Reflecting on the Summer Vols

The summer volunteers from session 1

Leading a summer volunteer session with Andrew Hemby was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had this year. From May to June, we hosted our first group of volunteers, a group of 9 students and recent graduates from all over America. They constantly challenged and encouraged me with their enthusiasm and work ethic, and their humor and good nature kept me in high spirits for the whole month. Summer Sessions, I came to realize, meant sharing a house with twenty people and handling and coordinating ten new schedules, but the tradeoff was the privilege of getting to know some new friends!

One of things I really enjoyed over the course of two months was taking a group of summer vols to partner with House of Hope, an organization that empowers former/current prostitutes by employing them in a bead-making program that provides alternate income. Each Tuesday morning, I went with a group of girls to volunteer at this nearby nonprofit. We sat with the women and helped make the beads made of wrapping paper. The results were pretty awesome, and I know all of the volunteers who worked in this program were touched by the women and girls they met. We spoke with the owner about Nicaragua's sex trafficking issues and were all shocked by the intensity of the problem. Young girls are sold into the sex industry, generations of women in the same family make a living out of prostitution, and the government does little to nothing to stop this travesty. I only regret it's the end of the year and I have less time to work with this organization and learn from the women who work here every Tuesday morning.

The summer volunteers were very helpful with a range of programs. The first group attended our Child Sponsorship field trip to Laguna Xiloa and kept all of the children entertained and safe in the waters.

Summer session one also organized all of our donations to get ready for the Clothing Sale held in Cedro Galan during session two (more on the sale in another post). This was a huge (hot, sweaty, smelly) task as we did it outside one morning, but everyone was positive and helpful in organizing the clothing.

Both sessions enjoyed meeting the people we work with in the nearby communities of Cedro Galan and Chiquilistagua. Our friends at 13.5 hosted a dinner, and the antics of the chavalos didn't disappoint!

Leah and I had great helpers in our Children's English class. Here are our session two volunteers with the kids. Thanks guys!

One of my favorite things about summer volunteers was the opportunity to see Nicaragua all over again through their eyes. The following are some of their photos:

THANKS Summer Volunteers!!!

23 days & counting...time to live it up.

Tuesday morning found me light-headed, weak-bodied, slightly sick...I stayed it this mode until Wednesday afternoon. I guess Kid’s English perked me up. Perhaps it had something to do with making silly faces with Marcos. That always lifts me up.

(despite appearances, this kid always makes me really happy)

Thursday heralded the month of July, and the month of July meant 23 days left in Nicaragua. Thursday meant three more weeks left in the place I’ve called home for the last 12 months. All this time I’d been dreaming of home (family, friends, American food, aiiiiir conditioning, etc etc) and here it comes...REALITY CHECK! Realizing “the end is near” must have kicked my butt into shape. Walking around on Thursday in the community, I realized it’s time to live every day as if it were my last (in that I don’t pass over any opportunity) and also the first (in that I bring that same enthusiasm to each and every moment as I would have during my first days here). I also want to start blogging more about my last days here so as to shed more light on my day-to-day. So here goes.

THURSDAY.

Thursday morning after Chureca as usual, I went to my last Comedor. Comedor is a time where all the kids in the Cedro Galan are invited to have a meal, and we come to help serve/wash dishes. After Comedor, Manna hosts “Tuani Hour.” As this wasn’t my designated day to wash dishes and/or plan Tuani Hour, I went to visit friends who live in the community. I ate fresh calala ice cream and walked down the road to pick mamones at my friend’s sister’s house. All of this was completed in time to join in the last bit of Tuani Hour fun - an art class involving sketching faces. I had some very interesting interpretations of my face done by a few mischievous students. Next my friend Mayquelin invited me to see her pictures of her recent Quinceanera party. The girl was decked out princess style with a huge pouffy pink dress and a tiara. Absolutely gorgeous. I told her so, too.

After these adventures I walked down to 13.5 where I was heralded with the “You don’t visit us enough!” greeting. I made myself a promise to come back as much as possible and spent the rest of the afternoon playing SET with Maycol. Great game. Great boy.

FRIDAY.

With both of our cars out of town, Daniel & I figured we’d try our luck and see if the kids wanted to walk from Farito to the Library for our usual Library hour. We walked from our house the back way to Farito, a dirt road passing families, dogs, chickens, beautiful hills. Greeted by a group of ten little ones waiting our arrival, there were mixed emotions about the walk to the library. In the end, walking won and off we went. I mostly chatted with the girls, held hands, learned about their schools (they’re on winter vacation now for the next week), and then raced across the field to beat the boys to the library. After an hour or so of reading in the Library, Armando and I were off to pick mangoes. And then we were all off to an afternoon of soccer before the long walk back. According to my promise, I detoured on the way home for a 13.5 visit and more SET.

The night didn’t bring much scandal or interest, but I did learn to play desmoche, a Nicaraguan card game reminiscent of Jin Rummy.

SATURDAY.

Today I went to a soccer game held nearby in which the girls from 13.5 played (and won, might I add). Leah and I convinced the Lesther and Marcos, two younger brothers of a teammate, to accompany us. Their shenanigans didn’t disappoint. Lesther and Marcos are always full of energy and Marcos kept passing me nancites (disgusting fruit) of which I ate a few before declining the others. People here love nancites; from what I know, gringos usually don’t. There are plenty of other Nicaraguan fruits - mamones, jocotes, icaco, mangoes, pitahya - which are absolutely delicious.

I promise to have more reflective/interesting updates in the future. I just wanted to get the scattered details of the last few days on paper...well...on the blog.

Happy Mother's Day!

In celebration of Nicaragua's upcoming dia de la madre, we dedicated two "tuani hour" classes this week to crafting Mother's Day gifts. On Tuesday, we wrote and decorated cards and made bracelets. Today, we took photos and decorated picture frames. Here we are, hard at work...

However, apparently today wasn't just about celebrating mothers. Look at what I found one of the chavalos busy crafting...

In case you need a closer look:

Finally, a translation: "Jan I hate you a lot and I hope we continue like this"

No. Words.

Jan Maggi

Vamos a la playa!

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to go to the beach with some of my fellow PDs and a new friend visiting Kelly. Little did I know I'd be sharing the sun with...

COWS!

This certainly made for an interesting day at the beach. This whole situation made me chuckle... hope you enjoy the photo!

Love,

Jan Maggi

Just because.

Today was a rough day. I got some bad news.

I went on a walk to clear my thoughts. As I made my way down to the library for "Farito" homework help, I decided to visit some of my English students. I stopped by my home-stay family where I was reminded about some upcoming birthdays. Next, I visited a newer student's house for the first time. Her mom runs a venta, a store, and this little girl always has the cutest earrings. One time, after I complimented her on her fun yellow square studs, she showed up at the next class with a pair for me! I've heard this is very Nica (i.e. compliment someone and then they'll give you whatever you complimented them on), but it had never before happened to me. It's a touching, uncomfortable place to be in when someone gives you a gift and you don't know how to begin to pay them back (as we so often feel the need to do after a gift is given). Well, during my visit today, my student's mother showed me her store and pointed out a few stacks of earrings for sale. Remembering that she wanted to give some to the other teacher (Leah) and wanted to let me pick some out myself, she asked which I liked. Indecisive as I am, and unwilling to take away the earrings but unable to pay, I said I loved them all. Next thing I know, my precious student and her mom are insisting I take the whole package of beautiful butterfly earrings. Just because.

A little kindness goes a long way. This made my day.

The Earth's pretty super tuani, if you ask me...

This “semester” we at MPI have all been trying out something a little different in place of what used to be our Art class. It’s called La hora tuani, cool hour. Basically, this is a time where the PDs on a rotating schedule can take an hour and teach the kids anything that they find particularly cool. So far, there’s been guitar, kids’ yoga, popular dance, pancake-making, and science, among other things. This has been a cool time (ha - literally) to expose the Farito kids to a wide variety of topics and ideas, experiences and experiments.

So...what do I find super tuani? So super tuani that I’d want to spend not one Tuani Hour, but two playing around with the subject at hand? The environment! Conveniently enough, today is Earth Day, and with the whole world in celebration, the Farito kids, some fellow PDs, and I joined in this week with some pretty tuani activities.

To get them in the spirit, we spent Tuesday making posters to advertise Earth Day and talked a little bit about why the Earth is important. We also talked about how we can take care of the planet, with the kids offering some helpful suggestions (Plant trees! Put your trash in the proper place!). We spent the second half of class making that classic kid pleasing dessert, dirt, except instead of combining oreos, pudding, and gummy worms, we used oreos, flan, and sour gummy worms. It was festive! It was very real looking, but I have a feeling that with so many deviations from the normal recipe, it was unfortunately very real tasting as well.

"Dirt" cups...a little too real

The main event, however, surpassed all expectation. Thursday’s class was completely dedicated to a community clean-up. We showed up today to see over twenty chavalos ready to don gloves and bag trash! They quickly scampered about the dirt roads of Cedro Galán looking for trash, even asking for more bags to fill. In the end, we bagged 26 bags of trash in less than an hour! It was so much fun and so successful that I hope we do it again soon. After all, every day is a great day to take care of the Earth!

little hands, big help!

Do something great for the Earth today!

- Jan Maggi

Bad News/Good News

Lately I’ve been pretty depressed with the world news. 21 people were killed in Thailand’s red shirt anti-government protester movement. Colombia’s using child informants in a civil war they deny exists (i.e. “If we’re not in a civil war, we can’t possibly have child soldiers”). A former human rights lawyer and judge in Moscow was recently murdered by Russian nationalists. Poland’s President and other officials died in a plane crash. Rio de Janeiro is literally underwater with 229 killed by the recent flood and countless buried in mudslides. Sex abuses scandals rock the Church while earthquakes rock the lands of Haiti and Chile.

It’s so easy to remain isolated from these events, for these places to seem remote, for these people to be only numbers. I’m thankful to be living abroad because I am constantly reminded that there is more to life than my comfy, cozy, little world at home.

There’s more than sipping Starbucks while reading the NYTimes, jogging through the park, studying all day, lunch on the go, dinner with friends, studying in the library, and repeat. To put it in perspective, even here in Nicaragua, there’s more to life than Elena’s delicious meals, driving in the Micro to programs, Chureca, Cedro Galan, Chiquilistagua, dinner with the PDs, reading NYTimes online, Skyping sessions, watching the sunset, and some version of repeating this day after day. Yes, these are the little routines that make life, life. But there’s always something more, and for some reason, living abroad helps me focus on that more that’s out there, even if that something more is the depressing news that makes you wake up and realize that life isn’t always what it should be. At home and abroad, people are dealing with the same problems: domestic violence, teenage pregnancy, illiteracy, lack of infrastructure, poverty, homelessness, racism, sexism...

If that’s the “bad news,” what’s the good news? The good news comes in the form of people and institutions who say no to the problems of the world. I am impressed with the work of friends in the Peace Corps and USAID. I am impressed with what my friends are doing abroad and at home and even in the Vanderbilt/Nashville community. Those stories encourage me to seek solutions and to keep hope. This year I have discovered that a life dedicated to service doesn’t necessarily mean a career dedicated to nonprofit or humanitarian work. Everyone can act out service and social justice. Advocacy comes through awareness, and that is something everyone can and should seek.