Where You From?

Accents are funny things.  I know I have one when I speak Spanish for, as my host niece so delicately put it, I speak "feo."  Yet, I don't think I have as much of an accent as other people from the States when speaking Spanish.  It depends on the day, if I've been talking or thinking in English, and if I am tired or nervous, but most of the time I can keep my accent at least a bit in check...or at least I like to think I do.  The point is that I definitely have an accent, but it is not so obvious that people from my town know where I am from, which has lead to some very interesting questions about my nationality.  What follows is a list of guesses as to my place of origin, from most to least common.

1. Spain
2. Costa Rica
3. France
4. Chile
5. Brazil
6. Nicaragua
7. Colombia
8. Puerto Rico

As odd as these might sound, the prize for weirdest place people have though you were from definitely goes to my friend Lindsey with Mongolia.

This is what a Nicaraguan woman looks like at the start of her labor pains.

She's much braver than I would be.

Why I Love My Panzonas

As I've mentioned before, one of my favorite things about my service is hanging out with the panzonas (pregnant women) at the casa materna. Usually they are bored out of their minds, just sitting and waiting for their babies to finally arrive, so we try to make each other laugh as much as we can to pass the time. One day about a week ago I was sitting on the porch with two of the panzonas, when the director of the health center came walking by, and the two of them started giggling as quietly as they could until he was out of sight. When I asked them why they were laughing so much, one of the women, Reina, told me the story.

It's orange season now, so there is a truck that passes the casa materna every day, full of workers going out to pick the oranges, and every time they pass they always yell rude things at the pobre panzonas. Once, for instance, they yelled, "what the hell did he do to you to make you so panzona?!" to which Reina replied, "the same thing he did to your mom!". Reina is awesome, if you were still wondering, by the way.

So one afternoon, as Reina was texting on her phone, she heard the orange truck go by, and just then she sneezed. Not looking up from her phone, she heard someone say, "bless you," and assumed it was one of the orange pickers.

"Why is that idiot telling me 'bless you' after being so rude before?" she asked out loud.
"Shut up, you," one of the other women hissed at her, "it's the director!"

Reina looked up, and sure enough, there was the director of the health center, standing and staring, open mouthed at the panzona, wondering what he had done to piss her off. Now, whenever they see him, they can't help but dissolve into giggle fits. And it's stories like this that make me love my panzonas.

How to Wash Clothes Nica-Style

 Since I know all of you were dying to know.

Tools of the trade...always choose soap like this one, the ones with other colors will irritate your skin.

First, fill up the lavandero.

Check out how good shape my bucket is in.

Sprinkle laundry soap in the bucket and fill it up with water.

Put clothes in the bucket and let sit.

To properly scrub your clothes use the palms of your hands, don't make a fist, or you'll scrap up your knuckles.

Rinse and repeat.

Does it still stink?

Of course it does, that's because you sweat to an alarming degree...seriously, please ask me worriedly if I´m ok because I sweat so much.

Throw some suavitel (fabric softener) in there and let sit. It will make your clothes smell less disgusting.

 

 

Fill it up with water...

let it sit...

Hang up your clean clothes and hope it doesn't rain.

What I've Learned

I have been in Nicaragua for a year and one day now. When people ask me if it feels like it has gone by fast my answer is always yes and no. My best analogy is a week where you suddenly realize that it's the weekend, and think to yourself, "wow, how it is Friday already?". But then, as you look back on the week Monday seems like forever ago.

It seems crazy to think I've been here for an entire year, that a new set of health volunteers has arrived in country. When I was in their place, all the Volunteers I would talk to seemed so confident and experienced, and they seemed to know everything. Now that I'm one of those volunteers, I realize they must have been faking it, because I definitely do not know everything. I haven't even found that "amazing" ropa americana store that supposedly exists in my town, though I'm starting to suspect that it's because my definition of amazing differs from that of the other volunteers. There is a place that sells a ton of jeans, but I'll be damned if I've seen them selling skirts for thirty cords a pop.

Anyway, my point is that I still have so much to learn and do during my time here in Nicaragua, but I have learned a number of key things like:

How to hand wash clothes, and the wonders of suavetel to make even the most sweat-soaked shirts wearable again.

How to endure a ten-hour bus ride on a chicken bus. Hint, it involves a lot of bachata and self-imposed dehydration.

The importance of friends and family. I have never been so lonely as I have here, but talking to friends here and back in the States has kept me from feeling it too much.

That to check if your cell phone has a charge, you can lick the metal bands on the battery, to see if you get a little shock...you can also just plug it in with its charger, which is safer and not nearly as gross.

How to give health talks in Spanish on topics ranging from the birthing process to hand washing.

That I can be funny while speaking Spanish. It has taken a lot of work, but my Spanish has improved to the point that I can express my personality, and actually make people laugh at my stories, not just at how I speak.

The simply joy of a corn tortilla hot of the tamal accompanied by a big chunck of cuajada.

That the mere sight of me can reduce small children to tears. My town is pretty isolated so some people, especially from the outlying communities, haven't ever seen someone as white as me before, and I've caused at least two children to burst out into sobs when they see my gringaness.

How to crotchet, and how to teach others to do it, in Spanish, no less.

That if you decide that you are going to help eradicate malaria one little mosquito at a time you must be prepared for the consequences. Seriously, that one I just squashed had so much blood in it, I'm surprised a pair of miniature detectives hasn't roped off the area already. If an anopheles with a badge shows up to question you, you don't know a thing, got it?

So I suppose I have learned a lot during my year here. I'm excited to see what lessons the next year and three months brings.

Buena para caminar

One of the first things that attracted me to my site when I first heard about it was the possibility for extending health care to some of the more remote communities surrounding my town. I had visions of me traveling on horseback for hours, admiring the hills covered in rice and corn fields, connecting with those so isolated from everything else. But months passed in my service and the only times I went out into the communities the health center personel and I would go in the ambulance. Bouncing in the back of a car down muddy roads so impossibly gouged and grooved by travelers so as to resemble mini mountain ranges did not fit into my idealistic imaginings somehow.

Finally when I chanced to hear about an outing leaving early in the morning, I simply showed up wearing my rubber boots and wide-brimmed hat. They had no choice but to take me with them. So after waiting for an hour for the attending doctor to arrive, he, a nurse from the center, and I headed to the hills to visit some patients.

You know the tired phrase be careful what you wish for? Hold onto that thought.

At first the doctor was worried about me coming along, seeing as women are dainty flowers or something of the sort, but Santos, the nurse, came to my defense saying, "No, hombre. Ella es buena para caminar." She's good at walking. Grateful to Santos, and not wanting to slow them down or appear weak, I kept up the pace. Well, at least the doctor and I kept the same pace, Santos is in another league, and was constantly well ahead of us both.

The man is a BEAST.

We visited ten houses, navigating empty corn fields, dried and dead after the recent harvest. At each one we stopped while Santos and I took vitals, and the doctor prescribed high blood pressure and anti parasitic medication. Afterwards we would sit for a little and enjoy the fresco, or the coffee, or oranges, or whatever the family would offer us, while we tried to steel ourselves to keep walking.

Santos taking vitals.

This particular area is built on very high, very steep hills, so that most of our walking was straight uphill, but for most of the time I felt good; I was energized and enthusiastic to be experiencing a unique day. We even traveled through a cacoa grove.

Asking for directions in the cacoa grove.

This is what the pods look like inside.  You can eat the white pulp, which is bittersweet, then let the seeds dry and make chocolate.

It wasn't until we reached the last house, with a woman whose eyes are so glazed with cataracts they look blue, that I began to feel the strain of the day. We had started out at eight that morning and it was past two in the afternoon, and we still had at least two hours hard walking to get back to town.

She asked me when I was going to visit again.  I said I didn´t know.  It took us more than four hours to reach her house.

With the local brigadista leading the way, we made it back by five, but by that time my legs were shaking, that I lost my footing on a particularly muddy hill, and fell on my butt. Just the doctor saw it, and he was just as tired as I was so I didn't lose too much face. He still offered to carry me back to town though. I declined. Politely.

That´s him with one of our last patients.

More and more people kept showing up from the fields to have their blood pressure checked as well.

Then this little guy showed up too.

Even though I was sore for days afterwards, and even though my prideful delusions of myself as still in shape after months of a sedentary life were utterly destroyed, I am glad I went. Seeing the faces of the people I met in these photos, and the fact that the perpetually serious Santos has smiled at me twice now since then, makes me feel like I made, if not a difference, at least a connection.

La Purísima and Graduation

Two big things have happened since I got back from a whirl-wind vacation with my parents.  The first was La Purísima, or the celebration of the Immaculate Conception.  This is celebrated as kind of a Mary themed trick-or-treat.  Houses put up shrines to Mary and then people go from house to house, singing prayers, and then the family hosting the singers will give out candy and plastic buckets, cups, and other items with the Virgin Mary´s image imprinted on them. 

My host family´s shrine.

The crowd waiting for their treats.

Also there are fireworks.  Lots and lots of fireworks.

(I tried to load a video of the fireworks here, but after thirty minutes of waiting, I gave up.)

Then, yesterday, I was invited to the graduation for a CICO, which is kind of like a Kindergarden graduation.  All the kids were looking very cute in their uniforms, and the parents were very proud.

Then, after everyone got their diplomas, there was a Santa-shaped piñata to destroy.

To the victor go the spoils...

And then what kind of party would it be without some dancing?