Jugo Chavez ha llegado

So, I´m going to skip over some info to try and catch up. Beachy showed us all around Managua for the first several days that we were in town, giving us an amended Witness for Peace tour, which included backgrounders on Nica´s history and US involvement in Nicaragua (notably crazyman William Walker, who in the mid-nineteenth century invaded Nica twice with the goal of taking over the country to provide more slave-holding territories for the southern US states to export their slaves. he was eventually shot by a Honduran firing squad.), tours of various communities, ranging from the landfill and survival economy therein, to Managua´s yuppie mall. All in all, a real whirlwind tour that I´m not doing any justice to at all.

The biggest news was the arrival of Jugo Chavez, Justina "Juicy Juice" Wenger. She´s been here nearly a week, after spending some time in the Bolivarian revolution to the south. She was promptly taken from the airport to a party at the WFP house. I´m sure others will add entertaining details about the evening. For me, an exciting part was having a conversation in Spanish, which primarily involved me explaining that I didn´t know a word in practically every sentence, but which fortunately created an entertaining atmosphere for the conversation. Other than that, there was lots of dancing and good times. The following morning was not such a good time and I woke up feeling incredibly ill (it was not a hangover). However, I was incredibly dehydrated and proceeded to kick-off my morning by throwing up for a while. I´ve since paid greater attention to drinking a litro or dos of agua cada dia.

This past week, from Monday up to this evening was spent on Ometepe (for three days), a volcanic island in Lake Nicaragua, and Grenada (last night), a colonial city half way between Ometepe and Managua. Ometepe was incredibly beautiful, with lots of exotic birds, friendly people, stray horses, and otros cosas. We had hoped to get to Finca Magdalena by 5 pm on Monday, but in what is becoming typical fashion, we started off several hours later than anticipated. All was fine: we made it to the ferry by mid-afternoon and caught a bus that would take us most of the way to the hostel/cooperative. A local gentlemen told us we had a 40% chance of catching another bus the rest of the way, because it would be after six when we arrived in the neighboring town. So when we arrived in Santa Cruz, it was pitch black outside and raining a little. The town was about three building and four houses, mas o menos. Fortunately, a couple of Spanish tourists got off the bus at the same time and told us that FM was only a 45 minute walk, so we hiked it in the dark and arrived shortly before 8, completely drenched, mostly in sweat. The following days included games, hiking, swimming, eating, sitting in hammocks, etc.

In other news, I lost my glasses today while swimming in Lake Nicaragua. Fairly dumb move to wear them in the water. Fortunately, I have a couple of pairs of contacts, so I´m not completely up a creek. Tomorrow will be a fun adventure at the optomitrist!