bienvenidos a nica

I arrived in Managua 2 days ago and was immediately struck by the humidity; southern Nicaragua’s climate is much more tropical than I expected. A staff member of Viva Nicaragua, Yasser, picked me up and drove me the 45 minutes or so to my home in Granada where I met my family for the summer. Marta, the mom, is extremely kind and accommodating. I love the house (Mom and Mags, yall would too!). Everything is open, almost like the whole house is a patio or courtyard with partial roofing over the rooms, and tropical green plants are everywhere!

Lying down in bed that night, I realized that I hadn’t stopped sweating since I exited the airport. I can say now, 2 days later writing this, that I still haven’t stopped sweating haha, but its wonderful!

The top 2-3 feet of brick latticework bordering my walls and the pane-less window underneath are both open to the night air. Looking up through my mosquito netting that first night, I was delighted to notice glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to my ceiling. Surrounded by the sounds of a tropical rainstorm and with my rotating fan positioned so that it would blow muggy but cool air from my head to toe, I lay on top of my sheets, wondering if I’d ever use them at all this summer. Enveloped by this scene, I was overwhelmed and excited at this summer’s opportunities. I couldn’t help myself from smiling and thinking gratefully— This is exactly where I want to be.

Yesterday morning’s activities only confirmed this. After a wonderful breakfast of gallo pinto (black beans and rice), mango, banana, and black coffee (sounds heavenly, does it not?), Yasser picked me up again and gave me a “tour” of the town, helping me purchase a Nicaragua cell phone and showing me some historic sites, a local internet café, and the beautiful and expansive Lago de Nicaragua, on whose shores Granada is located. I would definitely call Granada a town rather than a city; it feels very small and minimally urban. Except for a few traces of Spanish colonization such as several cathedrals and a town square, Granada is almost even reminiscent of a village more than a town. Most of the roads are paved, but there is not too much car traffic (and even less traffic rules or regulations). The streets are occupied mostly by people walking, driving motos or small horse-drawn vehicles, fitting way too many people on a bicycle, or even shepherding small groups of cattle or horses.

I cannot hope to describe the city to you. Photos to come, I promise. One thing to keep in mind as you envision Granada: color. Picture everything, every wall, every storefront, every home’s façade a different bright color. Corals, mint greens, and pale and dark blues make up the streets and squares of this city.

After touring Granada with Yasser, I met with Carrie and William; Carrie is my Viva Nicaragua contact and William is a local community leader. Carrie and I are hoping to use micro-finance to stimulate and help start and loan to a small piñata-making business in the community of Valle de Granada. As William has experience in making piñatas, he took me to a store and the local marketplace to purchase supplies. The marketplace was an absolute zoo. Remember that scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when Marcus Brody is alone in Egypt in the middle of a busy market shouting, “Does anybody speak English?” with people stuffing chickens and rugs in his face? This is a little bit how I felt. It was fantastic.

: )

When I returned for a short break I played escondite (hide-and-seek) with Andrea, the six-year-old granddaughter of Marta, the woman I’m living with. We played with my room as the boundary, so we were left with few places to “hide.” I nonetheless made a big show of looking for her throughout the room. When it was her turn to count, Andrea followed my lead by dramatically asking herself, “Donde está Sarah??” and searching for me under lampshades and in small drawers while I crouched obviously in the room’s opposite corner; all the while stumbling over their fluffy white dog, Osito (“Little Bear”).

(As I’m writing this, Andrea just poked her head in my room with a pink plastic toy computer and asked if she could sit on the foot of my bed and work while I write... ¡QUÉ PRECIOSO!)

Then came the part of the day that I am most excited about. Carrie picked me up and, dodging potholes, cyclists, and stray dogs, we took a short and very unpaved road into Valle de Granada, the community just 5-10 minutes from my home, which we will be working with on the microfinance project. To those of you who traveled with me or saw pictures of Guatemala last summer, Valle de Granada looks and feels a lot like Julio’s community, La Arenera. Like La Arenera, there is no electricity in Valle de Granada. From my observation, most of the homes appear to be small shack-like or lean-to structures made of plywood, chain-link, and corrugated tin. There is, however, one cement building which serves as a community center and preschool. There I met with several women interested in participating in the piñata micro-loan project and some of the local kids hanging out. As I walked up I noticed that one of the children had a brightly colored green and red bird sitting on his shoulder, pecking at his T-shirt and cawing the arrival of an outsider.

I also met Doña Sandra, a local woman from Valle de Granada who, in Carrie’s words, has ambitions and desires to completely revolutionize her community. It was her idea to start a microfinance plan with a small piñata business. She mentioned that an additional problem with the community is that it is very difficult to organize people, and that there hasn’t been a census done in almost 10 years. She asked that I work on that as well while I’m here, which I of course enthusiastically agreed to do! So… Does anyone know how to take a census? I guess email me if you have any thoughts on that… : )

She also said that I would be giving workshops several times a week on things like budgeting, accounting, and making a business plan. I even overheard her telling the women that I “knew a lot about business administration”…. Although I certainly do not “know a lot about business administration,” I’ll hopefully have the time to appropriately research and prepare for these workshops not only in their content, but in their Spanish-only presentation as well….

One thing I like so far about this endeavor is that Carrie and Doña Sandra want not only to augment these women’s income, but empower them within their community as well. Our business workshops will be coupled with team building, conflict resolution, gender studies, and self-esteem presentations as well.

Carrie’s tentative plan for me and for the women of Valle de Granada this summer is an ambitious one. As the project evolves over my 8 weeks, we aim to disburse the first loan to the women and begin selling piñatas 4-5 weeks from now, and finish up the summer evaluating and supporting the women in hopes that their business and the loans will continue and even expand after I leave. As Carrie and I briefly spoke this afternoon (in my first English conversation since arriving!), I realized that my project is somewhat of an experiment, and is going to be very independent. I’m very pleased with this. Discussing our visions together, I foresee us working through the trials and errors of this project together, alongside Doña Sandra and the women we will be serving. I feet like less of a college intern and more of a colleague, which, to be honest, is both extremely exciting and enormously intimidating.

At the end of my first full day last night, I couldn’t be more excited. My home and my work plan and environment are beyond anything that I could have ever anticipated. I only hope that I’m able to dig in and invest in these women and this community in a manner effective enough to produce some progressive results by the end of the summer. I already know that this will be a challenge, both intellectually and emotionally. But right now I’m just so thankful to be here and I feel so at home already—I have wanted to do this kind of work in this kind of environment for so long. With some prayer and perseverance, this is shaping up to be quite a summer.

And I’m already learning things! After dinner last night of black beans, homemade taquitos and queso frito (yes, fried cheese), I tried to help with the dishes. Marta giggled and kindly showed me that you’re supposed to scrub the dishes then reach a bucket into the sink filled with water and pour water over the dish, not put it in the sink and run the faucet. Silly gringos…

Sorry this post is so long; no one is expected to read whole thing (except maybe my immediate family). Honestly, I want to write as much as possible whenever I have to time more for myself than for anything else. Hopefully this blog post will give yall enough to chew on for a few days as I get settled in and dive into working with the Valle de Granada community : )

(And hopefully I can find some internet to upload this before too many more days and adventures pass)

More to come!

LOVE TO ALL,

sarah

“The aim of our charge is this: love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith… To the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”

- 1 Timothy 1:5, 17