Anecdotes of Nica Life

Today I would like to share a few amusing anecdotes with you all from my time in Nicaragua up until now. (They are in order from most boring to most amusing. Haha)

1.    One night  I was walking home from buying bananas when this man pushing a cart through the street stops me. He says his name is Nelson and I´m invited to go to mass at his church this Sunday if I would like. He asks me what my name is, I tell him, and then we say goodbye. A few days later, I´m walking to the bus stop to go to work, and I hear someone calling my name. I turn around and there is Nelson waving at me. I yell adios and wave back. This has happened a few other times since then. All of a sudden today, as I was walking home from work. He yelled hi, and ran over. I couldn´t tell if he was exhausted from working or drunk, but he didn´t look too well. When he got to me, he proudly held out a plastic bag with something in it: a huge chocolate sucker.  I wasn´t sure what to do since I´ve only kind of talked to this man once, and I still wasn´t sure if I could trust him, but I put my hand on his shoulder and said thank you. I probably should have stayed and asking him how his day was for a few moments, but I was so shocked by the random kindness which was sadly mixed with my own feelings of being afraid that I said a quick goodbye. I hate not being able to trust people. I hope my friendship with Nelson can grow past this.

2.    Chelsea and I were walking through the barrio one evening when our neighbor Doña Maxima invites us to meet her son. We talk to him for awhile, and then she brings out chairs to sit. Later he leaves, and she proceeds to talk to us for at least another hour. She wants to know all about us, our families, and our work. She also fills us in on all the good and bad JVs of the past, spending a significant chunk of time on some guy named Jaime who apparently is one of the worst people she’s ever met. Later I go get the head massager that the Belize City JVs sent us (one of those with the little metal wires that you push down and they surround your head). They all go crazy. Needless to say, Chelsea and I don’t actually make it back to the house until 10pm. Haha.

3.    One day during lunch, I was holding this baby. I have no idea who it belonged to. All of a sudden, warm liquid starts streaming out of her cloth diaper and onto my pants and shirt. We tried to dry it off with some towels, but I ended up having to finish the rest of the afternoon looking and smelling as if I had peed myself.

4.    Last week Silvia, Silvio, and I went to visit a few of the women in my banks so that I could start learning where they live. The first house we visited kindly poured us each a full glass of soda. The soda was refreshing, especially in the heat of the day, but it still took me a long time to finish it. We move on to the second house. Here we are received with another huge glass of gaseosa (what they call soda here).  I really don’t drink that much gaseosa in general, and I was already full, but I didn’t want to be rude. I managed to get down the majority of it. We then passed on to the third house. Again we were each given a very large, very full cup of Orange Fanta. I didn’t stand a chance. On the positive side, we spent the rest of the day making gaseosa jokes, and I felt like for one day they were able to see me as someone other than the girl who doesn’t say much.

5.    At the beginning of my time in Nicaragua, I was blessed with what I still believe was a UTI, even though the lab test results said nothing was wrong. The only advice I got was to just drink lots of water. During this time, we took a trip to the Feria in Arenal. Almost the second we stepped on the bus to head back to Managua, I felt the urge to pee. I tried every trick I could think of to help hold it through the over an hour long bus ride, but I wasn’t doing very well. With about 20 minutes left, Jenn also started expressing her own concerns about needing a bathroom...and it was more than just pee.   We managed to hold it until we at least got into Managua, and then we quickly exited. Unfortunately, a toilet was nowhere to be found. I was desperate. I ended up squatting next to a wall in the middle of busy Managua with only a thin shawl and a jacket for cover.  As a chela (white girl) in this country, I already seem to attract a lot of attention. Peeing on a sidewalk in the heart of Managua didn’t help this.
     At this point, Jenn decided she could make to the house. We picked up another bus and started heading toward the house, but as chance would have it, a huge Christmas/Purisima parade ends up blocking the road for at least 5 minutes. We were all laughing hysterically at this horrible coincidence.  Luckily, Jenn was able to make it to the sacred bathroom just in time.

6.    Last week I came back from our weekly grocery shopping at the outdoor market to find Elspeth in our house. We start talking about the paperwork needed for the U.S. Embassy since we are in the process of getting our Nicaraguan Residency cards. I decided to get some of the paperwork from my room, but as I open the door, I am surprised to find a flapping chicken on my dresser! I yelled in shock and closed the door. As I have never really had any experience handling chickens, I freeze up and don’t know what to do. Elspeth comes over and tries to shoo it up through the opening in the roof where it must have fallen through, but it can’t make it. We figure it must be one of the neighbor’s, so I go next door and ask Geovanni if he’s missing a black chicken. It’s his. He comes over and easily grabs it, expressing his apologies. It isn’t until after he leaves that I examine the damage. Apparently the only place the damn bird had found worthy of pooping was on my pillow…which she christened 3 separate times.

7.    This last Sunday, I was coming back on the bus from Batahola where I had just attended an evening mass. As the dilapidated bus is nearing my stop, I notice a man in a full cow outfit at the back of the bus. This costume is complete with an udder, black afro wig, face paint, and a red clown nose. I get up to wait near the doors (which is right next to cow man) as the bus gets to my stop. Instead, the bus keeps going. I start banging on the roof to signal the driver to stop, but he doesn’t. The cow man jumps in to help, banging on the roof and yelling at the top of his lungs. Finally a good quarter mile down the road, the bus stops. I thank cow man for the help even though it wasn’t even his stop, and I get off. I had been so caught up with getting off the bus, that it took a few minutes of walking before it really hit me how incredibly absurd that whole situation was.

P.S. Kelly made me start reading the Hunger Games, and now I’m addicted. I am about to start the 3rd and final book. Yikes.

Hope all of you are doing well!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Toda vida es sagrada

No puedo creer que I have already completed 4 weeks at work!! Last week I was sitting around with the bank team discussing what we want to accomplish this next year. We passed the entire morning this way, and then at noon after we’d finished, we went our separate ways for lunch. As I walked to Sobeyda’s house (a woman who is paid to cook lunch for Heather and I each day), I suddenly felt a wave of joy. I really love my job. We had just spent the entire morning discussing goals, and we hadn’t mentioned money a single time. Yes, dealing with money is a large part of my job, but my coworkers were just as (if not more) concerned with the mental and spiritual growth of each woman at the bank. They don’t even really like calling it a bank.

 We discussed all the different ways we could possibly go about helping the women improve their personal self-esteem, gain conscientization of their circumstances, and build solidarity as a team. This included everything from simple activities in which each woman would be able to share her personal voice and experiences to setting up literacy classes for those women that cannot read and write. This program is such a lovely balance between caring for the physical, concrete economic issues of the women, while also caring about each person’s individual growth as a human being.

Unfortunately I still feel that my lack of Spanish is hindering my ability to learn about the lives of the women, as well as my desire to share with them. This has probably been the most frustrating part of my experience here so far. I try so hard to counteract this lack of words with smiles, hugs, and the learning of names, but it really isn’t enough for me. How can these women know that I care about them if I can’t understand what they are confiding in me? It is so frustrating and very defeating. But as the book I just read discusses, there are so many things that we can learn from pain; we shouldn’t rush over or avoid it. In many ways, embracing it can be sacred. The books states,

“When we avoid darkness, we avoid tension, spiritual creativity, and finally transformation. We avoid God, who works in darkness – where we are not in control! Maybe that is the secret: relinquishing control” (page 47 of Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer by Richard Rohr).

Maybe this quote will sounds odd out of context, but oh well. I guess you’ll all have to go read the book when you’re done with Tattoos on the Heart. : ) I would agree that realizing I am not in control here has been very humbling. Realizing that I need to learn patience with myself has also been very necessary, especially in the last 4 weeks. It is okay if my Spanish isn’t perfect. It is okay if I can’t always understand what is happening. And honestly, if I never get it…it’s still okay. It does not lessen my value as a human being. I am still just as worthy of love and care as I was before when I was in the U.S. speaking grammatically correct English.

Understanding this last point has also helped me lately to realize this same thing in other people. Despite their abilities (or lack of them), other people are equally worthy as human beings. This woman may be 25, illiterate, and married to a 65 year old, but that does not make her less worthy of love. That man may be drunk and stumbling past me on my way to work at 7:45 in the morning, but that does not make me better than him. If we would just stop comparing and judging everyone, maybe we would finally realize the intrinsic value that each person has in this world. Toda vida es sagrada.

Rohr writes, “Either we see the divine image in all created things, or we don’t see it at all…Everything becomes enchanting with true sight. One God, one world, one truth, one suffering, and one love. All we can do is participate” (58-59).

This is really long again. Ha. I hope you are all doing well!! 

Here are a couple pictures, but I´m going to put the rest on facebook.