Author Archives: Fortunato Velasquez

About Fortunato Velasquez

Fortunato Velasquez received his Registered Nurse's license from the State of California during the month that Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. On February 15, 2020, my friend and the director of the Fundación Señor San José in La Paz, La Paz, Honduras, Sister Edith Suazo Fernandez died at the age of 47. https://youtu.be/Poqcf0vn0qQ This a video of her funeral.

Foundation Children

Since Sister Edith’s death the resident children were dispersed to various locales by the corrupt and incompetent government agency in charge of at-risk dependents. Some have fared well, others not. A few were placed right back into the same abusive situation from which they were saved by Sister Edith and the court system. I have hired three of the eldest to work part-time here at the Home, their previous home. One has graduated high school, the others are in secondary virtual classes. I am working to enable others lost in the bureaucratic cracks and abandoned by government hacks. Hiring former residents to continue to maintain the Foundation property provides a sense of continuity and pride towards eventually post-pandemic providing a home for other at-risk children by our private foundation and keeping it out of the reach of bureaucratic malfeasance.

Bici Time

I have become a beecee rider again. The law here says no driving a car if not authorized by the last digit on your ID card. That means once in ten days. Although many folks do cheat and sneak. If the cops catch you, however, there will be a fine. An old broken-down bike here at the Childrens Home was just gathering dust so I had it repaired. New inner tubes and a new tire made it well. I rode it home from the bike shop this morning, about 8 blocks, and my legs let me know the difference. The guy charged me a dollar to put it all together. I bought the parts last week in Comayagua. $10. Better than a fine and if I ride it every day, I will travel farther and farther, and my legs and body will thank me. Have a great week everyone.

The Neverending Story

The government has appropriated space in empty La Paz schools to house overflow symptomatic covid-19 positive patients. The high school has become a food distribution center. The country has 27,583 positive individuals and 771 deaths attributed to the virus. All the country’s hospitals are filled to capacity. There’s no room at the Inn. The populace continues on mandated lock-down. Municipalities screen visitors and deny entrance to outsiders. The Fundación Señor San José, the Children’s Home, is empty and silent. I maintain my apartment and a presence to thwart thieves. The foundation’s president has ordered no business activity until after the Quarantine. Realistically, the country is locked down for the rest of the year and perhaps longer. The outside world is doing no better than us, and probably worse. I have a home: I can buy food: I am allowed to drive my car one day in 10. But there’s no place to go. I thank God for my health, for my family, and for my friends here in La Paz. Again, realistically, my attorney friend has made out my last will and testament.

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Pleasant News

I have hired two friends to help me half a day once a week to keep the Children´s Home in good order and the grounds well-kept. One is a lady who worked at the Home part-time when it was still in operation. The other a former resident who graduated high school last year with a focus on bilingual education and who now lives with her grandmother nearby. Deisi Milagro told me last week as we prepared ground for a garden that she had taught a fourth grade class English for her senior class project before graduating. She was so happy that the kids didn´t want her to leave and wrote notes asking her to remain. She added that she had taught the kids the same English lessons I taught her and and several other residents of the Home over the years. I will help her continue her studies at the university as soon as the pandemic allows. That news made my day. I remember I considered my teaching as planting the seeds of a garden and watching the seeds flower. Life is a garden of love. What you sow, so shall you reap. Deisi Milagro and I are now sowing gardens together.

They Will Never Learn

If the Orange, Pathological liar, Criminal Psychopath is reelected, I believe the US of Northamerica will cease to exist. If the putrid creature loses the presidential election, the country in its current form will also cease to exist. I have been around a long time and I left the country because it is a racist horror to its core. I am a History major university graduate and I early recognized that although the antibellum south physically lost the Civil War, their hate-filled racial animus has permeated every goverment institution and a majority of the populace to this very day. – The national covy count today in Honduras is 7,669 positive infections and 274 covy deaths.

Rage, Destruction, Epidemic

As a norteamericano country governed by a criminal cabal burns, its pink population and large black minority population sinking under and dying from an ignored pandemic, the rage at the sanctioned racism and oppressive military police injustices towards the black community erupts in an accumulation of destructive and long suppressed anger. The country will be destroyed. It is as simple as that. There is no going back. There is no normal. If we die, you die. – In Honduras today, the positive covy count is now 5,093 and the dead number 201. There is no racism to speak of here, after the native population rose up and kicked out the murdering, thieving pink spaniards who had subjugated them for 300 years.

15 May 2020 Covy

On 15 March 2020 there were 3 positive covy cases in Honduras. At the same time a woman flew in from Spain to attend a family baby shower.

On 22 March there were 26 covy cases. On 30 March there were 110 cases. On 8 April there were 312. Then covy got busy. On 28 April the cases jumped to 702. Today, 15 May 2020, there are 2,318 covy cases and 138 covy deaths.

Honduras’ population is only 8 million folks. Needless to say, the country is still on lockdown that began on 15 March 2020. Two months ago.

Movin’ Right Along

702 positive covy cases in Honduras this morning with 57 deaths. Not much compared to the US of Northamerica. But enough to keep the country on lock-down until next month. A bit of good news for the Children’s Home is the potential repair of our well pump so that we can have potable running water access 24/7. A representative of the Home’s benefactor with subsequent constuction 4 years ago came by Sunday to review the building. I had emailed the gentleman after returning from the States in January explaining the problem and the lack of money for repair. He never answered. Until this past Sunday. He must have heard my prayers.

The Children’s Home

I moved into the Children’s Home complex a year ago April 1, 2019. I left for my three-month road trip May 3rd. I returned home to Honduras from the US of North America on August 6th. In October I was hospitalized with Dengue Fever. I returned to the USNA in November 2019 for a gall bladder surgery at the Seattle VA Hospital, the operation completed on New Years Eve. A flight back to Honduras on January 7, 2020 seven days post-op was a very painful experience. My friend and mentor, Sister Edith, died on February 15, 2020. I live alone at the Children`s Home now paying the rent that keeps the complex from being abandoned and prey to squatters and thieves. My friend Celeste keeps me sane. There are now 312 positive diagnosed covid-19 casas in Honduras, 2 of them in La Paz. We are in for a long haul.

More Virus Lore

We now have 110 confirmed positive coronavirus cases in Honduras, and the populace is still still under curfew. In my opinion, this will not end for months. It is now the norm to wear a face mask when out of the home and to maintain two-meter distances from others when in line to buy food or any other needed basic item. One must consider human survival on the planet to be existential.