Wandering Shepard: Mothers Day Weekend

After three weeks or so, I finally feel comfortable with Niquinohomo and its surroundings. Enough so that the other aspirantes and I decided to make a weekend out of these past three days. The US isn't the only country that enjoyed a three day weekend, we got one here in Nicaragua as well. And we made the best of it, exploring the social scene of the surrounding towns, as well as getting to know the locals – both the people and the nature.

Saturday kicked off with an early morning trip to nearby Masaya, one of the biggest cities in Nicaragau. Ron, Cassi, Michelle and I were on a quest to find a cheap football and basketball. And by football I mean soccer ball, try and keep up with the local terminology. We decided what better place to experience than the local market, and what an experience we got. We walked into the wrong entrance, and found ourselves in the food mercado, surround by an assortment of smells and different local produce, with people haggling left and right in rapid Spanish. Super overwhelming, and it took awhile to find our way to the artisan market where we eventually found a football. And in my broken Spanish, I even managed to talk the vendor down a couple cords. I can’t wait until my Spanish is better, and I can return and really try bargaining with local vendors. I've been jones-ing for a hammock.

As luck would have it, we ran into other small business aspirantes, also doing some exploring and shopping in Masaya that morning. Like us, it was their first time, and collectively we discovered that to get back home we had to walk to a bus station probably a mile away from where we got dropped off. That really interefered with my plans to get home to watch the Champions League Final with my family. At the last minute, another aspirante, Ben, and I decided to catch the next bus, and ended up sharing a Tona and watching the first half of the game at some random highway side bar. While I was sitting in this bamboo shack of a bar, watching the game, I started to think where I would be watching the game back in the states. It hadn’t really occurred to me until that moment I was actually living in Nicaragua. Pretty crazy, right?

We – the aspirantes in Niquinohomo - knew that the local kids would be pumped to play football after the game, so we held our second youth group meeting after the game. Creating a local youth group is goal number three of training, I’ll explain more later. But we had about ten of 19 kids show up, and we ended up playing a small sided soccer game on the local basketball court for close to 2 hours. It’s amazing how much energy these kids have, especially in the 80 degree heat (which is a cool day mind you). Great bonding experience with the kids, and we all felt we deserved a night out afterwards, and met up with everyone in small business in Masatepe later that night.

While enjoying the night, we decided that Sunday morning was the time to explore the Laguna de Apoyo, a pristine Lagoon that exists in the crater of a longtime dormant volcano. Along with a host family brother, ten or so of us made the trek down to the lagoon. This is us at the top:

After a 40 minute hike downhill, we were ready to jump into the lagoon in all of our clothes, and it took some serious restraint. It’s been about a month since I last went swimming and I’ve had the itch to jump in a body of water since leaving Frisco. Could you resist this on a hot day?

The water felt fantastically cool, especially once you dove down. And it got deep quick. In a tribute to bringing the lane lines out at ECBC, I grabbed a heavy rock and just started walking along the bottom. After 10 steps I was probably 10 feet deep. After 15 steps, maybe 20. I used this time as an excuse to test out my new camera, and it works. Hello everyone!

When I returned up for air, I found most people hanging out in the shallows, soaking in the sun and working on their beach bods.

Despite being in the sun all day, we’re forced to wear pants and long sleeves, which really prevents us from getting the tan we’re all looking for. The only damper on the day was our return trip up, which ended up taking close to an hour and a half, and despite being in semi jungle, there was surprisingly little shade, so we took advantage of it when we could. Some of the aspirantes were really hurting.

And today was el Dia de las Madres in Nicaragua, a national holiday that all schools and most business take off. Mothers day is important back in the states, but it is a huge deal here in Nica, and from lunch on was a celebration with the family, celebrating all the mothers, and enjoying a beer or two here and there. I took the occasion to snap a photo of the fam and I: