Peace Corps Journals

321 days ago

As much as I loved vacation it feels great to be back on my regular schedule. Let’s rewind back to February. First of all we celebrated the Superbowl down here! For most of the volunteers it is an excuse to get together, so basically Wil and I were the only ones cheering. But I accomplished my goal in teaching Wil how football works and what the rules are. So during the game after a recovered fumble he would look at me and say “that’s good right!” He told me that one time when he was in high school he and some buddies were playing basketball but it got dark and they couldn’t see the hoop so they decided to play “American football” which consisted of one person with the basketball yelling HUT HUT HIKE and everyone trying to tackle the person with the ball. But now, he is a Packer fan and understands the purpose of the game even though there were a few plays where there was a big pile of guys on top of each other that I am sure looked like the Nicaraguan way of playing football.

Valentine’s Day is also the anniversary of Matagalpa, 149 year anniversary this year. So Wil and I went to go watch some of the bands play and walk around seeing the different artesanias and traditional food for sale. Then had a fancy dinner and some wine in the city to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

Then on Mark’s birthday and Aly’s engagement party day there was also a huge party at my house. My “host brother” was celebrating his graduation from college (the only one in his family of 8) so it was a pretty big deal. They brought in a DJ, killed two pigs (luckily I wasn’t around for the slaughtering and luckily they all know better than to offer me to eat the dried pig skin that was hanging on the line for a couple days), spent 300 dollars in just liquor, and invited pretty much the whole town! My host sister from training came to visit as well. We danced all night and then the next day I took her to a recreation area close to my house that has a pool and restaurant. I’ll be seeing her again shortly when my parents come to visit!

I also joined the town soccer team which has been pretty fun. At first we were playing on a regular field. The first team we played against I swear the girls were 12 years old! There was one girl my age so I just played against her. Granted I have a height and weight advantage but speed against these tiny Nicaraguan girls is not my strong point. We went undefeated in the league and now switched to futbol sala which is played indoors on a basketball court. At first I liked the idea because I thought it meant less running. It’s the opposite, because you have to play offense and defense the whole game. There are only 4 players on the court plus the goalie, and since the court is so small you really have to control the ball well or it just goes out of bounds. The other downside to futbol sala is that with all the dust down here, you just slip and slide everywhere! We had our first game last week and won 4-3.

Science classes are going well. The kids have been great for the most part. There are always those days (normally with my class of 50) when I just need to take a second and breathe and choose to laugh to myself at the craziness of the kids rather than losing my patience. Co planning with my teachers is great, since we’ve been doing it since last year they are used to it now and putting forth more ideas which is the objective. March 21st was World’s Forestry Day so I gave an interactive class about the benefits, threats, and facts about deforestation. Then we did a tree nursery with all my grades in recycled plastic bottles. Since it was there job to fill them with dirt and cow manure in their houses we will see how many of the trees grow considering that in most places in my area the dirt isn’t very fertile. Another thing I started at my school is garbage separation. Santa Julia, which is the same organization that I help out with, with the Special Education students, also has a recycling process. They donated 3 recepticles to us to collect plastic bottles. (which before this the school used to burn). So now every week with my students we empty the recepticles, smash the bottles and put them all in big bags to drop off at Santa Julia at the end of every month. A community member offered to also take the school garbage to Matagalpa to drop off at the dump (again instead of burning). It has been going great, the high school students even made extra boxes to throw out only paper. Thursday we did a community clean up as well with my 5th and 6th graders. Walking only 20 feet I had counted 38 plastic bottles on the ground! My sixth graders didn’t believe me, but when they went out to clean they realized that the majority of trash on the ground are plastic bottles which we can now RECYCLE! One other thing that I started in my school with the help and support of my director, is a community bank. Here in Nicaragua it isn’t common that people save money. They live paycheck to paycheck so this is a way all my teachers are saving 5 dollars every month for the end of the year. And there is more, they can take out loans. Banks here in Nicaragua have a ridiculously high interest rate (38%) on most loans so nobody can afford to take out a loan. Our teachers each month can lend up to 25 dollars and have two months to pay it back with a 10% interest rate. The interest then gets divided into all the members of the bank ( I think we have 20) at the end of the year. The teachers are smart and try to lend out or borrow all the money in the bank every month even if they don’t really need it so we can gain interest. I insisted that among themselves they had to pick the president and vice president so it can be sustainable so I got stuck with the position of keeping the locked box with the money at my house (the president has the key) As it turns out the only box we could find is a huge 10 pound wooden box. Perfect for storing a sheet of paper and a few bills of money right? So lucky me gets to lug that thing to and from school once a month.

My English class is going well. This 6 week block I had all new students, and I feel like they are more interested in the class than my last group so it was pretty successful. My mom sent letters from her sixth graders in the States that were written in Spanish and English for my students. Oh boy, were my students excited about these letters. Of course all the girls wanted a boy pen pal and all the boys wanted a girl pen pal. So everyone is all giddy now about writing to their “gringo” friends.

Two Fridays ago, Wil’s best friend, Franklin, invited us to go on a day trip to a place in northern Nicaragua called San Rafael del Norte. I thought it was just going to be Wil, myself, Franklin, his wife and 3 kids, but along came two sisters and a brother of his wife and 2 of their kids! San Rafael del Norte is known for it’s famous priest, Father Odorico de’Andrea. Supposedly he was buried with brand new sandals, and then when they opened up his tomb years later not only was his body and face in tact, but his sandals had been used. So the story goes they he got up and would walk around still helping people. Nicaraguans say that he is in the process of being canonized a saint. After seeing the two famous churches there we stopped by the park to play with the kids, and then on the way home stopped at some greenhouses to see the gardens, and then of course to eat. We got back to Matgalpa at 4 and since Wil and I have been wanting to donate blood (more him than me) and we both had the day off we went. He does it every four months, and I went with him 4 months ago just to keep him company and the guy working guilted me into donating by telling me a story about a 4 year old boy in the hospital in Matagalpa that was dying because there wasn’t any blood in the blood bank at the Red Cross. Well that time Wil and I both had the flu so in the end we couldn’t donate. When we walked in and the same guy was there and he looked at us for a second and then was like “hey you’re the same couple!” and was excited we came back. I of course was freaking out since I hate needles so I couldn’t look. They started with me about 5 minutes before Wil, and he still finished first because I didn’t like squeezing the ball. In the end I survived, and plan on doing it again in 4 months.

So on to some bad news. On Ash Wednesday Kiotho’s mother passed away at age 57. She had been pretty sick with diabetes the past few months, in and out of the hospital. I had seen a lot of improvement the few weeks before. She had a heart attack and passed away on the way to the hospital. Kiotho is my age and my best girl friend that I have here, its twice as sad because her father passed away only three years ago. Here the culture is quite different. The day after someone passes away here, the house has a vigil for 24 hours. People go to the house all throughout the day to visit with the family. The family has the responsibility to cook for everyone that comes, which is economically a hardship, and a lot of work. School was cancelled and all the students and teachers went for two hours during the day to pay respects. Then at night the whole town went to the house. If someone didn’t know any better they would have thought it was a party due to the amount of people in the street, the yard, the house, the neighbors yard. There had to be at least 500. I stayed until midnight, but the majority stay with the family until six in the morning. The next day they had the mass at nine which was heartbreaking, but again everyone in the community was present. After the mass we all paraded down to the cemetery for the burial. Then for nine days they do a prayer service in the house at 4 o’clock every day. On the ninth day everyone from the community goes to the house again at night for the ninth day prayer service. They pray the rosary, sing, and again support the family. The family again has to feed everyone that comes. I stayed until 11 thinking it was over, but people stayed with the family again until about 4 in the morning. For me it was interesting to see that everyone goes to show their support for the family, even if they aren’t close friends or didn’t know the person very well. Kiotho seems to be doing a little better but keep her and her family in your prayers.

Princesa and Diego update…not too much is new with my crazy pets. The other day I was holding Diego outside and a lady walked past and let me know that black cats are the devil and have demons inside. Yea, people here aren’t too fond of black cats…but I told her Diego was perfectly harmless and then gave him a big kiss. Princesa is good, she is due for all three of her vaccines so she is not going to be happy when I come home from the city today and take her to be injected from the “vet” in my town. She has been having major flea problems lately, probably because I bought a cheaper brand of flea meds and it just doesn’t seem to be working, if anything I feel like it’s attracting the fleas. It doesn’t help that every waking hour she is playing with the neighbors dogs which I am sure are full of fleas. I need to start looking into all the qualifications to bring her home, my time is running out here, and the months are flying by.

Well I am off to buy a pinata for my favorite boy, Juan Alfredo, it just so happens that his birthday falls on a day that I have class with him. So since he doesnt have a mom or dad I am going to surprise him with a pinata at school!