Simon and Rach in Latin America

Mexico City

2010-03-05T14:51:00.000-08:00

We were pleased to find a flight home via Mexico, rather than the more usual stopover in the US. It is one of Rachel's favourite countries, having studied here in 2001 and returned since, and nice to be there together and for Simon to get a feel for it. It was a gloriously sunny day and only slightly smoggy, which meant fantastic views of the enormous sprawling city and surrounding mountains as we came in to land.

It's hard to get your head round the scale of one of the world's biggest cities. We had a wonderful time exploring the centre for a few hours before our flight home.

Every other car isn't a Beetle any more as it used to be, they've stopped making them and there's been an influx of Chinese and Korean cars. It's still easy to spot the classic adopted Mexican vehicle though.

We headed for the Zocalo, the enormous central square, which was dominated by a temporary exhibition, due to open the next day.

The cathedral is a whopper by any standards.

The Museo de Bellas Artes

Our final joint photo in Latin America

There is still a ramshackle charm to the central back streets. Mexico City first appears to be a very modern and clean city, easy to travel around by metro. It's got beautiful, historic buildings and shiny modern tower blocks, but the great thing is, you're only ever two corners from a real sense of a vibrant Latin America, such as this back street flea market.

Mexican food

2010-03-04T14:26:00.000-08:00

We were only in Mexico City for the day on our way back to the UK but we managed to pack in a few tasty treats.First up was a small, friendly cafe with good coffee, pastry and juice. We wandered on and stopped at one of the many juice bars, Mexican style, where Rachel reminisced and Simon had his first try of a delicious, cool and refreshing horchata, a rice based drink with cinnamon, lime juice and sugar.We couldn't visit Mexico without stopping at a street cafe for fiery tacos. You could order all sorts of cuts of meat, tripe featuring heavily. We opted for a straightforward pork. What makes them is the guacamole, chile and freshly squeezed lime. It didn't take too much searching to find a charming and very cheap local lunch establishment where we enjoyed several courses and refreshing lime juice served by a lovely, old waiter. It felt as though this place hadn't changed much in the last thirty years.We enjoyed soup to start, accompanied as always in Mexico with chile, lime and fresh tortillas.Next up was a plate of salad.
We were starting to flag under the quantity of food by the time we got to the third course, fish in a tomato sauce for Rachel. However, it was very nice so we happily stuffed ourselves before our long flight home. It was the perfect food end to our Latin American adventures.

Goodbye Nicaraguan Friends, Hasta La Proxima

2010-03-01T13:24:00.000-08:00

After eight busy months living, working and travelling in what became 'Nuestra Querida Nicaragua' it was time to head home and have our baby but with high hopes of return visits in the years to come.
We left South America with a photo from every country we visited but we leave Nicaragua with images of some of the lovely people we have been lucky enough to spend time with, who have inspired us, and who we consider our friends.Our favourite place to stay in Esteli, with lovely friends and fantastic hosts Pancho and Elena and family.

Marlon, Myra, Marciel and Marlon Mauricio in Sontule.
Una de las clases de ingles de Sontule
El grupo de mujeres de Xilonem, Sontule
Jackson, Sontule
Indira, Minor and Ivancito, coffee picking in Sontule
Roger
Raquel de los Estados con Raquel la inglesa
Brigido
Melana
Ivan y Danelia
Our Nicaraguan family, la familia Villareyna
Nelson and his family
Nick with Marti
Adilia y Reyno
Brenda y Candida at Hostal Tomabu
Luis y Erme
Sobeyda, Bryan y Fabricio
Michael y Noemi
17 de julio. Celebrating 30 years of Sandinismo. Viva Sandino! Viva la Revolucion!
El Lagartillo. Jerry y Jose Angel, Lizbeth y Erme.
The fantastic view near to El Lagartillo
Maribel y Ricardo, Tina and Nick
Our trip to Honduras to the solidarity concert in Tegucigalpa
Lesbia, Fran, Bryan, Juan David y Ana Sofia
The class of six, seven and eight year olds in Sontule that Simon taught and Chucky the dog
The wonderful family Villareyna, Dona Lucia, Don Rogelio, Marlon y Rogelito.

We found Nicaraguans to be welcoming, generous, fun and humble. Their quality of life despite how few material possessions and wealth they have compared to us is inspiring. The hospitality we received is something we will aim to emulate and their pragmatic approach to life we hope to remember and influence us in the way we live our lives.

The caves of Sontule

2010-03-01T09:04:00.000-08:00

We had heard tell of some caves in Sontule but had never visited them, so off we went. Jackson was our guide and Marlon Mauricio and Valeska came along too for the two hour trip uphill and down again. The caves were used many hundreds of years ago for storage by the indigenous people who inhabited these parts before the Spanish saw them off. Lots of artefacts have been found here, mainly bits of ceramic and flint spear and arrow heads, but its all been removed now and taken away by anyone who fancied it. The trip was a success; we enjoyed it, the kids enjoyed it and Jackson was pleased with the responsibility of guiding us. The only negative was the dozen or so tiny ticks I picked up somewhere and found stuck to the top of my arm and my armpit. They are too small to photograph, but we have both had to remove them now, which is easy once you’ve located them, and can both testify to their itchy nature.

Orlando's land

2010-02-28T09:47:00.000-08:00

Clem, Orlando and Simon holding a coconut, plantain and nothing, respectively.
We had a lovely morning out on a windswept, drizzly but still sweaty day, travelling in a dug-out canoe with Orlando and his son Clem, to their land near to Pearl Lagoon. Orlando is the community guide in the Misquito village of Awas. The windy weather meant that we could use a black, bin-bag material, sail to bob across the lake. From the shore, it was a good half hour hike to Orlando's patch of land. Here he grows yucca, which is the main carbohydrate in their diet, and accompanies fish stews.Orlando harvesting yucca, a root vegetable, also known to us as cassava It's easy to farm. Once the roots have been harvested, a section of the stem is cut off clean and re-planted straight in the ground. It soon takes root, and in another few months, the yucca is ready, and the process can begin again.

Orlando's little hut for relaxing in and cooking lunch, looking a bit worse for wear following Hurricane Ida last November.

Clem with a wild banana plant. The fruit is inedible but the flowers are very pretty.

Orlando visits the land most days, after fishing. In addition to yucca, coconut and plantain, he also has sugar cane, pineapple, tropical apples, a local fruit (called bread fruit eaten fried with meals. Sadly we didn't get to sample this), bananas and something he called a pear, though we don't think it would have looked like the pears we know. During our trip, he kept our energy levels up with coconut water fresh from the palm, tropical apples and sugar cane to suck on. He was a great guy working hard to bring a little extra money into the community through tourism.

Distinctly different Caribbean communities

2010-02-28T08:59:00.000-08:00

Travelling from one community to another around the Caribbean coast, we were amazed by the differences between them. We began in Bluefields, a large busy port city. Formerly, the city's population was mainly Black African descendants who settled here at the end of the slave trade. There are much stronger links to Caribbean culture than to Spanish and the predominant language is Creole English. There were also English pirates operating in this area for years in the 18th century and the British government funded indigenous groups to wage war on the Spanish. In recent years, a lot of people have moved to Bluefields from the Pacific side of Nicaragua, leading to a big multi-cultural mix and English and Spanish spoken in equal measure - we were never quite sure which to opt for.

A large, Victorian-style wooden house in Bluefields. A lot were destroyed by hurricanes in the 1990s. So now, the pretty houses are out-numbered by uglier concrete structures.Near to the port in Bluefields. Lots of wooden buildings. Large boats come and go as well as locally-crafted dug-out canoes for fishing These old containers were being used as offices and shops in Bluefields.

Moving on to the small, sleepy town of Laguna de Perla, the Spanish community reduced, and Misquito people lived alongside Creole. Menus were dominated by prawns and fish stewed in coconut milk and there were large shrimping boats in the dock. Although the roads were sandy, there were a few vehicles around, as the road to Rama and the rest of the country has recently been improved.

A large fishing boat in Pearl Lagoon dock. The main street in Pearl Lagoon

A couple of kilometres walk from Pearl Lagoon town, along a raised track through a swamp, led us to the Misquito settlement of Awas. The Misquito people are indigenous to Central America, and the largest population lives in Honduras. The people we visited in Awas through a community tourism venture, still live a simple life growing their own food, mainly yucca, and making a little bit of money from fishing and community tourism. We were made very welcome in the house of Orlando (centre in the photo) and his family.

The Garifuna people are descended from people who escaped from British slave ships in the 17th century, found refuge on the Caribbean island of San Vicente, and later migrated to a number of islands and communities around the Central American Caribbean coast. Orinoco, a further hour's bumpy boat trip across Pearl Lagoon are one such community. There were no cars in this village, the only form of transport was boat, as it is hemmed in on all sides by jungle. It was a nice community with lots of children playing around the houses and in a large, community grassy square. There is a tradition of African drum music, and we enjoyed listening to some local lads gathered in the street for an impromptu drum session. OrinocoOne of the main streets in Orinoco.
The village drumming workshop where drums are made.
The small town of Pueblo Nuevo didn't have any road transport either. It was all horseback or boats. But it did have a very different feel to anywhere else we had visited. The vast majority of people were Spanish-speaking Nicaraguans. They made their way from further west, clearing forest land for cattle grazing as they went. It was highly politicised when we passed through as candidates for local elections were on the campaign trail, albeit by boat.

The Sandinista FSLN flags were out in force as were those of several opposition parties, including the right-wing PLC.The variety of life we encountered made the trip worth the effort for us.

Khaka Creek jungle reserve

2010-02-27T08:21:00.000-08:00

It’s not that often you come across something truly inspirational but after just 2 days and a night at Khaka Creek Reserve we were not only informed, enthused and relaxed but also inspired. The commitment of the staff at the reserve showed in both their enthusiasm for the project and the amazing amount of work that has been carried out there. Miguel, the project coordinator and Tito, a forestry guardian and guide welcomed us like friends and brought the project alive for us as they each showed us round and told us about their work.

The reserve is an hour by boat up the river Wawachang from Pearl Lagoon on the Atlantic side of Nicaragua. Agro-forestry school for locals. Accessed only by boat. Trying to stop deforestation in the area through education and job opportunities. Walking between the Reserve and the local village of Pueblo Nuevo. The picture shows the extent of the deforestation and what the Reserve would be like without the project.

Khaka Creek includes around 400 acres of forest and of course a creek called Khaka amongst others. Some parts of the forest are virgin but lots has been replanted by the reserve since it was set up in the late 1990s with funding from Norway and Lichtenstein. The tourism venture, including food, nice big rooms and guided nature treks was started later, in 2006. Flicking through the visitor’s book it was clear the reserve receives tourists regularly from European and Central American countries, Canada and the United States but we were the first English people to make it there, which was surprising but nice too. We think we left a good impression. Hurricane Ida hit the reserve last November. We were in Nicaragua and remember people saying there was a hurricane but it never reached us and we heard no more about it. It was a shock then to walk around the trails of the reserve and see that about 90% of the trees in the reserve had been flattened by some of the fiercest winds to hit the area in many years. On our trip we also saw aid being distributed and encountered people still homeless and living in refuges three months on. Food aid being distributed in Pueblo Nuevo

Considering the scale of the destruction we could hardly believe the many acres of land that had been cleaned, organised and replanted in such a short time. Miguel is an expert at getting people involved in the project, both locals and foreigners. All sorts of people had been there helping and brigades of volunteers were expected to arrive over the coming months. He told us of the day after the hurricane struck, of standing at the top of the brand new observation tower that had miraculously stayed standing while all around it toppled, looking over the dramatically changed forest all around and saying ‘right, how can we start to make this good again?’ We had a lovely time walking the nature trails, which had all been cleared, cabin shelters and bridges repaired. There were good quality information signs all around the trail, written in English, Spanish and Miskito (a local language). Walking on the first day with Miguel we found out loads about the different trees in the areas, which were habitats for monkeys, sloth, birds and insects. We climbed the base of a mighty almond tree with amazing roots. The very tough almond shell. A squirrel had expertly drilled around this one to get the nut. What the squirrel was after - the soft, nutritious almond nut.

We were also shown the Lechevaca (cow's milk) tree which when cut bleeds a creamy sap that tastes sweet and quickly gets very sticky. Miguel told us the sap used to be used in chewing gum production, which is now all made artificially. He has a great plan for producing an all organic, naturally flavoured gum. Once the sap is harvested, a bit of soil rubbed in to the tree will help it to repair itself and carry on growing healthily. The next day, with Tito, we saw lots more of the ongoing reforestation work at the reserve. We were also luckier with the wildlife and managed a close encounter with a beautiful boa stretched out along a branch and a great view of a white faced, cappuccino monkey looking out for fruit.

After Miguel prodded the boa with a stick, it moved pretty quickly into a hole.

Apparently, the day after the hurricane there were many monkeys walking the ground wounded and confused, which did at least enable the team to feed them and get some good photos to help promote the reserve. Sadly, though not surprisingly, we failed to spot a jaguar roaming the trails, but we did get a good look at jaguar poo, which is surely the next best thing. We were also treated to Tito’s lovely poetry and songs about the reserve and the wildlife and one about eating monkeys, which he assures us he doesn’t do any more. It was brilliant to see that, of the funding available, a chunk of it was set aside for covering the costs of groups of local children to visit from surrounding schools, youth projects and Scout packs. Trips out of school rarely happen in state schools in Nicaragua, so the value is huge of bringing children to educate them in caring for the environment, reforestation and local wildlife all while camping in the grounds and having presentation and awards evenings. Some of the groups were filmed and were involved in the filming themselves and we watched some of the evidence of youngsters busy enjoying doing things like planting trees, cleaning land and learning to control forest fires. We visited the on-site primary school that is also funded by the project. It was amusing to find out that over half of the 13 children were Tito’s (all by the same mother which was a pleasant surprise by Nicaraguan standards). The children were very hard at work, getting a good education. They had their own vegetable patch out back producing food for them and the school, as with the whole site was hooked up to a solar power supply. It left a big impression on us seeing all the hard work going on at the reserve, finding out so much about the natural life of the forest in that area and seeing the forest struggling back to life after the devastation of the hurricane. But considering our own plans and ambitions for the future, the real inspiration was in witnessing first-hand that when a project is done well and with enthusiasm and inspiration, it can be so successful and make such a difference to the environment, the local community and to all the people who visit it.This plant is known locally as 'Whore's Lips'. We don't know its Latin name. It's the dry season at the moment and a good job too, because in the rainy season this swamp is filled with crocodiles. The exoskeleton of a type of locust. After many years under ground, it crawls out into the open in this form and attaches itself to some nearby wood. There it sits for a couple of days before bursting out of its own skeleton and flying off in the form of a locust. It leaves behind this shell which would be too heavy to fly in.

Journeying around the Caribbean

2010-02-26T09:21:00.000-08:00

Boarding a panga bound for Bluefields
In order to experience the Eastern, Caribbean side of Nicaragua, we could have done what many tourists do and simply flown to Bluefields or the Corn Islands. Instead we set off from Leon and spent 8 days travelling by minibus, old American school bus, taxi, coach, motor boat and canoe (with and without sail), exploring towns and communities we hadn’t previously seen and didn’t know much about. It was a bit more tiring at times, but overall we were very happy that the way we chose to do things let us see much more of the country, appreciate the changes in geography and ecology and meet lots of interesting people.

From the time we left the ‘end of the road’ riverside town of Rama until we returned there 6 days later, all of our journeying was by water. The semi-scheduled boats, or pangas, sat 20 people and zipped along the water powered by a huge outboard motor. You had to wait for the boats to fill and so rigid timetables went out the window and everything slows to the same, chilled out Caribbean pace. Twice we had to wait for over 3 hours. However, after sauntering on last to our first boat, when our 20 people were finally all present to board, and ending up on the seats at the very front of the boat facing to the rear squished in next to a couple of very fat people, we soon learnt that it pays to be first in line. Those seats are the bumpiest and most uncomfortable of all. When we ended up with the same seats on the next leg across the large expanse of Pearl Lagoon, the boat slammed repeatedly on the choppy water and we soon had to call for an emergency stop halt, play the pregnancy card and get everyone to clamber over to swap seats so that Rachel could sit at the rear of the boat, where things were vastly smoother. When the water was calm and the sun was low or hidden by cloud, the boat journeys were a joy, passing beautiful forested shores, swooping fishing birds, shrimping boats of varying sizes, waterside communities and even the occasional ship wreck. A commercial shrimping boat leaving Bluefields. Shipwreck in the foreground. A more humble vessel for shrimp fishing in Orinoco. This boat was carved by hand from a single trunk by villagers. It takes around six days to make and lasts for at least four years of service.Travelling up the Wawachang river with Harley, our captain, and Karleene from Pearl Lagoon. Our favourite trips were when we downsized boat to travel up the river Wawachang to a forest reserve and when we joined local guide Orlando for a trip by canoe to his farm. The breezy conditions meant a homemade plastic sail was in order to power the canoe, an alternative to the usual pole and oars; either way it was peaceful and relaxing to progress more slowly and without the noise of a motor. Of course the other extreme is bouncing perilously across miles of windswept lagoon being soaked by spray, motor roaring at one end, dreadful reggaeton and college rock blaring from speakers at the other end, all while frying under the full sun. Although at times it felt like we were travelling more than staying put and we wouldn’t want to have to travel by boat all the time, it certainly added to the feeling of experiencing a new part of the country and made our adventures feel more adventurous.

Juigalpa

2010-02-23T16:04:00.000-08:00

Juigalpa is the capital of the Chontales region of Nicaragua, where the majority of the country's beef is produced. You can tell it's cattle country by the wooden rodeo stands in many villages and towns we passed through and by the high percentage of men wearing cowboy hats, not to mention the availability of dairy products and top quality steaks.

A lovely hilltop park with a cow and maize statue, perhaps once a fountain.

Heading east from Managua on our way to the Caribbean coast, we chose Juigalpa as a stopping off point on the way there and again on the return journey. It has the most modern cathedral we have seen in Nicaragua with beautiful contemporary stain glass windows. Juigalpa seemed to be a fairly religious place as we saw people pouring into the church on the two Thursday evenings we spent here.

One of the town's main tourist attraction is its excellent collection of pre-hispanic stonework, housed in a small warehouse. There was also a room at the back with ceramics, random antique objects and a section on stuffed animals with genetic defects - think a calf with 3 heads and 2 penises. We didn't take any photos of this, nor of the pickled baby born with one eye, we found it a bit disturbing.

We read in the guidebook that there was a great swimming hole a few kilometres out of town on a dammed up section of the river, popular with local kids. The taxi dropped us off at an unsignposted track on the main road, which we walked down to discover some lovely boulders and rocks bordering the river, but nobody else around and no obvious place to swim.

A little more exploring up river and we came upon a large concrete wall and a big swimming hole. It clearly wasn't used very much any more, largely due to the fact that whoever had come up with the original concept of damming the river, had failed to take into account that any trees, logs and branches floating downstream would get stuck there. Spot a very white Simon trying to gently lower himself off the dam wall.

Luckily the far side was still clear and the water still clean, so we had a quick, refreshing dip to wash away the day's travel dust.

Venturing north with Lynne and a hire car

2010-02-22T16:50:00.000-08:00

We hired a car for a few days and headed to the mountains in the far north of the country, which we were yet to explore. On the way, I was dropped off in a cafe which sells excellent banana milkshakes to work on my fair trade book chapter while Simon and his mum went to one of our favourite tourist spots, the Somoto Canyon. Instead of a long hike, they took the novelty option of exploring the canyon by boat and inflatable tyre.

From there, we headed through the bustling and pretty northern city of Ocotal and on via a workshop selling disappointingly garish and ugly ceramics to Ciudad Antigua, a very peaceful town down a dirt track. The street sign on this sweet little house states that 'AQUI FUE CALLE' or 'HERE WAS A STREET'.

The town was one of the first established in these parts and was famously raided by English pirate Henry Morgan in the 17th century. Ciudad Antigua is nowhere near the sea, but Henry made it here after by navigating a long way up Central America's longest river, the Rio Coco, from the Caribbean. He was one of the most brutal and successful pirates with raids in Mexico, Cuba, Jamaica, Panama, Nicaragua and Venezuela earning him the nickname 'Morgan The Terrible'.

The pretty, old brick built church from these times is still standing, albeit with a new façade.

Having a hire car enabled us to get to places not many tourists can easily reach. In fact, as the above photo shows, it got us to places where hardly any cars actually go either. We passed one bus and one pick-up truck the whole time we were there.

Next, we travelled further north into the foothills of the Segovian mountains and spent the night in the town of Jalapa, which had more roadworks and deep, muddy diversions to challenge our little car, than anything else going on. It's famous for a huge food festival of maize every September, but other than that it seems to remain sleepy. The next day, we took the car on a ridiculously bumpy, stony, muddy uphill mountain track to a place called Finca Cerro Jesus or 'Jesus Mountain', a stone's throw from the Honduran border. We went on a challenging trek through coffee plants and lush cloud forest to reach a couple of pretty waterfalls and some breathtaking views. Afterwards, we got our energy levels back up with a tasty lunch in the coffee farm workers' canteen.

It would have been worth the effort alone for the road journeys in this beautiful part of Nicaragua, formerly a stronghold of Sandino's army in the 1930s and later in the 1980s, witness to some of the most fierce fighting between the army and the CIA-funded Contras, of which so many farming families were victims. But the walk really gave us chance to appreciate it all.

The Mighty Matapalos

2010-02-21T16:31:00.001-08:00

The enormous matapalo tree (literal translation is 'tree killer'), or strangler fig in English, is a very important tree in the cloud forest ecosystem. The way the tree grows leaves lots of nooks and crannies for all sorts of insects, animals and plants to set up home on it or in it.

It is a fascinating tree. The matapalo's seed firstly needs to make its way by bird or animal poo to the branches of any other species of tree. There, it germinates and starts to send roots down towards the ground. It takes a number of years, but the roots eventually take hold in the ground and wrap themselves around the trunk of the victim tree. They grow thicker and stronger, as the matapalo tree simultaneously starts to grow upwards above the height of its victim tree. As the years pass, the matapalo tree's canopy is higher and broader than the other tree, the trunk completely encases the other tree's trunk and so the original tree eventually dies, strangled and starved of light and nutrients. In the end, the victim tree rots and collapses, leaving the majestic matapalo, often with a large hollow space inside its trunk as evidence of its evil doings. Inside the trunk of a fantastic matapalo tree in Miraflor.

Climbing into a matapalo up the fallen trunk of the original, strangled tree. A few seconds later, I was quickly running down again when I realised I had disturbed a bee's nest.

A road

2010-02-21T10:18:00.000-08:00

The old road from Jinotega to Matagalpa has some of the most beautiful views in the country. Stopping off with Rachel and Nick at a windswept viewpoint.

However, the road has been heavily pot-holed for years and the Jinotegan locals are not impressed. Feeling their town has been a little forgotten. Jinotega demands its roads. Now!

In the last year or so, things are improving. There has been massive investment throughout the country in repaving major roads. Firstly, this was financed by American money, but they got cold feet after local elections in November 2008 which they claimed were fraudulent (a slight hint of hypocrisy can't be overlooked given the US interpretation of democracy in Central America, most recent example being Honduras). Venezuela's Hugo Chavez stepped in to replace them and ensure the projects continue. Local protests about the state of the old road are not without their sense of humour.

Laguna de Apoyo

2010-02-21T10:01:00.000-08:00

Staying on the shores of this volcanic crater lake close to Managua, has to be one of the most relaxing getaways in Nicaragua. The lake is warmed by venting gases somewhere far beneath the surface - the lake is 200 metres deep in parts, making it considerably lower than sea level and the lowest point in Central America. It was a strenuous hour and a half slog uphill to reach this viewpoint but well worth the effort for the magnificent views across the lakes and volcanoes of Nicaragua.

Unlike some lakes in Nicaragua, it's really clean and as an added bonus, mosquitoes can't breed in the slightly sulphuric waters. We spent a couple of nights here with Simon's mum, Lynne. It was a good end to her holiday after a couple of weeks filled with walks and mountains in the north of the country.Lynne on a tyre

It's not difficult to feel chilled out as you bob about in a tyre in warm lake water inside a forest-lined volcano crater with sound of birds and howler monkeys in the background.

San Juan del Sur

2010-02-21T08:53:00.001-08:00

San Juan del Sur is the most popular beach spot in Nicaragua. The town has a nice beach and a small port at one end with lots of fishing boats bobbing about. There's no shortage of bars, restaurants or places to stay. We went first with Jonny and stayed in the town, and then a month later with Jan and Nick, when we stayed a few miles north near to some lovely quiet beaches.

Both times we went, we enjoyed some excellent seafood and made the most of the Pacific sunsets with a drink and an ice-cream.
The beaches to the north of San Juan del Sur are quiet and clean and perfect for a swim.

A handsome blue and orange crab scuttling across the beach. It was a nice crab but it ventured too far from the sea and the next time we saw it, half an hour later, it was in pieces. Presumably due to a dog or seagull attack.

Food. So much glorious food.

2010-02-20T07:42:00.001-08:00

It's been a long time since we last posted a food update, and needless to say, we've been experiencing a lot of good, tasty meals. Here are a few of the highlights.

Esteli and Sontule

Mini-novelty cauldrons with a candle inside, and bubbling refried beans with a mozzarella-style cheese on top. Served with tostones - squashed and lightly fried savoury plantain.

Burgers - there's no McDonald's anywhere in Nicaragua, outside of the capital Managua, but most places do have a good independent burger restaurant. This is the first time we ate burgers in Nicaragua, and tasty they were too.
An impressive carbohydrate loaded meal in Sontule - rice with veg; spaghetti with tomatoes and oil; boiled melanga (centre) - a nice root vegetable, although can be a bit cloying; beans; and an ayote (like a watery squash/courgette) sliced and fried with egg on the outside and cheese in the middle.

Visa trip to Costa Rica
Chinese food was everywhere in Liberia in the north of Costa Rica. This restaurant was recommended to us and was a popular place serving up massive portions for about $5. It wasn't as gloopy as Chinese food can be in the UK, but it was certainly different to a traditional Nicaraguan meal. Above - noodles with prawns and vegetables in soy sauce, and below, breaded fish in a tomato-based sauce.

Seafood by the Pacific
Delicious lobster. The cheese slices wouldn't be an obvious addition in the UK but here they are seen as fancy.
Fantastic seafood platter to share. Fish, squid, clams, octopus, king prawns and lobster tails.

Seafood soup loaded with crab, squid, octopus and fish. It was very hard to get any meat from the crabs but they added great flavour and the bits were good to suck on.
Barbequeing with Jan and Nick. It's always good to cook for ourselves sometimes. We produced a very agreeable pile of steak, sausage and chargrilled vegetables.

Sweet treats
New sweets (to Simon) can be just as exciting as gourmet meals. These assorted-coloured sweets all tasted of banana - the artificial flavour that you get in those banana-shaped foam sweets at the pick n mix at the cinema or Wilko's.

In the East of Nicaragua, a new crop of maize is producing some yummy food. This atol is in between blamanche and semolina pudding in consistency, but with a fresh, maize flavour and topped off perfectly with a sprinkling of cinnamon. A treat like this perks up any long bus journey - a lady got on the bus to sell them at a bus stop for around 15p each. Maybe we should introduce this into the UK.

They look like grapes or blackcurrant, but they are neither. They are coyolitos - harvested from a certain kind of palm tree, they are incredibly sour but enjoyed by Nicaraguans with a good dose of salt. We could only appreciate them in a heavily sweetened juice.

The Caribbean

Food is very different here to the rest of Nicaragua with strong influences from Africa and other Caribbean communities. It's out with the tortillas and in with fish and seafood cooked in coconut milk.

'Run down' is the traditional seafood soup in the region - fresh fish is cooked in coconut milk along with yucca/cassava, plantain and melanga. We enjoyed this one with local community guide Orlando (pictured) and family after a trip to his land.

Delicious breakfast for £1.50 each in Bluefields port with great views over the dock and lagoon. Fresh fruit, pancakes, cereal, freshly squeezed orange juice, and unfortunately, instant coffee.
This fruit is called an apple, but it is quite different to any apples we know. It's definitely not a direct relative of the apple as it has one big, lumpy stone in the middle. However, it does share a similar taste, quite sharp and full flavoured with a light, crisp water-filled consistency. Very refreshing.
Orland stood next to an 'apple' tree. His son was up the tree knocking down apples with a big stick.
Munching on an energy-boosting sugar cane. A treat for local kids and sweet-toothed tourists.
An assortment from the bakery: coconut bun - a bit like a cinnamon swirl but minus the raisins and with a light coconut flavour; coconut bread - white bread baked with coconut milk, so delicious when fresh; and sticky, spiced ginger bun with raisins.
Fresh prawns in coconut milk, garlic and tomato. The prawns here are harvested straight from the lagoon and the sea using circular nets thrown by hand from small, wooden canoes. It's lovely to eat prawns of all different sizes as the ones bought in the UK, which all seem to look alike, are a reminder of the shrimp farms they come from, which are very damaging to the environment.
This is a pineapple plant. A quite improbable looking spiky shrub to be the producer of such a delicious fruit, which grows out of the middle and then sits surreally atop the plant.
A very rich prawn salad with tomatoes and cucumber, cooked with coconut milk, butter and mayonnaise. The coconut bread served with it was some of the nicest bread we have ever tasted.
A spicy beef patty served hot from a basket at the port in Bluefields as I (Simon) had just eaten a big breakfast, I limited myself to two. They cost around 15p each and were brilliant.

Coffee picking

2010-02-10T18:56:00.001-08:00

It is nearing the end of the coffee season in Nicaragua. We were keen to join in, having lived in a coffee growing community, Sontule, for much of our time here, always enjoyed a good cup of coffee and worked with coffee cooperatives. It's taken months for the cherries, each containing two coffee beans, to ripen from hard green pellets to bright red, juicy fruit, ready for picking. In Nicaragua, there is a national price set for coffee picking - 25 cordobas, or around 80p per lata or 'tin'. This turns out to be a surprising amount of coffee. One lata is a bit more than one of the full baskets we're holding in the photo above. A good coffee picker with a good strip of coffee trees to go at with lots of cherries can pick up to 8 latas in a day, which would earn him or her around £6.50. Most people pick 4 or 5 latas a day. Tipping the coffee into a lata to see how much we'd all picked. On that day, I reached my personal best of just over 1 lata. I wouldn't be able to enjoy many banana smoothies on that performance.

On bigger fincas up in the mountains, coffee pickers go to farms for the season (around October-February), stay in dormitories and are given food. Although it seems like they are paid very little money, it's a good earner here in Nicaragua. However, people can earn more in Costa Rica, and there have been years when the army has been drafted in to pick coffee because too many temporary workers went south.
With the Villareyna family, who we stay with in Sontule - grandsons Minor and Ivancito, and son Marlon.

In Sontule, coffee picking is very much a community and family affair. It seems to be most people's favourite time of year and there's a real buzz in the countryside. People are up early and out picking by around 6am. They finish in the coffee fields around noon, then it's time to bring all the coffee in, measure it to see how much each coffee picker has earned, and then put it through a de-pulper - a sort of mangle - to remove the fleshy fruit from the glistening coffee beans.

Together with American Rachel, we had our first coffee picking lesson with a friend Henry one morning on his dad's land. It's a beautiful setting - the coffee is mainly grown under shade on the forested mountain slopes. We were each given a basket to wear on our fronts and a sack to tip the coffee in when we filled our baskets, or for us, when they got too heavy. The coffee trees are planted in rows, which had become a bit higgledy piggledy. Some of the older trees were twice our height and we were taught to pull them down by their thin trunks to reach the top cherries. It's quite an arm work out. I also realised that I wasn't wearing the best top as little beetles from the coffee plants kept falling straight down it. Other than that, it was a fun, surprisingly relaxing experience. We were also accompanied by 6 year old cousins, Bryan and Kevin, who were in Simon's school class. It was their family's land. They taught us songs as we worked and picked a bit of coffee themselves. Bryan

With the money they earned over the coffee season, Bryan brought his school uniform, which we saw him in, looking the smartest kid at school, on the first day back; whilst Kevin bought bangers and sweets. At the end of the morning, we took the coffee to be de-pulped, which turned out to be another arm work-out.

We continued to pick coffee in the mornings for a few more days in Sontule, in different patches of land up in the hills, with Rogelio and Lucia's children and grandchildren, whom we know well. There was always a great atmosphere, lots of laughing and singing whilst sometimes lurching from tree to tree to prevent ourselves from slipping down the steep mountain slopes. On more successful days, when the sacks weighed too much to carry, Jackson was summoned on his horse to carry them back to the house. We were on the final pick of the coffee trees that week as it was nearing the end of the season and they had already been picked twice. We were told to pick everything, including the unripe green beans, and overripe or bad black beans, which we would then sort out later back at the house. Indira, Valeska and Simon removing the green and black coffee cherries before they go through the de-pulper, while Monkey the puppy chills out. The removed beans will eventually be used to make fairly ropey coffee to serve at their house - it always comes with plenty of sugar to make it drinkable.

A couple of weeks later, we went on another coffee picking expedition in the beautiful mountains near to Matagalpa. This time, we had Lynne, Simon's mum, with us to make her coffee picking debut.

We were picking coffee with Nick and Rachel at Nick's friend Byron's farm. It was the morning after a full moon, and our timing in this was deliberate as Byron believes it is when coffee is at its sweetest and best. Byron with a banana flower

The coffee we were picking will be roasted and sold at a stand at Harvest at Jimmy's festival near to Ipswich this September http://www.harvestatjimmys.com/ and we may have some for our wedding too. Byron honed our coffee picking skills, teaching us to pluck rather than pull the cherries from the branches to avoid the stalks coming too. If we de-stalked the branches, we were told, there would be no coffee cherries growing there next year.

After the coffee is picked and de-pulped, it is fermented in big tanks for 36 hours. After that, it is rinsed in channels, scooped up and laid out on patios to dry. In Nicaragua, when the coffee is oreado or damp (46% humidity), it is delivered to a dry mill to finish the drying process, down to 12% moisture. This is the legal humidity requirement for importing coffee into the EU, it prevents potentially carcinogenic mould developing. The farmer cooperatives in communities like Sontule are part of bigger central cooperatives which own their own drying, processing and quality control facilities. This has been a great achievement for the farmers over the last 15 years or so, greatly aided by Fair Trade markets, as they now own the coffee supply chain all the way up to exporting the coffee. This means they are in a much better bargaining position than they were when they sold their coffee up in the hills to whoever would buy it from them for whatever price they were offered. Three very successful coffee cooperatives in Nicaragua are Prodecoop http://www.prodecoop.com/, Cecocafen and Soppexca http://www.soppexcca.org/. The photo below shows a water-balloon game with workers at Soppexca's mill. In the background, the coffee is wrapped in plastic. In the early morning, the plastic is spread out and the coffee left open to the sun to continue drying. This takes several days. On one road heading into Matagalpa at this time of year, coffee is drying on fields and concrete patios for as far as you can see. In the evenings, there are these plastic humpback piles everywhere. Once the coffee is dry, the green beans, which will be exported and roasted in the consuming countries, are still in a protective cover, the texture of papery-parchment. This is removed by milling just before the coffee is shipped.

This is more or less the coffee harvesting process over here. Now go and treat yourselves and support the farmers by buying some yummy Cafedirect Nicaraguan coffee.

Beware of the beast

2010-02-09T21:38:00.000-08:00

This apparently unassuming furry caterpillar is in fact a beast to be reckoned with in the countryside and forests around Sontule. Poke him with a stick and he won't roll up, as most English caterpillars do, but will instead attack with surprising ferocity - he moves quickly and you really feel the resistance against the stick in your hand. If he were to get you, he would first bite you and then, to make matters worse, he would quickly urinate on the bite, leaving an open infected wound causing what has been described to us as 'an intense, burning pain'. We found him on a big rock and could quite easily have sat on him. We had a lucky escape.

Full moon

2010-02-09T21:32:00.000-08:00

While we were in the highlands of Nicaragua on a coffee picking trip, we stayed at an agricultural training centre in a spectacular location. Our trip deliberately coincided with the full moon, as the farmer we were visiting believes that coffee is at its best for the few days around a full moon. Something to do with gravity drawing sugary liquids into the coffee cherries.

Gigantonas

2010-01-22T18:14:00.000-08:00

These large, colourful lady puppets are usually manned by boys, accompanied by a gang of their friends, one of whom should have a large papier-mache head of a dwarf man and the others skipping about drumming out a noisy rhythm with little drums. The puppet represents a Spanish colonial woman, and the dwarf her admirer who follows her reading poetry and moralising. It's a tradition going back years and even includes an annual competition to pick the best combination of dancing lady, moralising man and costumes. A gigantona preparing to dance in the competition in the square.

The boys see it as representing their neighbourhoods and parade around the streets throughout the entire Christmas period hoping to earn a few pennies as they go.

With Rachel outside a gigantona workshop

The Purissima

2010-01-21T18:06:00.000-08:00

Before heading to Leon for the rowdy Griteria festival in honour of the Virgin Mary, we joined the more religious, community-based Purissima celebration in Sontule on 7th December. Rogelio and Lucia play a central role in the event at the local, no-frills Catholic church and put an admirable amount of effort into preparing and providing gift bags for all attendees, from adults through to children. As a result, hundreds of people turned out and packed into the church.

Jonny particularly loved his first appearance in church, weddings and funerals excepted, for about 20 years.

At the end of the service, the kids queued up eagerly outside to receive a bag of sweets, a drink and a little toy.

The adults each received a bag containing a plastic cup, a drink, an orange, a banana, some syrup-soaked pumpkin-type vegetable, a few bought sweets as well as home-made banana and toasted maize sweets. Our first Christmas presents of the year.

Beef casserole in Sontule

2010-01-20T17:58:00.000-08:00

We had promised to cook a meal for the extended family in Sontule for some time. Shortly after Jonny's arrival in Nicaragua we loaded up with stewing beef from a friendly local restauranteur in Esteli and headed for the hills. It's tricky to know what to cook for so many people with no oven so we settled on a beef in red wine casserole with mashed potato. The meal officially opened the family's new dining room, linking the house to the kitchen and was accompanied by speeches from Rogelio, Lucia and us. Some loved it, some left it (it was a bit rich for all Nica palates) but all enjoyed the sense of occasion and trying our meal. It was amusing to note that they nearly all preferred the rice-crispie cakes which we had made for a previous party and which we found distinctly unimpressive, particularly as they didn't set.

Volcan Masaya

2010-01-19T17:48:00.000-08:00

Another top class Nicaraguan tourist attraction is Volcan Masaya. Here you can drive your car right to the rim of a large, active volcano where molten lava lurks within the deep crater. We were told this sign was put up only 6 months ago and has been eroded by acidic, sulphurous gases.

Our little yellow hire car can be seen alone in the carpark on the left.

We turned up for the twilight tour which involved viewing three large crater from various vantage points whilst trying to avoid clouds of sulphur; walking through tunnels made by lava flow many years ago; sitting in the pitch black at the entrance to a cave as thousands of bats rush past; and looking into the crater after dark to see the glow of the lava.

Sunset over the volcano

Walking through the lava tunnel

Precautionary gas masks as we approached the crater rim.

The Griteria in Leon

2010-01-18T17:24:00.000-08:00

Being a Catholic country, the Virgin Mary is a significant figure and a great excuse for a party. She is celebrated throughout Nicaragua, but particularly in Leon, on 8th December. We're not sure why it's this date but we joined in anyway. Following on from more sombre and religious celebrations of the Purissima on the 7th, the Griteria is mainly concerned with noisy fireworks, free sweets, garish shrines to the Virgin Mary in full view in people's homes and lots of partying. The key question to learn if you want sweets is, 'Quien causa tanta alegria? '(Who causes so much joy?). The answer from the Catholics along with a handful of sweets is, 'La Virgen Maria!' There are also a few songs if you want even more sweets but we didn't manage to learn those. Some of the sweety stations were quite hard work, battling against local professionals with backpacks laden with free sweet treats.

People were letting fireworks off all over the place, but the main display was in Leon's central square next to the cathedral. As usual, safety precautions were left to your own judgement. In a gloriously Latin American disregard for public safety, men ran through the crowd carrying wooden bull shaped frames above their heads from which fireworks flew randomly in all directions causing spectators to squeal and run for cover. The bright lights in the photo are the firework bulls.

There was no cordoned-off area as local men lit rockets with cigarettes and launched them from their hands.

To finish off the firework display, a dubious piece of corporate sponsorship came alight, 'Long live the Virgin Coca Cola'

Somoto canyon

2010-01-17T17:10:00.000-08:00

Up in the north of the country, near the Honduran border and not too far from the sleepy town of Somoto, lies the convergence of two small rivers to form the Rio Coco, the longest river in Central America. The first two miles of the Rio Coco just happens to flow through a spectacular, steep-sided canyon. It was only discovered as a tourist attraction five years ago and still receives very few tourists considering its beauty. This is probably set to change shortly, as the location gains in fame as it is now an official national monument, featured on the new 50 cordoba banknote and highlighted in new guidebooks. With Jan and Nick at the head of the canyon.

We've visited twice now and loved jumping in and out of the water, clambering over the rocks, peeking into caves and hiking up to viewpoints with local community guides. With Jonny on what turned out to be a day for lots of swimming and floating.

Swimming through the stunning canyon with clear waters and bats overhead.

Spot Simon jumping off a very high rock into one of the deeper parts of the canyon.

We encountered this little tortoise crossing our path but he quickly retreated into his shell.

Cerro Negro

2010-01-16T16:53:00.000-08:00

Cerro Negro is one of the smaller peaks in the line of volcanoes which runs more or less from northwest to southwest Nicaragua, following the coastline of the Pacific. The volcanoes are a stunning backdrop whenever we're travelling around much of the country.

Cerro Negro is an active, black ash volcano. It looks a bit like a giant slag heap and stands in contrast to the surrounding slopes which are now covered with vegetation. You can't see molten lava but there is a lot of smelly sulphurous gas and yellowy-green rock around its two craters.

We've been there twice now. On the first occasion, with Rachel's cousin Jonny, we joined a tour group and clambered up carrying large boards of wood which we then used to sledge down a steeper and smoother side of the volcano. This was very much a 'manage your own risk' activity. We were given guidelines on tapping your feet to slide at a sensible pace, or lift your legs to fly down and usually fall off. We were kitted out in orange boiler suits with patched up holes and a pair of safety goggles.

Everyone arrived down at their own pace, gravel-splattered, filthy, but uninjured and reasonably exhilarated. Jonny just holding it together as he hit the steep lower section.

Rachel relieved to be down in one piece.

We returned with Jan and Nick, this time finding our own way there in a hired pick-up along unsigned, sandy tracks. This time we walked up and down and made the most of a gorgeous sunset. The way down looked pretty dramatic from the top, but actually was a really great way to descend in big, sliding strides.

New Year's Eve

2010-01-15T16:30:00.000-08:00

Feliz y prospero ano nuevo a todos y todas. We're a bit late with our New Year well-wishing as we've been busy having so much fun travelling the country with Jonny (Rachel's cousin) in December, enjoying the festive period and then exploring some more with Jan and Nick (Rachel's aunty and uncle).

We spent New Year's Eve in two different parts of the country. It began early in the hills at Lagartillo. We were up at 5am to join a large group from the community in a walk in memory of six of their family and friends who were killed in a Contra attack there on 31st December 1984. We more or less walked the route that the women and children of the community took that day to flee to the town of Achuapa, around 6 miles away. The walk to the cemetery was enjoyable through beautiful scenery, but also poignant as we chatted about their memories of that day. Nick (who lived in the community in the late 80s) set off fireworks along the route to mark the event.

Words were spoken and a song was sung at the cemetery in honour of the communities heroes and martyrs.

We crammed into the back of a pick-up truck to get a lift up the steep, bumpy track back to the village and on to the second part of the day. The central area of Lagartillo had been transformed with red and black Sandinista bunting and balloons. A stage had been set up for music, poetry and long (and to our ears), fairly dull, political speeches by local Sandinista councillors. There were hundreds of people there and the community provided a delicious beef and vegetable stew, tortillas and a maize-based drink for everyone.

The event was drawing to a close at around 5pm when we set off for Leon with Nick, Rachel and a very talkative Spanish man intent on teaching us ancient Spanish songs for a good part of the journey. Back in Leon, many streets were roped off by residents who had rigged up big sound systems and pinatas and had their plastic tables and chairs set-up on the streets ready to party. We arrived at a friend's house around 11pm where we ate roast chicken and rice before shooting off to the old fort above Leon for a great vantage point to see fireworks being set-off from houses all across the city and to drink a toast to 2010.

Birding with Nelson

2010-01-01T18:16:00.000-08:00

Nelson is a good friend of ours from Sontule who came to my classes. Apart from being an enthusiastic student and a hard-working farmer he also studies birds in the Miraflor national park and keeps records of the species that he spots. Part of that work is trapping in nets to record the passing of migratory birds.We got up nice and early and once the cows were milked and we had a bit of food in us we set off with Nelson, his two daughters and Rachel's cousin Johnny, getting a good 6am introduction to the Nicaraguan countryside on only his second morning in the country. We had already prepared two nets the night before and only had to open them out and we set up another one 50m away. Then we lay in wait a few rows of coffee bushes away.The first couple of times we checked, the nets were empty and we were beginning to wonder if there were any birds at all. But soon they started to turn up. It was very fiddly getting the birds untangled without hurting them so we left that bit to Nelson. Once out they were popped in a sack.Back at our little den it was time to search through the books to identify what had got itself stuck in the nets.Some birds were calmer than others.

Everyone had a go at identifying, a task that proved very tricky at times when faced with a page of ten small green hummingbirds with just a fleck of white or a dark beak to separate them.
We trapped nine birds altogether, including four different kinds of hummingbird. It was a lovely morning, very interesting, and in great company.

Christmas Day

2009-12-29T11:25:00.000-08:00

It was a lie-in for us on Christmas Day. We opened a few presents from our family, including chocolate and toffee, which we got stuck straight into, before getting up and eating delicious papaya, the rest of the hen from the night before and a ginger pudding with rum custard, which we had made in Leon and brought with us. Diosmara and Carolina trying the pudding

A couple of hours later we set off with most of the kids from the village to a big pool in the river. It was the most refreshing swim we are ever likely to have on Christmas Day and great fun playing frisbee and leaping off rocks with the kids. On our return, we chopped up and scoffed an enormous watermelon.

We set off back to Leon after sunset, singing a few Christmas carols in the truck to relate to our UK Christmas. 'In the Bleak Midwinter' and 'Once in Royal David's City' seemed a little odd in context with the rest of the day.

Christmas Eve

2009-12-26T20:52:00.001-08:00

The night of Christmas Eve is the big Christmas celebration in Nicaragua. We spent it in a remote community at Melania's house with Nick and Rachel. We headed up into the hills in a pick-up truck full of presents for all the kids in the village. They all had a little bag stuffed full of things like water pistols, marbles, glowing sweets, rattles, imitation barbies, toy cars, headbands with feathers and balloons. The night before, there was a bag-stuffing party at Nick's to get it all sorted. It's a fairly poor village so the kids wouldn't really get much else apart from this.

We arrived in time to witness the stuffing of the hens, which we were to eat at midnight. American Rachel took on the task of stuffing them which proved to be pretty tricky. Melania had removed all the meat and bones from the plucked hen but left the skin intact with just a slit down its breast. The meat was cooked and then mixed up with oiled, uncooked rice, vegetables, a version of Worcestershire sauce and tomato ketchup. The whole lot was then stuffed back into the hen's skin and sewn up. After four hours in a big outdoor clay oven, the rice had expanded and the hen emerged looking like a plump roast chicken. We had to wait until midnight to get stuck in to platefuls of tasty hen and rice.

The early evening's entertainment got all the kids and women in the village involved in singing, pinatas and water balloon throwing. Simon controlling the pinata string while the little lad tries to whack the star with a stick and make sweets fall out.

The water balloon game

Unfortunately, most of the men and older teenage lads were already drunk by this point having spent most of the day gambling on the cock fight being held in the village.

As the sun went down, a lovely old man with a crinkly face and a twinkly smile donned a flashing Santa's hat, seated himself under a tree in the dusty main street under a lone light bulb powered by a little battery, and proceeded to give out around 100 presents. After this, it was time for the disco, and the drunken lads and men swayed in to partner up with the ladies for a mixture of raggaeton, salsa and hopelessly slow ballads.

At midnight, we set off fireworks and distributed sparklers before retiring to Melania's house to finally tuck in to the hen.

Learning to kill a hen

2009-12-20T10:22:00.001-08:00

We enjoy eating hen and vegetable soup regularly in Sontule. The hens are killed on the same morning they are served up for lunch. They spend their lives before this pecking and scratching at the ground around the house eating a diet of mainly corn and grubs. We hope to be getting involved in farming when we get back to the UK, so we were happy to have the opportunity to learn to kill a chicken and prepare it under the expert guidance of Lucia.

Firstly, the chicken is tied up by its legs to a branch and the wings are folded over themselves twice to prevent flapping. The hen is soon surprisingly calm.

The next part can be a bit tricky for an amateur: cut the skin on its neck, locate the major blood vessel, and sever it with the knife. Unfortunately, on my first attempt I chopped the windpipe. Not only that, but after I had cut the correct vessel and the blood started to flow out of the hen's body, it gave a last mighty flap. I had only crossed the wings over once, rather than twice, and Lucia and I were splattered with dark, sticky blood. The hen dies within seconds but continues to twitch for a while. It's left to hang for a good half hour to drain all the blood.

The next stage is to pluck it. To do this easily, the hen is submerged in a big pan of boiling water for a few seconds and then it's no problem to pull out the feathers.
Feather-plucking

There are still a few remaining bits of feather so the next step is to char the skin well over a flame. Next the chicken is scrubbed with soap and then rinsed thoroughly.

All that's left to do then is to cut the carcass into pieces. We were impressed by how efficiently and quickly Lucia did this, extracted the windpipe and the few bits that really are inedible (although the cat was happy to give them a go). The organs were kept, as was an egg, still in the hen, and a few developing eggs.

This hen (gallina) had clearly led a long and active life, as the meat was a little on the tough side, but it did taste good and for us it was important to know what goes into the process of killing, preparing and eating a bird.

Costa Rica visa run

2009-12-13T17:01:00.000-08:00

We went to Costa Rica for a few days to renew our visas after nearly 6 months in Nicaragua. We only got as far as the northern town of Liberia where we spent an afternoon and evening wandering around before heading to the beach. The main square in Liberia, full of families wandering around and sitting on benches in the evening.

By night, the stalls lining the square opened up to reveal an enormous amount of Christmas tat, of the like we haven't seen in a good while - there's not much of it in Nicaragua.

We had taken a tent with us and planned to camp in a national park but it all seemed a bit ambitious when we were informed that the well had dried up in the campsite and the only option would be to trek for 20 kilometres with all the water and food we needed for several days. Instead, we found an air-conditioned apartment in the very touristy Playa Coco. We went to a couple of other beaches around the headland, saw monkeys swinging in trees, ate pizza, saw lots of Americans and had a very relaxing few days.

Playa Hermosa

Playa Ocotal

We liked what we saw of Costa Rica although we prefer Nicaragua!

Animal babies

2009-12-01T16:48:00.000-08:00

A month or so ago quite a few of the animals in Sontule started popping out babies. Two pigs gave birth and no matter how hard-hearted a campesino, you can't help but smile at the sight of 21 piglets scampering around. Young piglets suckling an hour after being born.

The less cute side to it. The exhausted mother and the pile of afterbirth. Evidence of the fact that the last piglet had only popped out twenty minutes before this photo was taken.

Traviesa, meaning 'naughty', also had a litter of 5 pups. She hasn't been the greatest of mums as she ate some toads, got very sick, and ignored them for several days. Things were starting to look bleak but luckily she got her appetite for tortillas and bones back and started feeding them again. The puppies are now doing well and making a nuisance of themselves by licking our toes as we try to shower or drinking soapy water as we wash our clothes.

The piglets four weeks on. They tear after their mother if they think there is a chance of milk. The rest of the time, they could be anywhere around the garden, the fields or the road.

Last day at school

2009-11-28T16:30:00.000-08:00

One of the highlights of my time in Sontule has been teaching at the local primary school. I mostly taught Spanish to the first grade, 6 and 7 year-olds, and maths to the second grade, 7 and 8 year-olds. I got to know the kids really well and we had a great time. This was the thing that got me known around the community as the whole school knew who I was and so all their families did too. Playtimes last a good hour and mainly involve the boys playing baseball or pretending to shoot one another, while the girls organise themselves into friendly team games. The views never got boring.

It was quite a change to teaching in England. Not only was I teaching in Spanish, but my only resources were a board, a pen and some paper. I soon adapted and definitely learnt as much myself as the children did.

Climbing on a ruined wall by the outdoor school kitchen. You would never get away with this as a teacher in the UK.

Loud speaker advertising

2009-11-27T16:39:00.000-08:00

This is a fine example of why we so often have to ask people to repeat themselves when we are talking to them on skype. The pink building is Cafe Luz, the only cafe in Esteli with wifi and where we can often be found on our days in town.

There are all sorts of vehicles touring the streets with a variety of loud speaker systems strapped to the roof. They blare out advertising jingles at ear-busting levels for anything from pharmacies, to nappies, to events, to where you can get your tyres changed. It's a charmingly simple form of advertising if a little invasive at times, but nobody here seems to mind that.

Very small bananas

2009-11-27T16:34:00.000-08:00

We've blogged once before about the huge variety of bananas available in Latin America, and Nicaragua is no different. Last week in Sontule we encountered what was definitely the tiniest to date. The one pictured was pretty much the same size as all the bananas in the bunch. That's just the way they are. They were very sweet but a bit hard in the middle, which made them just right for adding to our hot milk and oats each morning.

Baking day

2009-11-21T19:06:00.000-08:00

Baking day is quite an undertaking at Lucia and Rogelio's in Sontule. We're not just talking about knocking up a quick victoria sponge or a batch of flapjack, there's a bit more to it than that. A large, igloo-shaped clay oven, a good two metres across, occupies part of the yard near to the kitchen. The oven is made from bricks and clay and requires a red hot pile of firewood inside to get the whole thing baking hot. The embers are then pushed out of one side and the baking is ready to be popped in the other side. The oven spends most of its time redundant, except for occasionally housing a laying hen, so baking day makes for a good spectacle.
Rosquillas were the main item for the oven, in their hundreds. These are small biscuits made from cooked and ground corn, cuajada cheese and a bit of margarine. Some are savoury and shaped like a little hoop, others are round and sweet, filled with an unrefined dark sugar and called hojaldras. There are always people selling them on buses and they're available in cafes and corner shops, but their quality varies greatly. They are definitely at their best when they're warm, but Lucia's rosquillas were particularly impressive and kept us coming back for more for a good few days. They go down especially well with a coffee.All the members of the house got stuck in to the baking process. Lucia and Endira did the preparations and Rogelio was in charge of the oven. Jackson did a bit of fetching and carrying, while we were taking photos and employed to clear the trays of cooked rosquillas and place them in a bucket. This involved plenty of sampling.

From one side of the oven to the other. It doesn't look hot in there, but it's baking biscuits in 15 minutes.
We took a photo of ourselves nibbling rosquillas in Esteli, which for some strange reason turned out like a promotional shot for a rosquilla company.

'Mmm...rosquillas'

Old Man's Beard

2009-11-21T15:11:00.001-08:00

An old man and his beard.The forests of Miraflor are beautiful and on many of the trees grows this wispy plant, called Barba de Viejo, or Old Man's Beard, which gives an eery edge to foggy mornings and a touch more shade when the sun's out. It looks spiky until you touch it and realise it's very soft. Local uses for the plant, known in some Engish speaking parts as Spanish Moss, include mulch for plants and a natural, luxurious toilet roll. We are yet to test either claim.

Deer for lunch

2009-11-18T14:59:00.000-08:00

Walking uphill in Sontule towards the cooperative building one morning after breakfast we heard a yelping up ahead and saw an Alsatian attacking something with skinny legs. As we approached and threw a stone at it, the dog ran off, leaving behind a beautiful, young, white-speckled deer with a mangled leg and blood dripping from its mouth. It is the first deer we have seen in Nicaragua and we were just thinking that it was a shame to see one in such unfortunate circumstances when Don Rogelio appeared on his horse, heading for the fields. He agreed that it was a shame for the poor creature but quickly moved on to the prospect of enjoying it for lunch. He was thrilled with us for seeing the dog off in time and asked Simon to pass the deer up to him on his horse. It was kicking weakly on the floor. Simon hesitated for a couple of seconds, but after a couple more 'pass it to mes' from Rogelio, Simon grabbed it by the scruff of the neck and its hind quarters and passed it up to Rogelio who slung it over the front of the horse and trotted back to the house with it. A few hours later, we were enjoying its tender meat in this delicious casserole with a beetroot and cabbage salad, rice, beans and tortilla. Sontule has been in a protected nature reserve since the 1990s and nobody had eaten deer for years. We were popular with the family for the rest of the week on the back of our deer discovery.

A funeral in Sontule

2009-11-16T14:34:00.000-08:00

Last week we attended the burial of a local mum who died in childbirth after a complicated pregnancy with her third child. Her baby daughter survived and will be brought up by an aunt in Esteli. Her two other children, Walter and Juan Ramon, are eight and six, and in Simon's Spanish and Maths classes. At least for now, they are staying in the community with their dad.

Nicaraguans bury their dead usually within twenty four hours of them dying, and it is a big community affair. The evening of the death, the family holds an all-night wake. For this lady, over 300 people attended. Her parents' home is two hours walk through the hills from Sontule but over 40 people went from the village, returning in the early hours of the morning. That afternoon, friends dug the grave in the cemetery, a beautiful, shady spot in the mountains in Sontule. The next morning, the whole community headed for the cemetery, including lots of children, to await the arrival of the family with the coffin from the neighbouring community. Nobody knew what time it would arrive, and whether it would be carried through the hills or brought in a pick-up truck. In the end, it was a pick-up that appeared with around twenty people crammed into the back along with the coffin. We waited in the cemetery for a couple of hours, and were given a bit of a tour of the graves by our friends. Rogelio and Lucia's relatives are all buried here, as well as some notable locals killed by the Contra in the 1980s. Another little boy from the school matter-of-factly showed us his mum's grave. Next to Lucia's family's graves, including a daughter who died as a baby.

There were a few striking things for us about this funeral. Despite this being a really tragic death, the community was typically stoical about it. They had all visited the family already and offered their condolences. In the cemetery there was a lack of drama, collective grief and dark, formal clothing. There was more of a feeling of the community simply gathering to pay their respects, offer support and do what had to be done in putting the coffin into the ground. It seemed very natural to include children in the event. Many children had bunches of flowers from their gardens and either looked on curiously or played quietly in the background. Walter and Juan Ramon, her two sons, spent most of the time sadly looking on, but also looking round and showing interest in the whole event. At one point, Juan Ramon looked over, recognised us and gave us a big smile.

Lucia and Rogelio led a few prayers and singing before the local men lowered the coffin into the grave and took turns to fill in the earth. The family take no part in the physical act of carrying or burying the body. All of the community waited until the grave had been filled, sitting around in small groups chatting or gathered around the grave, before laying flowers on it and heading off to carry on with the day's work.

Tweeting to Twitter in Sontule

2009-11-16T14:32:00.001-08:00

This is the only place in Sontule where there is a mobile phone signal, next to the school and ten minutes up the hill from Rogelio and Lucia's house. It's a nice spot for a Tweet.

Fifteenth birthday parties for girls

2009-11-15T12:58:00.000-08:00

Fifteenth birthday parties (quinceneras) are the most significant ones for girls in Catholic countries. Traditionally, it was a coming-of-age, time to get married occasion. We've been invited to a couple now and they have both been quite different from one another.

Last night was party night in Sontule. For the first time since we've been going there, the entire family turned out: Rogelio and Lucia, with their six children and eight grandchildren plus a good turn out of local friends and neighbours. Marciel is their eldest granddaughter and lives over the road, as well as attending my kids English class, so we see a lot of her.They'd gotten hold of a pick-up truck in Esteli to bring up the family from there and the enormous birthday cake pictured above. We spent the afternoon making rice-crispy cakes, pop-corn and decorating the house, while the family made an enormous pan of rice and chicken. It wouldn't be any kind of event in Nicaragua without the speeches and Don Rogelio rose to the occasion with messages of love, God and happiness. After the speeches and food, the dancing got under way. In Nicaragua, people don't ask you if you enjoyed a party but rather if you danced a lot, which to them, amounts to the same thing. While dancing is obligatory, how much and how enthusiastically you do it is optional. Rachel stayed on the fringes while I did some hip wiggling and got challenged to a dance-off by Rogelito which was declared a draw after I replied to an impressive display of bandy legs and a bridge with my swallow-dive breakdance move. Rachel chose well to enjoy some calmer dancing later on.Our rice-crispy cakes turned out disappointingly crumbly but Rachel's brainwave of serving the mixture up in paper cones was a hit with the locals who luckily for us had mostly never eaten rice-crispies before so had no clue as to the poor quality of our party treat.

Conos en el aire!

It was great to meet the members of the family who live in Esteli and who we hadn't met yet and most importantly Marciel had a great 15th birthday party.

The other quincenera we went to was the city version, of the daughter of a good friend of our friend Nicholas in Leon. Firstly there was a church service with lots of smart people, the whole affair looking more like a wedding to our English eyes although we did only get there in time for the post-service photos. We managed to scrub up well for the do as is clear in this picture of Rachel looking fabulous, holding Naomi, a little friend in Leon.The party was quite a contrast to the Sontule celebrations- in a reception venue rather than a front room and with a higher budget reflected in the dress and cake and the dress on the cake.Of course material trimming really aren't the making of a party, that would be the people, the food and the music. And so it was that in both parties we enjoyed the company of friends, ate well, and danced to a mixed bag of Salsa, Reggeton and 80's pop (Oh for a night of good music!)Throwing some shapes.

The house is fine, but where is the kitchen?

2009-11-09T16:15:00.000-08:00

This house is in the rural village of Sitio Historico, a few hours east of the city of Matagalpa. There were quite a few identical houses dotted about (like the one pictured above), built of brick rather than wood and with a tiled roof rather than tin. We were told they had recently been built by a European NGO. It's easy to imagine the designer in Europe very pleased with how the design looked on paper, but out here things are a bit different and it's equally easy to imagine the Nicaraguan family entering their new abode only to glance around and say, 'donde esta mi cocina?'. Naturally, the new houses were designed with an internal kitchen but most Nicaraguan campesinos find this concept completely alien. Hence the fact that every single one of these houses now has a rustic wooden lean-to shack annexed on to the side or a few paces away at the back of the house. Not only that, but for most of the day the entire family can be found choosing to sit in the kitchen, leaving their beautiful new houses empty until bedtime.

Second-hand clothes

2009-11-06T18:37:00.000-08:00

There is a thriving second hand clothes market in Nicaragua, nowhere more so than Esteli. There are rows of shops just selling second-hand clothing and shoes, mostly shipped in from the US. Just as in the UK, some people are a bit too proud to buy second hand, but for those like us, with an eye for a bargain, it's a fun shopping experience with more interesting, quality clothes on offer than in the other shops (think branded shirts and spangly, clingy lycra tops).One of the biggest and most popular shops with a great range of stuff.

Here we are, sporting our newly purchased, second-hand shirts.

Unsophisticated shops need unsophisticated changing rooms.

Second hand furniture

2009-11-06T18:26:00.000-08:00

Chipboard wood-effect veneer, nasty looking computer desk: $90

Brown wood effect, vinyl-upholstered, dirty old armchair: $35

In Nicaragua, where very few desirable household goods are produced or imported, any old piece of second hand tat holds a value far above what it would in the UK (where we replace a sofa because we're bored of its colour). This second hand shop in Esteli had a selection of furniture outside which could easily have been salvaged from a UK rubbish tip. Here it has the same price as new items available in IKEA. This is too expensive for most people, which is probably why on the whole, people aren't too bothered about having fancy things in their homes and most front rooms are furnished with plastic or wicker chairs and not much else.

The friendly police of Nicaragua

2009-11-04T18:09:00.000-08:00

One of the lovely things about Nicaragua is the friendly face of the police force. Since we arrived four months ago, we haven't once seen a police officer throwing his or her weight around but we've seen plenty of friendly coppers pottering around on bikes, chatting to people on buses or sitting around smoking a fag at big public events. Just like the army and other public institutions, the police force had a complete overhaul after the 1979 Sandinista Revolution. Now they really do seem to be of the people and for the people. In most of the other Latin American countries we've passed through the police has had a history of being a repressive, militant and highly corrupt organisation which is still reflected in the way they interact with the public. In the UK of course, we have a delightfully friendly police force, apart from the occasional racist and the entire traffic police.

The Nicaraguan police are occasionally accused of being ineffective, and they do take small bribes for traffic violations, but on the whole I think people realise that they're a lot better off with a friendly police officer that they can chat to, rather than the violent, abusive, oppressive fascists currently being suffered by their neighbours, the Hondurans.

Legally, motorbike drivers are supposed to wear a helmet, but it turns out that a baseball cap or any form of covering on your head classes as a 'helmet'. There are also no rules about passenger's headgear, you often see mum, dad and child squished onto a motorbike, or bicycle for that matter. As you can see from the chap on the red motorbike, the police on the whole aren't exactly on the ball in enforcing this law.

We had to put a photo of David the policeman on, just because he makes us chuckle. When we left Pearl Lagoon in the Caribbean, he spent a good half hour very seriously and officially recording our details onto a sheet of blank, white paper with a biro. When we returned a few days later on a quick speedboat stop-off, he shook our hands and greeted us like old friends. He asked Rachel again if I was just her friend, and when we announced we were getting married in September, he gave up on her and asked if we had any female friends who would be interested in him. He asked us to take his photo to show them. He ran off to write down the police station number for any interested girls, but sadly while he was gone, our boat departed.

The good and bad of music in Nicaragua

2009-11-02T19:04:00.001-08:00

This is one of our favourite songs from our time in Nicaragua. It's a lovely folk song which we think would make a great replacement for the dreary national anthem. The words have been conveniently translated into English for non-Spanish speakers.

Bizarrely, most of the Western music in Nicaragua is at least twenty years old. There's an unnerving amount of poor commercial disco from the Village People to unknown lost 'classics' (see Best of Disco 1983). But the song we've heard more than any other on bus journeys across the north of the country is this slice of 80s classic soft-rock love cheese, by mullet-clad stadium rockers, Air Supply: Making Love Out of Nothing At All. The video is quite something.

Day of the Dead

2009-11-02T17:23:00.000-08:00

I have encountered 'Day of the Dead' or 'All Saints Day' a few times now, with mixed experiences. It's essentially a Catholic event, and was forced upon Latin American along with Catholicism when the Spanish invaded. I spent a morbid and woeful Sunday aged 16 in the graveyard outside a dusty village near to Salamanca in Spain with my Spanish exchange girl. The entire village gathered in the walled cemetery. The priest intoned for hours and my family cried next to Great Uncle Mathias' grave. It had been preceded by a couple of hours 'Santa Maria-ing' in the church and the whole thing nearly broke me. A few years later and I was in Mexico for 'Day of the Dead' - the celebratory and politically charged Mexican version of All Saints Day which incorporates the Aztec beliefs that your relatives return from the dead for the day. Kids dress as skeletons, offerings for dead relatives of their old shoes, their favourite food and drinks are placed outside each home to welcome back their dead relatives for the day. In Mexico City, the city's main square is filled with gazebos with different themes, one linking the day into highlighting childhood obesity and death caused by too many McDonald's, another on journalists killed because of their political views and investigations and this sort of thing. It's fascinating and a lot more fun than Spain.

So on to Nicaragua. A big part of the day seems to be about clearing up your relatives' gravestones. There is one cemetery for the dead people of Esteli and this is the day when all those who are still alive head down there. The cemetery is packed with families, and of course all the traders selling tortilla with shredded cabbage, fresh oranges to suck on, flowers, confetti, and oddly, sacks of sand to throw on the graves after clearing off all the overgrown grass. There were also young lads with machetes and muscles trying to make a few cordobas for those less inclined to do the clearing themselves. The tombs, which house generations of familial skeletons, ranged from the grandiose to the simple and moving, with misspelt names or back-to-front letters but lovely flowers.The poorer end of the cemetery. In the background, the names of the deceased are painted onto the concrete walls.

It was a really interesting and enjoyable communal event to go along to. Some people were obviously deep in thought, but the majority mainly seemed to be settled in for the afternoon to catch up with friends on what is a big social event in the year.

Flower sellers set up in the main square in Esteli.

Walking through town on our way to the cemetery, this friendly father also heading there, asked us if we'd like to take a photo of his trailer load of flowers and daughter because he thought it would make a nice picture.

Baseball

2009-10-26T16:34:00.000-07:00

Baseball is the national sport in Nicaragua. It's the game kids choose to play most often and there's Sunday leagues organised throughout the country. There's a number of Nicaraguan players dotted about the US major leagues and so this is where a lot of the spectating is done, via national and cable television. There is, however, a pro-league in Nicaragua in which four teams compete, playing in different cities around the country. I had a free Sunday so I decided to check out a game in Esteli where Oriental were playing Chinandega.
I had been here previously with Rachel for the Catholic radio song contest, and there were a lot more people on that occasion. This time around there were several hundred people sat on the concrete seats in the big iron stand. I paid $3 to get in, but received a free upgrade to the covered stand when the sun started shining on the seats that I was in. I chose to support Oriental, because they had bigger bellies and bigger mullets and a nice grey and red kit. As it turned out, most of the people from Esteli were supporting Chinandega and they were the better team. Four hours was quite a long time to watch baseball and most of the scoring seemed to come from mis-fielding and a bumpy infield. There was an impressive array of goodies on sale, including ice-cream, beer, crisps, chips, barbecued meat, sweets, gum and fags. I followed the game to the bitter end, which Oriental lost 15-11 by being worse than Chinandega. The winning team congratulated themselves and, for those who understand it (I just about do), the scoreboard in the background shows the story of the game.

It was an interesting trip out, but I'm looking forward to returning to the football ground a lot more than I am the baseball ground.

Real Esteli 2 Walter Ferreti 2

2009-10-26T15:54:00.000-07:00

Not since San Salvador at the end of June had I seen a live football match but with a free night in Esteli while a night game was on, it was definitely time to end the drought. Baseball is the biggest sport in

Nicaragua

with larger tv audiences and is the sport most placed by kids. Football though is gaining popularity fast as more people get access to cable tv and lately the streets of Leon are full of 5-a-side games of an evening. There are plenty of shirts or stickers around for Barcelona, Madrid or the top premiership teams. The national side have never achieved anything but there is a lot of interest in the success of neighbouring Honduras qualifying for the World Cup. The national league is basic but Esteli are one of the better teams and attendances have been boosted recently by the advent of floodlit evening games. The lights were brightly leading the way to the ground as I walked down past the funfair opposite the ground and into an impressive number of fans with a good showing of home shirts. The tickets were 3, 4 or 5 dollars and I went for the main stand luxury where my digital camera would be a little less of a novelty, though as it happened the whole ground was very safe and friendly. The pitch was grassy but clearly hard and uneven and the 3-sided ground was nearly half full with maybe 2000 fans and 60 away fans, all in good mood. Real Esteli, who play in red and white, are sponsored by Bimbo (bread) while Walter Ferreti, who play in red and black are sponsored by the police.Real Esteli fans behind the goal. The three banners from left to right read, 'In heaven or in hell, wherever you are, I will be!!!'; 'My old woman gave me life and The Train gave me my heart - Player number 12 is present'; 'Sometimes drunk, always with The Train'

A bonus was the sort-of-large screen showing live tv coverage of the match but with a good 5 second delay. This led to an amusing set of replays showing the crowd how skilfully an Esteli winger had managed to deliberately kick the player in the head who had just fouled him; the fans cheered loudly and the ref chose not to look. The official commentator used this phone as a microphone throughout the game

The first half went by in a blur of poor refereeing, with the away side looking the more organised and it was they who took the lead with a long free kick headed in by a running forward showing rather better timing and awareness than the Esteli defence. Free quick goes close for Real Esteli. Note the 'big' screen behind showing live action.

The most noise thus far came at half time as some uncomfortable looking lycra-clad girls were paraded around the pitch to promote a mobile phone company, to the whistles, lewd comments and laughs of the crowd, around 80% of whom were male.

The second half started like the first with the home side looking short of ideas and the lead was soon doubled as a run to the by-line and pull back was finished off with a neat low drive. Things were looking bad for Esteli.

I started chatting with a lad next to me who turned out to be a youth team player and mostly interested in which Chelsea players I thought were good. I’m not really sure he got the concept of me supporting a team from the fifth division as there is no real pyramid system in Nicaragua. I was interested to find out that the top player at the club earns $1500 a month and he was bemused to find out players at his favourite English club can earn over $100,000 a week. “Can you see them in the street?” he wanted to know, and “does Frank Lampard help the poor people where he lives?” “Not really” and “probably a bit” were the best I could do. He was happy to hear that the clubs help with community projects and there are good youth academies that are free if you’ve got the talent.

Back to the game and against the run of play Esteli pulled one back with 10 minutes to go, possibly directly from a free kick that went through a crowd of players. That was a signal for the fans to get excited and noisy and for the players to give it a go. Well into several minutes of injury time, or play-acting time as it is in Latin America, a long ball beat the Walter Ferreti centre back and, with the forward through on goal, the keeper chose to go for the legs. The ball nearly rolled in but as it was cleared from the line the ref pointed to the spot and sent off the keeper. After several minutes of stropping the penalty was put away and I cheered in genuine joy for the unlikely comeback of my new Nicaraguan team. There was time for Esteli to go close again before the whistle blew and it was the away team breathing a sigh of relief.

Video of last gasp equalising goal for Real Esteli

Man of the match was surely the Walter Ferreti left back and number 2 who caused most of the damage down the wing and tackled like a tiger too.

The action wasn’t over yet however as no sooner had the game ended than one of the Walter Ferreti players launched an attack on the referee who luckily saw him coming and sprinted away with a look of panic written across his face. Players from both teams then got very giddy and a few punches were thrown. This sparked a brief pitch invasion and the intervention of some helpful police officers to break up the melee. All in all it looked a rather fun pitch invasion and I was almost tempted to join the young lad who I had been talking to and who I now noticed was on the grass.

The video below shows the general confusion after the final whistle, with the referees standing well away from the action and, noticeable, standing near the bottom of the picture in his baggy shorts, is the youth player I was talking to. Unfortunately, I just missed the attack on the referee by the Walter Ferreti player whilst I was busy celebrating the comeback.

It was a fun end to a good match and a fine result for the boys in red and white. Hopefully it won’t be long until I’m back there for another game to support Esteli, ‘El Tren del Norte’.

Gender roles

2009-10-15T21:28:00.000-07:00

We're continuing with our Monday arts and crafts mornings, designing posters for rural workshops run by the women's organisation, Xilonem. This week, it was gender roles - how are they and how should they be?
This poster sums up a typical countryside scene. For the girls, it's dolls, dresses and washing clothes; for the boys, it's bats, balls and machetes. For the young ladies, it's virginity and sweetness; for the lads, it's getting it on with as many young ladies as possible - surely there is a paradox here? For the women, traditionally, it's babies, babies, babies, fidelity, sweeping the house, washing the clothes and preparing and cooking the food; for the men, it's land, horses, meetings, posturing and a few women on the side. Obviously, it's not all like this but many aspects of it are the reality for a surprising number of families. We're learning more about this with our time spent in the countryside and participating in the workshops in Sontule.

Simon depicted the happy scenes of caring and sharing. Notice how the woman chopping wood is keeping a safe, stretched distance from the log. Maybe he is keen to avoid her being weed on by a caterpillar and contracting a weeping wound on her neck.

Oh dear. A very big spider

2009-10-13T19:20:00.000-07:00

This horror is as big as a hand. It spent a good forty minutes on our bedroom wall in Lagartillo, where we were home alone on Sunday night. We spotted the beast by candlelight and were unsure what to do. I showed the photo to a work colleague today who thinks it is a dangerous poisonous creature. He isn't sure whether it is a scorpion or a spider though, which slightly detracts from his danger declaration.

When we spotted one another, and shone the candle on it, the beast shot into the corner of the room where it cowered behind a dissembled hammock. We cowered under the sheets and there was a stand off. I encouraged Simon to end this by somehow removing the spider/scorpion from the room using the hammock. He refused and fortunately, the creature had the good sense to leave of its own accord. It ambled upwards at a leisurely pace and disappeared over the top of the wall into the roof or garden. I think it's best not to consider how many of his or her type are lurking in the countryside here.

Lots more Nicaraguan nibbles (and Colombian ants and English flapjack)

2009-10-05T15:53:00.000-07:00

A delicious pure fruit orange and carrot ice lolly in Leon. This lovely cafe only sells these ice lollies. Nothing more. Nothing less. But they come in lots of tasty flavours, including watermelon, melon, coconut, tamarind, mango and rice pudding (which we realise isn't pure fruit, but it is natural and yummy).

By contrast, and contrary to its appearance, this is the most revolting drink and fruit you are ever likely to set eyes on - nancy, or to Nicaraguans, nancite. Fortunately, the season is finally coming to an end, as its been stinking out buses, street corners and restaurants for a couple of months now. This nasty berry is best described as 'vomit juice'. The berries themselves are chalky, cloying and taste of vomit. In a juice, with plenty of ice, the first sip is bearable, but then as you swallow it, the full vomit force comes to the fore. Jon (pictured below) has recently arrived in Nicaragua. We thought it best that he experience the juice for himself rather than rely on our judgement. The vomit flavour had a delayed reaction for him and he got several sips in before it hit. At this point, he gave up and we gave the rest of it to a street kid. We were told by the restaurant owner that it is the most popular fresh juice in Nicaragua and the boy was delighted with it. They can all keep it and we'll stick with the passion fruit and guayaba juice options.
Taking on a nancite juice is an unpleasantly memorable experience for any tourist. You have to be brought up on this stuff or live here for a good long time to tolerate it.

ESKIMO has a national monopoly on ice-cream. There are at least five ESKIMO's in every town plus lots of ESKIMO street vendors with carts. Flavour of the month is a bargain at just 7 cordobas (around 25p) a cone. Simon buys the flavour of the month at least once a day when he's in a town and knows in advance the date that the flavour is due to switch. The flavours of the month are currently fig and condensed milk (Simon pictured with this), strawberry or chocolate and vanilla.

Another chalky, moderately offensive fruit (although it has nothing on nancite) currently in season and popular with the locals called jocote. Sold in clear food bags on the streets with salt and chile sauce, its dryness tends to leave your tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth and other than that, the main points are coping with the excessive salt and chile. We have also tried the ripe stewed version of this fruit in natural yoghurt and it is definitely the preferable option.
Guayabas are in season and they're yummy. The trees are full of them in the countryside and their distinctive sweet smell and refreshing zingyness are a current highlight on our long walk to Sontule each week. Larger varieties, like the one pictured, are on sale in the streets of Esteli. People bite into them as we would an apple.
A couple of weeks ago in Leon, Nick cooked a bean soup with lots of 'trimmings' for a group of us. It was an ambitious undertaking given the heat and that everyone's soup was tailored to their egg preferences (poached/scrambled/fried). He managed the individualised frying pans admirably and the result was delicious.

The bean soup included a poached egg, fried onion and garlic, baby sweetcorn, cuajada salty cheese, green beans, peppers and avocado.
It was an early start for me in Sontule one day to make sweet corn tortillas, guirilas, with Lucia. Normal tortillas have the consistency of a dry dough and have to be 'palmed' into shape - forceful downward finger taps with one hand whilst simultaneously circular shaping the tortilla with the other hand. This sort of guirila is much simpler, it just needed a bit of swirling around the banana leaf with a spoon to form its circular shape. It was then cooked on the banana leaf on a hot plate over the wood-burning stove.

The warm guirila made a satisfying breakfast served with fresh cuajada cheese, made from curdled cow's milk from the farm.
When we're in Esteli, we like to go our local Mexican restaurant. Its delightful owner, Daniel (pictured above making Simon's burrito) proudly tells us that he is '100% Nicaraguense' but that he learnt to cook Mexican food from a wonderful Mexican chef years ago in Honduras.The food comes with an impressive array of extras - refried beans, lime, tomato and onion salsa, a minty and refreshing guacamole, hot chile sauce and tortilla crisps.
This bizarre fruit which grows directly from the branches of the tree is called jicaro. Its seeds are sold in a powder form to mix up with milk and water into a satisfying drink.
Waiting for the bus to Esteli one Sunday in a sweltering Leon, we ended up in the ropey, but air-conditioned, supermarket cafe. Simon picked out this rather large cake which I thought tasted overridingly of bubblegum.
Three months into living in Nicaragua and this is the first cooked meal that we prepared together for just the two of us one weekend in Leon when we were home alone. There's some good mince in the supermarkets, which bodes well for impressing our Nica friends with shepherd's pie.
There's a French baker in Leon and he does a good line in croissants and pan au chocolate.

I decided to made the most of a Canadian coffee roaster being in town to set up a coffee tasting session at Nick's to trial one of the cooperative's coffee brand's against the competition. Obviously it was far superior...if a little under-roasted. We're not about to drink it in this photo, we're smelling the coffee grounds.

We bumped into Simon's first language teacher from Lagartillo, Ermelinda, in Esteli the other weekend and were invited round for dinner to their place in Esteli. We thought the occasion warranted mum's flapjack and a bottle of red wine, both of which went down very well with Erme, her Colombian husband Luis and their son. Luis had recently returned from Colombia and had brought with him some roasted big-ass ants (one pictured on Simon's palm above). We had heard of them in Colombia but hadn't tried them. They were an odd experience. On first crunch they were crispy and a bit fried tasting but nothing more. As we continued to chew, a strong, burnt pork flavour emerged. I wasn't convinced but Simon ate a fair few.

We have now repeated the flapjack a few times for various friends and it's going down very well. It is particularly popular with Brenda and Candida, the cleaning ladies, at the hotel in Esteli. They requested the recipe, along with the lady who runs the pharmacy. We had a run through batch with them all.Sampling the finished product.

The Catholic Radio music festival in Estelí

2009-10-05T15:23:00.000-07:00

The local catholic music station in the north of Nicaragua organised a song contest and festival of traditional music held, at the baseball stadium in Estelí. We’ve been meaning to get ourselves to the stadium, but imagined it would be for a baseball game rather than a religious gathering. It was a little odd to be surrounded by so many people wearing their newly purchased merchandise – t-shirts featuring the holy virgin and the motto, ‘seeking the truth’. But it was also a nice family event with lots of food stalls, kids running around, and groups waiting to go on stage, largely dressed in cowboy hats clutching accordions or guitars. We entered the raffle, which was a bit pricey at around 80 pence per ticket, but we were excited at the prospect of winning the excellent prizes of either a bullock or a heifer. We weren’t entirely sure how we would tend to either of them in the hotel should we have struck it lucky, but we’re off to the countryside to visit a cow-less friend at the weekend and we knew she would have been delighted had we arrived with either. However, this all remained hypothetical. The first prize to be drawn for was the heifer and we didn’t win. The draw for the bullock wasn’t to be until later in the afternoon. A combination of the speakers being turned up far too loud, the singers warbling largely out of tune and the electricity intermittently cutting out, meant that we ran out of steam and left before the bullock draw. However, we did leave our hotel address on the raffle ticket stub, so just maybe a bullock will be coming our way some time this week.Sheltering from the sun in the stands with our English friend Jon

We concluded that although the event was an interesting spectacle, we’re more at home at the Sandinista gatherings with their black and red party flags, rousing revolutionary songs and a generous supply of rum and beer. A particularly passionate congregation cheering on their church's performance

Mini gay pride festival - Nica style

2009-09-29T12:39:00.000-07:00

Sitting working on my laptop on Nick's kitchen table in Leon along with the other Rachel and Carmela, we heard a great commotion coming up the street. Our Nica friend Carmela informed us that it was yet another saint celebration, this one for San Jeronimo. In Nicaragua, this means street processions and then on to the church. The San Jeronimo day has been adopted by the gay pride movement, albeit subtlety by the standards to which we have become accustomed. Still, amongst the dancing bulls, drums and marchers in matching t-shirts there was the odd cross-dresser. Impressive for a country in which a macho-culture is still so firmly embedded.

Genitalia, HIV-awareness and art therapy

2009-09-25T17:28:00.000-07:00

A couple of months ago we participated in a workshop on self-esteem in Sontule. It was organised for local youths by an Esteli-based feminist organisation called Xilonem. We were impressed at the content and how it was facilitated and offered to get involved. It's taken us a while to sort ourselves out and work out which days we'll be in Esteli, but for the time being, whenever we have a Monday or Friday free, we're popping down to their office to help out in any way we can. So far, it's involved us preparing posters for use in workshops in rural communities. On Monday, male and female genitalia posters were required. Rachel's lady bits

Fortunately, we had the help of a few text books and we were quite proud of our genitalia by the end of the day. Simon's man bits

We thought we performed fairly admirably given the presence of teenage boys in the room looking over our shoulders inquisitively (they were supposed to be preparing a theatre drama in the room next door). The finished article ready for action

Today, we've been designing posters on HIV and AIDs awareness. We're going to be participating in the workshops on this in Sontule next week. Despite the therapeutic nature of our art, we're excited by the prospect of getting out of the library and into the classroom.

The lovers are pretty impressive on this, although the man in the hospital bed was free-styling, whereas the rest were based on drawings.

Worth noting in this stunning poster is the huge, menacing mosquito, which may well suck your brains out, but won't give you HIV.

We're looking forward to going back on Monday and producing some more fine work around the themes of domestic violence and challenging gender roles for children (think boys playing with dolls and girls playing with hobby horses, which is a particularly boyish pursuit here).

Our base in Leon and our friend Nick

2009-09-25T16:58:00.000-07:00

We keep mentioning that we have a friend called Nick and that we are in Leon, so we thought it would be good to put a face and base to the names. It's a fun place to be, there have been a fair few parties and gatherings, the one in the photos below for the arrival of Nick's mum, who came to stay for a few weeks. The parties, amazingly, materialise from thin air. Nothing is ready, and nobody, including Nick, is there an hour before. But then, suddenly, the hardcore friends arrive and get out the brush, mop and bucket for a clean, re-arrange the furniture and bring half the food. All other guests, which include neighbours, Leon socialites, long-standing friends, and anybody else who fancies coming along, turn up with food and drink at generally the same time as Nick arrives home. It's a system that works remarkably well and all due to Nick's charming laid back hospitality and fantastic network of friends. We're here now for odd weekends and occasionally for a few days during the week. We're rarely the only people Nick has staying. He has worked with rural communities for many years, and anyone from these places that comes to Leon for work, pleasure, meetings or whatever, turns up at the house to stay. It's been lovely for us as we've met so many people and been invited to go and stay with them in their communities, such as Melana in La Rinconada. Nick and his girlfriend Rachel

We love having access to the kitchen and the opportunity to cook food, as everywhere else, we're staying in hostels or with families. Our biggest success so far has been a huge shepherd's pie, which had the Nicaraguans asking for thirds. Unfortunately, we have no photographic evidence of this. This photo features a delicious bean soup, cooked by Nick.Sobeyda (an actor and dancer) with her two boys, Bryan and Fabrizio.

Nick in his favourite hammock with Ale and one of his most impressive organising friends, Carmela.

Ambling around in Miraflor

2009-09-25T16:36:00.000-07:00

For the first time in a while, we spent a whole day walking in the countryside in Miraflor. We had been set a task of sorts by our friend Nick, to visit a coffee cooperative in Cebollal, a few miles from Sontule, to find out a bit more about the work the cooperative is doing in the area. We had some vague directions and got lost a couple of times, which was absolutely fine, as the high plateau of Miraflor is a beautiful area of cloud forest, farming and quiet, rural communities. After a couple of hours wandering along tracks, we came to the community of Cebollal where several tourist ventures have been set up with lovely cabins. It's worth mentioning that these would be highly suitable for any family or friends who want to come and visit us from the UK (we're still waiting for offers). We had a yummy juice at one place and then got shown around another, where we were too stingy to spend £3 each on lunch (the local rate is 50p), but did climb up a rickety wooden ladder to its view point.

All the farmers we were hoping to track down in Cebollal were in Esteli for a meeting, so we just had a little explore ourselves around an environmental centre, an orchid garden, a coffee tasting lab and a beautiful area of coffee planted beneath tall native trees. The coffee cherries were abundant on the trees but still green. They should be bright red and ripe for picking come December. Luck was with us at lunchtime, when we stumbled not only upon the perfect house for a delicious, locally priced lunch, but also the home of the only coffee farmer, Luis Romero, in the village that day. He had stayed behind because he was overseeing a workforce fixing the road. On his patio, flanked by coffee and banana plants, flowers and herbs, we chatted to him for an hour or so about the coffee cooperative and the traditional medicinal plants which he is researching and has re-introduced to the area. With Luis and his youngest daughter Carla.

We found a shorter but equally pleasant route back to Sontule, which was fortunate, since we arrived back at Rogelio and Lucia's house the very second that an almighty, three hour downpour began. Rather than sheltering from the rain, the family were outside capturing rain water in very high spirits, relieved that there was a reprieve from what has been an worryingly dry rainy season.

'Chilastra' strikes

2009-09-16T20:22:00.000-07:00

This began on a Wednesday as an unconcerning tiny itch and a little red mark. It appeared after carrying a big log to be chopped for firewood from the hill across the road from the house in Sontule. Over the next two days, it spread around my neck and in patches on my face.
By Saturday my neck looked like a nasty, weeping burn. It was very sensitive and I couldn't turn my head for the pain. It did provide a point of interest for the locals in the village we were in, who turned up throughout the weekend to stare in a fairly horrified manner until we told them that it was 'chilastra', which seemed to make sense. We're not sure exactly what 'chilastra' is, just that it's apparently caused by the environment, it's not very nice and it usually disappears after a week or so. Several people in Sontule claim to have had it, and while all agree that it's painful and unpleasant, the point was also made that I was lucky I didn't have it on my bottom like some unfortunate folks who would not have been sitting down or dressing for several days.Luckily, I had a willing nurse on hand to administer a number of remedies. The leaves I was given to chew on then apply, made little difference, tasted horrible and stuck to my wound. More successful was the freshly cut aloe vera that Rachel smeared gently along my sore patches. A week and a half on, the skin on my neck has scabbed over, peeled off and is now fresh and smooth after the kind of skin peel you have to pay a lot of money for in certain clinics.

La Rinconada

2009-09-12T11:32:00.000-07:00

La Rinconada is a community about an hour's walk from the nearest bus route. It is the home of our friend Melana who we have been saying we will go and visit. We were greeted by Melana on our first visit to Nick's house in Leon and have met up with her several times since in Leon and at the music festival we went to in Achuapa. Five years ago Melena had cirosis of the liver and was given a few months to live at only 35 years of age. She went with Nick to an alternative treatment center in Managua for acupunture and a consultation. After a complete change in diet and some medicinal teas, she's been in good health since and is going strong. Although she misses the odd bit of rum, fried food, salt or occasional cigarette, she loves to chat, dance, cook, clean, farm, look after her kids and campaign on local issues to improve the community. She also established the local nursery school where she continues to teach.

With Melana and Nino, who lives over the road and is one of Melana's pupils.

It was a relaxing place to be, which was lucky as due to my uncomfortable rash, I spent most of the time sitting or lying in the shade. The houses were built with the help of an international brigade, including our friend Nick and his parents, 18 years ago. They're nice and cool with brick walls and a tiled roof, rather than the more common wooden walls with a tin roof that gets very hot in the day. The house only has one bedroom which we shared with Melana and her two daughters. It wasn't luxurious but it was nice to be treated as one of the family.

The community has a plentiful supply of fresh water. All you need to do is wander 50 yards with a couple of buckets several times a day to fill them from the well.

On Sunday lunchtime the Sandinista party representative showed up to take photos and information from party members. The rep had travelled a fair distance on some terrible roads across the hills for the occasion, but after 5 minutes the camera ran out of battery and so it was game over for the day.
Having preened themselves for the party membership photos, the lads (chavalos) were keen to have a group shot, which we should be able to print out for them. Unfortunately, there is a decidedly macho culture in Nicaragua as the picture clearly shows. It's all about posturing and looking moody. Most of the lads above are perfectly friendly on a one to one basis and only act like moody gangster wannabes when they're together. The national chavalo uniform is simple to adopt - jeans, baseball cap, chains, with t-shirt and trainers for casual days and shirt and shoes for Sundays, or Rumdays, as they could be re-named here.
Sadly, we left a day earlier than planned, cowering in the shade as we waited for the bus, mainly to go and show my ugly rash to a pharmacist. Hopefully, we'll be back in a few weeks in good health and cooler weather to explore the area a bit more.

Tuna & a saucer; mayonnaise & a chair

2009-09-12T11:22:00.000-07:00

There still aren't too many supermarkets in Nicaragua, refreshingly they're not that big a part of life here. While the UK has a highly organised system of 2 for 1 and 3 for 2 offers, the marketing in Nicaraguan supermarkets takes a different approach. There's a table at the front of this supermarket (called El Hogar, although it's difficult to spot the sign) in Esteli, where small items are sellotaped to larger items. These range from sensible offers such as small olive oil sellotaped to big olive oil; to a saucer stuck to a tin of tuna; and a doll-sized plastic chair available to shoppers purchasing a jar of mayonnaise. We were tempted but we didn't need either so we just took a photo.

A brief introduction to Simon's life in Sontule

2009-09-09T13:22:00.000-07:00

Sontule is the name of the community in the mountainous national park region of Miraflor where I go for three days every week to teach English and learn about country life. Every Tuesday I catch a 6am from Esteli, which drops me off two hours later at a little village, from where I walk a further hour and a half along a track through the hills to the community. It's an early wake-up but a lovely, relaxing way to start my few days of work and to get straight into the pace of life out here - slow. I have a small and basic, but perfectly adequate room in the family house of Rogelio and Lucia.

There's lots of fluffy things around at the moment. The cat's had kittens and there are two sets of twelve chicks tweeting their way around the house and garden all day.

Lucia keeps a beautiful flower garden right outside my room. Last week I couldn't believe the number of butterflies darting around amongst the varied and brightly coloured flowers.

After a coffee and some sugary bread, it's time to head out and milk the cows with Rogelio. Rogelio's a good teacher and I'm getting a lot better, although this gets put into context when he starts milking, which is like a hosepipe to my weedy tap. This task is rewarded by my next breakfast of fresh, hot milk with the cereal I bring from town, much to the family's amusement, who cannot conceive how anyone can function on less than a big plate of fried rice, beans and tortillas for their breakfast.
So I help out in the local primary school every week, teaching Spanish to 7-year olds, and maths to 8-year olds. Although my Spanish is still rough around the edges, the content of the Spanish work is planned for me as I have half the class whilst the teacher has the other half. The teaching in rural Nicaragua is basic, almost entirely children copying from the board. I like to think I'm helping a bit by varying things at least a little with flash cards, re-arranging sentences, asking questions and encouraging as much participation as I can whilst helping little Cristofer, who usually gets left alone to scribble lines in his notebook.
Breaktime lasts the best part of an hour, during which, the children receive a tasty hot milk drink and some less healthy biscuits. The boys grab a bat and play baseball while the girls often playing a mysterious game, involving bouncing a small ball and picking up stones. The oldest boys seem pretty good at baseball to me, and all come to school with their own glove. I have tried to explain cricket several times to Nicaraguans and have completely failed.
Lunchtime is at 12 and after this I can be found doing any number of things, such as bathing using a bucket of cold water, fishing in a pond, preparing for a lesson, reading in a hammock, walking cows to a field or chopping wood for the stove. Jackson, pictured above, helps on the farm and is my teacher in all country matters involving manual labour. He is a fairly simple lad, with limited communication skills, but he's good natured and a dab hand with an axe, fishing line or horse.Jackson doesn't make quite such a good photographer - there is a log at my feet, which I managed to split.

Walking around the community is very enjoyable, soaking up the views, greeting passersby and enjoying the calm, friendliness of it all.

Professor Wallace at work.With my Thursday afternoon class who are currently learning about countries and nationalities along with the negative present form of the verb 'to be'. Everyone who comes to the classes is really nice and eager to learn, which makes the classes enjoyable and rewarding.

Right outside my room is a magnificent chile plant. This is a particularly fiery variety which I enjoy every night, pickled in vinegar, as an accompaniament, to my evening meal, which inevitably involves rice, beans and tortilla.

The people have welcomed me, the lessons are going well and I'm learning a lot about the farming here, which is all completely organic. I should be here until the end of November, with Rachel coming to join me for a day every week before we head back down to Esteli or another part of Nicaragua together for a long weekend. It's all working out pretty well at the moment.

The contrasting fortunes of Black and White

2009-09-09T13:17:00.000-07:00

This is Negro. He lives near to the house of Fermin and Rufina in Lagartillo. He is allowed to wander through the kitchen and receives plenty of tasty food scraps. He is a happy dog.

This is Blanco. He lives in the street in Lagartillo. Nobody likes him and children throw stones at him. When I asked them why, they said it's because he's nearly dead. He is a sad dog.

There are Negros and Blancos in every rural village in Nicaragua. It comes down to survival of the fittest and luck.

The turtle's head. And nothing more.

2009-09-07T13:11:00.000-07:00

We're not sure how this unfortunate fella met his end, but we found just his head lying on the beach at Las Penitas near to Leon. He still had lots of fleshy bits stuck on him. It could have just been an aquatic attack by a caiman or a carnivorous fish, or quite possibly, at the hands of local hunters - turtle meat is an illegal, expensive delicacy here along with raw turtle eggs.

Horses, rings and girls at the village fete

2009-09-07T12:58:00.000-07:00

We were back in Lagartillo a few weeks ago for the annual village fete. It attracts quite a crowd from the surrounding villages who mainly arrive on horseback. We arrived in time for the main afternoon event - the Corrida de Cinta (Ribbon Race). This involved men mounting their horses, and galloping, one after another, towards a rope stretched across the road with a collection of loops of ribbon dangling from it. With a chopstick-style stick in hand, they had to spear a ribbon as they galloped past. If they slowed down, they were booed and disqualified. The rounds of galloping past the ribbons were repeated for around an hour until all the ribbons had been speared. Whoever collected the most was the champion and could choose a lucky lady to ride off with him on his horse. In fact, anybody who had speared a ribbon selected a glamourous lady from the crowds lining the track to gallop off back to the village with them.
Competitors gather ready for a round of high-speed horseback fun.

Oswaldo was among the least graceful but most entertaining and charismatic riders as he was mocked and jeered by the crowd as he approached at a relatively pedestrian pace every time but still failed to tag a ribbon.
Ker-pow. Got one!

Successful competitors with their dishy damsels.

The next day at the nearby viewpoint.

Music and Solidarity in Honduras

2009-08-29T20:22:00.000-07:00

The National Movement Against the State Coup in Honduras.We heard about a music festival, with artists from across Latin America, organised in protest against the military coup in Honduras. It sounded like fun and we wanted to find out more about the situation there so we set off with a group of friends representing Nicaragua, the UK, the US, Taiwan, China and Sierra Leone, in solidarity with the Honduran people.

Briefly, for those interested but uninformed, on June 28th the Honduran military arrested the president, Manuel 'Mel' Zelaya, sent him off in his pyjamas to Costa Rica, and won't let him go back. From outside, it is hard to know what to think as huge sums of money are being spent by unknown big businesses to pay for lobbyists and to ensure media coverage is scewed. It has been implied that Zelaya wants to be 'another Chavez' (which might not actually be such a bad thing in the eyes of people who can see beyond a strongly pro-capitalist western media) and that he was ousted because he was illegally looking to be re-elected. That angle, which was accepted by mainstream media, is a huge exageration and distortion of the truth. In fact Zelaya is a moderate reformist who was asking for the country's opinion on future amendments to the constitution which was written in 1982 by the military and could not possibly have allowed him to stand in the elections this coming November. The main reasons for the coup are of course money and very rich people, as is the case with nearly all state coups. Zelaya wanted some state ownership in a totally right-wing owned media and importantly, he achieved a significant increase in the basic wage (can't find hard figures but around $5 per day). In 2005 the president of Haiti was overthrown for supporting an increase in the minimum wage. Since then the military have assumed power (illegally) and looked to control opposition to the leadership by shutting down media, removing freedom of speech, resricting movement in the country and violently disrupting peaceful protests. Of course, the lobbying happens in the United States which is where all the trade flows on the back of a poorly paid workforce. And while Obama speaks out in support of democracy, Hilary Clinton bad-mouths Zelaya, US aid continues to flow and the US military happily carry on as normal in their Honduran bases.

Enough with the politics for now; this is what we got up to in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, last Sunday.
It was nearly a six hour journey each way from Leon in the north of Nicaragua to Tegucigalpa but it's not too arduous when travelling in the back of a pick-up though some lovely scenery from the coastal flats, past great volcanoes and up into forrested hills.
We were half expecting to be turned back at the border or at one of the military checkpoints on the Honduran main roads, so were pleasantly surprised to make it all the way to the capital and find a well-organised festival underway on a sports field of the University (which importantly is autonomous from the government).
The festival was flying under the banner of Voices against the Coup
.There was already a healthy crowd around by early afternoon, despite the fact that poorer people from outside the capital cannot travel in the country and an increasing fear of the police and military. Luckily, this peaceful protest had been allowed to go ahead, although radio coverage of the event was pulled halfway through.No festival is complete without a bit of merchandising. This man had optimistically turned up with leather hats, Honduran flags and some random ankle supports- presumably just because he had some lying around in a box at home, rather than specifically targeting people injured by military beatings.
There was lots of talking to be done with the good people of Honduras. In the middle of things in this picture are 2 Rachels, Nick and Albert, making connections and getting the low-down. Several spokespersons for the movement against the coup are dotted about, and on the right is a man with a mightily impressive belly. Apart from news of human rights violations, there were more positive messages also. Mant citizens of Honduras have been fairly docile for years, happy to believe what they were told in the media, but now realise they have been reading gross lies compared to what they have witnessed with their own eyes, and it's leading towards a new age of awareness. As was very evident at the festival, the middle classes are joining the movement against the coup in great numbers as the truth becomes obvious that Zelaya was representing the majority while the current leadership serves only a very small and very rich majority.
Umbrella-ella-ella. Not Rhiana and no sign of rain either, but there was plenty of fierce sun to be avoided.
A more impressive merchandising venture was offered by students. Rachel joined hundreds of others in buying her blank t-shirt from a big pile for about £1.30 and then taking it to be silk-screen printed right there and then with a fetching design.
Voila! A blury t-shirt. Actually a blury photo of a clear t-shirt- it must be pointed out that our photos were mostly taken on my phone as we didn't risk taking our camera in case it was confiscated and that it was accidently on low-resolution. Some of the better pictures were taken by friends.
.The crowds built up and everything passed smoothly. There were some good bands so we managed a bit of a dance, mainly to professional, traditional folk groups in the afternoon. There were also some inspiring speeches, which Rachel had to mostly translate for me, and an impressive turn on guitar by Zelaya's daughter. As the evening drew in, the crowd were also addressed by the man himself, desposed president Zelaya, by a telephone link facilitated by the radio station, which may well have been the moment the transmissions were pulled.
We had an enjoyable and fascinating day out and were sad to be leaving while the concert was still in full flow, although the Argentinean hard rock band that were hitting the stage were not quite to our taste. Still, a six hour journey awaited, which again passed painlessly, with a clear starry night, some singing and a good splash of rum.

A lunchtime spot in Leon

2009-08-29T13:41:00.000-07:00

There is less of a fussy divide in Nicaragua between inside and outside and between who can and cannot cook and sell food. It is quite normal for anyone to prepare a spot of lunch and set up a table outside their house, or invite you inside, to eat it. Typcially, it consists of some sort of stewed meat, beans, tortilla, salad and a fresh fruit drink of something like lime and dragon fruit, all for less than £1. If you have a car, and it fits in the house, then logically, you bring it in too, like in this yummy lunchtime spot in Leon. The kitchen at the back has a double bed in the corner. Simon awaiting his lunch in the family home.

More food

2009-08-28T14:10:00.000-07:00

Rice, beans, tortilla and salty cuajada cheese continue to be central to our diets, particularly when we're in the countryside, but there's lots of other delicious alternatives on offer too.

A takeaway lunch in Matagalpa from an organic cafe opposite the coffee cooperative's office. I opted out of having meat with this feast of tortilla, beans, cuajada cheese, beetroot and potato salad, shredded cabbage and carrot salad, and a tomato and onion salsa.
Walmart strikes again. Pali is the biggest supermarket chain in Nicaragua, and along with another one, La Union, is owned by Walmart. As is ASDA. Argh, they're taking over the world.
A rich bean soup, sometimes with the offer of scrambled, poached or hard-boiled eggs mixed in with it. Simon opted for chips with this one in a Cuban restaurant in Esteli.
Anything that can be done is done with maize/corn in Nicaragua. These are similar to really sweet, toffee popcorn but less fluffy.
An amazing looking dragon fruit, which is very good in juices with lime.
A big birthday cake carried through the dark in Lagartillo by Balta to a 15th birthday celebration. There aren't many sweet treats in the countryside, but when a girl turns 15 it is a big event.
Corning from the cobs fresh maize with Rufina in Lagartillo, in preparation for making tortillas. A surprisingly tough job.
A sweet guirilla tortilla made with a sweeter maize variety, very delicious and makes a change from the usual savoury ones. Served with fresh, salty cuajada cheese.
This looks like pureed potato but it most certainly is not. This, of course, is a maize-based dish of ground maize mixed with milk, water and sugar, called atol. People eat bowls piled high with it, which if you've been out in the fields all day like they have is a good idea, but if you haven't, you quickly feel like you might explode. That said, in smaller portions it is a tasty treat. There's a deliciously ripe mango in the background on this photo too.
Eating ceviche with Rachel in a friend's mum's house - fresh fish marinated in lime juice with chile and onion. A refreshing snack and it reminded us of Peru.
A grizzly Simon on the streets of Managua eating a greasy bunuelo - a deep-fried dough ball dunked in a sweet, sugar-cane syrup. Very tasty and very unhealthy.

Singing at a rural town festival

2009-08-27T16:25:00.000-07:00

This was a couple of weekends back now but it being our first, and perhaps only, festival appearance, it's worthy of a belated blog entry. Near to the community Lagartillo where we have spent a couple of weeks and where the language school is based, is the small town of Achuapa. Our friend Nick knows lots of people here and works closely with the local farmer's cooperative which supplys sesame seed oil to the Body Shop for its cosmetics. This meant that somehow or another, we were 'connected' to the festival and a performance of some sort or another was expected of us. The annual arts festival began nine years ago, and participation by all seems to be one of its overriding features. The festival kicks off on the Friday night with the 'Golden Festival' for performing old timers who played the fiddle, sang and danced. The Saturday festival began around 4pm and went on until 2ish. The silk blazer band.

It involved anyone who wanted to get up on stage, from local children's dance groups to a rock band from Managua and a brilliant Nicaraguan singer-songwriter Salvador Cardenal. Together with our friends Nick and Rachel, we sang Nina Simone's, 'I wish I knew how it would feel to be free', which was probably bearable only because of Felice's fantastic effort on the piano. I fought off the urge to be sick or run away before we went on stage, translated the fourth verse to the audience of a few thousand people, because the words of the song are incredible, and actually quite enjoyed the whole thing. We were back up on stage later on as backing dancers doing a side step shuffle whilst Nick played the piano. We sat down for the next part when our American friend Rachel dazzled everyone with her impressive Irish dance moves.

Small festivals beware, maybe we'll start looking for more places to put in a performance. Simon during one of his more inspired moments

The festival did sum up something special about Nicaragua - music and dance is a big part of people's lives, and no matter your ability, you are encouraged to get stuck in and are treated as equals. The most talented musicians don't seem to put themselves on a pedestal here and the audience does its best to be enthusiastic about everything.

A new photographer

2009-08-18T16:19:00.000-07:00

In the lovely village of Lagartillo, our camera was borrowed by one of the many delightful children. We were impressed with 6-year old Cynthia's efforts, which include all of the photos below.

The beautiful sky

In our matching festival t-shirts

The trees

Simon's headless etch-a-sketch man. Cynthia didn't recognise it as a person, just as 'clothes'.

Neighbour, Helen

Negro, one of the better presented dogs in Nicaragua

The photographer, Cynthia

Cynthia's feet

Lagartillo

2009-08-04T16:22:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago we spent the week living with a family in the rural community of Lagartillo. They have set up a small scale language school, with one-on-one tuition in people's houses and a determined effort to get their pupils involved in the community and up to speed on the Sandinista Revolution and the history of the community. Simon is back there this week for another week of classes. Whilst Simon went to classes with Ermelinda, I focussed on learning about food. With the help of the extremely patient Tina, starting at 6am, I learnt to grind maize, shape it into flat, round tortillas and place them carefully onto a hot plate. My first few efforts were a flop, and although I got better, there are still a few tricky bits which probably make all the difference between a successful or a disastrous tortilla and Tina discreetly avoided entrusting me with these tasks (further grinding of the maize with a stone rolling pin; adding water to the maize to the right consistency; flipping the tortillas). Tina's stove

I also learnt to make this fresh, salty cheese called cuajada. It's just fresh milk, a bit of water and a mysterious clotting tablet left together for a couple of hours and then with both hands in the milky, watery tub, you slowly squidge the cheese together and squeeze the water out, and then lift it out of the tub, knead it like bread and form it into an attractive lump. Again, there's lots of skill to this, where if I were to try it myself, I would end up with bits all over the place; it was only under the guidance of Tina that it all seemed simple. Rice, beans, tortilla and cuajada cheese make up the staple diet here.

Having made the cheese, and given that I grew up on a dairy farm and have never done it before, I decided this was the week to learn to milk the cows by hand. It turned out to be surprisingly tricky and exhausting. I assisted a lad who does this every morning. He grabbed two udders at a time, squeezing one and then the other, as though he were flicking a tap on and off. I tried and after a good amount of tucking on the weathered, wrinkly udder, a piddle of milk shot out at an angle and hit him in the face. I got marginally better, but were we to have relied on me to milk the four cows, I would have been there all day with milk curdled in the heat by the end of it all and me in a heap.

Lessons weren't just in people's houses, they included planting coffee trees, lopping down weeds and overgrown grass with machetes, playing football and walking through beautiful countryside to a lovely waterfall. There were lots of semi-solid cowpats in this field.

This looks a little half-hearted but that's just the photo treating me unfairly.

All were suitably impressed with Simon's diving technique.

On the way to the waterfall

Kids from the local community sang traditional and revolutionary songs to us one night. They're part of a group in the village who are gathering popularity in Nicaragua. They're playing at a small music festival we're going to this weekend in their nearby town of Achuapa. (We're also expected to sing at this festival. We practiced 'Jackson' by Jonny Cash and June Carter this weekend, but we were sounding pretty ropey and there's no chance to practice again, so we'll just have to try our best to merge into the crowd and avoid the stage)

We also went along to a few English classes at the local school. I taught them the English classic of 'We are Derby, Super Derby, Super Rams', which they quickly got the hang of and hopefully are still singing. We have a video of this but our laptop has gone wrong and so I can't reduce it and load it up.

There is so much more to say about this community but I'll leave it there for now. Simon can write a more inspired update next week.

Matagalpa

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This is Matagalpa, a bustling town in the mountains in the heart of the country's coffee growing region. We were first here a couple of weeks ago, and I'm back this week to begin work with a coffee coop that has its base here, Cecocafen. If all goes according to our semi-plan, I'll be back here for 3 days a week for about 5 weeks over the next few months. It was pretty cool and stormy when we were here last time. This week it's sunny and hot with lots of mosquitoes. We found a nice local park with this impressive mural marking the entrance to a short commando slide. The down side of the park was its efforts to provide a zoo. The cages were all far too small and thoroughly miserable.

Moving on and changing themes, the main square pays homage to the fight of the Sandinista revolutionaries in 1979 with this statue surrounded by Sandinista and Nicuaraguan national flags. 'SADRACH' can just be made out written on the pink wall to the right of the man. I was feeling quite sad when we first arrived here and I discovered my i-pod had been stolen. Seeing this sprawled all over the town didn't help to improve my mood. It is either the name of the current mayor or a mayoral candidate for the next elections. SADRACH is everywhere in Matagalpa.

In the hills

2009-08-04T13:03:00.000-07:00

I was much more comfortable on terra firma, than I was climbing 30 feet up a ladder in strong winds to the rusty, old viewpoint (below).

We spent last week staying with a family in a community called Sontule up in the mountains in the north of the country. The whole area is now a nature reserve which should help prevent more deforestation. Most families have small plots of land growing coffee, in amongst banana plants and jungle-like forest. The scenery is stunningly beautiful with undulating green mountains, covered in forests and dotted with rural houses and farms for as far as you can see. We have failed to capture this in any of our photos but hopefully, Simon will do so at some point as, from next week, he's going to be spending three days per week here teaching English to children and a youth group that wants to learn English for tourism.

The 'village' is set around a big hill. It takes about an hour and a half with lots of walking up and down to circumnavigate it. The houses are all spread out and have no mainline electricity or running water. Better off families have houses with several rooms built with concrete breeze blocks and tin roofs; poorer houses look like they only have one or two rooms and are built from mud, wood and straw, maybe with an old tin roof. The toilet is a drop loo, smelly affair at the bottom of the garden. The toilet. Not too bad first thing, but full of big, buzzing flies by midday. More bearable with the door open.

The view from our bedroom window of a coffee plant with green beans, they should be ripe and ready for picking come December.

There's one bus a day to the community when it's not too wet, otherwise it's walking here from another bus route two hours away, or horseback. There was lots of rain while we were there, so much so, that to get back down to Esteli, the bus had to stop and put chains on the wheels to stop it sliding off the muddy tracks and down the mountain.

As seems to be the case in the countryside here, most people are related to one another in some way and extended families either live together or opposite one another. We stayed with Don Rogelio and his wife Dona Lucia and their youngest son, Rogelito. Their other children, brothers and sisters, and nieces and nephews, all live nearby and drop in regularly.Simon in his borrowed jumper to stave off the morning and evening chill in the mountains, with Dona Lucia, Don Rogelio, and two of their sons, Rogelito and Marlon.

The slightly better off families, like the one where we stayed, have a solar panel which powers a tv with a terrible reception for a couple of hours in the evening, when everyone gathers around to watch very melodramatic Colombian soaps. The kitchen is in a separate building to the house and meals (rice, beans and tortilla are the staple foods) are cooked using firewood.

The village has a small scale tourism project, which consists of a trickle of tourists coming up, staying with local families and getting to know the community. We realised when we arrived that 'getting to know the community' was a bit vague, and we weren't really sure what we were going to do with ourselves for the week. In the downpours of rain, I was beginning to resign myself to reading my book for the week. However, things seem to have a way of working themselves out in Nicaragua. Particularly as it seems to take so long to do anything by my usual standards (e.g. 1 hour waiting while the chains are put on the bus half way down the hill; 40 minutes walking to reach the one shop in the village; 20 minutes trying to work out how to get water out of the well to have a shower and 10 minutes psyching ourselves up to tip the freezing water over our heads whilst squatting in an outdoor cubicle in the rain). View from the kitchen to the rarely used outdoor oven with the pig, roosters and hens pottering around.

Days start and end early in the countryside to make the most of the daylight. Most people are up by 5.30am and in bed by 8.30pm. Nicarauguan breakfasts are savoury, typically consisting of rice and beans (gallo pinto), sometimes with a grisly piece of meat. Dona Lucia was fond of the frying pan and on our first morning prepared for us deep fried tortillas stuffed with cheese, accompanied by a fried egg. I couldn't cope with this for anymore mornings so I played the foreigner card. This was fine, I think Dona Lucia concluded that we were typically odd and on subsequent days we given a less hearty, but more digestable biscuit/stale bread and fresh mangoes with black coffee that was only bearable after about 3 teaspoons of sugar. Other meals were far more delicious, a highlight being a fritatta made from various vegetable leaves, herbs, egg and flour. Hopefully Simon will learn how to make it. The family's pig, with a wooden, crossed contraption around its head. I haven't spotted a use for this yet but there must surely be one.

We soon got stuck in to weeding the vegetable patch and learning about different plants and herbs; going to the local school and teaching the hokey cokey to 6 year olds in their haphazard PE lesson; attempting to teach a Spanish class (oh dear) and maths to troubled children who the teacher preferred to separate from the rest; going to a workshop run by a feminist organisation on self-esteem in which, much to my amusement, whilst worringly everyone else took him seriously, Simon proclaimed in a group exercise that his character defect was being 'dangerous' (peligroso) rather than his intended one: 'lazy' (perezoso); getting lost in the hills trying to find viewpoints; going to introduce ourselves to a heavily pregnant lady a few miles away who we had heard had an inspiring vegetable patch. All in all, it was a great week and I feel pretty envious of Simon going back there each week. Part of the family's beautiful, flower-filled garden.

Celebrations in Managua

2009-07-24T11:57:00.000-07:00

Through a combination of intermittent internet connectivity and leaving our camera in Leon we have been slow to update the blog. We have, however, been very busy and have lots to write down. For the moment we're making use of some photos taken by a friend of ours (another Rachel- an American working in Nicaragua) to record our fun weekend in Managua, the capital of Nicaragua, to join in with the celebrations marking 30 years since the people's Sandinista revolution.Waving the Sandinista flag with Rachel.

We knew all about the celebrations- it was the question on many people's lips in the weeks leading up to the 19th of July- 'Are you going to the Plaza?'. On the 19th July 1979, the country was finally officially liberated from nearly 50 years of rule by one right-wing family. The years of Somoza rule saw nearly all the wealth and resources of Nicaragua end up in the hands of the family's private companies and channelled out through the USA. It was the end of a bloody revolution which had seen Somoza's airforce carpet bombing cities in the North, and brave Sandinista guerrilla fighters, supported by the poor farming families, pitted against the American trained National Guard; old rifles and home-made bombs against high-powered machine guns and rocket launchers. Unfortunately this was not the end of the suffering as throughout the 80's the US government, with money channelled from arms sold to Iran, and private backers, funded the Contra rebels in an attempt to destabilise the Sandinista government (destabilise meaning the rape, torture and large-scale massacre of thousands of innocent villagers). But the victory did lead to land reforms, freedom of speech, health, education and roads for rural communities and eventually to a peaceful democracy.

We arrived in Managua on Saturday with our English friend Nick and Rachel and stayed with Belkis, a Nicaraguan journalist friend of Nick's. We set out in the evening to check out the set-up in and around the main square before all the hoards arrived on Sunday. Between bars, we had a wander round the plaza late on Saturday night when there were aleady plenty of stalls set up selling tacos, barbequed meat, t-shirts, hats and flags. We were joined by more friends of Nick, a Nicaraguan family, and one of them, Pedro, gave us an animated and fascinating tour of the revolutionary sights, including the tomb of Carlos Fonseca, the founder of the FSLN, the Sandinista party.

The next day we joined hundreds of thousands of people in the main square in melting heat to listen to Daniel Ortega, the president, give his annual speech. It was a rousing affair, speaking out against the American intelligence agencies, their participation in the Honduran coup and their setting up military bases in Colombia. He made the distinction between US foreign policy and the US people, which was fortunate for us, as we look like Americans and he even offered some support for Obama. It was a great family atmosphere and most people were there for the day out and the celebrations rather than pinning on every word of his speech. After it was over, the band started up and the sound of thousands of noisy bangers filled the sky. We joined in, dancing around and were received warmly by the fellow partygoers. We were offered shots of a strong spirit, aguardiente, by a group of lads, and were given a Sandinista flag to wave, by another group, who wanted their photos taken with us. As the crowd dispersed, we made our way back to Belkis' mum's house, which had been turned into a bar for the weekend. We met more entertaining and increasingly drunk Sandinista revellers there and our Rachel was given a t-shirt by Rigoberto, who ended up too drunk to speak, while the American Rachel received a Nicaraguan flag. We headed to a crowded, outdoor basketball court surrounded by bars and stalls where a local Sandinista youth group had set up a stage and organised a musical line-up of impressive quality.

With American Rachel, Nick and Belkis waiting for a band to start.
We had a brilliant night listening to some really good, politically charged music, waving our flag and dancing with lots of locals. It was an inspiring and fun day, sharing in the recent history of the country, getting an insight into the importance of politics for the people, and being welcomed so warmly into a giant, friendly and fun-loving community.

A shop sign in Leon

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After a couple of beers, we had to look at this sign several times before realising that it was simply a mouse and mouse lead.

Granada

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Lots of horse and carriage ride options for tourists. We also spotted a couple used as hearses during our time here, with black lace on the horse, a black carriage and the family and friends walking behind to the church.

Things are taking a while to come together here in Nicaragua. With a few different options in the air and nothing happening fast, we decided to leave Leon for a few days and head for the tourist hotspot and beautifully restored colonial city of Granada. The cathedral on the main square

A lovely hotel. We didn't stay here.

It certainly has some magnificent buildings and good, international restaurants but it was all a bit touristy and expensive for us. However, should any of our friends and family come to visit, it is lovely and relaxing and a good starting point for volcano treks and island boat tours. It would be a good place to visit.

Granada lies next to the enormous Lake Cocibolca, otherwise known as Lake Nicaragua. Close to Granada are hundreds of small islands, reachable by boat tours or hiring sea kayaks, both of which turned out to be surprisingly pricey. We're suddenly getting even stingier now we're setting our sights on living in Nicaragua for a while, rather than just travelling through. Instead, we opted for hiring fairly rickety, but bargainous, bikes for the afternoon, and set off by ourselves to explore along the lake. This was our definite highlight. We had a great time bumping along stony, dusty tracks past banana plants and squished mangoes, under the shade of mango trees and past tiny, rural settlements. We eventually arrived at a deserted bathing spot which had a shut up restaurant and nobody around except for a tortoise ambling across the path and lots of sand flies. We quickly got into the water to avoid being bitten and yearning for refreshment, but we disappointed to find it was the temperature of a bath. As we swam out past hundreds of tiny, jumping fish we found the odd cool spot. The setting was truly beautiful, we spotted a variety of water birds flying amongst the rocks and lush greenery with the waters of the lake stretching for miles beyond. We took an alternative route back into town, which led us up a fairly steep hill. We stopped for a drink at a local place and were invited to sit in wooden rocking chairs outside their shop/house and chat to the family as we quenced our thirsts with a couple of ice cold colas before heading down at dusk back into Granada.