Thursday, November 29, 2007

No hay agua=No hay shower!! And why not have a Panqueque Block Party!!

¿Qué Paso?:

Get a shoe shine: For only C$7 I am able to get my shoes shinned. They tend to get pretty beat up on these dirt streets, so it’s a good thing it is cheap and the shoe shiner lives down the street from me.

Minor injury: I did something to my fingernail (ok I slammed it in the door one night when there was no electricity and I was super sleepy trying to guide myself around in the dark) and now it is turning black and hopefully staying put…I really don’t want it to fall off…but time will tellL

Weather: It is winter, what does that mean exactly in a tropical country…well, it’s still hot, there is no snow, and it is only going to get hotter because guess what season comes next…summer (aka hot hot hot).

My bike: The key to riding my bike is simply to never switch gears. Yes, this presents a slight problem when there is a drastic change in terrain, but I have learned the hard way that switching gears = long walk home (probably through mud). It also elicitates stares from all the people I pass by while walking my bike…this of course leads to town gossip…by the time I make it back to my house EVERYONE already knows that my bike broke down (again) and that I tried to fix it (again) and finally gave-in and resorted to just walking it back into town.

What I am thankful for this year: This was the first Thanksgiving that I did not go home to be with my family. Instead, Peace Corps arranged for volunteers to eat Thanksgiving dinner with various American families that live in Managua. Therefore, I was not without pumpkin pie and turkey (but I still missed out on Gram’s hot apple pie…can pie be shipped through UPS??).

Sweet dreams: The typical Nica bed frame is made from wood and woven wicker…then there is the option of placing a thin foam mattress (or if extremely lucky putting a REAL mattress on top of the frame). Unfortunately, I am not “extremely lucky” and I only have a foam mattress placed over the woven wicker (to provide a thin cushion for my back). I chose to buy the foam mattress to save money, but it has drastically deflated since I first purchased it and now it is merely a thin fabric covering. Recently, I also splurged and bought a real pillow!! I was so excited to have a pillow again…that very night I anticipated getting the most restful sleep ever…but unfortunately that didn’t happen…I got maybe 3 hours total! Turns out I have to ease back into using a pillow…go figure!

Playing on my radio now: Juanes

Here is a sample of a product that 4th year students came up with for the business course LEC National Contest. The product his group created was a notebook holder:

Well, the water went out again…and has yet to return!! Now if I had some warning (any warning in fact) it would be just fine because I could plan ahead…but there is never any warning and my neighbors dig into my stored water before I can even dig into it. Therefore, even though I store water (just in case) it doesn’t even matter because everyone else using it! I am left with inability to shower, dirty dishes, dirty floor, unclean clothes and barely enough drinking water (I am soooooo thirsty!). However, I have learned to wash a ton of dishes with only 1 gallon of water…I can also shower with 1 gallon of water (but right now there isn’t even 1 gallon to spare). The town announcements have promised that the water will return tonight (but I have my doubts!). In the meantime, I am using plenty of deodorant and my hair has been braided for the past few days! I have no issues living without electricity, but living without any secondary water source (my town has no rivers) is a difficult adjustment. People in my town resort to either traveling out to fincas to shower or going into the cities to shower…I am just playing the waiting game for now and hoping for rain.

Sometimes I make some poor decisions, oh the gift of hind sight, if only I had the gift of foresight! Anyway, I decided I needed to get some exercise and I went for a bike ride. However, instead of leaving in the morning (which is my typical routine) I waited until the sun was going down…during dusk! Apparently, the bugs come out in droves during dusk. Therefore, I was riding around an hour from my town and watching the sun fade behind the volcanoes, while getting pelted in the eyes with bugs! I finally made it back to my site and washed out my eyes with drops. Three days later my eyes are still blood shot and itchy! I will never again ride my bike that late in the day…it may be cooler but it is not worth getting bugs in my eyes. Another lesson learned the hard way.

The school year has commenced and summer break is in full swing. To keep myself occupied, I decided to pull together my best students and create a youth group. The kids like hanging out at my house, and I like the ability to practice my Spanish with my students. I have also been taking on some extra crafty projects…por ejemplo I made a shelving unit for my books and I also jarred my own jelly. I decided jarring food would be a useful lesson to pass on to my students, because without refrigeration jarring is a wonderful alternative for preserving food (plus it’s a fun activity to do with kids, very hands on and they can all taste the jelly!) I will give an update in a week or so about how the jarring lesson went with the kids.

The first youth group project I completed with the group was a fundraiser. I pitched the idea to the group that we make panqueque (pancake) mix. The kids are not really familiar with pancakes, because their typical diet consists of rice, beans, cheese and tortilla (morning, noon and night). So I thought it would be fun to introduce a new (and easy to make) food to the kids. To kick off the project, I invited all the kids over to my house on Saturday morning to enjoy a feast of panqueques (basically I turned my house into IHOP). Anyway, I had the kids, and all my neighbors jam-packed into my house as I was cooking up a storm. It worked out really well because each kid brought a different pancake ingredient with them (sugar, eggs, flour, and milk). Instead of pancake syrup, which costs a fortune because it is only sold at an American-like grocery store located in the city, I made a fruit syrup sauce. The kids and my neighbors loved the party and people came back for seconds!!! After the party finished, the kids and I assembled pancake mix in small bags, which we then sold for C$5 a bag! The fundraiser was very successful and now we are just trying to identify a community project that the money will contribute towards. The next party I am hosting is simply a Queque party (cake party) to celebrate the youth groups hard work (I have learned through trial and error that incentives are key to keeping a group together and making food is cost efficient because each kid can contribute ingredients found in their backyard).

To keep in shape I am still bike riding everyday, but instead of riding to my schools (since school is not in session) I have been able to explore the more rural farm community around my site. The paths have been badly washed out due to the rain but it is slowly drying up. As I was biking out by the fincas (farms) yesterday, I reached a point where there was a 4 foot deep mud pit. On the side of the mud pit was a very narrow dry path full of rocks and lined by barbed wire. I stopped my bike to scope out the situation (should I turn around? Go through the mud? Or risk riding on the small narrow dry patch of dirt?). Meanwhile, a farmer on his bike was on the other side of the mud pit doing the same thing I was doing…scoping out the situation. He decided to walk his bike carefully across the narrow dry path, teetering dangerously close to the mud one minute and barbed wire the next minute. After watching this scene, I decided to up the anti and cross the path while riding my bike. The man told me to be careful!! I backed up my bike 15 feet to get a running start…then I hopped on full speed ahead and crossed…the farmer cheered me on…I luckily did not fall into the mud pit…what a rush! The paths that I bike on are always full of rocks and I have become accustomed to using my brakes to navigate over rocks/mud/pits etc. The nicas are amazing bike riders…so I feel the pressure to be a good bike rider as well…I have mastered riding without hands on rocky dirt paths (and my neighbors just laugh when they see me coming…gringa riding without hands…haha!). My next challenge will be biking while having a fellow passenger riding on the bike-bar in-between my handle bars and bike seat (Nicas are always giving people rides around town using this method…so in order to fully integrate I feel I should also learn how to do this!).

Sunday, November 18, 2007

My brakes are shot, and apparently my Nalgene is filled with Swero (which is not an alcoholic drink)

Striking a pose with 2 of my counterparts!
¿Qué Paso?:
The evacuation is over: After being evacuated from my site for about 2 weeks, I was finally able to return to my house. Things are a bit on the moldy side but it’s nice to be home.
Weather: Lately, it has been very sunny and the nights have been rather cool. The torrential rains have stopped and winter has set in…Deciembre is the coldest month of the year.
Knock Knock: Who’s at my door? Why a Jehovah’s Witness!! Trying to convert the gringa…Gracias a dios!
My bike: The local bike shop came to my rescue again and fixed my bike seat (woo hoo it no longer swivels left to right while I’m riding). The bike repair guy also feels sorry for me, which he should considering I tend to do more “bike walking” than “bike riding.” Therefore, if I have just a minor bike adjustment the bike repair man will fix it for free. Today, on my way back from a rural school I realized that as the weather gets hotter, the earth gets dryer, and the dust starts to swirl. I was so dirty after my 20k ride that I had to jump into the shower really quick before going to my next school (I was just glad that the water was still running that late in the day).

So I have been carrying a Nalgene bottle filled with water for the past few months. It is an essential part of my “pack,” because I ride my bike everywhere. Plus, there is a high probability that my bike will breakdown, and so, it is always good to have plenty of water and a snack for those occasions. Well, it wasn’t until recently that one of my counterparts asked me about my “kidney condition.” I was struck with confusion and responded “What kidney condition?” She responded, “Your water bottle is filled with Swero, right?” Now, until recently I didn’t know what “Swero” was and during this particular conversation I thought that Swero was some kind of alcoholic beverage. So I assumed that the teachers all thought I had some kind of kidney or more likely a liver problem because I was drinking hard alcohol throughout the day. I immediately asked my counterpart, “What is Swero?” And thank goodness she explained to me that it’s not liquor (as I had previously thought) but it is oral re-hydration salts. This made me feel a bit better; at least they didn’t think I was a drunk. Instead everyone thought that I was dehydrated. A big cultural difference is that Nicaraguans do not drink as much water as I do! I get at least the recommended 8 glasses a day…where my guess is that they drink maybe 2 glasses a day (mas o menos). Also, another Nicaraguan teacher at my school has a kidney problem and therefore she has to drink a lot of Swero to stay hydrated…so that’s why everyone thought I too must have a kidney problem. No worries, I am healthy (so to speak…minus the occasional parasite or bacterial infection).

I was recently sent a fabulous care package that included a large map of the United States. Naturally, I hung the map in my living room so that I could point out my home state of Colorado to all visitors. However, I was not prepared for the map to be such a big hit. A friend of mine came over to chat and caught site of my map. She rushed over to look and started tracing a route on the map. Next, she asked if she could go get her friend…pretty soon I had a group of people in my house all staring at the map. One hour later, people finally started to disperse but up until that time they all had been standing and simply staring. They all wanted to know where the Casa Blanca (Whitehouse) was located, New Orleans, and Colorado. To the right of my U.S. map I have a large map of Nicaragua. This map also fascinates people and I am happy to point out where our town is located. I never thought that I would be a geography teacher, now all I need is a World Map (that would blow peoples minds!)

This is the really big spider I have livig in my house!


I never enjoy visiting people late at night, because by that time I am exhausted and my Spanish comprehension diminishes by 60% when I am tired. Of course, people always ask me to visit at night and so I make my rounds…but as soon as I step out of my house I get bombarded with further visit requests. For example, yesterday I left my house at 5pm to make a quick run to a friend’s house and somehow I didn’t end up returning to my house until 11pm. I talked to everyone and was ready to crash when I finally got back home. I have learned that nothing is ever “quick.”

Last week I traveled a few hours south of my site to participate in a Spanish Taller (workshop). I got to stay with a different Nicaraguan host family for 1 week as I worked on the subjunctive tense. The family took in the back of their truck to a nearby tourist town, because they thought I would enjoy the mirador (view). In this town, there was a hotel (4 stories) that we stopped at to visit some of their Nicaraguan friends (who worked at the hotel). My host family wanted a tour of the hotel. We all got to walk around and check it out. Then we all went to the 4th floor to see the dinning room area. I was with 5 adults and 2 small children and once we all reached the 4th floor, I went over to the balcony to look at the view (a huge full moon hung in the night sky) but inadvertently I scared all the people I that brought me to the hotel. In small towns, tall buildings are few and far between (it is very rare to see a two story house). Therefore, this 4 story hotel was a colossal building for the Nicaraguans I was with and they were scarred for my safety (because I was much to close to the railing!) They pulled me back and wouldn’t let the kids get within 4 feet of the balcony. I could only imagine what they would think of a city like New York, with skyscrapers galore.

I had a brief moment of worry this morning as I biked out to catch a bus only to find out that the bus may not arrive at all! However, 40 minutes later the bus pulled up and I gratefully hopped on and had the conductor throw my bike on top. Twenty minutes into my bus ride, a guy on from the back of the bus tried to “put the moves on me.” In the U.S. a guy will usually buy a girl a drink at a bar when he is trying to hit on her but in Nicaragua it’s a different story…the guy in the back of the bus bought me an ear of corn to eat…that’s right, I accepted corn on the cob from a guy a didn’t know! Delicious. Next, I arrived at my school just in time to see prizes being given away to the students with the highest percentages. The prizes included brand new bikes, and in between the prizes being announced, my students preformed various dances. It was muy algre (very happy)! Afterwards, I had to wait for the bus to bring me home…but to my horror the bus that had brought me apparently broke down…and there was a good chance that I would have to bike 40k out (through some really rough terrain…in a dress). After waiting for 2 hours at a bus stop, a new bus arrived to take everyone out of the town to the main road (where I could easily bike back to my town).