Via Nica

Some portraits of people from my community

2008-06-27T13:22:00.000-07:00

Doña Selena

Daisy and Carolina

Jose

La Lluvia

2008-05-31T07:29:00.000-07:00

For the past few months I was beginning to think life here wasn´t so physically hard as I imagined it to be. Sure, it gets hot and dusty, but that makes my afternoon bucket bath super sabrosa. Spent a lot of time swinging in my hammock. Sat on a lot of neighbors porches drinking mango frescos. Enjoyed several warm, starry nights sitting on my doorstep. Tranquilo, as we say here.

Then, it started raining.

In Nicaragua there are two seasons, summer and winter. Or better said, dry and wet. In the dry season (December to May) everything dissipates to dust and it gets hot as hell. In the wet season (the other 6 months of the year), which is just starting this week, it rains and rains and rains and floods and hurricanes sweep over the country and blows roofs off and takes out electricity and water for days. Just a week ago I was strolling around my community in my flip flops. Yesterday I was up to my knees in mud (and probably cow poo too, but it all looks the same at this point) just walking to the bus stop. As the bus approached the river, the driver went out and contemplated the gushing currents. People on the bus started telling me about last year when so and so´s pickup truck was swept away as he tried to drive through the river. Or the time everyone had to get out of the bus and cross the river, waist high in water. The bus driver decided the best thing to do was to floor it through the river (yeah..we don´t really do bridges here...), but not without stalling in the mud and me seriously thinking about how I could climb out the window if it came to that. We made it to Matagalpa City, but the bus driver decided we weren´t making the return trip because the river was too flooded to drive through. So I was stranded in the city for the night and there may or may not be a bus going back today.

Basically, what used to be an idyllic bus ride to the city is now a huge pain in the muddy ass. The good thing about all this is I think in the next few months I can entertain you all with more outrageous and interesting stories, you know, the ones that start with I-walked-10-miles.

Matagalpa City

2008-03-13T08:20:00.001-07:00

Matagalpa is the birthplace of Carlos Fonseca, the founder of Nicaragua´s Sandinista party. Accordingly, the city is a Sandinista stronghold and there are lots of cool murals glorifying Cuba that we´d never see in the U.S.
Typical Street and of course all the buses are yellow school buses from the U.S.

This is in another city, Sebaco, that I pass by when I leave Matagalpa and there are TONS of fruits and vegetables to buy year round. The best part is I don´t even have to leave the bus because the vendors will run up to the bus window to sell their goods.

This is the main Cathedral. Basically every major city in this country has a cathedral. I´ve seen lots and I still think Matagalpa´s is the prettiest especially on a day like this when the sky is deep blue.

A Small Side Project

2008-03-12T07:51:00.000-07:00

I´ve been living in Jucuapa Occidental about 3 months. When I first arrived, people would stop in their tracks and stare, jaws dropping, and children would hide behind trees and stare, because I might as well be an alien. Now, people mostly know who I am but at times I still think that they can´t believe this random Asian girl is living here. Admittedly, I would be shocked too if I were a Nicaraguan who in the comfort of my home was watching a Jackie Chan movie on TV when one day this Asian girl walks into my house and starts talking in Spanish to me. (By the way, this really did happen..several times.)

Part of Peace Corps experience is sharing American culture with Nicaraguans. For me that means explaining that there are people of all nationalities who live in the U.S. In the proecess, I´ve found that Nicaraguans are generally very misinformed about Asians in so so so many ways. I have cringed so many times at these questions - Are Japan, Korea and China all the same country? Which is closer to us.. China or the U.S.? If you speak Chinese to a Korean he can understand you, right? Do you know kung fu? Are you related to Bruce Lee?

Therefore, I have hatched an important side project, non agriculture related but really super important. In the next two years I will properly school Nicaraguans on Asian culture. Sometimes I get frustrated like explaining for the millionth time that I don´t know kung fu. But other times I am pleasantly surprised. One day I was helping this kid with his English homework and at the end of the session we were chatting. He asked how to write my name in Chinese. I´ll use &&& to represent my name here. Then he said he was going to try and write it so he took my notebook and a minute later returned it, having written neatly on the page ¨THANK YOU &&&¨ It really made my day because here was this Nicaraguan out in the sticks who´s never in his life travelled outside a 20 mile radius from his home, and he made that connection.

What is a Community Bank

2008-03-12T07:41:00.000-07:00

The basic idea is that in rural communities are huge needs for small loans (super small we´re talking like $5 to buy medicine) because at certain times of the year when there are no harvests the cash flow trickles dry. But, there are no banks out here. Therefore, I formed a community bank with about 10 women, complete with President, Secretary, Treasurer and Auditor.

Every moth each member deposites 40 cordobas, equivalent to about $2 in the bank. This creates a fund from which they can borrow money with 10% interest. At the closing of the bank in December, each member gains back all her deposits, plus earns a little extra with the interest that gets divided equally among all members.

The community bank is a project I´m really excited about because it doesn´t depend on outside organizations, it teaches women the habit of saving and it teaches leadership. All in all a really cool idea!

Teaching English

2008-03-12T07:30:00.001-07:00

Every week I teach English to 5th and 6th graders at the elementary school. At first, I proceeded to lay out the basic rules of grammar because I´m part of the school of proper grammar, but I quickly realized during the first class, as their eyes glazed over that I needed a new plan. Therefore all proper grammar as we know it was thrown out the window and I now write lists of basic English phrases like numbers, colors and days of the week, which they copy in their notebooks and repeat. Seems kinda dronelike to me, but at least they´re happy drones! And they get really excited because for them, it means they´re ¨speaking¨ English. Mob rule wins here.

I´m also going to start teaching a group of high school boys. They could use some work in pronuncation of basic words. Yet, somehow they have nearly perfect pronunciation in a variety of pick up lines, which I find amusing. The plan is to replace ¨Hey baby I love you¨with ¨Hi, how are you doing¨

Ketchup

2008-03-12T06:36:00.000-07:00

One of the challenges of living in rural Nicaragua is lack of access to a variety of nutritious food throughout the whole year.

For me, that means for example I decide I want to eat chicken and carrots tonight because I haven´t eaten vegetables nor meat for a few days, so I walk to the nearest store to find neither are available. That means rice and beans (and a multivitamin!) for dinner...again! Luckily, I have access to Matagalpa, the nearest city, so the next time I make a tripI can bring back nutritious food to stock in my house.

For Nicaraguans who can´t afford the bus fare, it means rice and beans for dinner EVERY DAY. Sometimes there are bell peppers, onions and tomatoes at times of the year when they´re harvested. But you never know because the stores often bring them in from Matagalpa, which is an hour away by bus on a dirt road and the goods have to be put in sacks and carried on horseback.

We all know that variety in diet is extremely important, but it´s not common knowledge here. Even for those Nicaraguans who do understand, they might be too poor to buy vegetables and meat everyday, or as I mentioned, there just might not be any in the store that day. Therefore, one of the areas that I am working in is food security and sustainability. Local, affordable and accessible food for all!

Right now is the tomato harvest in my community, so my project has been showing people how take full advantage of the abundance of tomatoes, by workshops on how to preserve tomatoes in the form of ketchup.

I learned that after the tomato harvest every year, hundreds of pounds of tomatoes go to waste because they go bad before they can all be eaten. Trust me, for the past weeks, I´ve been eating about 10 tomatoes a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner, and they were still going bad because I wasn´t keeping up fast enough. I also learned that Nicaraguans loooooove ketchup. Like, if you buy a slice of pizza here, it´s smothered in ketchup. They also use ketchup in spaghetti, rice, and enchiladas.

Ketchup is super easy to make. First, we halve the tomatoes and discard the seeds and juices. Then we throw the tomatoes in a pot with onion, vinegar, sugar and salt and cook until the water evaporates. The, we put the ketchup in sterilized glass jars, which can sit for up to 3 months without refrigeration. Such a simple concept and so great because all the ingredients are in the community, it tastes and looks like store bought but much more affordable. And, people are really proud that they can make it themselves and are creative in the recipes. One day as I was doing a demonstration and putting a clove of garlic in the pot, someone remarked that they loved garlic and why not put in more and before I could stop them, they threw in like 5 more cloves. In my opinion, it ended up being delicious. Other people scrunched their faces and decided they´d go home and make their own version, with tomatoes and lots of sugar, hold the garlic. Either way, they now have a great source of Vitamin C stored safely for consumption later.

Next project...mango season is coming up which means mango jam!

What I´m Doing Here...Philosophically

2008-03-06T07:25:00.000-08:00

Jucuapa Occidental is a community of subsistence farmers who practice traditional agriculture on steep mountain terrain. They´re excellent producers but if there´s a bad season like last year when tropical rain storms destroyed many bean crops it means next year finances are tight. In rural Nicaragua that means kids can´t go to school because the family can´t afford the bus fare or there´s no money to buy medicine. In addition, there´s no access to credit so the families can´t always find alternatives. In other words, the usual circumstances that make it hard to earn a living as a farmer - being at the mercy of the weather, geographical and social isolation from cities - are much worse in Nicaragua than in the U.S.

Government aid money is nearly non-existent but fortunately there is a government organization, INTA, that sends field technicians out to develop communities like mine. INTA and Peace Corps Nicaragua have partnered up, so this is where I come in. INTA technicians bring projects such as introducing improved seed varieties, soil and forestry management techniques, crop diversification and animal husbandry. I collaborate with INTA to make these projects successful. Also, since I live in the community I can identify and organize any other needs people have and create my own projects. There are also other organizations such as the Center for Tropical Agronomy, and National Union of Agriculture Producers and Ranchers who do lots of cool projects. There is definitely not a lack of motivated Nicaraguans to work with and for this reason I´m always optimistic.

For sure, a lot of times the work is frustrating and I´ve had my share of failures and awkard moments but I know they weren´t in vain because the Nicaraguans recognized that someone cared enough to try. And for someone living in their small rocky corner of the world trying to get by everyday, it means a hell of a lot.

Next Post: What do you do when it´s the tomato harvest and you have hundreds of pounds of tomatoes to preserve? Make KETCHUP!

Photos of Where I Live

2008-02-02T07:51:00.000-08:00

I live in a small community called Jucuapa Occidental, nestled in the central highlands of Nicaragua. My community has about 70 houses, a primary school and a catholic chapel. Needless to say, it´s rural. The tradeoff is that it´s gorgeous!

To get to my site the school bus has to drive through this river. In the background is a half finished bridge, which will probably never be completed (a recurrent theme here).

There´s also a river that runs through my community. Right now it´s summer so the water level is low and we easily cross on the stepping stones. Apparently during the winter when it floods it´s more of a challenge. We have to put on rubber boots or get on horses to cross. Or, on some days it´s not crossable.

This is what a typical huerta (field) looks like. Farmers in my community grow corn, beans, tomato, bell pepper and onion.

This is my host family, the Cruz Rodriguezes. Patricio my host dad (left) is a farmer by day and plays the violin in a mariachi band by night. Tony my host brother(center) walks around with his shirt unbuttoned, typical of the men in the campo. Margarita my host mom (right) is wearing a shirt says ¨Jesus, my true friend¨ In the U.S. if I saw someone sporting that shirt I´d do a double take, but in my community it seems quite normal.

When I first moved into the community I attended a lot of social events to get to know the people. This is a birthday party for my host niece. I find it somewhat disturbing that the pinata looks like her.

For a confirmation ceremony, an archbishop came and we all paraded behind him into the church.

In my community there´s a cattle ranch where cuajada (cheese) is made. We collect all the curd into a plastic sack and squeeze out all the water. Then, we curd goes through a hand mill to condense them so they stick together. Finally, we toss them into 1 lb balls and sell for about $2. Really good cuajada reminds me of fresh mozzarella. Cuajada served with fresh, hot corn tortilla is one of the best foods EVER!