#32 Swearing-In Weekend

The weekend of swearing in was very interesting and eventful including lots of press coverage, pool parties, discoteca dancing, and even a meeting televised live with The President of Nicaragua.. We had finished three intensive months of learning a new language, adapting to a new culture, and becoming close with both other volunteers and the families with whom we were living. Finally after this weekend we would have no more all day classes and lessons followed by evening activities to complete projects and presentations.

 We had the first event at the Holiday Inn in the capital city, Managua. There, our Nica families and loads of Peace Corps staff came to celebrate our swearing in, the 50^th anniversary of the Peace Corps, and the 30^th anniversary of the Peace Corps in Nicaragua. [Not related: I find the whole “30^th/50^th anniversary” ridiculous as completely arbitrary numbers are a cause for celebration while no one cares for, say, the 38^th year… I just don’t understand some things.] After awards were given to the families for hosting us, we were sworn in swearing to defend the US against all enemies foreign and domestic, given pins, and ta da we could move on to the next step.

This event had dozens of reporters and cameramen present because it was all those arbitrary anniversaries and there were some important people in the room like heads of international affairs and ambassadors and whatnot… After our turn, people were given awards based on years of service or other special people in the audience. One woman in the audience was a volunteer in the first Peace Corps group in Nicaragua and my host mom shared a cool little story with me about her. Apparently when my host mom was a child this volunteer was in her town and taught someone in the town to make soymilk. Now, years later, my mom and the whole community now know how to make soy milk and understand the nutritional benefits of soy.

Good ole' Elba and Louis

We spent the afternoon in our Country Director’s home celebrating our swearing in with various staff from the Peace Corps and eating some tasty food sans rice and beans for once. Evening came, and we boarded the busses for our meeting with President Daniel Ortega. None of us really knew what to expect and were all very excited because he’d never had a meeting with the Peace Corps before and the US and Nicaragua have a very turbulent history including a war within the lifetime of most adults in Nicaragua. We arrived at a government building and were told to leave our cameras in the bus and proceeded to enter the building. We walked right into the meeting room to meet with President Ortega. I distinctly remember how bogus it was not walking through metal detectors, emptying pockets, or nearly and level of security you’d expect to have prior to meeting the most powerful man of one’s nation.

We walked in to this meeting room, tables formed in a rectangle with the short ends  occupied by youth supporters all sporting the same political t-shirts. We sit, wait about 20 minutes in this absolutely freezing cold room with four massive cameras ready to air our meeting live on television for the whole country to see. President Ortega walks in and does a lap around the room shaking everyone’s’ hands. When I had told my parents that we were scheduled to meet the President, the first thing my father (a collector of autographed baseballs, a serious collector) asked me was to ask the President to sign a baseball for him.

Well, I had a baseball in my pocket at this point shuffling through my fingers, debating in my mind whether or not to go through with it. He comes closer, I take it out, whisper to those around me “Do I do it? Do I do it?” Replies, “no Zac don’t it” “put it away” and then I got the go ahead from one volunteer (usually all I need to try just about anything) and it was game on. Mr. President comes around to shake my hand, I bust out the baseball and pen for his signature, ask him in shaky Spanish if he’d gift me his signature, and without hesitation he took the ball and signed “Daniel” onto it. He asked me what my favorite baseball team was and I remember having to ask him to repeat it 2 maybe 3 times because I wasn’t ready to be fielding questions from the President, slightly nervous, and the whole Spanish language thing on top of everything. Unfortunately afterwards, his autograph got slightly smudged during transport, but it’s the thought that counts. You can still see it pretty clearly (I'll post a photo when I get the ball back from safe keeping in the PC office).

The President, his wife, and daughter took a seat in the center seats and the meeting began. After welcoming everyone, he took out papers, looked them over and went down the list of names in the room from the papers. It started very normal, saying hello to the higher ups in the room - the ambassador, PC country director, 2^nd in line in PC Nica, etc… After the higher ups had their diplomatic and politically correct answers and conversations, he then continued down the list to the PC staff asking what sector they worked in and general info about them, asking one Environmental woman what was the biggest problem with Nicaragua and her very safe reply of trash. I was just so glad he didn’t ask me that question as I’m sure I would have said something stupid and offensive. Sometimes it pays always being at the end of any list of names (Zac Wessler). Then President Ortega began down the list of newly sworn in volunteers, completely shocking us because we were not expecting anything of the sort and also because there were roughly 45 volunteers that he would be going through.

Mmmmm Cake

The questions were more or less the same per person with anecdotes or tangents whenever he wished – Where are you from? Where are you going to be working in Nicaragua? What sector are you working in? How long will you be here for? What kind of previous experience do you have/Where did you work prior? Some interviews went better than others as the language levels within the 45 of us fluctuated drastically. My conversation went smooth, saying thank you for the signature, saying I was from Connecticut (another volunteer before me from CT as well had to repeat himself and say CO-NNECT-I-CUT several times before me, so when I said Connecticut there was a little chuckle), telling him I’ll be moving to the Island, him saying that climbing the volcanoes is dangerous and a little tangent, and telling him where I worked prior. All in all not bad.

Translated Article about the Meeting

Translated Article about the Meeting 2

Three hours later, bathroom starved, hungry, and somewhat high from that exciting meeting, we went back to the hotel and fiesta’ed. Pool parties and going to an outdoor discoteca for the night ended with laughing, dancing, and all sorts of fun.

#31 Quick little stories

We had our final language exams one week before swearing in and I walked out thinking I botched it, but low and behold I passed at the required level needed for swearing in. All of us in the lower language groups made it through and didn’t need to stay back for an extra week of classes. Woo hoo, this means I can speak Spanish everyone. That is cool. I like that.

My wisdom teeth that I’ve had since I was 13 started hurting the other day and after speaking with a dentist, it looks like I’ll be getting them pulled on Monday the 8th. Never had surgery in a developing nation before, this should be interesting…

You can buy any movie you want off the streets or in the markets for very, very cheap. I bought Transformers 3 and a 3-movie disk of the all the Matrix’s for the grand price of $1. All DVD quality. When you come visit, bring a few dollars and you can return with an entire new library of movies.

My last night with my training town family was wonderful. I was able to have a great connection with them and I truly see them as a second family. We exchanged gratitude over dinner and I learned much of what an impact I had on the family and them on me. I believe I left a strong impression on the importance of education and enforcing discipline on the children and even in the manner they run their business (recording sales, expenditures, etc…).

The next morning (Friday July, 29th), the four of us trainees had an interesting adventure making our way to the capital city with our huge bags. The first van we tried didn’t make it out of our training town, breaking down every 20 yards and having to siphon gas from the red gas tank sitting in the back seat of the van in order to keep the car from stalling. Once that didn’t work, my dad called up a friend with a big pick-up truck and loaded it up with our belongings. Halfway to the US embassy where we had a meeting with the ambassador, the truck overheated and we had to pull into a garage to do some quick repairs. No worries though, we got to the embassy only an hour and a half late, but in time for the meeting with the ambassador and the special coconut bread, sweet breads, and home made jam brought in from the Caribbean coast for our enjoyment.

On Friday night, we checked into a nice hotel near the Peace Corps office in Managua and were able to take our first warm shower, have pool parties, and even access the wifi from our big comfortable beds. After 3 months of cold bucket baths and sleeping in a mosquito net to avoid the occasional cockroaches and rats, this was luxury in the purest form.

That Saturday would include our swearing in ceremony celebrating us as new volunteers, 30 year anniversary of the Peace Corps in Nicaragua, and the 50^th anniversary since the start of the Peace Corps by JFK in the 60s, lunch at the PC Country Director’s home, and lastly a 3 hour meeting live on television with the President of Nicaragua. Very detailed blog post in the works.

#30 Finally Some Free Time

It’s been a while since I’ve had the chance to sit down and write a few blog posts. The last few weeks of training were packed with literally non-stop activities, classes, trips and assignments permitting me no time to chill out or write a few paragraphs. It is three weeks later and I am finally a sworn in Peace Corps Volunteer living at my new site on the beautiful volcanic island of Ometepe.

One of the things I am proud of accomplishing during training is our time spent with our youth group. Every week for the past 2 months or so we have spent at least 2 hours every Tuesday and Thursday with a group of five 14-19 year olds working with them to create, market, sell, and participate in a competition for the best overall ‘effort.’

Our product – an artistic ceramic piece, with a story and a working whistle etched into the product – didn’t come to fruition until the last two weeks, and it wasn’t until the very last week that I realized the impact we had on the five people in our group. In my training town were four trainees and together we gave classes/lectures to our youth group on goals, leadership, analyzing markets, marketing strategies, presentation skills, decision-making, working in teams, and thinking about their future.
During the final week, youth groups from each training group in the business sector and agriculture sector competed in a product fair to see who had the best product, presentation, and reflection on what they learned in the past few months. The competition was located in nice location about 45 minutes from the closest training town and for many of the students it was their first times being that far from home. During the drive, many students were taking pictures on their phones of the Nicaraguan landscape and their energy was practically tangible. The competition lasted for the morning hours until after lunch on a Friday, allowing the students to be excused from school for the whole day.

While our group undoubtedly had the top product, we did not place in the competition. It was a combination of being out-done presentation wise and the fact that you can’t eat a piece of art that lost it to the judges. Our group was still ecstatic to have competed and participated in the whole project and really proved it to us later in the week.

A few days after the competition, we took our youth group out to an expensive dinner at a touristy look out point near our training town. We reflected on the past few weeks and casually discussed each other’s lives over dinner. Following dinner, our youth group brought us back to one of their homes (also a ceramic workshop and showroom) and gave us the four ceramic pieces we worked with them to produce. They explained how grateful they were to have worked with us and how much they learned during our meetings. We exchanged contact info explaining that if the 5 of them were to need anything (letters of recommendation, advice, or just want to chat), they should feel free to contact us. We walked the other group members back to their house where they gave us hand crafted whistles as gifts.