Ideay

I had a dream last night that that I was back in Glenwood Springs after my two years of Peace Corps service was finished. I didn’t remember anything from my two years of service, as if my memory had been erased. Everything at home seemed strange and foreign. The entire town was under construction – installing strip malls. The unfinished strip malls were shiny, cookie-cutter designed, sterile, and flooded in florescent light from the cloudless sky. The town was full of strangers. I went to my favorite places hoping to find familiar faces and all I saw were strangers. I called my friends, eager to have someone to talk to and relate to, but they didn’t recognize me and had moved on with their lives, getting married and starting families. My cat didn’t even recognize me. I tried driving and found that I didn’t know how to. I rode my bike and crashed into things on the street. I wanted to call my friends in Nicaragua but I couldn’t remember any of them. I was totally lost and alone with no direction. And then I woke up. And what I thought was, “Shit, I’m only going to be here (in Nicaragua) for two short years and I need to make the most of it by taking every opportunity I get.” And also, “I need to have a plan mapped out for when I finish so that I don’t have to go home and face that situation.”

We haven’t had steady electricity for two weeks, maybe because of the rain, but maybe not. The rain has been flooding rivers and washing away houses and bridges. The water that comes out of the tap is mud and it gives me a good excuse to put off showering for another day to wait and see if it will clear up. I got a water filter – a clay pot inside of a bucket – and now I don’t have to use the chlorine but my water tastes like clay, which I can live with, because at least it’s clear.

I had my first terrible class last week. The professor was in a meeting so I taught the class alone, which I’ve done several times and it’s usually not a big deal, in fact I almost prefer it. The grade was 10th, the class size was around 40 students (small by Nicaraguan standards) and the topic for the day was “Leaders with Entrepreneurial Spirit” and “Creativity.” Class started out normally: about 10 minutes late with students walking in and out at their leisure, yelling out the open doors and windows at class mates, passing notes, and texting on cell phones. All of this activity I have to work around every day and with minimal shouting it isn’t usually an issue. But for some reason, on this day, the students were absolutely hellish. They up and left class, they refused to participate, they were screaming. And after multiple attempts at controlling the situation in a measured and civilized manner, I ultimately got frustrating and ended up yelling, curse words and all, in English. Which was actually pretty effective because the room got silent as I paced back and forth in front of the room berating them for their poor behavior and lack of respect. Honestly, I come with a disclaimer that says “I AM NOT A TRAINED TEACHER” and my classroom management skills are mostly made up on the fly. And that’s what you get. This next week, the professor was in the classroom and their behavior wasn’t much different so it was a consolation to me that they weren’t just acting up for me - they’re always a rowdy class, and that made me feel better.

The boyfriend/girlfriend thing here is really weird to me. On the one hand, it’s very formal and conservative. Girls generally aren’t allowed to have a boyfriend until they have graduated from high school, and when a boy wants a girl to be his girlfriend he asks her in person, “Will you be my girlfriend?” kinda like middle school. On the other hand, Jinotega (my district) has the highest rate of unplanned teen pregnancies in the country, and Nicaragua has an infidelity rate of 70% among men (the highest rate in Latin America.) WHICH is one of the reasons that when my site mate, a health volunteer, asked me if I wanted to co-teach a series of 10 classes to 9th and 10th graders on healthy relationships (Noviazgos Saludables) I agreed. I really enjoy the class because it’s information that the students never formally hear (self-esteem, emotions, gender roles, sex, etc) in a format that they never have (participatory!) We get to talk about topics that are slightly taboo, and I feel like I learn just as much from them about Nica culture as they learn from me about destrezas para relacionarse.

I was riding on the bus yesterday (feeling sick again with flu) when a man boarded and sat in the seat behind me. He waited until the bus started moving again before he twisted around in his seat, craning his whole body around the back of my seat and leaned over my shoulder.
“Sarah Johnson” he said. Um, if that’s a statement then I don’t need to reply with anything other than a weak smile, right?
“Sarah Johnson” he said more urgently.
“No” I said, assuming that he was trying to verify whether or not I was she.
“You were here in 1991” he said in Spanish. And if I was confused before I got even more confused because, dude, I was 6 years old in 1991 and either 1) you have no concept of age or the passing of time or 2) you are verifiably crazy. I decided to just ignore him since I wasn’t really feeling up to playing along. He sat back in his seat a few moments and then lurched forward again
“What’s your name?”
“Vanessa” I replied.
“Donalda?” he said.
“No, Vanessa” I replied.
“Oh, Donalda” he said.
“No. Vanessa” I stated firmly, thinking that he must be fucking with me, but know that he wasn’t.
“Nice to meet you, Donalda.” And with that he sat back in his chair, pleased with how the conversation was going.
He leaned forward again “Where do you live?”
“San Rafael” I replied, trying to be a vague as possible as to thwart any attempts at stalking me.
He eyed me suspiciously “Where in San Rafael?”
“Over there.” I pointed in a general direction.
“Who do you live with?” He interrogated.
I sighed. It really is impossible to keep where I live a secret since the town is so small and there are only two white girls living in it. One would have to conduct a random survey of probably 2 people to find out my whereabouts. I told him where I live. “I live with [name omitted to protect the identity of my land lady].” LUCKILY, he was just as confused about that as he was everything else.
“Oh, you live at INTA?” he said, smiling.
“Umm…..Yes” I said, although I have no idea where the INTA office is (Ministry of Agriculture). And with that he left me alone for the remainder of the bus ride.

I have gripe for the third time in as many months. I usually feel fine during the day, light cough, slight fever, congestion, but I’ve been spending my nights awake taking various mixes of drugs trying to control my symptoms so I can rest. I have a friend who is a doctor and he comes over to check on me periodically and adjust the plan of attack according to my latest health developments.

Last weekend was the birthday of a relative of the family that I live with and they threw a party at their finca in the mountains. A friend and I decided to walk to the finca instead of catch a ride because it’s a beautiful, rugged dirt road curving through mountains and we hadn’t seen each other for a while and wanted to catch up. A heavy rain had just passed through the area and the air was fresh and the ground was muddy. We walked and talked and laughed for about half an hour, all the while I was following her lead thinking she knew where she was going, and she (as it turns out) assumed that I knew where I was going. Both of us had been to the finca once before, and it isn’t that hard to get to, IF you know which forks to take. But….we got lost. My friend climbed up an embankment to get a better view and try and figure out where we were and heard the music from the party. Excellent, all we had to do was climb over a barbed wire fence, walk through a field, and presumably we would be there. But, it had just rained, so as we got about half way through the field we found ourselves mucking through a swamp. Which made me glad that I had decided to wear my new rubber boots on their maiden voyage, because I arrived dry and comfortable.