Some rich plot of land on an island, Volcan Mambachu, algo Conquistador, Las Isletas, Granada, Granada, Lachy with the kids, moustache vs. beard, Vine Climbing; Telica, big corn vs. little corn; Corn Islands, on top of water tower; Corn Islands, Corn Islands,

Viva Leon

In the early morning of a typical thursday in Leon, I walk by the scenes that have become familiar to me walking around before 9am. The old lady selling some kind of bread derivative, followed by a young lady posted on an ideal spot on the corner selling bags of delicious fruit for 10 cordoba a piece (50 cents). Street vendors are unloading their carefully boxed bootleg cd´s and dvd´s, and arranging them on displays, these go for 20 cordobas a piece ($1), and span a wide range of quality. Taxis drive by honking, for what I´m still not sure. They seem to honk at you, the gringo, as if saying ´I know you guys dont walk.´Sometime thisd is accompanied by a full stop and gestured hand motions, paired with nnverbal mouthings of something akin to ´come on, you want the taxi or what?´ As if you are too dumb to even realize you want a taxi. I cross the street, careful not to get hit by any of the wild aforementioned taxi cabs, springing to the other side of the street which is shaded. In many places the difference between walking in the shade or under the sun may be nominal, but here in leon it will completely change your little foot excursion about town- from a nice albeit hot leisurely stroll through the shade, to melting in a pressure cooker and collapsing about 5 blocks down. I walk into Big Foot hostal, my favorite in the city and where I stayed a few times, to drop of my very dirty laundry that is in very serious need of being cleaned properly. If you wanted to continue walking, you would pass by Via Via, another hostal which tomorrow night will have live music. Tonight the music is at Olla Quemado. Turn the corner at you will walk by the movie theatre, which is actually quite nice. The theatre usually has 3 or 4 movies going at a time, and you could buy a ticket, popcorn and soda for something approaching $5 US. During the day there is a hobbled over old woman begging, usually roasting in the sun as opposed to the security of the shade opposite the movie thatre. At night there is a gang of street children jumping around and begging for money as you exit the theatre. I suspect some are high off glue, and yes they do sniff glue as well as god knows what else to get high. These children are who Quetzaltrekkers, the organization I´m volunteering for, is trying to help. The other day we took a group of ten or so kids to the beach, which is about an hour from here by bus. They were all crazy and full of energy. some of the attention we were giving them on this day is the most they would have all week. We brought kids from the older half of the Las Tias Project, ranging from 13-18. Although they all looked like they were about 9 years old, from the malnutrition they have had. I think some of us trekkers are going to the beach today, minus the kids. Chris is guiding El Hoyo, which I was originally scheduled to do but I had to pull out, because I didn´t sleep at all the night before as I helped guide the Full Moon hike, which is once a month and starts at 11pm and goes until the next afternoon- no sleep. I managed to wrangle about 3 hours of sleep at the Quetzaltrekkers house, which is equal to about 3 hours of sleep in a frat house I´d imagine. Living in the house is like being back in college, noisy and fun. Chris and I were scheduled to do El Hoyo back-to-back, but I had one of the newer volunteers take my place today and I´ll join Chris Saturday for the hike. All this writing is making me hungry, might be time for another leon tradition we have, going to Comedor Lucia and getting a nice plateful of food for a little under $2.

Paradise Found

(Disclaimer; Sorry Mike, followers, I have to do it. I wrote this account on the beach and thus feel compelled to publish it, even though mike already summarized most of what i will say. just read one, his or mine, or read them both and put together the pieces. :))
Although it took us four days. Each day only adding on to the expectations crafted for the island we now find ourselves on. Thankfully, it lived up to them all.
We started on sunday in Leon, our new home away from home. the antigua of nicaragua if you will. the revolutionary, left leaning, artsy, university town that mike and i will call home for the next two months. we catch a bus to managua, nicaragua´s capitol. like all central american capitols, its big, intimidating, dirty and hurried. Managua, especially spread out after never really being rebuilt from the damage done by an earthquake in the early 70´s, was no exception.
we catch a bus to El Rama, the small port town up river from bluefields. bluefields is the town where the boat to the corn islands, are ultimate destination, leaves from. of course this town can only be reached by boat as well. i knew this, and thought that we could make it to el Rama, and catch the last boat to bluefields that same day. but the 7 hour bus ride to el rama was indeed 7 hours, and by the time we got there it was dark and rainy and even if boats left off schedule, we would not be fortunate enough to be offered this exception. we would have to stay the night. we ended up having beers and dinner with a couple from oregon at the kingston discoteca in el rama, and got our first taste of a corn island native by meeting a carribean from there who gave us the low down on the boat situation. the boat from bluefields to the corn islands didnt leave till wednesday, which is what our handy resource guide book told us, but we decided to disregard. it was only sunday, the boat didnt leave till wednesday, and our scottish freind from Leon, who flew, was already on the beach.
we woke up the next day and waited at the dock for several hours before catching the hour long boat ride to bluefields. we arrived, FOB, and were immediatly greeted by a friendly Garifunan eager to get his surcharge by showing us to the right hotel. at this point, indifferent, not naive, to the fact that we might pay an extra dollar just to be escorted to a hotel we could find on our own. mike and i have grown accustomed and quite effective at shaking off this middle man service, but this time we conceded. like our homeboy from livingston, guatemala´s equivelant of bluefields, Spicer was afro-carribean, rasta-like, here and there toothless and ultimatly a begger. unlike ´alex the great´ from livingston, Spicer didnt have marijuana tattoos scattered throughout his body, nor an immediate exposed reputation as a theif and often spoke about his family, ´job´ and his affinity for jesus. we accepted him as less shady, although i am not so sure he deserved this more benovelent impression. he talked about music; peace, love and then war. he told us about his days fighting as a Contra and the weapons he was offered as a little boy to kill the ´communists´. here mike and i were, fresh out of a FSLN museum in Leon, central americas revolutionary capitol, shooting the shit with an ex-contra. amazing.
we were able to shake of spicer eventually, but not before asking us for money. this was our first refusal of many, as we would spend the next two days actively fending off begger after hustler after mugger, gunning for the cash of the new white boys in town.
bluefields is a shit hole, never go there.
its´people is supposed to be its´ asset. the immense mix of ethnic groups; black creoles, meskitos, mestizos, brisith whites all share a common home. but the only piece of the diverse pie of people here we were approached by was crack addicts, prostitutes, drunks and street peddlars. we couldnt leave our place without being the only 2 fat cow gringos stuck in bluefields before the wednesday boat that needed to get cheated before then. every step we were grabbed, mobbed, begged and virtually assaulted. what little small talk i did make resulted in their eventual confession that he or she had originated from the islands. i thought, ´´great, is where we are going the source of these degenerates?´´ thankfully this is not the case, and little corn island is 100% void of its shaddy offspring. long story short, our 2 nights in bluefields we spent in nocturnal seclusion, playing cards on our porch, cursing ourselves for not flying.
the 5 hour boat ride to the islands was a mess. the cabin was like an eboli clinic. kids crying face down in their own vomit, parents arnt helping because they are sick and throwing up too. islanders get sea sick?
i couldnt take it, went outside and hung on to a railing for dear life as the boat battled wave after wave en route to the islands. mike stayed in the emergency room and later admitted that he too was paralyzed by the ominious power of sea induced nausea.
we got to big island not knowing if we were going to stay there or boat it to the small one. we caught a cab on the only road on the island, that circles it completely, to a hospedaje that apparantely offered camping for a nominal fee. the woman tried to charge us $10US to camp and we knew we could get a room for 15, so we hit the trail, prematurely searching for the paradise we were looking for, not knowing that it didnt exist on this island, but only on little corn. this woudnt be a problem if every half hour the sky wasnt dropping torrential down pour. but it was. we scurried on foot to various points of shelter at each commencement of rainfall, while looking for a cheap place to gather oursleves. when we did, we realized we had one more boat ride ahead of us, to little corn, the next morning.
we woke up on the big island, ran across the air field, reserved a flight back so we would never have to do the aforementioned voyage again in that fashion, and hopped on the 30 minute boat ride to little corn. sure enough, waiting at the dock with us, was the German speaking Swiss newylwed couple we had met on top of el tigre, at El Mirador. this excursion, mind you, was 60 km into the jungle, over a month ago, and almost 500 miles away in northern guatemala. here we are getting on the same boat with them on the carribean side of nicaragua. if its a small world, then this region is miniscule. i am telling you, the 6 degrees of seperation reduces to about 3 when you are traveling, as you constantly run into familiar faces all on the common trail.
Little corn island is shaped similar to another island floating along the atlantic, this much bigger, and yes, Palin proponents, actually a continent; Africa. you get dropped off at the dock on the SW side, at lets say Angola. we followed the signs to beach front hospedajes inland, and ended up on the other side, lets say Somalia. this entire east coast of the island holds beach front hotels with bungalos and cabanos literally opening their front doors to the crystal clear, calm and glistenig water. there are no cars on this island. the dock side, where the village is, has a school, a few tiendas and restaurants that compete for the cheapest lobster in town. our spot, is completely self sufficient, as it harnesses its power daily by wind turbines and solar panels. most of the island seems to operate like this as well.
on the north side, lets say Morrocco, some of the nicest places to stay are, with cabins on stilts, on soft grass fields, right before the white sand that leads to the beautiful turquiose water. most beaches are deserted and you can spend a whole day circling the island by beach or exploring the trails inland. right next to the baseball field, where little corn vs. big corn battled eachother on sunday (oh yea, baseball is big in nicaragua) is a lighthouse. it rises at least 10 meters into the air, and mike and i climbed its steep metal ascension to find the one true panoramic view of the island. breathtaking view for an enchanting place.

bring your bug spray

small region, big history

Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua.
three countries that consecutively line the pacific ocean. three countries in a slim region, naturally endowed with abudant wildlife, volcanoes, lakes, beaches, waterfalls and jungles. an area that covers 600km from the top of Guatemala to the bottom of nicaragua. holds both the largest and smallest countries in the region and share a common border with honduras. 3 countries that have all struggled, to a greater extent, through a common trajectory in history. from indigenious living to colonial occupation. from popular uprisings to brutal repressions. from violent revolutions to external intervention. from communal farming to export controlled economies. from natural disasters to failed basic infrastructure.
many factors dictate as to why the three have developed so disparately.
Guatemala´s geography kept it the most preserved and secluded. its size alone, in relative to the region, makes it a geographic liability. its vast junlge in the NE, vocanic mountains in the SW, and barren landscape in between adds dificulty to conquerization.
Natives in nicaragua allied with vying european powers to expel the latters´ neighboring countries off their land.
El salvador holds a population that remains civically involved and politically engaged, constantly ripening their readiness for collective organization. they also had leaders who, in fear of the power the masses may yield, created deathsquads, exterminated thousands and commited massacres.
Nicaragua held revolutions in the streets, where armed civilians, so desperate for change, used guns to further their ideals. their adversary, the somozan dictator, was shot dead in Leon, before his son assumed control and succesfully managed the civil war by procuring military and finacial aid from one of america´s finest; ronald reagan.
he and his previous cronnies were also integral players in the formation of the neoliberal economic policies that created the the broad label of ´banana republics´, and of course the socio-economic system it rendered. this essentially involved large US and multinational coorporations buying, stealing, and cheating huge portions of land, in stark opposition to the good will of the public, to grow crops for export, more often than not bananas. these mono-agricultural systems exploit the land and its people, degrade the local enviornment, create malnutricious diets, and rampant capitalistic free-for-alls. many of the crops, such as wheat, sugar and corn, are not sold and consumed in their original, natural and, in moderation, healthy forms. they are instead refined, processed, preserved, bagged and canned into not food, but food products. the once nutritious crop is then transformed into an addictive and unhealthy export. these goods are cheap and easily transportable, and thus flood shopping aisles the world over, including central america.
what this means is that cooperations from the global north control crop yield. they collect produce and resources, that could otherwise be used to sustain local communities. they ship these goods to huge warehouses and factories, where the nutrition is sucked out, and in its place preservatives and chemicals are pumped back in. Wa-la: Coca cola, Dorritos and Big Macs.
so the banana repblics, under CAFTA and the politicians who crafted it, end up exporting natural resources at the expense of their people, land, environment, safety and wealth, and import diabetes, obesity and bad health. as the never ending greed for profits expands, more land is taken from the native population. inevitably, and rightfully so, the masses organize. they elect leaders who vow to redistribute land. the US cooporations, wary of this rising opposition, use money, power, influence and even nepotism to lobby to their chums in Washington. military and finacial aid suddenly funnels itself to the forces of the status quo. the ruling elite and thier agents use these funds to squash the prevailing voices of peasants, farmers, laborers, clerics, normal folk, and of course those damn intellectuals.
this is the common theme that has caused so much hardship in this region, so much civic turmoil, policital unrest and tumultuos history.
Guatemala: bananas, Nicaragua: coffee and bananas, El Salvador: coffee, sugar and bananas.
the differences in the three respective societies mike and i recognize as we travel thru.
Guatemala still has a thriving indigenious population. 60% of the people in fact, remain virtuously mayan, and continue to speak over 20 different mayan dialects. the mayan indigena mostly populate the western highlands, but are present in every guatemalan city from antigua to livingston. they have preserved thier food, language, clothing and culture suprisingly well. guatemala, like the rest of the region has endured its fair share of natural adversity. an earthquake in the 70´s contributed significantly to the escalation of civil war, as thousands more fled to the streets after being left homeless from the disaster.
El Salvador is much less traditional. a consumer driven society, fueled by remittances sent home from immigrants abroad, mostly in the DC area, has created the façade of a prosperous state. on paper, the reality is more bleak, as unemployment and poverty persist. money sent home is rarely invested for the future. instead of it being spent prudently on health, education and housing, remittances are thrown right back into the hands of wealthy CEO´s by consumer spending.
Nicaragua, we havnt yet fully figured out. it is the largest country in the region, also has the lowest population density. it is considered one of the poorest in the region as well. however, in general the people seem the most laid back, nonchalant and carefree. the first bus ride in Nica, where mike and i got our first impression of their people, and indeed was a quite accurate depiction, as the people laughed, joked and threw oranges at eachother. when you go to a comedor or a tienda here, you have to seek out the service to be served. it seems that they have little qualms with being one of the poorest states in the region, or on the other hand, have no interest in the materialsim that wealth breeds. but the low crime rate should attest for their congeniality.
more from nica to come.

Bungled trips, shady hustlers, and corn islands

Chris and I ponder in thought as to how we will spend our next 5 hours on Big Corn island before we can catch a flight out to Managua, and then eventually a bus back to Leon. We decided to put the brakes on the travelling for a bit and post in Leon, volunteering with Queztaltrekkers, an roganization that leads hikes up volcanoes to help support a school for street children. Some of the pictures posted of nicaragua are from our trip with Quetzaltrekkers up to el hoyo (the hole) a volcano with a nice view. After the hike, we spent the weekend in Leon partying and then sent out for corn islands by land, something which not many travellers do, and we would soon find out why. most simply fly from managua to the corn islands, but we decided to go by land for some adventure and to save some money. This became a disaster. 2 hour bus ride to managua without incident, but it was on the 7 hour bus ride to El Rama which made me think about posting in Leon with queztaltrekkers, thinking: man I really dont want to do more 7 hour bus rides. Of which we have had our fair share. So we get to el Rama late and night and there is nothign to do but find a hotel to stay in. Met a nice American couple that just got engaged and enojyed a meal and some conversation with them and Reggae Town Ranch Discoteca which was more of a big empty bar then a club. this is also the time and place in which we discovered that the ferry to Big Corn island leave only on wednesday (this being sunday night).Slept in a little the next day and went to the dock to take the panga to Bluefields, the port town on the coast from which the ferry to the corn islands leaves. The panaga however does not leave until it is full, which means 18 people, which means we would have to wait over 4 hours. However, during this time I did find a place to use the internet and phone the peace corps, and found out I had been invited to volunteer in honduras, starting June 30. So it looks like I will come home after this trip and come right on back to the same region. And ironically, we had completely skipped honduras on our way to nicaragua. So we finally caught the panga to bluefields, which took an hour and a half, and started on our way to find a cheap hotel. While we thought El Rama was kind of seedy and sketchy, goddamn if Bluefields didnt outright win that title and then some. Upon exiting the boat we were approached by Spicer, and local hustler who wanted to help us find a cheap hotel. Well rest assured we have encountered many of these characters before, but Spicer would prove to be the most annoying and persistent of all the hustlers. He essentially latched onto us for an hour or two posing as a friendly local, but when we finally tried to really shake him off the obvious truth revealed itself when he asked us for some money. We did not give him money. He came back the next day and for about 30 minutes entreated chris to give him money, stating many - although each irrelevant- reasons as to why we should give him money. The most obvious being that he showed us to our hotel, something we reminded him we could have done on our own and had he stated upfront he wanted money we would have of course refused. The best part of the story, if you remember those of you paying attention to the timetables here, is that we had to spend 2 days in the grotesque caribbean port town hellhole known as bluefields, a fate which seemed worse than death upon our first revelation of this truth. The seedy atmosphere of bluefields was only enhanced by the fact that A) we were the only two white faces walking around, and B) this mad all of the countless unemployed black creole hustlers B-Line straight to us to offer still more countless goods and services of which we wanted no part of. Wednesday we finally made it to the boat for Big Corn island, a simple journey with locals and foreigners mixed, that would evolve into a 5 hour horror show complete with almost everyone puking their brains out and the kids -oh lord the poor kids- endless in their shreiking and wailing. I too became seasick, although not to the point of throwing up, I simply stayed in one place, meditating and feeling miserable while the entire world around me collapsed into shrills and cries followed by eerie silence, off and on. Meanwhile Chris was having a gay old time, jumping around the front of the boat and back inside, not one hint of sickness about him. When the shitshow ended, we fell about the land of Big Corn Island, only to be met with on and off rain for the rest of the day. In between slight breaks in showers we would move with our bags to find a place. We quickly realized big corn island wasnt the paradise we had hoped for, more of a fishing island than a paradise, and that paradise was waiting for us on little corn. so we slept on big corn and headed to little corn the next day, only to be welcomed by 5 days of perfect weather in a lush tropical paradise. pristine white sand beaches and crystal blue and green waters, finally we had found what we had been looking for for oh so long. Plus the fact that you could get $8 lobster whenever you wanted helped us fall in love with the place even more. but now its back to leon, a city we enjoyed and our future home for the next 2 months. time to hike volcanoes and help street children.