#19 Now with pics :)

*** Several people have been very generous and sent math material for my brother! No more are needed right now, please hold on to your philanthropy as I'm sure I'll have more requests in the future ; )   (When they arrive, I'll be sure to give some shout outs)***

The weeks are speeding up now. I just took my fourth dose of malaria medicine on Friday, meaning we have finished 3 weeks in Nicaragua. I’ve had another busy, interesting, eventful, and (of course) hot week here in little San Juan de Oriente.

Last Sunday, I think around 10 or so of us were told about a path to the lake in my town (you can see it in the background of the group shot in a prior post). We were told it was a lengthy steep downhill hike, but were still surprised when we arrived at the lake about an hour later with tired ankles. Besides two Nica’s, we had the whole lake to ourselves, which made the natural beauty that much better. After our hike I was looking forward to that refreshing water, but the water, like Nicaragua, was predictably warm. We played around for two hours or so before heading back to town. A sweaty hour later we were back in my little town and burnt red from the sun. We all immediately bought some Gatorade and ice cream, chilled for a minute and went our own ways. Check out some photogs 

 Mother’s Day was on Monday the 30^th (I think my host dad said a week ago that May 30^th is his birthday… oops i forgot…), and Nicaragua goes big for their mothers. On Sunday afternoon, after the field trip to the lake, my mom took me to a Mother’s Day presentation thing in a corner of my town that I didn’t know existed. I usually say okay to things I don’t really understand when my parents invite me places and this was no different. When we got there, I walked into a seated crowd of about 400 women all staring at yours truly. Get jealous. The show included some traditional Nica dancing with extravagant dresses, a biblical story involving a baby being born without arms or legs (or something… I started laughing because I thought it was a joke but my mom nudged me saying nuh uh), a poem about the moms, and obviously some singing.
Since they were all staring at me when I walked in, I took a photo of them as I left:

I’m asleep, it’s 3:15 AM when the neighbors feel it’s a good time to play some music. We are talking a full blown live band – horns, guitar, drums, vocals – at full volume lasting until 4:45 AM. This is not unusual. Cars drive around with full PA systems tied to their roofs. Nicaragua is loud. Often.

Monday was the actual Dia de Las Madres and we didn’t have class because of it. In the morning I accompanied my mom to the elementary school where one of my brothers had to sing with his class to all the moms of the town. Each grade did their own thing and the moms were so proud of their little chicos. Mateo, Jake and I did some last minute gift shopping and went to the neighboring town and bought flowers for our moms. Our gifts were greatly appreciated, but we had no time to rest because we had to change and meet up with a professor to do some lesson planning for the classes that we are going to be teaching this coming week.

We spent a few hours with Professor Gerardo at both Mateo’s and Gerardo’s house talking about the entrepreneurship course that we’d be teaching.   [Quick insert: this course was started by the Peace Corps 10 years ago to teach business practices and have students ultimately compete their business plans in a national competition, and the course has recently become part of the national curriculum for all juniors and seniors in Nicaragua. One of our jobs here is to train the teachers to excel at teaching the course.]   We had a little difficulty with the Spanish, but it worked out and the teacher was excited to receive the material and seems to be looking forward to starting the course. We meet again on the 5^th to write our lesson plans down do real work.

Lastly, Monday evening, I attended my first church service here in Nicaragua. A few highlights:

• All the brothers, sisters, and children were called to the front and when I stayed in my seat the guy on the mic made sure to say Zac, Zac come to the front.
• Everyone started hugging the moms, I joined hugging all these strangers I’d never seen before, I realized they were hugging their close family not just everyone, I walked to my mom gave her a hug and my cousin laughed at me.
• The Pastor spoke with me for a solid 25 minutes about life in Nicaragua, tried to explain Zacaria’s character from the bible, told me about the American missionaries who paid for the construction of the church, etc…

The service was a little softer than I was expecting, especially hearing how fierce the other churches are when walking around the town. I may go again. Maybe I’ll come back a religious nut… haha no.

Not bad for two days.