. And it’s about two blocks away from us.

We visited again, just the two of us, and began to meet the people there. They walk fearlessly between classroom and courtyard. The veterans hold the arms of newer students, and the bold grab the hands of the timid. Our new friends introduced us to newer friends, and we passed hours talking in Spanish that seemed to roll off our tongues easier there than anywhere else.

We were completely charmed. I tried not to be offended when a blind man, Nixon, professed undying love for Anna because “she is the most beautiful.” Another new friend was eager to perform for us a Spanish pop song that he’d translated into English. He sang it in an accent we couldn’t understand, but with such abandon and sincerity that we applauded uproariously at the end.

Our new friend Leo got out his guitar and played some of his favorite songs for us -- everything from traditional Honduran music to “Yesterday” by The Beatles. Almost everyone at the school is musical and we passed the guitar around to everyone who heard it and came over. We watched the blind climb trees to pick fruit, dance salsa together, and smile with the unbridled joy that comes with not knowing how to guard your facial expressions.

We left only when it became dark, and promised to return the next week for the big game, when true to our word, we leaned forward on the edge of our seats as volunteers passed us popcorn and coke in little plastic cups. When the ball rolled into the net, we all shouted together, and I didn’t know how full a room could be with sound. Our friends jumped up and ran into each other, hugging everyone who wandered in their path. We screamed and pounded our feet against the floor, for a moment, feeling like our hearts beat together with the hearts of all Honduras.

I’m not going to cheapen our experience with some play on words that has to do with what our friends see and what they don’t. All I know is that the blind lead the blind with more care and love than most of us could muster. And as we said goodbye again, laughing and shaking hands we were counting down in our heads how many days before we can visit again.

Downtown

Calling a taxi is still not easy. Directing a taxi where to go, when you yourself are not exactly sure, is even more difficult. This is why my friend Anna and I ended up at the wrong university stadium last Saturday. By the time we drove to the correct stadium, we missed the walking tour we wanted to participate in. However, Honduras has definitely instilled an attitude of “go with it,” in us so we thanked our driver, made a few phone calls, and changed our plans.

We started by checking out the marketplace in Tegucigalpa. It was bigger than any farmer’s market I’ve ever seen, with booths full of fresh beets, pataste, papaya, squash, pineapple, and any other food you could imagine. Everyone was yelling and kids were riding on their parents' shoulders, and it was just so much fun. We bought pupusas from a vendor and walked past butcher stalls to watch a makeshift dairy churn cheese in huge plastic barrels. Honduran cheese is different from the cheese we're used to. There's quesillo, which is kind of like mozzarella; but most dishes use a hard, salty, crumbly cheese that I still haven't learned to appreciate.

From the market, we walked to Central Park. Everyone we passed by was enormously helpful. People offered directions without us asking, some even welcomed us to the city. Our next stop was the National Art Gallery. A local orchestra was practicing in one of the empty rooms upstairs, so the entire time we browsed, we were serenaded. Overall, I was quite impressed by the innovation and quality of some of the work in the museum.

All in all, it was a great cultural experience. We met tons of kind people, used our Spanish enough to call taxis and talk about consumer rights with a curious passer-by. It’s also nice to feel like I’m figuring out a city. We were almost giddily exited when we realized we could get from Congress, to downtown, to the market, and back if we wanted to. A second-hand store attendant recognized us from last week, and we found a new favorite bakery. At the end of the day, we saw the walking tour that we had missed -- a group of tourists, everyone with expensive cameras, staring at things though their lenses. I think we ended up getting the better part of the deal.

Dead Fish, Volcanoes, and Friendship

Last weekend we took advantage of our Friday off to visit the beaches on the South of Honduras. We hired a little bus to take us down to the wharf, and I ended up sitting in front next to the bus driver. This move always takes a leap of courage, but he was talkative and friendly, and in one of my proudest Spanish moments so far, we managed to chat for the entire drive!

We were dropped off at an isolated wharf, where "lanchas," little boats, waited to ferry us across to the island Amapala. 

Amapala is a small, poor island that depends on tourism for much of its economy. Southern Honduran beaches have dark sand and dark water. Since most tourists prefer the pristine, white-sand beaches of the North, we had a lot of the island to ourselves.

Once we were on the island, we checked into a little hostel for only $6 per person. On the other side of the island there are larger, more resort-style hotels and nicer beaches, but it's nice to be in a place where adventures are more important than comfort. Thankfully, spiders in the shower, sharing beds, and hungry cats that steal our loaves of bread are all still adventures.

We took mototaxis across the island to one of the beaches. Mototaxis are ubiquitous in Honduras, and they're wonderful. They're like little motorized tricycles with open sides that can squeeze four passengers and zip between traffic. They're perfect for rural areas that don't have roads for cars, or just for people who only want to spend 50 cents to get somewhere close by.

Though the beach wasn't anything out of a guidebook, the views were still spectacular. We were surrounded by mountains on every side, and rock formations bordered the little beach we found. 

My favorite part about little vacations is the people we meet. We found some fisherman and watched as one expertly filleted a stingray. 

We also ran into a group of school principles on vacation. We talked to some for a while and got to show off our (limited) knowledge of Honduran geography and history. Before we left, they saw my camera and wanted to be in a picture so we would remember them.

When the tide came in and swallowed the beach, we waited for our mototaxis in a restaurant right behind us. There we ate what was likely the freshest seafood I've ever had. Food that can stare back at you is the best kind, right?

The next morning, we started on a hike up the mountain that fills the center of the island. Years and years ago, it was a volcano, which made me imagine clambering up black rock sides and staring down into an open top, belching smoke and fire. Disappointingly, it was almost exactly like any other mountain, with the exception that the path was made up of much more volcanic rock.

After a 2-hour hike, during which I sweated more than I've probably ever sweated in my life, we finally reached the top. Through the clouds, we could see mountains and inlets for miles. To our left, El Salvador stretched into view, and Nicaragua to our right. As the clouds shifted and changed, we could see the shrimp and seafood farms that make up tiny pools for miles inland. With the sun shining through the clouds, it was a spectacular view.

At the summit, we also met a new friend. When exploring the area, we ran into a man with a machete and two barking dogs. Through a particularly difficult conversation, we finally established that he was the keeper of the paths, and lived up on top of the mountain in a little hut for a month at a time. He was thrilled to see us, which is nice, because it's always good to befriend men with machetes.

"Do you like guavas?" he asked us, when it looked like we were ready to leave. When we said yes, he led us to a wild tree off the beaten path, hacking grass down with his machete to make a way for us. "This is a good way to celebrate our new friendship," he said, but he said it in Spanish, and with a strong accent. "Do you understand?" he said, and we said no.

"Friendship -- that's when people look after each other and care for each other." He shimmied up the tree, tying his barking dog to a branch. "It's when they make sure the other is safe, and they want to give them things." He picked armfuls of guavas and handed them down to us, enough to fill our backpacks. "Do you understand?"

We nodded our heads and shook his hand. And there, on top of a volcano, taking fresh fruit from a very kind mountain man I think we really did understand friendship a little better.

Little Things I Love about Honduras

-Men cutting the grass on the median with machetes.

-Strangers coming up to practice Spanish with me

-Avocados

-When the Honduran soccer team is playing and the entire country puts on their team jersey

-Mountains

-Playing in the living room with my 2-year-old “niece,” blowing imaginary bubbles

-Delicious, fresh juices I’ve never heard of before (Hibiscus? Passion fruit?)

-Telenovelas

-Waking up every morning to find fresh pancakes on the table

-When the sun sets and we can look down from our backyards and see the capital city sparkling with a thousand colored lights

-Fried plantains

-The patience of strangers who speak at half the speed when they see how lost I am

-Handshakes with air kisses

-Our bus driver who drives us a different route to school every day

-The delightful absurdity of hearing “My Heart Will Go On” every day on our bus ride into town

-Granitas

-Pulling into Santa Lucia after a long weekend, seeing the little lagoon and the corner market, and thinking, “Aah… I’m home.”

Questions for the Proactive Consumer: What's a Maquila? (1 of 3)

Stop what you’re doing for a minute and check the tag on your t-shirt. This may require some contortions on your part. That’s okay. I’ll wait.

Got it? Now, what connection do you have to that country, whether it was Bangladesh, Nicaragua, or Vietnam? What connection, besides the fact that your purchase supports a system of thousands of workers in conditions that you probably wouldn’t appreciate?

You’ve probably heard about “sweatshops” before, and you probably think you know where this is going. But my goal isn’t to make anyone guilty, it’s to take an honest look at the processes that go into making these t-shirts we’re both wearing. (Mine was from Haiti).

I had the privilege of visiting four different garment factories in the North coast of Honduras, where about 2% of the United States’ textiles originates. Though Honduras only holds a small share of the U.S. market, a full 62% of Honduran exports are textiles that will end up in the United States. For Honduras, it’s a huge chunk of their economy.

Factories in Honduras are called maquilas, which is a word that originally referred to the amount of flour the miller would keep in exchange for grinding it. In the same sense, the economic boost and job creation the factories offered was the “maquila” that Honduras got to keep, while the USA ended up with both the textiles and the companies’ profits.

I’ll start by conceding that the conditions we observed when we visited weren’t awful. It was loud and the close quarters were chaotic, but the rooms were air conditioned and music played over loudspeakers. The workers were dressed nicely. Some of them smiled at us as we walked by.

But it’s still easy to see why people get outraged. In Honduras, maquila workers make less than the Honduran minimum wage. To keep international companies from leaving Honduras, the Honduran government set a different minimum wage for maquilas. While elsewhere, people must be paid 325 U.S. dollars per month, in maquilas, they can be paid as little as $225 per month, which comes to just above $1 an hour. Even this is twice as much as Chinese workers make, and five times higher than what maquila workers make in Bangladesh.

To put this in perspective, when I was working at a hotel this summer, I made an hourly wage that was eight times higher while working four fewer hours per day. And this was not because I had any particular skill set. This was because I just happened to be born a couple countries north.

Besides the low pay, maquilas also threaten the health of their workers. The lint and chemicals in the air can affect workers lungs, while repetitive motions lead to injuries like carpal tunnel and torn rotator cuffs. One woman we spoke with said that after three years, every worker has been affected by some sort of stress injury.

Finally, the pressure against unionization is still very much in force, at least throughout Honduras. Though it’s illegal to fire workers for attempting to start a union, the practice is commonplace. When enough union workers are blacklisted from all maquilas, the rest of the workers are too afraid to make any motion to organize.

Judging from the information in the last few paragraphs, it might seem like maquilas are terrible and should be eliminated. Groups like United Students Against Sweatshops would certainly agree. But it’s not as simple as that, or as clear-cut. If maquilas were completely bad for Honduras, Honduras wouldn’t want to keep them so desperately. And there are other things that you won’t read on No Sweat handouts.

Maquilas provide employment for 150,000 Hondurans, and millions of Latin Americans in total. The average Honduran maquila worker has only finished 6^th grade, and while this is higher than the national average, it still means that they would have more trouble finding a job elsewhere. The other side must be heard. In one article we read, author Paul Krugman says, “Bad jobs at bad wages are better than no jobs at all.” As unpalatable as this may be, it’s worth pondering.

People often compare maquila workers with workers in the United States. But this is a false comparison. Instead, more telling studies compare maquila workers with those who want to work for maquilas. One maquila told us they turn away 93% of applicants. In several factories, the turnover rate was under 2% per year. People want these jobs. And they keep them. In a study my professor did, 96% of maquila workers said they were very or somewhat satisfied with their jobs.

This raises an important question: Do we need to change all maquilas, or do we need to change the society that makes working there look like an attractive choice? Can we do both? And what does that look like? I'll admit right now that there is no easy answer. But that's why I'm here this semester. Because knowing is the first step towards action.

Questions for the Proactive Consumer: How do you Make a T-shirt? (2 of 3)

What does it look like to work in a maquila? This varies factory to factory, but the processes are the same. Everything begins in a textile factory. T-shirts start out in a large concrete room where spools of white yarn are fed through tubes into a whirring, spinning cylinder-shaped machine the size of a phone booth. If you’ve ever seen a grandmother knit socks with four needles, you’ll have an idea of what this machine is doing, except with over 1,000 needles.

The fabric comes down from the needles in one smooth tube that is rolled onto a bolt. When the bolt is full, workers take it to a huge, steamy room where machines that cost upwards of $1 million churn the fabric through softeners and dyes. Other machines dry, iron, and preshrink the fabric. Workers monitor the machines in the 90 degree room, most wearing face masks against the lint in the air. But most workers are in the next room where the finished fabric is cut.

Some fabric goes through machines that press pieces for clothing out in patterns, but most goes to be cut by hand with mini chainsaws, cutting through a hundred layers of t-shirt material at a time. These premade, precut pieces are sold in Honduras, but also to El Salvador, Haiti, and other maquilas around the world. From spool of yarn to stacks of precut sleeves takes about 48 hours. Since the machines can’t be safely turned off, shifts work around the clock.

Maquilas buy fabric in precut pieces. The pieces are separated by garment color and style and given to “cells” of workers that stitch the garment together. Each t-shirt is sewn by 8-10 people, while polo shirts take up to 22 workers. The “cells” work in an assembly line style, so each does the same motion throughout his or her 12-hour shift, 1800-4800 times per day, depending on how complicated the product is. The finished garments are folded and boxed right at the cell. Underwear is hung on racks and price tags are affixed. In most maquilas, the workers put in 44-hour weeks, working 12 hours a day for four days, with three days off.

Though we visited two textile plants and two different maquilas, our visit to Fruit of the Loom was by far our most in-depth. An entire team of workers met us at the front of the factory. When he found out we’d be visiting, Fruit of the Loom’s Director of Corporate Social Responsibility, Stan, had decided to make his own visit coincide with ours. Stan shook each of our hands as we entered a room stocked with drinks, donuts, candies and snacks. They were desperate to impress us.

Fruit of the Loom, which manages Spalding, Russell, and Vanity Fair, employs 1,177 people in Honduras alone. In 2008, Fruit of the Loom closed the one maquila in Honduras that had unionized—reputedly to eliminate the union. Pressure from student groups forced the company not only to reopen the factory, but to pay back wages for the year that all its employees had been without work.

Stan was understandably cautious with our group, as if he expected that any moment we would break out into a protest. “Students against Sweatshops are really hard to work with,” he sighed. “They’re the reason I have no hair.”

In their credit, Fruit of the Loom has come a long way since reopening their factory. Three of their plants now have fully recognized unions, and the company is one of the highest-paying in the country.

They’ve also taken steps towards environmental sustainability with a shift from traditional coal-burning plants to new ones that burn king grass which is grown nearby. The waste product from the dyes is organic and clean enough to be used to fertilize the grass, creating a renewable circle of energy production and waste treatment.

Though the wage gap has yet to be closed, and many issues persist, it’s encouraging to see the improvement that has happened over just a few years. It’s also important to note that this change only happened when pressure from the inside (the desire for unions) met pressure from the outside (students against sweatshops.) Fruit of the Loom will do what it takes to keep a profit, and if underwear shoppers suddenly find the ethics behind their boxer shorts important, the company will be forced to comply.

I can’t overstate the power of organized groups, whether that’s inside or outside of the company. We, as shoppers, can change what we demand. But the workers themselves are fighting for better rights too.