two months!

buenos dias! it's been a bit since i've written on here about my life- but i've been writing LOTS of letters so if anyone's interested in being a penpal i'd like that MUCH more than this silly internet business. just email me and i'll send you my address. hope this update finds each of you happy, healthy, living fully, and spreading the ripples of hope, love, and empathy that we so desperately need in our world.

i'm having a bit of a reality check these past couple of days- spending time with a group of 20 or so high school students from the states (private boarding school in boston)... nothing like being around these kids to make me realize how far i've come and why i'm here rather than back in the US! actually i think many of them are here for the right reasons- to learn about the culture, to help (they're working on breaking ground for construction of our new classroom building- definate HARD labor), and to actually interact with people beyond a surface level. however, i'm also experiencing lots of frustrations with them such as their tendency to 1) complain about everything, 2) this morning whining about getting up at 7 because they're "on spring break" (HONESTLY?! are you here to sip virgin pina coladas and frolic on the beach or are you here to HELP?), 3) the usual high school bullshit (i know i was like this too), ie: bringing prom dress magazines to a place like nicaragua, and 4) their relative unawareness of why they're here in general (i asked one girl and she responded "because i convinced my parents to buy me this trip instead of a lettermans jacket and a class ring"... well YEAH it's awesome she's here but i didn't ask her HOW she bought her plane ticket... i was sort of hoping for something deeper than that). maybe i'm placing too many expectations on them, or being hasty to judge, but i just guess above all else it's hard to be around them because they remind me of what i left back in the states- that being a complete unawareness of how poverty truly exists in the rest of the world... remind me of how far removed i am yet how close i am also- as it hasn't been long that i've been aware of these realities myself. even being here they stay in this lovely house in cusmapa with running water, great food, comfortable beds- and i wonder if some of them will go home STILL totally unaware of the actual type of poverty which exists here- dirt floors, chicken coops in the kitchen, only tortillas to eat, no electricity or running water (or even SAFE water available), malnutrition, kids that walk to school more than an hour each way every day, the amount of mothers completely raising families without any help... i just want to shake them and make them see what i see- but know i can't do that. also they haven't been having any sort of discussions at night about what they've been experiencing here which is strange to me. i'd think if i were a teacher and chaperoning this trip i'd make it a point to have multiple discussions with my students DURING the trip about what they were seeing, experiencing, learning... and WHY things are the way they are here. maybe that's just me...

another part of the frustration equation is i've been writing back and forth with my cousin julie for the past few months about all sorts of things- but one of these things being the inhumane conditions in which most of the employed people of nicaragua endure on a daily basis. my friend karlita (she's from nicaragua, my boss' secretary in managua- a 27 year old SINGLE woman with a great job, extremely intelligent, doesn't put up with any of the bullshit guys try to pull around here, and is just basically wonderful) and i were talking about her trip to the US a few years ago and she was trying to buy some "american clothes" which meant she went to buy a shirt at walmart (made in taiwan), bought a tommy hilf shirt (made in singapore) and went to buy some nike shoes (made in china... or something to that extent) and was absolutely baffled that she couldn't find anything to buy that was actually made in the US. i guess i never really thought of the fact that there arent really ANY factories in the US (beyond stuff like ford and dodge... some food factories...) but as far as actual production of the goods we take for granted, buy cheaply, and trash without a second thought... we don't have any type of production of those things in the states. we never have to SEE the sweatshops, the factories (which karlita was telling me about) in nicaragua that employ people for about 12 hours per day who get a half hour lunch, can not go to the bathroom, sometimes get beaten, and make less than 25 cents per hour. the government here has all these contracts with chinese businessmen who build factories, employ thousands of people at these rates in horrific conditions- then the government can brag that employement rates are up. the thing is, who in america actually WANTS to know why their walmart tshirt is so ridiculously cheap? i know until the last couple of years, i haven't had any kind of awareness... which is awful (not the awareness itself, but the lack thereof).

julie and i were also talking about being in a third world country and how realizations about your relative safety can be a bit unnerving (although i know her experience has been a bit more drastic than mine- as i don't have to worry too much about crime where i'm living now, only in the bigger cities). if you allow yourself to be truly honest about what would happen to you if something awful were to happen (crime or health-wise) you begin to realize how truly alone you are. even stuff with sickness- steph (the other volunteer) and i were in managua to get her some tests (her stomach's been bad pretty much the whole two months we've been here) and went to a nicaraguan doctor and she just kept saying "well if he doesn't figure it out i'll just call the embassy and they'll know what to do" UM. what? i'm sorry but i really think the US embassy in nicaragua probably has more important things to deal with than a volunteer's tummy bug. i think a lot of americans just really have this false sense of security even in the most remote of places that if something bad happens they'll be able to figure it out, things will get fixed because they're american. steph's comment cracked me up, like we could have just called the embassy and they would have sent over a limo to take us to their state of the art hospital (which they do have one of those i believe) free of charge where i'd have been offered steak and macaroni and cheese and jello salad in the waiting room and they'd fly in the best doctor available in the US for a quick visit... no questions asked. HA. instead we ended up in a private hospital that had just lost it's electricity for the afternoon (minus the emergency room and ICU) and i felt, honestly, that if i had to be in a hospital there i'd probably be OK but i really wouldn't be certain. it was a bit sketchy to say the least. i can't even imagine what a public hospital is like- i'm planning on visiting one before i leave here, just to get some sort of persepctive. the thing is, we have to PAY an arm and a leg in the US for our healthcare but at least we have the OPTION of receiving high quality care in sterile environments... and are guaranteed electricity at our hospitals.

things here are going well for me- teaching-wise i've been very busy. we have a concert tonight for the high school group, then the 22nd is a big celebration for Padre Fabretto (who basically founded the town of cusmapa) so we're getting all ready for that concert also. english classes are going well so far- though attendence is always sketchy at best and there's no chain of command so student's aren't held accountable for missing class at all. THAT will prove to be extremely frustrating over time as i'm expected to return to step one when a student's there who doesn't understand the material. the awful thing is there's many students who really want to be there, and love learning english- but there's others who i can tell think it's complete bullshit. a question, then: why am i teaching english to kids who don't want to learn english in one of the most rural places in this country? shouldn't i be teaching the kids who WANT to learn it rather than spending all my efforts on those that don't care to? guess that's part of the challenge of teaching, making those who don't deem a subject to be relevant understand that EVERY subject's important in some form. still, doesn't make it any easier. my friend james (the one doing JVI) told me that he's feeling the same way, so he's been indulging himself in letting his high school class use 10 minutes of classtime every day to discuss a controversial subject (first in limited english) but then in spanish... he just picks things, for example: the fact that nicaragua recently completely banned abortions (even if the mother WILL die if the baby isn't aborted) and lets the kids debate about them in class. he refuses to give his point of view, just stays there to keep things civil and respectful. NOW that sounds like my kind of class! i think what's hard is that i want to teach a class where there's deep conversation, debates, and students are empowered to give their opinions on issues that matter (rather than teaching about the times of day and colors). again, another reason why i'm excited my spanish seems to be improving... i'll be able to talk to my students more and more about what they believe, and what parts of their lives they see needing to change. THEN i can start being able to work on these changes from the ground up, with the students :) something to look forward too, though i'm thoroughly enjoying this time of getting to know them as well. as always enjoying the ride rather than looking to the finish line. i had the biggest compliment i've recieved yet on my spanish- after talking to one of my fellow fabretto employees who's working on a rural secondary education outreach project for a while he just looked at me and said "you talk like a nicaraguan." QUE MARAVILLOSO! i was a bit pleased at myself after that little comment- which served as karma for me to speak crappy spanish the rest of the weekend.

i had one of the most random experiences i've had down here yet this past weekend- i went with steph down to managua so she could get some tests done and we stayed in a hotel there for a few nights. the first night we were sitting down to dinner and the other couple in the restaurant struck up a conversation with us asking if we knew how much it should cost them to get to the airport. i told them we lived in nicaragua, we had the name of a taxi driver we could give them and the guy asked me where we worked/lived, then looked at me and said "wait, what's your name?" turns out he and i had been writing back and forth online because i was giving them some tips for their vacation here- and we just happened to be staying in the same hotel in managua the last night of their trip. it was SO bizarre. we ended up hanging out with them for a couple of hours talking about their trip and how they want to move here... they're from alaska, he's an anthropologist and she's a lawyer- both in their late twenties- just an awesome, life-affirming couple. i just couldn't believe the randomness of meeting him (i mean managua's a BIG city too!). it was good to meet some americans who want to help here for the right reasons- and are looking to take action soon (rather than just vacationers)- they described adventures of getting lost in the mountains, almost falling off a cliff, learning how to make tortillas, being woken up by howler monkeys, and misadventures in their spanish learning experience. it was great for me to meet these type of visitors (who i find here in nica are NOT as few and far between as they seem to be in many other places) who plan on taking valuable parts of their experience home and spreading awareness, and then DOING something about it. excellent.

ah, good news! i think i'm headed back down to managua next weekend with magda and cindy guadalupe (my co-worker and her daughter who i wrote about earlier in my 'power of one' blog) to get her to a doctor's appointment on friday! i talked to my boss, peter, about it when i was in managua last weekend and told him i thought we needed to get the ball rolling- and this groups going down on a private bus on thursday, so they'd have room for magda. it's virtually impossible for magda to travel with cindy on a public bus, and dangerous too... so the fact that they have a bus going down there already works out perfectly. i'm going to go down there with her to help out if she needs anything (even if it's just to carry bags or somethin) so i told magda that today, that i planned on going to which she responded "why?" and i said "to help..." and she was really happy about that. i hope something comes out of it... i guess there's also a school near managua where they do parental training on some physical therapy that magda could take some classes at, which would be awesome. vamos a ver... (we shall see...)

i realized how much i love being here yesterday when i finally came back to town and went to teach my littlest kids choir class. i was absolutely ecstatic. seriously beaming ear to ear... it was wonderful. i do really enjoy teaching, and just one smile from one of those little ones is enough for me... they're precious. one of them even gave me a hug today!!! my first student to do that. i DO feel like i've made a commitment to love the people here, and have begun to make that leap (the leap of love)- i think because of certain roadblocks that are just a part of the culture (ie: kids not being held accountable for showing up for class, certain kids not being expected by their parents to do anything beyond living in cusmapa and struggling to survive forever, combined with my own realization of distancing myself sometimes....) it's sometimes hard to remind myself that my being here in the first place is a pretty great thing- and the fact that i already feel so at home here, that i'm opening myself up more and more to the experience... means that my heart is already here. and that i don't necessarily need to teach these kids perfect english, to be a hardass, or to make the music program "the best" but that i just need to LOVE and let the rest happen as it will.

last night as i lay under the stars with karlita and laura (a nurse who came with the group from the states, AWESOME lady who's into energy healing and all sorts of interesting stuff) i sang to the stars and was enveloped in a warm mountain breeze... listened to the roosters and felt extremely peaceful. we did some yoga this morning as the sun was rising over the mountaintop... nothing like meditating in the early morning when the birds are waking up and the fresh breeze whips around you, brings you to life... i also realized that i'm going to HAVE to start doing yoga outside on a regular basis, no matter what the neighbors think of me (i'm sure they already think i'm a wierdo!) so that every morning i can awake with a deep bow of appreciation for the beauty i experience here every day, as well as a salute of namaste to my pig friend who tiptoes around my backyard on her ridiculously small high-heeled piggy feet.

suppose that's about all for now- things are moving along fast! i celebrated my two months of being here last saturday by drinking some hot chocolate :)
here's to many more months of good health, high spirits, wide eyes, and an open heart.
love to all, callie