June 30th
Being the day before I leave for counterpart day in Managua, and going on my site visit, today I was planning on resting. Unfortunately, I had a laundry list of things to do so I definitely did everything but rest.
The day started out with me rolling out of bed and going down to the local barber shop to get my haircut. “Dile que querés el mismo corte, pero más chiquito, y no querés pelón.” So that’s what I went to the barber and told him – same haircut, but shorter, don’t buzz my hair. I was really nervous as the last time I attempted to get my hair cut away from home was in DC at Great Clips and it went horribly wrong. The lady had no idea what I was talking about and effectively screwed it up. I was so terrified at what she was doing that I left in the middle of my haircut.
However, that was not the case with this guy. I told him what I wanted and he just went at it. There was no chatting, no measuring to make sure it was the right length – he just eyeballed it. Immediately upon seeing this I thought, “Oh my god no,” but after I saw how it was turning out, I became amazed – why wasn’t Great Clips this effective? It was so efficient – comb, cut, comb, cut. In about 7 minutes (I timed it), my hair was completely cut. He just had a pair of scissors, so I was wondering how he was planning on doing the sideburns and the back of my neck – until he busted out the straight razor. I was super nervous about that one as I had never used one before, but he just swapped out a new razor blade (which strangely look like the same razor blades my dad in the U.S. uses for construction) went at it and gave me the closest shave I’ve ever had in my life. After the shave, he busted out the industrial strength hair gel and effectively turned me into Ricky Ricardo – I got a picture, don’t worry. Oh yea, and the final cost of my not-too-shabby haircut? In dollars – $1.03 – that’s not a typo, one dollar and three cents. Yea, I can’t believe it either.
I headed home after the haircut, took a shower, and then Oliver showed up. He’s supposed to come over to practice his English with me…but we always just end up speaking in Spanish anyway. He hung out for about an hour, and I headed over to Jordan’s house to get pictures off of Danica’s camera (I posted some of them). After that, it was lunch, then time to head over for a quick training session at Olla de Barro.
The medical officer told me that I’d be getting the first shot of my post-exposure rabies vaccine there, but when I saw her she just told me I’d get it tomorrow. Uh…great. She gave me the option of going back to Managua with her and spending the night in the hospital, but since I hadn’t packed or anything, I just said I’d show up tomorrow. But then she broke the bad news to me – I have ANOTHER shot I have to get 2 days afterward. This means that when I’m in Achuapa (aka – the middle of nowhere), I have to hop on a bus for the 4.5 hour trip back to Managua just for the second shot. I’m going to spend 200 cordobas just to get this shot – irate. But it doesn’t end there. Since I live in such an isolated place, I won’t be able to get back to Achuapa before the buses stop running that afternoon. So this probably will mean I’ll be spending the night in Managua, going to Achuapa in the morning, hanging out afternoon Saturday, and then leaving on Sunday for Masatepe. I effectively will waste 2 days of my site visit because I have to get this damn shot. $#@*!
The rest of the day after training consisted of me bombing around town on the bike, running errands, and paying for half an hour at the internet café, and actually staying 2.5 hours. I threw a bunch of crap in a bag for my site visit for tomorrow, so I’m pretty much just crossing my fingers that I’m bringing enough crap because I’m definitely not going to double check to make sure.
Bring on Achuapa!
July 1st
I was pretty excited upon waking up, as today was the day we would all be meeting our counterparts. Fortunately, Jordan called me up right after I woke up to tell me that her host dad was going to Managua anyway. Being Mr. Pinche, this meant I got to save myself 23 cords – that’s like 3 ice creams!
Upon hearing that we’d be getting a ride, I was stoked. However, after 5 minutes on the highway, I saw my life flash before my eyes. Nicaraguan drivers are literally the worst drivers on the planet – and it’s something they’re proud of too. I’ve never been on a ride where I’ve been so close to being in a serious accident, so frequently, in my entire life. Luckily we arrived sans incident (but the ride ended up being roughly as uncomfortable as the ride in the microbus (do to the unscheduled pickups we made as well as sitting on my bag the entire time).
We showed up to find a handful of volunteers already there, and ended up waiting with them for a little bit before hopping the first Peace Corps truck to Ciudad de Dios, some huge compound in the middle of Managua. There were roughly 90 counterparts for all the TEFL and SBD volunteers there ready to greet us, most of whom were completely ecstatic to be there. We went through the basics (PC goals, how we’ll be working together, what to expect of counterparts/volunteers), and then split up into our respective TEFL and SBD groups. There we did a small ice breaker with all the counterparts and volunteers, then introduced ourselves to our counterparts.
Lunchtime rolled around and I had to be dragged off to the Peace Corps med office to get the first of my 2 post-exposure rabies shots. It ended up being a lot more difficult than it should have been as I ended up waiting an hour before I could finally get a ride to the office. To make things worse, after getting my shot, after a phone call from an unidentified person, the med office wanted to talk to me again. They interrogated me about why I shake and was concerned that I was super stressed out. I told them I had tremors and that I wasn’t stressed as I’m in the highest Spanish level and lay in a hammock for 10 hours a day. Then just to prove them wrong again, I told them to take my blood pressure and told them it would be 110/70. They took it…and that’s exactly what it was – Goggins 1, Peace Corps 0.
Upon returning to training, I met 2 of my 3 counterparts, and did planning for what I would do during my site visit, as well as for the first 2 months in my site. I have to go back to Managua on Friday to get my second rabies shot, so I’ll only be in my site for 2 days instead of 5. However, due to the incredibly small size of my site, I’m going to be able to see my 3 schools and the 2 NGO’s I’ll work in, meet the mayor, chief of police, health minister, and education delegate in 1.5 days. Now that’s efficiency.
A lot of people took off immediately after the conference and went to their sites (if their sites were really close), and the volunteers that remained all hung out, fraternized with the counterparts that were still around, and all hung out the rest of the night.
Tomorrow will be the first day at my site! Stoked.
July 2nd
My first day on my site visit couldn’t have come soon enough, and I was super excited and woke up 20 minutes before my alarm. Peace Corps wasn’t going to give us a breakfast, so I downed a Powerbar (thanks again Heather!), and hopped on the Peace Corps party bus with all the volunteers and counterparts that didn’t leave the night before. I was a bit worried because I’d barely talked to my counterpart that spent the night, and in the morning before getting on the bus, our conversation was just about what bus to take, where we were going to catch the bus to Leon, and that we were going to meet her son in Leon and see the cathedral.
The bus ride from Managua to Leon was much of the same as it was just small talk, but I kept slipping in how excited I was to buy 12 or 70 bicycles, and that I planned to ride my bike everywhere, and advise the 2 bicycle shops that are in town when I get to site. When we arrived in Leon, her son (who is 18) picked us up, and we went to La Union, a huge supermarket in Leon. I bought a handful of bananas, and orange juice, and a croissant for breakfast and gradually got my counterpart to warm up to me. We went to the cathedral afterwards and bought a ticket to walk up onto the roof (which was 4 times as much for me since I’m North American, that’s price discrimination, $#@*$@#). We met up with my other counterpart, Isolina, and she went with us to the top of the cathedral.
After taking the self-guided tour of the roof of the church (it had great panoramic views of the city), we left the church and just chilled out. I told me counterparts that we didn’t need to do that much since I’d have plenty of time in my 2 years in-site to go exploring around Leon. They agreed, so I just bought a Gatorade and we did nothing. We went back to the grocery store to grab some lunch, before heading over to the bus stop. To get to the bus stop, it involved catching a truck (I think it’s the bus) with tarp over it, and piling roughly 50 people in the back of a small pickup truck.
We arrived at the bus stop where we caught the noon bus leaving for Achupa. Apparently the driver who drives the noon bus is the fastest out of all the drivers and always arrives an hour before the others always do. Nevertheless, the bus still had it’s moments. The first ‘moment’ was when it went from being a zillion degrees and sunny to a complete downpour. I don’t know why, but all of a sudden there was a literal waterfall coming out of the dashboard of the bus. The driver didn’t even bat an eye as one of the guys who worked on the bus was there with a rag in hand mopping up all the water. Second came when we had to drive off of the road an on the grass for a bit while we drive around a semi truck that was completely totaled after hitting a horse. Third came when we were going from El Sauce to Achuapa and there was a stampede of cows down the middle of the highway that we just drove through. The bus driver didn’t even slowdown; he just laid on his horn and drove through this huge herd of cows – all of which surprisingly moved out of the way.
The drive itself was absolutely gorgeous as it goes from the Pacific coast (which is extremely hot and flat), to the mountains of Estelí, which are rolling, super lush, and green. It made for quite a scenic ride, and yielded me having my head out the window for 2 hours just so I could gawk at how beautiful it all was. It really started getting beautiful as we got closer to Achuapa as they were no longer just forests full of hills, but more mountains. But not only that – they’re cloud forests, so there generally are a handful of big fluffy clouds just a little ways up the mountain – it’s absolutely gorgeous.
My house is on the ‘highway’ into town so I got off almost as soon as we entered the town limits. I got off the bus, it drove away, and all I had to do was turn around to find my house – my gigantic, beautiful house. The house itself is located across the street from the only basketball court/playground in the town, across the street from the police station, and at the base of a mountain. One of my schools is literally 40 meters from my house – I could easily throw a rock and hit the school from my front door. The other I have to walk a mere 2 blocks to find, whereas the third is located 3 km away, so I HAVE to ride a bike to get there – bummer.
As for the house itself, my host mom is the directora (the principal of one of my schools), and her house is just enormous. We’ve got about 10 rocking chairs and gigantic ‘living room’ that doesn’t appear to be used. After passing through the living room (which is the entire front part of the house), there is the dining room (which is the second part of the house), then there are two ‘wings’ of the house, one on both sides (the shape of the house is like a U, with the bottom being a little thicker). I went exploring immediately dropping my stuff off in my room (which is huge, has a real mattress, dresser with mirror, fan, and and CEILING TILES, as well as a screen. It’s incredible. I heard all these noises, so I went to investigate my back yard. The yard itself is quite expansive and I saw that we have 10 roosters, a bunch of chickens, a big pig, a small pig, a cat (whose name is Garfield), 3 dogs (one is named Odie), and after hearing a noise while I was in my room, I discovered that we own a huge field adjacent to my house where our horse roams. It’s amazing. But not only that, the neighbors that are behind our house have a sheep farm, which I just couldn’t get enough. This is by far not what I expected in my wildest dreams. It’s the most perfect living situation I could ever dream up, and I’m probably going to end up living with this family for a while so I can save some money (I’ll be saving TONS of money) for the next couple of months. Not only that, but since it’s my directora, if there’s ever a problem in her school, she’s the one I have to talk to.
After taking a self-guided tour of the house, our employee, Coco (as she’s called), took me to one of my counterparts house (on the same street about 100 meters north). My counterpart proceeded to give me a tour of the town, which lasted about 15 minutes. In those 15 minutes, I met the delegate for MINED for Achuapa (effectively the superintendent), she has about 70 names, so even if I could remember any of them, I wouldn’t write them down. The tour ended at my other counterpart’s house, which is about 2 blocks from my house. The whole town itself is on about 2 streets that go north to south, then 3 streets that go east to west. It’s something completely different, but totally awesome as every house really has a big property so the blocks are relatively large.
My counterpart who was giving me the tour, took me down another street on the way back to my house so I could become acquainted with all the town had to offer. We passed a lot of her students, all of who greeted her in the street, and whom she addressed as, “Mi amor.” Yea, I don’t think I’ll be calling my students my love, but I’ll definitely address them.
After getting home, I went and chilled out in my hammock (which is also amazing), and talked with our employee. It really got into a heavy conversation as we started talking about the importance of appearances in the U.S. and morality issues, but it was a good conversation. Furthermore, she thought I was 28, to which I just laughed like crazy. However, after finding out I was 22, she proceeded to call me ‘joven’ (youth) the rest of the night (she’s 25). But she’s really cool and totally ambitious, so I talked with her a while.
I also wanted to grab some breakfast for the morning, so said she’d take me to the one mini-supermarket in town. However, immediately upon leaving the property, all the lights in the entire town went out. Definitely one of the weirdest things I’ve ever experienced, but really funny as everybody all over the town immediately busted out candles, flashlights, and cell phones to illuminate whatever they were doing. The mini-supermarket closed because the lights went out, so we had to find a pulperia that was open instead. I ended up just picking up a couple boxes of juice, and found out I didn’t need to buy any eggs because our chickens lay eggs everyday. So hey, I’m saving money already!
After returning home, we sat in front of our house, the ‘highway’ and I chatted with our employee, my host grandma, and the son of the directora, though I don’t even know his name.
I’m really, really excited about the site as it has 2 bike shops, an ice cream shop, and all the roads are ‘paved’ (well if they aren’t they’re in the process) with blocks. So it will be really fun to ride my bike around the town. I’m already dreaming up a bike race or even that I could arrange.
Oh man, what an amazing site. This is going to be great.
Did you know that chickens/roosters sleep in trees? Neither did I.
July 3rd
I had to wake up super early this morning because I had to arrive at my counterpart’s house to take the 5 km bike ride to our school. So I woke up at around 5:30, took my bucket bath, and had some breakfast. After breakfast, I continued by the routine by brushing my teeth – That’s where all normality ended. While I was brushing my teeth, a gigantic frog jumped out of nowhere and landed on my pants. At first I thought it was mud that magically appeared, but upon further inspection, I saw it was a frog – go figure. The routine was further interrupted by a huge ruckus coming from the yard. So I went out to see what was going on to find one of our dogs (a fully grown German shepherd) chasing our pigs through the yard. I don’t understand our dog, it’s fine sometimes, then at sometimes, it just feels like terrorizing the million animals we have. This includes our cat Garfield. The dog, Dobil, will run from the complete opposite side of the compound and bite Garfield’s head. Weird dog. After our employee (who from now on I’ll just refer to by her name, Coco) got him to stop chasing the terrified pigs around the yard, he immediately started chasing our chickens around the yard – damn dog. Finally I got my head back on straight and headed off to my counterpart’s house. I couldn’t remember where she lived (even though there are only around 4 streets anybody lives on in the entire town), so I just hoped I’d arrive in time (I left with 9 minutes to get there). Much to my surprise, I walked across the entire town and arrived at her house in a mere 4 minutes.
After arriving, we borrowed a bike from the guy who lives across the street from my counterpart, and headed off to Los Caraos, one of the schools I’m going to teach in (that is located in the village/town of the same name (I think?). The ride there was absolutely incredible and consisted of riding down a dirt road through farms for the whole 5 kilometers. But what made it all so beautiful was that these farmlands are nestled in the middle of mountains (Nicaraguan mountains, so more like just gigantic hills), and most of the time, there are clouds that hover below the peak of each hill/mountain. Not only was the ride beautiful, but also it involved riding past gigantic cows (milk cows) that were walking up the road to get milked. The remarkable thing was that nobody was guiding these cows – they knew exactly where they were going and exactly what they were doing without any guidance. They’re the healthiest looking animals I’ve seen in all of Nicaragua, and they use no hormones to get their milk, so all the milk that is sold (it’s pasteurized), is super fresh, and super delicious.
We arrived in Los Caraos where I was introduced to the entire school (it’s a preschool, elementary school, and high school – all in all, about 300 students total), after the singing of the national anthem. I didn’t have anything planned out, so when my counterpart told everyone I had something to say, I was kind of…not prepared. So I just told everyone I was super excited to be there and that my Spanish is a lot better than the last volunteer’s Spanish was, so they should watch what they say because I can understand them.
After visiting the school, we walked down the dirt road around the corner from the school to the director’s house. He broke his leg, and can’t leave the house, so we paid him a visit. After the visit, we picked up our bicycles and took the ride back to Achuapa – which was as amazingly beautiful as it was earlier, but a little hotter.
My counterpart lent me her bike when we returned to Achuapa, and I headed over to the 2 other institutes I am going to teach at to introduce myself to my counterparts. At the private school/church in the middle of the town, I ran into some bumps with my schedule, as nobody there actually knows my schedule. The director has no idea, and my counterpart doesn’t really either. So I just told them what I knew, and they told me we’d figure things out on the 28th when I come back after training is over – whatever, I’ll worry about it later. The other institute is where my host mom’s daughter is the directora (I found out today that the grandma is actually the one that owns the house, and the directora lives behind my house), and she introduced my to my counterpart there – who is incredibly quiet and timid. I’m already worried about discipline problems in her class.
After visiting the institutes, I really had nothing more to do, so that’s pretty much what I did. I tried to do some of the Peace Corps nonsense they wanted us to do, but nothing really came of it, so I laid in the hammock reading Newsweek magazine for a couple of hours. I also called my counterpart at the NGO I’m supposed to work with in Achuapa, but she is busy tomorrow, so I won’t be able to meet with her until when I get back either. Hopefully she’ll call me – but she wrote down my number wrong, but upon trying to explain that to her, she told me she knew…which she doesn’t. Whatever, I’ll clear that up when I come back.
With all the contacting of the counterparts done, I had nothing more to do – so off to the market I went. I unfortunately discovered that most things in my town are super hard to come by. “Do you have a huge bottle of water?” “No.” However, for whatever reason, they sell the generic box of Fans Corn Flakes that I bought when I was in Chinandega during my volunteer visit. This is awesome because it’s a fortified food, and after seeing the food selection in the town, it’s going to be exactly what I need to get my vitamins. Another point of humor out of the situation was the sticker they put on the box to translate the ingredients into Spanish – it said “Corn Flokes”. I’m so accustomed to spelling errors now that I’m starting to doubt if the way I learned to spell things is really correct – good thing I’m not a TEFL volunteer.
I went to drop my counterpart’s bicycle off at her house, and ended up sitting and chatting with her for a couple of hours. All the meanwhile, her daughter (I think?) was playing with some of the kids in the street, and she tripped and smashed her face on the road. When she went stumbling through the street, she was just covered in blood and just with tears in her eyes and not wailing and screaming like anybody else would. When she’d fallen she hit her forehead on a couple of rocks and one cut her forehead open pretty badly. But we got her cleaned up and she was fine…for Nicaragua I guess.
I left pretty soon afterwards and headed back home so I could learn how to make gallo pinto and whatever else we would eat for dinner (I ended up making scrambled eggs as a side dish). So I cut up a bunch of whatever (onions, peppers, and something else…basil?), and cooked it all up and it turned out pretty tasty. I ate with our employee and we had a good talk about economics, psychology, non-verbal communication of bugs, and I translated a bunch of my good stories into Spanish – and they still yielded the reaction I wanted to! After dinner, I showed her some pictures from my trip to South America before heading to bed – I’ve got another early day tomorrow…if I actually had anything planned.
So I found out the road to the next town is 23.36 kilometers. That trip will have to wait until I come back in a couple of weeks.
July 4th
Well, Happy 4th of July – I totally forgot until I got a text message telling me so. I didn’t really have anything to do today since I’ve been so on top of my game, so I planned to sit around and do pretty much nothing the entire day, however, that is typically when I end up doing something.
I did a bunch of exercises in my room, then went across the street to the only basketball court/swingsets that were built with a loan from the World Bank, and did a bunch of pull-ups. Unfortunately, I wasn’t out there that long because it was brutally hot for some reason – so back home I went. I came back, and after I inhaled a bowl of corn flakes, I grabbed my two Newsweek’s and planned to just sit in the rocking chair and read them cover to cover before I even though about doing anything. While reading, Coco made me some milk and gave me some sort of bread biscuit. The milk looked suspiciously…natural, so I asked what kind of milk it was. Leche pura! That’s right, it was milk that came straight from the cow this morning. Not only that, but it was amazingly hot (if you want to drink the milk safely, you boil it for 3 minutes). I nervously took my first sip of it and found it to be ridiculously sweet. I tried not to think about it and just drank it as fast as I could, as I was worried that I would think about it too much and throw up or something. At the bottom of the glass, there was highly concentrated sugar melted to the bottom of the cup – so that’s why it was so sweet. An experience for sure!
After getting my experience for the day, I finished reading my magazines, and headed over to the police station across the street to introduce myself to the police chief and all the officers so they know who I am/help me out when I’m getting the crap kicked out of me/when I want to crack some skulls. Peace Corps told us to go with our counterparts to do this, but I’m too damn cool for that – I went by myself. I went in and introduced myself to the sergeant and told him my deal: I’m here for a long time, I’m not your normal chele, I’m teaching in 3 schools, I’m working for 2 NGOs, I live across the street, by the time I leave, everybody will want my autograph. So after giving him my schpeal, I met the police chief. Nobody in the town knows who he is because he was just appointed 8 days ago, so I think I’m one of the first people to actually meet him. He was a real warm guy and said whenever I needed anything, just to let him know and he’d help me out – awesome. Coincidentally, his name is Richard (or rather, Ricardo, the name I go by here)– double awesome.
After meeting the police, I headed back home. However, it was only around 11, so I figured I’d be more productive and go over and meet the mayor. Peace Corps told us we should go there with our counterpart as well, but I’m savvy, so once again I flew solo. I grabbed my stuff and walked the 3 blocks there, and was received very warmly by the secretary. After explaining how awesome I am, and why I was there, he told me to chill out for a second while the mayor finished a meeting he was in. Some random guy (who ended up being the cashier of the mayor’s office) immediately walked up to me shook my hand and said “¡Buenas tardes chele!” Such enthusiasm! After a couple of minutes, he told me I could go in to meet the mayor. I entered his office to find a bunch of novelty joke trinkets on his desk to go along with a bunch of retro style, black and white striped couches – weird. I just told him I was there to introduce myself, and that I was there for my site visit and wanted to meet everybody in the town so I could come back and get down to business after training. He was a really friendly big guy and after I was done explaining who I was and what I was doing there, he said he’d give me a tour of the whole mayor’s office. He brought me into one room where I met all the accountants and people in charge of the town’s finances, then met the cashier (again), then he brought me in back to some other offices. There I met the city head of environmental development, and the development specialist, both of whom were bright, friendly people, and said that whenever I needed anything to just stop by. While walking back to the main building of the mayor’s office, the mayor showed me the kitchen and told me if I ever wanted to stop by and have a café and some sweet treats in the morning, that it was open to me. Furthermore, he informed me if I ever needed photocopies or anything at all, just to let him know and he would pave the road to my goal with pork – awesome. I really felt/feel kind of like a celebrity as everybody thinks I actually know what I’m doing.
I felt pretty good about my solo trips, and decided to stumble home after that as I finished everything on the checklist Peace Corps wanted me to do. As luck would have it, immediately upon returning home, it started raining like crazy. I ended up spending two hours eating an enormous bowl of soup, and just kind of zoning out. I ended up sitting in one of our rocking chairs and just staring out my front door, watching the rain clouds go up and over the mountains to the east of my house – super cool.
When the rain finally stopped, I decided to take a walk over to the my counterpart’s house for the sake of taking a walk and got all the way over there (yea, I know it was only 6 minutes, but it IS on the other side of town), she wasn’t there. So I walked home and bought an enormous bag of bread to quell the rumbling that was going on in my stomach since I’m ALWAYS hungry. Hey, you gotta keep that parasite happy.
My counterpart ended up calling me around one o’clock to tell me that my sub directora from Los Caraos wanted to meet me, and I spoke to my sub-directora (vice principal) unknowingly for 5 minutes before she told me to stop by her house at 4 PM, and gave me directions to a house I’d never been to.
Off to her house I went at 4 (she lives around the corner from me – like everybody else in this town), and talked with her for about 30 minutes before she invited me to go to something that was going on later that night at 5:30. So I went home and killed an hour before coming back. We met up with my counterpart, and another professor from the school and walked to the west end of a town – an unknown area for me. I found one of the bars in town, as well as the ice cream shop before we ultimately arrived at our destination – a funeral. During all our conversation, and chatting about a teacher who’s father had died, I’d neglected to put 2 and 2 together (as well as actually pay attention to the conversation) and figure out that I was going to a public viewing of the body – awkward. There were about 50 people there, and I was the only chele for miles. I uncomfortably sat there before my counterpart told me I should go eat dinner and then come back. I was pretty ecstatic that I got a get out of funeral free card on that one, but couldn’t help but think how awkward it would still be when I got back to the funeral and walked with the body of somebody I’d never met down the streets of Achuapa.
No more than 5 minutes after I got home, it started raining like crazy again and my counterpart called me up to tell me I’d get super wet if I started walking to the funeral, so I shouldn’t go – score. I told her I’d pass by her house tomorrow to fill out some stupid worksheet with her, but apparently she’s going to be in the school doing final grades for the students. So I just told her I’d go to the school to fill out the worksheet with her. If I ride a bike it will take around 25 minutes to get there (if I’m putzing along at Nica pace) or about 10 minutes if I go at Goggins speed ($#@%ing fast), or if I walk it will take years – I don’t have anything else to do tomorrow, so that might be the game plan.
Definitely the most unorthodox 4th of July in my entire life.
June 5th
Oh life in the campo. Last night was the first night I didn’t use earplugs the entire night. That really says something because Nicaragua is super loud all the time, be it cars in the city, or chickens and roosters in the campo. However, that doesn’t seem to be the case here – the sun goes down and everything shuts up (with the exception being our dogs flipping out for a couple of minutes during the night. So in light of the insanely quiet night, I got the best sleep in my 2 month Nicaraguan history.
I had one task on my agenda for the day – go to Los Caraos again to meet with one of my counterparts to fill out this Peace Corps ice breakers form (I probably should have filled it out during the first or second day I was here…but whatever). After getting ready and putting on my “here to impress you” clothing, I borrowed a bike from some lady who lives in my house (honestly have no idea who she is). She said I could borrow it and if I damaged it, I’d have to pay for it – I always thought that was some kind of unwritten rule, but whatever. I inwardly scoffed at the idea that I could possibly damage a bike, being as much of a bike nut as I am.
I figured just rolling up my pant leg would be good, and off I went to Los Caraos. Upon passing my counterparts house, I saw the rain had wreaked havoc on the route leading out of town, so I was forced to take a back road to get to the road that goes to the school. As I immediately found out, the heavy rains from yesterday left immense lakes and mud on the entire 5 km ride to the school. This yielded every possible bike component being coated with 3 inches of mud, and the chain making some not-so-friendly noises. Just before I arrived at the school, the chain had had enough with me and ceased working – so I had to walk the last stretch to the school.
Unknowingly (but not unsurprisingly), I arrived at the school to find that I had been covered in mud (so much for impressing people). There were tons of students at the school for exams (Sabatina, I think it’s for the kids who can’t go to the school during the week because they work), and I filled out the form for a bit. After filling the rest out of the form with my counterpart, my sub-directora asked if I would join them in drinking a class of leche pura that was a mere 30 minutes from the cow’s udders. Mmm…sounds good, but me hace daño is what I told them (literally – “it makes me pain”). They told me that they drink it everyday and it doesn’t do anything and that the pain is just psychological. I just said I’ll have to accustom myself to it little by little.
Following this exchange, I headed back home after smashing the bike back into working order with a rock (I cried a little). I don’t know why the ride home from Los Caraos is amazingly faster than the ride to the school, but I wasn’t about to question it – as long as I didn’t have to walk home, I was a happy camper. Ultimately, I got home totally caked in mud – and just had the clean-looking pair of pants I’d worn yesterday. So I hopped into those, and cleaned the bike off and lubed the chain it as I wasn’t too keen to fix the bike that I’d borrowed. This was all fine and dandy until I realised that I had totally covered my last clean pair of pants with mud – this was just like some kind of vicious cycle.
With the need for mud-less clothes at a premium, I decided to teach myself how to wash pants with a brush and a concrete slab. Aside from being a total pain in the ass, and me not being very good at doing it, I got out the paw prints of a pair of pants and hung them up to dry.
Unfortunately, following this, I had NOTHING to do. I figured something would eventually come up, but how wrong I was. I started reading a newly found Newsweek, and it started to rain. I continued reading through this ridiculous downpour until it passed over. My new game plan was to finish reading the magazine, and then go buy some bread since I’m always starving, but this game plan was thwarted with the arrival of more rain.
When the rain finally subsided (again), I’d spent a total of 6 hours in the hammock reading Newsweek’s – gross. A quick dinner later, and that brought the end to the day. I have a 4 AM bus in the morning so I can get back to Managua for my last rabies shot, so that will be an experience, well, and early one.
I need to get some new hobbies – indoor hobbies.
Posted by thegoggins 
