27 Months of Peace Corps Service in Nicaragua comes to an end!

I tried to think of the perfect post to close this chapter, but I can't find the right words.  So instead, I'm posting a video.  What an amazing journey it has been as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Nicaragua!    

Proud to officially be a RPCV!


                                                Video

Resilience

     On Thursday April 10^th a 6.2 earthquake hit my community of Nagarote shaking the whole town for 45 seconds straight, followed by a long, powerless night of aftershocks.  In a city like San Francisco, a 6.2 earthquake would probably do very little to no damage due to the structural design of the buildings, but in a developing country like Nicaragua, where the majority of the homes are patch-worked together in a very simple way, an earthquake of this magnitude can be devastating.  In Nagarote and the surrounding communities, 2000 families lost their homes and over 200 people were hurt.  One woman died.  Nagaroteños spent a dark and scary night waiting and sleeping outside for fear that their homes would collapse on them during the many aftershocks.  Earthquakes continued to strike for over a week, a 6.6 in Rivas, then a 5.6 in Managua and hundreds of 3.0 to 4.5, keeping everyone on edge. 

     

     Last July Nagarote celebrated its 50 year anniversary of cityhood.  My sitemate Chelsea and I joined in on the festivities of a very proud and united city.  They completely remade the central park transforming it into an elegant and peaceful location.  They made major improvements to the city like repainting the church, creating rentable food kiosks, adding more public garbage cans, paving new pedestrian sidewalks, adding lights, and displaying beautiful decorative flags, making it a vibrant and beautiful place to visit and live.  Forty-five seconds was all it took to set them back so far, to undo so much of the progress it has recently achieved.  Walking through the streets about a week after the earthquake, we passed piles and piles of shattered cement and roofing on the sides of the road, homes spray painted with giant red X’s, inhabitable, ready to be demolished, and homes with entire chunks of their walls or roofs missing.  All the picture frames that once hung in the living room of my home sat in a dusty pile cracked and broken.  The TV in my room was no longer sitting on the wooden shelf, because it fell and shattered.  Giant cracks ran from floor to ceiling and in some parts of the kitchen the sun shinned brightly down on our faces because parts of the roof were missing.  I walked into my next door neighbor’s house, a family that has a 13 day old baby, and as I stepped through the door frame, I instantly entered the backyard, because there house no longer had walls. 

   

     I visited the homes of all my former neighbors and counterparts listening to their stories.  “Gracias a Dios nada grave paso a nuestra casa”  “Gracias a Dios estamos bien” (Thanks to God nothing horrible happened to our house.  Thanks to God we are ok).  So many of their homes suffered serious structural damage with huge fresh cracks running from ceiling to floor, but as long as their homes were still standing, they were grateful to God for sparing them. “Vamos a seguir adalante”, (we will move forward) everyone kept telling me, smiling and relaxed, certain that they will rebuild and press on working together as a community.  Their positivity both inspired and completely broke me.  These beautiful people are some of the hardest working people I have ever met and they struggle every single day to provide for their families and fight against the thrills of poverty.  They fight against obstacle after obstacle to improve their economic situation, to live a respectable life and here they are facing another huge setback.  The average person lives on two dollars a day in Nicaragua struggling against a constantly devaluing currency, inflation, rapidly rising food costs and electric prices, extremely high unemployment, a sub-par education and health system, a history of unstable government and war, sickness, disease and every possible natural disaster.  Amongst all of this continued hardship, they maintain their resilience, their inspiration to do better and never once will you hear them complain.  Their strength, endurance and positive spirit is incredible.  They face adversity with such grace. 

     If you would like to donate to a Nagarote earthquake relief fund, you can do so through an NGO I worked with while living in Nagarote, The Norwalk Nagarote Sister City Project. 

     To donate to the earthquake relief fund, go to www.sistercityproject.org and hit donate, or send a tax deductible check made out to N/NSCP to PO Box 382, Norwalk, CT 06852 

JUST BE HAPPY.

Usually in life, packing your bags and running away when you’re experiencing a moment of frustration isn't an option.  In ‘real life’ you are forced to find a way to adjust, move on, and get over it.  Here in Nicaragua, all we have to do is say the words that we are done, that we can’t take anymore and in a few days we will be on a one way flight home.  It’s that easy.  But what exactly would that accomplish?  Would running away from challenges bring happiness?  

Regardless of where a person is in life, it’s probably a great lesson to learn to not let your ability to be happy rest on the actions of others.  Lately, I have had to remind myself that although bad people can temporarily rob me of my sense of security, physically hurt me or steal my favorite things, they sure as heck cannot steal my happiness.  Only I have control over my reactions and outlook.  As a good friend of mine so nicely put it, we can build tons of wonderful memories but unfortunately, it only takes one bad event to shatter all the good ones.  So it's important to remember that happiness is found in the simple things, like a cup of good Jinotega coffee, an old fashion book (the page flipping type), a song (on an ipod from 2004), a conversation (on a $18 cell phone or rocking chairs), a hot shower (with a bucket), unplanned adventures and officially being a proud owner of a mini-fridge.  Happiness is definitely, definitely not found in a shiny, perfect, flawlessly beautiful Samsung Galaxy tablet… right?  Happiness is embracing where we are, the simple things that we have, and simply making the best out of our circumstances.  As much as I have felt ‘over it’ in the past few months, and over mal-intended people, it’s important to remember that a few bad moments can’t ruin this amazing experience.    

Life is so incredibly good.  This experience is so incredibly unique, beautiful and completely impossible to replicate.  Just this month, I watched a baby be brought into this world, saw a man’s life be saved with a leg amputation, organized a national event, proudly watched my students compete in the National Small Business Competition, and I sat with the Ambassador in her living room discussing current political events and Nicaragua-US relations after a delicious Thanksgiving meal. 

I am so grateful for this experience, difficulties and all, because this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.  No one ever said it would be easy, and honestly, I wanted to be challenged.  So this Thanksgiving, I am grateful for the ability to overcome challenges, for my health, my general safety, my beautiful family, FSU being #1 in the nation, #unconquered!  living in the cold mountains and even for the challenges that will maybe one day make me stronger or at least give me a good story to tell. J  And last but not least, my dear, sweet Nicaragua, I am still so incredibly grateful for you and all the goodness you have shown me over the past 20 months. 

Transitions

Nagarote has been my home for over 15 months.  It is the place where I have always been greeted with open arms, patient ears and an eagerness to work together.  I am grateful for the time that I've had here and for my kind neighbors and community members who have always watched out for me.  I know so many amazing people here that wouldn't hesitate for a second to help or protect me in a moment of need, but unfortunately, the good people who form the vast majority of my community, can’t be around every single moment when I step out off my front door to do my job.  It breaks my heart to finally admit that I had a serious security incident in my site a while back.  It changed my sense of security in my community and changed the trajectory of my service.   

I understand that bad things can happen and do happen everywhere in the world every single day; it just bums me out that it happened here in my community, in a place where I felt safe.  After spending a week in the capital city, I returned to Nagarote, with the support of Peace Corps, determined to continue my work here.  I tried my very best, with added security measures, to return to life as usual and return to my routine.  I didn't want things to change.  I realized that things would be different but I was completely certain that I would find a ‘new’ normal and still have a successful service in Nagarote.  I delved full force into competition season and worked to see my schools through La Paz Centro’s first ever municipal small business competition, my biggest accomplishment yet.  But once that ended, I came to a difficult realization that although I am completely dedicated to my community and feel so at home here, I can’t continue with a successful service in Nagarote while my sense of security has been permanently broken.  So, after much thought and some tears, I have decided to take a site change and will be moving to Jinotega, a sleepy mountain city in the north, at the end of this month. 

I have been spending my last few weeks in Nagarote and La Paz Centro finishing up projects and visiting the people that have made my service here so great to tell them personally that I will be leaving and to thank them for everything.  My community has been extremely understanding and for that, I am grateful.  Most importantly, my amazing host mom, Dona Patricia, whose kindness, generosity and love makes leaving her home almost unbearable, is completely supportive.  It’s comforting to know that I will always have a loving family and a warm bed for me in Nagarote.   

So November 1st marks a point of transition, a fresh start in a completely new and foreign place.  I am leaving a blazingly hot, flat and dry part of Nicaragua where the sun shines brightly every day and volcanoes loom in the horizon and venturing to a cold town that is tucked in a valley surrounded by mountains.  I am staying positive and thinking of this as an opportunity to start a new chapter in my service; a chance to call another community my home. I look forward to forming new relationships and having exciting new work responsibilities.  It’s time to pull out from under my bed the sweatpants and sweater that I've worn twice in the past 18 months because it’s going to be cold where I am headed.

Jinotega, Jinotega

To my two big sisters,  whose advice and honest opinions I often needed, thank you for staying calm and always supporting my decisions. Love you guys


Please feel free to ask me personally what happened.  It’s not a big secret, I just felt it was best to keep the details off of the wide-open internet.

Love, H  

Nagarote, siempre en mi corazón. siempre mi primer hogar.

Waiting for Winter

Everyone in my community told me that Semana Santa, the last week in March, was the hottest week of summer.  They forgot to mention those 4 weeks in April and 4 weeks in May that were just as sweltering with many days reaching 99 degrees.  If I could sum up the past few months of my life I would say they have consisted of irrepressible sweating, 6 liters of water a day and bottles and bottles of sunscreen. 

My daily attempt to hide from the sun

Sitting in my tinned roof house at 1 pm reminds me of those days back home when I would climb into my car after it had been sitting in the sun all day and for a moment that nice warm suffocating heat felt really good... and then I would blast the a/c and go about my day.  Well just subtract the a/c part and you get the gist of what it feels like in my bedroom when I'm trying to get jeans to go up over my sweaty legs.  

My host mom put a kiddy pool in the backyard for a few weeks, which I told her I would spend the next two months in if I could.  

We all struggled through the height of the heat.  Everyone spent as much time as possible outside in the shade, or with their shirts up over their bellies in pure Nicaraguan fashion.  My happy spot was a shady bench with a bag of fresh cut mangoes from my favorite mango vendor who sells the biggest mangoes I have ever seen. 

         

                        

On May 21^st it rained.  My whole family was home when we heard it start to downpour on the tin roof.  We excitedly ran out onto the front porch and stood there silently for awhile just watching it fall.  After a period of silence my uncle asks “what day is it today?  I responded “May 21^st” then my mom says “May 21^st, the first day of winter”.  That night, I didn't sweat while sleeping.  It was magical.  At 94 degrees Winter had come to Nagarote, Nicaragua.       

This semester I attended my first Nicaraguan wedding and quinceañera, a girl’s 15^th birthday party, the equivalent to our sweet sixteen.  Things that I learned:  it is acceptable to only show up to the wedding reception, it’s appropriate to ask the mother of the bride/birthday girl how much every item of the event cost and it's of the utmost importance to take home a centerpiece.

The wedding was for some cousin I had never met.  We skipped the church ceremony and just went to the reception, which felt so strange.  We sat at a huge table with all my aunts and uncles.  They served about 4 different courses of food on plastic plates over the course of the afternoon, all typical Nica dishes.  After our bellies were full, it was time to break it down on the dance floor.  My aunts were all very passionate about the need to teach me, their adopted gringa niece, how to dance properly.  Being the lone gringa at this event I was bound to stick out regardless of my stellar dance moves or lack thereof.  But, I still felt obliged to try to convince my aunts that some white girls can dance, or at least try. 

For the quinceañera I went with my immediate family and my ‘host cousin’ Chelsea, who is also my Peace Corps site mate.  This event was f-a-n-c-y.  They went all out for this 15 year old, red carpet and all.  At one point the power went out and everyone just kept dancing.  That’s when I remembered that yes, we are still in Nicaragua.      

I went to see ‘how the other half live’ by visiting an agriculture volunteer for the first time.  My group, Nica 59 consists of small business and agriculture volunteers.  The ‘aggies’ live very different lives than us 'bizneros'.  We live in communities of about 4,000 – 100,000 people whereas they live in communities of about 300 families.  We biz kids have internet cafes and convenient stores in our sites.  Sometimes we even have banks, grocery stores and ice cream shops.  Most aggies probably have one small convenient store in site.  We bizneros usually have houses with cement floors, running water, consistent electricity and maybe even wi-fi.  Aggies usually have dirt floors, no running water and maybe electricity.  My friend needed some help with an oven project and it was a great excuse to finally get out to an agriculture site.  After a handful of bus transfers and an hour walk into endless sugercane fields we finally arrived at Colby's site.    

The road to Colby's house

 The family we were building the oven for had a meal waiting for us when we arrived.  They even had ice for the beverages, which Colby said they had to walk very far to purchase and did so especially for us.  We helped build the base for an improved oven using horse poop and a glue made from dragon fruit.

Using dragon fruit as glue

Drawing water from the well

mixing the 'cement' 

The first step, the 'table' base is finished!

   

On Saturday June 15th we got hit with a 6.5 earthquake.  I wasn't home when it hit but it was one of the strongest earthquakes my community has felt for a very long time.  My host mom told me she thought the whole house was going to collapse.  Everyone ran out into the streets screaming and the power got knocked out for the day.  It also triggered a tsunami alert for the entire Pacific coast of the country and all volunteers whose sites are in coastal communities were evacuated.  No one was reportedly hurt just really freaked out.  We continued to feel 4 - 5 magnitude aftershocks for the next few days until things settled.  

Other highlights: 

I repelled down a mountain: 

Photos by Gonzalo at Namancambre Tours 

                                     

I hiked my 6th volcano, Volcan Mombacho   

Mombacho Volcano, Puma Trail

            I became a Godmother to a beautiful baby girl named Lucy Joy, thanks to my best friend Lea and her husband Owen.  

I successfully taught a series of community English classes:  

And I completed my first year in Nicaragua!

Thanks for reading!  

H

Vale la Pena

2013 is already a quarter way over!  I’m not counting or anything.  Well, actually I count everything.  I count up: I've been in country 337 days and a Peace Corps Volunteer for 255 and I count down: 60 days until Lucy Joy is born, 86 days until I get to meet her, 109 days until I've been in site for a year, 470 until I finish my service.  That’s normal behavior right? ...I Don’t think so, but I keep doing it so it must benefit me somehow.  But then I stop and realize I have 16 months left and I think I should stop counting for a while... 

I have officially reached the part of my service where we are supposed to experience a mid-service crisis.  Characteristically, this happens between months 11 and 15.  I’m right smack dab at the Beginning of this time frame.  So it’s time to just take it day by day, reflect on the good, find the positives, and power through it.  It's time to really appreciate the little moments, like a breezy bus ride to school listening to my iPod while staring out the window at the volcanoes along the highway, or how a walk through town takes twice as long as it should because I stop and chat with so many neighbors along the way and exchange greetings with even more, hearing “Hola Profe” or “Adios Hannah!” or "Hello Teacher" and, when all else fails, I have to remind myself that the work I am doing here and the things I am experiencing are more exciting and rewarding than a 9 am to 5 pm job in a cubicle with a/c and a 401k.  Vale la pena, It's worth it.  

This is Kenya.  She is nine years old and lives next door to me.  She is an incredibly smart and curious little girl who I love spending time with... most of the time.  When she comes over to the house to buy things at my mom's store, she loves to talk to me through my bedroom window... at all hours.  This week I had a 5:30am visit.  Kenya: "Hi Hannah!" Me: "Hi Kenya, I'm sleeping"...Kenya: "Your window is open"  Me: "Yes Kenya, I sleep with it open because it gets hot and I like the breeze but, Kenya I'm sleeping"  Kenya: "...What are you doing?" Me: "Kenya, I'm sleeping right now, it's early, I want to sleep"  Kenya: "Oh you're sleeping?  ...Are you tired?"  Me: "Yes Kenya, I am sleepy, please let's chat later I really want to sleep"  Kenya: "Why are you tired?...Do you have to go teach soon?"  Me: "Yes Kenya, I only get to sleep a little bit longer, please let me sleep, ok?  Bye Kenya."  Haha.  

I wanted to start this school year off strong by having a teacher training before the new year started in mid February   So the week before school started, I got the approval and support of La Paz Centro's Ministry of Education to have an entrepreneurship teacher training.  They made it mandatory for all the teachers to attend and provided me with a projector and I brought snacks and 5 hours worth of teaching material.

All set with my materials and refrigerio (snacks)

7:45 am: I show up at the school pumped and ready to go for an 8 am session start time.  The classroom we are using is empty of desks and chairs so the principal and I go hunt down some unused desks, dust them off, and carry them into the classroom along with a teacher's desk.  Ok, perfect.  8:15 am: the technical director from MinEd shows up with projector.  Awesome.  8:30 am:  Two teachers have arrived... I silently chuckle to myself thinking, "wonderful, I'm going to give a five hour session to two people..."  But low and behold, all eight of La Paz Centro's entrepreneur teachers show up by 8:45 and we are able to get started.  Already, the day was a success just getting them all to show up!  
My most experienced counterpart co-taught the session with me.  Using the teachers as my students, I modeled for them what an interactive classroom should look like by using dynamic activities to keep them interested and engaged, activities that they then took and used in their classrooms.  We went over lesson planning and the first semester of the curriculum.  I printed out best practices guides, workbook guides, and materials for them to incorporate into the classroom.  They were all excited for the material I provided because they don't have access to many resources.  I was happy for the positive feedback from the teachers and the ministry of education about the success of the training, and to see my teachers implementing the techniques I taught in the following weeks of class!  It was nice to start the school year off with a good success!  Also an awesome way to celebrate my 200th day of service which fell on my teacher training day, remember how I mentioned counting everything... 

Apart from teaching in my 6 schools this year, I am also teaching a class at the NGO youth center in Nagarote called Norwalk, named after Norwalk, Connecticut the city who has supported Nagarote for over ten years through different development outlets and recently built a beautiful youth center.  I have a  group of ten students attending my weekly class where we discuss topics pertaining to life skills development and business and entrepreneurial skills.

Studying Creativity by trying to create 4 triangles out of 6 Q-tips

Listing the qualities and character traits that we have
and the ones we are working to obtain

Norwalk Field trip! 

The committee from Connecticut came for their yearly visit to the Norwalk-Nagarote project in March.  My Peace Corps site mate Cindy and I spent the weekend with this great group of individuals acting as tour guides and translators, they in return fed us delicious food and paid our way to Volcan Masaya!  After a long weekend of translating and answering almost nonstop questions about Nagarote, my service as a PCV and Nicaragua in general, I was voiceless and happily worn out by Sunday night.  Having a captive audience wanting to know more about the place I call home and the work that I do here was the best treat a PCV could ask for!   :-)

The Norwalk Delegation in front of Volcano Masaya

Learning about the Norwalk finca, or farm

Saudi and her pet bird

Rows of Papaya trees on the Norwalk farm

Taking the delegation out for Quesillo!  

The Nicaraguan staff at Norwalk singing for the delegation  

I came home from teaching one early afternoon to two hens tied together by their feet in the kitchen.  They were yelping and trying to flap around (difficult when tied together I learned).  I was awkwardly trying to fill up my water bottle from the 5 gallon jug that sits up on that ledge as they were flocking into my leg.  Interesting experience.

11am two hens in the kitchen

6pm dinner:  Gallina Rellena, a Nicaraguan dish made using Hens :-)

Eating 'fresh' food here is a normal and usually awesome experience.  It's so different than running to the supermarket to buy whatever cut of meat we want for dinner.  I've now eaten fresh chicken, hen, cow, and pig.  I say usually awesome experience because the buckets of raw cow meat all over the house on Saturday mornings still kind of freak me out.  But, we get to eat fresh off the farm cow!  In December a big scary looking man came over to my house to slaughter and essentially dismember one of our pigs in my backyard... on the same table I use to wash my laundry...  After making squealy noises as I curiously watched and took pictures of him working, he asked me, "what, have you never seen a pig be slaughter before?"  and I respond: "No!  Never!"  Pig Slaughterer:  "Where do you get your meat in your country?"  Me: "I go to a big supermarket and buy it!"  Pig Slaughterer shakes his head and keeps cutting.  I'll save you all the bloody pictures of that experience.  RIP Mr. Pig.            


On March 6^th the new group of Peace Corps trainees came to Nicaragua!  Nica61 is composed of 16 community health trainees and 16 small business development trainees.  Henry and I, small business Nica59 volunteers and two health volunteers from Nica55 and Nica57, were chosen as the greeters for the new group.  It was a big honor to be selected to represent the small business sector.  We made corny signs to welcome them to country at the airport and then stayed with them through their first 4 days in country.  

During orientation, our role as greeters were to support the training staff in helping with the event and to offer a volunteers perspective during training sessions.  We shared hotel rooms with the trainees, attended all their training sessions to offer our personal experiences and advice, and hung out with them after sessions to answer any and all of their questions about life as a Peace Corps Volunteer.  This experience brought back so many vivid memories of my first few days in Nicaragua.  I remember so clearly walking off the plane and being greeted with big smiles and signs by my greeters and the Peace Corps Nicaragua staff.  I remember them loading us all up in the big PC bus and meeting Don Douglas for the first time.  I remember that first drive through Managua where they pointed out what we were driving past on the way to the hotel.  I remember picking my greeter Michaela’s brain with a thousand different personal questions.  

Those first few days, well actually the first few months, of Peace Corps service is so unknown and honestly quiet scary.  I remember saying to Michaela during my orientation, "I can't wait to be in your shoes in a year!"  Now, here I was standing in the same place greeting the new group like she did for us in May of 2012.  Now I was the person giving the advice as the ‘seasoned’ volunteer!  It was hard to believe enough time has passed for me to be the expert on all things Peace Corps Nicaragua!  I can say I was extremely happy to be in Michaela's shoes this time around and not back in the shoes of a scared and naive trainee.  Going through that process once is enough!  Nica61 is now almost half way through their pre-service training and will be sworn in on May 24^th as official Peace Corps Volunteers.  

Health and Business Sectors ready to welcome Nica61 at the airport!
Carol, the lovely lady in blue, is our country director 

The new kids!

I roomed with these three lovely ladies during orientation 

Nica 61 and greeters.  This is the cleanest they will probably ever be here.  :P

Classes are going well so far.  I have almost 300 students so to start the year off I created some homemade dry erase name cards and took pictures of every student so I could remember all of their names!  Classes are chugging along wonderfully, my teachers are making great progress and we are right on track in the curriculum. Success.  

Getting kids to participate in class (hard to do with 45 kids)

Creativity project

Students watching a video about the
national small business competition 

In January I hiked my 4^th volcano, Volcan Telica, one of Nicaragua’s most active volcanoes which last erupted in 2011.  After almost five hours hiking up, we were able to stare straight down into the mouth of the crater, a 400 foot drop into lava.  Don't trip.  We stayed on the volcano to eat dinner, watch the sunset, and peer down into the volcano in the dark to get a better view of Lava.  We could see the lights from Leon, Chinandega and Nagarote!   We then climbed back down the volcano in the dark.  The path was small, steep and I gracefully fell more times then I can count... I say gracefully because I managed to reach solid ground with only a few scrapes.  The hike up Telica was the most beautiful hike out of the 5 volcanoes I have hiked thus far.  We saw thermal vents spewing steam, crossed through corn fields and sat in crevices of giant trees.  So awesome!  I now have 5 volcanoes down and 7 volcanoes to go, and plenty of time to climb them all!  

We reached the summit!  

Telica!

LAVA!

I ventured north recently to hike and swim through the Somoto Canyon, located in the northern part of Nicaragua close to the Honduras boarder.  The Canyon has stunning 100m cliffs with lots of difficult obstacles to cross and swim through.  Vale la Pena because the views were remarkable. 

Somoto Canyon, Madriz, Nicaragua  

Somoto Canyon, Madriz, Nicaragua  

Somoto Canyon, Madriz, Nicaragua  

One of my dearest friends and college roommate from my junior semester in the Republic of Panama and my senior year at Florida State came to Nicaragua for 11 weeks to work with a human rights NGO in Leon.    It was awesome having her just down the road from me during the past few months.  We took a weekend to go explore the mountains after she had recovered from a bout of Dengue.  Mayling, a mutual friend of ours who also studied in Panama and lives locally met up with us to explore the waterfall.  

Checking out the old graveyard in Matagalpa

Saying hi to Ben who was laid to rest in Matagalpa. He was a 27 year old American engineer who was working on a hydroelectric dam in rural northern Nicaragua to bring electricity to the community when he was killed in 1987 by the Contras, a rebel group funded by the U.S. government and CIA. It says "the light that's lit shines forever"



Chris came from China to visit me during Semana Santa.  After 11 months of being on opposite ends of the earth, we had a wonderful time together exploring Leon and Granada.  After reassuring him that it was ‘impossible’ to get hurt while volcano-boarding down Cerro Negro, the youngest and most active volcano in Nicaragua, he of course had a ridiculous wipe out while going 65mph down the 1,600-foot volcanic slope.  He walked away with a gnarly gash on his arm.  The hard part was trying to pick all the volcanic rock pieces out of his knuckles and clean the ash out of his raw skin.  Glad he is a trooper. 

The sign says "Don't Pass.
This zone is at risk for volcanic eruptions"

So naturally, we pose with the sign and
then continue to climb up the active volcano.

Me going 30mph...

Chris going 65mph.

 Volcano Boarding is ranked #4 on readers digest's "10 death defying travel destinations"
CNN has it ranked #2 on it's "Thrill seeker's bucket list"

Rebecca came to visit in April!  We scurried up to the mountains to spend some time in the cool sleepy coffee town of Matagalpa, my favorite city in Nicaragua.





Then we enjoyed a fancy night in a nice hotel in Managua where I ran around like a kid in a candy store taking multiple hot showers and turning the air conditioning down as far as it would go while snuggling my big sis under the big down comforter.  A-maz-ing.      

Then after soaking in the a/c, we went up to the hot and sunny Nagarote where Rebecca got to meet my host family, a ton of my neighbors, eat quesillo, ride in her first bicycle taxi, and eat some Nicaraguan ice cream.    

Nagarote's Mirador 

Eskimo!  

 The next few months are going to be very hot with most days getting up to 100 degrees.  I am going to be buying a lot of ice and drinking a lot of water as to try to survive April, May, June and July.  The good thing about the hot months is that my favorite produce, avocados and mangoes, are in season and soon mamones will be back!  I have some awesome projects that I will be working on along with teaching in the schools that should keep me nice and busy.  For fun, I am planning on hiking some more volcanoes, Volcan Cosigunia and the El Hoyo and Las Pilas volcanic range, visiting Ocotal, a city in the north that I haven't been to yet, getting to the beach and I will probably be calling home at least once for a night in an a/c hotel in the city to escape the heat.  I hope that the hot months will fly by fast and that the cooler air of fall comes soon!  And above all else I will be spending a lot of time reminding myself that my service is vale la pena.  

Bacon, coming to a backyard near you soon.