The First Three Months

 So I thought I would start off with some gorgeous pictures that I have taken off my site to get you interested:

OK I’m sorry I lied…

I told you that I would write again soon…and here I am almost three months later putting my actions into words.  To be fair we have been having a fair number of electrical shortages and the last thing I want to do at the end of a hot day is sit in front of the computer.  For those who know me well, I’m actually sleeping plenty now.  Weird I know.  Anyways this post is going to be pretty long with a ton of pictures so I’ll split it up into titled sections so you can pick and choose what to read.  Enjoy!

On my life here so far:

            Amazing would be too soft of a word to describe things so far.  There have definitely been ups and downs but for the most part everything has been great.  I have been in training in a little town called Nandasmo about an hour and a half outside of Managua and taking a crash course in Spanish as well as sustainable development.  The days have flown by and at the moment I have a little bit over a week left in this place.  It is shocking because I have finally become at home here.  I have spent time working in a bakery (panaderia), carpentry shop (muebleria) and making friends with countless kind individuals here.  It will be strange to pick up and leave for a far away place (Quilalí, I’ll talk more about my site in a bit) leaving behind so many relationships that I have forged in that frantic rush one often finds themselves in when they are lost and looking for any foothold.  I’ll be leaving behind a family who made me feel at home and a community that I have come to call my home.  I can only hope that my new home will treat me the same.

On a regular day:

            Generally I’ll get up around 6:30 am or when some fruit falls from a tree and lands on my tin roof scaring the hell out of me.  Then its breakfast and off to class by about 8:00 am give or take.  Class goes till 12:00 pm when we break for lunch and then starts again at 1:00 pm going till 3:00 pm.  After this I usually spend a little time relaxing and then head to the basketball court.  There is a small team in my pueblito that plays against other pueblitos every weekend so we usually play and the game switches between basketball and cement court soccer (football sala).  I usually head back home after the game about 6:30 pm and have dinner and chat with the family about anything and everything.

            During the week, this is my regular schedule Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursday.  The other days I usually have to travel to other pueblos for meetings and presentations on various themes ranging from security to technical aspects of our work.  Every day brings something new!

On my transition:

This is my little house and through that window to the right is my room

            The next 7 days are going to be quick and very interesting.  I will have my last Spanish class tomorrow and my last language test to see what range I will be in before I get placed in my site.  I’m currently Intermediate Mid Strong, which means I already qualify to move ahead.  Next week I will be doing all my last minute meetings with my supervisors and having a day at the Embassy as well.  On April 1^st I will be sworn in by the staff and the ambassador and then the next day, head out to my site.  The entire process of training has gone by faster than I could have imagined and from what I hear, the two years here will as well.

My training town team Allison (left) and Angie (right)

Holman "Memito" my host nephew

Church of Nandasmo

Me cutting up a coconut, I always seem to have a 5 o'clock shadow nowadays

My Host Dad

My Host Family

On my site:

            I was assigned my site about 2 weeks ago and spent all of last week visiting it and trying to determine my work there which I will be taking over form a previous volunteer (Liz Sampson).  From what I understand integration and figuring out the regions in which I can do the most work will be the focus of my first couple of months in site.  The site is called Quilalí and is located in the department of Nueva Segovia in the northern part of Nicaragua bordering Honduras.

This is Nueva Segovia, Quilali is located to the bottom right of it

To get to my site, I take a bus from Managua to Occotal ( the capital of the department) which takes somewhere between three of four hours.  From there I jump take another bus through dirt mountain roads, over rivers and along cliff faces till I dive back into the city of Quilali which is located in a valley surrounded by mountains.

Quilali is a decently sized town (about 11,000 people in the city) with 29,000 people in the Municipality.  It is incredibly rural with a lot of my work concentrated outside of the urban center.  The majority of the population works in farms and Quilali is known to be a great place to get coffee.  For example my land lady walks out every morning and picks fresh coffee beans, which she then roasts over a fire and grinds for coffee...every day.  I think I am addicted already.  I am also currently considering either buying or renting a horse so that I will be able to go out to the communities with ease to work.

During my site visit I managed to hitch a ride in an ambulance back from the main hospital in Occotal to Quilali:

not quite the same at the ones back home

My Landlady (right) and her family

The Volunteer that I will be replacing

Me on top of a mountain with a great view of Quilali

What I can look forward to seeing for the next two years!

On my work:

The work of the Peace Corps in my sector in Nicaragua is pretty straight forward at the moment.  I will be concentrating on HIV/AIDS education in at risk populations and working on the issue of teen pregnancies (at times below the age of 12) which have been deemed important to the health ministry (MINSA) of Nicaragua.  On top of this I will be working in the Health Center in my site with anything they can use help with as well as working on their public health concerns which include Parasitosis, Upper Respiratory Infections (a lot of people burn their trash and there is a lot of dust), STI’s, Dengue and some Mental Health Problems.  I will be leading youth groups, training brigadistas / youth health promoters, working in the Health Center and working in the local schools.  On top of all of this I will be picking up any side projects such as potable water supply or childhood nutrition.  To say the least there is a lot of work to do at my site and I'm really looking forward to learning a lot of about grassroots public health and rural development.

On Icy Cold Bucket Showers:

Just jump right into it.  They don’t get easier when you easy into them, and they end quicker and might even be refreshing if you do them fast.  I haven’t really had a problem though as it is rarely chilly after 5am here making the cold water feels great.

On Latrines:

Not as bad as you think they are, you get used to them.

On New People and New Cultures:

I have found that culture is stunning and different everywhere you go.  That being said, no matter how different people might seem from you, there is always some common ground to be found.  People are people.  They all have their fears, insecurities, aspirations and needs.  I think that once I came to terms with that, I was able to relate a lot easier.

 On to the next chapter:

So I will end this entry here.  I find myself in one of those many moments in life where one chapter ends and the page needs to be turned.  For me this chapter was fantastic; one filled with adventure, excitement and unfortunately way too short.  I have a small idea of what I have in front of me but I can't even begin to guess at the big picture.  I'm sure story will be long and suspenseful; filled with some potholes, trials and tribulations.  But the pages will keep turning and I look forward to what are sure to be some of the best years of my life.

I wont assume to make promises about my next blog entry, but I will at least try to get up some pictures from swearing-in and my first month in my site.

Also if you are planning on sending letters at the moment, hold off until I figure out what my new address will be please or I wont get it for at least 3 months.