Las Vidas de Los Guerrillas

I knew that this family was tied to the revolution. I’ve already told you about the scholarship that Felix and his brother Emilio received to study at the Russian Naval Academy in the mid to late 1980s. However, I didn’t realize that El Pajaro Loco himself had fought as well. Sometimes I feel like conversations about the Revolution in 1979 and subsequent Contra War are like lenses through which I can better understand the history of the United States, since I have never spoken to anyone who either fought in the American Revolution nor the American Civil War. While everyone knows the simple facts about US History, the revolutionary spirit and the struggle that people faced having to fight against their former compatriots is different when presented in conversation, albeit difficult for me to understand since my Spanish is not nearly to a level of fluency yet, than in a history textbook or novel.

El Pajaro Loco was telling me about how he fought side by side with Felix in the Mountains very near the border with Costa Rica which was one of the main fronts of the Contra War. One image stuck out in my mind. He said that in those days he used to smoke a lot and was nervous all the time. Although, I couldn’t quite understand which was the cause and which was the result, I suspect that with or without nicotine pumping through his veins, the constant threat of danger from guerrilla would have been sufficient to enervate someone sufficiently. However, when he did smoke, he had to cup his hands around the butt of the cigarette or cigar so as to hide the faint, but distinct orange glow from sight. As he was telling me this, he showed me with his hands how he used to hide his smoking from the enemy, undoubtedly always on top of the next mountain. I’m sure that just added compounded the nervousness: his refuge itself—smoking—was shrouded in further danger.

Las Avispas versus Los Humonas…Ganamos!

The past week has been taken up with preparation for, and the realization of, the Jornada Nacional de Salud—National Health Day. The Ministerio de Salud—the Ministry of Health—mobilized all of its satellite centers, of which there is one in San Juan called the Centro de Salud, to vaccinate the population and especially children under the age of five. The campaign spans two weeks, from April 23 until May 6, with the primary days being April 28 and April 29, the former for caravanning into the Campo and setting up vaccination stations in the houses of Brigadistas, schools, and other public places, and the latter for doing the same within San Juan itself. During the remaining 12 days, the Centro de Salud has been and will be visiting other communities that were not feasible to visit on April 28. This effort to visit every community in the Campo is serendipitous for me because it allows me to: 1) get to know communities that I haven’t already; 2) observe a vaccination campaign in a Third World country which is pretty neat in and of itself; 3) collect water samples from filters in communities that I haven’t been able to visit thus far.

Ok, that’s the background.

Now, Thursday, I joined a group of nurses, a doctor, and some other medical staff on a trip to Miravalle and Toro Venado (literally, “Valley View” and “Bull Deer”). The drive itself was beautiful: we were driving on the side of a mountain, from the top of which you can see the ocean to the west and to the east, Lake Nicaragua and the two volcanoes, Concepcion and Maderas, which form La Isla de Ometepe. After this, the road cuts around the mountain and weaves in and our of dry river beds in thick forest. I immediately went to Toro Venado to collect water samples from the filter in their school. As an added bonus, there was a small monkey sitting next to the well in a collecting basin for water but which was dry, but that is somewhat of a digression from the story, so I’ll stick to the main line. But he was damn cute. And a kid picked him up and freed him from what seemed like entrapment in the basin. Ok, I digressed and told you I wouldn’t.

I walked back to Miravalle after receiving directions that I couldn’t understand, and took samples from the two filters there, one in the school, and one in a private household, which I needed guides (two kids, one was 8, the other 10) to find. By the time I got back to the medical station where the staff from the Centro de Salud had pitched camp, they were wrapping up their vaccination operation and I was tired. After about 20 minutes of resting, I got into a conversation with the doctor, Hector Luis Galan, about his service in the military during the Contra War. We got talking and continued to wait for the truck to return to pick us up. We were interrupted by a shout from inside the pharmacy by the preschool teacher who emerged with not one, but two wasp bites. After giving her some hydrocortisone cream, we went inside to investigate. As one would expect, there was a series of wasp nests inside the pharmacy and a relatively constant flow of these flying menaces in and out of the two-room building.

I got thinking: wasps are bad, the other room in that building is the preschool, pharmacy and preschool. I’m sure you know have a friend who is highly allergic to bees and carries an Epi-pen with them everywhere. It’s a nightmare if there is a stinging incident and no epinephrine in sight and in fact, it can spell death. If the point of our visit was to prevent disease (doubly so with vaccinations and water filters), perhaps the best preventative measure, perhaps the most important thing we could do for the health of the townspeople buying items at the pharmacy or the little 4-year-olds sitting innocently in class, would be to eliminate those damned wasps!

I shared my thoughts with the doctor who, perhaps because our earlier conversation of war had rekindled some deep love of struggle that exists in all of us, concurred without the need for further convincing. However, we had no chemicals or body armor on site. My initial strategy was to start a small fire inside the building (it was made of concrete with tile floors) and smoke those insectual beasts out. This was quickly changed to: light a fire on the end of a broom stick and burn the wasps and their nest. We got some poster paper from the preschool and made a large cone shape around the broom stick in which went kindling and small sticks from outside. Then we closed the cone so that it had a cocoon-like shape, in the middle of which was the fuel for the fire. I was deemed the point man to take the fire to the enemy.

With fearless courage, I confronted the swarm and with a quick movement of flame-to-nest, pissed off the majority of the wasps in the pharmacy. I’m not stupid, so I ran. Now the swarm was dispersed and bussing all over the place. The direct vicinity around the pharmacy was filled with inch-long insects darting this way and that. The Doctor-Warrior took the weapon from me and continued to inflame (both figuratively and literally) the nest and some remaining wasps, most of which were rendered harmless because their wings essentially crinkled under the heat and so they fell to the floor. However, there were still the wasps that had escaped the initial attack and they were starting to reassemble back around where the nest used to be. I grabbed the roll of poster paper and began swinging. For a guy that hasn’t played competitive baseball in about 12 years (barring two games in college, which were a joke—sorry Kyle), nor has ever fenced and to my (conscious) knowledge has no experience with the Jedi Force, I did pretty well. The Doctor-Warrior grabbed a rag and with deadly aim was able to eliminate several wasps who sought refuge in the corners of the room. After about 10 minutes, I had hit, right out of the air, about 7 wasps—bogies—and proceeded to finish the job with my shoe. It was exhilarating. And neither the Doctor-Warrior nor I, the temporary Jedi Knight, got stung!

After it was all said and done and we were again waiting, I said to the doctor:
“So what do you think is more important for the health of this community, the vaccines or killing the wasps?”

His response: “Las avispas!”

So, as it turned out our public health arsenal that day not only included the standard: vaccines, needles, Vitamin A, and water filters (and testing materials), but also the: broomstick (which didn’t itself catch fire), a rag, and a rolled up piece of poster paper.

To Credit or Not to Credit…

Leonel and I were talking just before we went to give a presentation about the upcoming National Health Day (Jornada Nacional de Salud) during which every child under the age of 5 will be given a range of vaccinations all around the country. Leo was telling me about the numerous phone calls he has received and continues to receive offering him the “opportunity” to have a credit card. The decision for him is difficult—does he want to own a piece of plastic that on the one hand could empower him to purchase some of the items on his wish-list but on the other hand could being a cycle of debt which, if he is not careful and responsible, could give him endless financial headaches.

I began my evaluation of his decision, naturally, from an American point of view: credit is good. You collect debt which allows you to do more with your money and in addition, you establish yourself in the eyes of the bank as a responsible individual, able to pay back loans on a regular schedule. This in turn allows you to increase your credit limit, decrease the interest rate incurred if you can’t pay your monthly bill all at once, and hence, increase the amount of debt that you owe.

Leo looked at me somewhat blankly. Why does he need to do this? What is the point? He owns his house (i.e. he doesn’t need a mortgage) and the only thing he could think of using this “arma doble firma” (double endged sword) for is buying a motorcycle, a new TV, and maybe some other amenities which, while he would like them, he does not need. The possible costs are great: if he is unable to payback the credit card and find himself locked into monthly payments which perpetually increase. I was reminded of my grandfather’s viewpoint of credit, debt, and loans as intangible forms of imprisonment.

This got me thinking down a path that passes between the American culture which I know and feel, and the Nicaraguan culture which I am trying to learn and understand. Of course, one of the overarching intents of making a trip as I have, is to see, experience, and feel the places where my culture clashes with, mixes with, or otherwise intertwines with the culture here; this is, after all, an intercultural experience. However, I think that in order to see these points of demarcation at which one culture says one thing and another says the opposite, I must approach my experiences with a relativistic frame of mind. While the natural impulsive thought process is to witness something new and feel that since it is different, it is therefore worse, this impulse must be fought. Otherwise the whole project of learning from others that come from different viewpoints as your own is lost. The difficult part comes when you want to form an opinion because ultimately, you need to take action—Leo needs to decide if he wants to sign up for a credit card or not.

We'll have to continue this conversation later...there is much more to say. (The pictures: one is of Antonia Solis, the Brigadista-or health worker-in one of the communities, with a filter that she just finished installing. The other is Leonel teaching parents and kids about the vaccination campaign which is going on right now.)

Semana Santa

I’m BACK! Have no fear—I’m still alive and kicking strong! So why such a hiatus? ¿Porque tanto tiempo? Well lots has happened and lots will be happening in the next few weeks. Let me bring you up to speed: since the beginning of April, when I last wrote an entry, Semana Santa (Holy Week) has come and gone (thankfully, its gone—I’ll explain in a moment) and our water filter team has had two very productive meetings and the project is picking up substantially. I would say most of the activities over the past two weeks fit into those two categories.

If peace and quiet is what you are looking for, San Juan del Sur is, for the majority of the year, a good choice, especially considering the access it gives visitors and (although less so in recent years) residents to the beautiful and relatively secluded beaches to the north and south of here. However, during Semana Santa (and from what I hear, a few other times during the year) this place becomes an extension of Managua via the various discos that pitch camp on the beach, street vendors hoping to make a quick buck, and hordes of people from inside and outside of the country that arrive to vacation. People camp out on the beach or sleep in hammocks strung up between any trees they can find or flood the houses and apartments of relatives (at times, distant relatives) in order to join in the revelry, dancing, and of course drinking. The music from the discos competes with the music from various house parties until about 4:00 in the morning. On some streets, the crowds rival an inner city strip during peak hours. The population of the town more than doubles. While it was of course “an experience” and I did get to see a band called Kudai in concert (they are from Chile and I had never heard of them, but thoroughly enjoyed it), for someone that came to Nicaragua to do volunteer work, it was not what I expected nor really what I was looking for. Hence, on the afternoon of Easter Sunday, when the hordes of people began to make their treks back from to where they came from, I shared a sigh of relief with most every year-round resident here.

Semana Santa was an experience in, if anything else, Irony. On that Friday (Good Friday), there was the traditional Via Cruces procession through the streets of San Juan with statues of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. One stretch of the procession was along the road which follows the beach where discos has set up their temporary stations. There, the various religious signals were interdigitated with beer posters advertising, Victoria beer, one of Nicaragua’s national brews. (See the picture in this post.) The juxtaposition of religious and commercial symbols was truly ironic to me. In addition, while the influx of people was inevitable good for local business and restaurants, I have come to believe that the majority of profit that came from the five day fiesta was diverted back to Managua in a strange perversion of the natural beauty of the San Juan del Sur Bay whereby the large discos used the land for their own profit and on Sunday left behind only the hordes of trash along the beach which was eventually taken out to sea by the high tide. As was explained to me by my “uncle” (El Pajaro Loco’s youngest child, Bosco) who slept in the room next to mine during the week, “Nicaraguans work to prepare for Semana Santa and when it’s over, we prepare for the next big vacation in December.” Taking this to be true and combining it with the knowledge the San Juan del Sur is likely the most popular vacation spot for Nicaraguans, I at least have a vague understanding of the general aura of obligatory partying which permeated through the streets during the Semana Santa.

But that is all over now and we are back to life as usual in this town. Yesterday, I went with Fidel Pavon to Papaturro to collect samples of water from the remaining houses in our Pilot Project (the three pronged approach of 1) Filters; 2) Education; 3) Anti-parasitic medication). He is the technical expert on our water filter team but defies the American stereotype of “technical expert”. He is very strong, likely from lugging the 170 lbs filters around all day, and is very charismatic. The two of us went house by house with one of the health workers in the town and collected a total of 24 water samples. It was exhausting but we now have a (more or less) full data set of results from the families in Papaturro to see exactly how their filters are working. This is good.

In the next few weeks, the Ministry of Health (Ministerio de Salud—MINSA for short) will be taking part in a nationwide vaccination campaign and in doing so will visit each community in the Campo. This is fortunate for us, since transportation is always an important consideration, and often difficult challenge. The hope is that we will be able to tag along with the trips to these rural communities and collect samples from each filter in the field so that we can answer the question, finally, “Are these filters even working correctly?”

Los Sonidos

Among the greatest shocks to my sensory perception, the Nicaraguan sounds ranks high. From traveling to tropical climates before, I was prepared for the initial wave of heat that hit me as soon as I stepped off the plane and I was even somewhat prepared for aspects of the landscape from the myriad of pictures I had seen prior to coming here. But that still leaves three senses which, by the nature of the way we gather information, remained unprepared when I began my travels.

My first night I realized that there was going to be an adjustment curve; aside from having to tune my ear to hear a new language, there is another, non-linguistic, vocabulary that I have had to adjust to and to which I am still adjusting. For example, the nighttime battles between the dogs and the roosters (contrary to what I had thought before coming here, roosters do not reserve their cock-a-doodle-dooing only for sunrise—they shout all through the day and oftentimes, all through the night). And just about when the dogs and roosters are settling in for their morning nap around 6:15 am, the man who sells yogurt wheels by in his pushcart yelling, at the top of his lungs, “¡Lecheria!” This really pissed me off for a while. As did the guy who parked his car about 15 yards from my window two nights ago, at 3:00 am mind you, and proceeded to blast music. I still don’t understand the rationale for that one. Or there are the sounds which are familiar, but are equally surprising because I didn’t expect, in a million years to hear them here, in a third world country. These include: Metallica’s “Nothin’ Else Matters” and Guns n’ Roses’ rendition of “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” during breakfast (there is a house that abuts the home I am staying in and they have quite a diverse music collection). However, these past four weeks would not be the same without these sounds, especially such a strange combination of them (hard rock music with roosters in the background is strange in my book). I’m not sure if it a manifestation of a changing culture—the fact that markedly American sounds are mixing with markedly Nicaraguan sounds to form a new audible pallet—or what it signifies, but thus far, these sounds have been a part of my experience here.

The two pictures: the first is of a carretas that came from far away to a field near San Juan del Sur for a century and a half old tradition in preparation for Semana Santa. The second pictures is the culmination of this procession, from various homes in Nicaragua to Rivas which is a short distance from San Juan del Sur, whereby there is a church service, seen in the picture, and then the carretas make their last rounds before going home.

¡El Subway va ABAJO del rió!

The other day I was sitting at the table for lunch with el Pajaro Loco and his granddaughter, Nazaret. After a few minutes of silence, he started to tell me about his experiences as a seaman between and ages of 20 and 22. Further separating his experiences from the majority of Nicaraguans’, he told me about his travels to Houston, Galvaston (TX), New Orleans, North Carolina, and the Big Apple, where he spent six days (one of which was watching the boat which was docked in Brooklyn). He proceeded to describe the going to the top of Empire State Building (which apparently in 1958 was achieved by riding a series of elevators) and his experiences at, what I think was Coney Island. It was phenomenal to hear him talk about his one experience at an amusement park and to see his granddaughters reactions to descriptions of a rollercoaster.

“They bring you to the top of a mountain and then…WHOA!!!!!” His recreation of the screams were thoroughly amusing and it was one of the few times when I felt that I was actually conversing with him, rather than exchanging words—I could actually understand the excitement in his eyes and read his youthful personality, as opposed to simply hearing and comprehending the words coming out of his mouth.

“And the subway, it goes UNDERNEATH the river! (¡ABAJO del rió!)” he continued. It was great to hear him recount aspects of his travels, such as the subterranean transportation system that exists in many metropolitan centers, which average Americans don’t think twice about, but which are objectively amazing feats of engineering and human achievement.