The End

The week that I just spent in Sabana Grande showed me the three following things:

One: Being placed in Managua was the worst thing that could have happened to me on this trip, and is directly responsible for ruining the trip's incredible potential. Don't get me wrong, I don't regret coming here or anything, I just feel as if I've wasted an incredible amount of time.

Two: If I had been placed in Sabana Grande, I would be content to never leave. The village is wonderful, the landscape is breathtaking, the weather is pleasant, and the people are amazing (you can also breathe the air without feeling like you're sucking on a tailpipe).

Three: I have to come back to Nicaragua.

Just as a comparison and summation, I'd like to list the things that I've done in each respective place.

Managua:

-1 week of cutting rebar with a hacksaw

-7 weeks of sweating profusely, sitting at my computer doing nothing.

-2-3 days of work designing an air conditioning system for a building, only to find out that they didn't have the funding to do it anyway, and that the air conditioner company would have done the analysis (more accurately) for them.

-Played frizbee with Kevin, Kevin, Elias, Denis, and Jason

-had 250 dollars worth of my stuff stolen

-lived with Dona Claudia, her daughter Karelia, her mother Dona Carmen, and all the other students. This was the best part about Managua, and I really enjoyed my time in the house. It was fun to talk to some of the students, especially Edwin and Karelia, and Dona Claudia's incredible gift for gab easily tripled my Spanish comprehension abilities. The only downside was that most of the students were always busy with schoolwork or eachother, and thus we didn't make many close connections. Oh yeah, that all and the fact that Dona Claudia is a pastry chef. Mmmmmm.....

Note: While based in Managua, I did complete one week of PV system installations. These were incredibly educational, and are responsible for my seeing an enormous portion of the country. I don't count these as something that I accomplished in Managua, because I could have easily lived in Sabana Grande, and travelled to Managua in order to leave for installation purposes. In fact, we were very close to Ocotal during our week of intstallations. In fact, there are other volunteers in Sabana Grande right now who have plans to go on installations with Suni, while living in Sabana Grande. (Ocotal is 10 minutes from Sabana Grande)

In 6 days in Sabana Grande I:

-Repaired a malfunctioning wind turbine. (It later tore itself to pieces, and since there was no funding, could not be further repaired.)

-Layed the foundation for a paper recycling program. Rebecca, a business volunteer from England had the idea that instead of buying paper to label their solar roasted coffee, and other products, the village women could use their paper waste. The women liked the idea, so she came to me and asked me if I knew anything about paper recycling. I didn't, but I spent a few days playing around with a bucket, a drill, and some water, and figured it out. After making a bunch of test sheets that met standards, Rebecca and I went to a local trade school and talked to an administrator, who loved the idea and said that they would start saving all of their clean paper waste for us.

-Plowed a field by hand. This is the kind of work that everyone should be required to do for a month or two of their life. It gives you a hell of a lot of respect for the people who do it all day, every day, especially the old ladies and 8 year old children.

-Went adventuring in the woods with Donald. (Donald is one of David's host brothers, and reminds us very much of Bart Simpson)

-Played frizbee with Rebecca, Donald, Giovania, and Wendy. (Giovania and Wendy are Rebecca's 12 and 14 year old host sisters)

-Taught Luis Miguel some Taekwon-do (Luis Miguel is Donald's older brother...I think.)

-Got my butt kicked by an old lady (Susan knows Aikido)

-Played soccer with David (another volunteer from Texas) and the gang of local boys, including Donald and Luis Miguel. David and I got our butts thoroughly kicked, and marvelled at the incredible feats of athleticism that these kids displayed, either in flip-flops or bare feet on sharp quartz gravel bordered by barbed wire fences.

-Watched a baseball game between two Sabana Grande teams. This was the most entertaining baseball I've ever seen in my entire life.

-Explored a waterfall in Dipilto with a bunch of the volunteers, led by none other than the intrepid Donald himself.

-Watched the Nicaraguan police beat the heck out of a drug dealer (not in Sabana Grande, but on the road to Dipilto, many many miles away).

-Helped a group of 22 primary school teachers move into the village and settle down. Nothing like a convention comprised of 22 copies of my mother to motivate me to run off into the woods with Donald. (i love you mom)

-Played Uno with Scarlet, our 12 year old temporary host sister, who consists of laughs, cuteness and pure awesome rolled into a bundle.

-Developed a close relationship with Rocky the dog, whom I semi-purposefully whalloped across the face with my shoe (he probably has fleas, and I didnt want him jumping on me), and later fed a tortilla in apology. He then began to always sit at my side, and follow me down the street.

So anyway, I'm back here in Managua, looking at 4 more days before that big bird home, and I cant help but feel a bit disappointed with how this entire summer went. I feel like i could have accomplished so much more, learned so much more, and enjoyed myself so much more if I had lived up there.

At the same time, I'm still glad that I came, and overall I'd still say that it was a very positive experience. If nothing else, I now have a knowledge and appreciation for a part of the world that I previously knew nearly nothing about, and a desire to someday return.

Sabana Grande, Round 2

After sitting at Suni for the past 5 weeks, doing pretty much nothing, under the constant illusion that work was on the horizon, I decided that i was fed up with sitting around, wasting my time here in Nicaragua. So, after making some arrangements, Jim and I are going up to Sabana Grande next week, to help the people up there with the enormous amount of work that they have to do.

I think that we'll be working on trying to fix the broken wind turbine... which is everything that I want in life, and more. Ever since we went up there to visit and Dan explained that the turbine hadn't been working, I've been itching to get my hands on it.

I apologize to those who have been wanting me to write more, but there has literally been nothing to write about, as we have spent an enormous amount of time doing...nothing.

Current Events

Yesterday, as Jim and I sat in the kitchen at Suni, wasting time on the internet as usual, we got a text message that Erin and Maria were downstairs. We didn't know that they were coming to Managua, but it was a pleasant surprise, and they ended up spending the night at Dona Claudia's as well. After dinner we went to Las Gallerias with Erin, Maria, Heydi and Hellen, because Erin needed some things. Heydi is leaving the house today, because her term is over and she now has a month and a half vacation before the next starts up agian. This is disappointing, because she's the most talkative of the girls, and talking to her has really helped me with my comprehension skills.

Dan and Nathan arrived today, to spend their last two days in Nicaragua down here in Managua. They're ready to get back, and truthfully we're kind of jealous, simply because we're bored here at Suni due to a complete lack of work to be done. I think that we're going to be heading out in the morning to go to the Masaya Volcano, something that I've been looking forward to doing this whole time.

Earlier today, we went with Emilio and another guy to start setting up a Suni stall at this place in the city that I can only describe as something that reminds me of a flea market. Apparently, for 10 days out of the year, it fills up with vendors, and people come from all around Central America to buy things, because for these ten days, no tax is assessed on items bought there. This is a big deal, because sales tax down here is about 15%, simply because no one ever charges it, so when they do, they need to make a good bit on it for it to be effective. Preparing the stall first involved clearing a pile of rotting scrap wood, and waterlogged particle board from the area in front. We loaded it all into the truck, and then when I asked what we were going to do with all of it, the non-Emilio guy (i have to find out his name!) asked me if I had ever seen the "Basura Municipal de Managua" (Managua Municipal Dump), and when I said that I hadn't, he laughed and said, "Then you're about to!". Outside the dump is a relatively expansive slum, and that was our first stop along the way. As soon as we pulled in, the truck was spotted by a group of boys, who could not have been much older than 8. They ran and jumped onto the truck, and yelled for it to stop. We stopped, and they immediately began ransacking the pile of wood for anything that looked flammable (which was most of it) and started throwing it off into the street. Quickly they were joined by a group of men, who were more effective at removing the larger pieces. Once they had taken what they wanted, we drove onward into the dump, leaving a pile of wood in the middle of the street, quickly being divided up between the different households that were represented. Two of the boys stayed on the truck with us, and directed us through the dump to an area where we could deposit the remainder of our garbage. When we got there, the boys proceeded to offload the rest, and we payed them a few cordobas. The dump itself is composed of acres and acres of dirt mixed with compacted trash, that forms the "ground" layer, and is continuously packed down by the lines of trucks and carts eternally driving back and forth. On top of this layer is a good six foot deep layer of new garbage that stretches for acres in every direction. In this heap, thousands of people work side by side with thousands of vultures picking it clean of anything valuable. The people (often whole families, with old people, and babies) are after scrap metal, glass, plastic, and paper-recyclables. There are even some shanties built on top of the mounds...why commute to work if you could live on top of it? The vultures seek, and easily find bits of rotting meat, and dead animals. We saw two mounds, ten feet high and about 30 feet in diameter, one comprised completely of cow skulls, and another comprised of assorted bones. Both were covered in a two foot thick layer of vultures, stripping them clean. In all directions, random fires burn, probably fueled by discarded petroleum products, and methane from decomposing garbage. Needless to say, the smell here is something that I've never before experienced, and wouldn't miss too much. Interestingly enough, the rate at which trash arrived at the dump (which services the entire city of Managua, population: 1,850,000) was only a tiny fraction of what I have observed at the Montgomery County Solid Waste District, that only services a single county in southwestern Ohio (population: 559,000). I attribute this to the fact that people here literally put every single item they have to its fullest use. Every bottle, cardboard box, or piece of plastic that can be used again, is. In addition, many of poorer residents burn their trash with the wood that they use for cooking including plastic, styrofoam, and other things that really should never be incinerated.

We're not actually leaving

On second though, lets not go to the Mining Triangle... 'tis a silly place.

We're leaving

Monday afternoon, we're leaving for the Autonomic Region of the Northeast. We'll hopefully be back in two weeks, and I'll hopefully have lots of interesting things to say. Until then, here's some stuff about the weekend.

This weekend we went to Leon. The city is nicer than Granada, I think, because it’s less crowded. I don’t feel like writing much here right now, so I’m going to be brief. We met the Sabana Grande crowd, including two new volunteers, David from Texas and Jarrel (sic) from California. We went to the beach, and it was wonderful. In my limited beach experience, I have only really been to North Carolina’s Outer Banks, and New Jersey’s Cape May. Both of these locations yielded shores lined with sharp rocks, violent waves, and the coldest, most un-enjoyable waters that I’ve ever experienced. In addition, they were both a tad dirty (strewn with people’s garbage) and crowded. The beach in Leon was none of these things, and has finally shown me what a beach should be like. We accessed the beach by going through a bar situated not 50 feet from the tide line. In each direction, as far as the eye could see, the beach was lined with bars, hostels, and little bungalows with palm-thatched roofs and rows of hammocks occupied by napping patrons. The beach itself is of black sand, which extends at least 100 feet out into the surf, making the sea bed incredibly soft on the feet. On our stretch of the beach, there was an outcrop of rocks that extended a good 200 feet into the ocean, on which the incoming waves would crash and break before coming ashore. On one side, this created a calm section of beach, with little to no waves, and on the other side waves tall enough for the numerous surfers to successfully ride all the way onto the beach. The best part of all, was that the water was so warm that you didn’t even need to get used to it, and clear enough that you could see your hands a few feet beneath the surface. We spent a few hours here, attempting to body surf the larger waves, and throwing ourselves against the smaller ones. In addition, Dan and I climbed out to the edge of the rock outcrop, and watched the thousands of little rock crabs that inhabited the place dance about and get hammered by the waves. If there is any place in Nicaragua that I would be fully content to live, it would be on the coast at Leon. In fact, I can only imagine that it’s a hidden gem as far as beaches are concerned, because no-one really thinks of Nicaragua when they think of vacation spots. I’ll have to keep it in mind for the far future.

autonomic, because the government gave up on trying to control it.

Assorted

Today, we finally finished a project on which we have been working for the past two weeks. Douglass had asked if we knew how to calculate the air conditioning load for a building, and although neither of us had ever done so for an actual structure, we were dying for some work, and knew that our Thermodynamics teacher would kill both of us if we couldn't figure it out. So, being engineers, and thus loath to actually do any math by hand (and because we frankly don't know how to do any of the calculations for this by hand), we searched around on the internet until we found a few programs that looked like they might do the trick. We then went to the building, and realized that it was still only in the construction phase. When we arrived, workers were halfway done installing the corrugated tin roof, one of the new additions to the pre-existing concrete walls of the old structure. We gathered what data we could, using a pool thermometer as a thermocouple, and my notebook as a ruler. At this point, we're using an estimate that Jim came up with using a very simple program that he used to analyze the building room by room. It's incredibly simplistic, and I fear not very accurate, as it doesnt take into account weather trends, user behavioral patterns, and a million other factors. I attempted to use two different pieces of complex software that do take these things into consideration, but they were too geared toward an "American" standard of construction, requiring far too much input data that frankly, no-one has. Jim's estimate should be fine, as it is very conservative, and looks at the building in a worst case scenario. The people who are going to be using the building want to use solar absorption chillers to air condition the building. As far as I can tell, these operate on the same principle as heat pumps, or other absorption chillers except that instead of getting their thermal energy from the combustion of fossil fuels, they utilize water heated by the sun. After some research, I've found that this technology is incredibly interesting, because on principle, one of these systems could air condition a house using little to no electricity at all. Of course, there's a high startup cost.

Beyond this, Jim and I are going to meet some of the people from Sabana Grande in Leon tomorrow, and we're going to spend the day looking around the city, and then come back Sunday morning.

Next Tuesday, we are going to be shipping out on the first round of EU installations to the Northeast, which will mean that I'll be gone for about two weeks. This is kind of a daunting concept, but I'm rather excited to go get my hands on something after spending all this time at a computer. The Northeast is apparently the most rugged area of Nicaragua, and is often referred to as "The Mosquito Region". This is the area where Malaria exists, there's no Malaria in Managua or the southwest, only Dengue. I've heard some other stories, but I'm not going to say anything about that until I get back. I'd like to provide my own account of things. We may not have hotel access, so Jim and I are seriously considering purchasing a tent in the local supermarket for $30. Its either that or sleep in a sleeping bag, wrapped in a mosquito net. I'm pretty excited!

The move

On Monday of last week Jim and I moved to a different house, due to the problems we had been having with theft, and random charges that should not have been assessed to us.

Our new place is the home of Dona Claudia, and it is by our standards amazing. In the front of the house, Dona Claudia runs a Pasteleria (cake shop), and from what I have seen, her work is most impressive. In addition to cakes, she bakes all kinds of different pastries, which we have been lucky enough to have at breakfast the past few days. I told her that she has to teach me, sometime when I'm not at work, and she agreed.

We now have our own room, with a locking door, a tile floor, an air conditioning unit (which we have decided not to use, out of respect for their desire to save energy), our own separate bathroom, and permission to use our fan whenever, and for however long we like!

By far, the best part about Dona Claudia's is the fact that there, we feel welcome. Behind the cake shop, the rest of the house is partitioned into multiple rooms, which Dona Claudia runs like a boarding house for university students. Here, we are only two among around 10 other students, some of whom speak English, and almost all of whom are eager to talk to us, or at least help us by correcting our Spanish. Most of the students that we have met are girls (the guys seem to be a bit more hesitant to interact), but one hombre, Edwin, speaks nearly fluent English, is working on a degree in Civil Engineering, and has been most helpful in facilitating my practicing of the Spanish language. Yesterday, he decided that he would no longer speak English with me, unless I first attempted to say it, or understand it in Spanish. A painful idea for me, but a good one nonetheless.