Semana Santa

This past week was Semana Santa, or Easter Week, here in Nicaragua. Instead of just celebrating one day, we make a week out of it. I had the entire week off from school so I decided to celebrate like 99% of Nicaraguans and go to the beach (or in my case, the riverside). My site has dozens of rivers and I was lucky enough to visit a different one everyday with some of my local Nica friends. I posted some pictures on my photo site so if you’d like to see them, let me know. Overall it was a fun and relaxing week, and I’m glad I got to see more of my site! It’s really quite beautiful the amount of nature we have left here. You can see in some of my pictures on the drive up to one of the rivers (Agua Fria) we saw some monkeys in the trees and were surrounded by shade-grown coffee farms. Unfortunately this area, like many others, is threatened by deforestation and my town is already starting to face water shortages as a result.

I’m hoping in the next couple of months to start making some tree nurseries in the schools (once the rainy season starts) so that in a few months we can plant the trees. My eco-youth group is also really adamant about planting trees so reforestation will be one of our main activities. Also, this month is “health month” in the schools so we are learning about the importance of gardens and will be starting one in each of the schools next month. Each of the schools has a compost in process so hopefully it will be ready for use in the garden. I’m looking forward to doing the gardens in the 2 rural multi-grade schools, but the urban school will be a bit of a challenge because the kids haven’t grown up in an agricultural environment and are showing less interest. We will see how it works out! In the meantime, I’m practicing making a garden in my yard, so hopefully I will have some lovely produce in a couple of months!

In the meantime, I’ve been getting up bright and early three times a week for my 5:30 AM soccer practices with my new women’s soccer team (if I didn’t enjoy coaching and soccer so much, you couldn’t pay me to get up this early)! I’d like to take all the credit for forming and starting the team, but really most of the work can be accredited to the Soccer Federation here in my town. The team is made up of students from one of the high schools, and eventually we’re hoping to have a women’s league with all of the high schools involved. Practices have been a challenge because we have minimal resources (few soccer balls, no cones, no pinnies, etc.), but even though many of the girls haven’t played before, they have a good attitude and there’s definite potential for improvement. In the meantime, I’m trying to coordinate with volunteers in neighboring towns to hopefully have some competition with teams from other towns (once they’re formed). I’m enjoying coaching (with the help of another coach who basically coaches all of the teams) and playing again. I’ve been dying to get out and compete myself and it looks like the Men’s Over 30 league that’s going to start up again 2 nights a week in the park may make an exception for a 23 yr old gringa ;). So I’m hoping that works out!

That’s about all that’s been new. Next week I will be spending a few days at a Nature Reserve in Matagalpa for In-Service Training with my fellow group of environmental ed. volunteers that came in September. I also may take a weekend trip to my training town in a couple of weeks to spend time with my host family and friends from training, as well as some fellow volunteers. I am enjoying all that my site has to offer, but it’s also nice to get out every once and a while and visit other parts of Nicaragua, as well as old friends.

Keep the mail, emails, and blog comments coming! I appreciate every little bit of correspondence I receive from anyone, because as much as I’m enjoying my time here, I do continue to miss you all! Looking forward to my 2-week visit home the end of June/beginning of July, but in the meantime, keep in touch and keep reading!