new house, hot shower, learning the hard way

A moment I have greatly anticipated is finding the place I will call home in Managua for the foreseeable future. In hopes of completing this quest, I left Leon (for the first time on my own!) in the cool morning drizzle in a microbus (advantage: faster than big buses; disadvantage: less leg room). When I got to 7 Sur (shorthand for a highway location where people change buses) in Managua, it was still raining, so I decided to take a taxi from there to the office instead of waiting for the bus. I had arranged to meet Hultner, a Nica who lives in Las Brisas (a cute, quiet neighborhood I had visited with him and Kim, my jefa, 2 weeks ago) and also works with the Nehemiah Center, to go look at some of the places for rent there. I am discovering that it makes a big difference when people here realize you have Nicaraguan friends. I got to the office before he did, so Kim wound up driving me back down the hill and over to Hultner's neighborhood where we proceeded to walk around in the drizzle and look at houses. After 2 hours of looking, the first house we saw still appeared to be the best. (It was 2 houses down from Hultner and his family, which made it attractive.)

BUT, God saved the best for last. Kim drove us over to see a place for rent across the street from someone else who works with the Nehemiah Center. When we arrived the owner wasn't there but there were some men working on the place, so we took a look around. In the front there is a ¾ wall topped with some nice ironwork that encloses the front patio (which includes an area for a car to be parked inside the gate). When you walk in the door, there is large living area with one dark wooden wall and rest white. The kitchen is off to the right and has a nice set of cabinets above the sink. Inside the kitchen area is plenty of space for a stove, fridge, and non-perishable food storage racks (all of which we'll have to buy). Down the hall are 3 medium sized bedrooms and a bathroom. Each of the bedrooms has a closet with storage space. Behind the house there is an outdoor area that will be great for drying clothes in the sun and another room that most likely would have belonged to an enpleada (household staff) of a past owner. We were all wondering what a place like this might rent for. So we called the owner, who was en route, and found out it was only $350/month! (This was after looking at 3 other places much less impressive in the $300 range).

After talking it over with Kim and Hultner, I decided that this was probably a gift from God and I should call the owner and arrange to meet him again to seal the deal. So I did. Then I spent the rest of the day in meetings with Nehemiah Center staff and the evening with FHI staff Shannon and Kathy Ahern and some guests of their family who happened to be in town. I also had my first hot shower in over a month! I had almost forgotten what that feels like...

Back to the house. We had arranged to meet again this morning at 10am. Unfortunately, being totally new to Managua, it was a challenge giving accurate directions to my friend Kathy who was driving me there. However, Senor Cesar Valle is a very nice man and was very forgiving of my being late to our meeting. When we arrived, he responded to my apology with a smile. “Nicaraguans are not very punctual, so we always say “mas o menos” when we set any appointment,” he explained. Don Cesar spent his career in business/HR and is now retired and managing property. He spent some time in the States and speaks English as well as Spanish, so that made our discussions this morning easier. I took a look at the house again and got to see the contract, and everything looks good, so I am going back to Managua on Monday to officially sign it and hopefully move in that very day! It is really gorgeous (a ganga, Kim called it), and I am excited about the possibilities that having a larger house will open up for me and Andrea, my future roommate, to be hospitable to our neighbors and teams that come to town.

After that, Kathy dropped me off at 7 Sur, where I was hoping to catch the bus back to Leon. I was a little nervous about this, since I had never caught a bus back from there before, but I felt confident that it would work out.

90 minutes later, after watching every city bus go by twice, letting one Expreso bus to Chinandega (that also stops at the bypass just outside Leon) pass me by, seeing every conceivable edible thing for sale, and hearing Losing my Religion, and Funkytown played at the bodegas behind me, it occurred to me that maybe the Expreso to Leon didn't stop at 7 Sur.

I was tired of standing, tired of people giving me looks (and trying to sell me stuff), and definitely wishing that I had eaten lunch. I wanted to go home (well, to Leon, I mean). My frustration almost got the best of me as my eyes welled up with tears. I tried to hold them back—the last thing I wanted to do as a gringa alone on the streets of Managua was to make a scene. “This is ridiculous”, I thought to myself. I just need to call a friend and figure this out. So I called someone and left a message. Of course, within 10 minutes, another Expreso to Chinadenga came roaring by and I scurried on board with great relief. I'm back in Leon now (glad to have beaten the rain this time) and proud that to say that I managed to survive my first trip between cities on public transportation alone. But I definitely learned the hard way this afternoon.

(Interesting side note about public transportation here: when I first got here and started traveling, I couldn't figure out why the buses-which by the way, are all really old school buses from the USA-are staffed with multiple people, and why one of them yells out where the bus is going at every stop, when most of them clearly say on the front what their destination is. Then, in the course of a conversation with another staff member, she reminded me that a large number of people here probably cannot read the names of the places on the buses because they are illiterate, and this is a majority oral culture. Duh. Suddenly the whole system made a lot more sense.)

El Nicaraguense

The other day I was at the most famous bookstore in Leon (Don Quixote) and picked up a book entitled, El Nicaragüense (in Spanish of course), which is a series of fascinating essays by Nica native Pablo Antonio Cuadra, analyzing various aspects of the Nicaraguan identity. Here is a rough translation of an excerpt from the first essay in the book.

"The dual signal of the 2 profetic volcanoes [refering to Ometepe, an island containing 2 large volcanoes near the center of Nicaragua] was made for Nicaragua. There they were established since the 8th century to the present time. And it is interesting to observe that the new indo-hispana history of Nicaragua also starts exactly in front of these 2 volcanoes through a dialogue, a conversation between Cacique Nicaragua and the conquistador Gil Gonzalez Davila in 1531. There begins the fusion of a new duality. Two blood lines, two cultures, together a symbol of the 2 volcanoes, and on the earth there was born a human being with a dramatic duality of identity. Could it be that the Nicaraguan is a person divided by doubt? Indecision? For in the "du" of "duda" [Spanish word for doubt] lives the same idea of duality.

Nicaragua is located in the center of what was the new world. The flora and fauna of both the Northern and Southern hemispheres grow here. The cultural influences of Mexico and Columbia are present here. Nicaragua was divided into two parts by the conquistadors--east and west. Nicaragua was dually governed from Leon and Granada (two different cities) for much of its history until Managua became the new capital. We are a country of but two seasons, winter (rain) and summer (dust).

The Nicaraguan is born in the shape of a Greek "Y", that obligates us to constantly unite, fuse, and dialogue with one another."

a smile in any language...

...looks the same. At left, Carolina, one of the girls in Santa Maria (a community of 350 families, 30 minutes north of Leon) I have befriended after weekly visits there over the last month, joyfully creating a bouquet for a church mother´s day program.

A cultural note: the flowers in the picture are Nicaraguan favorites. The white is sancuajuche (the national flower) and the red is ajenciana.

living history

Yes, the man you are looking at is a real live Sandinista, who fought in the revolution back in the 1970s (the picture he is holding which you can´t see is him during his combat days).

Diniseo Romero now has his own personal museum just west of Leon´s Parque Central on the first floor of what used to be a Somoza Palace and then Sandinista HQ, but is now a secondary school (the top 2 floors, that is). Señor Romero lives to tell the story of Sandino and how the FSLN (Frente Sandinista) was formed and overcame the Somoza dictatorship. This "museum" is comprised mostly of enlarged photos and text from books on the Revolution, but also includes a stack of stones from one of the walls the army built, and some of his own personal collection of photos. Romero is an unassuming, gentle man, who turns passionate at the mention of Sandinista presidential candidate Daniel Ortega and the future of his country. Now a peaceful patriot, he proudly showed me the book where he keeps the names and countries of every person who comes to visit his selfmade museum.

baile folklorico, nica style

One of the students who participated in a Mother´s Day program I attended last week in Poseltega, which is about 45 minutes north of Leon.

photos and contact info

http://www.fhconnect.org/sites/neumann/AprilMay06

That is where you should go to see my pictures from the last two months.

Also, real mail of all kinds is welcome and can be sent to me at:

Centro Nehemias
AP 1076
Managua, Nicaragua

: )

no ordinary taxi...

Another story for which a picture would have been worth a thousand words.

Yesterday morning I awoke at the crack of dawn to meet Anne and Heather on the esquina nearby because we had to go to Managua for the day. As we approached the road that leads to the bus terminal, Anne proceeded to hail the first cab that appeared. As it slowed down to pick us up, Heather and I noticed that this cab already had 2 passengers in the backseat--and it was not a sedan but a hatchback. The taxista, anxious to earn a few more cordobas, assured us we would all fit. I had my doubts, but what are you going to do? We were already running late. So Anne took the remaining spot in the backseat, and the driver told us that me and Heather could sit in the front seat with him. That might have been true in a sedan or if we were each 10 years old, but two grown women?

After I got in, it became clear that this was going to be a tight situation. Literally. Nevertheless, I squished myself over to the left as far as I could until I was practically embracing our driver and sitting on top of the gear shift, and Heather squeezed in next to me just enough to shut her passenger door. Given that it was 6:45am and I hadn't consumed any coffee yet, I did the only responsible thing one would do in this situation: I began to laugh uncontrollably. “Of all the taxis in Leon,” I sputtered. “And Anne chose this one.” “Oh this isn't even close to being full,” Heather commented. “I've seen taxis with twice this many passengers.” The driver was amused by my antics, I think; after the other 2 passengers got out at their destination and we rearranged ourselves, he turned to me and asked, “Are you comfortable?”. We eventually reached the terminal without incident, despite the obstacle of my left hip on the shift for ¾ of the journey (it's a good thing we never had to go higher than 3rd gear).

Once we got to Managua, I had another “first”--riding a city bus there. We were the last ones on and thus stood toward the front of the bus. I was holding onto the back of driver's seat while carrying Anne's backpack on my shoulder, and every sudden turn or speed change sent the bag flying into his head until Anne took it from me. It's seriously a miracle that we didn't have an accident. Of course, blessed Anne assured me this bus was far from full-- “full is when people ride in the cargo hold”. I am proud to say, however, that I managed to hang onto the handhold, unzip my purse, pull out my busfare, and close my purse without falling over—all while the bus was in motion!

Later in Managua, when I was retelling this story in a meeting, it seemed even funnier and I could barely choke the words out I was laughing so hard. “One day soon these experiences will cease to be funny and just become normal,” I concluded. “But until then, aren't you glad I'm able to laugh about them?”

chickens on board!

I wish I had a photo of this, but you will just have to use your imagination on this one. This morning my friend Heather and I boarded a bus to Santa Maria for a Mother´s Day program. It was just like any other trip on the Chinandega-bound bus until a Nica woman boarded carrying a huge burlap bag with 3 small holes, out of which poked the heads of 3 live chickens! The woman held the bag over her head as she walked down the aisle of the bus and these 3 chickens literally passed right over me as she searched for a seat further back on the bus. Believe it or not, the chickens seemed quite tranquil, despite their captivity...

(Aside: Mother´s Day is May 30th here and it is a huge deal. All the kids have the day off from school and instead of giving cards and families going out to lunch, there are these huge productions at all the schools and most of the churches involving music and dance and poems and gifts. Will post photos later this week.)

ruben dario and charismatic catholics

For the first time since I arrived in Nicaragua, I wasn't leaving town for the weekend, so after a leisurely breakfast Saturday morning, I strolled downtown in search of the Ruben Dario Museum. Ruben Dario is the most famous poet in Central America, and is a native son of Nicaragua. I walked for over an hour in search of this mysterious building (that happens to be right next door to Comedor Lissette, where I have eaten about 5 times).

After wandering around the museum (not at all like the museums in the States—everything was in black and white, for one, and many of the text displays showed serious signs of dirt and aging) for a bit, I ventured back out onto the street in search of lunch. One block north of the Museo was a little bodega that claimed it served the best refrescos in town. Since I can't seem to pass up the opportunity for a fruit drink in this country, I immediately entered the place and ordered an orange-pineapple fresco sin azucar, which turned out wonderful. So wonderful that I asked for another and an avocado sandwich on top of it. It was so nice to eat something not fried and not involving chicken (the safest meat to eat, and thus the one I choose 9 times of out 10).

Later that evening, I passed Anne's house and she invited me to this prayer group she goes to on Saturday nights at her neighbor's house. As we were about to knock on the door, Anne asked me, “How do you feel about being prayed over in tongues? It'll be translated.” Having never been prayed for in tongues (never mind by charismatic Catholics), I did not know what to expect.

When we entered the room, there were about 12 Nicaraguans there, including Don Benne, the only person besides Anne I knew. The prayer meeting had already started and several people in the group were praying aloud simultaneously or in agreement with one another (it's hard to tell when it's in your second language). After praying and singing for a while, I was startled when one of the woman gently took my hand and led me across the circle of chairs to the other side where 2 men and 1 woman laid hands on me. The woman prayed for me in Spanish, and then the 2 men began to pray...they alternated speaking in tongues and translating for one another as they did. Much of what they prayed for was for God to remove my worries and anxieties and burdens and anything not of Him. As the prayer meeting went on, several other people were prayed over in a similar manner, interspersed with songs of praise. Towards the end, Don Benne read a portion of scripture and then asked those of us who had been prayed over how we felt now. I could honestly say (in Spanish) that I felt better than when I arrived. “Como?” Don Benne asked. “Con la paz de Dios, la alegria de Cristo, y la presencia del Espiritu Santo”, I answered. “Eres catolica?” he inquired. “Soy evangelica,” I answered. “Pero soy cristiana primera.”

I didn't know what to make of the wide eyed looks I received. It is extremely rare here for evangelicals and catholics to talk to each other about spiritual things, never mind pray together. There is a serious divide between the 2 groups here, a sad witness to the unity of the body Christ prayed for during his last hours on earth.

After the prayer meeting, Anne invited me over for tea and we chatted about the experience, parents, God's redemptive power over our lives, counseling, dealing with pain and the process of growth as Christians we experience. I am so glad I have had all this quality time with her and Heather before moving to Managua. Their friendship has been a blessing.

Gracias Senor por todos tus bendiciones este dia. Tu eres maravilloso, lindo, poderoso, lleno de amor y misercordia y bondad. O Agua Vivo y Pan de Vida, gracias porque Tu me has dado todo que necesito para vivir. Aleluia!

TGIF, and a prayer request

This morning I went on a tour of Leon's oldest and most impressive landmarks, the Cathedral. As in most colonial cities, the Cathedral in Leon is in the very center and it is the tallest building in la ciudad; thus from its rooftop you can see the rest of the city laid out in every direction. It took a hike up some very narrow and dimly lit staircases to reach the top, but wow, was it worth it. A sea of red tile rooftops, churches, and street activity is visible from every side, as well as the Parque Central and the volcanoes that arc around the northwestern side of the city.

Back on the ground level, I saw this plaque on the wall (photo at left) with selected quotes from Nicaraguan writer (and possibly priest—I don't know) Alfonso Cortes (1893-1969). A rough translation:

“Time is hunger and space is cold;
Pray, pray, that only submission may fill the anxiety of emptiness.”

“The dream is a lonely rock
where the soul rests
Let it ring out within each day of life”

“O, the dead who have never lived!
O, the living who will not die!”

Violence in Managua

One of the subplots of life in Nicaragua is the ongoing tension between the college students and the police in Managua. Students here have been upset for weeks about a number of things, including the cost of transportation as well as the dearth of health care (though it appears the doctors who were on strike are no longer) available. The other day I was in Managua for the day and found myself with a few blocks of an area where students and police were in the middle of a violence exchange of gunfire. Thankfully the roads were blocked off and I was never in any serious danger, but one of my friends here had a bomb explode within a few feet of her car while she was out driving that same day. Things appear to be getting worse, not better. Newspapers and TV reporters here have covered almost daily the students in different areas of town who are burning buses and attacking police in the city. The headline Thursday was “Managua Bajo de Asedio”, or “Managua Under Siege”.

Dios, por favor tengas misercordia en este lugar y traigas Tu paz aqui...Amen.