Welcome to my Nicaragua Journal! I hope to be using it throughout my 27 months of Peace Corps service to post my thoughts, stories, and pictures from Nicaragua. I meant to start writing here some weeks ago, but have (perhaps understandably) been busy with other things, like packing, and seeing everyone I can before I leave. I'd like to take this first entry to answer a few frequently asked questions about what I'm about to do:
1) When do you leave?
On September 1st, I fly from Detroit to Washington D.C., where I will attend staging, which will be my first orientation to the Peace Corps with all of the other trainees en route to Nicaragua. This will last until 7 p.m., at which point I'm hoping to see a few people I know from Baltimore/D.C. Then at 1:30 a.m. on Wednesday, I check out of the hotel, and in the middle of the night am whisked away to Reagan International Airport, from which I'll fly to Miami, and then will arrive in Nicaragua at (hopefully) about 11:45 on Wednesday, September 2. I won't be sleeping much, that night.
2) What will you be doing when you're down there?
Teaching English! I'll actually be both a teacher and a teacher trainer, so I will teach English classes on my own in the evenings to people who live near me, but I will also be working with 1-3 high school English teachers in Nicaragua. I will be planning lessons with them, helping them build their English-speaking skills, making their lessons more communicative (and less rote memorization), as well as helping them teach their classes, at least sometimes. I also get to work on other community development projects I find other people doing down there, which I'm sincerely hoping involve recycling, and helping people get access to clean water.
3) Why will you be gone for 27 months? I thought it was a two year thing?
My first three months in country are going to be spent not technically as a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV), but as a Peace Corps Trainee (PCT). During this time, I'll get language training, health and safety training, acclimate myself to the culture, and instruction on how to be an ESL teacher. After these three months, which will be spent with three other PCTs, I will be sworn in the morning of November 23rd, and vow that I will spend the next two years doing all I can to help Nicaragua (provided that I survive that long, of course; the stat I saw is that 9 in 10 PCTs become PCVs at the end of training). So on that date, I will leave wherever I spent the first three months of my service, and go to a different site, where I will serve for two years and four days, as my end date is set at November 27th, 2011.
4) Does your ambiguity in answering question 3 mean you don't actually know where you're going?
Yes. No one is told exactly where they'll be serving or training, because the Peace Corps has to evaluate everyone participating to make sure they place everyone where their language and teaching skills dictate that they'd make the most impact. I'm just rolling with it.
5) So will you have internet/phone?
Probably. I just found out that I'm going to have free wi-fi for the first week of training, and assured that it's very likely that I'll have access to an internet cafe wherever I do the rest of my training/service. My laptop is coming down with me, so I should be able to let people know that I've made it down safely on Wednesday. I will eventually get a cell phone down there (American ones aren't compatible with their networks, by and large). Until then, I will use Skype whenever I can (you can search for me with either my name, or my email address, stevenmcarpenter@gmail.com . If you've never heard of Skype, it's wonderful, and free to talk to anyone else who is using it! Just Google skype, and the download page is one of the first pages to come up).
6) So can I have your address so I can send you things while you're down there?
Yes of course! My address for the first three months will be:
Steve Carpenter
Voluntario del Cuerpo de Paz
Apartado Postal 3256
Managua, Nicaragua
Central America
Please send me your address, and I will do my best to send you mail while I am down there, too! I've heard estimates on delivery times range from 8-10 days to several months. If it's anything like Ecuador, it'll be closer to the former than the latter. I will post my more permanent address at the end of my training period, along with my new phone number, when I figure that out.
7) Are you ready?
No! Though I am getting pretty close. I've got most of the clothing/toiletries/random stuff I'm planning on taking laid out, but I've got to figure out how I'm going to get it into 2 checked bags that can weigh only 80 pounds and be a total of 110 inches long, along with one carry on (my MSU backpack) that can weigh as much as I need it to. I'm also kind of freaking out about not having much in the way of teaching English resources; I think I'm going to go look at more books today. Suggestions are welcome from current/former ESL teachers!
8) Do you get any time off?
Yes! I accrue two days of vacation time per month, as well as some dollars to spend on vacationing. There are kind of a lot of restrictions on when I can use it, though. I can't take any of it for the first six months I'm down there, or the last three months. so that leaves me an 18 month window, during which I'm not supposed to take extended vacations during the Nicaraguan school year, which goes from February to November (their summer break is during our winter). So, I'm hoping to come home for sure for a couple weeks during Christmastime of 2010, and possibly will come home for a week during one of the two Easter weeks I'll be there for.
9) Is it dangerous/are you worried?
Well, yes, relatively speaking to the first, but no to the second. People who look like Rich Americans are routinely robbed, especially in Managua, and sometimes are kidnapped and ransomed or killed or eaten by freshwater sharks or blown up by forgotten landmines from the Sandinista/Contra civil war in the 70's/80's (during which the Peace Corps evacuated). BUT, and this is a big but, these things tend to happen to people who travel alone, and who have no connections to the local people. As a PCV, part of my job is getting to know as many people as I can (and talking with them in English). Once you are known in the community, people tend to be very protective of you. To not anticipate some difficulty with the above negative situations would be foolhardy on my part, hence why yesterday I insured most of the stuff I'm taking down with me. But I personally experienced very little crime in Ecuador, and I anticipate personally experiencing about as much in Nicaragua, because I will not be as dumb as I was in Ecua, and will not leave things lying around unattended.
10) Are you excited?
Oh man. I have been waiting so long for this. I started applying in January of 2008; that was over a year and a half ago. I will miss everyone that I know, I know, but I'm sincerely hoping to stay in touch. And while I'm a little nervous about the technical teaching side of the endeavor, I'm really excited to hone my Spanish skills, and develop my skills as a teaching mentor/English teacher. But most of all I'm excited at the prospect of being in Nicaragua, and feeling like I'm helping people as much as I can.
Whoo. Ok. That takes care of most of the FAQs that I can think of right now. I will probably post again before I leave!
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