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The move from my training town to my new site in the northern mountains of Nicaragua took place on Thanksgiving day.  And it was an ordeal even though the transportation part proceeded without a hitch.  The problem was with the hugely heavy and ungainly suitcase I had to schlep along with an overstuffed back-pack and weighty day pack.  The source of all this weight was not simply my clothes but also the ton of material PC thinks I need.  I agree I need it but moving it all required transfers from taxi to bus to taxi to taxi to bus and finally into my pueblo at the top of a steep hill.  I managed it all with the kindness of strangers, and when I got here my host dad met me on the highway with his “friend” a guy who lifted probably 70 pounds of suitcase on his back and walked it up to the house while my host dad and I hefted the packs.

Thanks giving dinner consisted of a tortilla wrapped around a piece of guajara (type of salty cheese) which I bought and ate on the bus from Managua.  I add this detail not to make anyone feel sorry for me (I don’t feel sorry for myself) but to show that I’ve learned how to manage. I’ve started to get a little organized, to get out and meet a few people at the local pulperias that sell the few things I bought to start cooking for myself.  Today my site mate, a health volunteer, who sadly will only be here for 4 months or so, took me to the nearest large town to hit the bank and to buy some food for the week.  So I am ready to cook for myself—oatmeal, pineapple, a few veggies, some peanut butter and wheat bread, and yoghurt.  In another week, after I get the hang of things, maybe I’ll try a preparing a real meal, but I need to figure out the rhythms of the house first—when the kitchen is used, when I can do my wash without taking up limited line space, in what order it’s best to get a shower in the morning.  I’ve arranged to meet with each of my Nicaraguan counterpart teachers next week,  And next week I’ll get back  to work on my Spanish. For now I’m trying to take it a little easy.

This is a beautiful town.  It’s amazing what mountains do for a place.  The mountains here are more like foothills, really sharply peaked and covered in vegetation.  I’d like to learn the geology. There are lots of nice vistas. The town is muy tranquilo.  In the night and mornings—actuaslly now that I listen all day long--, the roosters set up a competition (or maybe they are just saying hi).  One starts, his neighbor picks up. And the next one and so forth till the first one (under my window) starts again.  It seems that every  house has a big parrot in a cage.  The chickens sometimes roost in trees and are very pretty there. Today while my site mate and I were talking by the side of the road, a small parrot appeared between her legs.  She bent over and he hopped on her finger.  She went to put him up on a tree branch when a woman came running out.  He had apparently escaped from the house but he hopped on the woman’s finger to return home—another Nica moment.

I’m glad for this time to rest up.  Training has been full and when school starts in early February I’ll be very busy again.  These two months are for Spanish and for talking to people the best I can and for figuring out—or starting to—what I can do here to help.  

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