Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Day 14 Wednesday May 27

Kate…

Today was our last full day in Nicaragua. 

We woke up.

Ate breakfast.

Watched TV.

Walked on the beach and went swimming in a natural pool.  Took some fun pictures.

Ate lunch.

Took a nap (Kate) and skyped with Josh (Beth).

Watched TV and caught up on our blog.

Ate dinner.

Watched TV and finished our blog.

Packed for our trip home tomorrow!

Oh and somewhere in the middle of the day we finished that buttermilk-passionfruit cake.  Yup, we finished it in less than 24-hours.  But we’re just gonna pretend that it was somewhat of a small cake… 

Veronica blessed us with yet again another amazing dinner.  We decided we would be in big trouble if we stayed here for much longer.  She makes wonderful food.

Overall, one of the most relaxing, lazy days ever.

Day 13 Tuesday May 26

Beth…

Soo.. not much to report today. It was our first of two days spent having a little R&R at the gorgeous house in Santa Rosa. We did little housekeeping chores, like laundry, packing, and the all-important showering and bathing J We did spend some time swimming in the pool and enjoying the sun.  Veronica made us delicious food and even a buttermilk-passionfruit cake. Oh boy, looks like we shouldn’t try to ride any motorcycles uphill again soon!

Quite a pleasant day J

DAY 12 Monday May 25:

Kate…

Today, we woke up in Santa Rosa.  Seeing that it was our last day in El Transito, we had a lot to do!  We started off eating breakfast at another woman’s house from the church.  After that, we made our way back to the house to grab all of our gifts and prizes for the kids.  Because it was our last day with them, we decided we wanted to play a fun game.  We came up with our own version of Jeopardy.  In this game, everyone had a partner and we had six different categories.  These included saying the colors in English and Spanish, saying the question words (who, what when…) in English and Spanish, answering questions in English, and translating English answers.  For each category, there were seven choices: 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, and 70 points.  At the end, the top four teams with the most points were our winners.  For these winners, we had t-shirts or hats.  We were also able to hand out two starbursts for each boy and one starburst and a cute hair tie for each girl.  Overall, they seemed pretty happy.  We took pictures with all of the kids and said our goodbyes.  It was kind of sad.  Many of them came up to us after and gave us hugs and kisses.  Too cute. 

After class, we were a little sad, but were happy that we were able to give them the opportunity to teach.  While hanging out on our hammocks, Jorge, the captain of the El Transito baseball team, came over.  I had promised to give him the six baseball mitts and 4 baseballs that I brought.  The baseball gear was donated by a few guys from the Rice baseball team, so thanks guys!  We made our way to the baseball field to hand over the gear.  We were able to take a picture with them and watch a bit of their practice.  Alminton joined us on the trip and of course, while watching the practice, wanted to have another photo shoot.

Then, we had a quick lunch and went back to the house.  This is when we both passed out for 2 hours.  Oops.  We were awaken by our neighbor, Julio, playing the xylophone.  LOL.  Randommmm.  We woke up and prepared for our final class with the older kids.  We decided to just have a fun class and play musical chairs.  Whoever was the last one standing when the music stopped was allowed to re-enter the game if he or she could answer something we had gone over.

After the game, we all just hung out, ate sour patch, played volleyball, and took pictures.  Everyone wanted to go to the beach and play volleyball and soccer, so we decided to quickly pack up our stuff.  It was funny how we told everyone to meet us at the beach but instead they just waited on our porch while we were in the room packing.

After we finished packing, we made our way to the beach. GLORIOUS.  We played soccer for awhile, swam, played more soccer, watched some volleyball, and swam some more.  Then, some of the older guys had a little three vs. three game going on.  They asked us if we wanted to play and we said yes, making it a fun little 4 vs. 4 game.  Beth and I were on the same team.  Our team ended up winning 2-0. eth has some pretty awesome battle wounds for proof and I had a goal and Beth had an assist.  Very nice!

After a fun by hard work out, we took our last swim in the ocean for the day and made our way back to the house, only a two-minute walk or so.  For dinner, we walked across the street to Ronal’s house and had an awesome fish dinner!  After saying out goodbyes and taking one last picture, we got our stuff and made our way to Santa Rosa.

Overall, a very sad but warm and loving, relaxing but busy, and beach soccer-filled day!

DAY 11 Sunday May 24:

Beth…

Today was our day off from traveling and teaching, and went quite smoothly J We had an early breakfast kindly dropped off for us by Belkis, a sweet 16 year old girl with maturity beyond her age who teaches at the Christian school we have been teaching in.

After quickly finishing up breakfast, we had to work quickly to get the soccer, basketball and volleyballs together to give to the church. Our little friends Alminton and Ronal were there to help us as usual, and once we got everything together, they (rather unsuccessfully) helped us carry our large bag partway up the massive hill we have to climb to get to school every day. About 1/3 of the way up the hill, the pastor and another friend passed us on their motorcycles. His friend was kind enough to put our large bag on the back and take it to the church for us. In similar kindness, the pastor offered to give us a ride up as well. Funny story, that didn’t go so well. We both got on the back of the bike, and well, I would just like to argue that bikes should have listed weight limits as referance, just like elevators do, to prevent embarrassing situations like ours. We both hopped on the bike, ready to go, when it proceeded to go not forwards, but backwards down the hill. Looks like those beans and rice were finally catching up to us. WOW. Embarrasing. Can’t really defend myself in any way on that one. *sigh* Instead, Ronal and Alminton went on the bike, and proceeded to go up the hill with the pastor without problem. We walked.

Once we actually made it to the top, we were greeted by a large groups of kids, and explained where we were able to get everything we were donating to them. Because we only had one pump, we hung out with everyone while taking turns pumping up each ball. It was quite relaxing to just chill and talk with everyone. Once all the balls were pumped, we took pictures to take back with us to the school, and most people left. However, several of the little children stayed, and we played volleyball and kicked the soccer balls around. Kate began spinning Alminton, and soon all the kids wanted a turn. I decided it would be funny to try to get them to run and sit down in a chair right afterwards. I was right J they often fell from dizziness before making it to the chairs. Very funny J

For lunch, provided once again by Belquis, we ate a type of black tuna that has dark meat which resembles beef in appearance and is very tasty. We decided that for dessert, we were going to give Ronal’s family a little taste of an American favorite-SMORES! Yay! Let’s just say that they were a hit. I’m pretty sure Alminton had like 8 of them. Nommy!

Our next big activity was church, where we needed to prepare a song to sing. Yikes!

We dreaded the possibility of having to sing an English song in front of the entire church since the Sunday before, when the pastor asked us to do it. What gave him the idea that we could sing?! Oh boy. When the moment finally came, we took Kates computer to the front, played the lyrics in a powerpoint slideshow, and just went for it. Probably one of the most difficult things I have had to do in a long time, and considering I just took organic chemistry this past year, I like to think that makes it kinda a big deal. Overall, considering neither one of us are singers, I would say we did pretty well. Afterward, the pastor gave us a too gracious thank you and small gifts to show his and the church’s appreciation. It was so sweet I almost cried. I am going to miss these people so much, I can’t express the gratitude I have for all of the love that everyone has given Kate and I.

A day full of a wonderful mix of happiness and sadness of leaving soon.

 

DAY 10 Saturday May 23:

Kate…

After a good night’s rest in Santa Rosa, we got up at went into El Transito with Veronica.  Doña Ele and Ronal had us over for breakfast.  After scarfing down our rice and beans, eggs, and tortillas, we got into Ronal’s truck and said bye to all the kids, only to find that they were ALL coming with us!  YAY!!!  The trip included Beth and I, the Pastor and his son, Ronal and his 3 kids, Ronal’s brother, and Belkis, who is a teacher for the youngest kids at the school we taught at and an active member in the church.

Beth and I sat in the front as Ronal drove and everyone else hopped in the bed of the truck.  After about an hour and a half or so, we finally arrived in Leon.  We drove down a couple of busy streets that had all types of products being sold and people were EVERYWHERE!  Immediately Beth said that she loved the atmosphere and wanted to get out!  Our first stop was: the oldest church in Central America.  We got out and started walking towards the church.  As we crossed the street, one child each grabbed our hands.  It was too cute.  When we got inside the church, Beth kindly informed me of the sweat that was covering the entire back of my dress.  Awesome.  That’s what you get for sitting in the middle of a truck with no AC and very little air reaching you from the windows.  But don’t worry, I made her sit in the middle on the way back ;)

After seeing the church, we went to the ZOO!  Beth and I were not sure what to expect from this.  And we were definitely not blown away by it.  There was a total of probably 20 animals or so.  A few monkeys, a couple of raccoons, a couple of deer, a duck or two, some chickens, an alligator, 3 turtles, and last but not least, a not so cute anteater/pig looking thing.  We both thought of any zoo in the US and how this zoo was a joke in comparison.  But, the coolest things were the white-faced monkeys.  About three of them would come right up to the fence to look at us.  When I turned my camera on, it’s like they knew I was going to take a picture, so they started posing!  It was great!  Then, the stuck their hands out so that we could touch them.  The four little rascals had no problems grabbing their hands and smiling for the camera.  Beth and I on the other hand were a little more skeptical and talked about possibly using hand sanitizer after we touched them.  In the end, we decided it wasn’t the best decision and moved on.  About 10 minutes later when we left the zoo, the kids grabbed our hands again.  DINGGGG (lightbulb goes off).  The kids were touching the monkeys.  They did not wash their hands.  Therefore, we touched the monkeys without really getting to touch them!  BOO AND LAME!

After the zoo, we went to a small hole-in-the-wall restaurant.  The options were: fried chicken, chicken breast, or something else that chicken that we had never heard of.  We chose fried chicken, one because it was cooked the most, and two, let’s be honest with ourselves here, we like fried chicken!  When it came, it was possibly the smallest chicken wing I had ever seen.  It also came with white rice, some noodle things, and some vegetables.  Beth told me it probably wasn’t a good idea to eat the vegetables (YES!) and I didn’t really like the noodle things, so after I finished the chicken in 2 minutes, I tried to finish some of my rice.  I then ordered an orange fanta.  Very healthy?  You know the answer to that…

After lunch, we told the Pastor we wanted to do a little bit of shopping for small gifts.  He took us to a store that was like a party store/convenient store/the lady followed us around the ENTIRE store.  Did she think we were going to steal something?  I told Beth, if I had  any interest in stealing from the store, which I didn’t, I would probably steal some shampoo.  Then we told them we were going to just walk around the street we were on for a little bit and walked into a few clothing stores.  We saw a couple of cute things here and there, but for their prices, we decided we could probably buy the similar thing in the States.  We did not find any souvenir shops.  Boo L

After that, we went to the supermarket, for what reason I don’t know…  I guess maybe the Pastor thought we might find something there?  Haha  We ended up walking down the candy isle (hmmm I wonder who led the way…)  and I saw hersehy’s chocolate and immediately thought of SMORES!  Yes, my head was dreaming of chocolate deliciousness.  I asked the Pastor if they had ever had smores and he said no, so we bought the chocolate, marshmallows, and graham crackers.  Great success!

After that, we all piled into the truck and head home.  This time I was by the window and wasn’t covered in sweat.  Well maybe just a little.  I forgot to say that after Beth told me I was covered in sweat, I quickly decided it was my defense mechanism against all men who dared to smile or whistle at me.  Perfect.  Beth was wearing a backpack.  SUCKSSSS.  No sweat defense mechanism for her!!!

I fell asleep on the way home and by the time I woke up, we were back!  The kids came over right away and we just hung out for awhile.  We then told them we were going to cook a little dinner and that they should go home.  They didn’t.  So we made omelets and when I say ‘we’ I mean Beth.  All I did was chop up some ingredients.  After we finished eating, it looked like, and sounded like, a storm was coming.  We didn’t know what to do.  By the time we decided we wanted to go to Santa Rosa, it was raining.  We didn’t know who to ask to take us to Santa Rosa.  We decided to run across the street with all of our stuff and ask Ronal to take us.  His wife kindly agreed to take us and we were on our way.

Let me just describe the run over there.  First of all, I was wearing a skirt and my Nike tennis shoes.  A definite no-no.  Also, I had a flashlight on my head.  You know, the ones that construction workers use.  Lastly, Beth and I were screaming the whole run over to Ronal’s house.  Finally, we arrived.  Hallelujah.

Overall, it was an educational, shopping-filled and monkey day with a little splash of God’s sense of humor.

DAY 9 Friday May 22:

Beth…

Today, after waking up still salty from the sea in Rancho Fifo and having breakfast with Louisa, we went onto class for our last serious day.  We decided to review more vocabulary in hopes that they would be able to use it in the questions we had taught them. 

Today, Kate was the one with a skillful teaching trick. At the end of class, we asked everyone to prepare a question with new vocabulary to share with the class. We asked for volunteers before choosing groups to go. We were happy to have about 6 groups go before we had to start choosing. At the end, as a reward, Kate gave candy to all the volunteers as a surprise. Nicely done J

In the afternoon, we hung out with are little friends Alminton, Ronal, and Julio. Almiton loves Kate’s camera, so it wasn’t long before we were having a photo shoot of our own. For one of the pictures, Julio brought his pet parrot over, and Kate decided to pose for a picture with it. Right after the picture, the bird poo pooed all over her hand.

The camera: $200

The Bird: $5

Her expression while squealing “He just pooed on me, he POOOED on ME!!”: priceless.

Thank you Lord for sweet moments like these J

Not long afterward, we decided to cool off from the heat in the ocean with Amilcar. The tide was rather high and the water rough, so we were too chicken to go far in. Amilcar however, flipped and ran through the waves like no one’s business. Needless to say, having that tiny boy half my size go twice as far out as me was a bit embarrassing, but it’s all good.

We returned to Rancho Fifo soon after, and drank orange juice on the hammock to relax. It was what we in the US like to call “the good life”.  After yet a bit more napping, we held afternoon class.

For our class, we played hangman to review vocabulary. We decided to make it a competition between us and the class, trying to see if we could outsmart them with difficult words or expressions. Turns out, we can’t. Afterward, they decided to give us the same challenge and use difficult Spanish words. I am proud to announce that we won all three games and reclaimed our hangman respect. One of the words was the friggin national bird who’s sounds like someone is gagging, I think we did ourselves proud.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing and hanging out with our little friends. I am sad to say it was our last day of our full week L

DAY 8 Thursday May 21:

Kate…

Because there was no power last night, we spent the night in Santa Rosa.  In the morning, we taught the kids the rest of the question words and asked two boys to come to the front and say a couple of phrases because they were doing such a great job.  Their pronunciation wasn’t perfect, but it was pretty darn good considering how off it was when they first started, so Beth and I were definitely proud of them. 

Today, all meals were at Yolanda’s house.  The Pastor told us she is one of the oldest donors of the church.  For breakfast, we had, surprise surprise, rice and beans, an egg, a sausage, and calala juice!  We LOVE calala juice.  It kind of tastes like pineapple juice but without the tang.  Beth has been coming up with ways to sneak some back into the United States.  She’s kind of obsessed.  After breakfast, we went back to the house, which by the way, is soon to be a learning center, and caught up on our blog!

For lunch, we returned to Yolanda’s house for what could have been the best fish we’ve ever had.  It was called “Pargo” in Spanish, so I don’t know what that translates into English.  After lunch, we took our usual afternoon nap on our wonderful hammocks.  What a life…  Right Dad? J

In our afternoon class, we had a few more people than the day before and continued working on some vocabulary.  We went over animals and food.  A lot of them struggle with words that start with ‘s’ such as snake.  They always want to add an ‘e’ before the ‘s’ to make it ‘esnake’.  By the end of the class, the Pastor could say rice and beans faster than “arroz y frijoles”. 

Then, all of the students wanted to play volleyball with us.  We agreed to play because they said we could play on the beach and because we had not played with them yet.  We were a little surprised with their volleyball skills.  Not as good as we thought.  And they didn’t really play by the rules, but such is life.  We adjusted.  Beth kept trying to tell them that we had to rotate every time we got the ball again.  They didn’t seem to get it.  All they were concerned about was having Beth or I stand somewhere in the middle.  The two gringas in the middle.  Righttttt.  Sounds good to me.

The ball was constantly going out of bounds and one time it went over the wall of a house on the beach, so Beth and I decided to sprint into the water, for the first time, and soak it up.  It was still hot outside and the water was perfect.  Not too cold and not too hot.  Ahhh.

After we went swimming, we walked back to the house and found the Pastor there.  He was trying to set up a skype account, so Beth and I tried to help him.  We were able to get a little bit of a signal from the house two doors down, and talked to my mom for a little bit.  After that, we returned to Yolanda’s house for our last meal of the day.  We talked for a little while with her daughter in law, Rosaria.

Then we returned to the house for our beauty sleep.

Overall, a refreshing and yummy, fish-filled day.

Friday, May 22, 2009

DAY 7 Wednesday May 20:

Beth…

We started today off well after a restful night in beautiful Santa Rosa. School, as I mentioned, is at 7:30, so we had to high tail it out of there to be on time. We finished up our last exercises with the questions words, which actually take a while because we go around to each pair of students and make sure they are pronouncing the question and answer correctly. I wanted to make note of the students who were really trying, so I took out a piece of paper to mark down the standouts on the half of the classroom that I cover. Boy did that have an effect! All of the kids started looking at each other and trying to see what I was writing down, but I folded it, mainly to make them sweat it out a little. Wha ha ha ha. All of a sudden, the students who weren’t so interested in trying made a pretty strong effort to improve did. I would like to give myself a little pat on the back for that clever teaching tool. Muy bien yo.

We had lunch with a very kind lady named Anamarcia, who went on and on about how it was a pleasure to have Julie’s daughter and her friend over for breakfast. She made us tortillas, and beans with a side of sour cream. We also had some kind of milk or fruit juice (it was hard to tell) that was very sweet with a hint of nutmeg. I loved it, but it was too sweet for Kate. She had the most adorable puppies that chased her chickens around. It was pretty funny.

For the afternoon class, we decided to start covering basic vocabulary because we already taught them how to ask all the general questions they would need. Only three students came today, but it ended up being quite entertaining anyways because it was more personal and we were able to play some games that just take too long with a large group. We would say something in Spanish and ask them to translate it into English, and they would tease each other while they tried. Good times good times.

We ate lunch with Anamarcia, who was again as nice as she could be. Unfortunately, we cannot say the same about her chickens. Let’s just say they are a little on the wild side. While we were eating, one particularly aggressive one was scoping us out, deciding how to go in for our food. I could see the look in its eyes that whole four feet away, and I knew what it wanted. That chicken thinks it’s gonna get some food, that’s funny. For most of you that know me, you know it’s a difficult thing for me to share a bite of sandwich to a hungry friend, much less a butt-ugly chicken. Puh-leeze. Anyway, it came around closer and closer, and with a giant leap jumped onto our table. Being the stunningly brave people we are, Kate and I screamed in unison like little girls. Wow. We quickly shooed the chicken away, but the shame of having been scared of what normally is our food remained.

After class we managed to sleep, yet once again, in our most wonderful hammocks. I can’t decide if those are a blessing or a curse because, even if you aren’t tired at all, as soon as you sit in one, its pretty much guaranteed that you will fall asleep. No joke, it has been tested and proven. Unfortunately, I caught a little something and was rather sick for most of the day, but being able to take a nap was very helpful.

After the nap, we prepared rather quickly for our bible study. We decided to talk about God’s love and just how profound it is, as well as how his commandments for us are not just a list of rules or restrictions as they might seem to be, but rather a way of living that sets us free and gives us the strength to have a more fulfilling life. Now try saying that in Spanish, I dare you. No really, go ahead, because I probably could have used the information to sound a little smoother than I did. Not to worry though, it ended up going well anyway.

Once we got there, we first sang several songs and read a few verses. I was a little nervous that I would have to leave because I was feeling ill, but by the grace of God I felt quite well the entire time. After about 20 minutes, it was our turn to go for the gold. Needless to say, our Spanish was a little rough, because it is rather difficult to put across emotional messages rather than basic ideas. It began quite slowly and was a bit awkward, but after a little while I think we were able to get the message across. The people helped us with words we struggled with and couldn’t have been nicer. After our study, we decided to give our brief testimonies. For whatever reason, it was much easier for both of us to talk about our testimonies, or at least I felt like I was able to speak more smoothly. Gracias a Dios, we were able to finish without making fools of ourselves!!

We then decided to play a game that is something like “the great wind blows for” or “never have I” where everyone sits in chairs in a circle, except there is one chair too few, so one person is left over, and has to stand up. The person standing says something along the lines of “the great wind blows for people wearing sandals”, and everyone wearing sandals must get up and find another chair. The person left over has to share something about his or herself, and start another round. Take a wild guess at who was left over first. Bet you never would have guess it was me, would you? Oh yes, you betcha. A girl once known for being one of the fastest on the soccer team could not beat some 10 year-old children to a chair. Oh boy. So I shared some basic info like where I am from, how many sisters I have, etc. Almost immediately, I was asked if I had a boyfriend. When I answered yes, one of the older women said “see muchachos, she is already taken, too bad”. Slightly embarrassing, to say the least. But not quite as embarrassing as the fact that I proceeded to lose the next three rounds. Oy yoy yoy!!! I decided to just stop changing chairs even if I should have J Oopsies!! When Kate went to the front, they also asked if she had a boyfriend, and from then on out, everyone had to answer whether or not he or she had a girlfriend or boyfriend.  For those who did not have boyfriends, the boys would always say, “Do you want one?”  It was pretty hilarious. We played for quite a long time and finished the game with a particularly funny occurrence. The previous person said that everyone had to get up and find a chair on the other side of the room. In a rush, a young (pretty fat) boy and several women collided in one corner, and the boy ate it. Oh man it was awesome. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any funnier, a lady who still needed a chair leapt up to grab the one the boy missed. She went at it with such vigor that she proceeded to snap the chair in two. Oh man I haven’t laughed that hard in a long, long time. I couldn’t breathe for about 5 minutes afterwards. It’s things like this that make you so excited to get up every morning. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor J

Later that night, we had dinner at Anamarcia’s. She made us beans, rice and an egg, a particularly common meal here. We went to bed pretty quickly after that in Santa Rosa because the lights were out. Nice J.

Must say that was an awesome day. 

DAY 6 Tuesday May 19:

Kate…

So, last night we slept in Santa Rosa (J)  The power went out, so Jairo, our neighbor, and Alberto, a gardener from El Transito, took us to Santa Rosa… on motorcycles!  Beth says, “Sorry Mom.”  It was my first time and I had a blast!  WHEEEE!  Beth wants to agree, but feels like she can’t say it out loud. Oopsies.  But just know she’s thinking it.

This morning, we began teaching the kids the words that most questions begin with: Who, What, When, etc…  We practiced the pronunciations and basic and common questions that they might come across.  We had them practice in pairs or, compañeros, and you could really tell who was trying and practicing when we told them to.  After they practiced for a couple of minutes with their partner, Beth and I would walk around and ask one student to say the question and the other the answer, and after that, we asked them to switch roles.  The ones who didn’t try expected us to completely say it word by word for them, which kind of tested my patience.  But definitely a test from God…  The ones who did practice were ready for us with their best pronunciation possible.  Their homework was to practice saying who, what and when for the next class.

We forgot to mention that Jairo put up two hammocks for us yesterday. AWESOMEEEEE.  So, when we got back from class, guess what we did?  Yup, you got it, hammock timeeeee.  YES!  Amilcar dropped by, which means, he wasn’t in class.  Muy mal.  But we hung out with him nonetheless and had some fun just talking.  I busted out my mini iPod shuffle and let him listen to it.  He was so funny, so I gave him both headphones and let him dance away.  Too cute.  And hilarious.  And precious.  Oddly enough, Colbie Callait was his favorite singer, and he especially liked the song “The Little Things”.  He even tried to memorize some of the words.  Haha too cute.

For lunch, Ronal and Elle had us over for lunch.  We had ceviche, tuna, and rice and beans.  YUMMYYYYY.  While we were eating, the kids came home from school and ate their lunch too.  Alminto was chowing down on his food, so much, that half of it spilled all down his shirt and pants.  All he did was laugh and say “mama!”

In the afternoon class, we continued working on the question words.  The Pastor attended class today and every time he said something in English, whether he said right or not, he expected an applause.  Which he got, by the way, with a few giggles in between.

At 5 PM, we headed to the “cancha” or basketball court.  We played soccer for about two hours.  DURO!  I am proud to say, the girls took the cake AGAIN!  We beat the boys by not 1, 2, or 3 goals, but 4!  After Beth and I scored a goal, we would both do a crazy celebration.  Most of them laughed at us at first, but before you knew it, everyone had their own victory dance!

On the way back to Rancho Fifo, the lights went out. Perf.  Ronal and Elle had us over again for dinner, in the dark.  While we were waiting, we played with Emily, Ronal, and Alminto and got some pretty cute pictures of them.  For dinner we had… RICE AND BEANS!  And some fried cheese.  Interesante…

Because the lights were out, we went to Santa Rosa again.

A pretty comical day overall.  Gracias a Dios.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

DAY 5 Monday May 18:

Beth…

Monday was our first full day teaching both the little ones and the adults. Lord have mercy. We slept in El Transito, and put together our lesson plan pretty quickly. We decided to do the alphabet with the kids first, because after teaching the adults we realized that they have very little background. And when we say little, oh we mean little. So we went through the entire thing pretty easily, but it was a bit painful to hear them attempt to pronounce some letters and words and fail soooo badly. Hey, at least we only have up to go from here, right? We arranged a time to teach for the rest of the week with the teachers. Guess what we chose. Just try. Bet you didn’t guess 7am did you? Oh yes, 7am, perfect. We chose it because its so much cooler, and most people are up and about by then because the sun rises at like 5 anyway. This trip is about sacrifice and serving at all costs and times of day. I’m just going to tell myself its good for me. Anyway, we made lunch for ourselves with limited ingredients, we do what we can, can’t say its super healthy though. We also forgot to mention that the people here have generously fed us multiple times with delicious meals, usually beans and rice with eggs, beans and rice with cheese, beans and rice with tortillas, or beans and rice with fish. Did we mention beans and rice? I must say, its so tasty here, OM NOM NOM, according to me, or YUMMMAY according to Kate. It’s much better than in the States, probably because they cook it in fat. Funny story, I thought I was going to lose weight on this trip. Do NOT think that will be happening.

That afternoon, we taught the adults again, and reviewed question words, like who, what, when, where, why, how and which. They seem to be catching on a little bit and their pronunciation is slowly improving. We have them get into pairs and practice questions and responses with each other.

Later that evening, we played soccer again. Once more it was men vs. women, and boy, some of those girls have gotten competitive. We may or may not have had a slight influence on that. The men won the first game and the women one the second. If you look at the pictures, you can see just how sweaty I was. Cute. Good thing Kate nor I are looking for attention from los muchachos here, luckily for Josh and Martin :-P. Honestly though, we have gotten a little unwanted attention, but most of them are all talk with their friends, and actually kinda scared of us. WEANIES.

Per usual, a fun, fulfilling, and filling (thanks to the beans and rice) day.

 

DAY 4 Sunday May 17:

Kate…

Today was our rest day.  We spent Saturday night in Santa Rosa, which is a nearby beach development, but not many people have built houses on the land.  But, there is one family, the Marletts, who have built a BEAUTIFUL home and have been gracious enough to let us stay there when and if we need to (Thank you Terri and Chris!).  We woke up this morning and finished our blog for the first day.  Took a little while.  Oops.  I’ve always been good at procrastinating. 

After we finished, we asked Veronica, who is the caretaker of the house, to take us back to El Transito.  Waiting for us when we arrived were Amilcar, Julio, Alminto, Ronal, and Emily, our little entourage.  Love them.  Alminto, Ronal, and Emily are brothers and sister and live across the street.  They are the cutest!  Alminto is 4 years old, full of it, loves attention (and Oreos), and sounds like a little girl still.  Ronal is 5 years old, and a little gordo (chubby).  He loves to smile and be around us.  He always calls us “las gringas” and always wants to know where we’re going.  Emily is the oldest of the three and is very quiet, but she is a sweet girl.  We already mentioned Amilcar, but Julio is our next door neighbor.  He is fourteen years old and a talkative one.  Sometimes too talkative.  But he is also a very nice boy.

After that, Amilcar and Julio accompanied us to the beach.  We ended up walking to my Mom’s friend’s hotel.  His name is Roger.  He is also a gringo from the states.  YES!  We’re not the only ones!  We stopped by to say hello and drop off some saddle soap, horseradish, and sour patch kids, things you can only buy in the US that he misses dearly.  After hanging out for a bit, we walked back with the two boys and took some fun pictures.  They were incredibly fascinated with the camera.  Amilcar took my glasses and was looking extra fly.  They were a little big for him, which only made it cuter.  Beth ended up dunking Amilcar in the ocean in all of his clothes, but he didn’t seem to mind.  He actually quite enjoyed it.

When we got back, we rested for a little bit, and then made our way up the “painfully,” said Beth, HUGE hill to the 5 PM church service.  Their service is very different from what we’re used to.  There were about 20-30 people there.  They sang a lot, clapped a lot, and when the Pastor was praying, each person was also praying out loud.  Something very different and new for Beth to see.  They also stood up a lot, which for a two hour sermon, was not so much fun.  The Pastor gave a sermon on the story about Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden from Genesis.  I forgot to mention the pronunciation of Beth’s name by the Pastor.  Basically, can’t describe how he said it.  He was not even close.  At first, he actually didn’t attempt to say her name, but after Beth was like, “Pastor, what’s my name?”  he tried but struggled and it came out as a grunt.  Perfect.  Right before the service was about to end, the Pastor asked us if we wanted to sing a song?  Haha me and Beth sing…  That’s funny.  We said maybe next time.  Which you will hear about later. Beth would like to add that Emily held her hand the whole walk back from church, and she thought it was adorable.

After church, we had a quick round of cards with the Pastor and the little ones.  I decided to bring out a bowl of oreos.  Funny how Alminto thought de deserved three and everyone else only deserved one.  He grabbed those things so fast!  No one else even had a chance.  Too cute.

Overall, a relaxing beach day with an awesome church service.

DAY 3 Saturday May 16:

Bet… (I mean Beth!)

Today, we went to the beach again in the morning for some quiet time. The weather is beautiful here in the morning and the evening, but during the middle of the day it’s intensely hot and really best to just sleep, or that’s at least how we have dealt with it J. So at the beach, we read our bibles and relaxed in the shade. A couple kids came to visit, and per usual, I was wearing my most awesome tourist gear, so we got a lot of strange looks. Just for the record, Kate’s look was a little touristy too :-P Not to worry though, I didn’t chase any birds today. We basically just relaxed for about an hour and headed back to prepare for our next English class at three.  We started the blog, and as you can see, it is still a work in progress that we may or may not have procrastinated on a little bit. Oopsies.

 

For lunch, we took on the arduous task of cooking for ourselves with our tiny gas cooker. I would like to say that we did a pretty good job. We had ham, green beans, an apple and crackers. Kate was a little less than pleased to eat her vegetables, but with the help of the ham and crackers, she was able to manage and force them down. Kate would like to add that I did not particularly want my apple, but she forced me to eat it because I made her eat the veggies. Fine Kate, we are even J

So that afternoon, we taught class, and decided to review the alphabet and the pronunciation of each letter, because most people here have simply memorized a few phrases that don’t really sound like English because they say them with a Spanish accent. It was fun to teach them how to pronounce things like “th” (for example telling them to put their tongue in between their teeth) and the word “am”. I think they are starting to learn, which is very cool J

We played cards again that afternoon. It does get a little frustrating to play with the kids because they just say “mentira” or BS after every round. Kinda annoying, so we decided to play another game. They taught us one of theirs, which is similar to Rummy and pretty fun. I think I am going to try to teach them another game soon.

That evening, we played soccer for the first time on the basketball court. They actually don’t have a soccer field, because they used the space they had to make a baseball field, which is the most popular sport here. It was a lot of fun to play with everyone, and we decided to play men against women. I am proud to pronounce that with mine and Kate’s help, the women won. Get it girls J We may or may not have shown off our moves a little bit, just for fun. You know, after 15 years of playing we should be able to do something.

Overall, another good day J

DAY 2 Friday May 15:

Kate…

Today, we woke up to find that someone had eaten our bread.  Great.  It’s not like we were planning on having sandwiches everyday for lunch or anything.. No biggie.  We were wondering who on Earth was able to break through the steel barred door and take little bites of our bread.  It’s not even like the whole thing was gone.  Just random bits.  We asked our neighbor and the Pastor, and it turns out, we have little cat friends that like bread.  Now we know to keep our food locked up in zip lock baggies or in the refrigerator.

We went to the beach for the first time.  Beth looked a little bit like a tourist, but just a little bit ;)  You know, just bright clothing, a hat, sunglasses, a HUGE backpack, flip flops, a camera, an orange water bottle, and white skin.  But no big deal, she didn’t stand out or anything…  This is where Beth first met Amilcar.  Amilcar is a little boy from the town who comes from a rough background, but is still a precious boy that craves attention.  He was fishing with a coke bottle and fishing line and was actually pretty successful.  He had about ten fish in his little pile on the beach.  The vultures were crowding around his fish and after he left to fish again, they would try and steal some, but luckily, Beth came to the rescue!  To stand out even more, she ran at the vultures like a crazy woman.  She even flapped her arms like a bird to speak their language… (this is true)  Beth would like to add that no birds were successful in stealing any fish.

Later that day, we gave our first English lesson.  We had about ten people come, ranging from 14 to 32 years old.  We reviewed basic conversational questions and tried to get a feel for what they already knew.  It was interesting to see what they had trouble pronouncing.  “th” for Beth was especially hard, and even after a week’s practice, they continue to call her “Bet” or “Best”.  Kind of hilarious.

Later that evening, we played BS, which we called “mentiroso” in Spanish.  The Pastor ended up winning..  weird.  But it was a lot of fun and a good ice breaker for us and the kids that were there.

When it was time for bed, we set up our mosquito net (our lifesaver) and put on our fan (also our lifesaver).  Overall, it was a pretty good first day.  Just adjusting to the lifestyle, mosquitoes, and heat.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

DAY 1 Thursday May 14:

Kate…

So, I landed in Houston at 5 AM.  Our flight to Managua wasn’t until 9 AM, so I had some time to kill.  I decided to look up Beth’s flight and tell her where to go after she got off the plane, because I figured that would save her some time, seeing that her plane was supposed to land around 8:10.  She called me just as she landed around 8, and I told her we were boarding soon.  She freaked out a little and said, “Great, I’m going to be sprinting to the gate, 120 speed.”  She definitely got there with LOADS of time to spare..  Good job Beth.  I didn’t sleep at all the night before because I left LA at 12:45 AM.  I watched a movie and then couldn’t fall asleep, so on the flight to Managua, I passed out.  We finally got into Managua and had no problems with our bags.  They were waiting for us on the conveyor belt.  Hallelujah. 

Beth…

So I left for Houston around 5am from my house, which left me a bit tired because I had managed to go to bed around 3 that morning. Good job me for leaving the packing until the last minute. I slept straight through my flight to Houston, and landed only to call Kate and find out that our gate for the flight to Managua was basically on the opposite side of a relatively large airport. Nice. I finally got out of the plane at like 8:15 and sprinted, yes like 120’s speed sprinted to the gate. It was a freaking LONG run, and boy am I out of shape. Turns out my effort was pretty much unnecessary though, because I got there with like 15mins to spare. I took out some cash, but, being in a hurry did not take out enough. Looks like I was just on top of my game then lol. Kate passed out for the flight to Managua, and I talked to a guy who’s daughter is going to adopt some kids from Nicaragua. Very cool. We finally landed and walked out to find the airport employees all wearing masks. That was comforting.

Kate…

So initially, when we first walked out, we didn’t see Luis or Veronica, so we might have been in a TINY state of panic, but no big deal.  We decided to buy some minutes for the phone my mom gave me that works in Nicaragua.  After buying some minutes, we called Luis only to find he was standing like 20 feet away from us… haha whoopsie.  We loaded our 4 MASSIVE suitcases into the back of Luis’ truck, and off we went to the supermercado (that’s supermarket for all you Gringos, Dad).  On the way there, I was a little nervous that someone would just snatch one of our bags, because they were just chillin’ out there, but we made it safely.  Once we were in the supermarket, we spent about 1.5 hours trying to decide and find all the food we wanted.  A lot of sandwich meat, milk, cereal, OREOS, water, juice, soda (shhhh), bacon, cheese, crackers, mustard, mayo, thousand islands dressing, vegetables (yuck!), frutas, eggs, and bread.  In the middle of our shopping adventure, Luis brought us some pretty delicious ice cream, and two scoops of it!  NOT GOOD!  Finally, we made it to the checkout only to find that our bill was only $129 for 11 days worth of food.  It probably would have cost us about $300 in the US.  VERY NICE!

Beth…

Right after we landed we were able to get our suitcases really easily, though I did try and chase down several that weren’t mine. Once again, just on my game. We couldn’t find Louis at first, and I could just imagine my dad loosing it if he was there. Oh Dad. But we had a phone, bought some minutes, and called him only to find he was about 15-20 feet away from us. Well done Rice girls. We loaded everything into his large truck and it fit pretty snuggly, so it was hard to imagine loading groceries and a refrigerator in there as well. I loved looking out the window as we drove and just watching people. There are so many people out and about, and the city is so lively. Everyone has very American clothes, and there are a lot of American billboards and products. The difference is in the general environment. Houses are small, dirty, and made of trashbags, slabs of wood and corregated tin. It didn’t take us long before we got to the grocery store. We had to lock all the luggage in the back under bungie cords. While I never felt threatened as far as my safety, robbery is a huge problem there and you always need to be aware. When we got to the supermarket, we pretty much bought half of the store, I think Kate included a list above. We did a good job reinforcing the fat American stereotype lol. Everything was so cheap though, because 20 cordobas are about equal to 1 dollar. In total it was less than $150, pretty cheap for all the stuff we bought.

Kate…

We then had to wait for an hour or so as Luis had some business to do.  We hung out in a tiny air-conditioned room and tried very hard to be patient.  Not one of my strengths.  That’s why I don’t play golf like Justin does.  After that, we went to an appliance store to buy a refridgerator for my mom and all of the food we bought!  I found one that was 5-6 feet tall and made the purchase!  Beth said she thought the same one would have been twice as much in the US.  YES!  GREAT SUCCESS!  Now, here was our dilemna…  We had to fit oodles of food, all four suitcases, and a large cooler Luis and Veronica brought for all of the perishable foods.  Interesante…  Es posible?  SI!  Con Dios todo es posible.  Luis worked some magic and off we went!  I was getting tired at this point, seeing as I had only slept a couple of hours in the last 18 hours or so, so I decided to take a little nap on the way to El Transito.  20 minutes later, I was awaken with some fried chicken and coke.  Guess what?  I wasn’t tired anymore!  YUMMYYYYY.

Beth…

After the supermarket, we had to wait for Louis to do some work at his office, and ended up hanging out in an office with a friendly coworker. Afterward, we went to an appliances store to pick up a refrigerator for our house in el Transito. The store was so nice, and it felt really odd to walk in there after seeing what the rest of the city looked like. There were large flat screen TVs, dishwashers, cameras, and of course, refrigerators. It was just like being in a store in the United States. Kate bought a pretty big one with a freezer and all, and I thought that there was going to be no way for us to fit all of our luggage, food and that massive appliance into the truck, but Louis did somehow, and it looked pretty ridiculous because the fridge stood upright. I got a little sick in the car, and I think it was because of the ice cream I ate, but it didn’t last very long and all went well on our 1.5 hour trip to el Transito. The scenery is amazing, with rolling hills and tons of trees. I loved just looking out the window and eating the fried chicken Louis got us while Kate passed out in the seat next to me. With her mouth open. Cute. She looked like a baby bird with its mouth open for food. Thank God for free entertainment.

Kate…

When we got to El Transito, we started to unload the car immediately because we didn’t want to lose the light.  Pastor Carcamo came and helped us unload the refrigerator with Luis.  Beth and I would have done it, but we decided to get the groceries instead.  Haha.  Luis and Veronica gave us the cooler with ice, so we left all the perishable foods in it and loaded everything else into the kitchen.  The kitchen is small room that is not connected to the main room.  You have to go outside to enter the kitchen.  It has a small, metal-fenced door with a HUGE lock so that no one can take anything while we are not there or in the middle of the night.  We left everything else on the counter and proceeded to put our suitcases in the room.  Estella, my mom’s caretaker for the house, and one of her oldest daughters came to sweep the room and the porch before we settled in.  Luis, Veronica, the Pastor, Estella, and her daughter all left, and finally we were left alone… SIKE!  Julio, who is our next-door neighbor, called out to us, “Muchachas.”  We were not alone…  Julio is the son of Naya and Jairo.  He has two little brothers, Cairo and Christian, who is a new baby of three months.  He wanted to talk and had lots of questions including, “Y Dona Julie?”  Meaning and Mrs. Julie, where is she?  Yes, my mom is cooler than me.  But only in El Transito.  Sorry mama.  Meanwhile, Beth and I did not realize, but we were getting bit to death.  Awesome.  Finally, Julio ran out of questions and we went to go lock the front gate, which also has a HUGE lock on it.

Beth…

I had imagined what El Transito would be like so many times before I came here, and while I knew it would be different from that image, I was still surprised. I hadn’t pictured horses wandering around randomly, or the condition of the houses being quite as run down as they were. I loved the fact that there were a ton of people out and about, with kids running around in groups playing random games. Soon after arriving, we took the refrigerator in the kitchen, which is separate from the main room just like the bathroom is, and took all of our food in. We couldn’t refrigerate anything that night though because we needed an extension cord, and needed to allow the gas in the fridge to settle. Being the geniuses that we are, we left the food on the counter. I’ll let you know how that went in the next section.  We walked around just a little bit, went to a small bar about 2 houses down and used the internet cord to email our families. By the time we went back, it was getting dark, and we decided to call it a night. We decided to lock the gate, and well, got a little surprise.

Kate…

As Beth and I were meddling with the gate lock and a small flashlight, someone began throwing rocks at us.  My initial thought, “AH!”  But I tried to keep it inside.  Well I did grab onto the Beth and say, “What was that!”  We realized, they were rocks.  And this happened a couple of times while we were at the gate.  I proceeded to freak out a little.  I mean who throws rocks, honestly!  Next, we decided to grab some water and lock the kitchen, and again, more rocks.  No bueno.  We were a little scared at that point, especially me.  We went inside the room in a little state of panic.  Beth whipped out her pepper spray in 2.5 seconds and I grabbed the flashlight.  Now, I don’t know exactly what I thought I was going to do with that flashlight if someone did attack, but I had it just in case…  Wow.  I then thought it would be a good idea if we turned the light off inside the room, but left the light on on the porch, we they couldn’t see inside, because the windows only have sheer curtains, but we could see them outside if they got on the porch.  Wow again.  Then, we thought it might be a good idea if we turned off the porch lights too.  Just dumb.  So, there Beth and I stood behind the front door, ready to spray and shine if someone dared to barge through our door.  Beth kept saying I think we’re safer outside, because there were people out and about, even though it was dark, and hopefully they would see or hear us if something happened.  I thought the exact opposite.  I felt safe inside where they couldn’t reach us.  Eventually, Beth convinced me that we were safer outside, and we turned on all the lights and went outside, pepper spray and flashlight still in hand.  Then Julio, our neighbor, and Josue, one of Estella’s sons, came to talk.  Thank the Lord.  Those rock throwers couldn’t get us now!  Then a few minutes later, the Pastor came.  Hallelujah.  We told them that we were a little frightened, but they assured us that we were very safe and that there is no crime in El Transito.  We went to bed a little more comfortable, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t jump up a little every time I heard a sound.  And the same goes for Beth!  J

Beth…

I think Kate did a pretty good job describing this lovely incident. I would just like to add that I did think it was kids the whole time J I did get scared when we were in the house with the lights out though because it really sounded like someone was on the porch. Funny story, it was the wind. Aren’t we valiant. Also, while we were in the house, I taught Kate all of the self-defense moves I know. Thank you mom. It was really comforting to know we have so many friends close by that are concerned for our well-being and want to make sure we are safe and comfortable. We haven’t had a problem sleeping there since. Not to worry Dad, we are still alive :D