The Forgotten Ones

This week I volunteered in 'la casa de los ancianos' (an old folks home). Although I thought it would be an interesting place to see in a third world country, I was pretty sure it wasn´t going to be a very happy experience. I remember walking through the halls of the nursing home when my grandpa was there and my eyes were usually filled with tears before I made it past only a few rooms. This experience in Ocotal was no different.

We started the morning with a tour of the facilities. We saw the rooms where the residents live. It seems as if there are generally three residents to a room, although we saw rooms with up to six beds. Some of the rooms don´t have any windows. I have complained to other students about the slanty matress in my bedroom here, but my matress was nothing compared to the lumpy, super-thin matresses the residents sleep on.

Unlike nursing homes in the United States where it seems common to see residents attached to some sort of machinery helping to keep them alive, in this nursing home in Nicaragua, I´m pretty sure if you can´t function on your own, you will probably die. I suppose they might try to send you off in an ambulance before that happens, but everyone in this nursing home, no matter their condition, was able to walk themselves (with support from a staff member, cane or walker) to and from the recreation center where they spend their days.

Don´t let the name 'recreation center' fool you. I did not see any recreation going on. Although the residents indicated that occasionally they have visitors who come and play the guitar or paint with them. Generally, however, the visitors are international volunteers who come and talk with the residents. The levels of Spanish of the volunteers varied, some were native speakers as Spain has some sort of internship program that sends nurses out for a month or so at a time, most, however, seemed to fall into the intermediate-ish level like myself.

Some of the residents (those who are able) make intense efforts to fill the empty days with any activity possible. Generally this wasn't much. One grey haired and bearded gentleman always sporting a cowboy hat and Malcolm X glasses (apparently the womanizer of the group), wound and ripped strips of gauze all day long. My understanding is that he was making pillows from these strips. A few residents had personal radios, reminiscent of what they must have looked like in the 1960's, but batteries were in short supply, so I'm not sure how frequently these were actually used. The majority of residents, however, spent most of the day sitting in chairs, alternating between sleeping and staring into space.

Our program intended us to arrive at 8 am and leave at noon in time for lunch and afternoon Spanish class. The other volunteers and I (most did not choose the old person home to volunteer) struggled with our lack of desire to be there the entire time or to be there at all. While I supposed this comes off selfish, it was partially due to how difficult it was to fill four hours conversing in a language of which you don't have a command. Some of the the residents spoke very articulately and well, while others, having no teeth and not much education, understood us about as much as we understood them, so pretty much not at all.

Even with our reluctance to be there, we could not help but see the effects of our presence on the residents. Who has a heart so cold that could not be brought to tears by the toothless woman dressed in our Goodwill-rejects whose face lit up when you called out, 'Buenos dias, Maria!' Their immediate instinct when we arrived and made our rounds was to reach out and grab our hands. Touch, or, perhaps more specifically, love was in short supply there. Not that I thought the staff did a bad job, I have seen worse in terms of caring in the USA, but there cannot be a replacement here for what they had with their families.

Each resident had a story about how they ended up in la casa de los ancianos. Each story was sad, of course. And it made me quite aware of how alone the last part of life may be. Some residents have families (still alive), some don't. Some were from Ocotal, but most were from other parts of Nicaragua. One story was more difficult to hear than the rest, I suppose because her story didn't sound much different than one we might tell.

I will try to be brief with the story...

Her name was Rosa and we heard of her immediately as 'the one who spoke English.' English, she spoke well, but we generally spoke in Spanish as she had been a former Spanish teacher. Rosa had taught Spanish to foreigners in both Panama and Costa Rica. She had a husband and a son, both of whom had died years ago. Rosa had lived with family members up until a few years ago when as a result of her cataracts, which had made her blind, she caused a fire in the kitchen as she attempted to cook for herself while home alone. She was then sent to la casa de los ancianos in Ocotal which is far from where her family lives. I don't believe Rosa has had any visitors (family members) since she arrived. Each day she makes her way down to the same table bringing with her all her valuables (which can be carried in two small bags). She does some sort of sewing, I don't remember exactly what, and she waits for visitors. So do they all.

As we left each visit, the residents would grab our hands once again and ask when we were coming back. As I am now finally finishing this post many months after it actually happened, it has been a long time since I told them I'm not coming back.

Before I left I passed out toothbrushes, shampoo, soap, anything that I thought would make their life a little bit more pleasant. But perhaps it was also out of guilt that I too would forget them, or maybe not that, but that I should or could do more. You cannot forget. How could you?

The Chicken Bus

I began the long journey back from Granada today at 9 am. I first stopped in Masaya and attempted to look for the famous market. My frustration level was apparently high early on because rain and muddy streets sent me back to the road I'd gotten dropped off on after only about 15 minutes of searching.

I caught another microbus (minivan) and was squashed into the area behind the front seat. At one point we must have had 30 people in that microbus. They must do alright...

I arrived in Managua around 1040 am and having just missed the morning bus to Ocotal (the next bus didn´t leave until 230 pm) I decided to get on a bus to Esteli and take another bus from there. All buses to Ocotal stop in Esteli so I assumed I would have no problem catching another 'expreso' bus which is a fairly comfortable grayhound (older, of course) like bus.

I arrived in Esteli by 115 pm and decided to check out the place recommended by Lonley Planet for their awesome sandwiches cubano style. It took 30 minutes to walk to the restaurant from the bus station, and so I was happy to sit down with a cafe con leche and water while waiting for my sandwich. The restaurant, while good, is unfortunately not very speedy. 35 minutes later I was still waiting for my sandwich and decided to ask for it to go so that I could catch the 230 bus back to Ocotal.

As I just made it to the bus station by catching a taxi for 60 cents, I boarded the chicken bus. As you can see from the picture it is an old US school bus. They have added storage above the seats for bags in the school bus, making it a bit more practical for travelling longer distances. Accordingly to Lonley Planet, the journey should have been 1.5 hours. The actual journey was 2.25 hours. Unlike expreso buses, Chicken Buses stop by every person they see on the road just in case they might happen to want a ride. In Nicaragua a lot of people are walking places so that´s a lot of stopping. Also unlike expreso buses, Chicken Buses give you tour of the town, even the tiny towns, going through, stopping at parque central and various other locations before heading back to the main highway. The only good thing about the Chicken Bus was that we missed the area where they are striking and so I didn´t have to cross the strike line and change buses. However, I will avoid taking the chicken bus again if at all possible.

Hostal in Granada (Nicaragua)

This weekend I am in Granada which is about 6 hours by bus, taxi and microbus from Ocotal. I met up with Jenny, who is a friend of a friend who lives in Portland. I´m staying in hostal Oasis (recommended by Lonely Planet). It is a pleasant hostel with a pool which helps here since it´s freaking hot, the kind of hot where you sweat sitting down eating breakfast. However, I´m not so keen on the hostel scene. Maybe it´s been too long since I´ve been away or maybe I never paid attention, but it seems as if hostels are the new bar scene. Generally, I've always thought of hostels as a good way to meet people to hang out with. But at this particular hostel everyone checks you out as you walk down the hall. Well, not everyone. Not the couple sleeping in the dorm bunk below me. I don't understand this really. Have they paid for two dorm beds and only chose to sleep in one? Why not splurge the extra dollar and get a hotel room with a double bed since they are ridiculously cheap here in Nicaragua? Or is it actually allowed to pay for a single bunk bed in a dormitory? I guess I can´t complain since they only 'slept' and I´ve heard worse stories about bunk beds in hostels. Besides that, if it weren´t for the girl in the couple, I would be the only girl in the dorm. Maybe they put us in the man dorm. Oh well. We´re only sleeping anyway and it´s only $8 per night for a pool and free internet.

Volunteering in Ocotal

As part of our program, everyone has to choose somewhere to volunteer. I chose to volunteer in

a school is about 10 minutes walk from my house that is for students/children from the age of 14 months to 6th grade. It is a private school and costs $ 30 per month. It is intended for children of poor parents which is interesting because $30 is a lot of money to a Nicaraguan. Many of the parents are actually single mothers. According to the pregnant kindergarten teacher with whom I was talking, it is common in Nicaragua for men to leave their wife to ´busca una otra´ (to look for another). Many of the single mothers are not able to pay each month, but this is the only school in Ocotal where school goes until 5 pm. The others finish at 2pm. Back to the idea that $30 is a lot, I was told that farm workers make 4 cordobas per day (that´s like 30 cents per day). I have no idea what these single mothers make but they are probably cleaning houses, ironing clothes, or selling food, I don´t know. So honestly, I´m not sure how any of the families can afford to pay the full amount.

The first day of volunteering I was in the 1st grade classroom. It was apparently the last day of school for the older students (1st -6th grade) and chaos reigned in that classroom. I´m not sure it´s any different any other day though. As soon as I walked in the tin roofed classroom without a door, 10 of the 32 1st graders stampeded me, hanging around my neck and arms. I wasn´t really introduced or told what to do, but after I told every student my name, I attempted to help with whatever activity the teacher struggled to implement. There aren´t textbooks, only a really old blackboard and students have notebooks in which they write words listed on the board and then make sentences with. As I tried to help students, it was pretty clear a couple can´t read. Besides, they were more interested in asking me questions. I´d been warned by another volunteer with decent Spanish, but I was surprised that I pretty much couldn´t understand the kids unless they were asking me questions like ´How do you say_______(generally, their first name) in English´ or ´where do you live.´ After a while I managed to make them understand that I was still learning S panish. AS I watched this sink in, one of them commented, 'oh, that´s why you don´t always undertand !´ Bingo, Ana.

The second day of volunteering I was with the kindergarteners. In theory this should be a great place for a S panish learner to be. Unfortunately, kindergarten in this school is not the language rich environment our kindergartens in the U S tend to be. Paper is kept under lock and key. Some students have their own notebooks, some don´t. Same with pencils or anything to color with. There aren´t any toys in the classrooms, and they have some wobbly desks and wooden chairs that they bring out when the students are working on something. Generally, there are 42 students in this kindergarten class and two teachers. The classroom is very large, except it is divided in half with a tall cubby hole type thing and a younger group of students meets in the other half of the classroom. You can imagine the noise level of 60 some 3-5 year olds in one large classroom divided only by a bookcase. There is not a lot of teaching that goes on. When the teachers wanted the students to color, they (the teachers) first drew a picture of a teddy bear on individual sheets of paper and then handed them out to students. The time snailed by as another volunteer and I spent most of the time discussing the school. We weren´t really sure what we should be doing, and with the noise levels, we couldn´t really understand the students anyway. It was all a bit depressing and left us wondering if there is anything we can do to help.

Next week there is no school so I´m not sure where I will be volunteering.

Mom, please send toilet paper.

Greetings from Nicaragua.
This is not a vacation for the pampered.
It is definitely a place to get you out of your comfort zone. Of all the places I have visited, life here is completely different than life in the United States.

Let's start with the bathroom. Keep in mind that what I'm describing is pretty much the same as what all other students are experiencing. There is nothing exceptional about where I´m living. So the bathroom is semi-outdoors with a tin roof overhead. The toilet has no seat. Like Mexico and Guatemala, you must throw your toilet paper in a garbage can alongside. Unlike Mexico and Guatemala, to flush the toilet you pick up a rather large bucket of water and dump it from a rather high distance. Surprisingly, this works. Although I'm not thrilled about not having a toilet seat.

As for toilet paper, the guidebooks were right when they suggested bringing your own. My house has its own roll, but school and just about everywhere else goes without. Apparently people use newspapers or just about anything as a replacement. Luckily from day one I'd been carrying wet naps and now have bought my own roll which I will carry everywhere.

The shower was an even bigger surprise than the toilet. During the rainy season (which is now) most of the houses in Ocotal (the city where I am living) have problems with running water. Houses on the outskirts of town (that's me) have problems all the time. This is what showering now means to me for the next three weeks: I enter the stone or brick shower the top of which is open to the outdoors. On the cement floor there is a large bucket (larger than the one used for flushing the toilet). On day 1 I was given a bowl about the size of a dog food dish and was told (in Spanish) that the water only comes once in a while. Not sure that I understood, I walked into the shower and discovered the bucket and deduced what I was supposed to be doing. Needless to say I did not wash my hair that day. Today was the first day I attempted to actually wash my hair. I succeeded, but I have to say that it is not the most pleasant experience. I only have two and a half more weeks left of showering with a bucket and dish. I think this is the best way to approach the situation--wash my hair first, pouring water over my head only, and then wash the rest after my hair is finished. The mornings in Ocotal are actually a bit cool and so showering is as well.

While I'm sure what I'm describing doesn´t sound like much fun, I'm having a good time here. I am more immersed in Spanish here (by necessity) than I have been at any other location. There are approximately 10 students at my school, and I have seen only one hippie looking foreigner out on the streets.

Now I'm getting hungry for some beans and rice, so I'm going to end the post. I will write more soon and someday, probably when I am back in the United States, I will add pictures.