Back on the horse…

Not really sure why I am choosing this moment in time to start to write again but I am. I realized how much I missed writing and having a platform to be able to share my thoughts and stories. I believe it is both healthy for me and for the reader. Over the course of the next month, I hope to share with you all some of the most impactful stories from my 2.5 years in Nicaragua and then translate that experience to my current life, a grad student in Nashville, TN. How did I get from Granada to Nashville….who knows….but it happened and thus the journey continues.

A quick story. The last few weekends I have gone to different neighborhoods in Nashville to do recruiting for an after school tutoring program that is funded through the No Child Left Behind act. Basically, there is a lot of money out there for companies to help tutor kids who are on free or reduced lunch in order to prep them for the state´s exam. So I have been to a mainly Hispanic neighborhood, a low income projects (all Black), and a mixed low income apartment complex (primarily Black). The comparisons and contrasts between the neighborhoods (housing projects) are worth noting.

Hispanic – lots of houses with just the mother inside. Generally a broken car in the driveway. Certain mothers wanted to take to their husbands before signing up their kids. Did not ask that many questions about the tutoring but seemed a bit skeptical. I felt extremely comfortable in the environment….mainly Spanish spoken. Some men outside drinking.

Project – Set up as almost a campus, green spaces, townhouses. Lots of people outside on porches. Homes smelled of smoke, alcohol, drugs. Usually multi generational. Lots of screaming going on between adults and children. Felt very out of place and that people did not trust me due to race. Probably my own insecurity. Still felt pretty safe in complex. Lots of space between housing units.

Apartment Building – Felt more unsafe, more trash, more deterioration in the buildings, really steep staircases to get up to either 2nd or 3rd floors. Loud music outside….group of guys playing dice and betting. Lots of pimped out cars. Lot of people playing outside (it was a nice day). Felt more comfortable as I guess my first experience in the projects helped. Felt as if parents just wanted their kids to stay after school so they wouldnt have to deal with them….not sure if this is true, just a hunch.

Anyway, the cultural similarities and differences were interesting between the low income black community and the low income immigrant community. Also in many ways I felt like I was back in the barrio in Granada but the colors and language had just changed.

Recent Thoughts

While I was home visiting my family, I played basketball with my little brother only to lose to him for the first time EVER. In the midst of this loss, I also hurt my knee, dont know how it happened, but it began to hurt and has continued to hurt for the past two weeks.  And dont worry the knee is not an excuse for the loss, I had a chance to win with a three and just missed it. So in a bit of comic/not so funny relief, as I returned to Nicaragua, walking with pain, Granada’s taxi drivers decided to go on strike! So not only cannot I not walk well, I also cannot get around Granada as there are no taxis! There is a public circular bus that I have used but it does not go everywhere so in the end Ive bummed rides and walked really slow.

And now to make this whole situation even better, yesterday I fell into a 4 foot manhole on the street and bloodied up my shins nicely. Nicaragua is well known for just having uncovered holes in their sidewalks and finally after two years of living here, one got the best of me. This one actually had a top on it and I happened to step on the top, the top flipped up under my massive weight and i went straight down. Lots of blood, lots of bandaids, ugly bruising, but no breaks or serious injuries.

And the taxi strike continues here……

My best friends from UF are coming to visit me! 3 day trip down to Nicaland in May….I am super excited!  So time’s running out people, book your tickets now.

I am trying to decide about my post Peace Corps plans and right now everything is an option. I think I am stressing out over this all and have enjoyed not having to think about this for two years. I am definitely staying in Nicaragua until mid August and after that well the world is my oyster (I think thats the expression). I actually really like my lifestyle here but I am ready for my next challenge whether it be a new language, a new place, or a new business.

It is hot down here. The affordable a/c could do for the third world what it did for Florida. Hey…maybe I should invent this.

Just had my COS (Close of Service) Conference at the beach. Got to spend three days with my entire group while we discussed future plans and hung out on the beach. I was really lucky to meet some great people here and will definitely miss them.

Running of the Jews

I got back to Nicaragua after visiting my family for Passover and after a tiring 4 hour sleep, I got up to go visit my Nica family in Masatepe for the annual Good Friday “Running of the Jews”. Note…there is no proper translation in Spanish. My family had already told me about this event and I wasnt sure what to expect. I thought I would see something similar to what I saw in Antigua, Guatemala with a parade, people dressed up as Romans and Jews, and reading the decree of Jesus getting sent to the cross. It turns out that the event was done Nica style completely. As you will see by the photos, the Jews, Los Judios, looked nothing like real Jews. I was expecting big noses, curly hair, stunning good looks, and maybe a few kippahs. At the minimum, I was expecting cloth robes, Roman style hats, and Jewish stars. However, as you will see the Jews frankly just dressed up in women’s clothing, tshirts, and paper mache hats. There was also no reading of a decree just groups of 20 guys or so chaining either Judas or Jesus up and then running down the street at full speed while dragging the person in the middle of the group. I even saw guys running with their little babies! It was a bit chaotic but no one seemed to get too too hurt and the locals enjoyed the show. I hope you also enjoy the photos by clicking below.

Running of the Jews

Extending Peace Corps?

I officially have six months left of my Peace Corps service. I have enjoyed almost every minute of it and have grown a lot as a person during these past two and a half years in Central America. I owe much of that development to the people of Guatemala and Nicaragua. I now have a better understanding of poverty, Latin culture, power politics, and international development. I am bilingual (most of the time), have bona-fide teaching experience, and have acquired many transferable skills that will surely help my future professional and personal life.

Truth be told, I really, really enjoy my current lifestyle and job. It isn’t too stressful. I get to help other people and have a highly reputable organization backing me up. I spend lots of time with young people, have a flexible work schedule, and have free health care. I have a cute little house, good friends, and live in a cool city. I get to go baseball games, have a daily basketball game I can join, and live around the corner from the best fritanga (serve bbq chicken and cabbage salad over fried plaintain chips all wrapped in a banana leaf) in the country. So why wouldn’t I just stay with Peace Corps for another year or so. What is wrong with my life?

I was speaking with some of my Nicaraguan colleagues the other day and they mentioned to me that I only had six months left. What was I going to do afterwards? I let them know that I really was not sure right now and was considering various options. They then asked me why I did not want to stay. I thought it about it for a second, then a few seconds more (thinking of all the reasons above), and finally came up with the most honest answer I could give them. The money.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that the principal reason for not wanting to extend my contract is the dollars. I also need a break for the constant skin rashes, heat, and insects, but I could deal with that. So to quote the late great Big Pun, “It’s all about the cordobas, baby.” Or something like that. I believe that if Peace Corps were to give me a raise then I would definitely consider staying for another year. How much of a raise? It would need to be in the hundred dollar range. I think that’s reasonable.

I have now been making 250 large ones for the past 20 months and during the previous six months made no money and spent a lot. Truthfully, I have not saved one penny since I moved to Washington, DC three and a half years ago. And I love saving money! And even though this subsistence living has taught me a lot, I am pretty much over it. I am tired of spending more money than I make. It sucks not being able to take my girlfriend out to a nice dinner and to constantly be having to worry about how much money we are spending. It is a bit embarrassing that whenever I have visitors, they have to pay for my portion of their trip as well due to the fact that I just don’t have the money. My parents have to buy my plane tickets home to visit them and recently had to buy me new shoes. I haven’t bought new clothing in over two years, and I try to wear clothing twice just so I limit how much money I spend on laundry. I scrape around for free food like a college student inviting myself over to friends’ houses. The list could go on and on.

To be fair, I still live a great life. I drink beer and rum often and enjoy one or two meals out per week. I travel around Nicaragua (cheaply but still) and have sweet set of wheels (it’s a black bicycle). I have cable tv, a laptop, digital camera, lots of clothes that I saved from college. I always have food, have a great network of people in Granada to help me out whenever, and stay entertained. I also have parents who continue to support me when it is absolutely necessary.

Still, that’s the point. It sucks that you almost have to spend more money in Peace Corps than you make. The only way to avoid running a budget deficit in Peace Corps is almost never leaving your site, going out very infrequently, and cooking all of your own meals. It definitely is doable, and you can still have a fun life, but it is very difficult. You can forget about a trip home to visit your family; the airplane ticket is far too expensive. You can forget about going out to that cool disco (with a five-ten dollar cover) and sharing a nice meal out with your friends. You say that your clothes are fading and ripping. That sucks, better go to the local bargain bin. If you want to go to the beach, you better stay in the cheapest, dirtiest hostel and buy all your food in the market.

I would bet that if you surveyed all PCVs at the end of their service and asked them if they spent their own savings, 90 percent would say that they did. The normal amount would probably range between $500 and $1000. At least that’s the case in Nicaragua. Maybe other countries are different and it is easier to get by with the salary Peace Corps gives. True, we get a decent amount of money upon completing our 2 years ($6000 pre-tax) but a lot of that will go toward moving expenses and starting the next phase of our lives.

In the end, I feel like a spoiled brat for writing all of this but the point that I was trying to make is that is difficult to stay in Peace Corps for longer than 27 months if you like to visit your family, have a girlfriend, and use the internet frequently.

And I am not pining for a raise at all. I think that as PCVs that do pay us the right amount. They want us to live a very humble lifestyle and really be able to connect with our co-workers, neighbors, and local communities. They want us to have to worry about money, not be able to go out a lot, and not be able to travel often. The idea is that it keeps us in our site, working, and building relationships with our communities. And it works! If we were to get more money, Peace Corps would just become another international development agency where their people come down to help poverty while living in big houses, eating at fancy restaurants, traveling in cars, and experiencing a different world from those they are trying to help. Initially, I even told all of my friends that they should lower our salaries (this was before a girlfriend and visitors) and I still somewhat stand by that statement.

Does this all make sense? Should they give us raises to encourage us to extend our service or does that defeat the purpose of Peace Corps? Should they buy us one ticket home to visit our families during service? What do you think?

Mission Accomplished

What exactly is the ultimate goal of Peace Corps? Is the gran meta (as they say it español) world peace as the name Peace Corps implies? Is it improving relationships between the people of the United States and other countries? Is it actually to help others to meet their own personal and societal goals? Or I am just a pawn of the US government teaching people to become more comfortable with the Western/American way of life so it becomes easier to create a global empire?

Idealistically, it would be to bring world peace. Cynically, it would be the creation of the global empire. So let’s be realistic and decide that it is both to engage in intercultural exchange and work with host country nationals to help them meet their own goals. After all, those goals are in fact Peace Corps stated goals. I promise, you can even look it up.

However you look it, during my almost two years here, I have engaged in efforts (consciously and unconsciously) to work to meet all those possible goals. I have naively and passionately discussed how we can bring about world peace and believe I am doing my small part right now. I surely have created many meaningful relationships with Nicaraguans, shared my culture, and learned much about theirs. Through my work, I have tried to help the Ministry of Education implement entrepreneurship training courses and worked with various other business owners and organizations to help their meet their respective goals. And I have also done my part to help spread the seed of capitalism (semi-consciously) through my business ideas and advising, preaching higher profits and free trade; and surely I have forced others to become more comfortable with the Western way of life.

Of course, I am proud to have established what will be life long relationships with certain Nicaraguans but with my attractive (and humble) personality that was expected. I find myself most proud of being able to work together with Nicaraguans to meet their own goals. To do it not individually, but part of a dedicated group of volunteers and project that has been working in Nicaragua for decades, makes it feel even better.

Less than one month ago (in the first weeks of January) the 7-8 years of work that Peace Corps Nicaragua’s Small Business Development Project has been doing in the school system came to fruition when the Ministry of Education officially implemented “La Empresa Creativa” into the national curriculum. Bravo! Bravo! Eight years ago, MINED gave the go ahead for Peace Corps Small Business Volunteers to train and work with Nicaraguan teachers in providing entrepreneurial education to high school students through a course called La Empresa Creativa. It proved to be a successful experiment as the project has grown and developed year by year, volunteer by volunteer, culminating in this decision by MINED to add it to the national curriculum for this school year.

La Empresa Creativa is officially DEAD. Muerto. It is now part of the area Orientacion Tecnica y Vocacional (Technical and Vocational Orientation) and a course called Emprendedurismo (Entrepreneurship) will be given during the second semester of 4^th year (juniors) and the entire 5^th year (senior year). A few of my colleagues and friends worked with MINED and a Spanish organization during the past six months to design the curriculum and further adapt La Empresa Creative to work on a national scale with MINED’s guidelines. Now in my hands, I have the official course book for Entrepreneurship. Pretty cool, eh?

As Peace Corps Volunteers, we are still continuing our work with the Nicaraguan teachers and I imagine we will be for the next few years as we help to train all the teachers with no experience in teaching the subject. Yet, a huge shift has taken place. This is no longer a Peace Corps project. It is an official, nationwide course that has the full backing of MINED. Every single student will receive the course, and every school must assign a teacher to plan and implement this course. We are now purely in a support role and will probably faze ourselves out over the next few years.

Pretty awesome if you ask me, and an ideal example of a successful Peace Corps development project. MINED, the participating Nicaraguan teachers, PC Volunteers, and staff (mainly Georgia, my boss who has been with this project from day one) all deserve huge kudos. This is how it’s supposed to work folks.