Sunday, September 10, 2006
Please ignore the typos
Teeth
Nando, the sweet old man who works for Rogelio and Lucia Villareyna has got a new set of teeth. Dentures. But they are too big. And he loves his new teeth. And hes so afraid fo losing them, he wont open his mouth all the way when he speaks. It was really hard to understand what he was saying when he had no teeth, but now, its near impossible. This is also the sweet man who really loves to hug the chele girls when they come to visit (myself included). Hug and a kiss are par for the course for greetings in Sontule, but Nando really gets a good hug in and a big smack on the cheek. I don’t know if its because he’s a bit of a lonely old man, or if its because he likes the ladies. Especailly the young ones. Either way, its harmless so the hugging continues.
PoemsNicaraguans have a golden literary heritage, beginning with Ruben Dario, the father of modern Spanish literature. So even in the campo, people have an endless supply of love poems, dirty poems, funny jokes, dirty jokes, and their favorite rancheras memorized, ready to entertain a crowd with a few short lines of wit. And the occasional dirty word. The poems don’t work well translated, and the longer chiles (funny anecdotes), are too long for me to remember, so I will leave you with a few short poems that the nephew of el grán escritór de coplas de Terrero (the great couplet write of Terrero), Carlos Ariel Talavera Flores:
Del gallo me gusta el canto
Del caballo la carrera
Del toro la vuelta en el campo
Y de la mujer, la trasera
Dame tu mano paloma
Para llegar a tu nido
Anoche dormiste sola
Esta noche dormirás conmigo
Cuando pase por tu casa
Me tiraste un limón
El limón cayó por el sueldo
Y el sumo mi corazón
En el patio de mi casa, hay una planta de maíz
Si mi suegra no me quiere
Yo le rompo la nariz
En el patio de mi casa
Hay un palo de higuera
Los besos de mi boca
No son para cualquiera
Por ti suspiro
Por ti me muero
Por ti en las clases
Me saco un cero
Dos palomitas
Sentadas en un florero
Un le dice a la otra
No hay amor como el primero
Mañana me voy
Mañana es mi viaje
Un beso de tu boca
Será me equipaje
Entre espinas nací
Entre espinas moriré
El nombre de mi amor
Nunca lo olvidaré
Aquí paso una palomita
chiquíta y voladora
En las alas lleva flores
Y en el pico voladores
Las muchachas de este tiempo
Son como café molido
No han cumplido quince años
Cuando quieren tener marido
Los muchachos de este tiempo
Son como plátano asado
Quieren tener mujer
Pero no quieren ser casados
En la clase de matemática
No se es dos por dos
Pero en la clase del amor
Hasta le gano al profesor
Corriendo, corriendo
Pegué un trompezón
Por dar me en la frente
Me di en el corazón
La rama del tamarindo
Se une con la del coco
Si mi amor me desprecia
A mi me importa poco
En el patio de mi casa
Hay un palo de algodón
La novia que tenía
Me rompió el corazón
El amor no es poema
El amor no es canción
El amor el algo que se lleva
En el corazón
Que triste es encontrar
Espinas en vez de una flor
Que triste es encontrar
Odio en vez de amor
Naranja dulce
Limón francés
Si no te gusto
Porque me vez
Cruelty
Humans can be cruel people. At my house in Sontule, there are three dogs, duke, yoyer, y mimi. Yoyer showed up at the house one day with a bloody tail. Someone cut off about 4-6 inches off the dog’s tail, leaving bone is exposed. WTF?!?!?!? Yoyer is the most mellow dog, he hardly barks, and he’s not vicious or bien bravo like other dogs who try to bite you. Best I can figure is that he wandered over to someone else’s house and they ‘t want him sitting on their porch or around their house, and people here are not nice to dogs, they and kick them and yell at them to move. Well, they have fleas, which jump off the dog and live in the floor of the house. But that’s no reason to HIT, because the dogs will leave if you tell them too. Except maybe Yoyer. He’s one of those tail wagging constantly seeking approval kind of dumb dogs. And lazy, I have to physically push him off the porch sometimes if he’s in the way when we need to work. So he was probably sitting on the porch and someone yelled at him or kicked him and he still wouldn’t move, so they probably grabbed a machete, or had one in their hand, and whacked the dog’s tail with it. I can only hope that maybe they were drunk or did not mean to cut the dogs tail off, because to actually, with a clear head and cold heart, think “stupid dog, get off my porch”, and then cut off the tail. God. Even drunk or angry, no excuse. People suck sometimes. Seriously. And its true here, people who hit dogs hit other people to, like their wives or their children. I knew I liked Otoniel from the start when I noticed he never hit the dogs. Ever.
Privacy
I had a bad day yesterday. I got home as someone threw a note through the roof of my room. Wait let me explain. My room that I rent in Esteli. Which is at the casa of Erica and family. Last year I had a room in the house. This year, I rent one of two rooms Erica’s brother, Victor, built in their big backyard. Private bathroom, pretty nice. But right up against the wall of the neighbors yard. So anyway, the note said all sorts of disgusting things, and from what was written in the note, it was clear, that they had been WATCHING ME or spying into my room somehow. Freaked me out! I showed it to Victor, and he said it was probably the kids next door, who throw things onto the roof. I knew that they threw things, and that the chickens walk on the roof, but it must also be that the kids (teenagers, really), got up onto the roof and peeped in through a gap between the roof and the wall. So Victor went over there and showed the dad, and he took the note to compare it to the kids handwriting to see which one it is. But now I am completely embarrassed because I know the whole family next door, which is two houses, has probably seen the note. I think I might move. Victor is going to fix the gap, but seriously, I didn’t even want to take a shower because I kept hearing noises on the roof. I was planning on moving anyway to get a place with my own kitchen, so maybe this will be the catalyst for a change. I was worried at first, but since I am pretty sure its just kids, I don’t feel unsafe. But I am still going to look for another place.
Cleanliness
There are times when dirt floors in the house in Sontule really bug me. Like when the cat uses the floor underneath my bed and dresser as his own private litter box and my room smells like cat shit. Or like when I drop a contact lens on the floor and it gets covered by dirt. But you know, they sweep the floor everyday and mix water into afterwards to make it hard and packed down well. It may be dirt, but you can always tell a clean dirt floor from a dirty dirt floor. And well, think about it: You’re cooking, and you spill oil or water or eggs or milk on the floor. Who cares! Its dirt! It soaks right in! The chickens shit in the house. Who cares! Sprinkle a little ash on it and sweep it away! Coughed up phlegm and need to spit? Who cares! Do it on the floor! Your kid is not quite toilet trained and needs to pee? Who cares? Let him do it on the floor! Drunk man passes out at your house after a party and vomits on the floor? Who cares! Dirt soaks up the liquid bits, and you just sweep away the solid chunks! Whoever thought linoleum was a boon to housewives everywhere, clearly never studied the marketing implications of DIRT floors. I’m gonna make a fortune. All I need is a catchy slogan………….
Health
Here are some more folk cures in case you decide to practice alternative medicine:
If you think someone might have given your baby the evil eye, take a swig of rum and spit in the baby’s face. How does one get the evil eye, you ask? Apparently it can be done with mal intent, or just by someone looking at the baby with affection or envy for too long. This can also be prevented by tying a red string around the baby’s wrist.
Entertainment:
We have television in Sontule. I hate the TV. Its loud, and the picture is bad and fuzzy, and everyone has this running commentary during the shows because you cant hear everything that the characters say. And sometimes they watch it when its just loud snow. you cant even SEE nor HEAR anything. But cant turn it off, its like it has a life of its own. And its almost always telenovelas. Just bulla. Noise from 5pm until 10:30pm. And I like to go to bed at 9 or 10 pm. And sometimes for a few hours during the day when Kevin likes to watch cartoons. Sweet, he always asks me first, since the TV doesn’t work right (correction, works even less well) when the battery charger is on. But of course, if I say no, he throws a fit. I could just hit him with a belt, like what all good moms do, but no, I just let him scream, and just THINK about hitting him with a belt. And sometimes he throws things at me. You know, like rocks, or a machete. And sometimes he brings me papers I left outside, or just comes up to me for a hug with a shy smile on his face. Manic bipolar autistic, my pop psychology dictionary says.
Ethan syas I should pull a Sound of Music move, and take some parts out, and so when it doesnt work, tey will just think te signal is bad, ofrthat the TV is a piece of crap. It is, they bought it from this guiy, and its a running joke that its bits from old tvs held together with string. And thats not even my joke. My other favorite part is that the TV is conncected to a long thick wire,which runs from the TV, up through the roof and is rigged up to a giant pole (an old piece of my equipment-little did I know I would contribute to the creation of my tormentor) that is about 25m from the house. So when the signal is bad, someone take a broom and go about pushing and pulling the wire until they get SLIGHTLY better reception. Oh, and you have to use a pair of pliers to turn the TV on and off. And I think the volume is either set to mute or superloud. Nothing in between. Its so bad, that I have considered getting them a TV for xmas, just so at least it will be trashy tv noise without the static.
Chickens.
Chickens are evil. And dumb. I know I study birds, but chickens are evil. I was identifying insects with Julia on the porch when I heard this frantic squeak. I look up and a chicken is holding a big white tree froggy frog by the leg in its beak, which is sqeaking in panic. His cries bring a swarm of chicken (20 to be more exact) around the main hunter chicken, all with crazy bloodlust in their eyes. The main hunter chicken is snapping his head around, looking for a way out of the group, and takes off running, the frogflapping bak and forth in the chickens death grip. I chase down the chicken to try and free the frog (I have a soft spot for frogs), but they outrun me and they convene in a crazy circle of bloodletting (anyone remember the scene in the vampire theater in paris in Interview with a Vampire?) and all I find a stringy sad frog bits, and chickens darting in to gobble up the last pieces. I always say I don’t eat what I can’t kill, but maybe I can start eating chicken, because I don’t know that I would feel that bad about killing one of these.
Positive note:
I feel I have entered in a number of negative entries. You always reflect what you feel inside, so I guess, yes I am feeling a bit negative at the moment about the scientific merit and worth of my project. I mean, sometimes I feel I have been working for 6 years on crap, but I am sure its just normal ups and downs of being a grad student, but that doesn’t really make me feel any better.
What does make me feel better is to start working on the environmental education project and to go traveling with my friend Sara in Mexico. I am going to present at a conference, and then take the time to travel. And it makes me feel better that I am dating a really nice guy who always is around to help me any way he can, which is unfortunately not enough when, lets say, I need to do a complex statistical analysis or want an opinion on data collection or sample size. But is always there for me when I need someone to talk with. And he is good for doing favors and giving back rubs and just giving hugs when need be. Also good for hugs are my nica mom Isabel and friends Ana y Lesbia. I have good people here, just no good science geeks to talk to. Ok, enough mush, gotta a talk to write!
Concert
I went to a big rock concert last night with Otoniel. Freakin rocked!!!! I went and splurged on the more expensive tickets (its all relative, still only 18$ a ticket), and we were right up next to the stage. Only problem was that there were tons of young kids (15-17) in the audience, and all the grls went all stupid and jumpy and screamy during this one band Miranda. Which I was not impressed with because they were trying to hard to be cool. Like a New Order-Tivo-blondie-80s eletronica throwback. I mean, good, but not worth getting all crazy over. And a bit poserish all in different colored sequins outfits and posing and dancing and the guy singing doing his best impression of Mick Jagger crossed with The Cure crossed with Mighty Mighty Bosstones. But the we saw Quinta Estacion, Julieta Venegas, and Elefante, which were all amazing. I went for Julieta Venegas, but I ended up being most impressed with 5th Estacion. They were amazing live, all very good and talented folks, something I at times consider a rarity in Latin pop music. Or any pop music for that matter. Only other deal was is that everyone in the audience insisted on singing along to their favorite songs, so much so that the actual singer could not be heard. The singers seemed to like it or love it and encouraged it. I am sure it is very flattering, but jesus, you can sing along to your radio at home! The whole point of a concert is to hear the group live. Nicas do really love to sing along to the radio though.
Anyway, it had been a long time since I had been to a big concert like that, with five groups and all very good, when youre standing for 8 hours, but the music is so good, you stop caring. (except during the set change breaks, when I thought I was going to die). We had planned to take the car, but, surprise, surprise, its broken again. So we went for 2 ½ hours on the bus, planning to stay the night. But the concert lasted until 2ám, and the first bus back to Esteli is at 4am, so we just hung out at the Texaco Starmart (open 24hr!!!!), ate Sopa Maruchan (you know, cup a noodle soup-sidenote, when they prepare it for you there, they put mayonnaise and ketchup in it. I hate mayonnaise, and mayonnaise in soup is the worst! I scooped it out and put it in Oto’s cup. He loves it), and drank lots of water for about 1 ½ hours, and then left for the bus station. Three and a half hours later, we were back in Esteli. I slept from 8am-3pm, and not I will have to go out dancing for a friend’s birthday tonight. Kinda don’t want to but I have to. Ahh well, life is hard. Need to start working on my presentation and stop partying………………
Pinche
I’m not going to say which family the following story pertains too, because they are nice people and a good family, its just sometimes they can be so cheap! Like they have this old man who works for them. Very sweet, but also very old. He wanted to go away for Semana Santa to see his family. In fact it was a time when all of his family would be together (pity factor-old, may die soon, family lives far away, he doesn’t travel much). For this family, it was too inconvenient that he leave during Semana Santa, so they REFUSED to pay him until the week after so that he would have to change his travel plans. Even though he still got to see some of his family, he didn’t get to see all of them at the big party like he wanted to. Definitely pinche move on the familys part. Second pinche move. This family has a lot of cows. And theay also have a married son with a little boy about 4 years old. SO every morning, the little boys mother goes over and gets a free liter of milk from he mother in law for the kid. But if the kid wants any more milk throughout the day, the mom has to PAY for it. Now maybe not so bad, but it is the son who freaking milks the cows in the morning, and the daughter in law is always over making tortillas, helping with dinner etc. They never get paid for this work, and then the mother goes ahead and charges them for milk. Sheesh, you think free milk for your own grandson, especially when you son and daughter in law work around the house, would not be a big deal. And this family is not super poor either; they do ok.
Females
Families here don’t value girl babies. Even my friend Lesbia agrees with Fran that girl babies are more work. When I ask why, she says, well because you always have to be watching out after them, and not letting them go out with boys, and keep them out of trouble(pregnant). But, I said, aren’t boys just as much work, making sure they don’t get into gangs and start drinking in the street and hitting their wives or getting girls pregnant (notice that getting a girl pregnant is not really that big of a deal, while getting pregnant is)? It seems that bad behavior for men is expected and tolerated, but a girls bad behaviour ( getting pregnant or running off young to get married) is a really bad thing. I also point out to Lesbia that maybe boys are more work, because if you teach them to treat women better then you wouldn’t have so many worries about your daughters
When Esther, the daughter of Rogelio and Lucia was in the hospital after she gave birth, I went to go see her. She was a bit disappointed that her baby was a girl. Mainly since the father had wanted a boy. Men always want boy cildren, and apparently by as many different women as possible. Children are used as pawns in some weird relationship game often. Men get women pregnant to keep a hold over her, often coming back to her again just for sex instead of a relationship,and also some weird proof of virility thing. The woman has a baby to keep the man around and interested, and he is more likely to do that if the baby is a boy. Anyway, this was Esthers third baby by three different men. And he is married. And they PLANNED for her to get pregnant. WTF?!?!? She knows all about family planning and all that, too.
Worse still was the woman on the bed next to her whose baby just lay by her side and she didn’t even have an interest in it. Turns out her husband showed up and yelled at her for having another girl (third one), and then left outraged. Only the poor women’s old mother and 6 year old daughter were there to take care of her. And she look just so depressed, staring blankly off into the wall, not even responding to the baby when it cried. I feel bad for mom, but that child will have a hard life too. And its MEN who make the sex of the baby anyway, how stupid.
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Nando, the sweet old man who works for Rogelio and Lucia Villareyna has got a new set of teeth. Dentures. But they are too big. And he loves his new teeth. And hes so afraid fo losing them, he wont open his mouth all the way when he speaks. It was really hard to understand what he was saying when he had no teeth, but now, its near impossible. This is also the sweet man who really loves to hug the chele girls when they come to visit (myself included). Hug and a kiss are par for the course for greetings in Sontule, but Nando really gets a good hug in and a big smack on the cheek. I don’t know if its because he’s a bit of a lonely old man, or if its because he likes the ladies. Especailly the young ones. Either way, its harmless so the hugging continues.
PoemsNicaraguans have a golden literary heritage, beginning with Ruben Dario, the father of modern Spanish literature. So even in the campo, people have an endless supply of love poems, dirty poems, funny jokes, dirty jokes, and their favorite rancheras memorized, ready to entertain a crowd with a few short lines of wit. And the occasional dirty word. The poems don’t work well translated, and the longer chiles (funny anecdotes), are too long for me to remember, so I will leave you with a few short poems that the nephew of el grán escritór de coplas de Terrero (the great couplet write of Terrero), Carlos Ariel Talavera Flores:
Del gallo me gusta el canto
Del caballo la carrera
Del toro la vuelta en el campo
Y de la mujer, la trasera
Dame tu mano paloma
Para llegar a tu nido
Anoche dormiste sola
Esta noche dormirás conmigo
Cuando pase por tu casa
Me tiraste un limón
El limón cayó por el sueldo
Y el sumo mi corazón
En el patio de mi casa, hay una planta de maíz
Si mi suegra no me quiere
Yo le rompo la nariz
En el patio de mi casa
Hay un palo de higuera
Los besos de mi boca
No son para cualquiera
Por ti suspiro
Por ti me muero
Por ti en las clases
Me saco un cero
Dos palomitas
Sentadas en un florero
Un le dice a la otra
No hay amor como el primero
Mañana me voy
Mañana es mi viaje
Un beso de tu boca
Será me equipaje
Entre espinas nací
Entre espinas moriré
El nombre de mi amor
Nunca lo olvidaré
Aquí paso una palomita
chiquíta y voladora
En las alas lleva flores
Y en el pico voladores
Las muchachas de este tiempo
Son como café molido
No han cumplido quince años
Cuando quieren tener marido
Los muchachos de este tiempo
Son como plátano asado
Quieren tener mujer
Pero no quieren ser casados
En la clase de matemática
No se es dos por dos
Pero en la clase del amor
Hasta le gano al profesor
Corriendo, corriendo
Pegué un trompezón
Por dar me en la frente
Me di en el corazón
La rama del tamarindo
Se une con la del coco
Si mi amor me desprecia
A mi me importa poco
En el patio de mi casa
Hay un palo de algodón
La novia que tenía
Me rompió el corazón
El amor no es poema
El amor no es canción
El amor el algo que se lleva
En el corazón
Que triste es encontrar
Espinas en vez de una flor
Que triste es encontrar
Odio en vez de amor
Naranja dulce
Limón francés
Si no te gusto
Porque me vez
Cruelty
Humans can be cruel people. At my house in Sontule, there are three dogs, duke, yoyer, y mimi. Yoyer showed up at the house one day with a bloody tail. Someone cut off about 4-6 inches off the dog’s tail, leaving bone is exposed. WTF?!?!?!? Yoyer is the most mellow dog, he hardly barks, and he’s not vicious or bien bravo like other dogs who try to bite you. Best I can figure is that he wandered over to someone else’s house and they ‘t want him sitting on their porch or around their house, and people here are not nice to dogs, they and kick them and yell at them to move. Well, they have fleas, which jump off the dog and live in the floor of the house. But that’s no reason to HIT, because the dogs will leave if you tell them too. Except maybe Yoyer. He’s one of those tail wagging constantly seeking approval kind of dumb dogs. And lazy, I have to physically push him off the porch sometimes if he’s in the way when we need to work. So he was probably sitting on the porch and someone yelled at him or kicked him and he still wouldn’t move, so they probably grabbed a machete, or had one in their hand, and whacked the dog’s tail with it. I can only hope that maybe they were drunk or did not mean to cut the dogs tail off, because to actually, with a clear head and cold heart, think “stupid dog, get off my porch”, and then cut off the tail. God. Even drunk or angry, no excuse. People suck sometimes. Seriously. And its true here, people who hit dogs hit other people to, like their wives or their children. I knew I liked Otoniel from the start when I noticed he never hit the dogs. Ever.
Privacy
I had a bad day yesterday. I got home as someone threw a note through the roof of my room. Wait let me explain. My room that I rent in Esteli. Which is at the casa of Erica and family. Last year I had a room in the house. This year, I rent one of two rooms Erica’s brother, Victor, built in their big backyard. Private bathroom, pretty nice. But right up against the wall of the neighbors yard. So anyway, the note said all sorts of disgusting things, and from what was written in the note, it was clear, that they had been WATCHING ME or spying into my room somehow. Freaked me out! I showed it to Victor, and he said it was probably the kids next door, who throw things onto the roof. I knew that they threw things, and that the chickens walk on the roof, but it must also be that the kids (teenagers, really), got up onto the roof and peeped in through a gap between the roof and the wall. So Victor went over there and showed the dad, and he took the note to compare it to the kids handwriting to see which one it is. But now I am completely embarrassed because I know the whole family next door, which is two houses, has probably seen the note. I think I might move. Victor is going to fix the gap, but seriously, I didn’t even want to take a shower because I kept hearing noises on the roof. I was planning on moving anyway to get a place with my own kitchen, so maybe this will be the catalyst for a change. I was worried at first, but since I am pretty sure its just kids, I don’t feel unsafe. But I am still going to look for another place.
Cleanliness
There are times when dirt floors in the house in Sontule really bug me. Like when the cat uses the floor underneath my bed and dresser as his own private litter box and my room smells like cat shit. Or like when I drop a contact lens on the floor and it gets covered by dirt. But you know, they sweep the floor everyday and mix water into afterwards to make it hard and packed down well. It may be dirt, but you can always tell a clean dirt floor from a dirty dirt floor. And well, think about it: You’re cooking, and you spill oil or water or eggs or milk on the floor. Who cares! Its dirt! It soaks right in! The chickens shit in the house. Who cares! Sprinkle a little ash on it and sweep it away! Coughed up phlegm and need to spit? Who cares! Do it on the floor! Your kid is not quite toilet trained and needs to pee? Who cares? Let him do it on the floor! Drunk man passes out at your house after a party and vomits on the floor? Who cares! Dirt soaks up the liquid bits, and you just sweep away the solid chunks! Whoever thought linoleum was a boon to housewives everywhere, clearly never studied the marketing implications of DIRT floors. I’m gonna make a fortune. All I need is a catchy slogan………….
Health
Here are some more folk cures in case you decide to practice alternative medicine:
If you think someone might have given your baby the evil eye, take a swig of rum and spit in the baby’s face. How does one get the evil eye, you ask? Apparently it can be done with mal intent, or just by someone looking at the baby with affection or envy for too long. This can also be prevented by tying a red string around the baby’s wrist.
Entertainment:
We have television in Sontule. I hate the TV. Its loud, and the picture is bad and fuzzy, and everyone has this running commentary during the shows because you cant hear everything that the characters say. And sometimes they watch it when its just loud snow. you cant even SEE nor HEAR anything. But cant turn it off, its like it has a life of its own. And its almost always telenovelas. Just bulla. Noise from 5pm until 10:30pm. And I like to go to bed at 9 or 10 pm. And sometimes for a few hours during the day when Kevin likes to watch cartoons. Sweet, he always asks me first, since the TV doesn’t work right (correction, works even less well) when the battery charger is on. But of course, if I say no, he throws a fit. I could just hit him with a belt, like what all good moms do, but no, I just let him scream, and just THINK about hitting him with a belt. And sometimes he throws things at me. You know, like rocks, or a machete. And sometimes he brings me papers I left outside, or just comes up to me for a hug with a shy smile on his face. Manic bipolar autistic, my pop psychology dictionary says.
Ethan syas I should pull a Sound of Music move, and take some parts out, and so when it doesnt work, tey will just think te signal is bad, ofrthat the TV is a piece of crap. It is, they bought it from this guiy, and its a running joke that its bits from old tvs held together with string. And thats not even my joke. My other favorite part is that the TV is conncected to a long thick wire,which runs from the TV, up through the roof and is rigged up to a giant pole (an old piece of my equipment-little did I know I would contribute to the creation of my tormentor) that is about 25m from the house. So when the signal is bad, someone take a broom and go about pushing and pulling the wire until they get SLIGHTLY better reception. Oh, and you have to use a pair of pliers to turn the TV on and off. And I think the volume is either set to mute or superloud. Nothing in between. Its so bad, that I have considered getting them a TV for xmas, just so at least it will be trashy tv noise without the static.
Chickens.
Chickens are evil. And dumb. I know I study birds, but chickens are evil. I was identifying insects with Julia on the porch when I heard this frantic squeak. I look up and a chicken is holding a big white tree froggy frog by the leg in its beak, which is sqeaking in panic. His cries bring a swarm of chicken (20 to be more exact) around the main hunter chicken, all with crazy bloodlust in their eyes. The main hunter chicken is snapping his head around, looking for a way out of the group, and takes off running, the frogflapping bak and forth in the chickens death grip. I chase down the chicken to try and free the frog (I have a soft spot for frogs), but they outrun me and they convene in a crazy circle of bloodletting (anyone remember the scene in the vampire theater in paris in Interview with a Vampire?) and all I find a stringy sad frog bits, and chickens darting in to gobble up the last pieces. I always say I don’t eat what I can’t kill, but maybe I can start eating chicken, because I don’t know that I would feel that bad about killing one of these.
Positive note:
I feel I have entered in a number of negative entries. You always reflect what you feel inside, so I guess, yes I am feeling a bit negative at the moment about the scientific merit and worth of my project. I mean, sometimes I feel I have been working for 6 years on crap, but I am sure its just normal ups and downs of being a grad student, but that doesn’t really make me feel any better.
What does make me feel better is to start working on the environmental education project and to go traveling with my friend Sara in Mexico. I am going to present at a conference, and then take the time to travel. And it makes me feel better that I am dating a really nice guy who always is around to help me any way he can, which is unfortunately not enough when, lets say, I need to do a complex statistical analysis or want an opinion on data collection or sample size. But is always there for me when I need someone to talk with. And he is good for doing favors and giving back rubs and just giving hugs when need be. Also good for hugs are my nica mom Isabel and friends Ana y Lesbia. I have good people here, just no good science geeks to talk to. Ok, enough mush, gotta a talk to write!
Concert
I went to a big rock concert last night with Otoniel. Freakin rocked!!!! I went and splurged on the more expensive tickets (its all relative, still only 18$ a ticket), and we were right up next to the stage. Only problem was that there were tons of young kids (15-17) in the audience, and all the grls went all stupid and jumpy and screamy during this one band Miranda. Which I was not impressed with because they were trying to hard to be cool. Like a New Order-Tivo-blondie-80s eletronica throwback. I mean, good, but not worth getting all crazy over. And a bit poserish all in different colored sequins outfits and posing and dancing and the guy singing doing his best impression of Mick Jagger crossed with The Cure crossed with Mighty Mighty Bosstones. But the we saw Quinta Estacion, Julieta Venegas, and Elefante, which were all amazing. I went for Julieta Venegas, but I ended up being most impressed with 5th Estacion. They were amazing live, all very good and talented folks, something I at times consider a rarity in Latin pop music. Or any pop music for that matter. Only other deal was is that everyone in the audience insisted on singing along to their favorite songs, so much so that the actual singer could not be heard. The singers seemed to like it or love it and encouraged it. I am sure it is very flattering, but jesus, you can sing along to your radio at home! The whole point of a concert is to hear the group live. Nicas do really love to sing along to the radio though.
Anyway, it had been a long time since I had been to a big concert like that, with five groups and all very good, when youre standing for 8 hours, but the music is so good, you stop caring. (except during the set change breaks, when I thought I was going to die). We had planned to take the car, but, surprise, surprise, its broken again. So we went for 2 ½ hours on the bus, planning to stay the night. But the concert lasted until 2ám, and the first bus back to Esteli is at 4am, so we just hung out at the Texaco Starmart (open 24hr!!!!), ate Sopa Maruchan (you know, cup a noodle soup-sidenote, when they prepare it for you there, they put mayonnaise and ketchup in it. I hate mayonnaise, and mayonnaise in soup is the worst! I scooped it out and put it in Oto’s cup. He loves it), and drank lots of water for about 1 ½ hours, and then left for the bus station. Three and a half hours later, we were back in Esteli. I slept from 8am-3pm, and not I will have to go out dancing for a friend’s birthday tonight. Kinda don’t want to but I have to. Ahh well, life is hard. Need to start working on my presentation and stop partying………………
Pinche
I’m not going to say which family the following story pertains too, because they are nice people and a good family, its just sometimes they can be so cheap! Like they have this old man who works for them. Very sweet, but also very old. He wanted to go away for Semana Santa to see his family. In fact it was a time when all of his family would be together (pity factor-old, may die soon, family lives far away, he doesn’t travel much). For this family, it was too inconvenient that he leave during Semana Santa, so they REFUSED to pay him until the week after so that he would have to change his travel plans. Even though he still got to see some of his family, he didn’t get to see all of them at the big party like he wanted to. Definitely pinche move on the familys part. Second pinche move. This family has a lot of cows. And theay also have a married son with a little boy about 4 years old. SO every morning, the little boys mother goes over and gets a free liter of milk from he mother in law for the kid. But if the kid wants any more milk throughout the day, the mom has to PAY for it. Now maybe not so bad, but it is the son who freaking milks the cows in the morning, and the daughter in law is always over making tortillas, helping with dinner etc. They never get paid for this work, and then the mother goes ahead and charges them for milk. Sheesh, you think free milk for your own grandson, especially when you son and daughter in law work around the house, would not be a big deal. And this family is not super poor either; they do ok.
Females
Families here don’t value girl babies. Even my friend Lesbia agrees with Fran that girl babies are more work. When I ask why, she says, well because you always have to be watching out after them, and not letting them go out with boys, and keep them out of trouble(pregnant). But, I said, aren’t boys just as much work, making sure they don’t get into gangs and start drinking in the street and hitting their wives or getting girls pregnant (notice that getting a girl pregnant is not really that big of a deal, while getting pregnant is)? It seems that bad behavior for men is expected and tolerated, but a girls bad behaviour ( getting pregnant or running off young to get married) is a really bad thing. I also point out to Lesbia that maybe boys are more work, because if you teach them to treat women better then you wouldn’t have so many worries about your daughters
When Esther, the daughter of Rogelio and Lucia was in the hospital after she gave birth, I went to go see her. She was a bit disappointed that her baby was a girl. Mainly since the father had wanted a boy. Men always want boy cildren, and apparently by as many different women as possible. Children are used as pawns in some weird relationship game often. Men get women pregnant to keep a hold over her, often coming back to her again just for sex instead of a relationship,and also some weird proof of virility thing. The woman has a baby to keep the man around and interested, and he is more likely to do that if the baby is a boy. Anyway, this was Esthers third baby by three different men. And he is married. And they PLANNED for her to get pregnant. WTF?!?!? She knows all about family planning and all that, too.
Worse still was the woman on the bed next to her whose baby just lay by her side and she didn’t even have an interest in it. Turns out her husband showed up and yelled at her for having another girl (third one), and then left outraged. Only the poor women’s old mother and 6 year old daughter were there to take care of her. And she look just so depressed, staring blankly off into the wall, not even responding to the baby when it cried. I feel bad for mom, but that child will have a hard life too. And its MEN who make the sex of the baby anyway, how stupid.
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