Peace Out USA, Hello Peace Corps: Personal Space

This will be a three part post. Let’s begin with game four of the Nica World Series shall we?

CROWDED! I’m not sure if they were trying to sell out the stadium or just make sure that it was over-capacity but it was unreal. First, there were NO seats. There weren’t even aluminum bleachers. Just slabs of concrete in a very impressionistic form of bleachers. Needless to say, I stood for the entire 3.5 hour game. That being said, it was really fun. The game the day before was postponed due to rain (why you have your finals during rainy season is beyond me). So it was a double header of sorts; caught the 8^th inning of what should have been yesterday’s game and all of today’s game. Esteli (my team or at least the team that I associate myself with because my department, Madriz, doesn’t have a team) won both and became champions of Nicaragua! There was more than one beer induced shower thanks to the over-served aficionados of Esteli along with much more standard cheering and celebrating.

I decided to stick around do some shopping (wheat bread, chunky peanut butter, hot sauce and cornflakes = my staples) and get to know the city of Esteli. After grabbing a beer and using the internet, I caught the last bus that headed north towards my site. The closest analogy that I can give this decommissioned school bus was vying for a seat on the last bus leaving East Germany as the Berlin Wall was being erected. It was 3 or 4 to a seat and I wasn’t even lucky enough to nab one of those. So continuing with the theme of lacking personal space, I grinded on strangers for my hour and half ride home.

And to conclude, Sunday wrapped up our fiestas patronales with nothing less than an hipico. My devoted readers already know that an hipico is by a word, a horse parade. But by context, it’s a huge gathering of anyone and everyone to hangout. I brought my camera this time (and managed not to get pickpocked. See, I’m learning!) so here's some fotos.