Well first off I would like to thank the people that did send questions, even though I only received like 3 or 4 emails of questions. I was surprised to hear from some family that I haven’t talked to in a while, which for me is awesome. It definitely a moral booster to know that people are actually interested in what I am doing down here. Anyway, I will answer the questions next blog, I am going to save them and take them back to my house so I can give some more thought to them. Also, I was talking to a friend and she came up with the idea if you don’t have any questions per say another idea is to send me writing props.
See the problem that I am having is that now that I have lived down here 7.5 months (yeah, I can’t believe its been that long) things that were outrageous back when I first got here have become normal. For example, I was eating dinner at a friends house the other day and right in the middle of dinner two chickens started making a whole lot of noise and looked to be wrestling about five feet away from me (well if you didn’t know, they were doing the dirty and only the cock makes noise. The female chicken can´t make noise). Anyway unless I was thinking about my blog postings at the time it wouldn’t have even caught my attention.
I know you all are eagerly awaiting the results of my cats pregnancy so without further ado, I am happy to announce that I am the proud father of three ugly kittens. Easter morning, or I should say from 11 pm the night before Easter until 2 am Easter morning, my cat gave birth to 2 little male kittens and 1 female kitten. One is actually kind of cute but the other two have no chance of losing the ugly title. But anyway I must admit I was naïve enough to think the poor little cat was going to make a little noise and then three little cute balls of fur would walk out and it would be a good time. I would have a couple little fur balls that I could play with and they would chase after string. No, it was three hours of screaming and ill just say bodily fluids. Luckily the kittens never cry and I have found homes for two of the three.
So I am actually happy to note some progress in job side of things, yes I do get in a little work down here as well. This week I just started a women´s cooking class! Its exciting because like I have noted before most of the women only cook rice, beans, cheese and sometimes add a little meat. The goal of this class is to improve on a couple of things:
1. The variety of foods being consumed
2. Cooking while using less oils and salts
3. Getting the women together so I will have a base of women that I have built trust with for future projects
4. Increase use of local foods that are often ignored because they do not know how to cook them
So with that said I had my first cooking class yesterday. Thursday, I went around and talked to around 15 or 20 women who all acted very excited and told me that they would be there for the class. As typical Nica fashion goes, the class was to start at 4 pm and as 4:30 comes around I find myself still sitting alone in my house. Not a good sign but as many Nica´s come to meetings upwards of an hour after the start time it wasn’t unexpected. So at 4:30 I bribe a couple of the little kids outside my house to go hunt down some of the women that I have built trust with to get them to come. Much like in the US people don’t want to be the first person to attend, however, once they see one person show up then they follow them in the door. Well twenty minutes roll by and before you know it there was twelve women (okay 4 women, 6 teenagers and 2 kids) are all gathered around for cooking class to start.
First day I decided to make peanut butter and then use the peanut butter to make two different deserts. Who wouldn’t come back after making deserts? So anyway we learned during our training how to make peanut butter, however there is a large difference between learning how to do something and then taking that and trying to teach a big group of people how to make it. Let me also note here that I had to teach them how to do it in SPANISH!!! Well surprisingly it went extremely well, well except we added a little too much salt to the peanut butter. Go figure one of the two things I am trying to eliminate we go and add too much of, and yes all the women let me know of this fact.
But anyway the peanut butter was a little salty but overall pretty good, and the deserts, oh the deserts were delicious. A note, I have had less then five deserts here in Nicaragua and only one in the last four months so my taste for deserts may be a little off. First we made some no bake cookies that were peanut butter and oatmeal among other ingredients. Delicious! Second, we made some peanut butter fudge, however with this we are waiting for it to set so tomorrow will be the big tasting day. But early sights are looking like it will be quite scrumptious. So class lasted about an hour and fifteen minutes and I think it was a good start and we will just have to see how it goes from there.
So now I got three funny stories for ya…
First is a story that is quite old, however, I just haven’t got around to posting it. For this story we will have to go back to church, actually the second time I went to church is when I picked up on this fact. Well I am sitting in there in church not really understanding anything, like I have said before I go more to try to understand country Spanish and also so that I can meet as many of the people from the community as quickly as possible. So I am sitting there daydreaming off into nowhere because I get bored pretty easily. So im sitting there and I come back from my daydream when I notice the collection person coming around. Like a lot of churches he has a bag attached to a stick he can extend down the aisles. But as I am sitting there I realize that I recognize the bag, it was purple with gold letters on it….
I sit there and think to myself, this just can´t be they don’t have that product here. Let me note here that I was in no way shape or form inebriated in any way. But as I wait for the person to come closer I sit there and read the words nice and slow…
CROWN ROYAL!!!
For those of you who do not know what this is, yup it’s a mighty fine whiskey. Not quite sure but I think that’s a nice little promotion to break church rules. Ha!
Anyway lets move on to story two, breast feeding. People back in the US think it is scandalous when women breast feed out in public, that park bench is soo taboo. Well here there is no shame in whipping it out right in the middle of a conversation. I can’t tell you how many conversations I have had with breast feeding mothers. Once I was having a conversation with a women and here three year old daughter just ran on up and pulled the breast out for a quick drink and then ran off, sort of like the water break during football practice. Im sorry, but this just never will become normal for me. But when I had thought I had seen it all, the news managed to shock me.
See the news here is known for being risqué. Every nightly news you see someone that was attacked by a machete about to die being interviewed ¨why do you think the guy attacked you and cut off your left ear¨. So it shouldn’t have been a big surprise what was on the news.
So the story is about a single mother of four kids who is struggling to make ends meet. Not that strange of a story back in the US, and definitely not hot news here either for that much either. But the touching side of the story was that two of the kids were 6 month old twins. So the closing shot of this family…can you guess it. Yes, the two older kids are playing in the back ground as the mother is feeding her kids (yes, one per twin) in the forefront. Oh and did I mention that it wasn’t like a risqué magazine cover back in the states with the two kids acting as a bra. No, they managed to zoom in just to make sure that everyone knew EXACTLY what the two little ones were up to. Yes I had to pick up my jaw off the floor.
So the grand finale, like I have mentioned before some things that should be crazy are normal now. For example, a two hour walk to get to the highway to go into town. See my truck didn’t come into my community on Wednesday and I needed to get into town. Thus my only option was to take the two hour hike to the highway. Well I get about an hour and fifteen minutes into the walk and I feel something brewing in my stomach. Well let me tell you a little something about the shits down here. Once you notice something brewing its not like back in the US where it just pops up to say ¨Hey when you get out of your meeting or anytime you get a chance today Id like to go for a swim, just let me know¨ no down here they aren´t that jolly. Down here they are more like ¨You have exactly five minutes to get your nice little bum on the closest latrine before I ruin you week, no make that your life!¨.
Well when your out in the middle of nowhere Nicaragua there are no latrines around, thus I was faced with two dilemmas; where to go and what to use for toilet paper. Lets use a list to attack these two problems.
1. For some reason I was more worried about toilet paper, so lets start there…
Well luckily (or so I thought) I had a notebook with me. I thought some higher being was with me on this one, who hasn’t heard of the notebook paper coming in to save some poor chaps day. Well I am living proof that all those stories are LIES. I am here to tell you that if you are going on a hike, or a long walk for that much, where your not around a bathroom. Do yourself a favor and pack some toilet paper, it doesn’t take up that much room. Shit you can put it in your pocket if your worried about conserving space. So yeah notebook paper doesn’t quite fold like toilet paper, the corners don´t just move out of the way for your pretty little toosh. No the corners are there to fight, and I haven’t read any laws that say rear ends are immune from paper cuts, and I will attest that law would never be able to pass. I will just leave it at that all my back packs were just stocked with toilet paper.
2. Where do you go…
Well once again I thought a higher being was with me on this one. See being in the middle of Nicaragua the road that I was on has roughly one person walk on it per hour, at the most. So I wasn’t worried about people walking up on me, rather I was searching for the most comfortable area. I watched survival shows back in the states and remember a show that said you can use rocks to simulate a toilet. Thus, I decided there was no better time to try out my knowledge, well I should have tried to hide a little further off the road. As I am finishing up giving myself enough paper cuts that would make a secretary have pity for me I hear a sound behind me…clip clop, clip clop. Yup, here comes a cowboy, and no it wasn’t a night in shining armor. The best part I learned throughout our twenty minute conversation that followed was that I was only the second gringo (American) this guy had ever seen. Thus he was quite interested in what I was doing. Needless to say it was not my finest hour…
Well I hope you all have a good weekend and keep on rooting for my TARHEELS!!!
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