Nicaraguan Adventures

Tidings

2008-12-03T19:35:00.000-08:00

So, I realize I let my blog slide during my last month or so in Bluefields, but I assure you, it was due to thorough enjoyment resulting in a lack of time for writing and not for want of exciting stories. My final stretch included many riotous gatherings, lots of networking, new volunteers and all the joys of everyday life in Bluefields. I was incredibly sad to leave all my wonderful companions and return to the United States in October, but life always seems to have something new and exciting waiting for me and I am simply unable to resist it's draw. Hence, I have returned to the US and begun a new adventure living and studying in the Sonoran desert of Arizona. I continue to work diligently on my design for CERCA and to maintain contact with as many fellow volunteers and Bluefields locals as humanly possible. Ideally, I will have a chance to return to Bluefields in the not-too-distant future to reconnect with friends and oversee the initial phases of construction for CERCA. Wish me luck!

Moonlit Madness

2008-08-18T16:01:00.000-07:00

Since the very first time I visited Gualpatara, I had contended that we really needed to go back on a full moon in order to properly enjoy the surroundings. Despite being called crazy by 90% of the people I proposed this idea to, Stephanie was always in favor, so I knew we'd figure out a way to make it happen. Knowing it to be a fairly bad idea to go tramping through the Jungle in the middle of the night on our own, we recruited a few local friends to walk us out there and take care of any nasty creatures the wild might throw in our direction.

Having had a gran fiesta on Friday night, Saturday started fairly slowly, but with good weather. So, after finally Managing to leave the house in the early afternoon, Steph & I went up to the main house to do some "shopping" in the main kitchen and announce our intentions for the evening in case anyone else happened to be loco enough to join us. From there, we hiked across town through the barrios until we reached our friend's house where we had planned to cook some chicken to take with us. Unfortunately, said friend was on a mission when we arrived and could not be reached. A little perturbed by the delay, but still having a few hours of sunlight at our disposal, we hung out and played a few rounds of dominos until he arrived. At that point, he disappeared across the street with our chicken declaring that we would only prepare it then and cook it out at Gualpatara. A fair while later, we had rounded up the rest of the party, which grew well past our original intentions, but was still manageable, cut and par-boiled the chicken, collected a grill, hammocks, drinks and the like and were on our way back up the hill.

As we hiked through the barrios with all our equipment to cook and spend the night out, we got rather incredulous looks from most people we passed. A few knew various members of our party well enough to ask where we were headed, but not a single one believed the response. I should probably stop here to explain that only one of the 4 local boys we were with had ever camped out, and that one only because he'd spent nearly half his life living in the States. The rest had never even considered the idea. They were, however, very excited by the idea once it was proposed. In any case, after passing from one end of town to the other, we started up the steeper slopes and into the jungle. As we stepped off the last concrete pathway, we were immediately immersed in a trail of mud. The boys managed to proceed elegantly up the horrendously slippery slopes without seeming to pay much mind to their footing, but that was not the case for Stephanie and myself. For my part, I was concentrating thoroughly on every step attempting to avoid the mushiest of the mud patches. I managed to make it through fairly cleanly, but Stephanie didn't fair quite as well. 10 mins into the trip she was covered in mud up to her knees. Of course, that didn't slow her down in the least. She simply lost the shoes and kept on trucking.

We reached the crest of the hill just as the sun was sinking behind the distant ridges. As we hiked along the highest point for miles in every direction, we had an incredible view of all of Bluefields and the surrounding area. On one side, you could see the ocean, on the other, lush green jungle covering rolling hills for as far as you could see. As the sun sank lower and lower, dusk came on quickly. Just as the light was truly fading, we arrived at our destination. Being thoroughly sweaty and non too clean, Steph & I left the boys our flashlights and sent them off to find firewood while we clambered down the ridiculously steep, slippery rocks to reach the calm pool of water that had enticed us out in the first place. Jumping in, every step to get there was immediately worth while. We had the place entirely to ourselves, and it was pitch black at that point, so we took the liberty of removing our swimsuits and properly enjoying the cool touch of refreshing water against our skin.

As we were bathing, the boys managed to locate the candles and set them up along the path to light our way. Laying back in the water, we were greeted with a vision of twinkling spots of fire lining the rim of our secluded basin. It was magical.

Thoroughly refreshed, but feeling a little guilty for not helping set up camp, we started climbing out just as the skies opened up for the first time that day. Already soaked, we weren't bothered in the least. We did loose our beautifully lit path, but that was a small sacrifice to pay. Retrieving and donning our clothes, we climbed back out and greeted a few other volunteers who had decided to join us. Everyone else was slightly more concerned by the driving rain than either Stephanie or myself, but luckily it didn't last long enough to really become a problem. In fact, as the rain subsided, the clouds parted to reveal the rising moon in all her glory. A hush fell as we all turned to gaze upon this magnificent sight and took a moment to thoroughly enjoy where our lives had brought us.

As we turned back to reality, we had the difficult task of starting a fire in the now thoroughly drenched surroundings. Not to worry, this is a typical problem in much of Nicaragua; wet wood, wet ground, difficult to light a fire. Their solution? Plastic. The boys proceeded to burn plastic bags so they would drip onto the wood, causing it to burn slowly and hence dry out enough to light. Kinda brilliant when you don't have any pine sap handy. In almost no time at all, we had a fire going and chicken on the grill.

We passed the next hour or so watching our food cook while we listed to live music courtesy of our musician friend who had carried his guitar all the out specifically for the occasion. It was wonderful.

Then the rains came again.

That made us wet.

But, the chicken wasn't done yet, and no one really wanted to go anywhere, so we passed around a bottle of the cheapest alcohol in town and worked on keeping the fire as dry as possible. As the rain subsided, the odors of the chicken became truly overwhelming and we decided to dig in. It was delicious. M had come through once more with his skills as a chef and we had succulently slow roasted chicken with a touch of flame broiled flavor. MmmmMmmm Good!

Thoroughly satiated, but with plans to spend the rest of the night there, M directed others to gather more wood and fetch some water from the spring for the second course. This was to be a chicken soup, which we set to simmer as soon as the water arrived and veggies had been chopped.

Then it rained again.

And we got wet again.

Throughout which, the moon played hide and seek behind the clouds, only coming out in full force when the rain halted. This time for good. With a clear sky and full moon, it was if the noonday sun was shinning. You could see clear across the valley where the leaves were bathed in pale blue light and the trees shimmered as they played in the breeze.

By the time the soup was ready, we were starting to get a little chilly, considering we were all soaked several times over. Warming up with chicken soup couldn't have been more perfect. Once that was gone, we saw more ominous clouds headed in our direction and hence decided we might have to call off the plan for spending the night. Packing up our soggy belongings, we struck out again down the path that had officially become a river of mud. Nearly loosing my shoes in the first 5 steps, I quickly ditched them in favor of walking barefoot through the squishy brown mud.

We hiked out by the light of the moon, only switching our headlamps on when we passed through a dense patch of vine covered trees. By the time we reached civilization, we were all covered in mud, but far too enamored by our experience to care. Walking through the nearly deserted streets we made our way quietly back home. After washing off our mud-caked legs, we settled in and called it a night. And what an incredible night it was.

Trenzas

2008-08-14T14:43:00.001-07:00

At some point during my birthday weekend, Stephanie and I had realized that we had yet to make a single female friend here in Bluefields (besides our lovely volunteers) and hence have had almost no exposure to the females side of life. This has a lot to do with the much larger picture of gender roles throughout Nicaragua, and the fact that we work in an entirely male-dominated realm. The reality here is that the few women who do work work in shops, banks, bars and homes with the occasional teacher and doctor thrown into the mix. It's definitely better than it could be, but considering that most women are mothers by the age of 16, there's not a whole lot of opportunity for simulating and engaging jobs. Not to mention, 90% of the available work in Bluefields is unskilled manual labor.

In any case, we wanted to get a better picture of life as a woman and maybe get a chance to chat with a few local ladies. Not having many outlets within our social sphere, we asked around and found a friend of a friend of a worker who occasionally braids hair for a small fee. Not having many other options for meeting women, other than joining the church or getting pregnant, we made our way out to a barrio we had yet to explore to meet up with Fern. This was a bit of an adventure in itself since her directions were, go to the basketball court and wait. I'll come find you. Being the only white girls in town, not to mention this particular barrio, we figured we'd be hard to miss. So, we took a taxi to the court, asked a few people for Fern and were quickly chaperoned by a young girl down an alley and onto the porch of a house entirely dwarfed by an enormous fig tree with beautiful wandering roots. We sat down under the dripping laundry while piles of small children peered cautiously around the door frame.

A short while later, after we'd made good friends with the bravest (and youngest) of the children, her mother finally emerged from the depths of the house. After negotiating a price, we declared our intentions to return later that weekend and headed out. That Sunday, Stephanie, myself and a new volunteer who recently arrived made our way back to the barrio. Our friend was set up at the basketball court selling tacos with all the other ladies of the neighborhood and was thrilled to see us all arrive. When she realized all three of us wanted our hair braided, she called up her sister, enlisted her cousin and set up 3 chairs right there on the sidewalk.

We passed the next 4 hours surrounded by women and children of all ages chatting about daily life, relatives, men etc. It was a little hard to follow all the Creole when the women really got going, but it was absolutely fascinating nonetheless. Despite being the main attraction for the neighborhood that day, it was the first time I felt as if I was getting a true glimpse of the women's world here in Bluefields. After about the first hour, the women pretty much forgot we were there, relaxed and went on with their day the way they would have had they been braiding each other's hair. Well, that's how it felt at least.

In the end, it was a lovely, long afternoon with some wonderful results. Not sure how long they'll stay in, but for the moment I'm loving having my hair braided as it means no maintenance and significantly cooler temperatures.

Oh, in other news, we've also acquired a kitten and a puppy in the last week. They're both adorable!

Nica days

2008-08-14T14:25:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, most of the volunteers headed down to Monkey Point to pick up our valiant community liaisons were winding up their 2 month stint of living and working in the community. As a result, the house was incredibly quiet with only 5 of us still around. Over at Stephanie and my little house, things weren't nearly as silent as we had visitors starting around 8 am on Saturday. Shocked that we hadn't already been up for 4 hours (despite having been out dancing the night before with the same friends until at least 1am), our friends showed up to see what we might have on offer for the day. Not really having any plans for the weekend, we opted for a nice homemade breakfast and multiple rounds of Dominos. In fact, I believe we ended up playing Dominos until at least 2pm that day. I know you're all probably thinking, how in the world could a game as simple as dominos be entertaining for that long, but you have no idea. The way they play down here keeps you on your toes! For those of you in my family, watch out! we've got a new game to compete with Trumps! I have a feeling you're all gonna love it. Of course, you might have to come down here and play with 2 of my friends here to really get into it. These guys are truly amazing. After 2 or 3 tiles are laid, they already know where the game's going. In some cases, they lay down their first tile with the exclamation that they're gonna win. So far, they haven't been proved wrong in those cases.

In any case, we passed a lovely, properly Nica morning playing dominos and watching our supply of rum mysteriously disappear throughout the day. Around about 2pm we decided we'd had enough and kicked the boys out so we could shower and start our day.
The rest of the day consisted of more good food, a few rounds of pool and a night on the town. Not too bad for a lazy saturday in Bluefields.

Settling In

2008-08-14T13:20:00.000-07:00

So, since my crazy weekend of seaside fiestas life has settled down significantly and started to take on a welcomingly calm rhythm. I can now officially call myself a local as I now know enough taxi drivers to occasionally get free rides and I can no longer leave the house without expecting to run into at least 3 people I know. This change has not only altered my social life significantly, but has changed the pace of everyday life.

One of the very first days that I arrived in Bluefields, I accompanied one of the other volunteers downtown to do a few errands with him and stop by the bank. At the time, I became rather frustrated because doing errands entailed walking around in circles and checking every single shop to see if they had what we wanted. This also meant spending a few mins in each shop chit-chatting with the owners. Not to mention the fact that everything closes between 12 and 2pm, so we also ended up going to a friends place to hang out for an hour while we waited for things to open. Needless to say, I found this a rather odd routine and was somewhat putout by spending 3hrs doing something that typically would have required less than one. Of course, I now understand completely as I am now in precisely the same place the other volunteer was when I arrived. Here's a quick sample of a "short" trip into the city...

I went into town one day to copy keys and get a few food items. Only, when Steph and I arrived at the key shop, we were informed that the woman who normally copies them had gone on vacation for the summer. So, we went up the street to the only other place in town that copies keys. We showed them what we needed and were informed that they didn't have those blanks and we'd have to come by another time. Slightly frustrated, but with no other options, we headed on our way. Since my cell phone had gone missing and one of the people I needed to get in touch with had had their service disconnected, I headed over to their office to see if I could get in touch with them that way. On the way, I ran into a guy we'd met at the pool hall, who did an about-face and walked with us for awhile to chat. Then we came across one of the BSS boys who asked us to come by and say hi later. When I got to the office, the man I wanted to meet wasn't there. I left a message that I had come by and headed back across town. On the way, I passed a mechanic's shop with a pile of used tires out front. Since I may be needing a large number of tires for my construction project here, I stopped to chat with the thoroughly inebriated old man to determine how many tires he had and how much he would want for each of them. Then we noticed that the stationary store across the street actually had real books in the window, so we had to stop and take a look since I had yet to see a bookstore in town. Walking out of there, we ran into another friend who happened to be passing through. We chatted with him for a bit and then ducked back into the key store to avoid spending the rest of the afternoon with said friend. Since we were there, we figured it wouldn't hurt to ask a different employee about the keys we needed copied. He took one look, nodded, pulled a few blanks off the wall and started cutting. Who knows what the woman before had been thinking.

Nearly an hour later we emerged from the key store with a new sets of keys and headed down a few streets to get the food we had come for. Of course, this involved going down to the market to find nuts, to a different store for drygoods, to the only store in town that sells yogurt (when he happens to have it) and another stop at the only place in all of bluefields that sells real chocolate. In each store, we had to go through the same rigamaroll of small talk, comments on the weather, discussions of what we'd been up to recently etc. Then we'd pick out what we wanted and wait 10mins while they looked around the store for their receipts (a nearly unknown item that can often be a serious, but necessary process). Once they found their packet of receipts, we waited while they reverse-calculated the tax so they could write down the price they'd already told us as the final one. Sometimes, we'd also have to wait while someone ran next door to get someone else who happened to be literate enough to write out the receipt in the first place.

Walking out of the last store with all our goods in hand, we were finally ready to go, so we flagged down a taxi and hopped in back. Only, there was already someone in front, so we drove all the way across the city to drop them off in a different neighborhood before we could turn around, come back through the maze of one-way streets that make up the town center and head back towards our house. Only, on the way, we picked up another passenger who was only headed a short distance, but in the wrong direction. So, we drove across the bridge to Santa Rosa to drop them off, drove through the entire rest of the neighborhood just to be able to turn around, then got stuck in a line of traffic while someone stopped in the middle of the bridge to unload their truck and everyone else simply waited since they couldn't go around. 20mins later, we finally crossed the bridge and drove up to the house. Hence, what we had anticipated to be a short (hour or 2 at the most) trip into town ended up taking the entire afternoon.

Welcome to life in Bluefields. =) I have to admit, I'm starting to really love it. There's a pace to life there that forces you to relax enough that simple, personal interactions start to have more and more significance while the larger, stressful issues fade a bit. There's always quite a delicate little balance to be maintained between knowing how much to push to actually make things happen and knowing when to let things take their time. I think I'm starting to get the hang of it.

Seaside Sweetness

2008-08-05T10:35:00.000-07:00

So, as most of you are aware, Sunday was my 24th birthday. Having kept up a tradition of memorable events to mark the occasion over the past several years, I felt that this year needed to be equally entertaining. Hence, Stephanie and I organized a BBQ on the beach. As you've probably picked up from previous blogs, organizing anything here is something of a challenge, but either the gods were in our favor for the day, or we're finally getting the hang of life in Bluefields cause the day went off without a hitch (well, without any major hitches to speak of).

Having invited 3 very distinct groups of people to celebrate with us, we had a bit of coordination to do on Sunday morning. The night before, we had arranged a time to meet all the bE folks down at the docks, so Steph & I left our house sun morning to pass by M's place with our chicken for the BBQ that he had offered to help us marinade creole style. Floored to discover both him and his friend awake, showered and ready to go when we arrived, we caravaned our way through town with cooler, grill and supplies in hand. On the other side of town we didn't even have to knock when we arrived at the BBS boy's place (who had just come from a 2 month vacation to the States a few days before). They were up, dressed and ready for a day at the beach. Once again, we were thoroughly impressed having prepared ourselves to have to drag them from their beds.

We were getting close to the time we'd set to meet the bE folks, and we needed a few last min supplies, so Steph and I left M & company dutifully cutting up chicken while we went to check up on the rest of the party's status. Arriving at the docks, they were nowhere to be seen, but as soon as we'd finished buying supplies and returned, half the crew was already there. Wow. Once again, we were both impressed that everyone actually showed up at the time and place they claimed they'd come.

At that point, Steph headed back to the BSS house to commence herding her cats down to the dock while I awaited the stragglers from bE. A little while later, the majority of our crew was loaded into the panga, but Steph's group had yet to appear. Choosing not to hold up the rest of the passengers, we headed off across the lagoon.

Arriving at the other side after a pleasant and thankfully event-free trip, we headed through town towards the beach. Along the way we passed by crowds of children happily playing soccer in the streets, mostly in their skivvies. We also wandered pass large petrol storage tanks, a very loud diesel generator and many small, brightly painted houses.

Arriving at the beach we were greeted with nearly vacant stretches of sand with waves lapping lazily at the shore. The few people we passed along the way were out to collect wood, sell coconuts or, like us, spend a nice relaxed afternoon on the beach.

Arriving at one of the cute little wooden huts that line the beach, we stripped down, dropped our belongings and headed into the waves. The next few hours were spent body surfing, swimming and enjoying being fully immersed in cool, refreshing water.

A few hours later Steph finally showed up with boys in tow and we set up the grill for a meal of exquisitely marinated chicken complimented by homemade cookies and plenty of rum. It was a fabulous way to spend the day.

Good Vibes

2008-08-01T08:41:00.000-07:00

So, I'm gonna go ahead and skip a few really good stories for the moment in the interest of providing a more up to date blog entry. I promise to go back and write about the 2 different trips I'm currently missing, each of which has a plethora of good moments, but that will have to happen sometime in the near future.

For now, I want to tell you about a beautiful sunday afternoon. First, I need to back up at bit. About 2 weeks ago, two of the long time volunteers took off for vacation, leaving their house empty. Not wanting it to get robbed for the 5th or 6th time, Steph and I offered to move out of the now thoroughly crowded main house in favor of the 'pequeño casa' down the road. We couldn't have made a more perfect decision had we arranged it in advance. After a couple months of living in a bustling metropolis of people coming and going and never having a minute to ourselves, we suddenly found ourselves in the quiet of a private home. Immediately, we knew we had to take advantage of our new found freedom before we loose it again upon Seb & Juli's return. So, when our musician friend came by and offered to teach us to cook Rondon on sunday, we were happy to oblige.

Sunday morning dawned sunny and calm. Waking up and making ourselves a yummy breakfast of fresh mangoes, yogurt, fried eggs and homemade bread, steph and I waged bets on the probability of our friends actually arriving. We also set a time to commence our back up plan of heading out to the bluff should the boys not show (which is generally what happens around here). To our very pleasant surprise, the boys showed up 20mins early ready to hit the market for some supplies.

We strolled down to town, chatting and enjoying the sunshine the whole way there. Once at the market, we followed D & J around as they picked out the best coconuts, plantains, and yucca. Then we came to the fish counter and discovered that they were also offering conch, a delicacy that we just couldn't pass up. Fully loaded, we wandered the long way back through town and up to the house. When we got there, the boys took on the tricky tasks of peeling the coconuts with a machete and scaling and filleting the fish. Steph and I opted to work on the veggies.

I should probably mention at this point that I had tried a variety of different Rondons since arriving, but had yet to taste one that really knocked my socks off. In fact, I wasn't even sure I really liked the stuff, but considering that cooking Rondon is roughly equivalent to having a BBQ in the States, I wasn't about to refuse the offer. Man, am I glad to have made that decision.

Once the coconuts were peeled, we cracked them open, drained the juice and put chunks of luscious coconut in the blender to make coco milk. Three coconuts later, we had a wonderfully thick bowl of frothy cream-like milk. In the meantime, we had put the conch on to simmer and soften. Only, somewhere along the way, the boys forgot about that part... Suddenly the kitchen was filling with smoke and the conchs were beginning to fuse to the pot. Undeterred, we dumped some more water in, added the coco milk, veggies and spices and sat back to wait and see how much damage the fire had really done.

Not too long thereafter, the fish got dropped in for a few minutes and the meal was ready. We sat down to enjoy the fruits of our labor and each took a small sip to sample our concoction. Moans of enjoyment confirmed we had a done a fabulous job. Honestly, I had no idea that Rondon could taste even remotely as good as what we had created. I don't know if burning the conch helped, or if it was the fabulously thick coco milk, or what, but that soup was DELICIOUS!!!!! Cleaning out our bowls despite each being stuffed, we sat back thoroughly contented with fat, happy bellies.

Bugs

2008-07-29T16:10:00.001-07:00

So, there are a few things that I may have mentioned in passing, but have yet to really explain the full ramifications upon daily life. One of these topics is that of bugs, or insects if you like. Living in the middle of a jungle, there are a LOT of bugs. They range from tiny little ants that you can barely see to giant red ants that bite with a vengeance. From miniature beatles with flashy green wings to enormous cockroaches the size of a small cell phone.

When you wake up in the morning and reach for the honey, your arm is immediately covered in tiny crawling creatures you can feel, but rarely see. When you pick up the sugar, you have to sift out the black ants that have died overnight. As you sit down to enjoy your meal, you find ourself absently waving your hand over the table trying to keep the houseflies from contaminating your food. When you turn on the lights as you enter the house, you are greeted by a flurry of scurrying as all the cockroaches run for cover. Looking for a new outfit in the closet, you come across spiderwebs that you could have sworn weren't there the day before.

All in all, bugs are a fact of life here. If you leave food out on a counter for longer than 5 mins, it's a sacrifice to the bug gods. If you forget to put on long pants before commencing to cook, you find yourself doing a ridiculous dance as you hop from foot to foot attempting to continuously kill mosquitoes as they munch upon your sweet flesh.

On a grander scheme of things, bugs destroy everything here with a surprising rapidity. Wood succumbs to termites, any abandoned space is invaded by hornets, carpenter ants carry away plants piece by piece. In short, it's a jungle out there!

Kakabila

2008-07-26T18:57:00.000-07:00

Two weekends ago, I decided it was about time that I make a trip out to one of the communities and find out what life is really like for the people we are doing our best to help. One of the other volunteers was headed up to Kakabila for a rather long stay, so I opted to join him for the trip up and a few days in the jungle. It was a rather astounding journey that began with an early morning panga ride to Pearl Lagoon. Luckily, it wasn't raining when we set off, but a few hours later, as soon as we entered the Lagoon itself, our boat engine cut and we started drifting. luckily, our panga driver had done well enough for himself to possess a cell phone and was able to call around to some friends in the area. Just as we began drifting dangerously close to the shore, an empty panga showed up to give us a tow.

After a few false starts and some hard tugs that nearly dipped the edge of the boat below the waterline, we were on our way, securely tied behind our savior's vessel. At this point, a woman towards the back decided that she couldn't hold it any longer and asked the driver if there was some way she could pee. He told her to climb back beside him and hang off the back with one hand on the motor. Not too excited by this prospect after a brief, failed attempt to balance, she asked for another option. The driver scrounged around until he found one of his bailing buckets and handed it to her with the instructions to clean it out when she was done. Adamantly asking that he stay facing forward, she crouched down and relieved herself, dumping the contents of the bucket overboard and deftly rinsing her container. Much happier, she clambered back up to her seat and the driver settled back into his space.

Pulling up to a nondescript dock on a desolate strech of land, we all climbed out and huffed it out the road. Apparently, we hadn't quite made it to Pearl Lagoon. Instead, we were in some small town a few miles out and the panga driver was busy arranging transport the rest of the way. He had us set our things down in front of his house while he went to scrounge up some 3 wheel, semi open air taxis to get us on our way. Happy to take in the sights and chat with the small children that suddenly gathered, we hung out for about half an hour while two taxis ran shuttles of 2 people at a time over to Pearl Lagoon.

The drive over to Pearl Lagoon revealed a new view of the countryside. There was a surprising mix of homes along the edge of the road, ranging from tiny wooden shacks to McMansions of concrete. Interspersed were patches of lush tropical rainforest dense with jungle vines and riotous symphonies of birds. Eventually arriving in Pearl Lagoon, we got let out down the road from the dock and continued on foot through the torn up street they were in the process of repaving. The first dock didn't yield any boats headed towards Kakabila, so we went around the corner and down an alley to a small bar that happened to have a dock. Or maybe it was a dock that happened to have a small bar. Either way, we asked around and were pointed to a table of young men who were evidently headed to Kakabila at some point that day. Judging by the beers in hand, that didn't appear to be any time soon. We asked if we could hitch a ride and were welcomed to do so for the price of gas. Happy to know we had a chance of making it to our destination, Josiah settled in make friends and I headed off to the local power plant for a slight bit of research.

The journey to the generator turned out to be significantly longer than expected, but that gave me a chance to see most of the town along the way. Having gotten the info I needed by hollering at the top of my lungs over the roar of the diesel generator that powers the entire town, I found my way back to the dock. There, Josiah was well into his 2nd beer and there was a fresh one on it's way for me. Despite the early hour (I think it was about 10:30am), I couldn't very well be rude and hence accepted the nicely chilled bottle of toña that arrived shortly. At the time, I had no idea it was to be first of at least 4 more. Apparently, this was the regular agenda for the day. The boys we were chatting with had been out at the crack of dawn to lay their fishing nets and were now waiting for the evening when they would head out again to retrieve their blunder. Having nothing else to do, they typically spend the day drinking in town before driving their boats back home. Thankfully, one of the 3 guys we were with had opted to be DD and hence switched to soft drinks after his first beer. Rather surprised, but very happy to see such responsibility, both Josiah and I were quickly feeling our early morning booze. We were both drinking pointedly slow so as not to have too many, but every time they finished a bottle, they automatically ordered a full round, despite our protests. Not wanting too many to stack up and keep us from leaving, we dutifully kept pace the best we could.

A few hours and plenty of beer later, we all piled into a large dugout canoe. The majority of the boat was carved from a single trunk with a few extra boards added to each side. Unfortunately, the seams were unsealed, so water gushed through the gaps on every wave or turn. This made things more interesting as the bottom of the boat continually collected water. When it started to get too high, one of the boys would start bailing and the water level would reside. In this manner we crossed Pearl Bay and arrived at Kakabila.

Pulling up to a white sand beach with a long dock, we stepped through the last bit of water and onto shore. Just up the beach was a large, circular thatched roof structure that used to be a mini-bar and now functions as the teenage hangout. Beyond were towering coconut trees, spreading mango boughs and a collection of varied houses ranging from traditional wood and thatch to concrete block with tin roofs. I won't go much further into the architecture at this particular moment, but lets just say I was fascinated by what I saw during my stay and by the way people spoke about their homes.

That afternoon we shared a rather meager but delicious meal with our hosts of fried dough, beans and rice. Afterwards, I took advantage of some beautiful weather to stroll through the village. In total, there were only about 75 houses, each with anywhere from 2-14 people living in it. As I wandered around, various men (never women) would come up to introduce themselves and ask me what I was up to. Happy to chat, I asked lots of questions about life on the coast, about perceptions of materials, the history of the region etc. As the light began to fade, I headed back to our host's home and shared another simple meal of fish and rice.

That night, I watched the sun go down over the water with white sand stretching in a thin ribbon in either direction, framed by lush green trees and clear blue skies. I couldn't help but feel how incredibly lucky I was to be sharing this little slice of paradise with such generous people.

As the light faded completely, the true extent of our isolation became immediately apparent as the world turned pitch black. The moon had yet to emerge, so the only light in town came from one house with a generator. The only other glimmers were flashlights turned on and quickly off again to save their batteries. Suddenly, the work that blueEnergy does took on a much more personal significance.

Managua Trip - Part 5: La Laguna del Apoyo

2008-07-18T15:19:00.000-07:00

On our way out of the hostel, we asked the doorman where and when we could get a bus to La Laguna del Apoyo and were informed that there were 2 options. #1 wait til 10am and take the tourist bus to the private beach or #2 take the public bus to the intersection, get off and catch a different bus the rest of the way. Having no interest in waiting 4 hours just to pay twice as much to get to the same place, we thanked the doorman and headed towards the local bus stop.

We found the bus with little issue and once again ademantly informed the driver that we wanted to get off at the intersection to La Laguna del Apoyo and nowhere else. Nonetheless, we still had to holler and shout as we passed by in order to convince them to stop. We disembarked with our bags of goods from Masaya and rather blurryvision due to the lack of sleeping the night before. Crossing the street, we asked the sweet little couple on the corner if the bus was coming and were told yes, but they didn't know when. Not really wanting to stand still and wait, we started walking on the theory that we could just flag the bus down when it came by. Unfortunately, that never happened. Instead, we ended up hiking up hill for about 3 hours, hitching a ride for about 5mins of the way before hitting an intersection. I was truly surprised that more cars did not pass by, but it just was not destined to be our day. Instead, we got a lovely hike through the jungle whether we wanted it or not.

Finally arriving at the bottom of the monstorous hill we had just crossed and descended, we could see the water, but could not reach it. The entire beachfront was privately owned by various hotels and private homes. Slightly discouraged, but still persistant, we finally found an alley that led down to a series of restaurants right on the water. Not particularly in the mood for food just yet, we pushed through the tables and headed straight for the crystal clear lagoon. Despite the greywater runoff from the kitchen and washing stands that emptied directly into the lake, the water was stunningly refreshing. The whole body of water was ringed by hills covered in a vibrant green and rarely broken by human inhabitation.

Thoroughly refreshed and happy after our long hike finally bore fruit, we eventually climbed out and ordered some food. After a short meal of fried chicken and fries, we opted to take advantage of the hammocks hung about and each passed out in the shade for a couple hours.

When we woke, we decided we had had it for the afternoon as we were planning on catching the overnight bus back to Bluefields that evening. Hence, we decided that we would go ahead and pay for the first available taxi to take us all the way back to Managua. On our way back up the hill, we asked the guys on the corner where we could catch a cab and they waved down the truck that was just pulling out to take us out to the corner. Only, when we got in, we immediately hit it off with the driver, who had an easy laugh and was in a fabulous mood. When we mentioned that our final destination was Managua, he offered to take us the whole way. Weary and very greatful for the nice gesture, we passed the next half an hour chatting away with our driver. We did so entirely in Spanish and had a great time learning to really express ourselves only to find out later that he spoke perfect English and actually lived in the States. He was just back to check up on some business before heading back to finish a documentary on Kansas coal miners. After that, he was off to Hollywood to try his hand at becoming a movie star. I hope he makes it!

Getting dropped off essentially at our door, we came home to a mildly full house with Juli and Max having just arrived. We took care of a few last minute things before cooking a quick meal of pasta and making our way to the bus stop for another long journey back to Bluefields.

Managua Trip - Part 4: Granada

2008-07-08T15:16:00.000-07:00

As we rolled into Granada, Stephanie and I were both amazed to discover that not only did the streets here actually have names, but that they were written on the buildings at every corner. Excited to finally have something by which to orient ourselves, we pulled out the only map we'd brought with us and started scanning streets. Not really having much idea where we wanted to go, we simply got off as soon as we knew where we were. From there, we headed in the direction of the central park with the idea that we'd rent one bed somewhere so we could drop off our purchases and lock up our passports before heading out to pass the night partying with all the city-slickers that travel to Granada specifically for that reason.

As we stepped off the bus, we found ourselves on a beautifully paved sidewalk that ran alongside a perfectly maintained cobblestone road. On either side, beautifully maintained buildings ran uninterrupted with glimpses into gorgeously furnished living rooms with leather chairs and mahogany bookshelves. Feeling as if we'd walked onto an alien planet after several months in the grit and poverty of Bluefields, we were astounded to be among such wealth. As we headed towards the center, the elegance of design and the level of detail dedicated to each building only increased. Soon, we stumbled upon a gorgeous old cathedral that was in some disrepair, but still stunning. A few more steps down the road we stepped into a small hostel to ask about getting a bed for the night. Finding the price of $6 to be worth our while, Stephanie checked in and took our belongings up to 'her' room. It was tiny little thing with 2 bunkbeds that must have been built in place as there's no way the could have been maneuvered into such a small space, but there were locking cupboards on the wall, which was all we really needed. Putting away our few belongings and locking up our passports, we headed back out to the street.

On our way out, we asked the guy tending the front desk if he knew of a place to shoot some pool. After looking at us as if we'd just asked whether we could buy cheese on the moon, he slowly responded yes, but why do you want to know? When we explained that we'd like to play, his face went pale and he seemed a bit taken aback. Apparently not that many young ladies come by and ask to play pool in this particular town (or in any other around here for that matter). In any case, he reluctantly informed us that the only pool hall in town was just around the corner and we took off with a spring in our step. Passing by the pool hall just to make sure we knew where it was, we headed off for a meandering walk through town to see where we had landed ourselves.

The further into the center of town we got, the more European the whole place felt. There were colonial style mansions, Roman-inspired promenades and French-style chariot rides through the central park. It was all a little disconcerting, but also equally refreshing. In any case, we walked the length of the main drag where every other storefront was a restaurant or bar with outdoor seating, and were about to head back up to make a dinner selection when Ricardo finally got around to calling. Apparently he'd actually made it to town and wanted to meet us for dinner. Hiking back up the street until we ran into him, we discussed our options for dinner and decided on pizza as the only affordable alternative in this true tourist trap. Luckily, it was the best pizza either of us had tasted in a very long time. Apparently the owner is Italian and you could certainly taste it in the food. Not to mention, the service was impeccable. I can't even begin to describe how entirely different dining in Granada is compared to Bluefields, or even to Managua. In Bluefields, you're lucky if someone comes to your table without whistling across the room repeatedly and possibly even getting up and going to the kitchen yourself. And god forbid you need anything in the middle of your meal. Basically, if it's not on the table when they bring your food, it's not gonna show up any other time. In Granada, the waiter stands just a few feet away waiting to jump should you need anything at all. You don't even have to ask for silverware, they just bring it!

Anyway, we followed up our delicious meal with some equally exquisite sorbe at a small shop just across town. I honestly haven't had sorbe that yummy since the last time I was in Italy. Not to mention, I ordered starfruit flavor, which I'm pretty sure doesn't show up on the menu most places.

Well, it was still kinda early when we finished eating, and we had a full night ahead of us, so we opted to shoot some pool before commencing the night in earnest. This was a truly entertaining experience. At first, Ricardo informed us that we couldn't go into the pool hall as it was 'dangerous' and the boys were gonna shout at us. Giving him a moment of consideration, we thought about this and then burst out laughing. The truth of the matter is, there isn't a single place in Nicaragua that Stephanie and I can go and NOT get hollered at. So, after confirming the lack of another location, we led our reluctant friend into the dark underbelly of Granada.

The pool hall was brightly lit with tables spaced perfectly to allow uninterrupted play. The tables were also reasonably flat and well taken care of, quite a treat in our experience. Watching Ricardo play on the other hand, was more than just amusing. I'm not sure if he'd actually never played or simply didn't care, but I've honestly never seen anyone play even close to that poorly. This fact produced quite a few grins from the boys at the table next to us as Stephanie and I repeatedly sunk balls and Ricardo was lucky to even contact the cue ball. Well, at least I think that's what they were grinning about. It could also have been the slew of pictures they were not-so-serupticiously taking of us with their cell phones...

In any case, we killed an hour or two at the pool hall before Ricardo's friend called and invited us all over to his house. We drove a little way out of town and pulled over in front of a rather non-descript wall just as his friend was pulling into the very, very narrow garage door. Surprised that he made it through without nocking off both rearview mirrors, we followed him in to the most magnificent home I may have ever been in. The garage was bordered by an open air courtyard with lush tropically shrubbery and a brillant green lawn. Through an archway a wide, covered walkway led around another beautifully landscaped courtyard with thick columns supporting the upper story(ies). As he led us in, we could see into a few of the rooms immediatly off of the veranda, each with at least 15ft ceilings intricately decorated with carved metal crates and textured plaster. The furniture was made of solid, hand carved wood and the floor was tiled in exquisite style. Settling into one of the many sets of seating arranged around the covered veranda (which must have been at least 20ft wide), we were introduced to our hosts and asked to make ourselves at home. Both Stephanie and I were floored by the opulance of our surroundings and weren't exactly sure how we had managed to end up there.

As we sat back, our host brought out his laptop and set it to play a political documentary that discussed Nicaraguan history. Although I was only able to understand a small fraction of the film, the discussions the flew back an forth among our friends were tantilizingly interesting. Again, I wasn't able to catch quite enough to relate those conversations, but they covered every angle of politics you could imagine. Not to mention, everytime a new specialist or political figure appeared on the documentary, our host would point to him or her and relate some story of personal connection. I'm still working on figuring out exactly whose house we stumbled into that night, but I have a feeling they hold quite a few strings in this country.

Eventually tiring of politics, Ricardo invited his friends to join us for a night on the town, which they unfortunately refused, and we headed back into the city. Our first stop of the night was Cafe Nuit, a flashy little place with some live music and all the tourists you could stomach. We ended up at one of the only non-tourist tables with some people Ricardo knew from Managua, but they had all been educated in the US, so it wasn't a particularly 'genuine' Nica experience. In fact, the whole scene was a little odd. The entire time I've been in Nicaragua, I've only really spent time with people who exist relatively low on the economic food chain. Here, I was surrounded by young, rich blooded, college-educated individuals. It was a bit of a culture shock to see these very latino guys talking an acting like US frat boys. Not to mention, they weren't really interested in talking or getting to know us, just in convincing either Stephanie or myself to 'go for a ride' with them. Especially uncomfortable was the indifference they exhibited as to which one of us they wanted to take home. They simply tried one and then the other when they were refused. For the most part, we managed to ignore this and chat with the lovely girl from Argentina that was also at the table, but when they asked us to go back to Managua with them to party there for the rest of the night, we opted to decline. In fact, we were kindof hoping they'd take Ricardo with them when they left as he was getting progressively drunker and more annouying as the night went on. No such luck. They headed off and Ricardo stayed.

Then the lights went out.

Taking this as an omen, Stephanie and I discussed how we might be able to ditch our now inebriated friend without too much bad blood, considering he's a friend of our 'boss.' Just as we had decided to use the power outage as an excuse to call it a night and run, they got the generator going and the music came back in full force. We danced a couple more songs then told Ricardo we needed to drop off a few things at our hostel. He very reluctantly walked the 4 blocks with us after we refused to ride in the car with him. It was really interesting to see how uncomfortable he was with being on the streets. I have a feeling that being wealthy in Nicaragua comes with its own dangers, possibly even more so than being a foreigner. In any case, we made it back to the place we had rented with only a minor detour due to poorly recollected directions. Once there, Steph went up to the room and informed me that it was my job to get rid of Ricardo so we could go back out and enjoy the rest of the night. Using her as an excuse, I lied through my teeth and told him we weren't up for anything else that evening and we were gonna call it a night. After a very akward conversation, I finally managed to say goodnight and proceeded back up to the single bed we had rented. This was accompanied by a few odd stares from the young man at the desk, but he thankfully didn't say anything.

Hanging out in our room for a few minutes to give Mr. R a head start out the door, we started chatting with our bunk mates, 2 gorgeous European guys who were on backpacking trips. Despite our best efforts to rouse them from bed and have them accompany us to go dancing, the were insistent on calling it a night. Instead, we regaled them with tales of Bluefields and the Caribbean Coast. Pretty sure they only believed half of everything we told them, and I'm positive they thought we were drunk beyond belief, but we were just high on life by that point in time. In any case, after a very amusing little while, we decided the coast had to be clear and snuck back out into the night.

Finding ourselves quite to be rather starving, we wandered around town for awhile looking for some sort of food, but to no avail. It being well past midnight by that point in time, everyone had closed up for the night, including most of the nightclubs. However, we had heard that the real party got started down on the lake front when the town center shut down, so we flagged a cab and made our way to 'Kayak.' This place was a really cool little spot with a thatched hut bar and dance floor accompanied by seating scattered along the beach. Some of the tables landed beneath a beautiful old tree whose branches easily spread 40ft across with gorgeous, dense leaves of a rich, dark green. Kayak also served food, which made us exceedingly happy.

Stephanie and I sat down, very happy to have a private table a good distance from all the oggoling men across the way. No sooner had our waiter returned with our drinks than he informed us that the guys over yonder had asked permission to come join us. Amused, but not interested, we refused their offer and managed to make it through our delicious meal of frijoles cremas, fried chicken and plantains relatively unmolested. Of course, our privacy was too good to last. Not 5 mins after we'd finished eating, a very talkative young man approached us and began chatting. When he realized we both spoke Spanish, he sat himself down and entertained us with non-stop chit-chat. Luckily for him, he was thoroughly amusing and spoke very clear, fluid Spanish, so we let him stay. Then we discovered the real reason for his approach when he called 2 of his friends over to join us. We all chatted for awhile until the first gentleman, who was by far the most interesting, mysteriously departed and left us with his two rather inebriated companions, both of whom were more interested in convincing us to come back to their place than actually talking to us. We tried switching to dancing, but that didn't last long as both of them were more interested in feeling us up than actually dancing. Instead, we both ended up being informed we were the most beautiful women in the world and that our respective boys were each desperately in love with us.

Watching the sunrise over the lake, we decided it was probably time to ditch the guys somewhere around the 7th time they tried to kiss us. Telling them we were gonna walk back to town, we started heading up the beach accompanied by their incredulous stares, but thankfully not their presence. Wandering back along the beach and through the back streets to our hostel, we got a very different view of Granada than the one presented by the main streets. In the back alleys, there were no grand homes with tiled roofs and porches that spilled onto the street. Instead, there were the same ramshackle wood and tin structures that we had become accustomed to in our less touristy travels. Happy to see that Granada did in fact have real residents, and not just foreigners passing through, we eventually found our way back to the hostel. There, we each passed out for a few minutes in the hammocks swaying in the foyer before rising again and getting on our way.

Managua Trip - Part 3: Masaya

2008-07-05T20:08:00.000-07:00

Waking up to our first leisurely morning in a long while, Stephanie and I enjoyed a wonderful breakfast of yogurt, granola, orange juice and much more that is would be unimaginable in Bluefields. We hadn't received a call from our acquaintance of the night before about the ride he had offered, so we enjoyed our morning and got into a bit of planning. Pulling out maps and consulting our local friends, we decided that our mini vacation would consist of a trip to Masaya to check out the markets followed by a night in Granada and rounded off with an afternoon at La Laguna del Apoyo, a volcanic crater lake with what is posited to be the cleanest water in the country. Beyond being aware that there were buses linking each of these locations and that they were all reasonably close (anywhere from 20min to 2hrs depending on who you asked), we opted to leave the rest up to spontaneity and good luck.

Packing light enough to avoid renting a room should we so desire, the two of us headed down the road with the clothes on our backs and a vague notion of where we were headed. Accompanied by the usual chorus of car horns, whistles and catcalls that accompanies any mildly attractive woman (especially those of lighter skin tones) in this country, we cut across the the busy streets and headed towards the bus station. Along the way, we passed street vendors hawking everything from beautifully crafted jewelry made of seeds, shells and obsidian to gallo pinto, pineapples, gum and cigarettes. We also meandered past the Universidad Centro Americana whose walls were covered in magnificent graffiti art and a myriad of political messages.

Arriving at the bus station, we were immediately accosted by conductors wanting to know where we were headed and attempting to entice us onto their bus. Informing one of them that were were on our way to Masaya, he ushered us towards a bus labeled with Granada and assured us that we could get off at Masaya on the way. Discovering the price of passage to be less than $1 we figured we couldn't go too far astray and climbed aboard.

On the way out of town, we slowly cruised the streets as the conductor leaned out the front door and shouted "Granada, Granada, Granada!" Passengers walked alongside the bus to get the pace of it's movement before stepping up with the wheels still rolling. In no time at all, all the seats were taken and the aisles filled. Satisfied that he had gotten all the fairs he could hold for the moment, the driver steered us out of town and onto the highway connecting Managua to Granada.

As the conductor squeezed his way down the aisle collecting fares, we informed him that we wished to disembark at Masaya, preferably somewhere near the marketplace. He nodded and confirmed that he'd let us know when to get off. We should have known something was up by the skeptical expression of the older man next to him, but it wasn't till we'd passed our turnoff that the older man spoke up and told us we should get off. This was a little perplexing since we had not through any town of any description, but had been on the 'highway' the whole ride. Nonetheless, the conductor agreed that we had gone past our stop, asked the driver to halt and told us to get off. We stepped out on a non-descript stretch of road with nothing more than a few thatched homes in either direction and a fat horse happily grazing along the embankment. With a vague gesture back in the direction we had come from, the conductor stepped back aboard and took the bus away with him.

Luckily, both Steph and I were in the mood for an adventure, and neither of us had any pressing engagements to attend, so we calmly began strolling back towards the only intersection we'd seen, a couple kilometers back down the road. Being the only people walking and two gingas to boot, we attracted a fair bit of attention as we wandered down the road. Taking advantage of such to request slightly better directions, we were informed that the marketplace we were searching for was located to the left a 'short' distance past the intersection. I should probably take this moment to explain a bit about directions here... There are no addresses, even in Managua, which makes getting anywhere a bit of an adventure. The closest you might get is something along the lines of so-and-so's house, half a block south of such-and-such commercial center. There are rarely any street names and when there are, no one knows them. In some cases, directions don't even relate to existing things, but rather places that used to belong to so-and-so or buildings that used to have such-and-such store. In any case, this results in very vague directions and very relative concepts of distance. You can ask 5 people how far one place is from another and you'll get 5 very different answers generally ranging anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours apart. Hence, we didn't really put much stock in the description of the town being 'close' but simply commenced walking in the general direction indicated.

It didn't take long before the ominous skies that had been brewing most of the morning decided to let loose a short burst of rain as we made our way along the side of the road towards Masaya. Luckily, that interlude didn't last too long and we managed to continue without getting too soaked. Strolling along, we were passed on all sides by every conceivable variety of bicycles, motorbikes, horse-drawn carts, taxis, buses and trucks. Happy to enjoy the scene, we managed to wander past the turn that no one we asked had bothered to mention actually led to Masaya. We discovered this minor mishap only after flagging down a bus we thought was headed to Masaya only to be informed we actually wanted on headed in the opposite direction. Whoops. Relatively unperturbed, we spun on our heels and headed back the way we had come. This time, a nice young man on a bicycle slowed down to chat and we managed to get slightly more informative direction out of him. Double checking his suggestions with people hanging out on each corner, we found ourselves walking down a wide, cobbled road, this time with slightly more people on foot. Unfortunately, the rain had held off as long as it could and the light drizzle we'd been ignoring was quickly becoming for forceful. Luckily, we happened to be passing by a small food/beer shop and managed to duck inside just as the skies let loose.

Passing the time with a beer and some excellent chicken, tortillas and gallo pinto, we managed to shake any bad feelings from having ended up slightly lost. As soon as the rain let up, we were on our way again. This time, we could already see the beginning of the market in the distance, so we knew we were headed in the right direction. We walked down a rutted dirt road past shanty wooden structures with rusted metal roofs lining both sides. It being a saturday afternoon, we had to dodge a few soccer balls from the riotous games being perpetrated down every side street, but we made it through unscathed.

Arriving at the market, we wound our way through rows of small wooden stands, stepping gently to avoid the large puddles of mud, but still emerging significantly more mud splattered than when we began. As we passed through the food market where the tables were piled high with bananas, mangoes, cabbages, casava and much more, we soon found ourselves entering the clothing section. Pushing on through the maze of passages that ran seemingly without reason through the miniature city that the market turned out to be, we finally arrived at the area we were searching for, the one with vendors hawking crafts of all varies. There were tables piled to the ceiling with wooden table sets, hand carved sculptures, dozens of varieties of jewelry made from obsidian, shells and seeds. Hanging from the rafters were colorful bags of every conceivable variety, woven hammocks, tapestries and more. In some sections, stuffed chickens were displayed alongside dried, bloated frogs positioned in rather compromising manners. It was like walking into a forest of industrious elves keen to show off their skills. Picking through the trinkets, we each made a few small purchases and headed our way.

As luck would have it, we managed to arrive at the bus terminal just as the last bus to Granada was getting ready to embark. Taking the last available seats, we sat back, relaxed and headed off to what we had heard was a breathtaking city.

Managua Trip - Part 2 : Managua

2008-07-02T07:21:00.000-07:00

After arriving in Managua, Stephanie and I spent the following few days running around town gathering various supplies and running errands of one kind of another. On Thursday we had the pleasure of sitting through a three hour presentation by the US Embassy on their role in aiding NGOs operating in Nicaragua. Over the course of those 3 hours, only about 3 things they said were actually interesting and useful, but it wasn't a horrible way to spend the afternoon. In theory, the objective of the meeting was to provide a arena for networking among NGOs, but in reality, everyone was so tired of being there by the time the presentations were done that no one stuck around long enough to chat with. Not that it would have made much difference if they had. We were the only people there who do any kind of work on the Atlantic coast, so there weren't that many options for partnerships or mutual aid. However, I've neglected to mention how ridiculously ostentatious the Embassy ground were. After going through 2 security checks just to get through the front gate, we were met by a mini-van that shuttled us across the expansive grounds and up the hill to 'casa grande,' which lived up to it's name. Sitting in the entrance hall with roughly 100 other people, we had more than enough room to spare. I was somewhat flabbergasted when we were informed that the massive structure we were sitting will shortly be converted into the private residence of the ambassador. What anyone needs with quite that much space is well beyond my understanding.

Once we left the Embassy, we headed home where a couple other volunteers were just arriving from the airport on their way off on vacation. A little jealous, Steph and I determined that we also deserved a short vacation and began planning our own short trip for the weekend. Sometime after dinner as our friends were filing off to bed in preparation for their 4am departure, Steph and I decided we were in the mood for a few rounds of pool. Enlisting Rafael to act as our negotiator, we flagged down a cab and headed off to a very high class pool hall complete with full-size tables and air conditioning. Once again we were the only females in the room, but we're getting used to that pretty quick so it wasn't much of a bother. Plus, since the place was air conditioned, you didn't have to fight the stickiness of your own skin while sliding your cue into place. This made for significantly better games on all accounts. A few beers later, we were ready to make our way home.

It being quite late by this point, there weren't many taxis around, but we were willing to be patient. Finally one drove by and stopped only to inform us that the asking price was 3 times what we had paid to get there. Sending that driver on his way, Steph and I decided to test our theory of ginga price inflation by stepping out of sight while the next taxi rolled up. Our hypothesis was proven correct when Rafael had absolutely no problem getting a reasonable price the first time he asked. Thoroughly amused, we stepped out from behind the SUV we'd been watching through and hopped in the cab. I don't think our driver was all that impressed, but he'd already made the deal with Rafael and hence had to give us a fair price.

The next day, Juli called to inform us that she was coming into town to hang out for the weekend. Excited to have another friend in the big city with us, we managed to finish up the last of our most important errands in time to meet her back at the house as she came in from the airport. Having already made plans with a group of her French friends for the evening, all we had to do was step outside and climb into the back of the truck her friend was driving. It must have been quite a sight for everyone we passed on the way. Here were 10 'extranjeros' dressed up to go out on the town and riding in the back of a pickup truck through the streets of Managua. Again, thoroughly amused.

When we got out, we were at Bar Arriba where an apparently famous Nicaraguan band from Masaya was rocking the house. The music was actually awesome, but so incredibly loud that it was impossible to enjoy properly. We hung out through a couple sets and enjoyed some good old Toña (local beer for those of you who missed that blog). Had a rather amusing few moments when a guy came up and started trying to chat in rather broken Spanish. A little unused to being the one speaking superior Spanish, I asked him where he was from and discovered he had just come down from San Francisco to visit his family for Father's day. When I offered to switch to English, he was visibly relieved, but the conversation didn't last all that long anyway.

After the music had come to an end, all the Frenchies decided to head across town to a gay bar with a ridiculously high cover price (for Nicaragua, that is). Being on a rather tight budget, Steph and I opted for the free salsa bar down the road instead. Despite being the only people there, we still had a good time spinning across our own private dance floor. We were joined relatively shortly by a friend of G's who had come to visit Bluefields and who we had run into at the concert just a little while before. He didn't really know how to salsa, but he was forgiven when we discovered he had a car and offered to drive us to Granada the next day. Excited at the possibility of getting a free ride down the coast, we called it a night relatively early and headed home.

Managua Trip - Part 1 : the Panga ride

2008-07-01T12:29:00.001-07:00

Last Tuesday afternoon, after a hectic morning of last minute errands, Stephanie and I got decked out in our best fisherman's outfits and headed off to catch the panga to el Rama in the pouring rain. Having packed all of our belongings in layers of plastic and donned very flattering, over-sized, bright yellow rainpants, we were ready to embark upon our journey to Managua. Arriving at the docks, we paid our 4 cordoba entrance fee and lined up. An hour or so later, were were cozily squished into the front seat of the small wooded boat awaiting our departure. After wrapping up the luggage in another layer of plastic, the driver passed a clear plastic sheet along one edge of the boat and instructed us all to pull it up and over our heads. This was to be our only protection from the driving rain for the duration of the nearly two hour ride. As we exited the lagoon and picked up speed, those of us in the front had the pleasure of holding down the front edge of the plastic with our feet while forcibly pressing the top half away from our faces. With the panga moving at a good speed, this was no easy task. Of course, Stephanie and I had to count ourselves lucky since the farther back in the boat you were seated, the harder the plastic snapped down upon your head to the rhythm of the wind and waves.

Throughout the entire ride, all we could see was a thin haze of gray with an occasional splash of green on the horizon. Pushing the plastic away from your face was more than a casual motion and required constantly switching hands as one arm became exhausted. Luckily, both Stephanie and I were in high spirits and managed to thoroughly enjoy the ride, despite bone jarring bounces, fetid smelling plastic, rock hard wooden benches and rivers of water flowing across our feet. By the time we arrived in el Rama, we were both very thankful for the abundance of waterproof clothing we had worn and the redundant plastic wrapping of our belongings.
Hoping off the panga, we stripped down to slightly more reasonable clothes, secured seats upon the bus that would be departing at 7pm (about 4 hrs after we arrived), and prepared to wait. Smelling something delicious upon the air, we ventured across the street and discovered a lovely little stand selling deliciously marinated chicken, gallo pinto cooked to perfection and homemade tortillas. Feeling like queens at a banquet, we enjoyed our savory snack and settled in once again. Well, settled in until we discovered the existence of a billiards hall just down the street. Thoroughly excited, we passed the next couple hours accumulating quite a crowd as the only female pool players el Rama had apparently ever encountered.

A few pleasant hours later, we were on our way to Managua on the nicest bus I have yet to come across. Serenaded by everything from Spanish hiphop to Bob Marley to Brittney Spears and Madonna, we passed through the countryside and into the big city. Arriving in Managua, we were met by Victor and chauffeured back to casa Ivan where we happily collapsed into bed.

Sky high

2008-06-20T15:54:00.000-07:00

Alright, this one was too good not to share, but I'm gonna have make it quick... There are 2 types of wind turbines used by blueEnergy, tilt up and ladder-style (not the technical names). Anyway, one of them you service by tilting the entire pole down to the ground and doing repairs there. The other, you climb 100ft into the air and lower the turbine down. The second type was getting serviced yesterday, which sparked a burning desire to hike up the tower and get a good look around. So, after half jokingly suggesting that I'd like to climb up, Stephanie and I found ourselves strapped into harnesses and slowly making my way up the metal framework to the swaying platform above. Despite the rather incredulous stares from the workshop boys, we made it all the way up and thoroughly enjoyed the view. Being that high up offered a stunning panorama of all of Bluefields, the Corn Islands and more. Quite a treat for a Friday afternoon.

Nueva Oficina

2008-06-20T15:22:00.000-07:00

The past week was a whirlwind of sawdust, paint chips, cement and gravel. Over the course of 9 days, including a marathon workday on Sunday til 12:30am, we (the workers and various volunteers) managed to transform a rundown, hornet infested and filthy classroom into a pristine new office and conference room. We even completed a full kitchenette and bathroom along with all new grates over the windows and doors (welded into the reinforced concrete structure) and all new furniture. The Desks in particular were an interesting challenge. After starting with the conference tables and discovering that it's impossible to buy dry wood here, I had to completely re-design every component to be made entirely out of plywood. Hence, the desks were each designed to use exactly one 4'x 8' sheet of plywood without any wasted cuts. In addition, they were designed to be transportable and therefore come apart into 2 pieces. Anyway, this is all a much longer story, but I'm way behind on everything else, so I'll let a few pictures speak for themselves. Enjoy!

Here's what it looked like before we got started:

And here's where we're at today:

Beautiful Day

2008-06-08T13:46:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a wonderful experience, it had just a little bit of everything and not too much of anything. The day started with a little home improvement project of building a spice rack for the kitchen. This is something that has been on my mind since the first night I cooked here. Up until yesterday, if you wanted to use any spices, you had to lean all the way over the stove (which was usually on by the time you remembered you needed spices), and struggle to reach the tantilizing jars that stayed mysteriously just beyond your reach, often necessitating the use of a large ladle or other object to extend your reach. Having decided to take the day off from working since I didn't get much of a break last week, Julie and I opted to attempt to remedy the spice situation.

It was lovely morning of interminable rain that turned the ground to mud and brought the temperature down to a reasonable level. As Julie and I sat around sanding our wood I watched our neighbor cut her grass with a machete in the pouring rain, completely unperturbed by the fact that she was drenched to the bone. After laborously hacking through a board with a handsaw only to end up with a crooked, slanting edge, we opted to swallow our collective pride and go ask the construction workers over at G's house to do a couple quick cuts with the circular saw. This was a fun little adventure since it meant running across the mud soaked yard, dodging the laundry that was getting a second rinse in the rain, and attempting to elegantly slide down the slick, wet slope that led to G's front porch. By the second go round, we had already ditched our shoes and were making no pretenses to stay dry. Since it was still a warm day, there was little to be concerned with and we had a ball running back and forth for tools and borrowed supplies.

A few hours later, we were just putting on the finishing touches and getting ready to mount our new creation in it's resting place above the stove when the lights went out and we had to halt work on account of there being no electricity to power our drill. Luckily, it was just about lunchtime anyway, so we took a break, had some food and waited for the power to come back on. It's really kind of interesting because, unlike power cuts in the States, life just goes on when the lights go out. People keep cooking, flashlights are turned on, and most things continue as normal. We even have a backup battery bank for the office, so those who choose to can continue working as long as the power's not out for too long. In any case, as soon as the power was up and running again, at least an hour after it cut out, we climbed up on the counters and put our masterpiece in place. It wasn't quite a perfect fit, but it works wonders and looks relatively pleasing. =) All in all, not a bad way to spend the morning.

In the afternoon, Lynn baked a fabulous chocolate cake with homemade chocolate icing and she, David, Julie and I set out across town to deliver the birthday surprise to a friend of Julie's. We piled in to the cab, picked up some strawberry icecream and made our way all the way across town to 'Loma Fresca' or the 'cool hill' neighborhood for the English speakers in the crowd. After negotiating a price to be driven all the way down the rutted dirt path that leads to the nicest homes in town, we were happily bouncing along with icecream and cake in hand. When we arrived, I was thrilled to see that the home we were to go relax in for a bit was a beautiful wooden structure raised on stilts. As we were ushered in and up the stairs, we found ourselves on a gorgeous covered veranda overlooking the calm, gray lagoon. We passed a few delightful hours eating sweets, chatting and staring out across the steel gray water through a mist of fine rain. As the storms subsided, we watched tiny fishing boats and 2 man pangas (dugout canoes) make their way out across the bay. For the first time since the boat ride into Bluefields, I also got to see a bit of wildlife. There was a regal little egret who strutted around just below the deck, a pair of finches with bright yellow breasts and a chorus of other birds. For the first time in a long while, we were able to enjoy the sounds of nature without the blaring of taxis, barking of dogs and chorus of other noises that are the background to nearly every day.

Refreshed and happy, we said our goodbyes and wound our way back to casa blueEnergy. When we arrived, we were greeted by Guillaume who had just returned from Managua with Christian, a former volunteer who has returned for a few months of work, and Phillip, a former student of his who has come down to help out for a short time. With the whole family home complete with new additions, it was time for a trip to the corner store for beer and flor de caña to start off the night. We passed a few hours chatting while dinner was in the oven and then moved over to the table for slightly more serious discussions. As soon as the food was gone, and the precious wine (which we can't buy here) had been drunk, Guillaume took the opportunity to fill us all in on a myriad of new and old developments that will reshape many of our projects and directions in the near future.

Thoroughly saturated with information, most people drifted off to bed, but a few hearty survivors, myself included, decided that such a serious discussion could only be followed by a night at Four Brothers. Rallying the troupes, we squashed into a taxi and headed off for a night of dancing.

Hours later and happily exhausted, we made our way home and I fell into bed happy with the fullness of the day.

Change of Pace

2008-06-07T08:22:00.000-07:00

Since coming back to Bluefields life has taken on something resembling a routine. My project for the week has been to organize (aka 'do' in this country) cleaning out an unused INATEC classroom and converting it to an office for blueEnergy. This would at first glance appear to be a simple task, but as I am quickly discovering, nothing is ever simple. That said, it has been a relatively painless process to date and we are progressing much faster then I dared to hope.

The first major obstacle in beginning our renovation was to acquire a key to the room in question. This entailed meeting with the director of the IPCC campus (who is notoriously useless and loves to drag his feet). Our meeting was no exception to his general demeanor. First, he was "in a meeting" all day for 2 days and completely inaccessable. Then he tried to claim that they needed the room for some sort of administrative training sometime in the future, despite having received orders from the head of INATEC to grant us access. Once we got over that argument, he claimed there wasn't a single other locking room on campus where he could store the (unused) typewriters that currently lived in said room and we would have to wait until Guillaume got back on the weekend to discuss storing them. Though not a perfect solution, I managed to divert this argument by feigning fear of my boss's anger and offering to store the typewriters in the adjoining closet until G's return. Only 2 and a half days after we were supposed to start work on the room, I finally had the key in hand! Quite the achievement for Bluefields!

The next step was to empty out all the desks and typewriters and move them to the small closet next door. This was relatively easy until we discovered the plethora of hornets nests that adorned most of the windows and a few of the lights. At first, we managed to work in relative harmony until the stacks of desks begin encroaching upon the hornet's territory. At that point, in a momentary lapse of attention, I reached up to push a desk aside and immediately yelped in pain. Hopping down and running out the door with a sharp pain in my hand, I cursed the horrid insects and nursed my wound. Only, it wouldn't stop throbbing and was quickly getting red and swollen. Seeing what had happened, Ronald assured me that if I simply peed on my hand, it would all go away. A little skeptical, but without many other options and in serious pain, I opted to try this bush remedy. Surprisingly enough, it worked wonders. Only moments later the swelling had subsided and I was able to return to work.
I spent the rest of the day removing louvered glass panels and laborously washing each by hand. This was the first moment that I wished we owned a power washer. It would however, not be the last.

Although I had nearly forgotten about the hornet sting during the day, at night, as I lay in bed I could feel my hand slowly swelling and when I woke I was greeted with an itchy, bloated, bright red fist. Not a great way to start the day. Opting to work on some drawings rather than doing hard labor, I passed the glass washing task onto Juli and spent the day creating working drawings for the desks Felix will begin building shortly. I was greatly excited to see that he had already started on the tables I had assigned to him the day before, but my excitement was bit premature. By lunch time, Felix had already come to inform me that the wood we had purchased was still wet and would need at least a week to dry before any joints could be milled. Disappointed, but still enthusiastic, I turned my attention to other tasks.

One of the nice things about this week has been that I moved my office over to the shop, which means I actually get to leave the house. Each morning I walk through the streets and up the hill to the INATEC campus and our workshop. I spend the day either working along side the workshop boys or on the computer creating drawings. At lunchtime, we all hike back over the house for a big meal of rice, beans and some sort of meat before returning to work in the afternoon. It's been wonderful getting a chance to interact with all the local workers rather than being stuck in the tiny little office most people work in at the house.

Another recent alteration that has changed the pace of life is that we have now officially entered the rainy season. Everyday without fail, the skies will open up at least once to release torrents of rain. Unless you've personally experienced a tropical storm, I'm not sure I can properly describe to you the volume of water that rushes from the sky in a single instant. You can literally get drenched to the bone passing from the doorway to the sidewalk. Being wet has simply become a fact of life. If you need to leave the building, you're going to be wet. It doesn't matter how big your umbrella or how thick your raincoat, you're still gonna get wet. Fortunately, it's still relatively hot, so getting wet isn't such a big deal. It's not like a New England storm where you're shivering wet and miserable. Here you're just wet. In any case, the change in weather has brought a change to the pace of life as well. Things move with the rhythm of the rains. If you'd planned to go shopping, but it starts raining, you change your plans. If you know you have to do something outside, you make it happen whenever the skies are clear.

Alright, back to our new office space. Do you remember how I started wishing we had a power washer with the glass? Well, the next time I spent the day working on cleaning up the classroom, it was to scrape the flaking paint throughout the whole room by hand. Power washer would have been helpful. Next, I scrubbed all the walls, again by hand, to get rid of years of bird and bat shit, termite nests, vicious biting ants and other such things. Again, power washer would have been wonderful. Nonetheless, by the end of the week, we managed to get one coat of paint on the back wall and everything else prepped to start painting again on monday. Like I said, quite an achievement for the week. Now we just have to hope that the wood dries enough to finish the furniture and that the paint dries despite the torrential downpours and ridiculous humidity. Keep your fingers crossed and we'll see how it goes.

Let it Rain

2008-05-31T12:41:00.000-07:00

It's been one hell of a week since I last wrote. The film crew took off on Sunday, only to be replaced by Ismael, Marie and Mathias on Monday. The next 2 days were a whirlwind of activity as everyone else prepared for a long awaited trip to Cuba and I attempted to meet with all 15 people on my list. This would have been a lot easier had we all had our own transportation. Instead, we had to balance all 5 of our schedules in such a way that Victor, our driver, could chauffeur us all back and forth to a myriad of destinations all across the city. With the exception of a few minor issues, this actually worked out fairly well.

On Wednesday morning, I got up with the Cuba crew at 5am to say goodbye and deal with a few last minute logistics before crawling back into bed to wait for Victor's return. Alas, sleeping was not to be an option. No sooner had I closed my eyes than the phone started ringing. Dragging myself up from my mattress on the floor, I was informed by G that despite their best intentions to travel to Cuba on French passports, he and Mathias had to first exit the country on their American passports. So, after locating said passports, I caught a cab and managed to reach the airport with enough to time for everyone to get on their way.

The rest of the morning was spent running errands and locating various items that are completely unavailable in Bluefields. By the time I made it to the only place in the city that ships to Bluefields, it was already early afternoon and I had yet to make it to Matagalpa, 2hrs north of Managua, where I was scheduled to tour a hotel school. Getting back in the Magi-Boogy (our trusty VW van), Victor and I grabbed a bite to eat and started the long drive north. I'd love to tell you all about the sights along the way, but having only slept about 2hrs the night before, it wasn't long before I was passed out across the back seat of the bus.

Cresting a hill at the entrance to Matagalpa, we were greeted with a beautiful view of the city. The whole town is built in a valley ringed by towering mountains on all sides. Throughout the city church steeples rise above the corrugated metal roofs and city parks dot the landscape. After driving around asking everyone we met if they knew of the hotel school we were searching for, we finally happened across our destination. I was greeted by a lovely young lady who took me around and showed me all the different courses and classrooms. They had everything from cooking to computers to sewing and hairdressing. They also had quite a nice, simple auditorium with louvered glass panels for nearly the whole height of the walls.

Having taken lots of pictures and asked all my questions, I climbed back in the van and Victor maneuvered his way through the steep streets and we headed back out of town. On the way back I was delighted to discover that my Spanish has improved to the point of being functional and I enjoyed a lovely 2hr conversation with only minor miscommunications.

Back at the house, I made some food for myself and Rafael and started chatting with him about my plans for the rest of the week. When he heard that I was headed to San Juan del Sur the following day, he very shyly asked if he might be able to join me for the ride. Seeing no reason to force him to stay locked in the house for yet another day of mind-dumbing marathon television, I told him it wouldn't be a problem as long as his dad could come watch the house for the day. Clearly excited, he called home right away and made all the appropriate arrangements.

Bright and early the next morning, Victor, Rafael and myself were on our way south to San Juan del Sur, a world class surfing and vacation local. The intention was to get there, meet with a real estate agent who would show me around the local ecolodges and green-roof projects, visit an earthship construction project and make it back to Managua. Apparently, mother nature had other plans in mind.

As we approached SJS, the skies opened up and let loose all the water they'd been storing up for the past 6 months and traffic slowed to a crawl. The roads turned to mud and visibility depended entirely on wind direction. During a slight break in the storm, we found ourselves at what will one day be a bridge over the river, but which is currently a jumble of concrete and steel. Without the bridge, the only way to continue is to drive down the slope, through the river and up the other side. Confident in the power of Miss Magi-Boogy, Victor steered us down through the rushing brown water that crested the wheels as we passed through to the other side.

Once in San Juan del Sur, the rains started up again and the roads turned to rivers. Stopping in the market for some lunch, we kept our feet up off the ground and moved seats as the holes in the ceiling got progressively larger and closer. After quite a yummy meal, we made our way to Aroura Realty where, dripping wet, I was to meet my guide for the day. A phone call and a short wait later he showed up only to inform me that due to the hurricane we were in the middle of, all the roads were washed out and no one was going in or out of the town that day. Slightly frustrated, but with few available options, we sat down at a beachfront bar and enjoyed a cold beer. As we waited for the rains to subside, I was mesmerized by the repeated scene of gangs of fishermen attempting to salvage overturned and half submerged boats from the violent seas. First, a team of men would wade out as far as they could stand while their friends hauled on the bowline trying to bring their craft closer to the shore. As soon as it reached the first group, the would begin pushing it in towards shore, all the while battling pounding surf and violent currents. As I watched, at least 3 boats were salvaged and brought to shore.

Once the rains had subsided enough to see more than 5 feet, I ventured out to check out the ocean and was pleasantly surprised to discover that the water was warmer than the cold raining coming from above. Seeing that we still weren't going anywhere fast, Victor, Rafael and myself ventured further down the beach, away from the fishing boats, and decided to go for a swim. The water was gloriously warm, but incredibly murky due to the churning of the tides and runoff from the swollen rivers. Nonetheless, we passed a lovely hour or so hopping over waves and riding giant swells back in to shore.

After about an hour or so of calm weather, I figured it was time to try my luck at Aurora again. No go. All the roads were still washed out and there was little hope of any change before sundown. A little disheartened, I called up my second contact to see if I might have better luck getting out to the "casa llanta" earthship. Of course, reading the directions I had been given, which included the phrase, 'turn left into the creek,' I should have known that would not be a possibility. Nonetheless, Dave, who heads up the project for a couple weeks at a time, was willing to come into town and chat. So, I spent a lovely hour or so chatting about different building techniques and the logistics of acquiring bottles, tires and cans for use as construction materials. I also made plans to go out to the site early the next morning should I still be in SJS and assuming the roads were once again passable.

Not quite believing all the reports and wishing to see the extent of our isolation for ourselves, I climbed back into the Magi-Boogy and Victor drove us out to half finished bridge we had passed to come in. When we arrived, there was a line of trucks and buses stretching half a mile down the road, all waiting for the river to withdraw. Parking at the end of this long line of cars, we went on foot to the front of the line and were greeted by 15ft of rapidly flowing water rushing across the road we had passed only a few hours before.

Resigned to our fate we returned to town, played a few rounds of pool, had a few beers and located the cheapest hotel in town. Securing rooms, we said goodnight and reunited at the crack of dawn. The next morning dawned clear and bright, leaving few reminders of the havoc of the day before. Meeting up with Dave we ventured down a long dirt road past homemade cockfighting rings and ramshackle workshops til we did indeed turn left into the creek bed. Unfortunately, the creek was a bit deeper and the sand a bit softer than normal so we ended up parking where the car stopped itself and walking the rest of the way.

Very glad to have at least seen one of the 3 places I had planned to visit, I eventually returned to the car and we headed back towards Managua. Three hours later I found myself back at casa Ivan where a cold shower and a bite to eat commenced another long day. This one included various trips around town for last minute supplies, which was complicated by the fact that Friday was mother's day and all the construction supply stores were closed. Later, after finishing almost all the errands I had on my list, I had victor drop me off at the bus station and began the long journey back to Bluefields via the overnight bus/panga.

Volcanic Expeditions

2008-05-26T17:57:00.000-07:00

On saturday, the film crew, myself and Mr. G made our way around the town and out to the market in Masaya. On the way there, we stopped at a national park to explore the wonders of a beautiful volcanic landscape. As we pulled over and got out, you could see the smoke rising from a seemingly endless ravine. The slightly grayish clouds billowed up shifting with the wind. Staring down into the depths of this sleeping dragon, I kept hoping to catch a glimpse of its' firey belly, but the clouds of smoke merely played tricks upon my eyes. Every time I thought I might get a break, the wind would shift ever so subtly and a new puff of smoke would swim across my view.

The landscape adjacent to the gapping depth was barren and rock strewn. The soil shifted from black to green to red to yellow, all with a slightly hazy brown mirage suspended across it as far as you could see. As we climbed the winding stairs to the wooden cross erected above, the clouds of smoke brought with them swarms of every insect imaginable. Some were so small you had to strain to see them as they crawled across your skin, causing your hair to stand and your nerves to tingle. Others were little black lines that squirmed along, tickling the back of your neck, causing you to imagine them crawling into your ears and up your nose. The worst part being that at least some of these nearly unseen foes were vicious enough to sink their teeth in as the passed.

The only way to put up with the constant torrent of microscopic nuisances was to keep moving. So, I hiked quickly up the steps, enjoyed a gorgeous view for as long as I could stand before descending past the abyss once more. In no time at all, we were on our way. Well, after David got finished expelling the "welcome to Nicaragua" message his stomach was so adamantly presenting to him.

Managua

2008-05-25T10:09:00.001-07:00

The last few days have been quite a trip. I flew out of Bluefields on friday morning with the French film crew and Guillaume and landed in Managua a few hours later. As we walked out of the airport, G discovered that his phone was out of minutes, so we had to hike down the road a ways to meet up with Victor who would be driving us around in the 'Magi-Boogy,' a rundown diesel van, for the next couple days.

Having arrived after our first meeting was scheduled to begin, we decided to can that one and go straight to the house. On the way, I got my first real glimpse of Managua. It's a pretty intense city. Every stoplight brings a barrage of small children cleaning your windshield, women offering sliced mangoes, cold drinks and trinkets. The roads are full of the most incredible variety of vehicles I've ever seen in one place. There's everything from giant semi trucks to horse drawn carts and foot-pedal rickshaws. The houses are crammed in close, rusted zinc roofs and siding overlapping high walls with barbed wire and broken glass. In certain areas, the broken shells of collapsed houses and apartment buildings frame poorly constructed shacks and empty courtyards. The whole city feels as if it's been under siege for the past 30 years or so. Every home has a high wall of concrete and wrought iron with steel bars across every window and gates closing of each door. There's a tension in the air that mixes with the exhaust and thick, humid air to create a tangible, relentless weight.

Arriving at 'casa Ivan' we were greeted by Rafael, the young caretaker whose job it is to always be in the house. We dropped our bags, discovered the internet had been cut off for no particular reason, made a few phone calls and headed back out again. Guillaume went with the film crew to get his official residency ID after several years of buracracy. I headed off to the grocery store to stock up for the next few days. It was quite a treat to be in a real grocery store with a huge variety of food after a couple weeks in Bluefields where the selection is surprisingly limited.

As soon as I got back to the house, it was time to turn around again and head out for a meeting with Henry, the local architect that I will be working with on the design and construction of CERCA. Unfortunately, our taxi driver wasn't entirely sure where we were headed, so we ended up going by a different INATEC campus before going clear across town to our actual destination. Fortunately, the meeting that followed was well worth the trip! Henry has turned out to be a welcome and refreshing change from the norm or unmotivated and uncooperative individuals that dominate the INATEC offices. Not only had he found me the 3 things I asked for, but he'd gone out of his way to accumulate additional information and compile CDs with examples of hotel school layouts, building terminology and material specs.

With drawings and new material in hand, we headed off to the hotel school that has recently been built with the help of international funding. It was quite a treat to have a tour through the elegant dining room, fully stocked kitchens and 4 star hotel training rooms. Everything they had there was far larger and more upscale than anything we will be doing in Bluefields, but getting a chance to see the possibilities that are available sparked numerous ideas.

When we returned to Henry's office and picked up Guillaume, he was nearly dancing with excitement. He had just coerced his way into a meeting with the head honcho of INATEC and gotten permission to move ahead on a myriad of projects he'd been pushing for for quite a while. I was floored to hear him describe the trajectory of future development that will commence with a reorganization of INATEC-IPCC's existing infrastructure and the construction of CERCA. The vision he described will not only transform the way that training and enterprises occur in Bluefields, but will eventually alter the education system, living conditions and outside perspective of the entire Atlantic coast. There is something truly extraordinary about the way that Guillaume can visualize future endeavors and see how all the interconnected elements can grow together to create real changes.

Hyped up about the possibilities for the future, we came back to the house, cooked a yummy meal and started talking. Many hours later, we moved to the office to start making lists of all the the departments, projects and initiatives that we'd like to include in the development of CERCA and all the associated projects. Somewhere around 3am, still coursing with excitement, we finally called it a night and laid down for a few hours rest before the beginning of another long day.

Afro Beats

2008-05-22T14:42:00.001-07:00

The other night almost everyone from blueEnergy made their way down to the BSS apartment where we found a wonderful collection of local musicians waiting to entertain us. After a few rounds of dominos, nearly a full case of beer and what passes for pizza in this country, Kila-B took the stage and began freesyling to some funky beats. I'm pretty sure I've never seen anyone speak so quickly, rhythmically and mesmerizingly in my life. He rapped in a language somewhere between English and Creole while Kali-boom joined in with some back up and Zabu added his own mix of beatboxing with crazy clicks, whoops and cries. As the three of them got going, they traded off verses and mixed their voices in a cascade of tones that made your blood tingle until you had no choice but to start moving.

As soon as those three had exhausted themselves, a new round of musicians took the stage (aka the living room). These guys, whose names I have unfortunately forgotten, opened with some classic Bob Marley played on guitar and congo drums. The moved smoothly into a few Spanish ballads before coming back to Marley. The whole night was a constantly shifting flow of music from one style to the next. Every once in awhile, they'd let the boombox take over, but that was a fairly rare occurrence. For the most part, the party progressed with live music, dancing and of course, "Beer AGAIN!!!"

It was such a treat to be surrounded by the region's best musicians for a laid back private party where they sang when, how and what they wanted. Of course, some of the show was really just for the documentary film crew, but we all got to enjoy it anyway. I really can't wait to see this documentary when it comes out. It's gonna be really interesting to see what they include and what perspective they approach the myriad of stories that make up blueEnergy.

Well, I gotta go pack up for an early morning trip to Managua, but I did take a couple videos of the musicians, so if I ever manage to get them uploaded, I'll be sure to share. In the meantime, you can check out Kali-Boom and Zabu on UTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AZMzLR3eXI

Enjoy!

Maypole Madness

2008-05-17T10:32:00.000-07:00

May is a very special month in Bluefields. In fact, the largest festival of the year takes place of the course of the month. Every weekend there are large fiestas in the streets and the barrios (neighborhoods) take turns hosting the party and attempting to show up last week's events. Last night the party took place in the oldest neighborhood and was organized by the bluefields sound system boys. Our group got there a little late for the live performances, but just in time for the maypole dancing.

A large group of us had only just arrived when the announcer began requesting that "all them white girls come dance maypole." Seeing as Stephanie and myself were the only gringas to be seen, we had little choice but to be ushered towards the brightly decorated tree they had installed in the middle of the cobblestone road. I'm not sure if any of you have every encountered Caribbean style maypole dancing before, but it's a trip! Basically, it's a combination of African rhythm gyrations, hip-hop grinding and a ferocious battle of the sexes. Stephanie and I managed to keep our dancing reasonably PG, despite the crowds of men pulsating around us, but we certainly weren't prepared for the show that followed. As the real Caribbean ladies stepped it up, the crowds went wild and the dancers followed suit. I was stunned to see a very voluptuous lady trap her man against the maypole and begin ramming herself against him hard enough to shake the whole tree. Not too much later, several of the men began throwing themselves across the floor, knees bent and arms in the air shaking everything they had while the girls danced above them. At one point, someone climbed right up the maypole and was dancing with his feet in midair while suspended from the branches above. It was as if the gods had let loose their hold on the world and all manner of wild spirits had swarmed up to take control.

Unfortunately, along with the wild dancing and battling of the sexes comes some rather rampant drunkenness and high tempers. From the few nights I've been out on the town, it's rather apparent that fist fights are a nightly occurrence. After a few small shoving matches between various individuals, one of the fights erupted into a full-fledged boxing match that left one man being carried out holding his wounded head in his hands. That pretty much ended the party since half the crowd accompanied the injured man and the rest scattered throughout the barrio.

Not ready to call it a night, but finding it too early for Four Brothers, we migrated to LaLa (aka midnight dream). This place is probably my favorite so far. The entrance is located at the end of a large sloping driveway and through a chainlink fence. The first room you come to is literally pulsating with music that shakes the floor and is occasionally accompanied by a very loud foghorn. If you can maintain your hearing as you walk through the main dancefloor, you pass through to a slightly quieter space filled with tables of dimly lit figures. A few more steps brings you out to the deck and finally brings the music down to a reasonable volume as the sky opens up and moonlight floods your view of the bay. Settling in at a table, we passed a few hours sharing stories, dancing to the best songs and enjoying the nearly full moon.

As midnight rolled around and the staff began putting away chairs, our dream had to end and the party moved on. Almost everyone continued on to Four Brothers, but my stomach had finally gotten a proper "welcome to Nicaragua" message and I decided it'd be best to head home. A few of us piled into a cab and were shortly at our doors. A few more pleasant moments were spent sleepily chatting in the hippie room before finally calling it a night. For the first time since I arrived, it was cool enough to fall asleep without turning on the fan. I slept like a baby.

Sifting Sands

2008-05-16T19:20:00.000-07:00

Today was another lesson in patience and the reality of taking simple conveniences for granted. I offered to help Stephanie with the construction of a concrete water filter that she's been working on for some time. In fact, she's already made a few but wants to experiment to find the perfect balance between performance and cost. Hence, we were to mix several different combinations of varying size stones and sand from the river, the ocean and the volcanoes to achieve the strongest and cheapest concrete. Of course, in the States, this would have been a simple matter of ordering various size aggregates and various consistencies of sand and mixing it up in a cement mixer. Of course, in Bluefields, nothing is quite that simple.

Despite our low expectations, we arrived at the shop to find all the raw materials already laid out for us. However, raw materials is definitely the right description. Basically, we had bags full of whatever the boys who dive to the bottom of the river or ocean had scooped up in their buckets and sold to us. Hence, in order to have pure sand or stones of similar size, we had to sift the raw sand by hand. We started by simply shoveling piles onto our sifting screens and quickly realized we would be there all night if we didn't find a faster method. So, looking around the shop I noticed a set of hooks suspended from the ceiling. Thinking this could speed things up a bit, we commenced tying the various size screens up with space between so we could pour through the top and sift out everything at once. It was a little make shift, but it worked! That only left pouring our separated sands into buckets of water so the sticks, shells, leaves and other organic matter would float to the top where the 10 year old boy who had followed us to the shop would happily retrieve it all and toss it out on the grass.

We didn't quite get around to actually pouring the cement, but at least we've got the right size rocks all laid out together and the steel mold cleaned up and ready for a saturday afternoon mud mixing party.

Daily Life

2008-05-14T08:21:00.000-07:00

So, I realized after reading through my last postings that I have neglected to give any notion of the reality of daily life in Bluefields, an oversight I shall attempt to rectify. There are so many little conveniences that simply do not exist here that seemingly simple activities require serious effort and vast amounts of time. Of those elements that impact daily life, water is probably the most evident.

There are 2 sources of water available at the house, a collection tank for rainwater and the well. Neither local offers potable water, so the kitchen is equipped with a series of filtration systems that must be constantly replenished. During the wet season, this is rarely an issue, as the rainwater tank is nearly always full. However, at this point in time we are at the very end of the dry season and the rains have yet to begin, so the tanks are often dry. This means that the showerheads are unusable so we must all become experts at the intricate techniques of bucket-baths, which is always an interesting endeavor as one hand must always be employed for scooping and pouring water while all other actions are completed one-handed. This of course implies that there is water in the bucket to be used in the first place. =)

If there isn't any water in the shower (or you need to flush the toilet), as was the case this morning, one must navigate the intricate network of valves and switches located throughout the grounds in order to fill the large trashcans we utilize for water storage. If the rainwater tank is full, this is a simple matter of turning a single switch. If not, you have to go down to the patio, open the tank valve just slightly, walk out back to the well, reach down and open the valve inside and wait for the very long pipe to fill so you can prime the pump. Once the pipe is full, you close the well valve, walk back to the patio, close the tank valve, go across the patio, turn on the pump, take a leisurely stroll upstairs while the tank starts up, open the valve there and begin to fill your bucket. Since this is such a time-consuming process, anytime you go to fill one bucket, it is worthwhile to fill all the buckets throughout the house as well as those the kitchen and cleaning crew will need for the rest of the day. By this time, the 5min shower you were hoping for has turned into a 2hr endeavor. Welcome to the reality of Nica-time!

First Week

2008-05-12T07:55:00.000-07:00

The first week in any new location is always a challenge of new faces, proceedures, habits and adventures, but my first week at blueEnergy was further amplified by a whirlwind of ativity that began only a few hours after arriving. Most of the chaos was due to the fact that for the first time in history, all 3 co-directors of the organization, as well as 'mama blueEnergy' were assembled in Bluefields. To make things more exciting, they were commencing their first official operator training program to teach members of outlying communities the intricacies of wind turbine maintenance and management. This meant that, also for the first time, the leaders of all the communities in which blueEnergy operates were assembled together. Despite the challenges posed by instructing an eclectic group of individuals who each have their own prefered first language and varying degrees of comprehension, literacy and interest, the volunteers and workshop members diligently transfered their knowledge over the course of the coming week. In addition to all this excitement, and more important to my person agenda here, the head of INATEC, the national university that runs the local technical college which has partnered with blueEnergy and provides workshop and classroom space as well as transportaion and coordication, was to arrive on friday. But, I'm getting a little ahead of myself, so lets back up to that first night in Bluefields.

After a very refreshing nap and a quick (cold) bucket shower (the only kind of shower available), David, Lynn and I wandered down to the living room and chatted for a bit while other volunteers raced back and for intent of 15 different projects and attempting to mobilize for the training that was to commence in the morning. As the evening progessed, we slowly met each member of the household, some of whom have been here for the long haul and others who were only passing through for a few weeks. We also came to understand that dinner is always an impromptu event that happens whenever someone decides it's time to cook an takes the initiative to do so. Seeings as everyone else was more than overwhelmed with preparations, David Lynn and I took it upon ourselves to manage dinner. Slowly navigating through the foreign realm of a new kitchen with only fresh ingredients and basic stocks of rice, beans and noodles, we pieced together a lovely meal of spagetti in a spicy tomato sauce. All the other volunteers were more than grateful to sit down for a hot meal at a table overflowing with individuals from France and the US. After a lively dinner with stories of all variety being flung around the room (well, the covered patio as it's far to hot to sit down for a meal indoors), most people adjorned to the office for last minute preparations while a few of us, including Guillermo, the local director and his brother, Mathias, the head honcho for the US side of operations, cleared the table and dolled out the cervesas for a few raucous rounds of beer pong.

Somewhere along in the evening, after a few beers had been had, Guillermo pulled me aside and started to explain his vision for CERCA (Centro de Capacitación Ambiental), the project that I was brought here to oversee. Over the course of our discussion, it became clear that this center is a much larger project than I had previously imagined. It will include not only conference rooms and offices for blueEnergy, but also offices for other organizations, a 200 person auditorium, a dining hall for at least 200 ppl, a large kitchen as well as a smaller teaching kitchen and guestrooms. Overall, the concept is to create a center that would provide facilities for outside organizations to collaborate on various projects, to accommodations for visiting specialists as well as a training facility for hospitality services. All of this will be incorporated into a showcase for sustainable living that will include all renewable energy sources, water collection filtration and treatment, composting toilets, natural lighting, ventilation and cooling systems. In addition, the grander vision is to carry the same themes into smaller CERCitas that would be built in the communities and house batteries, volunteers, specialists etc. Feeling both incredibly excited and rather overwhelmed, I eventually said goodnight and laid down with my head still spinning full of cascading thoughts and visions.

The rest of the week passed in something of a blur. Since the head of INATEC was to be here on friday to discuss the possibility of actually building CERCA, I was immediately thrown into creating a presentation that included basic shematic plans and sketchs as well as a powerpoint exemplifying the benefits that could be reaped should this program go through. At the same time, the days remained hectic with migrations to the INATEC campus for communal lunches, presentations on various aspects of blueEnergy and the systems they provide as well as a lot of cooking for 15-25 people, gatherings every night that generally progressed far into the night. To make things just a little more exciting, all the taxi drivers in town decided to go on strike, so going anywhere meant walking through the scorching heat to arrive drenched in sweat and exhausted at your destination. Nonetheless, friday came along, the day of meetings went well, CERCA was signed off on by INATEC and I got a few minutes to breath.

Friday evening was consumed with a fabulous meal of beef boullion with a specialty potato dish from a specific region of France prepared by one of the many amazing guests we had over the week. After dinner, Colette (mama blueEnergy) enthralled us all with a wonderful presentation of her work studying the Rama language that started in the 80s and eventually led to the creation of blueEnergy through a series of events that I will have to go into at another time. Her presentation was interspersed with harrowing tales of being held at machinegun point by the Contras, living among the Rama in isolated villages and introducing Miss Nora, a Rama woman who helped to save the Rama language from extinction, to the luxuries of life in Eugene, Oregon for a short time.

The following day, the morning was spent preparing for a graduation ceremony to honor the community operators who had completed their training over the course of the week. After the ceremony, Stephanie and I snuck away for a small shopping tour of 'el centro.' Only mildly successful, we decided to drop by the Bluefields Sound System residence and say hi to a couple friends who live and work there. We sat on the porch and enjoyed the seabreeze while listening to Reggaton mixed with a few classics. On the way back to the house, we dropped Xander and Edwin off at a barrio party at the end of a dizzying network of winding alleyways. The fiesta was part of fiesta de mayo, a month long celebration that involves lots of crazy dancing, a maypole and copious amounts of flor de caña, the local rum (which happens to be delicious!). We got back to the house in time to start cooking before our own party was to begin. As we were cooking, a member of the documentary film crew that had a arrived a few days before and happened to be a world class bartender, began mixing various coctails with fresh mango, passion fruit, blended bananas and all sorts of delicious additions.

As soon as everyone was fed and happy, the BSS boys showed up in time to organize a dancing movement. As a group of maybe 20-25 people, we all departed casa blueEnergy and made our way downtown to the happeningest club in town, Cima. There, we sweat our way through the night gyrating to Reggatone music on the crowded dance floor. A few hours later, I found myself in the hatchback trunk of a taxicab with 2 other people while 5 more rode up front, driving with the door open while holding the taxi speaker on my lap and racing across town to Four Brothers, a dimmly lit shack with music and lots more crazy dancing. Somewhere around 2 or 3am, Staphanie and I decided that we'd had about all we could handle of the sex-on-the-dance-floor style that predominates the clubs and we headed back to the house. Unfortunately, we forgot that there aren't enough keys for all the volunteers and neither of us currently had a set. So, when we got home and found the gate locked, we had the joy of scaling the chainlink fence in order to get in. Luckily, a few people were still up over at Guillermo's house (one he's in the process of building just behind the main house), and were willing to let us into our rooms.

The following morning, a large contingient took off early for RamaKey, an island off the coast where lots of exciting things were to be happening. As I had no real reason for attending, Stephanie and I had made plans to meet up with the workshop boys for an outing to Gualaterra, the local swimming hole. However, when we got up, only one of the managed to show and he soon wandered off to who knows where when it bacame apparent that we were going to be moving rather slowly for the morning. Undetered, we managed to kidnap Lâl, the head of blueEnergy France, and convince him to lead us through the jungle to the mythical pool of water we'd been dreaming of since first learning of it a few days earlier. Hiking up over the hill behind our house, we were greeted with a stunning 360 degree view of nearly continuous rainforest, broken only by the blue of the bay. Marching down the oposite side, we made our way down a steep incline to an oasis of water complete with waterfall and several locals already enjoying the refreshingly cool water. Completely drenched in sweat by the time arrived, I couldn't wait to get in the water. Watching a few kids jump of the cliff and dive headfirst into the relatively shallow pool, I decided to follow suit, minus the diving headfirst part. I'm not sure I can describe the sheer joy of feeling cool for the first time in week. The unrelenting heat and humidity that had hounded us for the past five days was suddenly a thing of the past. We spent the morning enjoying the estatically refreshing waterhole until the influx of local families became too much to handle and we decided to call it a morning.

On the way back to the house, we wound our way through dirt paths that cut through backyards and banana groves and found ourselves thirsty enough to stop for a beer a few blocks from home. one beer quickly turned into more when the table next to us decided to buy us a second round, at which point we were socially required to return the favor. So, a few glasses later, we meandered our way back into the sunshine and found ourselves at home. Thoroughly relaxed from our excursion, we lazed about in hammocks sharing stories and enjoying the quiet of an empty house.

As everyone returned from their trip to RamaKey, a housewarming party was beginning over at Guillermo's complete with mardigras beads and feathered masks. Needless to say, the remainder of the evening involved plenty of toña and flor de caña.

And now, it's time to get to work.

Arrival

2008-05-12T07:23:00.000-07:00

I arrived in Nicaragua last sunday after a wonderful roadtrip from Portland to LA that included some exhilerating climbing, beach combing, an unexpected reunion and a minor flat tire on the grapevine. When I got to Claremont, I had the pleasure of attending the 27th annual Claremont Folk Festival which included Jackson Browne, Ben Harper and Taj Mahal, all of whom gave awesome performances. After only a few hours of sleep that night, I embarked on my journey south.

When I arrived in Managua after a short stop in the Miami airport (which has the worst signage I've ever seen in an airport), I was greeted by a waft of hot, humid air and a welcoming party of Victor, the local blueEnergy taxi driver, David and Lynn, two new volunteers who has just arrived from Costa Rica where they are studying at the American University. Although I had originally planned to spend the night in Managua before catching a bus overland to Bluefields, David and Lynn were planning to embark that night (about 2hrs after I arrived) and had graciously reserved me a seat should I like to join them. Rather than completing the 12hr trip on my own, I was happy to take their invitation to travel overnight with them.

On the way from the airport to the bus station, we stopped for a quick meal at a roadside restaurant and filled up on rice, beans, marinated onions and a little meat. Of course, we also had to enjoy a toña, the local Nicaraguan beer. When we arrived at the bus station, we passed off our bags to men packing everything into a tarp on top of the rundown old school bus that would take us clear across the country and sat down to wait. An hour or so later, people began cueing up, so we followed suit and were quickly (by nicaraguan standards anyway) on our way to a chorus of car horns.

After a relatively uneventful ride over the mountains and through the jungle, we arrived in el Rama, where the road from Managua ends. From there, we were to take a small boat called a 'panga' down the river to Bluefields. However, the boats wouldn't depart for a few more hours, so we settled in to take a brief nap as the sun rose and the sleepy little port slowly woke up. Around about 6am, we started loading into a small open motorboat with wooden bench seats and rather limited space. Being the last boat to load up, we still had a couple seats left open, which meant we waited for another 45mins or so while we watched the rest of the pangas embark without us. A little nervous to travel without the backup of another boat nearby to help with engine trouble, but mildly comforted by the dilapitated lifevests we were each doned upon boarding, we eventually managed to fill the boat to capacity, which meant being crammed in shoulder-to-shoulder with barely enough room between benches to place your feet. Nonetheless, we were soon on our way down a wide river lined by banana groves and towering trees with tendrils of vines tracing their way down through a thick canopy of broad leafed trees and mangrove swamps.

A rather windy and bumpy 2hr ride later, the river openned up to a large lagoon and Bluefields came into view on the horizon. Disembarking at the docks to a crowd of taxi drivers vying for our business, we climbed aboard one and were zipped across town to 'casa blueEnergy.' Happy but exhausted, David, Lynn and I were shown our rooms and allowed to gratefully pass out for a few hours in the midmorning heat.