To my beloved friends and family,
I have finally arrived in Nicaragua. I wrote this blog to the sound of trumpets and Elvis Crespo at a dining room table while a 2 year-old imitated me with his pen and paper on a beautiful day with the perfect amount of breeze. (For the rekerd, this computer dusnt have spell check for English that I can find, so any misplelings shud be overlukt.)
After flying into Managua and being separated from real Nicaraguan life for 3 days, they finally judged us on our Spanish-speaking abilities and sent us into the country. They sent me, and 3 others to Masatepe, a town of roughly 30,000 and no white people. I am staying with a family far more well-off than I ever expected when I signed up for the Peace Corps. Doña María Gertrudis, her aunt Salvadora, her husband Carlo, and their 3 boys all live with me. Fabian (who's first name is actually Leikar, after the Lakers) is 9, Jeanfranquito is 2, and Agdel is almost 1. Jeanfranquito doesn't really speak Spanish, more a mix of baby and Spanish, but tries to talk to me nonetheless, and appears to love having me beacuse he has boundless energy and is trapped in the house with his aunt and a baby most of the day. He enjoys having a new jungle-gym, and I must concede that I enjoy being his play-thing. Doña María works in the bank not far from the house, amd the house is above a little place in which the local kids can come play Playstation on 4 different TVs, which Carlo own's and operates, as far as I can tell. It's a very nice house, has a flat screen and cable, and I have my own (albeit tiny) room and bathroom. Cold-water showers are tough, but you learn to deal.
The other cool thing is that, because a lot of kids come by the house to play video games and the houses are close together, all the neighbors come around and hang out every evening to chat and watch the really little kids. Today some people waved me up to their house to watch Nicaragua play Belize in the Central American cup that's going on right now. And 2 days ago, my first evening here, I played jacks and "estop" (essentially Scattergories but even better and only requires a pen and paper) with some young girls from down the street. As it turns out, Nicaraguan children know their shit, and I got destroyed.
I'm in class for most of the day. It's a Spanish class for most people because the Peace Corps makes it very clear that the key to integrating and being accepted by the community is speaking their language. But because I'm in the advanced group, we talk about specifically Nicaraguan phrases and customs and train for our service. Today we went to the health center to meet the director and walked around town to get a feel for it.
So far it has been great, but its only been 2 days, and I'm guessing it will get far more challenging. I also am guessing that when they send me to my site of service, it will be a bit farther from my comfort zone. I'll let you know how that goes though. Still working on getting pictures up.
I love and miss you all.
Nick
p.s. Shout out to Andrew Martinez because he said it would make him happy.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
Inicio
To my beloved friends and family,
I wasn't 100% sure I´d actually get around to writing a blog even though I told almost all of you I would, but alas, it has come to be. (Disclaimer: This is not an exciting blog yet. It is merely an update as to the happenings of my life since departure from Sacramento for the curious. The interesting ones with information about Nicaragua will have to come at a later time.)
I flew into Arlington, VA on Tuesday, hung out in a hotel for the evening, and began the staging event the next day. It consisted of meeting all the other volunteers going to Nicaragua, 45 in total, and briefing us in safety and what to expect before the real training began. Everyone is going in either the same program as me, reproductive health and HIV education, or maternal and child health, which are apparently fields dominated by females because my group consists of 37 of them and only 8 of us reppin' the dudes. We were set to leave that night when 3 inches of snow got our flight cancelled. Of course I had packed for Nicaraguan heat, and was completely unprepared for the frigid weather wonderful DC so generously offered me. It turned out to not be all that bad, however, because I got to go out and see the Smithsonian Natural History and American History museums the next day, as well as try some of the most delicious beers of my life at a place that has a selection of over 300.
We finally left for the airport at 1:30am on the 14th, and got into Managua around 1:00pm. Because of the delay, plans for training upon arrival were changed. Initially, we were going to go to Grenada for a 3 day training retreat before we were separated into groups of 4 or 5 and sent to the towns we will train in for 3 months (we begin the the job VERY well trained), but now we are going to have that retreat in a hotel across the street from the airport before going to our training towns. It feels amazing to be here. Not only to arrive in country, but also weather-wise. It's about 90 degrees, sunny, bearable humidity, and has a nice, cool breeze. Hope the rain is good too, though.
Until this point, I forgot I even owned a camera, but now that I'm actually here, I'll start snappin' away and hopefully figure out a way to upload them. I've been talking to volunteers that have already been serving in Nicaragua for a while, and I'm getting more and more excited to get to the heart of both my service and the country. (Reading back over this, that sounds super cheesy. And I don't like it. But I'm not gunna change it.)
Like I said, the delay has left me without much to report, but I figured at least my family will be glad to hear that I'm here and happy. If you guys have any questions you want answered in the next blog, or requests, concerns, comments, compliments, good jokes, or just feel like telling me how much you love me, feel free to leave a comment on this. I'll try to check facebook, but family takes the priority on this one so I might not always have time to check it.
I love you all so much and hope everything is going well.
Nick
p.s. SO EXCITED!!!
I wasn't 100% sure I´d actually get around to writing a blog even though I told almost all of you I would, but alas, it has come to be. (Disclaimer: This is not an exciting blog yet. It is merely an update as to the happenings of my life since departure from Sacramento for the curious. The interesting ones with information about Nicaragua will have to come at a later time.)
I flew into Arlington, VA on Tuesday, hung out in a hotel for the evening, and began the staging event the next day. It consisted of meeting all the other volunteers going to Nicaragua, 45 in total, and briefing us in safety and what to expect before the real training began. Everyone is going in either the same program as me, reproductive health and HIV education, or maternal and child health, which are apparently fields dominated by females because my group consists of 37 of them and only 8 of us reppin' the dudes. We were set to leave that night when 3 inches of snow got our flight cancelled. Of course I had packed for Nicaraguan heat, and was completely unprepared for the frigid weather wonderful DC so generously offered me. It turned out to not be all that bad, however, because I got to go out and see the Smithsonian Natural History and American History museums the next day, as well as try some of the most delicious beers of my life at a place that has a selection of over 300.
We finally left for the airport at 1:30am on the 14th, and got into Managua around 1:00pm. Because of the delay, plans for training upon arrival were changed. Initially, we were going to go to Grenada for a 3 day training retreat before we were separated into groups of 4 or 5 and sent to the towns we will train in for 3 months (we begin the the job VERY well trained), but now we are going to have that retreat in a hotel across the street from the airport before going to our training towns. It feels amazing to be here. Not only to arrive in country, but also weather-wise. It's about 90 degrees, sunny, bearable humidity, and has a nice, cool breeze. Hope the rain is good too, though.
Until this point, I forgot I even owned a camera, but now that I'm actually here, I'll start snappin' away and hopefully figure out a way to upload them. I've been talking to volunteers that have already been serving in Nicaragua for a while, and I'm getting more and more excited to get to the heart of both my service and the country. (Reading back over this, that sounds super cheesy. And I don't like it. But I'm not gunna change it.)
Like I said, the delay has left me without much to report, but I figured at least my family will be glad to hear that I'm here and happy. If you guys have any questions you want answered in the next blog, or requests, concerns, comments, compliments, good jokes, or just feel like telling me how much you love me, feel free to leave a comment on this. I'll try to check facebook, but family takes the priority on this one so I might not always have time to check it.
I love you all so much and hope everything is going well.
Nick
p.s. SO EXCITED!!!
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