My House! La Casita.

After six months in site and six moves, I finally have a house I can call my own and if I am determined a house that I can make my home. The house is located right outside of the center of Granada on the way to a barrio, neighborhood, called La Villa. My street is located across from the old Coca Cola factory that has long been abandoned and near a few other abandoned buildings but my street itself is residential. It is pure dirt but my neighbors tell me it is supposed to be paved (well adoquinado, which means made into a street with little octogan stones) at some point in the next year. But as we are in Nicaragua, there is no reason to believe the government until you actually see the finished project.

Anyway, I really like the house and have spent the last two weeks trying to find furniture, buying a bed, moving all my stuff (why do I already have so much stuff?!?), and most importantly getting tension rods and a shower curtain in Managua. I also fought with the company that manages the house and the electricity company because my lights were not functional for the first five days. In the end I had to just hire an electrician off the street to connect the cables because the official light company is not actually interested in turning out your lights even after you have paid them.

I can definitely say that it feels really nice and comfy to have my own place. I play the music as loud as I want, I walk around disrobed if I want, and I can now invite friends and students over to hang out and chat. This past Friday night, I also got to enjoy my first porch sitting experience as a friend and I bought some fritanga (amazing fried chicken, with salad, plaintains, and the works) and some beers and then brought out the rocking chairs to the porch to enjoy the evening air.

There are some negatives about the house starting with the dust. Right now is the dry season in Nicaragua and it will not rain again until May. What this means is that it gets very dusty and since Granada can get pretty windy, the dust just flies all over the place and gets all over your house. Now if you have a house with real ceilings and completely closed in walls then you may not have a dust problem. But most houses have open spaces in the walls and the roof, and a patio, and thus dust gets everywhere. You clean the dust and then one hour later the house is dusty again. So it sucks right now and I am just waiting for the alergies to kick in. I definitely need to buy lots of plastic containers in which to keep my food, dishes, clothes, etc. The other negative is that the house is actually for sale so technically I could get kicked out at some point BUT the owners’ asking price is way too high so I think I am good to go. Oh and there are some slight problems with the roof that definitely need to get taken care of before the rainy season. 3 months to go!

Without furthur redo, enjoy this video of my house.

My House, La Casita

Oh and school started the other day…updates to come soon.