http://rumbum.com/1138-the-kindness-of-strangers

Saturday George picked me up, we met up with Eduardo,

and headed out of San Pedro. On the way out of town we caught up with 3 Guatemalan riders

who, curiously enough, had heard about me & my trip through the flurry of emails throughout Central America. We all rode together to Copan Ruinas, which was quite fun for me.

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Eduardo had to head back early, the three Guate riders invited me to go to the big rally / Bike Blessing in Escuintlas (Guatemala) with them, but I decided against it after my 7 hour border ordeal getting INTO Honduras…I didn’t want to have to go through THAT again. George and I had lunch together then he took off for his Saturday night date…

and I toured the Copan Ruins.

Copan was the southernmost of the Mayan Cities, and thought to be one of the three most important cities, Copan is known for its art and architecture.

Enjoy!

I updated my original post, as George corrected me. The bales that get spat out from the metal machine (wasn’t that cool???) are 300 lbs.

The copper bales weigh 4000 lbs [edited: ]and are worth $12,000. My mistake.

But while riding today I remembered another thing George told me: ever wonder why so many storm drains and such are missing in Central America…um, unethical recyclers (NOT INVEMA!!!). People will steal storm drains covers, metal anything, and turn them in for a few cents. George told me a not-so-funny story about a power tower that fell over because people had stolen the bolts (presumably for recycling) that held it together.

Over the years INVEMA has had to institute several rules about stuff they will NOT take…

But people will try anything, even putting nails in the plastic bottles so they’ll weigh more. And so INVEMA has a metal detector in their plastic processing system.

Quite the entrepreneur, George has already begun construction on a the first battery recycling center in Honduras. They are working on being able to capture both the plastic AND the lead / acid from the batteries, and have already done a bunch of ground testing on the site to make sure they do not contaminate it.

Now if he’d just figure out a way to deal with all the roadside trash he’d probably be sainted here in Central America…

Superhero George, just before he takes over the world 9or at least the central part of it...)

Anyone that has visited Central America knows that trash is a REAL problem…indigenous peoples have not been taught the difference between throwing a banana peel in the forest from throwing a coke bottle…many countries lack the find / resources / facilities for organized trash collection…many people are starving or just barely surviving…why should they care about trash?

It’s shocking to Westerners to see beautiful mountain vistas littered with trash…and a shame. It often bothers me, too.

George, my host in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, decided to do something about it.

Told me how he started his business, INVEMA….he was attending school in the US, and his friends gave him some crap about his not recycling…he didn’t think much of it at the time, but when he returned to his home country, Honduras, and thought of opening a business, he remembered recycling.

George runs the largest recycling business in Central America.  INVEMA employs a whole bunch of people, but it does two things even more important:  1. it provides an income for a zillion people who might not otherwise have income, because they pick through trash and recycle what is recyclable and 2. George estimates that about 40% of the roadside trash is collected by these people and brought in for recycling–thus reducing the litter that is such an eyesore.

Pretty dang clever if you ask me.

The Tour:

The claw picks up a giant load of metal and the compactor makes this 300 lb. brick [edited from original post]

And spits one out abut once a minute

They also recycle plastics. Do you know that they have  to do a 6-step process in order to get all the glue and paper labels off?

Fly-away paper

Steam

Recycled Water. The capture rainwater, store it it huge vats, use it for a week, then release it without any chemicals in it.

Green plastics waiting for processing

Incoming bales of clear plastic (they have recycling collection facilities all over Central America)

A recycle-r entering the scales

More bales of plastic

Inside the main building

The recycle copper: it gets bought for $3/pound x 400 lbs., so each one of these bales is worth $12,000!!! [edited from original post] They keep these locked up with a guard in a special room. I didn’t count, but it looks like more than 12 bales…

George said they used to have insurance, but he found it cheaper just to hire armed guards.

Call me weird (I am!) but I found this really really fascinating, and am very grateful to George for the tour of San Pedro and surrounds every bit as much as the tour of his facility.

Thursday January 7, 2010

I spent the night in the COLD! mountain town of La Palma…just shy of the El Salvador / Honduran Border. The plan was to spend the night close to the border, cross over super early, and go see the Copan ruins on the way to San Pedro Sula.

The nice fellow at the KTM shop in San Salvador, where I got my new chain, had contacted a motorcyclist friend of his, George, who told me that they have a motorcycle gathering every Thursday…and I wanted to be there for that.

Well, the border officials had a different idea for my day. They thought I would be MUCH happier spending 7 1/2 hours there with them, and missing the ruins, and riding after dark to San Pedro Sula.

!!!

By the time I got to San Pedro, I was frazzled. I’d lost my cool at the border and let the process really upset me. The depth of the ineptitude was overwhelming (It has since been suggested to me that perhaps they were after a bribe–they were waiting for me to ask how much it would take to get me out of there quickly–I am not totally sure of this.)

For the first time on my trip I came across kids that had put dirt in the road and wanted me to stop and pay them money. (I’d read about this on the motorcycle forums, so at least I was forewarned…) I slowed down, then went over the dirt mound really fast and just kept on riding.

The road quality in Honduras had changed dramatically–there were huge woman-and-bike-eating potholes , places where the pavement had been severely damaged, places where the pavement ended and you had to ford your way across dirt and rocks. The curious thing to me was that at least Honduras MARKED the places with signage where the road turned bad (most of the time). In the previous countries people just put rocks or branches in the road to warn you.

The good thing was the scenery was absolutely incredible–it made up for the terrible roads

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I arrived in San Pedro in a “state”. I’d ridden for more than an hour after dark, I had no idea where I was going, and finally just quit riding. I called George, asked him to come and get me.

I had a great time with the other bikers at S’Tragos Bikers Saloon, and fortunately they’d changed my point of view on Honduras