Youth Group Winners!

And first place in the Youth Group Product Fair goes to. . . Pan de Banano from El Recreo!!!!  My youth group won the whole competition against all 11 other groups from all the training towns of Agriculture and Small Business.  What an amazing surprise.  The other groups were so, so good.  I was really impressed with all the cool products that were there, like mango chutney, bags woven from plastic string, soap in a hand-painted coconut shell, glass candle holders, and the list goes on.  The agriculture groups won 4 out of 6 winning positions (best product packaging to the El Rosario group with their bamboo packaged shampoo, best flavor to the La Palmera group with their coco-choco-bananos, 3rd place to the Guisquiliapa group with their soap, and my group at 1st place!)  It was a tough day, but paid off in the end!

Well, this next week is the last week of training.  Today's my last full day with my host family, so I'm going to attempt to make them beef stew for lunch as a thank you.  I hope it turns out as good as it has in the past and that they like it.  Yesterday some of us went to the town of Masatepe to go thrift shopping.  There's some great thrift stores here in Nicaragua!  I mostly bought some simple t-shirts (so now I know I can easily get those here for like 30 cordobas, a little over a dollar each), and some skirts to add to my wardrobe.  I was hoping to find a nice Nica dress to wear for the swearing in ceremony this Friday, but my funds were running low and their nice dress options were limited to prom-style tule dresses like you find in any thrift store in the U.S.  Not doing it.

So speaking of this Friday, I'm swearing in!  I will be an official volunteer as of about 11am on the 29th.  Spanish classes were officially over as of last Wednesday, so this week is full of charlas every single day.  Thursday morning we move out of our home-stay houses and head to Managua for Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, for the ceremony and to spend one last day preparing to move to our sites on Sunday.  We had our final language interviews last Wednesday, and we find out tomorrow what our official language level is starting out as volunteers.  At the very end of service (after 2 years), they do an exit language interview also to see how you've improved.  My interview went okay.  I honestly don't think it was any better than the mid-training interview.  We've spent relatively little time in class for the second half of training than we did the first half, since we had two weeks off for tech week and the site visit week.  Plus with so many charlas during the weeks, you get to speaking a lot of English with the other trainees, and that can slow your Spanish progress down a bit.  But overall the interview was fine.  I'm still at an Intermediate Mid speaking level, which is the goal, so I'm not worried.  My language will definitely have to improve in my site where I'll be speaking Spanish 24/7, so it'll just come with time. 

So I finally have some info regarding my new address, but I don't have the actual address yet.  This is how it goes:  there are about 5 volunteers that live in the city of Jinotega, which is the closest large city to my site, about 2.5 hours by bus.  Those volunteers have a PO Box that they all share at the post office, and everyone who lives in the Jinotega area can use that one.  It sounds like the post office staff know that all the volunteers share it and let them take other's mail when necessary, like when they come into town they can deliver mail to their neighbor volunteers if they want, or the volunteers who live in the city can keep the mail at their house and we can just go visit them to pick up our mail.  So, I will have a PO Box number to share with you all for my future mail, but I don't know what it is yet.  I'll find out as soon as I can and get back to you.  But for now, hold off on any mail to the Managua address.  Since I'm moving, I won't have easy access to the mail that comes to the PC office since the traning staff always delivered that mail to us during training, and starting next week I won't be a trainee anymore!  Also, just give me a heads up in an e-mail if you can when you do mail stuff in the future so I know to keep an eye out for stuff to arrive.  It has been taking about 3 weeks to a month for packages to get here (even letters and cards too!), so keep that in mind if there's any time sensitive stuff.

Okay, Spanish lesson for this blog: "Si hombre" and "No hombre".  You say this in agreeance or disagreeance with something that the previous person just said.  It's like saying "Yeah man!" or "No way dude!" depending if you agree or not. 

'Til next time . . .

~Sarita~

Wale Site Visit

So I just got back from my site visit in Wale.  Spent my birthday yesterday in Managua during the site week processing charla we had.  Thank you everyone for your birthday wishes and e-mails!  My home-stay mom and sister gave me a pair of earrings and made me a really yummy chinese food meal (well, everything she makes is really yummy). 

So, Wale.  Let's just say it's amazingly beautiful.  I've posted pics on my shutterfly page so check 'em out!  Wale's located in the valley of Santa Maria de Pantasma, and my house is located directly on the main road winding down the valley towards the main town of Praderas on the valley floor.  There's a ton of communities in the valley, too many to memorize.  Since Wale's a little higher up than the valley floor, it's cooler than Praderas and the other communities, which is nice, because Praderas can get as got and humid as Managua.  The other two volunteers in my group closest to me are Daryl and Paul, about 8 km and 10 km away from Wale. 

My new family consists of Esmeralda and her husband and their 6 sons, ranging in age from 13 to 23.  The oldest goes to college in Managua, and is studying English and French. It's weird because he speaks English with some what of a French accent, and is sometimes hard to understand in English because of it.  Since Managua is about 5-6 hours away he lives there during the school year.  Esmeralda has a pulperia in her house, which is a little store, and it's mostly the youngest sons who are tending to it.  The week that I was there was a school vacation, so everyone was home.  So the kids were there all day to help with the pulperia.  It'll be interesting to see the change in routine once I'm back in August since the kids will be in school during the day, or at least the morning. 

During my stay I met with my community counterpart, Pedro.  He's an older gentleman who speaks insanely fast which makes it really hard to understand him.  But he does tend to repeat himself multiple times in the same sentence, so I can at least catch on to the important words.  He took me around to meet about 7 families in the community, which was nice but sometimes awkward.  Everyone always pulls up a chair and has you sit down with them, and sometimes offers you something to drink, like coffee or a fresco, which is fresh fruit juice.  I would introduce myself as the new volunteer coming to live in Wale and try to get some ideas from them what they know about the community or what there experience was with the previous volunteer who left last year.  Of course they all know about him and probably spent some time with him since everyone knows everyone else in the community.  I probably won't hear the end of the stories about him, as most 2nd and 3rd generation volunteers deal with when following a previous volunteer.  Communities always like to compare. 

Another younger community member, who's the vice president of the local Empresa, which is like a community support group for farmers, took me on a tour of the town of Praderas, about 5km down the road.  He took me to the police station, mayor's office, health center, court house, and introduced me to the people that worked there.  It was also a little awkward at times, and I had a hard time understanding a lot of what was being said, but that's just how this whole thing goes.  It's gonna be weird and uncomfortable pleanty of times in the beginning.  Plus I felt like he was obligated to show me around and spend his whole day carting around the new gringa.  But he did work with the last volunteer so he should be used to it. 

The room I have is within the main house.  It has only a bed, which is all they have to provide, so I'll be buying more furnature when I move in.  All I really need is a table and a chair, and something to put my clothes in/on.  The latrine is out back, and is nicer than I thought, considering the door closes all the way, there's actually room for your legs when the door is closed, and the seat is plastic.  Other latrine experiences I've had the seat is cement and hurts cause it's sometimes cracked, and the door is too close to the hole so you can't sit down without hitting your knees on the door.  Every morning the family gets up at 5am.  The light never changes here like daylight savings back home, so every single day of the year the sun rises at 5am and sets around 6:30.  So every morning the roosters start crowing at around 4am, and the buses start running at 4:30, which are very loud on the road right in front of my house.  My new routine will be interesting. 

This week we have our final youth group meetings to prepare for the competition this Friday.  We also have our final lanuage interviews on Wed.  It's going to be a busy week.  But it's the final stretch before swearing in on the 29th!  Then I'm moving back to Wale for good on Sunday, July 31st, to start the next chapter of my Peace Corps journey. 

Spanish lesson for this blog: Chavalo/Chavala.  The word for kid or student (male/female).  Also: Chinelas.  The word they use for flip-flops or sandals, the kind we use in the shower and to hang around in the house in. 

Until next time. . .

~Sarita~  (that's what my new family always calls me)

Site placement!!

It's official everyone.  I'll be moving to a pueblo called Wale, in Santa Maria de Pantasma in the department of Jinotega!  Jinotega (pronounced hee-no-tay-ga) is in the northern central part of Nicaragua (get your maps out everyone!) and partially borders Honduras to the north (the municipality of Santa Maria de Pantasma is approx. 40 miles south of the border with Honduras).  Here's the info I've been given about my site:  my pueblo, Wale (pronounced waa-lay), is a geographically unique community located at the entrance to the valley of Pantasma, an ancient volcanic crater.  It gets rain nearly year-round, so it's green nearly year-round (yay!).  It's main production is coffee, and most families depend on their crops and animals for their entire income.  It does have both electricity and running water, like most all the sites, but that also depends on how close to the road you live. Many houses are right on the main road, but many also live back off the road, so utilities could vary.  My home-stay family live right on the main road, I'm told (and I'll find out this week when I go visit), but after 6 months I'll have the option to move if I want to.  The nearby town of Praderas has a high school, an internet cafe (which is apparently tiny, overpriced, and rediculously hot), and on the weekends local sports teams compete in men's baseball and soccer leagues, and apparently there's a recently formed women's soccer league as well.  This site is second generation, meaning I'm the second volunteer to live there.  However, the previous volunteer early terminated after 1 year, so it's been vacant of a volunteer for a while.  I was also told today that there was actually a volunteer before that who left after two weeks at site, so I feel extra pressured to hold my own and make them proud!  This site deserves a full-term hard working volunteer!  Here I come!

So the plan as of now is this: Thursday (July 7th) we're all packing up a weeks worth of stuff and heading to Estelí to meet with our counterparts, who are Nicaraguans that work with NGO's in the community, mostly INTA, a Nica agricultural organization.  Then Friday they leave with each one of us and accompany us to our sites, where we meet our future families and live in our new site for the week, until we return next Thursday, the 14th (the day before my birthday!).  So needless to say I'm going to be super tired for my b-day. But I'm ready to meet my new family and see my hometown for the next two years!  Let's hope I don't get sick in the campo this time. . .

As for my new address, I have no idea yet what that's going to be.  I expect I'll be opening up a PO Box at the local post office, so keep your pants on, I'll let you know as soon as I can what that's all about. 

Spanish lesson for this blog (I keep it real simple):  ¿Quien sabe?    That means Who knows?  It's basically what everyone says around here, and has been my motto about everything.  I finally know where I'll be living for my service, but who know's what it's going to be like? I shall see soon enough.  And I'll try to keep you all posted along the way. . .

~Sarah~