Early departure....

Buenas,

My apologies for the long delay in posting but the delay came in part because after agonizing over the decision all of last week I decided to return back home a couple of weeks early. So this past weekend I traveled into Managua as planned but instead of heading north to study more Spanish I changed my flight and flew home on Sunday. I am not going to get into the details of the decision here since I sincerely believe that blogs are not really public journals so if you are interested in more info please feel free to call me or send me an email.

But, I did do some more interesting things before departing so here is one last post along with some photos!

Last Thursday afternoon, my fellow students and I decided to make an afternoon trip into the city of Granada. At one time I had been thinking about doing a week of study in Granada but since I was planning to go north I wanted to at least get in to see the place. Granada is touted as the most beautiful city in Nicaragua and it certainly has very impressive colonial architecture. It is situated on the gigantic Lago Nicaragua and for a time was the national capital. It was also frequently burned to the ground in the past by pirates since it's location on the lake makes it accessible via the Rio San Juan to the ocean, and thus, was a central trading hub - and apparent bull's eye for pirate pyromaniacs!

After waiting a quite long time to hail a cab from the middle of nowhere (we were told it was easy to pick one up and then told it was near to impossible....but thankfully the locals helped us out with a phone call!), we made it to the city where we spent a few hours wandering around, seeing the sights, and treating ourselves to some non-traditional food at a restaurant (hummus....yummy.). Granada is also very touristy so I saw the largest number of gringos that I had seen in some time.

Here are some photos from Granada:

Some fellow students: Emil (from Denmark), Ali (USA), and taking the pic, TJ (from Australia)

The next day I left the Laguna and headed for Managua where I met up with Jes Buller, a '08 GC grad! She was in town doing orientation with the MCC SEED program which she now co-coordinates in Colombia. We ended up doing some sight-seeing with the SEED group as we visited. It was delightful to see her.

We hit up the standard views in Managua which included the empty and somewhat run down National Cathedral, the Palace, and a mountain top view of the city where a large silhouette statue of Sandino stands. Managua's city center was destroyed by an earthquake in 1972 and has never been rebuilt so it is a bit of a stark city and not particularly beautiful but here are a few photos from my two days there. Oh, and one of the bus terminal in Masaya that I bused through en route to Managua:

Sandino and a view of Lago Managua with distant volcanoes

The national cathedral (has not been restored since devastating earthquake)

Well, I guess until my new travel adventure - this is la Viajera signing off!

Be well!

La Laguna

After a number of days without access to the internet, our electricity is finally on at the same time as the interet is working!! I am now almost finished my second day of studying Spanish at the Laguna de Apoyo but I have been at the lake now for 4 days. I came to this gorgeous volcanic crater lake on Saturday already with the Goshen SST crew to finalize details for 3 student service sites and then spend some time lounging and enjoying the lake.

Swimming in the lake is phenomenal. It is cool enough to be refreshing but stunningly warm to this Canadian´s touch. The water is clear and at points you can see quite far below the surface. Jen, Lisa, and I went for a night swim after we were convinced by locals that the hundreds of fish we could see by the dock lights would not in fact swarm us upon entry into the water! We conquered our squeamishness and had a lovely dip. On Sunday, the students also came out and joined us for a day at the lake.

I then said farewell to the SST group and struck out on my own although still at the same location. My spanish school is at an ecological research station and it is VERY rustic. I confess that it is a little less exciting than I had imagined and I have decided not to stay for two weeks here. It is beautiful, there are howler monkeys howling in the distance as I type (and I have seen a number of these monkeys in the trees) but I am feeling restless and have decided to head north to the city of Esteli for my next two weeks. The GC students highly recommended it and I´m excited about cooler mountain air. It has been very humid here and while sleeping has not been too bad, I think that a week of this will be enough.

Here are some photos from around the station:

The daily swim continues to be lovely and tomorrow we will make an excursion to a look out over the lake and a small town that is known for its ceramics. I already visited San Juan del Oriente on Friday with the students but I will be happy to return again. This will probably be my last blog post until I am established in Esteli since the internet service here is so spotty.

Hasta luego!

Street Scenes

Without having the luxury of photographic support, here are a couple of observations from the streets here in Jinotepe:

Cambistas:
Yesterday afternoon, Austin, one of the GC students, helpfully showed us the way to the main market where we could change our American dollars into the Nicaraguan cordoba at one of the many 'cambistas' that station themselves at the street corners. These men stand with large wads of cash in their hands, often waving the bills at passersby as they solicit business. 22.5 cordobas buy you one American dollar so you can imagine that changing money can lead to very full wallets.

Funeral Observances:
As a couple of us were returning from the afternoon lecture (Goshen students study Spanish in the morning and then often have an afternoon lecture on a variety of subjects), we noticed a procession passing a few blocks ahead. In place of our kind of limo-hearse, there was a small pick up truck with a coffin placed in the back. It processed through the streets slowly as the mourners followed behind on foot.

Whistles in the night:
Our first two nights in the country were quite quiet and pleasant. Nicaraguans have a penchant for fireworks so other than occasional blasts sounding off, the night has not been too noisy. Last night however, our attempts at falling asleep were interrupted by shrill whistles from out on the street. These whistles would continue for a number of blasts followed by silence until another round of blasts sounded again. When I looked out the window, I saw what looked like our hotel's night security guard pacing the street with a rifle slung over one shoulder and a whistle in his mouth. After a number of sleepless hours, I finally made my way downstairs around 1:30 a.m. and I guess the hotel staff asked him to stop because thankfully silence soon followed. I'm hoping for a quieter night tonight!

Arrival in Nicaragua

Hola Amigas y Amigos!

After weeks of feeling great anxiety about how hot Nicaragua was going to be, I have been pleasantly surprised to discover that it is quite comfortable here right now. To be sure, I am still happy to indulge in a few nights of air conditioning at our Jinotepe hotel, but in general, the weather here has been beautiful thus far.

Upon arriving at the Managua airport, Deanna and I were first greeted by an old 'boss' of mine, Gonzalo Duarte, who I worked with back in Ontario for a summer. In one of those classic small world moments, I discovered last year that Gonzalo has moved to Nicaragua to further develop his non-profit organization, Companeros, and this is the organization that employs Goshen College's SST in-country coordinator, Dalena.

It was lovely to be greeted by a familiar face and we spent the night at his house and enjoyed a brief intro to Managua before traveling south to Jinotepe. We began our visit with the SST unit by attending their afternoon lecture on Nicaragua's relationship with its neighbouring countries. By far the highlight thus far was our evening last night when the whole group went to one of the students' host families for a surprise birthday party. Her host sister had organized a number of games including a fabulous pinata, a Spanish version of 'Fruit basket upset', pin the tale on Eeyore, and a particularly amusing dancing lime game! The whole evening was quite entertaining and the food was delicious. I am already enjoying the proclivity of tropical fruits.

Nicaragua is a beautiful country and I am looking forward to seeing more of it on Friday when we travel to Volcan Masaya for a field trip. I am afraid that I will not be able to post photos as I left my camera cord behind at home. Sorry!

Hasta luego.....