The backyard and shed. Many Nicaraguans apparently sweep their dirt backyards, but my family apparently just sweeps the indoor cement floors and then throws their dirty water out onto the yard to keep the dust down.
The latrine and the guard dog, Princesa, who Jenifer had rescued as a puppy lying in the middle of the street a few years ago.
The sink with strings of laundry above, and in that back corner, the greenish metal thing with the red curtain? That's the shower, where I quickly learned how to shave in the dark and clean myself sufficiently with a bucket of cold water.
When Diddier saw me taking pictures of the house, he grabbed me to take a picture of him in his spiffy school clothes. ¡Que guapo no?
My host family! My host papá is at work, but here is my host mamá, Jenifer, with her three boys, left to right, Diegmar, Diederich, and Diddier.
¡Un modelo! This is the first face Diegmar gave me when I tried to take his picture - he will be a character when he is older.
With the slight amount of extra time, the boys whined for my chicle (gum) after they had eaten most of it the night before, tried to steal my gummy vitamins (not easy convincing them those are for adults!), and were just generally curious about all my stuff. Finally at about 8, Paul and his host mom, Jessica (Jenifer's prima, cousin), came by to walk with us as became custom.
Paul and Jessica waited patiently as the boys ran wildly around the streets... We first dropped them at Gotitas (the pre-school/daycare) on our way to our community meeting place, Don Martin's house. We passed numerous homes, perritos (dogs), a fat conejo (rabbit), a few caballos (horses), and more pollitos (chickens) on our long walk, greeted everyone we passed with "¡Buenos días!" or just "¡Buenas!", and actually got there super early.
Paul's son Chris was staying with Don Martin's, the community leader, family, and it seemed the first night was a little bit of a tough adjustment for him. It could not have been easy not knowing much Spanish to be able to communicate with your new host family. We all had to ask our host families at the outset to forgive our Spanish, but many of our group members came into the trip without much Spanish at all, meaning opportunities for much growth but also conversation limitations. For some it appeared that "le cuesta hablar español," a new phrase that I learned from my host mom that translates literally as "it costs him/her to speak Spanish," or that it is just hard for them to speak Spanish. But we all tried! To forge connections with the community, it was especially important that a lot of the families were close to each other, and Paul and I were feeling rather fortunate that even though we were outside of the cluster, our families were linked as well.
Miraculously, even with notoriously flexible Nicaraguan time, everybody had arrived on time except when the bus showed up, todavía faltamos mi papá! We were still missing my dad! Meanwhile, my host mom asked Meredith if it would be possible if she came along on our trip to Cerro Negro the following week, the volcano our group was set to climb. She learned it was only $10 so she would think about it, and it would be so fun if she were able to join us! Finally my papa got there and hopped on the microbus, and then our whole group waved to our families on the curb... and then again after our bus did a U-turn at the end of the street!
Here is just one interesting photo from the city streets: we shared the road with a seriously overloaded horse cart!
Our tour of León began with a St. Luke errand actually, as Marc from our church had sent a few things along with Paul to take to his friends working in the hospital, so Meredith took him and an interested Laurie who wanted to see what a Nicaraguan hospital was like. The rest of us story-swapped in the air-conditioned bus about our first night with our families: the various amenities and living arrangements, first toilet and shower experiences, how cute our host siblings were (Joy's baby sister cried when she left!), miscommunications, and which animals woke us up during the night. Many seemed to disagree with the roosters about which hour they should wake up, and I guess I was lucky but our pollito at my house was a semi-pet that ran in and out of the house as it pleased and basically slept through the night! Others were tempted to pet their semi-pets such as parrots, puppies, and kittens, but again, that is a cultural no-no.
With errands out of the way, Meredith was our audio guide, pointing out murals such as the one below, remembering a peaceful student protest on July 23, 1959 that the police open-fired on, killing these four students.
This is a more permanent fixture than the demonstrations that happened yesterday (July 23, 2012) in the city, with the anniversary banner remaining in this plaza (also please note the flawless Gatorade basketball hoop...).
Kira fits right into this this huge painting about the July 23rd event.
This mural intends to raise consciousness about reproductive health, VIH y SIDA (HIV and AIDS), and the importance of awareness for both males and females, saying "con responsabilidad podremos ganar la batalla," "with responsibility we can win the battle [against HIV and AIDS]."
Taking care of the "nature that is the source of life," as this mural says, is still far outside the mindset of everyday Nicaraguans as the art may champion recycling, but plastic bags are just everywhere and trash floats around in the centro as well as the on the dirt roads outside of it.
Next we walked to the cathedral for a walking history of Nicaragua. I wish I had taken pictures of this
entire mural that wrapped around several corners, but with symbols it
traced Nicaraguan history from the Pre-Colombian era to Sandino's shadow
featured here...
... to the poetry and gun
referencing the poet who assassinated the dictator Somoza, to more of
current history with the Sandinista party.
The magnificent cathedral, which is now a UNESCO heritage site as of last year, which means funding for its preservation and maintenance but also some rules with that. The plaza in front is classically Spanish with the alcaldía (mayor's office) on the corner that just got a new paint job, but the restoration of the plaza meant kicking out a lot of street vendors. Apparently it used to be a lively place, but as we we observed the street lights being raised, only the sounds of hammering remained.
Group photo with the lion representing León (león=lion) outside the cathedral!
The cathedral may look weathered on the outside, but it is in great shape on the inside and truly magnificent. Every time I see one of these cathedrals and hear its age I am simply astounded by how human beings ever accomplished something like this, much less so long ago. This one was a pretty long-term project, with construction lasting 1747 to 1860, and while I have seen a few cathedrals bright with arrays of color and others shimmering with precious metals at every turn, this is the first I have seen whose structure is purely and simply white.
Tourist police officers taking their rest break inside the church. A pretty nice place to rest, no?
A commemoration of the Pope's visit in 1983.
Then we got to climb a claustrophobic staircase all the way up to the top! The domes look pretty silly from up here, but it is truly incredible how many of those arched ceilings you can stare up to from below. Also to note, the blackness of the cathedral's outer surfaces is due to ash from volcanic eruptions, the most recent being Cerro Negro, the volcano we are set to climb next week, in 1999.
Daddy-daughter photo.
Chris, Cody, and Joy look out onto the street scenes below.
While a few would have rather rested on the pews for a few more minutes, our next adventure was down to the criptas (crypts) with a guide who opened the floorboards for us and gave us the scoop on the priests, poets, and huge church supporters who have plaques down there.
We all, not just Don, had to duck our heads to climb down the stairs, but thankfully the ceiling was just high enough for him down there too!
With a few stomachs growling and a few bladders in need of emptying (sometimes it was hard to convince ourselves to use the latrine at home when we knew we could find a public toilet in a couple hours...), we then got an early lunch at El Callejon before it filled up with the lunch rush. It was kind of like the Nica version of a subway, like a buffet but you point at what you want and total it up in the end. Thankfully I went before my dad, given the portion sizes, so I could give him halves of things I wanted to try! Many got chicken and veggies and the like, and I went for the standard rice and beans, then a steak laden with a pile of onions I swear equal in size to the steak itself, a fried plantain stuffed with cheese, some cooked veggies, and papaya juice. My conversations with Don, Kira, and Chris at my table were made all the more interesting with the sweet background music and the squawks of the parrots caged just feet away.
We then went in search of internet as service in the PML office was still down, so we took a quick stop at a cyber with really cool painted Twitter and Facebook logos on the walls (the other wall featured Microsoft, Firefox, etc.)...
.... and the other option was a siesta in the bus for non-interneters.
Our agenda for the afternoon included El Fortín, a political prison run by Somoza that housed mainly university students taken for being subversives. As politically aware as many of my Carleton classmates were, I cannot imagine university life in such a politically charged atmosphere with the constant threat of being swiped from my dorm to be tortured. This fort was literally out in the middle of nowhere, but on our way out, our driver José said these days it is getting more populated. As we drove up and realized we had basically seen the cows below and maybe two houses (maybe) along the way, we revisited our conception of "populated."
The FSLN has claimed this space as well. There are demonstrations, complete with rallies and rockets, every year to reenact the march from the centro all the way here marking the liberation of the prison.
Jennifer wandering over the top of the concrete as many of the youth ran straight for the creepy cavernous feel below.
Don in contemplation.
Many of the walls are preserved in their bombed-out state from liberation.
This church is also a standing reminder of the war. La Iglesia de San Sebastian was built in the 1700's and is one of the oldest in the city, but it was destroyed in the war. Instead of attempting to restore it, the people decided to just cover it and leave it as a monument as well.
There is just so much history that permeates everyday life here. So much of the revolution happened everywhere, and a lot happened in such a short time. With these visits many of the adults were making connections and expanding their perspectives on what they were fed about Nicaragua by U.S. Cold War news. While university students here were living their revolution to take back their country from a corrupt dictator, the message my parents' generation heard was fear of anti-free trade, anti-U.S., pro-communist revolutionaries threatening a pro-American regime. And yet it is amazing, despite our country's direct involvement in the perpetuation of the dictatorship and war here, how warm and welcoming Nicaraguans are to us. We are here to learn and to love as well.
The Museum of Myths and Legends, where Meredith says, "The best part are the English translations!" It used to be a prison and now it has flowers everywhere, but there are also mosaics and paintings of prisoners going insane and being tortured...
"A typical Nicaraguan cart."
Once we walked through the archway in the back of this photo, we were taken through the museum by a guide named Sammy who gave us some good stories in English to take back with us. Inside the rooms of the museums, we were treated to stories about
traditional folk dance, literary heroes, and plenty of myths with crazy
old women who would prey on young men if they were on the streets at
night - anybody have any good social commentary for that trend?
This is the third place we have seen the characters of La Gigantona and Pepe el Cabezona, the Giantess and Big-Headed Pepe: legend that evokes pride for Nicaraguans in making fun of the Spanish (as represented by the woman) for believing the Indians were inferior, while Pepe is short with a huge cabeza to represent wisdom and knowledge.
One of the various ways prisoners here were treated by the Guardia Nacional (National Guard).
Sammy used some colorful language to
further elaborate on the National Guard's torture methods that we had
been learning about at the Sandino museum and El Fortín.
A good number of myths and inappropriate inside jokes later... We got to hop up on top of the wall where the guards used to camp, which was an entertaining little jaunt for us amongst the bird's eye views of the museum and surrounding area and the unfortunately unripe lime trees.
After a healthy afternoon of pig-witches, crying mothers, and headless priests, the group returned to the bus to chat about the upcoming days on our way to Sutiava. Wednesday, the following day, we would head to Talolinga, a an agricultural mountain village, where we would stay the night in hammocks and learn about life in this community where farming responsibilities are plenty, educational opportunities are few, and there is a single teacher for all grades in the school. We discussed packing details, and Meredith advised us to only bring what we wanted to carry on the three-hour hike and a bag to sling onto the sides of our two "bestias" she would rent for the day, as how Nicaraguans referred to these mules made for a rather funny expense tagline in the PML budget, she noted.
Sutiava, our final sight-seeing destination for the day, was the first neighborhood created in León, where apparently most people have more Indian blood and a single person here knows the original indigenous language of the area. We were entranced by the magnificent church of St. John the Baptist, and a few of us headed in that direction while others stayed with snacks near the air-conditioned microbus.
Joy was jokingly whining for someone to carry her because she was tired (as we all were), so I not-jokingly offered her a piggyback ride for the walk to the church.
The five of us who wandered in a loop around the church grounds got stopped by a woman asking for a contribución to be able to enter the church, so we went back to collect the others and venture inside. This church had a completely different feel to it than the cathedral in the centro did, but gorgeous in its own right. The richness of the wood here is simply incredible, and the gold detailing so intricate.
Apparently the only way the Spanish could convince the indigenous peoples to enter the church was to build their sun god on the ceiling, but once they did that, it took further work to convince them to not only stand right under the sun.
The kids lit some prayer candles and had fun playing with the goopy wax, and after they headed outside to taste-test mamones (a fruit similar to, if not the same as, longans, a grape-sized native Asian fruit where you peel the thin shell and suck the white flesh off the small pit), my dad and I semi-dropped in on the conversation Meredith was having with an old man by the church door. What we gathered was he was apparently the priest, and he said just six years ago he had to deal with altars laying outside of the church and the building itself was just in awful condition, so he worked project by project to make the church hospitable and respectable again. He had to search for old windows and doors for the perfect wood to match the rest, and he holds raffles in the surrounding communities to raise funds because the Alcaldía (the mayor's office) has made many promised but has been cutting corners like buying pointlessly low-quality paint that needs to be replaced in a few years. It seems government unresponsiveness is an unfortunately popular tale around here, so communities make do with what they have and really need a lot of drive and energy to get common-good projects done by themselves.
For probably the only time in the entire trip, we ended up arriving at la casa de Don Martín a bit early, so we waved at the couple of families who were early as well and then drove around a few blocks to point out some of our delegates' houses as well as a few houses Meredith wished had wanted to host. There were some in the neighborhood that were still quaint but gorgeous and well-kept, so readers, please take into consideration that not all of Nicaragua is stereotypically dirt-poor, and while much of the population does live in improvised housing, much of the population does not.
A few families took their delegates home at five as planned, but a number of families had not yet arrived so the rest of us started playing a little catch in the street with Chris's ball he had given his host brother - a great bonding tool! The circle got larger and larger and a number of the younger brothers just especially loved the random switches between catch, monkey in the middle, hot potato, etc., and we even finally convinced a few of the young girls to join in too - a couple of those 6-9 year-old girls had great hands too! You wonder how often the girls get opportunities to play sports here... so it was definitely fun to connect with them that way as well.
The game finally wound down when Paul's and my host moms came back from a meeting around 5:40, right after Paul and I had bought bags of fried plantain chips from the Drill-Mellums' host mom right up the street. Johana sells the fried plantains and fried yucca, among other things, right out of her front door, and man, were they good! My host mom makes plantains and bananas a variety of ways, but she and her boys enjoyed munching on a few of Johana's too on our walk home. We also had Chris along on our way so he could stay the night with his papa and not have to wake up Don Martin's family the following morning (when we all had to meet at 5:15am!).
Hopefully everybody went to bed a little bit earlier because we would surely be arising with the roosters on Wednesday... I enjoyed the hubbub in my house and hanging out with Jenifer and the boys as usual. I also felt like I was starting to understand her better and getting more accustomed to the accent, and especially as the night winds down, she speaks more slowly and thoughtfully as well. I still have trouble understanding more than two words that come out of the kids' mouths, but I did understand that Diddier called me his "novia" (girlfriend) on the first night, and I have now been promoted to his "esposa" (wife) - I knew love moved faster in Latin America, but hopefully not this fast!
I finally was able to get a couple more decent pictures of the house, including of the family pollito that runs indoors and outdoors and sleeps next to the mirror. It is sort of a pet and gets its tail pulled by the two-year-old like any house cat or dog would, but it is a Nica-style pet to be sure, as it comes and goes and serves its purpose.
The chaos in the kitchen.
Beans on the stove waiting for Jenifer's husband Douglas to come home.
Jenifer asked me to get a good picture of her with her cousin Enoc who dropped by, but he apparently hates having his picture taken and it turned into a whole mess of giggles in the kitchen.
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