¡Hola a
todos! Por fin puedo darles un poquito de asegurancia que hemos llegado en
Nicaragua, finally I can give you all a little assurance that we have arrived
safely here in Nicaragua. Today is the Saturday of our first week here, and it
has been an incredible experience so far. I compare it to how it feels time
passed in Carleton, where each day feels so long because you can pack so many
things into one day but the weeks pass quickly and then boom, you’re gone! The
time has passed perhaps even quicker for my papa because he has to go back to
work next week and therefore has to leave this beautiful country tomorrow
already. His presence will surely be missed, with his dorky-cute attempts and
fumbles with Spanish (and sometimes English…), supreme clean-up skills, and
mother-hen-guarding-pollitos capabilities. ¡Te veo cuando regreso, Papá,
y con más historias y fotos! (I’ll
see you when I get back, Papa, and with more stories and photos!)
Bueno, I
only have a short while to write this, so I will give a brief overview of the
week, and probably only after I get back will I be able to sit down in mi casa
más refrescante, my chillier house, to write in-depth day-by-day synopses of
daily events, thoughts, and photos. I am not able to get my photos off my
camera while I am here, but I promise we have a few decent ones! I almost ran
out of memory already on my main camera card, so I have swapped it out and it
is going safely home with my dad so I can go through all the photos when I get
home. I am thankful indeed that I decided to bring my DSLR also, because in the
event that I felt unsafe with it here, I could lock it up with our other
valuables in the PML (Project Minnesota-León) office in the city. And since I
have felt completely okay keeping it with me (other than when my adorable, but extremely
curious, hermanitos in my host family clamor for it), I hope my photos can be a
resource for the memories of the whole group as well.
(To bust
out a little Minnesotan): Sooooooo, just for a tiny taste, we have oriented ourselves with Nicaraguan
history, climbed a mountain, stepped in horse poo, used latrines, admired baby
chickens, wanted to feed the skinny guard dogs, played sports with children,
had a craft day, taken tours of some of the city and rural villages, made
carpets out of sawdust, painted in the primitivist style, seen sweet murals,
done a little souvenir shopping, slept in hammocks, tried to buy hammocks, eaten
tons of rice and beans and probably plantains too, relaxed on the beach,
attempted to function and communicate well with our lovely Nicaraguan families,
felt so much love from the community, and more! I have listened to and learned
and reflected on so many things that we are a week in and I am halfway through
my notebook! Hopefully my brain will not explode further with activity in the
next week or I will run out of pages for my thoughts…
Anyways, I
apologize that this is all I can give you all for the moment because I am
currently given a special privilege to write this while the others are learning
the paper mache steps for the foundation of their piñatas (So is it really a
privilege? I’m a room away and listening to the sounds of furious
newspaper-crumpling, laughter, and trash-talk between the teams). I’d better
head back and make sure my dad has not drowned ours with our instructor’s
homemade yucca glue.
Until I can
write again!
Con amor,
Kathryn
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