The School of the Americas Protests

I had an awesome weekend last weekend in Atlanta and Fort Benning Georgia, this article (here is a clip) by James Roberts sums up the weekend:

"This is, I feel, one of the most interesting aspects of the weekend: How can an event, which began as an effort to never forget the acts of violence and atrocity carried out on 6 Jesuit priests, their housekeeper, her teenage daughter and tens of thousands more who perished as a result of the S.O.A.'s teaching, now seem to offer...well, so much hope and excitement? I asked several people I met.

"I'm here because I see this as my chance to play a role in taking action not just against the School of the Americas and its practices, but in support of so many issues," said Cathryn Mulhvihill, a Sophomore at Valley Christian High School in San Jose, California. "I think it's awesome, that this started with a group of old people, and now, we've joined them - it's us, students and kids."
Others saw the excitement present in the room as little more than the manifestation of the social justice tradition.

"Everything can't be doom and gloom," said Jim Keady, "we have to be aware that it does exist, but recognize the power to change. That's the challenge of trying to live the Gospel, it sometimes offers us a paradoxical moment in which we have to celebrate suffering, in the struggle for justice." Keady, a former collegiate soccer player, is the Director of 'Educating for Justice', a non-profit based out of Asbury Park, New Jersey. He also organizes the campaign "Team Sweat", which works to educate investors, businesses and consumers about the injustice of sweatshops across the globe and is working to force sports apparel giant Nike to discontinue its use of sweatshop labor.

The same sentiment echoed from others who worked for organizations fighting for social justice. "We're here. We're not talking about it anymore," said Devon Davey of 'Not for Sale', an organization working to stop human trafficking and forced slavery. Davey, a student at San Francisco University continued, "I see our generation as a real force for change.""

Check out the article here:
http://ncronline3.org/drupal/?q=comment/reply/2680

Sunday was a great day, before going to mass with the President of the University of San Francisco, I went to the Green Festival in the south of Market which is an awesome place to learn about alternatives for a green holistic lifestyle. They have everything from food products to organically made baby cloths to green energy. Check out the website at www.greenfestival.org. I got to see Amy Goodman speak as well. She talked about Slavery and the President and how this is our opportunity to make our voices heard with everything. There was a booth about a grad school program through SIT in Vermont and some others so that was nice to see. I am super excited to go through the stack of information and free things I got. I actually grabbed a dog food sample that is vegetarian...now bailey can be like me!!

The anniversary of the Jesuit Martyrs in El Salvador

Last night Father Stephen Privett and about fifty students commemorated for this event in our beautiful chapel.


MEMORIAL MASS FOR THE MARTYRS OF EL SALVADOR
St. Ignatius Church, 9 pm
Mass to commemorate the deaths of the six Salvadoran Jesuit martyrs, their housekeeper and her daughter. Followed by procession to the top of the Lone Mountain stairs for a brief candlelight vigil in their honor.

It was the first Mass I had been to on campus and we led a procession with pictures and crosses with the murdered names on them up to the top of Lone Mountain, our upper campus, and had lit candles to remember and celebrate their lives, not those of the killers but those who sacrificed themselves. Father Privett blessed those of us going to the School of the Americas protests this week in Atlanta Georgia and wished us well.

It was very powerful because I have a close connection to two of the people killed after Jesuit Oscar Romero called for human rights help and support in El Salvador during the 1980s 12 year civil war. Ignacio Martin-Baro was killed for his good work helping the people which was seen as being against the corrupt government in place. I am the RA for the living learning community Martin-Baro Scholars named in honor of him and we focus on education about poverty and social justice in San Francisco. Then also one of the American Maryknoll sisters Maura Clark who founded the organization in Ciudad Sandino, Nicaragua where I worked for three months, working to end injustices. These connections are very powerful and motivating for me even though I don't consider myself religious.

All I can say is how excited I am to go to Georgia!

Monday Night in the Dorms

Oh don't you miss dorm life! If you have never experienced it, you are definitely missing out! Monday night we has a power outage in the city in our quadrant (not just the school thank gosh!) and it was interesting...I was watching Gossip Girl (a horrible teen drama that is sooo unrealistic) and the power just went out. After the ten second screams and running down the halls and flash light tag...it came back on. I was actually reading with my flashlight at this point and the hall lights come on but I continue reading, then on eof my residents comes in my room and turns my room light on...oopps apparently all the lights had come back on. Anyways, it was exciting. Just another night in the dorms...

YES WE CAN

Here is an awesome video with Obama in it....check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjXyqcx-mYY

Obama versus McCain- Something Interesting to Consider

Subject: What if things were switched around.....think
about it.

Would the country's collective point of view be
different?

Could racism be the culprit?

Ponder the following:

What if the Obamas had paraded five children across the
stage, including a three month old infant and an unwed,
pregnant teenage daughter?

What if John McCain was a former president of the Harvard
Law Review?

What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his
graduating class?

What if McCain had only married once, and Obama was a
divorcee?

What if Obama was the candidate who left his first wife
after a severe disfiguring car accident, when she no longer
measured up to his standards?

What if Obama had m et his second wife in a bar and had a
long affair while he was still married?

What if Michelle Obama was the wife who not only became
addicted to pain killers but also acquired them illegally
through her charitable organization?

What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard?

What if Obama had been a member of the Keating Five? (The
Keating Five were five United States Senators accused of
corruption in 1989, igniting a major political scandal as
part of the larger Savings and Loan crisis of the late
1980s and early 1990s.)

What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker?

What if Obama couldn't read from a teleprompter?

What if Obama was the one who had military experience that
included discipline problems and a record of crashing seven
planes?

What if Obama was the one who was known to display
publicly, on many occasions, a serious anger management
problem?

What if Michelle Obama's family had made their money
from beer distribution?

What if the Obamas had adopted a white child? You could
easily add to this list. If these questions reflected
reality, do you really believe the election numbers would
be as close as they are?

This is what racism does. It covers up, rationalizes and
minimizes positive qualities in one candidate and
emphasizes negative qualities in another when there is a
color difference.


Educational Background:

Barack Obama:
Columbia University - B.A. Political Science with a
Specialization in International Relations .
& gt; Harvard - Juris Doctor (J.D.) Magna Cum Laude

Joseph Biden:
University of Delaware - B.A. in History and B.A. in
Political Science.
Syracuse University College of Law - Juris Doctor (J.D.)

vs.

John McCain:
United States Naval Academy - Class rank: 894 of 899

Sarah Palin:

Hawaii Pacific University - 1 semester
North Idaho College - 2 semesters - general study
University of Idaho - 2 semesters - journalism
Matanuska-Susitna College - 1 semester
University of Idaho - 3 semesters - B.A. in Journalism


Education isn't everything, but this is about the
two highest offices in the land as well as our standing
in the e world. You make the call.


There has to be a reason that, in spite of the above, we
are where we are today.
Of course, there is a generous dosage of country-wide
stupidity too.

VOTE NO ON PROP K

I am voting No on prop k next Tuesday the 4th in San Francisco and here is why you should too...

Not For Sale: The UNDERGROUND

Undercover video from suspected place of trafficking in San Francisco. (Not for Sale Campaign)
IMMEDIATE ACTION NEEDED –
SF’s PROPOSITION K
BACKGROUND:

Not For Sale is against all forms of slavery: Anywhere and everywhere in the world. It is for this reason that we are deeply concerned that San Francisco (Full Disclosure: where we are based) is on the verge of passing Proposition K.

At first blush Prop K’s language appears to be an attempt to decriminalize prostitution; the terrible truth hidden within Prop K is that it would:

* (1) severely hinder –if not completely stop- local law enforcement’s ability to investigate and prosecute crimes of trafficking and slavery, by making it illegal for police to garner funds to investigate crimes of trafficking.
* And (2) de-fund programs that assist survivors, women and children, exiting the sex industry.

The measure directs the San Francisco Police Department and the District Attorney's office to refuse to enforce the State of California's prostitution laws. These sections include the laws used to investigate and prosecute traffickers and those involved in exploiting children. Non-enforcement of these laws would send an invitation out to pimps, traffickers, and johns.

According to San Francisco’s District Attorney Kamala Harris, Prop K, “would expressly bar the investigation and prosecution of human trafficking crimes. Human trafficking is a serious problem in San Francisco. Many people in the commercial sex trade have been trafficked and forced to participate in commercial sex. This measure would attempt to provide safe harbor to their traffickers." (italics added)
The Not for Sale Campaign is opposed to Prop K.
THE ACTION:

We need you to call, email, carrier pigeon your friends, acquaintances, sister churches, business partners who live in San Francisco to encourage them to vote NO on Prop K.

If you live in San Francisco, or the Bay Area, please contact Kilian Moote to find out how you can mobilize and act to stop Prop K.

For more information on Proposition K, please visit our local partners at www.noonk.net.

-Louisa Barry
Not For Sale, No On K Program Coordinator

USF news article about Nicaragua

This article is about my peers in Nicaragua this last summer on the USF website, take a look!

http://www.usfca.edu/usfnews/news_stories/Nicaragua1.html

Weekend with the Fam

I got to see the fam this weekend, my step grandmother came in from New Jersey and my Uncle Curt from Montana and we got to spend some nice time with my grandmother who is in the hospital for heart surgery. Here is my dad goofing around in the bed, it was actually really funny because when he got up he had baby powder all over his butt and back, and we didn't tell him...hahaa

Check Out the Not for Sale Campaign!

http://notforsalecampaign.blogspot.com/ or www.notforsalecampaign.org

This is the blog of the organization I am interning with. The org is awesome and I completely support it and have given them a lot of my time and energy so take a look!!

Horseback Riding in Half Moon Bay

Last Saturday I went horseback riding for a couple of hours with a few friends will and Brandon who are hilarious and this was their first time riding a horse...we were on beach in Half Moon Bay and it was so nice to be away from the city and be on a horse for a couple hours...what an adventure!











I was laughing so hard because I know they were going to be so sore after that intense ride!

Will and Brandon were all tuckered out it was so funny. They passed out on the bus ride back.

Pictures of DC

This is the USF group with the USF people affiliated with the campaign above us all.


This is the line of people walking to the theater with the candles.


Here is the Auditorium we had the majority of the conference at on the campus of Georgetown.


Part of the conference was having break-out sessions. I led the break out session on the student movement against trafficking. Under the campaign we have programs called "Free to..." while Free to Be for example is about expressing your freedom of religion or Free to Play where people should be free to play sports- in hopes of raising further awareness and getting more people involved.

DC and the Not For Sale Campaign

DC was great, it was a successful conference at Georgetown on October 8th and 9th. The attendees learned how to be smart activist, more of what the NFS campaign was about and how to get involved and education others. We lobbied on the hill talking to Congress men and women as well as senators' staffers and representatives. Thursday night we had a candle light vigil, to light the path that we walked on symbolizing our movement to bring light to the horrible slavery conditions today. We walked with candles to the E Street Theater in DC to watch an amazing new film out about musicians and the anti-trafficking movement called: CALL AND RESPONSE.

Look at the youtube link, it is out in theaters and I really recommend seeing it! My professor and the founder of the Campaign is in it- David Batstone and my class at the University of San Francisco got a shout out as well:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMVy3WgN2MM&feature=related

RA, ACE and Intern

SO much has happened in the last two months, where to begin...
Classes started a ltitle more than a month ago and they are good. I am taking Intro to GLobalization with with this great anarchist professor- the class has no strucure, I swear but it is great, then also political economy of developing nations- which is intense with about a hundred pages of reading every week, then there are my core classes I have to take which are Math and economics- which I definitely am not a fan of but will power through them.

I love my Resident Advisor job, being with Freshman and being able to help them and be there for them with so many questions and anxieties is really fullfilling! I really like the staff in the building I work with and my Hall Director, my supervisor who is an amazing woman. My co-ra, who lives on the other side of my floor is also one of my best friends and that makes my 24/7 job so much better!!

The McCarthy Center of Public Service and the Common Good also offered me a job with them about a month ago as an ACE. ACE stands for Advocate for Community Engagement. I get to facilitate the service students do in the communiy through their service learning courses they take at USF. The community partner I work with is called Glide in San Francisc, it is a great organization in the Tenderloin that really works with communiy needs, I feel really lucky to work with them.

I am also interning with the Not For Sale Campaign working with the high school movement in the bay area and somewhat nationally. We just had this greast conference in DC, the 8th and 9th of october at Georgetown University. It was to bring people together around the nation and educate them about trafficking and help them become involved in the anti-trafficking movement. We also lobbied a little bit on the hill with all the congress people and senators staffers and tried to put political pressure on the senate and house to the pass the Trafficking Victims Protection Act which needs to be reauthorized every two years. So we had a conference, that I helped work on for about 150 people, to help prepare people for the lobbying and get them more involved in the anti-trafficking movement.

My first month back

It has been a month since I got back from Nicaragua and so much has happened. I moved right back to campus adn went through RA trainning for two weeks. I am a resident advisor for freshman at the University of San Francisco. They are in a livign learnign community which means they take a course together about rhetoric, writting, and public speaking with a focus on poverty and social justic ein San Francsico. They are really great. For example I was sick the last week and they offered to make me tea, give me emergen-C or run to the cafeteria for me. We have already had sushi night and other great bonding experiences like volunteering at the San Francisco Food Bank. It is an all womens floor, so we are pretty close. It has been such a time saver and rewarding experience living on campus and meeting new people in my dorm, Hayes Healy. Living with Freshman also really makes me realize how much my friends and I have grown over the last four years. Most of them have serious relationships and are so smart and articulate and well traveled and extremely passionate. We all have so much in common it is amazing, especially after all these years. It is nice to live with the women I live with and be able to recognize and relate to their issues that I went through at one point, but it makes me so glad I am here, where I am at now after much experience and growth. I wouldn't change anything!

Well, I am also an ACE (Advocate for Community Engagement) under the office of service learning at USF. I am a liaison between a community partner organization called Glide and students at USF who do service learning in classes they are taking. I facilitate their volunteer work basically helping them in the process to learn and reflect upon their experience. Glide is a pretty famous organization in the tenderloin and they do such great work. I am excited to have hands on work experience, especially coming straight from Nicaragua where I was out there in the community. Going from that to into the classroom where we learn about a lot of theories is a little tough, but I am staying busy.

Then, the Not For Sale Campaign has been keeping me busy with in Internship entitled "Internship: Global Advocacy." I am workign on expanding the High School movement within the campaign while giving speeches and presentations throughout the Bay Area adn actually in Georgia. The Ignacian Network has conferences in Georgia every year to teach activist about effective ways to work as well as educate them, so I will be presenting Not For Sale's work and then going to the School of the America's protests they have every year there. This will be Novemeber 21st to the 23rd I believe. I am also going to DC to do DC advocacy days raising awareness about trafficking and furthering the movement. I love traveling, is all I can say! We got a new office in a new building at school so we are becoming official compared to two years ago when we were all figuring the campaign out when I was with Erasmus.

I am taking 18 units (16 is a regular load and 12 is comsidered full time student)though two of those units is the internship. I am taking the Global Economy, Intro to Globalization with this amazing anarchist Yugolavian man whose mentor is Noam Chompsky, Math to graduate and Political Economy of the Developing Nations. They are all good, except for math, but I am hoping John my brother will help me out more now that he is pretty much moving to San Francisco.

Mj and I have been planning my Birthday party as well with the theme being "aroudn the world." I want to celebrate all the places and organizations I have been to and worked at over the last year and half. This includes, Cambodia, Spain, DC and Nicaragua. So everyone comign to the party will bring 21 dollars instead of a gift and will pick the organization of their choice to donate the money to. We will have pictures, food, music and drinks from each place celebrating all different cutlures. I cannot wait!!

Well, that's the update. Now that I am in school back in the bay area and pretty busy I will be writing less frequently...see you on the flip side!

I am a Senior!

I received this today after registering officially to graduate!

Hello, Devon Davey!

Congratulations, you have successfully submitted your Application for Graduation and Commencement to the Graduation Center. Seven to eight weeks prior to your scheduled Commencement Ceremony, you will be notified in writing regarding your eligibility to attend the Grad Finale event and the Commencement Ceremonies.

Thank you,
Graduation Center

Hopefully you can celebrate with me in May of 2009!!

Coming home

Adjusting to the luxury, consumerist, privileged life in the US, the life I was brought up in, was not as hard as I thought it would be. But that is something I have really thought about since I came back...how I want to live my life differently. Living in a poor and underdeveloped country for the summer, I have a good idea of how to change my lifestyle in little ways to live more sustainably, more practically and more green. The challenge will be making those changes last forever.

Now I am back in San Francisco and love it. I am getting to see all my friends I have not seen in a year and I am an RA for Freshman on campus. They are great so far. I also got a job working as a student assistant to the office of service learning, so I will be working with the Nicaragua summer program for next year. I am super excited...thats the update for now!

Pictures...finally!

In Managua during our orientation week, we went to a museum outside on the top of a little mountain with a great view, but also pictures and information on Augusto Sandino, a revolutionary and important political figure who was assasinated.

Here is a view of Managua from a view point above the museum we went to.

Here Emily and I are sitting in our first, abuelitos, rocking chairs in Nicaragua. We will soon learn just how much time we will have spent in those great chairs.

This is the main street in Ciudad Sandino. My friend Jolie lived in the pink house on the left. It was challenging taking pictures in the town because everyone stares at your and knows you are wealthy and a foreigner, therefore we do not have a lot of good ones.

This is my front porch near la calle principal, the main road. We were on a dirt road. How we described where we lived, since there are no street names or addresses is by the main elctronics store called El Gallo Mas Gallo. So we would say, I live two blocks north of gallo mas gallo and one half block to the south.

This is just outside my room, the little back yard with the pila, where Dona Maura washed the dishes and cloths.

This is the outside of my room. I had a little furnished room that was not attached to the little house. It was nice to have so much privacy.

This is my host cousin of the house who lived a couple blocks away named Fanny. She is 23 and has a two year old son. 18-22 is the typical age to have kids in Nicaragua, if not younger. She I and were very close and I miss her so much.

Here is Fanny and her son Gabriel. He is a terrorizer!

Osmar, my little four year old host brother with his cousin Gabriel...how adorable from afar!


This is my amazing host mom Dona Maura, she is 65 and cared for the whole house and family. This picture was taken by osmar..he needs to work on his photography skills!

Here is Osmar with the crayons I brought him when I arrived. Kids have such few resources for education and creativity and kids need both to be healthy and successful.


A good Nicaragua friend, who worked for the Foundation for Sustainable Development, had me over one sunday all day and this is her family. They were so sweet, with four girls...imagine. I had a great conversation with her dad about the US and Nicaraguan cultural and lifestyle differences.

Here I am with Anabelsy all the way on the right and her family.

Home Safe and Sound

I got home last night after a three hour flight from Managua to Houston and a four hour lay over and then another 2 and half hour flight to San Francisco. The whole tim eI was thinking about NIcaragua and all the great adventures I had. I am so sad not to speak and hear spanish all the time now. It was great seeing my whole family a the airport though. Even bailey my dog was in the car. The last two weeks in Nicaragua flew by, there is no way i could explain everything so I will be putting up pictures so you can see for yourself! I am glad to be back in california, but will miss everything about the last three months. I called my host Mom Dona Maura last night when i got in and she practically screamed she was so excited to hear from me. She ssaid ohhh my doll I am so glad you are with your parents and safe...It is amazing how I made my life there for three months, my job, my family and my friends and that tim will never be forgotten!

My last two weeks in Nica

So much has happened...the revolution celebration was last saturday and thousands of people were at the plaza celebrating, some of my friends went and said that the President spoke and a bunch of the presidents from other latin american countries were there like, from paraguay, guatemala, honduras, costa rica and venezuela as well as the wife and daughter of Che Guevara. He is a augusto Sandino are huge revolutionary figures here. Their faces and names are on everything here.

That day, I spent it with a friend named Anabelsy and her family. She actually work with FSD as kinda a program assistant and is 22 years old and adorble, she speaks english but is very shy. I am happy we spent like 8 hours together sharing pictures watching La Patito Feo, a show with the famous song here Patito feo. That and the Divina song is very popular, I hear them both at least once a day. She has three sisters, and since I have none it was really fun talking with them and getting to know them. It felt good speaking in spanish the whole time.

This week, I went to evaluations of my organization that happens twice a year and every department reviews what has happened in the last semester, in the last six months. I definitely feel like I know my organization very well which makes it even harder to leave. We watched two inspirational movies (in english with spanish subtitles which was nice for me) called the Secret about the secret of life and one called the Cosmic Universe. They bohth really related to our work in being motivated in life and forming connections since the whole world a universe is connected. It was interesting too, at the start of each day we all help hands in a circle and prayed. I am not very religious but I participated and it was very intense, religion is a huge part of their lives here. Wednesday night I went out with Fanny, she is one of the granddaughters of Doña Maura, my host mom. She is so adorble and I love hanging out with her. We went to see the movie Hancock at plaza inter, one of the centers in managua, and we shopped around. She is 23 and so sweet. She was like I am free, she has a two and ahalf year old son named gabriel who she cares for while the father works all day but since mauricio, the father has this week off for vacation she was able to go out with me. Then we had pizza hut dinner which was a treat for her since she mostly eats gallo pinto too. Since i invited her out, i felt like i should pay and since I can and have the means to, she was very grateful and I am gonig to be so sad to leave her. Especially since we are still jsut getting to know eachother now. If I coudl bring one person home with me, I would bring her!

Then after dinner I met my friends at a nice mall called Las Galerias where we all went to this club called Moods. Needless to say it was ladies night and I paid nothign the whole night it was amazing! There were like ten of us and it was a blast! Though I was tired the next day!

Today Friday, we have out last meeting in Managua with the entire group of FSD and all the interns. It is for a talk we are having on the Novemeber elections in Nicaragua. Then we will all eat together after and probably go out again.

Since this is my last week I have plans almost every night to see everyone I knwo and say goodbye. I also ordered a chocolate cake today for my family to celebrate the last night before I leave. Saturday night I have plans with Gabi and Lesbia my coworkers for dinner and dancing in Managua. Sunday morning I am going to church with Fanny for the first time then I want to do some shopping in the market with her. I want to buy some presents for people here. Like the neighborhood kids play soccer with this old deflated ball, so I want to buy them a new one and like a new toothbrush for Osmar, my host brother since he loves brushing his teeth. Then monday I am goin again to las comarcas with my supervisor nelly and then am going to her house for dinner. Tuesday I am eating dinner at Fannys house just to spend more time with her. Then another coworker convinced me to go out to dinner with her on wednesday and thursday is jonnys birthday, a cousin of the house I live in and that is also my last night so we will eat cake....sad.

Well, have a good weekend!!

The Update!

So I am in Masaya right now and sooo much has happened. Ometepe was good I was with
emily and we had fun together and met a bunch of cute guys, Austrailians who gave us a ride from one side of the island to the other and another cute Nicaraguan who let us ride in the back of his camioneta (truck). There was not a whole lot to do and the weather was ok so we didnt really want to climb either volcanoes but we did do some hiking and went to ojo de agua, this little swimming water hole. Then wade and angie met us at monkie island an awesome hostel with a cute old nica man running it with his family and it was two dollars a night for stay in a dorm room, it was awesome.

Then i came home straight from ometepe and everyone else went to San Juan Del sur
because i had a fatty mirgrane. So i spent sat night in my bed crying,
i felt so horrible. i wanted to throw up even though my stomache didnt
hurt and i talked to my dad which was nice adn I felt a little better. Later that night Doña Maura gave me acetomenofin and i felt a lot better but it was really
really bad. then julie, the director of service learning at USF, the
woman who sent us here, came to Ciudad Sandino randomly. We knew she was in
managua and visiting but she was supposed to stay with emily the next
day. She is also a board memeber of FSD. so she ended up staying at my
house for 2 days, though and she doesn´t speak a lot of Spanish so i had to be with her helping communication. Then she saw my organization and fell in love and saw where jolie and em work too. She is awesome, a single woman who is almost 40 she runs marathons...So monday i painted a mural at the hospital in CS since we did not have class...well i spent the majority of my time painting a tooth on the ortho room. That was fun.

Julie said she thinks i have the best spanish and i was happy, but then
again she doesnt know spanish so i dont know how that works. then
monday when julie was with jolie and Emily, I went to masaya to shop and
take a break from CS. i got a shirt that says gallo pinto on it i love
it! I think it is super funny because gallo pinto is the traditional dish her and it is just beans adn rice, really nothing special but they have shirts with a picture on it. I also had the best pizza at the plaza with wade in Masaya.

what else...yesterday, thursday, the english professor didnt show up
so i took ALL her classes ALL day. it was amazing. i had no plans but
we worked on vocab and pronounciation playing games like hangman and
simon says. then with the older groups i just talked to them about my
life and the US adn they were all really interested. i was exhausted
after but it felt really good. i am really still trying to make the
most out of my job but it is hard, especially since my project did not get funded
and since i took all last week off. so i dont feel super productive.

Daniel Ortega is speaking at this huge plaza celebration tom. for the revolucion anniversary. I dont know if i wanna go, itll be hectic with drunk dancing people crowded together in the center of Managua. whats

hah there is this joke with my supervisor at the school, her name is Nelly, the director that she wants me to stay in nica she wants to adopt me and marry her son because i have lighter skin than his gf. LIghter skin her means you have more money, though that is not always the case, but it is what people generally think. I think that is one of the major reasons people always stare at me on the streets here. Same with any foreigner.

All my friends here all ask when I will come back and im like i dont know i havent thought about it.

Three Buses, Two Taxis, a Boat and a Motito Later...

After about six hours of public transportation, Emily and I finally arrived to La Isla de Ometepe on Wednesday after lunch. We had so many adventures...and the pictures will tell all when I put them up! We stayed in Charco Verde the first night, A place near Merida the second night (at Hostal Monkie Island) then near Balgue the third night. Angie and Wade met up our second night, which was great. None of us saw what we expected...the island is very spread out and outdoorsy. There are no real towns by any means but beautiful views nonetheless. I think my favorite part was climbing up this viewpoint called Mirador Del Diablo, either that or the old Nicaragua man who was talking to me on the boat ride over (they call the boats Lanchas) and he would repeat everything he said to me every ten minutes...he had a little short term memory problem, but I learned a lot about the Island!

I got home Saturday night and actually had a huge migrane and felt really really bad but I am doing much better now and Julie Reed, the Director of Service Learning at USF (the woman who basically create dthis program for us and who sent us here)is visiting us all here. So she is staying with me at my host family´s house. It is great to be able to share this with her and then take back our experiences to SF to talk about them.

Well, I am going to Masaya today, since we are still on vacation from class. Wade lives in Masaya and it is known for being an Artesan town. They sell amazing hammocks too so we will see what I come back with!!

La Cooperative Guadianes del Bosque

This weekend, all the interns took a six hour car trip to Jinotega, south of Managua. They told us it was cold there, but we didn´t know just how. We only stayed for about 24 hours (twelve of which I was sick throwing up, but I am better now) but we got to experience the real Mountains of Nicaragua. They were misty and beautiful with cow herds on the sides of the mountains grazing all day long. Everyone took a hike up to a waterfountain, though I was sleeping off my stomache bug or the bad food i ate, everyone said it was amazing. There was so much mud there too and it rains about 11 months of the year. It was great to see another part of the country but I was happy to come back home. Scarlet and Mauricio made the trip great too, they are the program director, Maria´s, kids. I have this week off, as mentioned before, so I will head to La Isla de Ometepe this week and meet up with everyone again on Saturday in San Juan del Sur which is about an hour from the island. Emily adn I are excited to see the lake the island is on and soak up the sun!!

How Time Flies and How Traveling is So Much Fun

Already onto my next weekend adventure. This week I worked with Gabbie, the psychologist and Isabelita, the Director of my organization, and we had introduction workshops for the new women and children´s refugee house program that was just created. It will be great, we had meetings with psychologists and the new director of the house that will be educating and rebuilding the lives of girls who have been victims of violence and have no where to go. I have been really excited to be part of this project. After those workshops this week, on Friday I am really excited to take a school field trip with the primary students at the private school I work at. We are going to the Zoo in Managua, so that will be exciting. Also, tomorrow is the 4th of July and my friends and I plan on celebrating in Managua with some fireworks after work. I doubt there will be anything special going on here but we all feel like we should celebrate it. Then on Saturday, all of the interns in Nicaragua though FSD (about twenty in all) are meeting early in the morning to go to Jinotega, in the northe of Nicaragua, for a mid term retreat and evaluation. It will be an ice weekend visit to catch up with everyone and see how everything is going. After this weekend and all the excursions and festivities, I luckily have semester vacation from school and get the whole week off. Emily, who also works at a school, and I want to go to La Isla de Ometepe. It is supposedly like the 7th wonders of the world or something and is the largest island in a lake in the world I believe. So we will spend four or so days there, and it is pretty close to San Juan del Sur so who knows, mayeb we will go back there. Well, I am really excited about this next week and then when I come back from Ometepe, I will only have about three more weeks left! wow that´s wierd. I feel like I have been here a while, but could totally stay for longer....

Hope you enjoy the fourth of July!!

A Chapter of Insipiring People

After my adventures and experiences from Cambodia and Thailand learning about devastating social issues, and Spain, experiencing Europe and Spanish, then to Washington DC getting to know my government and foreign policy and now to Nicaragua working in the sustainable development world, what else do I have to write about? I will be home in a month and go straight into boring Resident Advisor work in the dorms on my campus of University of San Francisco. So while looking for funds for my organization here in Nicaragua and realizing that my time here has reinforced my desire to work in public service abroad, I would like to start a new chapter of my blog writing about inspiring people in the past and present. This really started with my blog entry a few weeks ago about Maura Clarke, but I would like to continue writing about great activists and their contributions to soceity and humanity. So when I get back to the states I will start. I will just write about the people´s lives and what strikes me about their work.
Here is a primary list of inspiring people:
Hermana Maura Clarke
Ella Baker
Paulo Freire
Octavio Paz
Oscar Romero
David Batstone
Greg Mortensen
Jamie Zeppa
Dorothy Day
Paul Farmer
Olga Murray

San Juan Del Sur

Friday after our economic crisis meeting with FSD adn all the new interns that just came, Jolie, Wade, Emily, Angie and I hopped into a cab adn went to the Roberto Mumbue bus stop in Managua from where we took a big old bus to Rivas. From Rivas we took a 45 minute cab to San Juan Del Sur. Finally after huge Managua rush hour traffic and a couple hour bus ride we arrived to this small little beach town in the very south of Nicaragua almost near the Costa Rican border.

We stayed at a hostel called Casa Feliz, a small house dorm style place with a kitchen and all the hang out essentials. This great Nicaraguan surfer named Codo runs the place and is the quintessential beach bum. After explaining our hunger to him he showed us apparently he best pizza place in town run by an Italian man and oh was it amazing. The after pizza we got tot know the travelers staying at the hostel and decided to go out to a popular bar and then that turned into going to a disco and dancing with some great Nicaraguan dancers and meeting some really fun people. So we were very tired the next day, Saturday, but still made the morning surfing trip to a beach called Madeiras. We left around 8 and came back around one and we so tired at that point, but swimming in the cool pacific ocean was awesome. It actually drizzled a little but it kept us cool. After our beach adventure with the people at the hostel (they all surfed and are beach bums) we ate on the water back in San Juan. The town here is very cute, the guys we went out with from the night before, our friends, see us probably five times a day just walking around...that is how small it is. Eating then resting, then a little card games and them more eating. We went again to the pizzeria with our German friend, Sandra, to show her how good the pizza was. There are a lot of other Americans and Europeans here.

Sunday (today) we went to a different beach called yankee with the same people from the hostel and while they surfed we swam and enjoyed the sun. Emily and Sandra took surfing lessons from Codo and it was quite entertaining! Luckily Emily and I both have Monday off since we both work at schools and there are no classes. So we will be here until Monday. After the beach we just made it back in time to watch the last half of the Europe cup. It is huge here, since everyone and their mother plays soccer. Spain played Germany and WON!!! I was very happy....

Anyways, it is nice to be in somewhat of a touristy town where everyone is used to white people, unlike Cuidad Sandino really. As well as, it is nice to meet new people and be by the beach with a cooler climate.

I will post pictures when I have more time...all my best for now!

The funniest video about Nica...

Gabbie found this video online and it is hilariously true about how people in Nicaragua drive...take a look on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iddTlrF8mtA

FSD Blog Entry

I was asked to write about my trip so far for the FSD website, the organization I am here with, so here is a little peice of formal pretty writing about my trip (since my blog is like a random stream of conciousness ):


How does one prepare to move to another country? To live with a new
family? To communicate in another language? Or to be seen as an
outsider? How do you prepare yourself for the unknown? You study the
language, you speak with those who carry experience and you bring your
unfailing passion and sustain your open mind, learning to expect the
unexpected.

This is what has given me such a positive experience in Nicaragua
thus far. Nothing really could have prepared me better than the
education I already had. I will be a senior next year at the
University of San Francisco, majoring in International Relations with
a focus on Global Politics and Societies in Latin America.

Moving to Nicaragua for my summer vacation and interning with the
Foundation for Sustainable Development, one of the most drastic
changes is being placed into another culture, and another already
established family. Being accepted with open arms and a traditional
kiss on the cheek is amazing. To know the reputation the United States
has had, especially in the last couple of years, and to be accepted
and unjudged by Doña Maura, the matriarch of my new home for the next
two months, and by Don Lorenzo is beyond anything I could have
imagined. They do what they can to get by, with a little wood selling
business and the income from my stay. One of the first sentences I
heard from Doña Maura, while receiving her brief tour of her humble
home was, "we have a poor home, very poor but clean." Cleaning and
caring for the kids is a full time job that often goes unnoted and
tends to be only half a days work for the women here.
My little host brother, Osmar who is 4 years old.


I find myself wanting to spend more and more time with my
Nicaraguan family, listening to their family stories (which are always
so interesting and dramatic) and all the biblical names the children
have, since it is typical in Nicaraguan culture to give your child two
biblical names. Here is Osmar again reading with Doña Maura, unfortunately it is not a common practice.

It is incredible how often, three or four generations
will typically live under one roof, and when one mother has seven
kids, you imagine how chaotic it is. Between all those mouths to
feed and all the noises the family makes it is quite a challenging
lifestyle. One of the first things I noticed upon moving to Ciudad
Sandino, is how noisy everything is, it is great. From the loud buses
and motos, to the roosters, music and voices of your neighbors, there
is always something or someone to keep you busy even when you are
doing nothing.

Going on my fifth week in Ciudad Sandino, I have learned the Dos
and Don'ts of daily life. While walking alone at night is not a good
idea, many of the same city norms apply even though Ciudad Sandino is
far from what we would consider a typical city in the United States or
other developed countries. The majority of the roads are dirt roads,
which turn into
rivers when it rains after the extreme heat and humidity. The
sanitation is definitely not what it should be either, but with
education and health as higher priorities, trash and recycling seems
to be a first world luxury.

I am working at an integral education organization that operates
a private school as well as a lot of kids programs for the local
community. Some of those programs include, dance, art, guitar, and
crafts classes in addition to vocational skills training. The
organization was founded by Sister Maura Clarke with the mission based
upon education including human rights and social justice bettering the
community. I am working to create a resource room with audio-visual
documentaries adn materials at the school called Maura Clarke, where
many of the students need scholarships to pay for their education. I
hope to create better and more diverse forms of teaching and learning
on campus through the new materials. Much of the teachign here
consists of copying what the teacher writes on the board into the
kids´notebooks. From Kindergarten early in the morning, and Primary
school in the morning and Secondary school in the afternoon, there is
so much energy, hope and joy in the kids faces. I am also working with
the English sections in the Primary and Secondary levels to increase
participation and
interest through sharing my experience and culture and by enriching
their classes with additional resources to promote further learning. I
love coming to class and having the kids be excited just to hear my
speak. They are so curious as to what my life is like, and I love the
exchange of culture that takes place.

When I tell the students in the English classes that I am only
twenty years old, they are in awe. I asked the English professor, Ana
Celia why they reacted that way, who I was pleased to know actually does speak
English (well with a hard accent), and she said they cannot believe you
are so young, educated and that you do not have any kids, in addition
to being in another country volunteering. It is very normal in
Nicaragua to see twenty year old with two young kids, who has dropped
out of school, is at home taking care of the kids and helping around the
house. Many still live with their parents as well, the family ties
here are extreme here, it is incredible.

Analyzing my situation as a twenty year old American and then that
of a twenty year old Nicaraguan, I am driven even further and that
much more passionate at working towards creating the same
opportunities as I had as a kid and continue to have. A very smart man I look up
to told me once, "luck is when you are smart enough to grab onto an
opportunity." I am very lucky to be a part of the Foundation for
Sustainable Development and be a student at USF and I believe the kids
I am working with feel the same.

Here is the Scoop

Hello there, thanks for staying with me and reading about my adventures!! Not many people have computers here in their houses and when they do they do not have internet, so my options are going to an internet cafe and paying for internet. While it is cheap here it is still not super convenient. But here is the update on my last week, which was very amazing. After I realized how great everything is here and how lucky I am to be here and meet such amazing people adn experience such a different lifestyle working in the area of international development, I just had a great week.

Last Friday, after working all day on my grant proposal at work, I got a ride home from Gabbie, my co-worker. Not only is it very rare to have your own car here because they are expensive but I got to ride in my favorite car (when it was rainning). Usually I would wait for the 115 bus to take me from Bello Amanecer, a poor neighborhood within Ciudad Sandino, and would walk to the bus stop, ten minutes and walk from the stop near by house to my house, another ten minutes...any it was rainning! Gabbies car was made probably 20 years ago, it is like a jeep but supper crappy. Her passenger side door has to be open and from the inside and closed from the outside, so I can never get in alone (I guess its a good safety measure though) adn the passenger window does not role down, so that sucks in the heat here. I also saved like an hour of travel evem though I just wanted to go across town. After a productive days work and my adventure in Chucky (what we call her car since it is almost as scary as that movie with the toy dolls) I took the bus into Managua to meet my friends Katie and Brian for a little Italian food in a mall. It is always a nice treat to go into managua and take a break from Ciudad Sandino. Managua is a nice city but still there is so much poverty and pollution and traffic. Actually it is not that nice at all but it is still a great break from where I live.

On Saturday, we decided to take it easy so in the afternoon Emily and I went to La Laguna de Xiloa. It is a little lake maybe 7 km away from where we live. We went swimming and just enjoyed the sun and surrounding mountains. It was very nice and slow paced. Then Katie and I decided to be fat kids to we went to the only super market in town called Pali and bought snickers and oreos and had a movie night at my place on her laptop since my family only have a tv without cable. But we watched surfs up in spanish it was great.

Sunday, I watched Spain play Italy in the Europe cup, which I think I have said before but it is huuuuugeee here! The guys in my family, Carlos, Oscar and Jonni (Carlos who is 45 or so and the boys who are my age) love Barcelona, Brazil and the general Spanish team. They are so enthusiatic during the games it is so much fun and they know all the players. And when they are not watchign soccer or working they are p'laying soccer. I have yet to play a game with them and their friends but I have definitely passed around a few times. Everyother week night or so it seems there is a soccer game infront of my house. Since Don Lorenzo and other family members often sit on our porch and and hang out it give sme a good excuse to always watch the games outside after dinner.

Monday I worked all day on my grant proposal (which was a solid eight pages and is in Spanish and English, I am proud!) and then went into managua to do a little shopping with Katie, to pick out outfits at Barrion, a Nica department store, for her going away party which was on that next wednesday. I also had a meeting with FSD, my program and some other interns talking about human rights and social justice as themes in our jobs. We always meet at a mall in Managua called Metrocentro at this cafe called Casa del Cafe. I had chocolate cake and it was great. Sometimes I just crave random food that the US always has. Here they don´t really have enough money for desserts and gallo pinto is the typical food for every meal. I like gallo pinto luckily and my host mom is a pretty good cook (not as good as my host mom in Spain but who is comparing) but the food here is a little bland.

Tuesday was just another work day on my project but Gabbie and I presented our project to the general Director, Isabelita, of CECIM (Centro Educative y Capacitacion Integral de La Hermana Maura Clarke which is the umbrella organization that operates the school I mostly work in), and she loved the idea. We already presented the idea of having an Environment day and actually setting up a recycling system at the school and she loved the idea too. It was really nice to hear we have her support on these projects. They are both very sustainable and realistic which are key elements I have learned in international development. After giving Isabel the copy of the project description and all the information, we had a great conversation about my work here and how things are going. She asked how I was feeling in general and I said, very much a part of the community here and a part of the organization. They really include in a lot and want to see what I am interested in as to where I would fit in. Everyone treats me as an equal or even a little special cuz I am white and a foreigner. I was pleasantly surprised how not one talked ot me extra loud or slow because they might have thought I don´t speak spanish well, but everyone really talks with me normally and are interested in my culture, where I come from and about my personal life. I couldn´t ask for more. It was really hard being thrown into a job where everything is foreign and new, but after the last month, I have a friends at work who I am comfortable with, I know the facilities and how everything runs more or less and I feel lucky to have had so much help on my project in the last few weeks. It is really hard to have to come up with a sustainable project within a month and try to implement it in two months. Getting to know the organization and come up with a realistic solution to a need is very challenging, especially when they need so much here and working with the skills I have is somewhat limited.

Here is a little about my project: What I described above is what I was pretty much sent here to do...create a sustainable project in two months with my skills meeting the needs of my organization and possibly having the chance to get money from FSD (the Foundation for Sustainable Development) if my project is good enough. So after talkign to people in the community a little bit and people I work with, we thought we would create a audio-visual resource room which would be attached to the library at the school. It would have interactive videos and educational documentaries about all different academic and social subjects. There is a solution and a problem clearly defined in my project. The problem, aside from social issues such as intrafamilial violence and low education levels, the learning system in schools here is very basic. It is characterized by teachers basically copying down their lesson plans onto the blackboard and then the 35 to 55 studetns in each classroom section copying down the notes on the blackboard into their notebooks. There are not many great text books for all subjects or interactive learning. My project addresses learning styles of audio, visual and physical learners as well as those with special needs. Giving the library a resource room with a DVD player and audio-visual internactive materials that they can use as a part of their curriculum will enhance the way kids learn all around as well as improving the teachign system of teachers at the school. The sustainable aspect is that the room where these materials will be stored and used already exixts they just need the resources adn trainning on how to use them which is what I can give, along with the two directors and Gabbie the psychologist who have given me their full support on this. So, I turned in my prject proposal to the main office of FSD in San Francisco and will hear if my project gets approved on this Monday the 30th! We will see, I have a lot of faith in this project because it deals with education which is completely sustainable in general, because once you give the kids the tools and knowledge to make good and informed decisions and educate them about the world, social patterns and behaviors begin tot change improving the society.

Okay, I am sorry I know this is like a huge essay and don´t feel bad it you can´t read it all....

A couple more details...

I turned my project in on Wednesday, the 25th, which was a big day! It felt like a Friday with all the work I had accomplished that week and since we went out to celebrate that night. Well, after turning in my project via email I went to the school with Gabbie in Chucky to then head to Las Comarcas again with my supervior, Nelly. Since she was still in a teachers meeting at the school. Lesbia, the librarian, Gabbie and I decided we didn´t want to work anymore (at this time it about 4pm) so we played the card game UNO. Let me tell you, it is sooo much more fun in Spanish! They have different rules and we bet on the games. We bet things like a capuccino for the winner. Gabbie said she was good, but I thought I would be better because I have years of experience playing with my grandma in Kansas. But Gabbie ended up winning twice and now we owe her 2 cappuccinos, they cost like 50 cents each which is good for me but still a little expensive I think for Lesbia, who is Nicaragua. I loved hearing her little spanish sayings and retorts while playing the game, it was great and we were all really into it!

After UNO, Nelly and I finally left for the poor rural region in Las comarcas, the area is actually split up into towns, and I learned that last week we went to Cuajachillo 2, and Wednesday we went to Cuajachillo 1. So we went on her moto, very exhilerating and met up with two other women Milena and Marta, and we all set out walking in the town around 5:30 to evaluate the classes given to kids who work full time during the week. These teachers usually have between 4-8 young adults, kids or adults in their classes, which consists of sitting outside where ever there is light with their notebooks. Because these people live far from a school amd have to work everyday to survive and support their families no matter what age they can only go to school at dark after work for a couple hours everyday. So Nelly, my supervisor and the school´s director where I work and for the education campaigns in the rural areas, evaluates how the classes are going about once a week. I really enjoy these trip because we get to see the coutryside more and crazy animals like ducks, birds, pigs and huge cows and oxes all on one family´s property. This is definitely a different lifestyle than where I live in Ciudad Sandino, but it is still close...living day to day.

On the way home, we made a couple of stops on her moto (motorcycle) at the school the pick something up, at a vela (like an outdoor memorial service where basically the whoel community goes to remember and listen to the family of someone who died). It is such a tight knit community that everyone knows where the service is an who will be there, it is really great. We also stopped by a clothing store, which is usually just cloths hanging up infront of someone´s home, so Nelly could buy a new outfit for a school event they are having today. It is teachers day. So while waiting and evaluating the cloths she was trying on, I found a bright yellow Brazil soccer jersey and I instantly thought of Carlos, the middle aged son who lives in the house with me and so I bought it thinking I would give it to him when I leave as a thanks but I couldn´t wait so I gave it to him yesterdasy and he loved it! He is a funny guy, very polite but just does not say much to me, like he has his own life, but now we have a closer relationsip...he made me coffee today I was very excited!

After las comarcas I changed quickly to try and catch the last bus out to Managua to go out with everyone. We were celebrating Mariana´s Birthday (the program coordinator), our turning in and finishing of our projects, and Katie´s leaving the country. But, in trying to catch the last bus, I was witing and waiting and finally these two creeping older men came up to me since they noticed I was waiting by myself, which is a little dangerous, and they offered me a seat near them and offered help. They ended up being super nice and wanted to help me since they knew I was a foreigner and had been waiting alone for like 20 minutes. We ended up chatting a little and they told me the best way to to get to Managua since buses already stopped, was via taxi and how much I should pay and stuff. Juan and Maria were so genuine and since it is pretty sketch to take taxis alone especially being female and at night, they got me a good taxi and made sure the driver understood they would come after them if anything happened. They said I should come by their house the next day to tell them I was alive and well. They were really sweet and the taxi driver ended up being nice, he actually used to go to the dance classes offered by my organization. So I felt safe and I made to my friends alright. We ended up having a blast at this club called Hipa Hipa. It was the clubs 10th anniversary and there were fireworks and champagne which were very appropriate since we were celebrating so much that night. The director of the program an this other really cute girl that works with FSD, named Anabelsy, came out too and we all danced together and had a great time! We ended up staying out until like 4 and it was awesome but I have had my dancing fill for a while.

A random side note, Emily and I were hanging out sitting in the shade at the plaza yesterday, Thursday, and she said that you really become and are part of a community when you can gossip or chat about people in the community...people in the streets amd people you knwo things about. That is exactly what we were doing, chatting about people we saw pass or friends who live here. And that´s when I realized I am really a part of this community and people know me and it made me feel great for being here. Anyways, Wednesday was my last productive day of work and was actually really like a Friday for me, since I am only writing on my blog today (Friday) and not dong anything!

After lunch today I am going to pack my backpack and go to a meeting in Managua with my group to tlak about the economic crisis in Nicaragua and then we are all off for a weekend adventure to San Juan Del Sur. It is on the beach a couple of hours south of Managua and I am super excited to relax. I also don´t have to work on Monday since there is no class, so it will be a nice long weekend there!

So I am done writing, but I just wanted to mention that there is a young mom behind me with her four year old son talking on scype to his Dad who is in the US working. That is such a reality here. I hear stories of people´s fmaily members who are working in the US for a better life and to better support their families in Central America. It is just amazing because they are away from their families for years at a time. It is interesting to have lived in the US and in Nicaragua where both families members are away from eachother...

Francie Pants!

Okay so I know I have a lot to catch up on as far as everything that is going here in Nica, but everytime I write on my blog I look at Mary and Heff´s blog to get the latest update with Francie, their nine month old daughter. And before I write anything about my life here I just have to put up a million pictures of this adorable baby! Mare, I am so excited to come home and see you and Francie and spend time with you guys!


Here Francie is with her Aunt Baby Ann (Mary´s younger sister)

I Love the Rain!!!

Last Thursday night I kinda had the realization of my situation in Nicaragua now. I am lucky to feel very comfortable with my family here, being a vegetarian is very easy since they do not have a lot of money for meat anyways, and the food is good. My job this last week has been really great and I don´t feel weighed down at all (as I did when I arrived knowing I had to create and implement my own sustainable project that meets a need in the community all in two months in another language)and I really like the people I am here with. They are great support to have. My parents, the few times I have talked with them, have supported me through everything. I am feeling pretty good about my spanish abilities and communication with strangers and friends here is always exciting, though there is a lot to improve on still. I love the little idiosyncracies Nicaraguans have here. Like the words they use for certain things that I have never heard before, like Chela or Chavala or Barron they use for girls adn guys. I love how there is some sort of music playing everywhere you go no matter what hour and I have even come to accept and become accostomed to the neighborhood dogs barking at all hours. At work, it is great to work closely with this Austrian woman, Gabriela, who is so smart and really understands me. She is dating the director at the school we work at and it is pretty cute to see them together. Then Gabbie´s best friend at the school is her boyfriend, the directors sister who is the librarian. Literally everyone seems to be connected somehow in this town! Everyone knows everyone! Then when I woke up on Friday morning it was rainning. There is nothing better than waking up to rain the morning! The sound sis so great on the zinc roofs here. I could definitely see myself living here for six months or a year working at my organization and mantaining the friendships I have made. But then again after traveling for a year I am still really excited to go home to San Francisco and see my friends.

Yesterday in Las Comarcas

I was abruptly asked by my supervisor, Nelly, whom I greatly admire and respect, if I wanted to go to Las Comarcas with her and her team. I had no clue what she was talking about but she said I though you may like to come with me this afternoon. I though sure, if she thinks it is something I should see, then I am there- I totally trust her.
Somewhat later, I found out it is one of the poorest and most rural regions in the country. So we went in the camioneta, the truck that my organization uses for transportation (the driver´s name is Arnoldo, who I drive with every morning from CECIM to the school which is ten minutes away on dirt roads). So the truck in the back is full and the from car is full with 5 people and we head up to Las Comarcas.
They go every eight days to check on the progress of the adult literacy campaigns that the organization I work for created. So thirty minutes later of bumpy dirt roads and slow driving over pot holes the size of my body, we arrive to the poor houses spread out across the lush green land. It was interesting on the way there, I saw fields of crops, it looked like, with black tarps folded over with people shading themselves under them. I am not sure if people lived there or what, but Nelly (my supervisor and the Director of the school I work at) asked me if we have things like that in my country. I did not know how to respond. But, most of the homes in Las Comarcas are farm style. So we dropped off pairs of men and women to evaluate the progress made in the makshift classrooms and Nelly and I waited with some other people at a nearby family farm until their evaluations were done and we had to pick them back up in the truck in all the different places.
At the farm estate or finca, we stayed at, I saw so many animals. I saw the biggest pig I have ever seen in my life and its little piglet that were six days old. There were chickens, all sorts of dogs, maybe a dozen huge ugly cows and other animals. It was amazing to be at this farm aurrounded by the beautiful green mountains. While we were there waiting and talking, (though even when Nicaraguans are relaxing and not doing anything, it is never waiting, they have all the patience in the world because like I havce said before, their pace of life is just slower and everyone accepts that) Nelly joked that I coould ride a horse, since the man who just brought two cows home just came back adn the horse saddle was empty. I said I would love to ride the horse and the look on her face was great! I contantly surprise Nicaraguans, there are many things the think I don´t know how to do, maybe because I am American or because I dress fancy or something, but I love surprising them (for example everyone is always a little shocked when I tell them I know how to swim adn play soccer and play pool- which i guess people don´t alwaya know how to do or think only men can do those things). So point being I went for a horse ride and it was so amazing! It was a skinny horse, like all the horses in Nicaragua, which are all underfed, but nonetheless it was very exciting and I came back in my nice work cloths (because remember Nelly only asked me the day of if I wanted to go with her to Las Comarcas) adn it felt so good.
I met the Doña of the estate, Doña Eva who was kind enough to tell me a little bit of her interesting life story. She has lived there on that spot for 48 years...amazing. But she was also showing around two other Americans who were in the region working at an NGO called Canterra doing art therapy, however I noticed that they were using a Nicaraguan translator which surprised me. They are here for a week and neither of them speak spanish. Since I am surrounded by only spanish speakers everyday at work abd at home, I forgot how much I value my ability to understand and communicate somewhat in Spanish. It made me really sad for them that they don´t have the priveledge of communicating and learning about a whole nother amazing culture and country. Having learned spanish is definitly one of the best abilities I have and every year (out of maybe seven) that I have studied spanish has been completely worth it.
I am so lucky to be here in Nicaragua and to share my culture and learn about another so young in life. I feel like I have so much time ahead of me to learn!

NO Time for the Internet

It is so nice not having access to a computer in my home or super close to where I live or work. There are computers here, but they are usually being used or they do not have internet. I was thinking about how much I spent on my computer in Spain, and in DC and it was at least a couple hours a day and if not much more when I would watcha movie on my laptop. Not being on the computer here has let me communicate with so many people in different ways...personally and effectively. My lifestyle, our lifestyles in general in the US revolve around technology so I won´t mind coming back to my laptop when I get home, but I will have in mind how important personal communication is. The way of life here, the pace also encourages personal communication as well which is something I will take back with me for sure.

A little something to Honor Hermana Maura Clarke

Hermana Maura Clarke was the founder of the organization I work for here in Nicaragua called Centro Educativo y Capaitacion Integral de La Hermana Maura Clarke.
Here is an except from Wikipedia.org



"Maura Clarke (January 13, 1931 – December 2, 1980) was an American Roman Catholic Maryknoll nun and missionary to Nicaragua and El Salvador. She worked with the poor and the refugees in Central America from 1959 until her death in 1980. She was beaten, raped, and murdered, along with fellow missionaries Ita Ford, Jean Donovan and Dorothy Kazel in El Salvador, by members of a military death squad.

Maura Clarke was born in Queens, New York on January 13, 1931. She graduated from Stella Maris High School in Rockaway Park, New York in 1949. She joined the Maryknoll Sisters of St. Dominic in 1950 at the age of nineteen. Soon thereafter, she became a teacher and taught first grade at St. Anthony of Padua school in Bronx, New York. In 1959, she relocated to Siuna, Nicaragua, a gold mining town. Here, Clarke worked to help the poverty-stricken mining families. She then worked with the poor elsewhere in Nicaragua, and aided those who were devastated by the 1972 Nicaragua earthquake. She stayed in Nicaragua for seventeen years.[1]

In 1980, Clarke responded to the request made by Archbishop Oscar Romero for help in El Salvador. She worked in Chalatenango, El Salvador with fellow Maryknoll sister Ita Ford, at the parish of the Church of San Juan Bautista, providing food, transportation and other assistance to war refugees of the Salvadoran Civil War.

Currently, there is a junior high school in the Rockaway peninsula name Maura Clarke Junior High School, in her honor. Also, Maura Clarke High School and its founding organisation CECIM (Centro Educative Hermana Maura Clarke) in Ciudad Sandino, Nicaragua are named in her commemoration."

She was apparently an remarkable woman who served the poor. My host mother took my to work my first day at CECIM and when we approached the statue of Hermana Maura she began to cry. My host mom, Doña Maura Otero worked with the late sister here in Ciudad Sandino building upa dn restoring the community after the earthquake in 1972 thta destroyed so much. It was touching, and to know my host mom is a part of Nicaragua´s history is amazing.

My Weekend in Granada

So I know I still need to write about the last two weeks of my job and life in Nicaragua but I am in Granada right now and wanted to share my experience here with you first. So my friends from the program, Katie (who has been here for about six months working as an intern( and Jolie, Wade and Emily and I made a weekend trip to Granada which is just about an hour south of Managua.

It is known for beign a cute little colonial town by the Lago Nicaragua. We arrived yesterday, Saturday, for lunch. We stayed at this hotel for international travels called Libertad. There are hammocks everywhere and it is a nice open place. Anyways, we went to an international restaurant called Tercer Ojo and had yummy pasta with spinache and mushrooms. Eating out is so nice because the waiters are on nicaraguan time, so it is always a couple hour adventure. Getting the check will take from between ten to thirty minutes...the pace is nice and slow here, it is great. Then we visited a cathedral de San Francisco with a little outdoor museum.

The buildings here are beautiful colors, bright blues and light hues. Then we walked around the parque central and looked at all the stands of jewlery handmade and had ice cream we bought from the little carts men push with bells on them. There is a huge beautiful yellow cathedral on the parque central or sometimes called parque colon that is enourmous and ominous. I will have to put up pictures later, it is just I don't have anyway of downloading them onto computers here. Then we walked around and sat at a few outdoor cafes and had Tona and Victoria they local beers. After a light dinner of quesadillas we ended up doing dancing to an interesting Nicaraguan club. That is the sum of Saturday. Then today, Sunday, we woke up around ten and went to Kathy's Waffle House. After having Gallo Pinto for everymeal since I have gotten to Nicaragua, which is beans and rice mixed together, I craved pancakes and frenchtoast. There were definitely a lot of gringos there. Then we walked past the parque central to La iglesia de la Mercaed, another beautiful church adn walked to the top of the bell tower and say such an amazing view of Granada with a great breeze.

It is pretty hot here. Then we wanted to see the lake so we walked along the water for a little bit and decided to take a boat ride in a private ten passenger boat aroudn the islands in the area. There are 365, we only saw maybe a dozen but they were very pretty and some populated with monkeys. Prices are great here, I maybe spent 40 dollars this weekend. It was definitely a great break from Ciudad Sandino. Hasta luego...Saludos

On To The Good Stuff...

So...my Nicaragua Family.

May 29th, we all arrived at our families´ houses. I was the last one to be dropped off, which was nice because I got to see everyone else´s houses and families waiting their arrival. I was greeted by Don Lorenzo sitting in his old iron rocker, who is 80 years old and now know that he permanently lives on the patio so that greeting wasn´t anything special. He is so funny, I barely understand half of what he says, but the other half I actually hear is about my boyfriend. Don´t worry, no new news, I don´t have one but he contantly teases me about it...very funny. Actually one of the first things he said to me what ¨when you came to Nicaragua how many men cred for you?¨ He stays on his toes for an 80 year old.

Then there is Doña Maura who greeted me next and pretty much interrogated me about everything I like right off the bat. First thing I thought, she is another Conchi (my host mom from Spain). And that she is. She asked me what foods I like, since I am still a vegetarian and about my family and myself. Then she gives me a tour of the house. She says ¨we have a poor house, a very poor house, but it is clean.¨ This is very true. So there is the patio that is enclosed with iron rods that I guess are for decoration, then there´s a tv room where four or five abuelitos (wooden ricking chairs) sit at any given time around the tv. The floors are tiled and are pretty nice. Then that front room leads to a very small hallway where the dinner table is, set up against the wall. On the other side of the wall from the table is Maura, Lorenzo and Osmar´s room. The that leads to a very small kitchen with a low ceiling, even I have to duck a little when I pass through. Then just outside the kitchen is the back yard which is dirt and a fire pit. Though one of the sons lives in the house with us, Carlos, and his room is small with a swinging wooden door and then there is the bathroom. It is open but in a stall pretty much with the toilet there and then a half wall and a curtain for the shower. The toilet is just a bowl that flushes pretty much so I have definitely strengthened my legs squatting. My room is not attached to the house. It is in the back and is actually pretty big considering. Luckily I have an armoir, a bed stand and a double bed and some funny religious decorations along with a nice big fan, which is much needed.

So Carlos, he is maybe forty and lives with his mom, although he has a girlfriend and a daughter in teh same town. I try not to pry or ask questions when things seem a litte off, but I asked Doña Maura when he doesn´t live with them and she said, well duh, he just is used to living with his mama. She does take car of him, and all families no matter how large live in the same house it seems. He is very helpful aroudn the house though and since Doña Maura or Don Lorenzo never leave the house really, he is the errand boy. It´s funny, they have a cat named Minino who loves Carlos and is like a dog. It comes running when he calls adn sits on his lap and purrs. Carlos does not really talk to me, but I think I am growing on him. We watch soccer together a lot, since the Europe cup is happening now. And I made him laugh the other day, when I came back from the docter´s and said ¨Well, I am going to live.¨ That was progress.

Then there is Osmar. The four year old. We have a great relationship. Like, last night we played soccer together on the enclosed porch for like an hour and he is so cute. He does things to make me laugh over and over and thinks he impresses me all the time. He wants to be just like the men in his life, Carlos, Oscar and Jonni (who I will talk about later). He helps out as much as he can, but he is also annoying a lot og the time. He always wants to be in my room touching things and punching numbers on my phone. On sleep mode, my Nicaraguan cell has fish floating around and he always wants to see them. Maura tries to keep him away to give me my space

It is amazing how much respect there is within the house. The men and boys are so polite, at least around me. Saying, con permiso, with permission, when they leave the table and picking up things the women drop. They always do things for Doña Maura, eithe rout of respect, fear, or debt for something she did for them in the past. She is definitely the driving force behind the whole family, close and extended.