So, I hear you want to start a Central American garden!?

Who hasn’t thought of starting a garden in Central America?  Below is a list of advice I have for you on breaking ground for your garden.  As of now, my idea is to have installments of this as we proceed with the garden, but we’ll see if anyone is still reading this that far along.  And a quick disclaimer: while it may sound like I’m trying to recruit an army of child laborers, this all takes place in a school as part of their curriculum and participation is purely voluntary.  And yes, apparently machetes are allowed on school property. 

1) First and most importantly, don’t be ashamed that the elementary schools kids that are helping you are much more efficient at clearing the land than you are.  They may laugh at your machete grass clearing technique.  If this happens hand the giant knife to the 11 year old to do it for you.  This leads me to my second point…

2) If you think that your machete is too dull, it most likely is.  That being said, once again, hand it to one of the kids.  Basically what I’m trying to get at is that a lot of these kids like working with, and are very skilled at using machetes. 

3) Playing charades can only get you so far.  Try to learn at least a bit of Spanish before you try and get kids to help you.  If you don’t, you’ll get a large crowd watching you, but not many helping.   Even if your Spanish is horrible, they tend to understand what you mean when you couple it with over exaggerated hacking motions when trying to demonstrate that they need to clear the grass. 

4) Be careful.  Too many kids (and volunteers) swinging machetes and hoes around a 6m x 7m plot can be a bit dangerous.  With this considered, bring more than 1 hoe and 1 machete. 

5) Entice them with candy.  Yes, I know I sound like that creepy guy who drives around schools in a windowless white van, but it really does work. 

6) If you happen to look down and see a large bug that may or may not be a spider, don’t freak out.  Remain calm and calmly brush it off.  Freaking out will lead to mocking laughs. 

7) As cool as they may be to watch, you don’t want to start a garden near leaf cutter ants.  I think this one’s pretty self-explanatory (we actually considered this one before we started).  

8) Try to time it while the drummers are practicing.  It is entertaining and provides a great beat to work to. 

9) As hard as it may be, accept that the kid wearing the Cubs shirt is doing more work than most of the other kids. 

10) If all else fails, talk about baseball, they love baseball.

Working on the huerto (garden)

The (almost) fully planted garden 

I hope this helps you in your pursuits of creating a school garden in Central America.  

It is definitely the rainy season!

I have to say, getting stuck in a Central American open air market during a torrential downpour at dusk was definitely an experience to remember.   Let me start from the beginning.  All of the environmental sector trainees, myself included, had just gotten back to Jinotepe from a gardening glass in an old former school (the school would be a great backdrop for a horror movie).  Anyways, before taking another microbus back to our individual training towns, we all decided to go buy our Nicaraguan cell phones.  It definitely takes longer than you’d think for 20 gringos (not a derogatory term here) to buy cell phones.  So after about an hour or so, we were ready to head back, but the sky was looking pretty ominous. 

            As we started to run to the bus stop, the sky burst open.  By this point we were in the middle of the market, and it was hard to stay dry despite being underneath a roof (well, kind of).  After a couple minutes, we somehow ended up in the entranceway of someone’s house for a good five to ten minutes.  Once the rain died down a bit, we made our way back into the market.  By this point it was starting to get darker, and we were a bit lost.  Luckily we had our language teacher to help us out a bit, but we were still wondering the streets for about ten minutes in the rain trying to get back to the main road.  This whole time I was pretty excited that I was actually cold, which doesn’t happen much with the warm tropical climate.    

            Well, we ended up finding our way back to the bus stop, and made it back in time for a late dinner with our host families.  The whole time we could not stop laughing, and I know I at least was pretty amused by the whole situation.  You’ve got to love the rainy season, I know I sure do! 

A blurry picture of the Jinotepe mercado

Claire shared my mutual excitment for getting caught in a rain storm

Unsuccessfully trying to keep my backpack dry

It´s official, me llamo José

     Well I’ve finally moved in with my host family, and now live in a pueblo (small village) with three other volunteers about an hour southwest of Managua called Santa Teresa.  It’s very pretty and has a beautiful church and park at its center.  It was definitely a bit nerve wracking leaving the bus of English speaking volunteers when I was dropped off at my new house for the next 11 weeks.  My host family is very friendly and does not speak any English.  Even if they did, I’m pretty sure they were told not to speak any around the house to help me get used to the language.  The front of my house also has a little storefront, know as a pulpeía.  As of now, I probably understand a max of 15-20% of a conversation, and can speak enough to get to the point where my utterances probably make a bit of sense…maybe?  Either that or my host mom is just being nice and nodding her head to things she doesn’t understand (kind of like I’ve been doing).  It is nice though that one of the other volunteers lives right next door to me and our host mothers are related.

            My first night here was a bit strange.  I was asleep by about 8 pm, and woke up at about 3 am, (still 7 hours of sleep) to a chorus of stray dogs barking, my 8 month old host niece (who is adorable by the way) crying, and roosters going crazy.  I’m not sure what exactly the roosters find so appealing about the 3-6am timeframe, but they definitely were excited to tell the whole world they were awake and ready to go.  They pretty much slowed down at dawn, leading me to believe these roosters aren’t very good at telling time.  That being said, I still did get a bit more sleep, and recognize the fact that I’ll definitely get used to the endless nightly chorus of animals, or will just wear earplugs when I sleep.  

            I’m definitely not used to seeing horse and cattle pulling carts down the streets in my neighborhood in the US, and will have to get used to the dogs and cats that roam the streets.  I’ve already started to get used to cold buckets showers in the morning, and also had my first experience with cramming into a bus (well, it was a van, but served the same purpose) with Alex (another volunteer) and her host mom to head to the market 15-minutes away in Jinotepe to buy food.  The market was unlike anything I’ve ever seen to before.  There were many vendors selling everything from fruit and veggies to jeans.  I saw someone wearing a Chicago White Sox shirt, and someone else wearing a Chicago Bulls shirt.  There were men carrying live chickens and vendors selling soda and drinks in bags (which is apparently a big thing here).  It was definitely an interesting cultural experience in which I was happy to be a part of. 

            There are plenty of things that will take some getting used to, but overall I’m very excited for this new step in my life, and am hoping that I will be more able to communicate with Nicaraguans in a few months, at least past nodding to things I don’t understand and uttering grammatically incorrect words and phrases here and there.  Hopefully this will be one of my longer posts as I don’t want to bore you, but here are a couple of pictures as a reward to those of you who made it this far!

A look down my street 

My new enemy...the rooster

First few days...

     ¡Hola!  In case you haven’t seen my mass amount of pictures and posts on facebook, I made it safely to Nicaragua yesterday around noon.  It had been a pretty busy few days leading up arriving here.  We spent a day in D.C., which was a pretty cool way to spend my last day in the States.  While most of the day consisted of orientations, I was still able to walk around and see some of the must see’s.  Nicaragua is pretty much the same temperature as D.C., so I can’t say I’m too upset about that.   Right now we’re staying in a nice hotel compound, and besides the consant will be with our first host families in a couple of days. 

     The other volunteers here are pretty awesome, and I’m really hoping/expecting to make some lifelong amigos.   I’ll also find out tomorrow how bien mi Spanish was based on a language interview.  Right now I’m doing some serious soul searching.  Do I want to go by Joe or José.   Joe is great and all, but the j as an h thing could be a bit different.  I also just took my first malaria pills, so I’m expecting some pretty awesome (or horrifying) dreams tonight.  Well between being drawn away from righting this to throw a Frisbee around, go to the supermercado down the street, and play cards, I’m sure this journal has been all over the place.   To make up for my bad post, I’ll add some cool pictures.  ¡Adios! 

     Also, as a side note, on my quest to find wifi to post this, a bat just flew into my face.  Just thought I’d share that one too! I still haven’t stopped laughing.

Hayley and I on the bus ride from the airport

Our hotel for the first couple days

While out of order, this was my last night in the US (thanks Ellen for being a great tour guide)

Quick Turnaround

      It's hard to believe that I was up in northern Minnesota yesterday morning, in the 'burbs today and tomorrow, will be in DC on Tuesday, and Nicaragua on Wednesday.  It's definitely a full three days to say the least!  While I'm used to these quick turn arounds, this is a bit much even for me!  I definitely did this to myself, and I'm hoping that packing everything tomorrow will go well.  

      I do want to give one more shout-out to my Sawbill 'family.'  I have been so lucky to have had four great summers working with some truly amazing people.  You'd think living, working, and hanging out with the same people 24/7 for 3 months would be a bit much, but I couldn't have asked for a better way to have spent my past several summers.  For my last evening there a few of us drove over to Brule Lake and went for a quick paddle into the Boundary Waters to an island with a great overlook.  It was a beautiful last sunset!

Jessica (Hammer), Ana, Laura, and I enjoying the Sunset on Brule Lake 

It wasn't until our paddle back that the beautiful sunset turned into this; something I've only seen a couple of times.

      The next morning I was off to Chicago, and made it home by about 12:30 or 1pm.  By 4:30 it was time for my Going Away party.  There was not much time to relax, but it was really great to see everyone there.  Between leaving Sawbill and the party, I've never felt so loved and supported, and it really felt great.  I really appreciate everyones support, and can't believe that I most likely will not see anyone from home for at least several months, if not more than a year or two.   

     Today was a little less glamourous, and involved a lot of shopping, more farewells, and watching of a pretty horrible Syfy movie.  (If you ever want to watch a movie about a shark infested tornado, 'Sharknado' is the movie for you!)

    I'd like to end by saying thanks again for all the support from everyone! It means more than you guys know.  The waitstaff at Red Robin at the mall today even gave me two free shirts and a free meal when my mom mentioned what I was doing.  Needless to say, I will be leaving the states feeling loved and supported.  Thanks guys!