July 11, 2015

Today was the first of 2 days off.  We swam in Laguna Apoyo which is an extinct volcano.  It was amazing!  After lunch, we celebrated Aldrin's 18th birthday with a piñata.  then we went to Granada which is the oldest city in Nicaragua.  We are staying here for the night.  We were originally going to go on a boat tour, but the weather was bad so we may do that tomorrow if we have time.  We got a chance to walk around the city and look at some of the buildings.  Everything in Granada is colonial and brightly colored.  Our hotel is very nice and owned by a guy who is originally from Botswana (or Israel - I can't remember).  When we got near the lake, Elsa was tired so she decided to take a horse & carriage back tot he hotel.  There was room for six people total so Axie, Claudine, Alicia, Angelica, and I joined her.  The driver gave us a tour of Granada & took us all over & explained a lot of the streets and buildings to us.  It was awesome.  When we got back tot the hotel, we had a little down time before dinner, so we rested.  For dinner, we went to a restaurant called Nectar.  I had the Nicaraguan "Ropa Viejo" (which translates to "Old Clothes," but definitely does not taste like that, lol) - seasoned shredded beef w/sautéd veggies.  DELICIOUS!  It was a very active, but wonderful day.  Tomorrow, we get to go ziplining!  I'm so excited!

Laguna de Apoyo, an extinct volcano and lake.

Enjoying a refreshing kayak ride!

We enjoyed the afternoon at Laguna Beach Club, a resort on the lake.

Enjoying the sun and a refreshing swim.  The water was very nice!

Pastor Rich secures the blindfold on the birthday boy, Aldrin.

View of our hotel's courtyard & pool from my room

Iglesia la Merced, one of the many cathedrals in Granada

Girls just want to have fun!

July 10, 2015

We made more progress on the school today, with the help of the master builder from Villa Japon, Dimas.  More people from the community came to help.  One boy, Alvarado (maybe 16 or 17) helped me set blocks.  He was very soft spoken and fast speaking, which made it difficult for me to understand what he was saying.  A lot of our communication was through gesturing to one another, which I though was pretty cool.  If we continue the same amount of work, we will most likely finish the walls, and maybe even start on the roof, which I feel really good about.  The work is much more intense compared to SSP because we are building from the ground up, as opposed to just repair work.  After lunch, we went back to Miraluz to Doña Sofia's house and learned how to make tortillas - from corn!  We started with boiled corn, ground it into a paste, added water to make Masa (dough), shaped them to tortillas and then put them on the fire.  They were the most delicious tortillas I have ever had in  my life!  And we put some queso on them; ooh!  SO GOOD!  Of course we ate as soon as we got back and I'm still stuffed, nearly 4 hours later.  Elsa has been doing a lot of translating for us and she said that Doña Sofia is so happy to see that we are so united as a team already that she was moved to tears.  It warms my heart when I hear that because it means that I am playing at least a little part in enriching someone's life here.  Doña Sofia is so nice and welcoming.  She was patient with us as we went through the process of making the tortillas; and we've only been in the community for 3 days.  I can already feel like it's going to be hard to say goodbye.  It's so fun to see the youth interact with the children of the community also.  I can tell how much this experience is changing them which is truly amazing.  And I am getting to see more and more of each of my youth's personalities as we bond as a team.  I am so glad we were able to make this trip happen!

Howard (another chaperone) & Nancy show off their beautiful work!

Roger was our Master Builder.

Axie, taking a break from working to play with some of the children.

Axie with Moisé, one of the children who stole our hearts.

Eileen (one of our youth), having fun with some of her new friends.

Nancy & Elaine (another one of our youth), grinding the corn into masa as Doña Sofia (right) supervises.

Another beautiful sunset at Mundo de Fe (see the volcano in the distance?)

July 9, 2015

Today, we got to participate with more of the community.  People came throughout the morning to help wherever needed.  Many of us were mixing cement and one woman, Maria, never took a break.  Elsa (another chaperone, who was incredibly helpful at translating for us!), Nancy, and I kept having to stop because the shoveling was too much for our backs.  I learned how to set cement blocks from Sheldon (another chaperone, and expert builder who has lead many mission trips to Kenya to help build a hospital), which was cool.  He seems to really enjoy seeing how buildings are built in different places.  It seems like the more time I spend with him, the more I like him.  After lunch we went to one of the community learning centers to interact with some kids.  We played games, colored, and got to take a tour of another school that Seeds of Learning (SOL) is working on.  When SOL first came to Villa Japon 2 years ago, there was only a two classroom school.  They built a second and the community ended up doubling their enrollment.  Now, they are building a third 3-classroom building because the high school kids can only attend school on Saturdays due to the fact that every classroom is currently housing 2 classes - a morning shift and an afternoon shift.  The hope is to be able to have enough rooms in order to ensure that kids stay in school all day because kids are less likely to attend if they have to attend the afternoon shift.  It was really interesting to interact with the kids because they were so accepting of us all.  One boy, Bryce, insisted on coloring with me.  Then he took Alicia's phone and took a selfie with me.  The kids also made us friendship bracelets.  Such a great day.

David (one of our youth), Elsa (top right), and Nancy (bottom left) playing Jenga with one of the kids of Villa Japon.

Me with one of the children from Villa Japon.

Axie (middle), one of our youth, interacting with some of the children from Villa Japon.

Claudine (one of our youth) helps a boy from Villa Japon with his Math homework.

July 8, 2015

Today was our first day at the work site.  We got quite a bit done, which is good because our day was cut short because of... wait for it... RAIN!  And lots of it too!  Coming from drought ridden California, it felt so refreshing that I stayed out in it for about 10 minutes.  If I had known that we were going to have to walk back tot he car in the torrential downpour (at least according to this gringa), I may not have done that.  But it was so nice to hear the rain - I never realized how much I missed it until I heard it.  So now we are back at our home for the next two weeks.  The food is still so delicious and I could totally get used to someone cooking me lunch and bringing it to the work site each day, instead of the PB & J's that we get at SSP, hahaha.  Because of our unexpected trip back home, we were able to watch a video on the recent political history of Nicaragua - the Sandinista Revolution.  Like much of Central & South America, up until the 1980's, Nicaragua was under a military dictatorship.  The revolution, while successful, did take it's toll on the economy, which is why Nicaragua is the second poorest nation in Central America, after Haiti.  It's almost time for dinner and rumor has it we're having homemade tortillas!

Our work site

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Nancy (one of the other chaperones) and I had a conversation earlier about the availability of water to the community of Miraluz.  They don't have running water and rely on 3 water wells to get water from.  Yesterday, I was talking with Julian (the regional director for Seeds of Learning, the organization that SSP teamed up with to make this trip possible) and he mentioned that each house is limited to a certain amount of water jugs per day.  It's amazing at how your perspective can change on what you think are necessities when you are serving a community with much less that you.  Nancy and I came to the conclusion that the people in Miraluz only bathe maybe once a week and/or for special occasions, and toilets are latrines - holes dug in the ground (18ft deep), with a seat built on top.  But, even though the community struggles, many still seem content with what they do have.  It's amazing, and make me feel like they are much richer than me in many ways.

July 7, 2015

I can honestly say that the best way to see the sun rise is on an airplane 35,000 feet in the air (and wouldn't it suit my luck that I couldn't reach my phone/camera to take photos :-/)!  I have never seen such vivid and distinct colors.  And it was equally awesome to see the sun rise above the clouds.  We are in San Salvador right now for a stop/layover and will arrive shortly in Managua.  I can't wait!
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We had a welcoming ceremony from the community we are serving.  There was lots of music and dancing and interaction with the people of Miraluz.  We were all able to express our gratitude (both the community to us and us to them) for being able to be a part of this project.  Even though we were all tired, we were excited and had a great time.  One girl even taught Stephen a dance.  It was funny.

Part of the Welcome Ceremony

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We have some amazing cooks - Rosa and Marta - that will be cooking most of our meals.  For lunch, we had a kind of pork stew and for dinner, we had Gallo Pinto (a rice and beans dish) and chicken in a sweet sauce.  SO GOOD!!!

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We are staying at a place called "Mundo de Fe" (trans. "World of Happiness" which is very fitting).  It is gorgeous!  So green and lots of colorful vegetation.  And always butterflies flying around to get some nectar from the plants.  Birds are constantly chirping and sound so different from the ones back home.

Some of the beautiful and colorful foliage

They have a couple of cages with parrots in them

Sunset at Mundo de Fe