Life's a beach

So as my last post stated, I left sleepy little Pala for hip and happenin’ Leon.  For those of you who didn’t read a post back in June called “Vounteer Visit”, Leon is awesome.  It’s possible I’m jaded from such small town living but seeing supermarkets and restaurants make my jaw drop.

It was fellow Biz Nasty 56 PCV Ben’s bday so we all decided to meet up.  Leon is in western Nica near the Pacific Ocean.  It was amazing because 16 of 21 of our PCV swear-in group attended.  This is amazing because there are volunteers that live near Costa Rica, the Atlantic, or Honduras (me) and we all showed up.  It took 3 different buses and 6.5 hours (but only $2.60) to make the journey.  We stayed at a basic hostel (dorm style and community bathrooms) but it was literally on the beach.  Words don’t exist in English or Spanish that describe how nice it was take a break from rice and beans to sit in the sand eating fresh fish and drinking rum cocktails.  In addition, a PCV brought an AMERICAN football so we got to play some 4 v 4 touch (I made a heck of a catch, look for it on ESPN Deportes).

But the best part was the culmination of a multi-week project.  On our first day in Nica, we took a group photo of all of us new business trainees.  Our buddy, Matt, was unfortunately caught in perhaps the goofiest looking pose ever.  Therefore, for the past three weeks, we have been secretly taking turns photoshopping Matt into hysterical photos.  Overall, there have been about 20 submissions and we had to start a blog to keep them all straight.  So that Saturday night was the grand unveiling of all the photos and I don’t know if I’ve ever laughed so hard.  And to top it all off, one PCV made a PINATA of Matt wearing the exact same clothes in the exact same stance as the original photo.  Hilarious.  So we all took turns taking shots at the piñata blindfolded while eating cake and ice cream.  By far, the greatest day of service.

Original foto

Matteo and his pinata

 It’s getting close to crunch time with finishing business plans.  I’ll keep ya posted!

Nica School System

Cousin in-law Vanessa would like to know what schools are like south of the boarder!  In a short answer, they’re similar, yet different.

Preescolar = Kindergarten?  Starts at age 3/4 and goes for 3 years.  I’ve never been to one so I don’t know what they learn/do there.  Only in the mornings for 3 or 4 hours.

Escuela Primaria = Middle school.  Ages 6/7 and lasts for 6 years.  Again no experience here.

Insituto = Highschool.  12/13 years old and is a 5 year curriculum.  This is where I work so I have a decent idea of what goes on.  The students attend either in the morning or the afternoon for a little less than 5 hours (7am-11:45 or 12:15-5pm).  Of course a borderline obnoxious amount of this time is wasted or lost by students arriving late or what have you.  Classes are in 45 minute periods.  From what I observed, the only classes that meet nearly every day are Spanish and math.  Other classes include: history, sciences, psychology/sociology, English, physical education and OTV.  This is a little embarrassing because my course is in the OTV curriculum and I really don’t know what it stands for.  Anyway, throughout the first four years of OTV students learn life skills such as word processing, self-esteem etc..  Then in fifth year comes OTV Emprendedurismo aka Entrepreneurship aka my class.

After they graduate highschool they can attend a vocational school or a university.  These are usually three or four years and offer all higher level education for everything from teachers to doctors.

This may be needless to say but I feel I should state that Nicaraguans are very intelligent.  I observed a math class during training and was expecting the students to be doing long division or something.  Instead they were graphing trigonometry functions, yuck.

Well I had a rough three day work week, off to the beach!

Nica Pastimes

So as you may notice with blogging several times a week I do have free time.  Quite a lot in fact.  As soon as it gets dark, (6pm) I’m usually restricted to the confines of my home.  So my two main activities are reading and TV watching.

For my less personal followers that don’t know me so well, let me be frank.  I don’t read.  It’s not that I don’t enjoy it or that I’m illiterate (literacy rates are sometimes low in the rural community where I work—mandatory education ends after elementary school) but there’s almost always something I’d rather do (surf the web, watch a movie, hang with friends etc.).  But if you move me to a small town in northern Nicaragua and remove these basic comforts, reading begins to sound like a better and better idea.  So much in fact, here’s a list of what I’ve read:

Confessions of an Economic Hitman – Already blogged about this one, great read.

Water for Elephants – I was afraid that I wouldn’t like the book because that guy from Twilight was in the movie.  Irrational, I know but I really despise Twilight.  Anyway, loved the book.

Lamb – Satire of Jesus’ missing years between schooling the Pharisees at the temple and getting baptized by John.  Funny and well written.

Superfreakonomics – Written by two economists from University of Chicago, it runs economic models on everything from prostitution to global warming.  Interesting and humorous.

The King of Torts – Thriller/Mystery of an unsuccessful lawyer who stumbles on a huge settlement and what greed causes him to become.  Interesting and a quick read.

The Marks of Cain – The Da Vinci Code but not as well written.  Still worth a read if you’re looking for a page-turner.

I’ve read the last five all in the past month.  Hooked on phonics works for me!  Clearly I’m reading faster than I can obtain (three were loaned and three were mailed to me) so I’ve decided to do something more ambitious/foolhardy.  Today at the school library I picked up The Fellowship of the Ring.  Yes, it’s in Spanish.  Now I’m a nerd in two languages.  Wish me luck…  The next ones lined up are The Hunger Games and The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo (thanks to my personal English major, Michelle!)

TV.  As with what I’ve noticed in many developing nations, televisions are must-haves.  In some cases, owning a TV has ranked more important than indoor plumbing, a mattress, a refrigerator, tiled floor – you name it.  I’ve seen shanty towns of cardboard and zinc wired with electricity and satellite dishes.  Television is THAT important to some cultures.

As for what people watch, it varies greatly.  If you have antenna service you only get local channels (maybe six in total).  But since TV is so important, most people have standard cable with ups the total to 22.  Included in standard cable are all the local channel plus ESPN, Discovery, Fox, TNT, Universal, and Cartoon Network.  Of course these are the Latin America versions but I’ll quickly list some of the most popular shows on each network.

ESPN: Sports (soccer, baseball, tennis, cycling, boxing), SportsCenter, Futbol Picante.  I once got to watch the Cowboys/Jets game, awesome.

Discovery: Deadliest Catch and Man vs Wild (called A prueba de todos or “To Test Everything”)

Fox: The Simpsons, Glee, The Glee Project, 24, The Gates, Modern Family, Rescue Me

TNT: Mainly just movies.  I just watched V for Vendetta and Fast and the Furious 2.

Universal: House M.D., Law and Order, Medical Mysteries

Cartoon Network: Scooby-Doo

That’s it for now!

Agua

I’ve received a couple questions about my water source (thanks Kloempkens!).  For the most part, the water in Nica is safe—the locals drink it.  Of course with my stomach refusing to cooperate with Nicaragua and their feisty bacteria, drinking unpurified is not a smart option for me.  Therefore, after spending almost FIVE months in Nica (can’t believe it), I’ve used three mediums to purify my water.

During training, my host family was kind of enough to boil my drinking water.  Fairly simple process: boil for five minutes, cool and drink.  An overlooked yet important step: they covered the water while it was boiling because otherwise the water would absorb that smoky/carcinogen flavor (obviously they used a wood burning stove top…).

When I got to site, I, of course, was too lazy to spend my valuable time boiling water (to make a sizeable quantity takes over an hour).  So, I bought agua pura in the giant five gallon jugs.  This became a hassle for two reasons.  First, water is HEAVY (duh!).  Walking five blocks with five gallons of water doesn’t sound that awful until you factor in the 95 degree heat.  Afterwards, I would literally collapse and have to shower.  Secondly, water isn’t cheap.  Well I guess it depends on the perspective.  After purchasing the five gallon drum, it costs roughly $2 to exchange it for a filled one.  Clearly that’s a reasonable price seeing as in the States we will spend $1 on 12ozs (which is ridiculous by the way…).  But I also had to take in account that I drink a LOT of water.  How much?  I could easily drink the five gallons in less than two weeks (over a half gallon/per day).  So I was beginning to get annoyed with this option and began investigating into option number three…

FILTRÓN!  So Peace Corps Nica has a deal with this company that makes water purifiers, Filtrón.  What is a Filtrón?  This:

My water purifier

The picture may not give an accurate picture of how basic this “contraption” is.  Basically, it’s a large clay flowerpot.  Once enough water is placed in the flowerpot, the ensuing pressure causes it to leak through the porous clay.  And voila!  Filtered water.  Of course, the first couple times the water tasted, surprisingly enough, like clay (major design flaw?).  Not to be deterred, after rereading the Spanish directions I found that this was to be expected and that “extra mineral flavor” will soon stop.  And to their credit, it’s already beginning to taste better.  So for being free and minimal maintenance (wash it once a month), this is looking like the best option.

Pour out a little tap water for me, cheers!

Tramposos!

Another one of my favorite misnomers.  Hacer trampas does not mean “to do tramps” as it may imply.  Instead, it means “to cheat”.  This topic is a hard pill for me to swallow.  For the most part, I would consider to have successfully navigated my academic career with a high degree of integrity (senior year physics may have been an exception but I mean, come on.  It was physics.).  Therefore, I hold my peers in the same regard and perhaps even more so, my students (I’ll admit, it is way more fun on this side of the gradebook.).

This week was first time I’ve seen exams administered and I think the word that describes my initial opinion was ‘appalled’.  I’m not sure if I saw a single student finish their exam honestly without cheating.  It was blatant; students were literally helping each other by talking to their neighbors, passing notes, and sneaking peaks at others all under the nose of the professor.  Now I understand that the Nicaraguan school system differs from American schooling in just about every possible way imaginable but this made me upset.  How can these students show zero respect to the professor and break the rules?  This is when truly understanding culture becomes imperative to the success of any foreign project and also to avoid prejudices.  Nicaraguans, especially in the rural communities where I work, place a high importance on collectivism.  Basically, people value the group more than the individual—either everyone succeeds or no one does.  The students were sacrificing their personal recognition (being the only student with an ‘A’) for the benefit of the whole (every student receiving a passing grade) to beat the system (us evil professors).

Or maybe I’m completely wrong and they just never learned the material—it was a physics exam.