Mochilas!

Third grade students creating a poster of their community
using the donated school supplies after a class on what
makes up our environment.

After lots of supply shifting in my parents' basement before I came back to Nicaragua in July, we filled two suitcases... one with 33 backpacks and one with pencils galore.  Well, I can't tell you how incredibly happy these kids are to receive backpacks.  Below is a picture from students in Aguas Calientes, proudly sporting their new look.  The first grade boy, Jesús Alberto, hadn't been coming to school for the past month and a half because he didn't have a book bag.  His teacher delivered him his backpack and the very next day he started studying again.

The pencils, are just as much of a hit.  Today, I brought about 75 pencils to the school in Las Limas.  The teacher handed out one pencil to each student at the beginning of the day.  While watering the garden, one boy showed me his tuani (cool) pencil that had "Happy Halloween"written on it with pumpkins.  That sparked the conversation of what Halloween is and how it is celebrated in the US.  The group of students were amazed that on this day we go from house to house asking for candy.  (It is a pretty great tradition.)  Something as small as a pencil can be the perfect way to share American culture.

Jesús Alberto, Maryuris, Kenia, Luvy, and Mariana
1st-3rd multi-grade students

Some other updates... I am now co-planning with my teachers, which means I go to each of their houses weekly to plan the lesson for the following day.  Although it's much more time consuming, it's been a good way to personally get to know each teacher and have conversation outside of the classroom.

My women's group and I are sewing shoulder bags using material from used clothing.  Well, I haven't exactly made one yet but I did learn how to sew on a foot pedal sewing machine after 2 weeks of trying.  So far we've sold 5 at $2.50 each.  If we sell 40, we'll be able to buy another bookstand for the library to hold the mountains of books that are currently in cardboard boxes and on a folding table.

Last weekend, I went to the Miss Nicaragua pageant at the Ruben Dario Theatre in Managua because a girl from my town represented the region of Boaco.  16 other people from Teustepe and I fit in one pick-up truck to support her.  I was squeezed semi-comfortably in the back of the truck with 10 others on the way there, even though there was a ton of wind and a slight drizzle.  It was a hilarious ride on the way home with 13 of us in the back, holding the banner we had made over our heads to protect us from the 20 minutes of pouring down rain.  I can't wait to do it again.

14 more days until it will be one year in Nicaragua!

One of the cutest boys I've ever seen wrapping a trompo, 
the huge fad right now in Nicaragua.

Veggies

Deserving of its very own post…. We have fruit!  Lots of cucumber and a few pipian (squash-type veggie) are growing in three school gardens.  Having students run up to me on the road to recount this thrilling news has made the torn shirts from barbed wire, buckets of sweat, and countless ant bites completely worth it.

And my 3 favorite answers to the questions, “How were the two weeks of vacation?  What did you do?”

1.     Great.  I ate a lot of boiled corn!

2.     Fun!  I got to take showers in the rain.

3.     Excellent.  Nothing.

1-2

2 months without a post… oops!  I’ll try to stick to just explaining the exciting things that have happened.

First, thank you SO much to everyone who donated school supplies and backpacks, especially those at Bloomingdale School and the Scotch Plains Brownie Troop.  During my one week, wonderful vacation at home in July, I was able to meet some of the Brownies and see the incredible effort everyone has been putting forth to help out my students.  My parents’ basement is chock-full with supplies so now we’re trying to figure out how to get all of it to Teustepe.  I was able to carry two suitcases back to Nicaragua, one full of 30 backpacks and the other with pencils, crayons, and markers.  Can’t wait to give them to the kids!  (There’s still probably about 450 pounds of supplies waiting to get transported.)

I’m currently taking advantage of the excellent Amigos de las Americas volunteers to create another world map on the outside wall of the school in El Crucero.  These four high school students/graduates have been living in Nicaragua for the past month, working with the youth in their community to create media projects.  In their spare time, they’ve been helping me draw and paint what is soon to be an amazing, huge world map. 

After months of practice, the high school softball team I’m am the assistant coach for finally had its first game.  What better way to start the season than at Nationals?  We were instructed to meet at the high school at 7:00 AM on Wednesday morning to arrive in Managua at 9:00.  I should have known that 7:00 Nica time really meant 8:30, which was when we hit the road.  Representing the department of Boaco, we played our first game that afternoon against the department of Carazo and won 17-4!  All of the softball teams stayed at IND (Instituto Nacional de Deportes) in dorm style rooms.  We had the bad luck of getting placed in the building without running water.  Solution?  Wake up at 3:00 AM when it was pitch black outside to bathe ourselves by filling and dumping bottles of water over our bodies from washbasins in the open air.  I first nixed the idea of getting up at 3 in the morning but after some raised eyebrows from the girls, I, too, stripped down in the dark to get clean before the construction workers started their day next door.  Talk about adapting to the situation…  Unfortunately on day two, we lost 2 consecutive games versus the departments of Chinandega and Rivas and were sent home.  Season record: 1-2.

Next week, my regular schedule will start up again which I’m looking forward to (although I wouldn’t have minded to have the lovely company and delicious food in NJ for a few more days).  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the school gardens are still green and growing.  My women’s group just bought a sewing machine with the money we earned from selling our earrings and our next project is making shoulder bags and purses from fabric scraps and chip bags.  My next feat is to learn how to use a sewing machine with a foot pedal.  It’s not as easy as it looks.

Tomorrow is the party that my Nica friends organized to celebrate my 24^th birthday!

With the rain comes...

Scary flying ants.  I apologize for not updating in a long time but I was preoccupied killing the hundreds of flying ants that decided to invade my room after the first rain fall.  Okay, I guess I'm exaggerating a little bit by saying that I didn't have time to write.  The part about there being hundreds of flying ants is not an exaggeration.  After one hour of using about half a roll of toilet paper, large amounts of Baygon (the equivalent of Raid), and a few sturdy flip flops, I killed almost all of the buggers.  A dozen or so made a classy reappearance a couple weeks later but I think the situation is now under control.

Jillian!!  Jill came to visit the second week in May and it was so much fun.  She posted a lot of pictures if you want to take a look.  I took her to school with me on Wednesday and Thursday.  She helped paint the school map in Las Limas and got to play some baseball at recess.  She also got to speak a little Spanish during my lessons in El Crucero.  On the weekend, we took a trip to Granada where we went kayaking and zip-lining.  We stopped in Masaya on the way home to look at the crafts... I bought a mini hammock!  We couldn't have asked for better weather except for some rain on the bus ride home on Saturday which was, hands down, the most crowded bus I've been on so far in Nicaragua.  Sorry, Jill.  On Sunday, we experienced the "Hipico" which is also celebrated the Sunday before a town's patron saint's day (Teustepe's is May 22).  This basically entails lots of cowboys showing off their horses, mariachi bands, and fiestas.  Overall, a fantastic visit!!

         

                                                                          

     

More water (sometimes).  So now that the rainy season is just starting up, we've been getting more water during the day.  Hooray, showers!  (Unfortunately, Jillian didn't really experience this too much when she was here.)

School gardens and tree nurseries :)   All of you green thumbs out there know it's a little difficult to plant just about anything without access to water.  Now that it's been raining for at least 30 minutes about every other day, we've been able to transplant trees at the schools and have started the school gardens.  We're already seeing lots of green.  Each environmental Peace Corps volunteer received fencing, tools, and seeds from USAID so I decided to use these resources to work with the kids and parents of Las Limas.  The wonderful parents worked hard the other day to cut down huge posts and put a fence around a 12 x 12 meter space at the school where we'll be planting peppers, tomotoes, cucumber, and squash.  I really didn't think we'd be able to achieve a garden at this school because there is no water access and a ton of pigs, but I think the kids will soon with adding lots of veggies to their diet!

Bipolar weather.  It's great that things are starting to turn green again but the incredible heat in the morning that brings on the rain in the afternoon has made me realize just how much I am able to sweat.  Not pretty.

A sad farewell to the bridge.  You definitely are familiar with the log bridge I'd been crossing to take the short route to 3 of my schools.  My heart palpitations had finally stopped after about 2 months of getting used to crossing the bridge and my balance could now be compared to that of a pro gymnast.  I'm very, very sad to say that the river is growing and the wading is returning.  Take a look at the beautiful pictures below....

 

Things are continuing to go very well.  I received a training last week with a community member and other volunteers and counterparts on how to build  biodigestors and improved ovens... so cool.  I think we are going to build a demonstration oven at a local NGO who works with youth in the communities.  I'm still involved with softball and the games should begin on June 3.  My cousin, Danny, gave us t-shirts from his high school and the girls and me are really excited to be outfitted in Saint Anthony's gear for the game.  Thanks, Dan!