Dengue Fever

7 November 2013.  Nicaragua, including our own city of Leon, is currently suffering from an alarmingly high incidence of dengue fever.  This mosquito-born illness is very serious, so mosquito control is a high priority in Leon these days.  Here is a picture of our street taken just as the insecticide fogger was finishing the treatment of our house.  The fog coming out of our front door was so intense it stopped traffic in the street!

Casas de Justicia

The World Renew evaluation team visited the CCDH (Christian Center for Human Rights) local office in Matagalpa.  Each of the CCDH local offices is called a Casa de Justicia (House of Justice).

I stopped to take this picture of the sign at the office door and noticed that a final "A" is missing from the end of Matagalpa.  "There wasn't money in the budget for another A" they explained.

Then we visited the Casa de Justicia in La Dalia.

Followed by a visit to remote El Cua, where the CCDH office was jammed with clients and justice promoters. 

And finally we visited all the Casas de Justicia (there are 3!) in Jinotega.  These women are the lawyers who do all the legal work and guide the non-lawyer promoters. 

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Volcan Masaya -- Be Careful Where You Park!

On October 27 we visited Volcan Masaya with Sue Carlson and Luke Theule.  They had come to Nicaragua to assist in World Renew's triennial evaluation of CCDH (Christian Center for Human Rights).

Volcan Masaya is very active.

It is constantly emitting steam and sulfurous gases.

You can drive right up to it in your car.

Just a couple years ago it burped out some boulders that crushed a car in the parking lot, so we can no longer park at the caldera's edge.  Instead we have to back in about 50 meters away so we can be ready for a fast get away.

I was sad to have to return the hard hat at the end of the visit

Caught Between a Cow and .... WATCH OUT!

3 October 2013. On Monday Peggy and I were driving back from Managua to León after a day in classes with the Dordt College students.  Two Nicaraguan passengers were in the car with us. We were going up a long and winding grade on the two-lane road.  Ahead was a tractor trailer rig going about 65 kph, slow but not crawling as is often the case.  Behind us was another tractor trailer rig who clearly wanted to go much faster than 65.  I was sure of that because I could read his Honduran license plate in my rear view mirror.

As our tight little pack came around a blind curve I instantly knew there was going to be trouble.  A cow was walking into our lane from the right shoulder.  The truck ahead of me braked quickly and pulled to the left.  I braked and looked in my rear view mirror.  Clearly I was not going to hit the cow, but it wasn’t clear that the massive truck behind wouldn’t roll right over us.  In the mirror I saw billows of smoke coming up from his tractor tires as he braked really hard and veered to the left.  WE were the biggest obstacle in his path.  I saw an opening -- I accelerated and jerked to the right, escaping onto the shoulder.  Thank God there was a safe shoulder right there, because more often than not there isn’t on these roads.  The truck in front continued on.  We zipped around the cow and back onto the road without even stopping.  The tractor trailer behind us had the most difficulty of all recovering from his evasive maneuver and still dealing with the cow who continued in his direction.  Well, we all survived – even the cow. As soon as the road and traffic allowed I passed the slow truck ahead of us and sped on, hoping to never see that Honduran plate in the rear-view again.

Gracias a Dios.

Students, Cohorts and ... Professors?

3 September 2013. We’ve been really busy the last few days.  You wouldn’t know it from reading this blog, of course.  From the blog it looks like we’ve been totally absent for a couple months—which we were.  For 8 weeks we visited family, friends and our church in North America and generally took some time off.  In that time we studied no Spanish, breaking our self-made promises to do so.  But, so I told myself, I was letting all that Spanish I had learned earlier sink in.  And that turned out to be quite true, as much of it has sunk so deep that I can no longer dig it up.

Anyway, now we are back in Leon.  This past weekend 7 Dordt students arrived.  They are taking a semester abroad to study in Nicaragua.  They’ll be living in Leon, and we’ll be somewhat involved in their program. Part of our volunteer responsibilities is to offer them a place to drop in from time-to-time (like the 3 sitting in our living room now), some mentoring, and a weekly time of pizza and spiritual discussion using Geography of Grace by Rocke and Van Dyke (a recommended read, for sure).  But more than that, we (both Peggy and I) are going to be attending their History and Culture of Nicaragua class and assisting Professor Joel Huyser as discussion leaders.  The plan is that we will take over full responsibility for the class next year.  This is going to push us a bit. 

For the last few days the students have been involved in orientation and moving into their new Nicaraguan host family homes.  Now they are finally settled in and starting classes today.

At the same time, a Missioner Cohort arrived and is settling in to her host family home.  This young woman is Nicaraguan, but has been living in Costa Rica with her mother for the last 6 or 7 years.  Our other Missioner Cohort is a young man from Michigan.  He arrived earlier and has been studying Spanish since June.  

You must be asking, What is a Missioner Cohort?  This is a year-long volunteer position offered by the Christian Reformed Church to folks who want to live in an intentional community of spiritual study, prayer, work and play to support the community of Christians in León as they (the Leones) seek to better engage their neighbors. The Missioner Cohort opportunity is brand new, and we are charged with helping to make it work well.  It’s a good chance for folks of all ages to experience what cross-cultural ministry is like in a developing world context while growing in spiritual discernment. You can find out more about it here:  http://www2.crcna.org/pages/servicelink_intNIC_cohort.cfm

So our formal Spanish study has ended, and now we are feeling our way forward not only in our Spanish language and Nicaraguan culture adventures, but also in this new multi-faceted role of walking alongside these 9 students and missioners.  We are excited about the prospects and not a little intimidated about the challenges, especially this future “professorship” of Nicaraguan History and Culture.  But, we have already started reading.  It’s like going back to school ourselves, but with a much different perspective.   

Cloudburst

3 June 2013.  After living in León for five months with barely any precipitation, it has finally begun to rain hard.  Just a few nights ago we were enjoying dinner with a couple friends in our neighborhood Mexican restaurant.  Can you imagine the temptation of living less than a block from your favorite Mexican restaurant and less than 2 blocks from your favorite pizza restaurant?  We have become regulars.  But back to the rain.  It began with bangs of thunder and within seconds it wasn’t just rain, it was a cloudburst.  For a few minutes the sound of the rain hitting the roof was so loud we had to shout to be heard.  As the rain continued, we relaxed, enjoying the fresh scent and the instant coolness brought by the rain while we waited for a break in the cloudburst so we could walk home.

When that break finally came, we made a dash for home.  But when we got out on the sidewalk we could see the streets were filled and gushing with water.  It could have been a delight to wade into it, but all I could imagine was how dirty it was.  The torrent was carrying away all the city’s accumulated dirt, litter, filth and, well, let me just say the leftovers from all those cart-pulling horses that use those same streets every day.  I was actually fearful of what might contaminate me if I stepped in the water. 

But we were committed, and when we found the spots where the water flowed the shallowest, we waded in and crossed over the streets.  In a minute we were home, refreshed from the rain and the adventure.

I’ve been thinking about that.  It struck me how the cloudburst and the rush of water was like the grace of God that rains from heaven.  About how there is so much grace gushing out that it is sufficient to wash away all of the accumulated trash, filth, and decaying things of a whole city—even the whole world.  And when the city has been washed clean, it is freshened by that very same grace and prepared to sprout new grass and leaves, to become verdant, to produce new life in abundance.

In our church baptism, a symbolic outpouring of God’s grace, is done with a sprinkling of water.  But the next time I see a baptism, I will be thinking of this cloudburst.  How the water gushed in such abundance that washed away the entire accumulation of filthy stuff and left the city not just clean, but also renewed and ready to spring forth in abundance.  That’s an image of God’s grace that I will remember.  

Subtle Changes

Last night as we walked home with our to-go pizza from Antonino’s Pizzeria we got a little wet in the rain, the first rain we have felt since we arrived in León in November. It lasted less than 30 minutes, but it was refreshing.  So refreshing that when we got up this morning and went into the garden, the fresh air felt a little chilly at 27 degrees centigrade.  Chilly at 27?  Good grief, that’s 80.5 fahrenheit.  We have begun to acclimate, and just in time.  They say April is the hottest month here in León.

Another subtle change is happening.  I did not notice it coming, but suddenly I saw it one morning this week as we walked to our Spanish school. When we rounded the corner and turned westward, it struck me that the pedestrians were no longer all walking on the south side of the street.  They were walking on both sides of the street.  As they always had done before, all the people were still walking in the shade of the buildings.  But now the shade is distributed almost evenly on both sides of the street.  Of course!  The spring equinox just occurred a couple of weeks ago, and the sun now appears virtually overhead, north of the equator for the first time since we moved to León.  Soon we’ll all be walking on the same side of the street again—the north side.

The Last: Bat Falcon

8 March 2013.  The last half day of birding at El Jaguar (more than a week ago already) brought us 3 new Nicaragua species and 2 more life birds.  The Strong-billed Woodcreeper looks like a giant-on-steroids version of North America’s Brown Creeper, but my favorite bird of the trip was the last lifer, Bat Falcon.  A stunning black, white, and orange bird, this small falcon zoomed through the sky like an aerobat, catching and eating insects and—was that a bird it just ate?—other creatures on the fly.  For a moment I thought the falcon was a white-collared swift, but no, it was bigger and had those cool looking orange legs and belly that flashed at us when it banked the right way.  It flew around and around above the openness of the coffee plantation, giving us plenty of time to enjoy the show.

In all we found 15 new life birds and another 23 new for Nicaragua.  With so many others remaining on the reserve's list, we left El Jaguar with lots of reasons to go back again someday.  The fact that the chigger bites did not exceed the total number of new birds was an added bonus.

By the way, if you shop at Whole Foods in the US, you can buy El Jaguar's coffee.  It is sold under the Allegro brand name and is labeled "Nicaragua El Jaguar."  If you try it, you'll be drinking the same delicious and bird-friendly coffee we heartily enjoyed during our stay at El Jaguar.  The birds will thank you for it. 

Los Pinos

Today we visited Los Pinos, the pines, north of San Rafael del Norte.  The terrain was much like the pine-oak habitat of southeast Arizona, but rather more open because the land is used for cattle grazing.  It seems most of the green and black warblers of north America like this habitat.  We saw Hermit, Townsend’s, Black-throated Green and Grace’s warblers, all in the pines.  We missed the Golden-cheeked, but it’s sometimes found there, too.  Other birds were the highlights of the visit, though.  Black-headed Siskin, Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl (for Peggy), and Lesser Roadrunner were the lifers.  Later, at man-made Lake Apanás, we found a group of Grassland Yellow Finches for the last lifer of the day.

We have one more half day of birding here at El Jaguar.  We clearly aren’t going to make my goal of 25 life birds, but we already have 13 and that is quite respectable I think.

The Chlorophonia Show

24 February 2013.  In two days of birding at El Jaguar we haven’t seen as many life birds as I had dreamed, but we have certainly seen enough to keep our spirits high.  So far we have seen 9 life birds and another 11 species we had not previously seen in Nicaragua.  Not bad at all.  

The most fun today were the very small Blue-crowned Chlorophonias, 3 of them, seen very high in the forest canopy sitting in a little window of direct sunlight in the lowering late afternoon sun.  Their lemon yellow bellies and fluorescent green heads and wings glowed neon-like in glorious contrast to the shadows cast by the leaves surrounding them.  The show of light and color was especially satisfying because we already today we had twice missed seeing this species, and we only found this threesome by craning our necks and scanning the canopy for many minutes, searching in the general direction from which we heard their cooing song.  As each of us finally fixed on the birds, each in turn “wowed” at their brilliance.  They were, quite literally, the highlight of the day

The Subjunctive Holiday

23 February 2013.  We are making progress.  I’m just sure of it.  We have to keep reminding ourselves – we’re making progress.

This afternoon I am sitting on the porch of our cabin for the weekend.  We are in El Jaguar Private Reserve, where they both grow shade-grown coffee and cater to birds and birders.  There is no internet here, so it will be days before this gets posted.  I am looking out over a narrow valley.  On the down slope in front of me are coffee plants, banana trees and flowers.  On the opposite slope is a beautiful forest.  It’s quiet now, all the birds are taking siestas, too. 

We are taking a holiday from our studies.  For the last five weeks we have been hitting the Spanish hard.  Trying to learn, understand, and remember the subjunctive tense has been making us tense.  It has not been an easy time lately, but we are our own worst problem.  We talk to each other in English instead of Spanish.  But I have to say, after 4 hours of class each day I need a nap, and then when I’ve finally finished my homework, I really feel ready for bed.  It seems the only relaxation time we have is when we speak English.

But I know we are making progress.  When we arrived at El Jaguar, we spoke several minutes with the young man who greeted us before we learned he speaks a little English.  He will be guiding is in our birding the next few days, and I think it may actually be easier for us all to communicate in Spanish.  At least as long as I’m not required to express my thoughts and desires in the subjunctive. 

We already have one life bird for the day, Plain-capped Starthroat—a hummingbird.  The bird list for the preserve includes as “common” 37 more species that would be lifers, plus another 22 that are merely uncommon.  Let’s see, if we see only 40% of the common and uncommon life bird candidates, we would have seen (this is in some kind of subjunctive, by the way) about 24 species.  And we are also going to visit some other spots that feature other interesting new birds.  So I think an ambitious target of 25 sounds good.  Only 24 more to go.  Time to hit the trail.