Wednesday, March 28, 2007
more ctaching up
ok
So I have been very remiss in my blogs, but here is some email news to
get you through
Have you ever been awoken at 4am by a mariachi band outside your
house? No? well, I HAVE!! Arent you jealous. they were singing
Mañanitas, which is a trad birthday saong, and I was like, its not my
birthday! But when I peeked outside the window, they were serenading
the house across the street! Well, I guess i will have to wait for my
chance to pretend I am in a Vicente Fernandez flick ( my fave es
Muerte de un Gallero- Death of a Cockfighter)
And guess what!!!!!!! We are redoing my room!!! otoniel and Henrry
have put up new panks for the walls, so the wind doesnt blow through,
and taken down all the nasty 4 year old newpaper which mice love to
eat and is the hiding place for chinces and spiders!!! And a new
plywood division between my room and the lab so I have some more
space. and best of all...(drumroll) CEMENT FLOORS!!!!!! Im telling you
folks, lap of freaking luxury! i can do yoga!
So when my mom comes to visit, she will be like, what have you been
bitching about Missy, this is beautiful! And then she will visit the
rotting letrining with rusted walls, a door that doesnt close, and
half burned used toilet paper outside. Lovely. and she will take it back. Still working on that
one. Yeah, and trying to get Kevin to NOT drink water straight out of the
water filter. I mean, he puts his mouth right over the tap. Kids are
germ factories. I love them, but there are two sacred rules in
nicaragua...Never touch the dogs, and if you touch the kids, wash your
hands as soon as possible.
I have been hangning out a bunch with a swiss girl named Beatrice who
has been working on a project for some months, and stays at Danelias
house when in Sontule. She is doing interviews in the community. she
and me and Oto and Leo and Juanita went to the river to go swimming
one day at a beautiful little spot, with a rock bed in the river where
we sat and a lovely deep part to go swimming. She Lots of fun and sweet, and she went
out dancing with me and Oto and Leo and Juanita after the river
picnic and got her cell phone stolen. I swear, I have seen more things stolen here in Esteli.......
I went to Maggie jos despedida (head of English project). It was at
Erickas house, where I used to live. Oh, it was fun, we danced till
late, so I didnt even mind missing Guradabarranco which were playing at Rincon LEgal.. I am going to be
famous now bc MJ put me on the English recordings to go with the new
teahcing manual. I guess my pronunciation was good enough that she
even forgave my horrible American accent. Must be all the theater
training.
I then wen the next day with her and Maxine and Mike (Australian
english teachers in coyolitos who now do community projects and are
going to buy a farm!) and people from the UCA to visit another UCA
with an ecotourism project in the south, near Granada (UCAs are
cooperatives formed after the revolution and during the land reform).
It was great fun, and we went swimming in pools of soft warm volcanic
water.
I have been reminiscing my trip with Peleus, and as in all things, I
will put little vignettes. What I was thinking about today was playing
soccer with kids on the beach and making sand turtles. They were obviously experst at making sand turtles, bc they even used their hands to make the little trail turtles leave when coming up onto the beach. and more correctly, Peleus played soccer, I didnt do to lousy foot eye coordination.And how me and
Peleus walked down the beach to a forest of dead standing trees rising
right out of the sand. It was really beautiful in this part of Nicaragua. The lake in the crater was blue blue blue greeny pretty. Supposedly your could climb down a trail into the crater, but since we could see and hear rocks falling down the walls while walking around the top, it did not seem advisable. We followed that up with a trip to Padre Ramos and Jiquilillo, a GORGEOUS beach and beautiful estero, where I looked at more birds, saw traditional fisherman, saw the destruction of industrial shrimp farms (BOYCOTT SHRIMP!), found a dead baby hammerhead shark and tons of sand dollars, saw beautiful sunsets right into the water (just like California!!!), and ate so much fish, I couldnt have been happier. We stayed at this Rancho crun by this guy Nato, who works on community projects. One night when we were there, his friends came to visit for his birthday. There was also at the time a cool old German socialist (seriously, lived in bolivia for years publishing a workers magazine, like hard core radical socialist!)who was thinking about moving to nicaragua, his girlfriends, another German guy with complete lack of control over his 5 year old kid who destoyed things and picked food off your plate.( he was also the one who gave me the really bad cold!) one other American and one nicaraguan,one Japanese guys also working on social projects. So we drank rum, Nato did a cool Fire dance display, we danced a ton( Shion the Japanese-american, and Julio, the nica taught me some great Merengue moves which I have since forgotten-no one dances Merengue here in Esteli..boohoo all reggaeton, so I dont have lovely dance partners!)And to top it off, went swiming in the ocean under an almost full moon!
We also spent a few days getting the city vibe in Leon, where I played tour guide and visited churches and even caught a film, which was nice, in a real movie theater with air conditioning ( I just recently missed Babel here in Esteli, bummer bc I really want to see it. We got to eat good food (my god, I had a salad!) and hung around chatting with Peleus and taing in the sites. Very cool.
To see his pictures, here is the link. I have yet to post mine.
only on
Internet Explorer: http://www.peleus.net/Nicaragua_files/frame.htm
Oh, but so you dont think its all fun and games, things progress with
the education project, we are organizing a big community wide activity
for Earth Day. And I have started field work. It will only be more
work from here on out....twice as much with half the staff!! fun!!
chau
melissa!
Link
So I have been very remiss in my blogs, but here is some email news to
get you through
Have you ever been awoken at 4am by a mariachi band outside your
house? No? well, I HAVE!! Arent you jealous. they were singing
Mañanitas, which is a trad birthday saong, and I was like, its not my
birthday! But when I peeked outside the window, they were serenading
the house across the street! Well, I guess i will have to wait for my
chance to pretend I am in a Vicente Fernandez flick ( my fave es
Muerte de un Gallero- Death of a Cockfighter)
And guess what!!!!!!! We are redoing my room!!! otoniel and Henrry
have put up new panks for the walls, so the wind doesnt blow through,
and taken down all the nasty 4 year old newpaper which mice love to
eat and is the hiding place for chinces and spiders!!! And a new
plywood division between my room and the lab so I have some more
space. and best of all...(drumroll) CEMENT FLOORS!!!!!! Im telling you
folks, lap of freaking luxury! i can do yoga!
So when my mom comes to visit, she will be like, what have you been
bitching about Missy, this is beautiful! And then she will visit the
rotting letrining with rusted walls, a door that doesnt close, and
half burned used toilet paper outside. Lovely. and she will take it back. Still working on that
one. Yeah, and trying to get Kevin to NOT drink water straight out of the
water filter. I mean, he puts his mouth right over the tap. Kids are
germ factories. I love them, but there are two sacred rules in
nicaragua...Never touch the dogs, and if you touch the kids, wash your
hands as soon as possible.
I have been hangning out a bunch with a swiss girl named Beatrice who
has been working on a project for some months, and stays at Danelias
house when in Sontule. She is doing interviews in the community. she
and me and Oto and Leo and Juanita went to the river to go swimming
one day at a beautiful little spot, with a rock bed in the river where
we sat and a lovely deep part to go swimming. She Lots of fun and sweet, and she went
out dancing with me and Oto and Leo and Juanita after the river
picnic and got her cell phone stolen. I swear, I have seen more things stolen here in Esteli.......
I went to Maggie jos despedida (head of English project). It was at
Erickas house, where I used to live. Oh, it was fun, we danced till
late, so I didnt even mind missing Guradabarranco which were playing at Rincon LEgal.. I am going to be
famous now bc MJ put me on the English recordings to go with the new
teahcing manual. I guess my pronunciation was good enough that she
even forgave my horrible American accent. Must be all the theater
training.
I then wen the next day with her and Maxine and Mike (Australian
english teachers in coyolitos who now do community projects and are
going to buy a farm!) and people from the UCA to visit another UCA
with an ecotourism project in the south, near Granada (UCAs are
cooperatives formed after the revolution and during the land reform).
It was great fun, and we went swimming in pools of soft warm volcanic
water.
I have been reminiscing my trip with Peleus, and as in all things, I
will put little vignettes. What I was thinking about today was playing
soccer with kids on the beach and making sand turtles. They were obviously experst at making sand turtles, bc they even used their hands to make the little trail turtles leave when coming up onto the beach. and more correctly, Peleus played soccer, I didnt do to lousy foot eye coordination.And how me and
Peleus walked down the beach to a forest of dead standing trees rising
right out of the sand. It was really beautiful in this part of Nicaragua. The lake in the crater was blue blue blue greeny pretty. Supposedly your could climb down a trail into the crater, but since we could see and hear rocks falling down the walls while walking around the top, it did not seem advisable. We followed that up with a trip to Padre Ramos and Jiquilillo, a GORGEOUS beach and beautiful estero, where I looked at more birds, saw traditional fisherman, saw the destruction of industrial shrimp farms (BOYCOTT SHRIMP!), found a dead baby hammerhead shark and tons of sand dollars, saw beautiful sunsets right into the water (just like California!!!), and ate so much fish, I couldnt have been happier. We stayed at this Rancho crun by this guy Nato, who works on community projects. One night when we were there, his friends came to visit for his birthday. There was also at the time a cool old German socialist (seriously, lived in bolivia for years publishing a workers magazine, like hard core radical socialist!)who was thinking about moving to nicaragua, his girlfriends, another German guy with complete lack of control over his 5 year old kid who destoyed things and picked food off your plate.( he was also the one who gave me the really bad cold!) one other American and one nicaraguan,one Japanese guys also working on social projects. So we drank rum, Nato did a cool Fire dance display, we danced a ton( Shion the Japanese-american, and Julio, the nica taught me some great Merengue moves which I have since forgotten-no one dances Merengue here in Esteli..boohoo all reggaeton, so I dont have lovely dance partners!)And to top it off, went swiming in the ocean under an almost full moon!
We also spent a few days getting the city vibe in Leon, where I played tour guide and visited churches and even caught a film, which was nice, in a real movie theater with air conditioning ( I just recently missed Babel here in Esteli, bummer bc I really want to see it. We got to eat good food (my god, I had a salad!) and hung around chatting with Peleus and taing in the sites. Very cool.
To see his pictures, here is the link. I have yet to post mine.
only on
Internet Explorer: http://www.peleus.net/Nicaragua_files/frame.htm
Oh, but so you dont think its all fun and games, things progress with
the education project, we are organizing a big community wide activity
for Earth Day. And I have started field work. It will only be more
work from here on out....twice as much with half the staff!! fun!!
chau
melissa!
Link
