Disco Movil

One advantage of having siblings around my age is that I can go out dancing with them on Saturdays. There is one disco in town, Disco Movil, which is about 2 blocks uphill (and I mean uphill) from my house. For 35 lempiras (about $2) you can dance to punta (a Honduran dance from the coast), reggaeton, meringue, cumbia and salsa (if you’re lucky). The disco opens at 9, but no one really goes out until at least 10. Disco Movil boasts a video screen (which plays random music video/movie clips) and light shows (lots of strobe lights and fog machines). It’s supposed to be the best disco outside of Teguz.

Last weekend my brothers and sisters and I went to one of their friend’s birthday parties. It was in the basement of this old restaurant. The party basically consisted of a dance floor, a DJ and a makeshift bar. There were about 5 of us PC gringas there. It was kind of funny because when we first showed up, people either 1. already had novias (girlfriends) and therefore couldn’t dance with us (everyone seems to be novios here) or 2. were very intimidated by us. But after an hour or so, the locals (besides are host brothers and sisters) started to dance with us. In Mexico, at the more sophisticated discos, techno music was the staple and sometimes that was all they played. However, in Honduras the staple is reggaeton. For those of you who don’t know, reggaeton is sort of like Latin Rap which has a distorted reggae beat to it. Generally, the lyrics are too dirty to mention, yet still som
ehow widely accepted in the conservative country of Honduras, where everything seems to be taboo. Two of the most popular artists are Daddy Yankee and Don Omar. Did you ever hear the song “Gasolina”? I think they used to play it on the radio in the US. Anyway, it’s music like that. Almost every song is reggaeton and when they run out of reggaeton songs to play, they just play the same ones over again. They never get tired of them. At the party everything was reggaeton except 3 or 4 punta songs and maybe 2 merengue songs.

Generally, my family’s curfew is 9:00, but on Saturdays we can “ask permission” and stay out until the late hour of 12.