...don´t ask me where that title came from. It just sort of came. I apologize if for any spelling or grammar mistakes. I´m typing this fast because I need to use the bathroom but do not want to leave the cyber to do so until im done.
Life has been good. Living here actually feels very normal. I have a list in my journal of ¨things that have become normal¨ that i will post sometime so you can get an idea.
Let me tell you about my adventure this past week. I went to Los Angeles......in El Castillo, Rio San Juan, Nicaragua. Its a small community in my municipality about 6 hours from where i live. That is, 3 hours by car over horrible rought more stone than gravel roads over hill and crossing rivers and then 3 hours by horse through muddy paths over hills and crossing rivers. I left on tuesday with a crew of health center workers. We were going for a ferria de salud on Wednesday to provide consultations, tooth extractings, immunizations, pap smears,hiv and blood sugar testing, urine testing, and a myriad of other things. When we left it was raining/sprinkling (or lluvizando). That was fine because I was riding in an ambulance. The terrain was rough as always and only a couple time did I actually think we might make it up a hill. But we made it up and down all with loud cheers and smiles each time we made it to the top. Just to clarify, its hard to make it up the hills because the are practically mud after a full day of rain and tires just cant get traction. On another ferria i attended in may the actually had to tie a rope to the front of our vehicle and pull it up manually. Anyway, we were going along just fine, well fine according to nicaraguan standards, until we reached a river. its normally a relatively small creek with a bridge over it, but after days of rain it had coverd the bridge and had a slight current. After about 20 minutes of assessing the situation, the drivers decided to cross. All vehicles made it without any trouble. We continued on just fine until we reached the top of a hill and hurt yelling. The abulance stopped and we all hopped out to see what was up. At the bottom of the hill was a very large river that would be impossible to cross in vehicle. We had to cross on foot. It will be hard to explain so I will attach pictures so you can see. Everyone made me cross first so that I could take pictures of everyone else crossing. So I started wading in the water with my camera tied in a small plastic grocery bag. The doctor who was acting as our guide saw it and insisted that he put it in his shirt to pass more securly. I hesistatingly agreed and grabbed his arm so start crossing. As you´ll see in the pictures there was a rope across the river to hold on to. I began walking and it took all my strength to not have my feet wiped out from beneath me. Actually at one point the were, but i just held on and pulled myself back up. About half way across it was much easier. Finally, my camera and i both crossed safely and were met with a crowd of smiling nicaraguans scattered on the hillside starting at me with wonder and amazement in the rain. When I pulled out my camera all the little kids moved much closed, watched my as I took pictures of everyone else crossing, and laughed as i poured water out of my rubber boots. When everyone crossed we headed up the hill to quezada and were welcome to the front porch of one of the residents for coffee and bread. It had never tasted so good. However, while trying the eat we were also surrounded by black bugs that I´m told come out right after the rain. They continued to cover my clothing, fall in some of the nurses´ coffee, and be just plain annoying until I got on my horse to finish the treck. The lady who gave us the coffee felt so bad for me that she gave me another piece of bread to put over my coffee so the bugs wouldn´t get in. Anyway, after a short rest horses arrived to take us and our supplies on the rest of the journey. As I mentioned I mounted mine and began the treck. Thankfully one of the young guides took the reins so all i had to do was try not to fall off as he lead the horse. This was perhaps the wettest 3 hour treck of my life. If got dark after about a half an hour and the only lights were two flashlights and the occassional strike of lightening. I was tired, soaked, and ready to curl up in my hammock when we finally arrived just before nine. We hurridly changed out of our wet clothes by flashlight (there is limited electricity ou there) and set up our hammocks. I enjoyed a hot cup of coffee and some gallo pinto before settling down for the night.
Just to sum up the rest of the trip quickly. Wednesday morning I bathed in the river (of course with clothes on), used the latrine several time throughout the day, helped with the hiv testing (i got to put all the bandaids on), took pictures, gave children candy, watched mud soccer, watched telenovelas on a tiny black and white tv, and drank lots more coffee. Thursday I woke up with tiny bug bites all over my left arm. (yesterday i had more. im told its some sort of bug that is so tiny it cant be seen and lives on your skin for 10 days and will continue to bite. it can be killed my washing the affected area in alcohol several time. i tried this and i don´t think ive gotten any more bites but i can count at least 20 right now). We had a delicious breakfast of rice, beans, cuajada, papaya, bananas, and pears (they are red down here). I decided again coffee because i didnt want to have to use the bathroom on the trip. We took lots more pictures of our group and the director of the health center took a ton of me on my horse because everyone kept mentioning that i wasn´t in any of the picture i´d taken so far. We finally headed out after packing up. After riding for about an hour we stopped at a house and were given a stock of huge avacadoes, other fruit, and water. We continued on and made it back to quezada. The ambulance and truck arrived an hour later. Miraculously the river level had lowered so much in less than 2 days that we were able to drive back across. When we got to the first river i mentioned you could see the bride and the water was at least 2 feet below. crazy. we finally made it home at about 4. I hopped right in the shower and relaxed for the rest of the day.
Well there are a lot more details, but at least this gives you a little taste of the adventures i can go on when i choose too. They are definitely not required but who wouldn´t want to do that. I´m headed to Fila Verde next tuesday and i hear its just as far.
Thanks for all of the love and support. Things are going well and I´m really enjoying my time down here. I can´t believe ive been in nicaragua for over 5 months. It´s ridiculous.
Enjoy the pics. ok its not working, so im going to run to the bathroom and try again later.
ok. im back and at a less reliable but cheaper cyber to finish up. the pics didnt work quite as expected, but you can see them on facebook.
cheers and paz as always
