Tamales are a Christmas tradition in Honduras.  This year, I took part in their preparation, at the house of my friend's mom.  There are 11 siblings in their family, and I'm friends with a few of them.  They've taken me under their wing and invited to many family get-togethers, and invited me to help out with their tamale making.
When I arrived around 1, their mom had already been hard at work for hours, preparing all the ingredients, including corn that had been cooked and ground by hand to make the dough.  There were several large bowls outside on the table, one containing the corn dough, another corn dough mixture that had spices added, giving it a reddish-brown colour, and others with rice, potato, peas and meat.  Being vegetarian, I normally don't eat tamales at Christmas, since they usually have either meat or chicken in them, but my friends have made me a vegetarian one previous years, and this year we made a few vegetarian ones as well.  
If it doesn't have meat in it, they call it 'mudo' (literally translated, it usually means 'mute').  I didn't want my mudo tamales to get mixed up with the others, so Manuel tied a string around mine to differentiate it.  He laughingly told me no one would voluntarily take a mudo one, that's considered the worst of the lot.  When they were growing up, if the meat finished up in the tamale making process, but there were still other ingredients left, their mom would continue making mudo ones until all the ingredients were finished, so there would be no waste.  The kids wouldn't know which ones were mudo until they bit into one, and once food was on your plate, you had to finish it.  Apparently tears were shed over the agony of having to eat an entire mudo tamale. If I had grown up in their house, I guess I could have made lots of friends, taking the mudo ones off their hands :)
The tamales get assembled on top of a boiled banana leaf.  In the past, the banana leaf alone was the wrapping, but now, the Munoz family also uses a sheet of aluminum foil so that they can be wrapped up more tightly, with the banana leaf still inside of the aluminum foil to help to give the tamale flavour.  On top of the banana leaf, you put a big spoonful of the corn 'masa', then the other spicy corn masa, then a handful of each of the other ingredients.  Next, you roll it up, making sure to tuck it tightly in, and compact the ingredients together when folding up the side edges, so that the finished product will have a firm, tightly packed consistency.  Once all the tamales are assembled, they go into a pot of boiling water for around an hour.  They're done when the potatoes inside have been cooked all the way through (all the other ingredients are already cooked, so the boiling process just firms up the dough and cooks the potato).  Take them out of the water, and straight to your plate for a delicious dinner!

Travelers around the world have grown accustomed to beach vendors.  Whether you love it or hate it, if you're on a popular beach, there seems to always be a crowd of people touting their wares.  Personally, I like the convenience of a mobile shopping center passing right by in front of me, so I don't have to go anywhere, as long as it's up to me to approach the vendor, rather than constantly having to fend off aggressive sellers.  I traveled in Brazil, and thought their style of beach vendors were great- you could buy everything from a sarong to a kebab roasted right in front of you, entire bars with blenders wheeled on past on the beach.  None of them really approached, they just called out what they were selling, and if you were interested, you could stop them.  Other places, I've had to constantly ward off the bombardment of people selling their wares.
In Roatan, the area with the biggest concentration of vendors out on the hustle is West Bay.  West Bay is the most popular beach on the island: white sand, turquoise blue water only a little over a km in length, and lined with resorts.  On cruise ship days, hundreds get taken to West Bay by bus to enjoy a day on the beach.  The beach itself is public, no one can charge you to use it, but there are no public facilities.  Want a lounge chair?  There'll be at least a couple vendors who can offer to rent you one for $10 for the day.  Hungry?  Vendors with coolers or buckets pass by, selling empanadas, banana bread, ice cream.  Thirsty?  Try coconut water or pineapple juice.  Alcoholic beverages are one of the few things the beach vendors don't sell, so you'll need to visit one of the beach bars if you want a cold beer or Monkey Lala.  If you're looking for an activity, there's someone to sell one to you, whether it's jetskis, parasailing, snorkel tours, ziplining, paddle boarding or fishing.  Didn't pack your shades?  There's a vendor for that.  Need some souvenirs?  Multiple options passing up and down the beach, from t-shirts to mahogany, bracelets to hammocks, cigars to hats.  To get in the season, there are also Christmas ornaments for sale.  If you need a new look, someone can help you out with braids.  And don't forget the massages- there's never a shortage of massage ladies.  These are the most persistent sellers on the beach, seemingly impervious to averted eyes and disinterested airs.  Don't think about just saying a polite 'maybe later', as that guarantees that you'll be followed by a shadow, so that 'later' isn't missed- the only way for them to move on is after a firm 'no thank you'.
Is the constant sales pitch bothering your beach relaxation mode?  Though the muncipality has tried to crack down and limit the amount of vendors on the beach, it seems to be a never ending hustle.  Stick in your headphones, pull down your sunglasses and just let them do their best and continue on their way.  Though the bombardment can be annoying, there are lots of hardworking people out in the sun all day long, just trying to make an honest living.  And if you'd rather relax in solitude, there are other, less touristic beaches around the island that can provide that for you, so get out and explore!

I've lived in the tropics for the majority of my adult life, but having grown up in Canada, there are several things that have been completely foreign to me when I arrived, that I've learned about while I've been here
1. Things grow way differently than I thought. I had no idea how pineapples, cashews and coconuts look when they're growing. I'm well educated and have read a lot, but there are some things that had just never come up before.  I thought pineapples maybe grew from trees, that the hairy brown spheres of coconuts that are sold in the supermarket were how they looked on the tree (maybe blame that are cartoon portrayals of coconut trees), and I don't really know how I pictured cashews, but definitely didn't imagine them anything like how they really are

2. I had no idea that the sky could hold so much rain.  Incredible- it can be dumping buckets for hours, and then going on even longer!  

3. The concept of 'tomorrow' is different when you live on a Caribbean island.  Tomorrow doesn't necessarily mean the day after today- it just means some abstract time in the future.

4. Little things I used to take for granted are actually luxuries and blessings, so I've learned how to be thankful when I have them: hot water showers, clean drinking water right from the tap, electricity that doesn't go out, going to the grocery store and being able to find everything on your shopping list.

5. There's no need for mail.  On Roatan, we don't have street addresses, no mail delivery- the electric bill gets tucked in by your meter, your water and phone bills also get dropped off by guys on moto, and if you have someone write to you, it eventually will arrive to the post office in Coxen Hole, though might take a few months to get there.  No flyers, no mailbox jammed with crap.  

I love the simpler lifestyle of living here.  Lying out in my backyard, gazing up at the stars without any city lights to block them, taking my dogs for a walk along the beach in the morning.  I like people smiling at me when they pass by, saying good morning, good evening and good night.  I like seeing kids running around outside playing, instead of glued to their electronics. I like the sweet smell of plumerias in bloom, seeing hummingbirds dart around the garden, hearing the sounds of nature, the warm feel of the sun on my skin, the taste of juicy mangoes and pineapple.  And I love, love, love not having snow.  Ever.