Border Run 2: Chapter 1

Time to collect more stamps!

Hamilton met us at the house so we could show him how we had prepped for the painting that was to be done while we were off the island.  Prep consisted of shoving all of our stuff into one room.  After that, we hoofed it up the trail to wait for the chicken bus.  It was actually a little later than usual  but soon enough we were bouncing down the road to start our border run adventure.  Day one's map of getting off the island can be seen here:  Mérida to Rivas.

We hit Moyogalpa and hopped off the bus in town, rather than riding all the way down the hill to the dock.  Why?  Because there are sandwiches to be had at The Cornerhouse, of course!  It's easier and closer if you get off the bus early.  See?  We're learning.  Bex! had her usual and I had mine - chicken salad with a salad and a steak sandwich with potatoes, respectively.  We also bought huge molasses cookies for the ferry ride to the mainland.

In the ferry terminal office, avoiding the sun

We hit the ATM and walked down to the dock.  After buying tickets and a short wait, we boarded the ferry and got comfortable for the crossing.  Going across the lake was fine, as expected.  But approaching the dock was a bit harrowing.  Big waves rocked us the last third or so of the trip, the ferry bobbing and weaving, pitching and rolling pretty good.  When a ferry exits the open water of Lago de Nicaragua, it takes a 90 degree left around a rock jetty to get in position to dock.  Just as we were making that leftie, a lancha was coming out from the dock at the same time!  We passed close enough that we could have exchanged Grey Poupon with the passengers on the smaller boat.  Okay, it wasn't that close but given the rough waters, I'm thinking it was not intentional.  Yikes.

We negotiated a price with a taxi driver and made our way into Rivas.  He dropped us at our home away from home (in Rivas, anyway) - Hotel La Mision.  Marta met us with smiles and showed us to 'our' room - #3, for those of you who are curious.  

Since our last visit, La Mision added an in-room mini-bar.
Nice touch, but we still need the corner pulperia for cold Toña.

We dropped our bags and immediately decided to run errands.  We hit the librería (stores that sell office supplies) for 3x5 notecards and whiteboard pens.  Then we walked down the street to The Digital Store and again bought them out of HP 662 toner cartridges.

The clerk helping us asked our name and how many cartridges we wanted.  She was obviously new!  The lady who knows us well was shouting the answers to her before we could respond!  "Su nombre es Rebecca!  Quieren todos los cartuchos de seis seis dos!"  (Her name is Rebecca!  They wants all of the 662's!").  After the toner buy we hit a farmacia for various meds, the prices once again reminding me that the pharmaceutical industry in the US is a complete scam.  A short walk back to the hotel to drop off our goodies then...

… it was World Cup time!  Like I said, it's a BIG deal down here.  In fact, each of the stores we had visited on our errands had the game on!  So we hadn't really missed anything.  We walked down to Rosti Pizza to watch the rest of the game.  There were a handful of folks in there and we had fun.  Some locals seemed surprised at first that we were rooting for Argentina and not the gringo team.  We enjoyed a few beers while watching Argentina beat Holland to advance to the finals.  When the match ended, we ordered a pizza to go.  We hit a pulperia for a few beers, then relaxed in our room with the AC and our crime dramas on AXN.  Television is a real treat for us when we travel!  Air conditioning is just an extravagant luxury, as well.

The next morning we got up early for breakfast at the hotel and packed our bags.  Pedro picked us up and drove us south to the Nicaraguan border.  What a zoo!  This was not our first crossing, of course, but it was our first time doing it on foot.  A crowd of people greeted us, all shouting over one another in an attempt to get us to hire them to help us get through the lines.  No help needed, thanks. 

It's kind of a strange set up.  They check passports before they even let you into the area where the immigration office is located.  Fair enough.  The guy barely glanced at my passport before waving me through.  My wife wasn't so lucky.  The guy looked at her passport, looked at her, looked back at the document.  Hmmm…  After what seemed like a long time but was probably only 30-45 seconds, the guy let her through.  Weird.

The next step is to fill out the immigration and customs forms.  On previous trips, these were supplied by Tica Bus.  This time, we had to find the forms.  Thank goodness for the dozens and dozens of people hawking them!  Legally, they can't sell them.  But they strongly suggest you give them a propina (tip).  After looking around to find free forms, I buckled and reluctantly gave a guy 20 cordoba (80¢) for the necessary documents.  This turned out to be money well spent because a tour bus unloaded right behind us, so we were able to get through the lines ahead of that group.

Next step is to pay the municipal tax of a dollar each.  Then we waited in line to go through the official immigration check point, pay our exit fees and receive our passport stamps to show we were leaving Nicaragua.  There was an elderly Latina lady in line ahead of us and a young Latino man cut in front, said 'Hola' to her, like he knew her.  He obviously thought he was dealing with inexperienced gringos.  The older woman glanced at him but didn't respond.  Bex! called him on it!  Haha!  He tried to say he was traveling with her and my wife responded with a sweet smile - and "Mentiroso" (liar).  He knew he was busted and skulked back to the end of the line.

It was finally our turn and we stepped up to the counter together, handed over our passports and documents.  Mine:  quick look, slide through the computer reader, stamp, stamp, done.  Bex!:  look at passport, look at Bex!.  Passport, Bex!  Typity-type on the computer.  Another look at both.  Hold passport up to eye level, to compare the two side by side.  Call over another guy to verify things.  Finally, after a lot of scrutiny - stamps.  WTF?

The thing to keep in mind is that Bex! looks almost identical to her passport photo.  It's a fairly new photo, she hasn't changed in the couple of years since she got the new passport.  Me?  Wow, let's see… Passport photo - long hair.  Now - short hair.  Passport photo - goatee.  Now - mustache and sideburns.  Passport weight - xxx lb.  Now - a good 40-50 less.  

Thus, began a deep introspection:  How well do I really know this woman?

Exit receipts in hand, we left the immigration office, shouldered our packs and walked about a kilometer south into Costa Rica.  It's an interesting stretch of road, kind of a 'no man's land' between the two countries.  We dodged big rigs and buses, and the guys who spray the vehicles to decontaminate them.  We've crossed the border between Honduras and Guatemala, and it's a short walk.  You can see the other country's immigration checkpoint while standing on one side.  This border crossing is a reasonable distance, although that's probably because it's on the Panamerican Highway and is the primary north-south route through Central America.  

A few more steps and… Costa Rica!

We beat the crowd and flew through there, although 'Rebecca' again got the special triple-double check before they stamped her through.  All in all, it was our fastest border crossing yet - about 45 minutes!!!  It would have been at least 10 minutes quicker for me if I hadn't been traveling with someone on the international watch list.

Now it was time to find some transportation to get us to our destination.  We needed to first find a bus that was heading toward Liberia, one that could drop us in La Cruz de Guanacaste.  This proved to be very easy, actually.  There were two chicken buses waiting outside the immigration office and one happened to be our ride.  Within five minutes we were on our way.  And about 30 minutes later - La Cruz!  The next step was to catch the bus heading to El Jobo, a small town on the south peninsula of Bahía Salinas (Salinas Bay).  This, too, proved to be a quick transition.  We waited all of 15-20 minutes for this bus.  Smooooth.  La Cruz sits up on the flatlands, high above the bay, so the bus ride was pretty cool - steep road, tight turns and exceptional views of the bay and the Pacific.  Once we got to the bottom, we bounced along the unpaved road watching for our destination.  The day's journey is mapped here: Rivas to Bahía Salinas.  As the crow flies, we were only 40-ish miles from home!

Our stop was short of El Jobo - we had to alert the driver to drop us on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere, at the Blue Dream Hotel, a cool little place overlooking the bay AND directly across the water at Nicaragua!  "Disculpe!  Aqui!  Aqui!  Gracias!"  

Despite the heat and the dehydration, this is not a mirage.

Dave waited and waited for the bell hop to bring his backpack UP to the room.

It's an interesting area, this part of Costa Rica.  They have not received much rain (sounds familiar) so it was extremely dry.  It's not a very developed corner of the country, although we saw signs for 'new housing developments' and 'se vende lotes' (lots for sale).  Some farming, a lot of grazing land, even an ostrich farm.  Or is it ostrich ranch?  

We found the proprietress, Kika, in her small hotel office.  We got checked in, she gave us the rundown on how things worked and showed us to our room.  Even though it was midday and she had been heading to lunch when we arrived, she got us settled, set us up with beers (Imperial) and even made us lunch, a tasty baked lasagna.  Mmmm, any food that's baked…

After a hectic run up to the end of our second semester, this sleepy little place was exactly what we needed to start our vacation.  This area is a world-renowned destination for kitesurfing, considered a mecca for enthusiasts of this sport. Hear that, Ben Dobler and John Knight??  Sadly, it was the off season so there was no kitesurfing happening during our stay.  And me finally in wetsuit shape - sigh.  From what we've read, it's a good place to learn because the winds almost always blow toward shore, so there is no danger of ending up in the ocean.  Or Hawaii.

But… we had lots of down time to read, relax, and beach comb.  This region has been in a bit of a drought, much like we've had in Nicaragua, so it was hot and dusty.  Can't imagine how hot it gets here in the Central American summer months.  Hooboy.  The Blue Dream sits on a hillside and the various accommodations (running the gamut from cabins to dorms) are terraced.  We were in a 'bungalow' overlooking the patio and restaurant.  There were two levels above us, so we climbed up to the top level where it was much cooler, sat in the shade, toes in the grass, drank beer, read and napped.  It was muy tranquilo, with very few guests around.

Blue Dreams is the terraced set of buildings on the right.

The next morning, after breakfast, we walked across the road and went to the beach.  Playa Papaturro is a long white sandy stretch along the southern edge of Bahía Salinas.  In the middle of the bay sits Isla Bolaños, or as I affectionately called it, Bologna Island.  We walked along the beach, picking up cool seashells along the way.  Heading west, we scrambled over the rocks on the point and took in the view.  It was windy!  Not sure how kitesurfing works, but I don't know why it's considered the off season unless they are usually getting rained on this time of year.  It seemed there was plenty of wind, for sure!

The Isla provides nesting habitat for frigate birds.

Frigate Bird riding the wind!

Crab riding the rocks.

These sand pellets appeared to indicate burrowing crabs.

Booby just wanted to go back to the hotel and chill.

Flying her hummingbird kite on the beach!

Bex!, with Bologna Island in the background

Dave, with Bologna Island in the background

Do hedgehogs have to wear swim trunks at non-nude beaches?

Later that day, we decided to go for another walk, this time to find Playa Copal.  In theory, the path leading to it was just a kilometer or so down the main road.  We walked well beyond that and either missed it or the distance we had in mind was incorrect.  It was a good walk anyway.  We saw signs showing plans for a huge subdivision-style development - definitely a gringo endeavor, I'm sure.  We passed a restaurant, but they only open during the high season.  And we saw a whole bunch of ostrich.  Or is it ostriches?

Enough guests rolled in on this Friday afternoon that Kika lit up the awesome wood-fired pizza oven outside for dinner.  The cooks were prepping dough all afternoon and the fire was lit around 4:30 to get the over ready for 7 o'clock, when they would begin taking orders for dinner.  Delicious super thin crust pizzas with ice cold Imperial.  Uh, hell yeah!  And, uh, for our former co-workers at CBA, especially the kitesurfing duo, Ben and John, they had a couple of pizzas on the menu that we found interesting:

Hmmm… maybe Ben Dobler has been down here before...

Saturday was time to depart and carry on with our border run adventure.  We had breakfast, packed, checked out and visited with Kika while waiting for the bus to take us back to La Cruz.  Kika is a neat lady - from Italy and has lived in Central America for quite a while, finding work where she can.  In fact, she lives part of the year in Cahuita, which is in the far southeast corner of Costa Rica and a potential location for us to explore in the future.  She was awesome and we had such a good time getting to know her.

We walked down to the road and found a shady spot to wait for our ride.  We enjoyed seeing this part of Costa Rica, although unless we took up kitesurfing, we probably wouldn't go back.  If you want to visit wild and wooly Costa Rica, this is it.  Go soon before the gringos take over!!

'Rebecca' - or so she says.

What a handsome gringo.

Soon enough, the bus rolled by to take us on our way.  Next stop:  La Fortuna, via La Cruz and Liberia.  The adventure continues!

Ciao!

What's Happened Since Our Guests? (Part 2)

Week of June 16:
- We finally met Cindi, our landlord.  She lives in New Mexico and visits the island a couple of times a year.  She was excited to see the house we're renting and how Hamilton did with the work prior to us moving in.  She's very nice and loves Merida as much as we do!

- We took the paddle boards out and made our way down the shore to drop in for a visit with our friends, the Lorio's.  It's nice to be able to get around on something other than our feet!

It's a jungle back there!

- We've been juggling the high school class schedule a little to accommodate a school program that, thus far, has been perpetually postponed.  The program is billed as a sort of talent show, with kids performing song and dance routines they come up with themselves.  One of our high school students, Ericks, asked our gringa friend Jen (who is a dance teacher) to help him and his buddies do a routine to "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys.  Haha!  She was tortured by the song!   The kids started out excited and energetic but then started being quite disrespectful of her, unfortunately.  Ericks is a great kid and he apologized for their behavior and attended every rehearsal.  But many of the others started talking back, showing up late, not coming at all.

It's funny like that here.  When something new is happening, people are really in to it.  But soon enough, the bloom is off the rose.  People get disinterested quickly here.  We've experienced this with our classes - attendance with a few folks seems to come and go.  It can be frustrating if you let it get to you.  Jen was donating her valuable time and was pretty pissed with the way the kids acted toward her in the end.  She and her family went back to the states for a couple of months, so would not be able to see the performance - should it ever happen. 

- Perfect picture of a pair of Pescadito's playful and perky puppies:

They ain't nothing but two hound dogs...

- We were out on the porch one day and saw a group of fishermen setting and pulling their nets up on the beach in front of our place.  This is common - pescadores use our beach frequently to pull nets in and gather their catch.  They were collecting and bagging their catch, when we noticed they had one fish they were kind of excited about.

We walked down to the see what they were fussing over.  They had a fish they called pesca de diablo (devil fish).  It's a nasty invasive species from South America that makes its way up the Rio San Juan.  They eat native fish and their eggs.  Ugly as hell too!  No pictures, unfortunately.  The guys said they are catching more and more of these, too.  Yikes.

Week of June 23:
- The World Cup.  One of only three or four sporting events that truly brings the world together.  The others, IMO:  the Olympics, the Tour de France (there are many cycling events but this is the biggie), rugby's version of the World Cup.  Yes, soccer, folks.  Neither of us were fans back home but down here, you kinda can't help but get caught up in the excitement.  So, yes, we did just that.  Ole ole ole!  We received a lot of advice from our friends on who to root for (Brazil and Germany), who to root against (Costa Rica and Mexico).  We watched when we could, catching parts of group play matches here and there.  And we followed results, story lines, and scenarios online, if for no other reason than to be able to engage in conversations with others.  

Not knowing a whole lot about how the event or the game works, we took it upon ourselves to frantically read up on rules, qualifying, point systems, players, coaches, teams, etc.  And it truly helped us understand what was happening.

I mentioned Costa Rica above.  And I've written about the fact that there is no love lost between these two beautiful and unique countries.  We only know a handful of people who were glad they were even in the World Cup tourney!  I asked our friend Pedro why the people of Nicaragua wouldn't root for their neighbor to the south.  His response said it all:  "If Nicaragua was in the tournament, they would not root for us."  

Okaaay.  Moving on…

-  We welcomed a new volunteer - Dani.  She is from Honduras, is related to Alvaro at the Hacienda and attends school in Florida, USA.  So, a changing of the guard, from Christina to Dani.  It's nice (and, selfishly, easier for us) when volunteers can 'hand off' to one another.

Jasmina, writing her name to introduce herself to Dani

Funny story:  My son and his wife, Lisa, taught at Escuela Internacional Sampedrana, a fully bilingual school in San Pedro Sula, Honduras.  It's a private school for rich kids, like a prep school.  Making conversation with Dani, I mentioned this to her and she responds:  "Oh, we hate those guys!"  Seems she attended the equivalent school in her hometown in Honduras of Tegucigalpa, so the two schools competed in all sports and club activities.  According to my son, EIS usually won the important stuff.  Haha!

- We've had a couple of heavy rains and expect them to occur more frequently as winter progresses (although rainfall is still far below average).  We were having issues on the backside of the house with water coming in through and around the kitchen window.  We informed handyman extraordinaire Hamilton and he came back a few days later with a newly created 'mini-roof' to install, to protect the tiled kitchen counters and other work he's done inside the house.  It seems to be working so far.

Pre-fabbed and ready to go.

OSHA?  We don't need no stinking OSHA!

Aww, it even matches the house colors.

- Turns out the 5:30 AM bus actually comes at 5:30 AM.  Go figure.  Our attempt to make a quick mid-week trip to Moyogalpa for supplies was thwarted by something Nica actually happening on time.  We missed the bus by about 10 minutes.  Live and learn.

- In a related story, the high school song and dance program got postponed - again.

- We found this baby iguana frantically trying to get out of the house.  We helped him exit, of course, but not until we go the picture!

- Christina and her boyfriend Chris left Merida.  She told us she loved her time here and was grateful that she never encountered a tarantula during her stay.  She admits a fear of spiders, especially those big hairy bastards.

- After seeing Christina off at a farewell dinner, we returned home to find a big hairy bastard on the wall waiting for us.  Attempts to reach Christina failed.

Week of June 30:
- We had a midday meeting at the bilingual school and took the opportunity to commute by paddleboard.  Good times!

- Piglet visit!

- We finally made the trip to Finca Mistica.  Um… yum!  Fresh baked bread and cookies.  They are located down the road toward San Ramon, so we rode our bikes there.  We got to the turnoff that leads up the volcano.  The 400 meters up was… challenging but worth it.  Food was great and we met a potential new student.

We're not really accepting brand new students any more to our existing classes.  We've been at this for five plus months and our students have come a long way!  To bring in a newbie would have one of two results:  the class would have to be slowed waaaay down to accommodate the new students which isn't fair to those who have been attending all year; or the class would continue at the current pace and the new student would be lost, become frustrated and ultimately quit coming.

So… we are entertaining the idea of adding a new class.  In fact, we are adding a new class.  Like we weren't busy enough before.  Oy.  This new class will be geared toward the folks who work in hospitality - hotels, restaurants, guiding, spas, etc.  Offered four days a week, we'll teach the same lesson on Monday-Tuesday and Wednesday-Thursday.  This way a student only has to come to two classes per week (M or T; W or Th) to keep up.  

We'll see how it goes!

- Pretty flowers!

Random splash of Nicaraguan color.

- Our unmown "lawn" makes great iguana habitat.  We love spending quiet mornings getting to see all three residents coming down to sun and munch the green stuff.

- The high school dance thing got moved yet again.  With a border run coming up for us we might miss it completely.  Sigh.  Ah well.  We had canceled some classes because of this event and subsequently tried to get word around to reinstate one of them. Perhaps we'll learn not to plan things around events in Nicaragua.  

Except that 5:30 AM bus.  That's friggin' clockwork, man.

- We were fortunate enough to get to know a couple of guys from Argentina - Juan Pablo and Gabriel.  Great people, traveling around Central and South America, finding work and opportunity wherever they went.  They have been in Merida at the Hacienda for quite some time, doing film and photography work for Alvaro, for the hotel, and for OBS.  And, boy, are they excited about Argentina's chances in the World Cup!

(l-r) Bex!, Gabriel, Gabriel's awesome mustache, big pile of empty beer bottles, random dude, Juan Pablo's thumb, Juan Pablo

They shared a fantastic example of 'finding work and opportunity'.  They were staying on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica during Semana Santa (Holy Week, Easter).  With their cash running low and tons of tourists available, they came up with a genius plan.  They bought fresh fruit (cheap), cut it up and sold 'fresh fruit salads' on the beach to hot and hungry tourists.  Ha!  Buy in the morning, sell out by midday, eat and drink beer at the bar the rest of the day.  Brilliant!  They made enough money to stay a little longer, easily covering their room and board.

- It was mid-year testing week for the schools, so we gave the OBS first grade students an English midterm exam.  We asked them to:

• identify colors - blue, green, red, orange, yellow, purple, brown, black, white; 
• count to ten (many kept going to 15 or 20!); 
• answer the question 'What is your name?' with 'My name is ____.'
• identify half a dozen noun flashcards - house, tree, leaf, sun, etc.

They did great and it's a good feeling knowing they are actually learning the language!!  

We is such good teachers.

- We decided to throw a little old-fashioned American Fourth of July party to celebrate US independence and the completion of Term 2!  Woohoo!!

Yep, vacation is underway!

First order of party prep - Corn Hole!!

We put the corn in cornhole.  Well, actually, we put it in the "bean" bags.

Handsome.

Magnificent detail work. 

Party Ingredient #1 - Red, White, and Blue Decorations; the chairs match, too!

Party Ingredient #2 - American Picnic/BBQ Food

Party Ingredient #3 - American Backyard/Bar Game

"Goooooooooooooooooooal!"  Oops, wrong sport.

Heated competition!

We found perros calientes (hot dogs), some bread that we could use as buns, Bex! made potato salad (having scored what was likely the only jar of mayonnaise available in the village), and I made baked beans (or as 'baked' as I could replicate without an oven).  The food was dee-lish and we had a great time.

Plus, for us - leftovers!!

- We continued to watch and closely follow the World Cup games.  Also, the Tour deFrance started.  So, yeah - sports central for us!  This is just like when the World Series overlaps with the NFL preseason!

- Hand feeding mangos to a 2,000 lb. bull!

I'm sure the barb wire will stop him, should he get upset...

- Needless to say, we paddle board every chance we can, even if it's just a quick out and back.  Like we said, getting good at this new endeavor here where the tropical water is warm warm warm is much better than falling in back home.  Brrrrrr! 

Week of July 7:
- We were fortunate to be out on the paddleboards to witness an amazing show from Mother Nature.  Sunsets here are usually awesome; this one in particular was spectacular!

A boy and his volcano

Bex! in silhouette

- Speaking of sunsets…

We were preparing to leave for ten days to make our required every 90-days border run to renew our visas.  During our absence, plans were in place for Hamilton to paint the interior of the house.  In preparation for this, we packed all of our stuff away and stored it in the spare bedroom.  

It was a strange feeling.  The house we essentially empty, save for the table, chairs and bed.  Every sign of 'us' was out of sight.  It made us feel sad and melancholy because it was a preview of how it will be when we head home in December.  Packed up, empty house, leaving on a bus.  (Although we'll have to send our luggage by taxi.)  Going home will be exciting, of course, but we'll likely never ever live in a place like this again and it felt bittersweet.

Can't even begin to imagine how hard it will be to leave in December! 

Anyhoo, we'll cross that bridge when it comes.  The night before we departed for the border, we took time to enjoy this view from our porch.

   

Hasta luego, Nicaragua!

Hello, Costa Rica!

What's Happened Since Our Guests? (Part 1)

In the weeks since we had visitors, life has been mostly 'normal' - as normal as things get living here, anyway.  This post will be mostly chronological, designed to catch y'all up. 

Saturday and Sunday, May 24-25:
 - As we said before, we bought bikes.  In retrospect we should have maybe shopped a little but it all worked out in the end.  Miguel picked us up at the port and took us to a couple of places in Moyogalpa that sell bikes.  We found one nicer aluminum frame bike and one crappy steel frame bike, at two different locations.  We bought them both and they'll work for the time we're here.  I am definitely missing my Trek Rumblefish 29er, though!!

- Before we left the island, we had asked Hamilton if he could rig up a safer, easier method for us to get through the barbed wire fence that keeps the livestock out of the yard and allows us access to Playa Gringo.  Now that we have paddle boards, we know we'll be making more trips to the lake, so making this easier was somewhat of a priority.  Unhooking stretched barbed wire each time was just begging for tetanus.

Imagine our surprise when we got home to see just how fabulous a job Hamilton had down for us!  He and his son set posts, built and installed a stellar gate, poured concrete steps (and inscribed our names in the cement) and cleared the rocks from the gate to the waters edge to make our walk even easier.  Once again, amazed and humbled by the quality of work.  We were even more surprised when he went through the detailed invoice for the job.  It totaled a whopping $114, materials and labor.  Seriously, I would put this guys craftsmanship up against any contractor from the states - any day, any time.

We'll be famous after we've gone.

Now we can have a Le Mans start to our paddleboard races.

We also created a Greater Kiskadee habitat.

-While we were gone, we also got a new lawn.  Everything around our house sprouted and started growing.  Including some flowers.  Apparently we have a garden.

Week of May 26:

- Back to planning and teaching.  We started the week with review to make sure students were back in English-learning mode, then continued on with our Second Semester curriculum.  Present tenses for some, simple past for others, irregular verbs, readings, dialogues, quizzes, prepositions and adverbs for our intermediate group.

- Reactions to my lack of facial hair were hilarious and mixed.  Let's see…  let's start with the OBS kids.  The first graders were mesmerized, many didn't know who I was at first.  After the buzz died down the teacher, Julia, had me sit in a chair and had the kids line up.  One by one, they stepped up to assess my new look, then voted with a 'sin barba' or 'con barba' - without beard, with beard - to express their preference.  Then they started referring to me as Profesor Sin Barba (Teacher No Beard).

Que guapo.

A stop at Margarita's led to more fun.  Tia Margarita welcomed Bex! and greeted me with a short hug and a kiss on the cheek.  In hindsight she was doing that as a courtesy to Bex!, saying hello to this 'new friend' she had brought!  We sat down and she came back a few minutes later with beers and to see if we wanted food.  I asked her what she had that day - chicken, pork - and she started to answer.  Then she stopped, did a double take and stared at me, then started laughing as she realized who I was!  

I'm not sure how many 6'4" white guys she's seen with Bex!, so I was a little surprised that she hadn't figured it out right away when WE WALKED IN TOGETHER like we always do.

'You've been taking other guys to Margarita's?!?'  'Oh, just Jesner from First Grade to watch cartoons?'  'Okay, then.'

Then her nephew and our adult student, Juriel, came home.  He said hello to Bex!, then sat down, introduced himself to me and asked when I had arrived on Ometepe, how long I was staying and if I knew David.  I played along, not sure if he was being serious.  Now, I can keep a straight face as long as I need to.  Juriel is a joker, too, but I've not known him to maintain the ruse for too long before cracking up.  This conversation went on for a good 15 minutes before it dawned on him, then he lost it.  Pretty good stuff! 

Look.  Over there.

Walking to class I passed Marbeli, another of our adult beginner students.  She stopped, looked at me, tilted her head to one side then asked 'Are you David?' (in English).  Haha!  I reassured her that I was indeed David.  She said 'Okay' then continued on her way. 

High school student Priscilla introduced herself to me and said 'Pleased to meet you' when I told her my name was 'John'.

Ah, good times.

- We decided to have Gerald, one of Hamilton's crew, work on the bikes to get them all shipshape to ride.  He took them away and brought 'em back the next day, all greased, oiled, adjusted and ready.  However, he pointed out that the steel-frame bike had issues, especially with the tires.  Old rubber was cracking.  

The next morning the steelie had two flat tires and upon inspection both tubes were completely rotted.  How long had this thing been sitting there?!  Anyway, there is (to our surprise and future assurance) a place in Merida that sells bike stuff.  I guess it makes sense, since it's the predominant means of transportation, aside from walking.  Hamilton and H, Jr. came over, assessed the bikes and made a parts run.  Two new tires, two new tubes and 800 cordobas ($32) later, we had two rolling machines.  Woohoo!

- We continue to see our monkeys on a regular basis!  Cornelius, Zira and Milo come down the trail, cross the yard and climb into one of the large mango trees.  Or they make their way, tree to tree, along the lake.  We even saw Cornelius make his way to our olive tree and start in on some juicy tender leaves down low.  We stared at each other - human and monkey - sizing each other up.  It was a memorable moment.  For us, too.

- We also enjoy our three iguanas.  We have yet to name these guys, although Moe, Larry and Curly seems to fit.  Iguana is food here, so on more than one occasion we've had to let people know 'Nuestros iguanas no son para comer.'  (Our iguanas are not for eating.)

Our home improvements also created iguana habitat.

- We immediately got back on Tia's nacatamale delivery route.  On our first visit to Maragarita's after our return, we were going to ask but Tia beat us to it, telling us she was making them, asking us how many we wanted.  We're regular customers,  ya know.  The next day, Juriel made the drop at our house - six delicious, still hot bundles of joy.  Maybe this is a startup business for me when I get back to the states.  Biking around early in the morning, throwing nacatamales up on people's porches.  Hmmm…

- We were invited to celebrate Nicaragua's 'Dia de las Madres' (Mother's Day) with our friend Maykel's family.  Actually, his dad, Chema, invited us earlier in the week to this special event.  Leopoldina would be making her special fried chicken recipe and other tipica food.  It was de-lish and the chicken was most excellent.  Plus there was a special cake, so we had a wonderful dessert.  We were very honored to have been invited and included in this special day for a special lady.  Maykel's wife, Zoriel, and his sister, Ashly, are also moms, so I think they got a little extra cake.

Hey, are those fingerprints in the icing?!

Mmm… something baked...

- We took our first official paddleboard trips, taking them out twice over the course of the week.  My NRS Baron 6 is perfect for my size.  In fact - knock on madera - I have yet to fall off this bad boy.  Bex! is sporting the Earl 6, which is the model on which I learned to fall off a paddelboard with dignity and grace.  Plus, Mike and Anne loaned us dry bags, so we can take some school supplies if we should ever decide to paddle board to work here.  Which we will.

Me, on my board - not under my board.

Sunshine, on a cloudy day.

Filling up our casita with toys.

Week of June 2:
- For the first time since The Swiss students were here at the start of the school year, we welcomed a real live, honest to goodness volunteer!  Hip hip hooray!  Christina joined us, all the way from Rochester, NY.  She is a professor at one of the universities there, teaching Spanish and Linguistics.  She was awesome, right from the start.  Teaching kids was a big switch from her college classes but once we introduced her and she got the routine, she jumped right in.  Having a short term volunteer also allowed us to restart classes for the grade school kids in the afternoon, something we regrettably just don't have time for when we're 'sans volunteers'. 

I mentioned to Christina that my uncle was a retired lieutenant for the Rochester Police Department.  I gave her a look and asked if maybe she knew him.  Her eyes got big - "No, no - I'm a goody two shoes."  Haha!

- Bex! found plans online to make a hummingbird feeder from some recyclable materials - a plastic 20 oz. Coke bottle and and plastic container with a lid.  Pretty slick design.  We mixed up some sugar water and hung it up in a tree we could see from the porch.  No action yet, although the ants like it a lot.  And it may be difficult to attract any hummers, given that there are plenty of flowers on the island
[Note:  Thus far, a month or more in, zero hummingbirds, so we think this experiment is done.]

- Remember the fiesta we threw for Bex!'s folks?  Recall that Mike recorded Los Tigres de Ometepe and we were able to burn CDs for them, so they had their music to enjoy and share with others!  The band was thrilled with that, but we were able to do something even more incredible for them.  Mike works for the public radio station in Juneau, AK and he hosts his own 2 hour radio show each Wednesday evening, called 'Friends and Neighbors'.  

We invited the band over to our house - only Jehu and Chema were able to attend.  Mike played a bunch of their songs on his radio show!!  We had a map of North and Central America so we could show them where Juneau is and how far away it was.  These two guys were grinning from ear to ear the entire time (despite appearances from the picture below), listening to their music being played on the radio so far away, and knowing it was being heard by thousands of people!  Bex! kept an email conversation going with her dad during the broadcast, so he was able to let listeners know that Los Tigres were listening along with them, all the way down in Merida, Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua.

Two-thirds of Los Tigres de Ometepe listening to their worldwide debut!

This was a pretty special evening for all of us!  We are trying to figure out what the next fiesta could be, so we can hire the band again.  

- Hamilton invited us to his home to celebrate his grandson's 7th birthday.  We felt honored to be included!  His wife and mother made some great food for the occasion - beef kabobs and roasted veggies were a real treat!  And we had cake, of course.  

We also witnessed a potential Toña beer commercial happening right before our eyes:
At one point in the evening, we ran out of beer, so Hamilton sent his son to get more.  He leaves on the motorcycle and returns a short time later with beer.. AND a hot Nica chick (his girlfriend).  It was pretty funny.
"It's good to combine your errands.  Why only pick up beer?  Drink Toña."

As I often discover, kids gravitate to me.  Or I gravitate to them.  Either way, my wife often accuses me of being a big kid at heart.  So it was no surprise to her that I ended up playing with the chavalos (children), organizing balloon games and relay races for them.  It was a blast!

Balloons + Kids + Dave = Fun and Laughter

'I Knew Them When: The Making of the Nicaraguan National Balloon Race Team'

If the nacatamale home delivery business doesn't work out, Dave could become a party catalyst for kids parties.

- We took our inaugural bike trip, a short ride down to Hacienda Merida and the bilingual school to catch the tail end of the Dia de los Nños (Children's Day) festivities.  This is a special day where school children are taught that they have the right to receive an education, to be respected, to be provided with health care, etc.  There were speeches made, which is why we decided to just catch the tail end of the gig.  Ha!  But we did have cake!

The kids enjoyed a piñata, then a special lunch… then they had cake!

Well, we missed the speeches on Dia de los Niños.  We didn't miss the cake.

- For our first actual ride of any distance, we met up with Christina and rode to the far end of Merida, in fact just outside of town, to have lunch at El Guanacaste Comedor.  This is a new restaurant that we've seen under construction over the last several months.  We marked the progress any time we passed by while on a chicken bus or taxi - the last time we passed, we saw they were open.

It was a good ride; the food was... okay.  Good to get out on the bike, though, and having a destination makes it easier to commit.

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.

Week of June 9:
- Bex! got sick.  Really sick.  The sudden onset and severity had us worried that it might be dengue, which would be, ya know, bad.  High fever, extremely achy, headaches.  We had to rearrange our class schedule on the fly, day by day, until she felt well enough to teach again.  I picked up some extra classes and am happy to say we only had to cancel a couple of sessions.  Given our schedule this was a pretty neat trick to pull off.  Needless to say, by the end of the week I was beat.  But Bex! felt much better and was back in the saddle in no time.

- While I was out teaching one afternoon, Bex! had a visitor in the house.  This little guy got inside and had a hard time finding his way out.  With Bex! helping, nudging and cajoling, he finally made it.  She ID'd him later as an immature (baby) woodpecker.  Note the elongated big toe, designed to hang on to the side of trees.  His head will turn red as he matures.

This is just a house.  Definitely not a birdhouse.

*****     *****     *****
There is oh so much more that's happened but I think that's good enough for Part 1!  More to come - soon!