Ba pues!

What can I say? These last eight weeks have been marvelous. I’ve had my ups and downs, both physically and emotionally, but as all things go, everything will work out in its own time. I’ve been inundated with a whole host of reflection activities: we had to compile a bunch of workshops that effectively drew on our eight weeks experience here, reviewing what we had learned as astute observers to our eager-to-learn asesoras, we have a bunch of surveys to complete (which reminds me that I have a particularly lengthy one to complete from Duke after this blog post) and everyone, from asesoras to my home stay family, has been asking me when I’m leaving and whether they’ll see me again. To which I respond, pessimistically but realistically, that no, I will probably never see them again. I was never good at goodbyes - both at giving them but also at walking away from people knowing that this will be the last time I’ll see them.

The national conference today went swimmingly well. We had some hiccups; for example, I waited on a street corner for close to an hour to pick up any asesoras getting off buses, and seeing not a single green shirt (the standard uniform of our asesoras), walked back to find out that every single one of them had managed to sneak past our defenses and get to the Palacio Mundial by themselves. One lady insisted on painting her nails during workshops and fell asleep a few times. But by and large, I was happy with the level of engagement all the attending asesoras demonstrated. Then again, only the most dedicated ones would have come to the conference, which is unfortunate because some of our weaker asesoras could have really used the help. I presented a bit on the technical information of how to use the luz solar, a spiel which I’ve delivered a hundred times over and was able to lengthen and present without much difficulty. Our spanish was on target, the energy level was there: I only hope that the content was truly helpful for the asesoras. The entire purpose of the (first-ever!) national conference was to get everyone in the same place so that they could share experiences, see that they were part of something bigger than just the two or three asesoras they worked with, and generally improve due to the interchange of information. On that front, I think that we succeeded. 

A few of us then headed out to Kathy’s, which is a waffle-breakfast all day kind of joint, a misleading tag because it was NOT open all day. In fact, it closed at 2 PM, which is approximately the time that we arrived at the restaurant. Heartbroken (because Kathy’s was on my bucket list here in Granada) we headed over to Garden Cafe, where after ingesting an avocado BLT, I felt almost happy that Kathy’s had been closed due to the astronomical level of deliciousness that was Garden Cafe. For less than four dollars, I inhaled a sandwich and potato salad that was probably better than the vast majority of sandwich and soup places that I’ve ever been to. Tomorrow it’s brunch again at the chocolate museum (I may not go, because I’ve been there twice), some swimming and then a straight out marathon until 4 AM when Tim and Tess and Santa come to pick us up for the last time. 

We had to eat quickly, which was not a problem because the food was absolutely delicious, because at 3 we had a despedida, which was absolutely beautiful even though my home stay family couldn’t make it. I later found out that they had a perfectly legitimate excuse, because family they hadn’t seen in a really long time suddenly called, out of the blue, and they had to go have lunch with them until four, longer than they had expected. Edgard apparently kept tugging on his mother’s sleeve to remind her that it was three; I can just picture his wide-eyed look of innocence and concern. The boy’s so sweet - he hasn’t been corrupted by the world yet. Kidding. 

Anyways, at the despedida, Tim, Santa and Tess all said some very kind words about all of us and gave us a personal story, a certificate from our Spanish school, and a framed picture of us in action. Tim chose to tell the story of how I threw up at a campaign in front of a startled crowd of customers interested in a stove and then ran back inside to resume the campaign. In other words, a story that I wanted as few people to know is now known by everyone. Great. However, Tim redeemed himself by showing us an absolutely beautiful video of a collection of photographs we had all sent in of our eight weeks here, both at work and at play. It was amazing to see each photo, each of which brought back a flood of memories of every activity we had done here. Although these eight weeks flew by, I can remember each and every one of the places we stayed at, and I hope I’ll be able to have these memories forever, or perhaps add new ones in the future should I ever return to Nicaragua. It is definitely in my plans to travel Central America at some point in the future. 

This may be my last blog post; if so, it was an honor to see so many people reading my blog everyday. Thanks for caring guys! I can’t wait to see all of you (ambiguous pronouns, yay!) in less than three days. I hope that you’ll find me much the same person that I was two months ago, but I also hope, at the same time, that I’ve changed significantly in immensely positive ways as well. As the Nicaraguans say, ba pues!

Second to last day of the program...

I’m beginning to slip a bit in my commitment to writing this blog, which is all in good time I guess since I’m (sadly, unbelievably) nearing the end of my eight, wonderful weeks here in Nicaragua. Edgard just came up to me and asked to confirm whether I had much time left in Nicaragua, to which I regretfully answered in the negative, that I was leaving in two days. We’ve begun to wrap up our experience, and tomorrow will be the last day of the program.  After that, it’s a half Friday and a full Saturday to ourselves to say goodbye to the country in which we’ve stayed for the last two months and prepare, by way of packing, for the journey back home. We’ve been working our butts off to finish all our work. Among the pile we had were our final recommendations for SolCom. I have mentioned that we’ve been tirelessly gathering surveys on our products, especially the ones we’re investigating, wherever we go. All those surveys (which in total, between the two teams, number more than 200) were analyzed and put into reports for SolCom’s leadership on demographic information, marketing tips and selling strategies for each of the product. For filters, seeds and stoves, new products which we are investigating and are likely to begin selling in the future, we sense great promise which we, however, need to supplement with hard data. I have to hand it to both the teams for doing an excellent job compiling thoughtful, well-supported recommendations and answers to questions we’ve been asking since the beginning of the summer. We also made the hard choice of allocating our 500+ dollars in funds to up to three of the groups that we had consultations with. In the end, after some debate, we chose SolCom itself (funds will go towards the marketing of seeds and the improvement of our publicity material), ALBOR (the rasta guys in Chichigalpa with the camelbacks) and Pueblo Hotel, the group of women we stayed with on Ometepe (for the improvement of their marketing material and strategy). 

One of my favorite activities we did happened at the very beginning of the day. To begin with, I got off on a rough start today, because my phone died unexpectedly in the middle of night, despite the fact that I had just fully charged it hours before. Because I use my phone for an alarm, the lack of said phone caused me to sleep until 9:30, an hour and a half beyond my normal waking time. Thankfully, we were still in the middle of our “words” activity when I arrived, breathless and full of penitence) on scene. The “word” activity refers to an assignment we were given almost at the very beginning of our eight weeks here. Each of us was given a word like “leadership,” “community,” or in my case, “service.” We were then asked to describe what this word meant to us and to prepare some kind of written or visual way of expressing our thoughts. I chose the cliche path of writing a poem. Here’s the poem below (forgive how kitschy it is). 

What service means to me: 

There wasn’t much time think of such things

In the rushed weeks before this internship.

However, the eight weeks would soon bring

The awareness that I knew zip. 

As our work load grew,

And the number we “served” increased quickly,

I began to wonder anew,

What exactly does service mean to me? 

When I first heard service, several things came to mind:

I thought of customer service or the domestic assistance;

Of ingratiating flattery or snobby contempt;

Of complete subservience or proud aloofness;

And other, misguided notions that, of my naivete, would tempt. 

Of the self-righteous helping the hopeless,

Of short term aid, a handout if you will;
Of the pitiful receiving merciful assistance, 

Without paying the bill.

But nothing substantial nor kind. 

Rather, service means not looking down but upwards;

Not serving something greater, and not someone smaller, than you.

Service meant thinking long-term, forwards;

Not just teaching but also learning, in lieu. 

Service means offering not just help, but understanding.

It does not mean topdown instruction, but inclusive conversation;

Not just fixing but also facilitating;

So that together we can effect a meaningful transformation.

Thus, “service” may not be as straightforward as we would prefer.

However when done correctly with all factors taken into account,

And along with the right attitude, to which I refer,

Service can better the world in more ways than I can count. 

Anyways, I was blown away by how much thought everyone else put into their pieces, and reminded once again at how talented and intelligent each one of the people on this trip are. Throughout my eight weeks here, I’ve been impressed by how creative and well-rounded everyone is, and appreciated the chance to work with every one of them on demanding and novel projects. The word assignment was a great way to reminisce and survey all we had accomplished and the distance we had traveled in our roads towards personal growth. 

I’ve discovered a new place that I wish I had known about before because I greatly prefer it to Euro Cafe. Garden Cafe it is called and it serves great sandwiches and smoothies, at exorbitant prices, but the atmosphere is enough to make up for it. Inside is a wonderfully decorated space with colorfully decorated chairs, extremely friendly staff, and the requisite courtyard full of sunshine and flowers. Yesterday we literally took over half of the place yesterday until almost seven at night putting together our lengthy report, which got goofier and goofier as I got more and more tired. Still, I think we handed over a great product. 

I won’t bore you with the details, but I have great hope in the development of seeds, filters and stoves by next summer for the next batch of fresh-faced, idealistic young SEC interns. The products have been enthusiastically received by the people we’ve met and lived with in the past eight weeks, and I know, but empirically and deep down in my heart, that they solve a pressing need that has real consequences on people’s lives here. I hope that next year’s people were as talented as us (but really) (kidding). I’ll be sad to just leave all this work behind, with so much completed and so much more to do. I can only imagine what it’s like for Tess, who has been here for almost two years and will be leaving only a few days after us. How do you just pick up and go without feeling guilty or unfinished? I suppose two years is different from eight weeks. 

Speaking of struggling internally, I’m divided on whether I should have given my second chocobanano to a woman who I see constantly walking the streets, haggard and usually beset by a few small children. 1) I already had had a chocobanano 2) I wasn’t hungry 3) I knew that she need the food more than I did and 4) she wasn’t a child who was skipping school or being exploited by their parents by becoming a beggar on the street. Plus I’ve seen her around before, so was I justified in wordlessly handing her a chocobanano and walking off? 

Tomorrow is a big day! Our national conference for our twenty something asesoras...meaning I now have to go and prepare a bit more by reviewing what I have to say tomorrow. Goodnight!

Coming to a close

Today was one of those days where everything turned into a blur of work work work. In some ways, it felt like we had come full circle, since we spent the morning in the top, airy and light-filled floor of the Palacio Mundial, where we’ll also be having our first national conference this Friday. We went over our various responsibilities and the seeming mountain of work that lay ahead of us in the next few days in preparation for Friday and also our final recommendations to be given to SolCom in summary of our eight weeks here. In reality, after being all prudent and delegating responsibilities, and then diligently hacking away at our seeming mountain of work, we were left with a completely manageable workload to complete by Thursday night. However, I’m not sure how to feel that our eight weeks here are going to be completed within the next few days, when I’ve been here for nearing two months, or how I should feel about my time here ending while simultaneously feeling like it’s just begun, that we’re still new initiates to the cult of MCM, learning bland, vague information in the Palacio Mundial for hours at a time. I feel incredibly comfortable now in Granada, though granted I only know a part of it. Still, it feels strange to be leaving (which I’ve always tried hard not to think about, since I should live in the moment here) and feeling like I’ve just returned.

I’m officially addicted to mangoes now. First papayas, now mangoes. I took a risk and bought a few off the street (they’re dirt cheap, but it’s still more expensive than free), washed them thoroughly in detergent, peeled off the skin and ate them for a snack after lunch and dinner. I also found the mangoes that Julia tucked away in my bag the day I left, which left a twinge of sadness at how quickly I had left them behind despite the fondness with which I remember them. I’m debating on whether I should call Julia and Carlos; will it only prolong the weird in between of nostalgia and the readiness to move on? Given also that Julia and I had to say everything twice to get understanding across, the conversation is bound to be awkward. I have a problem of letting go, and also of making connections really easily. The two in combination means I always have a hard time moving places and saying goodbyes. 

While buying my mangoes, I met the strangest man. He looked kind of shapeless and race-less; he was just a person with no identifying markers of ethnicity or culture, so I couldn’t tell what he was saying and in what tongue he was speaking in at first. Apparently he ran a store and hostel in Costa Rica for 18 years but couldn’t give me a straight answer as to what he was doing in Nicaragua. I should have prefaced by saying that he was sitting in a plastic chair on the sidewalk next to the market and by all appearances was helping a street merchant sell fried plaintains and mangoes. “What am I doing here,” he kept asking himself...He was a lost individual indeed, not physically but mentally and emotionally, completely directionless. Weird conversation. At least my mangoes were good.

Speaking about weird people, while walking home last night I found out that the otherwise sedentary homeless woman I pass everyday in the exact same spot no matter the time is actually a raving lunatic. I already thought her strange for remaining in, literally, the exact same spot for the last six weeks, everyday, a every hour. Last night however, she was sitting upright, shrieking like a banshee to some invisible victim who had provoked her ire or had grossly wronged her. Something told me her language wasn’t exactly PG either. The furor with which she spoke was enough to make me cross the road in a mild terror. 

We’ve essentially taken over Cafe Euro. I’ve crossed the line of guilted shame and don’t even bother buying an over-priced drink. I’ve even got the audacity to go and buy outside food, like Chocobananos (fulfilling that bucket list!) to the cafe. We simply set up shot, plug our laptops in (outlets are becoming a hot commodity as our laptop batteries slowly die, one by one, in the Nicaraguan heat. That’s another thing - Granada is noticeably hotter than Diriomito, where during some nights I slept with my jacket on I was so cold. Here I can sweat through my shirt within 10 minutes of walking), and type away. To my compañeros, I am incredibly grateful for how well we’ve worked together as a team and the “healthy debate,” as well call it, we have about every topic that comes our way. We’ve produced incredible amounts of work, believe it or not, during these seven weeks. 

One of the more excellent things that Timoteo does is notate and compile all of our deliverables and achievements and delivers them to us in condensed form on spreadsheets. While we don’t necessarily remember everything we do, to see it all tangibly accounted for on one sheet of paper does make me feel warm and fuzzy inside because I can sleep well knowing that we have achieved a helluvalot. We’ve visited 12 communities, sold 98 pairs of glasses and 44 stoves (which may not sound like a lot, but really is when you consider how hard it is to even establish oneself in another city). We’ve consulted with nine groups and given them all quality trainings and deliverables that if used right, should have lasting, long term consequences. As Tess, one of our group leaders told us, the fact that we came here a little shaky in our spanish skills and having no developmental or consulting work ever, and then ended up, within six weeks, coming up with a two hour workshop of leadership and business analysis with completely original material, all in relatively fluent Spanish, is beyond their expectations for any SEC group. I’m proud of us. 

Tomorrow Cafe Sonrisa is having the esteemed CNN showing up at their doorstep. I’m not sure whether they’re going to be taking a video or writing an article about the cafe, but I will definitely be there to get my fifteen seconds of fame. Plus I love that place and they have the best mango juice I’ve ever tasted. And hammocks to boot. Goodnight! I may go and watch one of the twenty bootleg DVDs I purchased yesterday...

Goodbye Diriomito!

Leaving Diriomito was emotional...Julia actually started tearing up a little and we hugged multiple times. The night before, she waited up until I got home from the movie and only went to bed once I got home. Although I felt a little guilty, since she could have gone to bed earlier (though she usually goes to bed at around 11 and gets up at 5; I’m not sure how she does it) I was also touched because all she does is worry about me. She also gave me a pair of earrings as gifts and a memory of staying with her and her family. I was completely taken aback, and kicking myself because I had packed little gifts to bring to Nicaragua as well but hadn’t brought them to Diriomito. They kept asking me whether I’d be back to Nicaragua, and whether I’d ever visit, to which I responded of course I’d visit if I ever found myself in Nicaragua. The real question is when I’m going to be back in Nicaragua again....They have my phone number, email and Facebook so thanks to our many technologies we will be forever in contact if we so wish. People pass in and out of our lives so quickly, but so many of these people are extraordinarily willing to share their homes and friendship no matter how transitory the visit. I almost felt a little guilty when Carlos, my papa nica, hugged me goodbye and called me “importada,” or in his own words as explanation, “someone who does good.” While we are definitely doing good here during out eight weeks in Nicaragua, none of us are here on exactly altruistic purposes. Nonetheless, Diriomito is home to my favorite home stay family so far. 

Last day in Diriomito :(

Yesterday we had a campaign in the town of Güisquiliapa. I had hoped that because all the asesoras lived in the very same town that we would have insane turnout. As it happened, we did have 35 people show up for eye exams and to look at the other products, almost too many to serve within the time span given to us. Santa had to begin giving eye exams because there were people who were waiting for two hours at a time, though I believe most of the delay can be blamed no on the inefficiency of any asesora but because people are extremely picky, choosy and don’t pay attention. Everything has to be gone over many, many times and carefully repeated to each person so that they understand everything, as the clients are often insistent that they need one thing when they really need the other. 

While the eye exams were going on, we would administer surveys and do demonstrations of the solar lamp. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the filter with me. However, we took the stove demonstration on to another level. We lighted up the stove and with the expert help of Peter, who wasn’t afraid to look silly to start the fire, got a pot of water boiling for coffee. The waiting people, sensing that we were at their mercy, then demanded sugar, which I went to buy at the closest pulperia. I’m going to miss the pulperias here. They’re little corner shops filled with snacks and your basic necessities, like bread, sugar, rice and corn, fruits, and utensils. You can often buy something good to eat for a few cordabas at one of the many pulperías that appears every block or so. All pulperías offer this coconut-vanilla cake that very closely resembles yellow cake without frosting, to which I am completely addicted. I’ll buy two or three pieces at a time and have developed a reputation for eating lots of cake. 

Then, with some SolCom funds, we also went out and bought some eggs, oil and salt. Although we got some smoke in our eyes and burned our finger tips a little, we managed to make huge quantities of scrambled and fried eggs as well as egg sandwiches. I offered for everyone waiting to make their own sandwich and in return fill out a survey, but no one wanted to do my genius idea so that flopped. However, what turned into an otherwise long campaign in a far away town without the promise of lunch turned into a fun few hours trying to get a little stove to cook our eggs and then being able to enjoy the delicious results of our success. 

The campaign itself was also a relative success. We sold a good amount of goods, resulting in a good commission for each of the asesoras. I think a reason why our sales weren’t astronomical however was because a lot of the townspeople knew that they could stop by any of the asesora’s houses at any time to purchase products and so they did not feel much urgency to walk to the campaign itself and wait in line. 

I had a relatively uninteresting afternoon after the campaign, other than nearly suffocating after being squeezed for half an hour in one of those ubiquitous small vans that we travel in, that the drivers insist will hold upwards of 20 people when only 15 will comfortably fit. My plans for showering were tragically cut short by a rain that was so ferocious I couldn’t hear the TV blasting at full volume over the pounding of water on the roof. At around 5, Julia asked me if I wanted to eat dinner with them, to which I responded, of course! Thinking that we were going to eat at home, I was extremely confused when she led me to a waiting taxi (owned by my home stay dad - who knew! Though this was the first of many surprises that night) and was driven, at an excruciatingly slow pace, to a house that I later found out to be the residence of the sister of my home stay father. After some questioning (no one told me anything unless I asked, which only contributed to be my extreme bemusement), I figured out this was a weekly family tradition during which everyone got together to talk, eat, and to my horror, pray. We spent a long hour alternately seated and standing in front of an altar adorned with Bible verses and flowers. I listened to them sing songs of devotion and penitence, interspersed with rapid fire verses recited from memory in a call-and-response type of thing. Whatever this catholic-sing a long thing was, it made me very uncomfortable, so I can only imagine how Carlos felt, since his entire family were religious fanatics and he, to belong, had to go through the motions while remaining a militant atheist. 

Afterwards, I kind of sat around awkwardly until one of the more outspoken uncles, who was quite obviously gay (I wonder how he, one of the loudest prayers, reconciled that with Catholicism and the rampant homophobia in Central America) introduced me to a few nephews of Carlos who were interested in talking to a ‘chinita.’ One of the kids even drew my profile, which I have safely sucked away for posterity. 

Today, we had a day off and walked to the Laguna de Apoyo, to Monkey Hut again. Because I didn’t use an alarm (I lost my phone until the afternoon) I woke up miraculously at 8:26, with someone coming to pick me up at 8:30. Unfortunately, my rush was for nothing because as soon as we left, it began to rain. We waited the rain out at one of the home stays; I ate a whole bunch of mamones, those lychee-type fruit that are extremely addicting simply because the gooey, fibrous almost gummy flesh is so damn hard to get off and each fruit represents a small personal challenge to eat. We then proceeded to hike through a jungle, literally, to get to the laguna. Because of the rain, each step, covered with wet palm leaves, became a dangerously slippery trap for our flip-floppered feet. My backside became completely covered with mud, which I persevered through on our 45 minute walk to Monkey Hut. Needless to say, we took a taxi back to avoid the arduous hike uphill back. Unfortunately, we could only get one taxi for the seven of us and so we had to cram give people in the backseat and three upfront. Bonding moments were to be had. 

Tomorrow we’ll be leaving Diriomito. We came up with a plan for the SolCom products that we have been testing with each home stay family. They can each buy at least one and thus continue to keep another sample for another month, during which we encourage them to market them to their neighbors, family and friends to raise awareness. I think the arrangement went over well and we also ran into Barney, my old spanish teacher, at the despedida (farewell party of sorts). He was wearing his date clothes as he was off to meet some friends and his girlfriend that night. Julia is going to buy a filter and keep the solar lamp as a sample for the next month. I have mixed feelings; I truly have enjoyed my time here in Diriomito and I love the small town feel. This is the Nica equivalent to the small towns of New England which I have grown to love. The woman who works at the pulperia knows us by site and gives us free mangos. Lester, one of the home stay dads, shakes my hand and calls me his amiga Emily when he sees us, though he calls everyone his friend. That’s my point though; the people here are incredibly warm and friendly, as as Pedro, the slightly deaf man who is a homestay host as well said, what they can’t offer in money they can offer in friendships and that we will find many friend here in Diriomito and in the neighboring towns as well. Leaving is going to be hard, but I also want to go back to my real home sometime. 

Goodnight! I’m off to Gloria and Lester’s house to do our daily movie night thingamajig. 

Some pictures

Doing what I do best...nothing.

Nicaragua's finest means of transportation.

Believe it or not, we cooked a delicious lunch on this stove.

Home sweet home for the last week!

My two favorite fruits here: mamones and mangoes.

Monkey Hut

I forgot to chronicle the interesting conversation I had with my home stay father, Papa Nica, also known as Carlos or Carlito, as he tried to convince me at first. Papa Nica is gruff and a bit standoffish at first, but he’s secretly a softie at heart. I found him lying in the hammock, which he had promptly inhabited as soon as I vacated the hammock, making me think he was a bit crabby at first because I was taking his favorite reading spot. Anyways, I asked him what he was reading and he showed me the cover: a dictionary of terms according to a materialist. At first, I was a bit taken aback: who would read a dictionary to begin with, and a dictionary according to a materialist? Who ever heard of such a thing?

After asking me the obligatory questions about what I was studying in college, etc, we began talking about his views on materialism (he is a staunch materialist and a believer in the scientific method) and his beliefs about God. He actually stopped conversation to shake my hand when I told him that I was an atheist, but the conversation quickly turned more into a debate, with him hogging all the conversation time (grrr) about his views on the scientific method, truth, and atheism.  I was initially impressed, and still am, about his curiosity about metaphysics and materialism, but was a little disappointed near the end of our conversation about his derogatory view on religion (which was still refreshing, in a place where I literally just passed a group of religious worshippers singing, badly I should add, some kind of religious hymn), his narrow definition of truth, his obstinate insistence that only that which is scientific can be trusted, and his didactic (and incorrect) explanation of deism. Still, it was extremely fun to have this kind of conversation in Spanish. I’m feeling much better about my Spanish-speaking abilities and have improved more than I thought I would at the beginning of this trip, but my constant falterings when speaking remind me that I have a long ways to go. 

Today however, my Spanish served me well. We traveled to the large-ish town of La Concepción, a town outside of San Marco and the center of 6-8 comarcas (communities) where we’re hoping to branch out, find and train future asesoras, and hold future campaigns. We currently have no presence at all out there. To begin building up contacts in an area in which we literally have never stepped foot, we made a “community visit” where we got off and began asking questions about social groups, religious/political organizations, community leaders. For example, the first place we asked was a pulperia, those ubiquitous corner shops that sell shampoo, snacks, etc. Beginning with the excuse of buying something, we quickly eased ourselves into conversation about community leaders and our work. From there, we got recommendations to go to the alcadia (the town hall), which was host to a bunch of youth groups and cultural groups, and the Iglesia de Aguacate, an evangelical church that is extremely active in giving trainings on arts and crafts to children and adults. we also ran into a random woman named Norma, who referred us to Yocanda, who then referred us to the Catholic Church (even for a medium town like Concepción, there were four churches). Meanwhile, another pair of scouters had found the Catholic Church’s school and had made contacts there with the enthusiastic director there. Later, we split up again to find the evangelical church which people had spoken to exultingly about. Here we ran into a hitch; we were completely sidetracked and taken aback by the impressive church structure we passed on the way to the evangelical church, and which we took to be the evangelical church itself. Let me tell you that this church would be considered extremely well built and kept even in the United States, so to see such luxuries like paved and crack-less parking lots and perfectly straight corners was as if this building had emerged out of a vision. Later, after many questions, we found out that it was the Mormon church, and not the evanglical ones. Rich Mormons...go figure. 

All was not lost however; I made contact with the police office and the local chapter of an anti-violence against women and children center right next to the police station. We eventually found the evangelical church, but just like every place we went, the person in charge was not there. However, we left with some promising contacts. 

I absolutely love my home stay family here. They’re extremely friendly and generous, and constantly try to engage me in conversation. The trick is to act stupid at first, so they don’t feel intimidated because at first everyone was very shy to talk and would only speak when spoken to. Just act silly and foolish and ask questions about everything and soon, they begin to open up and share more. I got a free mango today at the wonderful lady at the pulpería, who knows us well now because we buy so much stuff from her/use her store as a meeting site everyday. In response, seeing that I loved mangos, Julia went and cut some mangos down from the tree next to our house. Tomorrow she’s going to make me nacatamale, a heavy rice dish with meat and potatoes baked in a banana leaf, a dish which they eat on special occasions. Yay!

Margarita also took me to visit her sister’s house, Carla, who has the cute baby. I was completely shocked at the luxuriousness of her house, which was nicer than the one that I live in in the US. Granted, she shares it with her husband’s mother and another half family (that’s another thing; it seems very common for the grandchildren to live with their grandparents, while their parents are nowhere to be seen...). However, they have an amazing view of the laguna, which one can enjoy from their pool. Carla meanwhile, has a ton of unnecessary and expensive toys like a baby stroller and kitchen appliances, etc, all beautifully decorated. I wonder what her husband does; that’s another thing. The husband is always away. It’s common for the daughter to stay at home and take care of the kids, often passing the day away at her parent’s house which is invariably close or right next door. Meanwhile, I’ve only seen Carla’s husband twice, usually late at night, and I haven’t seen pregnant Margarita’s husband at all, even though she’s husband and you’d think he’d stop and help her more often. 

The day before today we had a free day and went to Monkey Hut, a small resort on the edge of the Laguna. It had hammocks (which I took a wonderful nap in), a small pier from which to jump off of, a small dock floating out a few hundred yards in the clear, blue water, and kayaks if one so wished to be adventurous. The water was the perfect temperature and the sun blazing. I got a great tan and also floated out in the water a bit on my tube. The waves are surprisingly strong out there so I bobbed like a top while slowly being pushed back to shore. 

Afterwards, and after a  quick hushed lunch, we went back to the markets of Masaya, where I purchased, after much hesitation and hemming and hawing, two hammocks at 300 cord each, which was cheap in comparison to all the hammocks there. All of my worries were put to rest however, because my home stay family told me that I had made a good purchase and that the hammocks were of good quality. I also found the exact same hammock for 80 cords more at another stall, so I know I got a good deal. Yay me!

Now I’m looking forward to watching Pretty Woman at ten with my home stay family. Tomorrow it’ll be another early day with a hopefully successful campaign in Güisquiliapa, the home town of our four asesoras. Goodnight!

Diriomito

I had a busy day yesterday, so I didn’t get a chance to blog. Or should I say, it’s so much harder to be efficient in a rural setting like this. I always have to walk from place to place to meet people, pick up things, etc, the sky darkens completely at around 6 o clock and there is constantly noise in the background, such as dogs, telenovelas, roosters confused about the time of day...

Speaking of noises, I’m woken up a good three or five times a night by noises. The dogs have this caterwauling session for about half an hour every night, where all the neighborhood dogs begin barking louder and louder, seemingly feeding off of each other’s barks so the noise increases exponentially. I imagine that they’re shouting insults to one another. Either way, I have to put on my sound-canceling headphones and listen to some calming nocturnes ironically at high volume to overcome the barking noises, and drift off which isn’t difficult because I’m oddly exhausted every day despite the fact that the air is much cooler and fresher up here in the hills around the laguna. 

Because we live on the elevated ridge around the Laguna, the town is essentially located on a huge hill that is one side of a larger hill surrounding the laguna. To go anywhere, one much traverse the one, main road, which runs either uphill or downhill depending on your direction. My backside and hamstrings have gotten their fair share of exercise from walking up and down the hill everyday. 

Yesterday for example, we walked up the hill, up and up and up until we reached the outskirts of Diriomito and reached the neighboring town of Pacaya. From there, we worked backwards, administering surveys about filters, stoves and solar lamps to every house on the road. We collected almost 70 in total between the eight of us, which beats Iniciativa’s record of 40 between two occasions, by a wide margin. What can I say? We’re kind of a big deal.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say this again, but I love doing surveys! It’s a great way to improve your Spanish, and I love experiencing the warmth and generosity of Nicaraguans. We had some good conversations and more than one family had us stay longer to ask us about where we were from and our lifestyles in the United States. While I’d say Americans are on a whole nicer than average, especially to foreigners and those of different cultures, they aren’t as willing to open their homes immediately to strangers and give them their time. Then again, there’s much more of a culture of keeping the door open for neighborhood guests and way less commitments that fill up or lives with meaningless busywork here. 

At night, I read my new book by Salmon Rushdie, wrote a bit for some assignments we have for the internship, and talked with the family. One of the daughters, Carla, has the cutest baby (almost one year old) named Juliana. The little kids here are absolutely gorgeous and Juliana is no exception. She’s cherubic, with dark curls, large eyes, and tiny little gold studs. Out of her little puckered mouth can come surprisingly loud shrieks, but her capricious affection makes up for her misbehavior. Because it was one of the group’s birthday, we went over to her house and watched Anchorman, which was the first time I had seen that movie. 

In addition to the dogs, an extremely loud rain, which sounds like drums being beaten on a tin roof, woke me up, in addition to the fear that the ants would appear again right after it rained. Finally, because there is no insulation between the rooms whatsoever, as soon as people got up and began to move, I woke up as well. 

The excessive amount of television my home stay family watches has helped me immensely in my Spanish, which I’ve found has grown by leaps and bounds since I first got here in Nicaragua, but has also noticeably improved in terms of fluency and comprehension since I got here to Diriomito two days ago. I’ve resolved to watch more TV in spanish when I get home to keep up my Spanish. We’ve watched the Discovery Channel, makeover shows, I Didn’t Know I was Pregnant, My Strange Addiction and many, many other shows together, all in Spanish. 

Today, we traveled to Güisquiliapa, a town about an hour away that is the hometown of four of our asesoras. We’ll be having a campaign for the first time in their hometown. Because the asesoras knew about half the people in the town, they did an excellent job doing publicity, having in depth, personalized conversations to each of the people about the campaign this Saturday. Finally, they went the extra step of making a map of the town and planning, down to the last detail, who was responsible for each section, making this one of the best-run publicity campaigns I had been to. 

We’re already starting to talk about what we need to do our last week here, which is a substantial amount of work. Our final report and product recommendations are due by the end of the week, which entails going through our hundreds of surveys, entering them into a spreadsheet and analyzing all the data, and then extracting conclusions. We also need to use this data to come up with recommendations and next steps for SolCom and our asesoras in the future. Also on the agenda is a reasoned conclusions of what to do with the money with which we’ve been entrusted; who do we invest a couple of hundred dollars in, and why? In addition to all this, we’ll be planning a national conference for all SolCom employees and affiliates in Nicaragua for next Friday and coming up with workshops and presentations. Finally, there are the sundry small things to do, like finishing our how-to article, writing my essay, coming up with charla scripts, etc. The work never stops. 

Luckily tomorrow we’ll be having our free day. In the morning we’ll be heading to the Laguna to a place called Monkey hut that has swimming, kayaking, tubing, etc. In the afternoon, we’ll be going back to Masaya where we’ll have a chance to use the internet (at last! Though my hiatus from the internet week to week has barely been noticeable) and go back to the markets to buy my hammock! 

Goodnight.

Ants on ants on ants

Today was our first day in Masaya, in a small town outside of Masaya actually called Diriomito. The two towns in this area are Diriomito and Pacaya, which are both relatively rural, though very welcoming and nice. The outstanding feature of both towns is that they have an amazing view of the Laguna de Apoyo, which I’ve mentioned in at least one blog post before. It’s essentially a giant volcanic crater formed 23,000 years ago which is now filled with water and has created an amazing, otherworldly place where situated between volcanoes. If one walks along the main road through Diriomito, one can see the Laguna shimmering ethereally in the distance on one side. 

The view from the top of the main road in Diriomito.

Before traveling to our home stays however, we stopped by for about an hour at the famed artisanal market of Masaya. It covers an entire block and is ringed by restaurants and food stands. Inside is stall after stall of ceramics, cloths, bags, jewelry, scarves, etc of all kinds. My goal was to find hammocks, which were rumored to be extremely cheap here, but they really weren’t. I did practice my haggling skills quite a bit; there’s really no trick to haggling at all, only to be shamelessly cheap, asking for prices you know they won’t give you and feeling to traces of remorse or guilt at being so stingy. I didn’t get a hammock (I hear they’re cheaper at the commercial, and not artisanal market) but I did pick up a few things to bring back home.  

I’m living with Julia, a grandmother, and her husband. The house is also inhabited by her extended family and grown-up children, though due to the traffic in and out of the house I’m not sure who lives here and who doesn’t. The people I’ve met so far include: Julia (of course), mi papa nica (Carlos, but Julie introduced me to him as my papa nica, which I had a good laugh at), Camelo (Julia’s grandchild), Daniella (another grandchild), Margarita, Carla and Blanca (her daughters), and the baby of Carla, who kept shrieking and making faces at me but was otherwise completely adorable. Papa Nica went straight to his room to watch TV when he got home and has been there ever since. 

The house itself is one of the nicer ones from what I’ve heard from people in the program and the girl who stayed here the week before. I have to admit, it’s relatively nice and looks extremely welcoming from the outside, having been painted a vibrant yellow. It appears to be well taken care of with an iron gate and cleanly painted lines. My room is also very nice, with its own armoire and TWO mirrors. Que lujoso! The only downside are the ant. I discovered the ants somewhat accidentally. I noticed a few huge ants crawling around and promptly snuffed out their meager lives, thinking nothing of it, only that they were the largest ants I’d ever seen (they were about half an inch big). Then I noticed a few more, and a few more, and realized the were a handful crawling on the walls, until I traced them back to the source, which was a huge fissure in a corner of the wall, about a foot away from my pillow. Through this fissure there was quite literally a flood of huge brown and black ants, some with wings, pouring through, milling around and swarming on the floor in the corner. There were so many that the corner was almost black. I screamed a little inside, composed myself, and ran out to tell Julia that there were a lot of ants all over my bed. 

We proceeded to spent the next hour systematically killing and sweeping up piles and piles of ants. I took my handy Repel spray, meant for clothing and equipment as it will stay in the fabric even after repeated washings, to douse the entire corner with toxic chemicals. Many of the ants kind of convulsed for a bit, while the rest began a mass exodus across the room and into the waiting feet of Julia, who was also armed with a broom. We’d sweep the masses of ants into the center of the room where Julia would crunch-crunch-crunch away and then Camelo would come in and push the pile of black bits into the backyard. I was alternately consumed with laughter and disgust. Afterwards, I thoroughly doused the bed frame and the underside of the mattress with more Repel and moved to the top bunk while also pulling out the bed farther away from that grim corner of death, site of the ant massacre. Apparently, these “ants” (I put quotation marks because they’re really more like dirt dwellers with wings) come out every time it rains, which is everyday. I’ve hopefully poured enough noxious chemicals on the walls to keep them out for a couple of days. 

I also taught Camelo and Daniella how to play BS; they were highly amused by my translation of “bullshit.” Meanwhile, we’re test driving the filters and stoves here with the families. So far, the families love the stoves and we’ve just started using the filters. Julia was immediately fascinated by the filters when we introduced them and inquired about the price ten seconds into the presentation; I’m really glad to see the immediate need and demand for our products and witness the cause and effect our work can have on real live people here. 

Goodnight for now! It’ll be a relatively early morning for me tomorrow since I didn’t realize there are no lights in the outhouse here, so I’ll have to take my shower tomorrow morning. I actually got to use the solar lamp today while brushing my teeth! It truly is a good product and now I can do my sales pitch with more authenticity. The bathrooms here, speaking of, consist of a hole in the ground with a wooden seat built over it (don’t get me started on the smell) and it’ll be bucket baths all around for the next seven days. 

Warning!

I will not have Internet access for the next week!

Fishing in the Pacific

This was definitely one of the best weeks that I’ve spent in Nicaragua. Then again, that shouldn’t be a surprise to me since I knew that San Juan del Sur was going to be right up my alley what with the whole beach-sand-sun-surfing thing. I’m already dreading our departure tomorrow to the middle of nowhere in Masaya, where I’ll be lucky to have electricity and a mosquito net. Then again, my Spanish could use some touching up again so I’m looking forward to the intense language and cultural immersion that we’ll be experiencing tomorrow. 

Today I dragged myself out of bed at 8:30 to get my free breakfast, which ends at 9. I’m not sure if the lady who runs the hotel knows this, but her clock is always about twenty minutes and she gives every sign that she thinks it’s the right time. Either way, it means I get breakfast for twenty minutes longer than I normally would. 

I promptly went back to sleep for another two or three hours after breakfast and after sorting out my laundry. Somehow (and this typical of me) I couldn’t find any laundry places that my fellow peers had used that very morning but all the ones I found were closed or told me that my laundry would be done the next day (Monday). I’m going to be cutting it very close by picking up my laundry pretty much at the same time our bus is coming. The laundry situation also meant that I had to go without a towel for the entire day, even on our boat tour and after I showered, yet at the same time I couldn’t NOT wash my towel which had been dragged all over the beach and back the day before. To substitute, I used my bed sheet, which was surprisingly absorbent. 

After waking up from my nap/extended night’s sleep, I took a walk around, buying some souveneirs for people back home and exploring the few blocks around our hotel around a bit. I later found out that Hotel Estrella, the hotel we’re staying at, is the oldest hotel still in existence at San Juan del Sur. There’s a photo behind the main counter showing a railroad track that originally existed right in front of the hotel. I’ve also realized how small a country Nicaragua is. Or, should I say, how self-contained the tourist track is. I’ve run into people I’ve met in Granada and Leon and Matagalpa, who either took tours with us or were a friend of the friend or happened to work at the hostel where we formerly were staying. There’s an immense feedback loop that goes on amongst people here as students/sometimes tourists and we end up running into one another over and over again. 

At two we departed for a sunset cruise, which I had been looking forward to since we got here to San Juan del Sur. My only regret is that I didn’t get to take surf lessons, though that regret is my fault because I was too cheap to splurge on lessons. The “cruise” took place on this dingy little boat with a netted roof, a boat which I did not mind at all, since that’s what we’ve been taking on tours all the time. However, I tried hard during the entire 5 hours we were out on the water not to spend too much time pondering the fact that we were on a small, plastic bathtub with a motor attached out in the mighty Pacific Ocean. 

We sailed out on these gorgeous waters, past amazing cliffs and small rock islands. We even spotted from far away Playa Maderas, where we had spent the day before. I wonder how the beaches here got formed, since they’re all these little scallops of sand that are carved out from the cliffs on the shore of the coast. The geological formations reminded me very strongly of Capri, my favorite place in the world besides home. The water was crystalline, flat and clear, and wondrous rock formations and crests would rise out of the water around us. 

We sputtered around for about a half hour before reaching our destination, a beach I think was named White Sands. The beach was completely deserted and un-commercialized, with the exception of some seemingly abandoned straw-thatched houses, completely untouched as well. Like all the beaches here, it was nestled in a little cove which looked like a hidden scallop of sand from the ocean. The water was a beautiful green-blue color and clear enough that one could see right through. On both sides we were surrounded by tall black cliffs. The sand was incredibly soft on the beach, but before we could reach the beach, we all donned snorkel gear and flippers and jumped off the side of our boat to explore the life on the floor of the ocean. There wasn’t much, but I had fun anyways learning to snorkel for the first time, which wasn’t took difficult except for the fact that I had leaky goggles that kept causing me to snort/swallow burning salt water. Sitting on the beach and looking out of the bay through the cliffs was almost unreal. Except for some pricy yacht floating off in the distance (it looked straight out of a J. Crew catalogue shoot), it was just us with our colorful snorkel gear, a small boat, and the waves, sun and sand. 

Afterwards, we headed out to deeper waters where we began fishing with some crude bait and tackle. We managed to catch a few small ones, but those served as bait for the real catches later on - two huge, two foot long fish that we caught within the span of half an hour. I’ve never understood the appeal of deep-sea fishing (or fishing really, at all) until today; fishing is in fact one of the most exciting pastimes. We connected (by we I mean our tour guides) three fishing lines together to create a stronger, fortified fishing line which we loaded with an entire fish. We caught a two foot long sturgeon first. Then, we landed a massive fish called a jack (I think?) which took Greg about ten minutes of hard core wrestling to bring up.  I just about died with laughter when Greg had to wear a pelvic brace thing from which he could put the fishing rod to create more resistance with which to reel the fish in. One of the crew would be waiting near by to spear the writhing fish with a harpoon. Then of course, it was the obligatory victor’s shot with the fish. Our overflowing cooler had to be sat on because the fish would still flop around even after being harpooned and having their spinal cord cut. 

We stayed out long enough for the sun to set on the water. Beautiful sunset, great catches of fish, general chill atmosphere and laughter...it was the perfect end to a good week. We dismounted the boat on the beach, seemingly emerging out of the water with huge fish in our hands. I wonder what people walking on the beach thought. We also found a restaurant that would cook our fish for us, and it turned out to be not only economical but also delicious. One of the fish (the jack, whatever it was called) turned out to have extremely dark meet, so that grilled, it looked like steak. 

I also heard some interesting conversation about Daniel Ortega and FSLN on the boat.The two drivers were NOT fans of Ortega, noting that in the seventies and eighties when Nicaragua’s civil war raged, he mandated that all young go into the army and sending them out to extremely rural places, often pulling them from college. Additionally, his administration seemed to behind the killing of the father of one of the tour guides. The two guys also said that there was a healthy mix of people both for and against Ortega in San Juan. They called him a communist, no better than Fidel or Chavez, which are extremely strong words in a country where I see trees and electric posts painted with the black and red colors (death and blood) of FSLN and pro-Ortega slogans painted over houses, sidewalks, the sides of buildings, etc. Ortega has almost unanimous popularity among the poorer Nicaraguans. Carolina, my Ometepe mom, told me that Ortega had been the only president for the poor and done admirable things such as give out free roofs and food, which I found to be nice, but dangerous because a) populist campaigns like that tend to obscure the real issues and let radical leaders get into power and b) that only ameliorates the symptoms of poverty rather than solves their root cause. Perhaps San Juan del Sur is so touristy that it is more capitalist than the rest of the country and so many people are opposed to him on economic policy issues. Ortega does say, directly on his ubiquitous political billboards (even though the election was more than two years ago) “Socialist, Christian and Solidarity,” something you could never get away with, not to mention win on, in the US. 

Goodnight! I’ll be sleeping without covers tonight...