Going to Chinandega!

October 3, 2009

My last week kind of sucked, on account of being sick and having no energy; but at about noon yesterday, after eating delicious veggie pizza, I reached a zen point where the meds in me finally started working with each other instead of against each other, and I started feeling better, and things started going well again.

Later that day, I found out that I’m going to Chinandega, Chinandega for four days starting tomorrow! All of the trainees are going to spend a few days with a volunteer who’s already been here for a year and a half, who are scattered all over the country. I was lucky, and got to go to a place that’s pretty far from where I’m at right now; it’s not quite as far north as Nueva Segovia or as nice temperature-wise as Matagalpa (where you need to wear sweaters!), but it has several perks. I’ll get to see a lot of the country on the way, since it’s the department (Nicaragua’s version of the state) farthest north that borders the Pacific Ocean, and right now I’m way down south. The volunteer I’m visiting had to have exploratory shoulder surgery shortly after training, so he missed 10 months of service, and just got back to Nicaragua a couple months ago. Because of this, he lives with a host family still, and while they can put him up, they don’t have room to host two gringos. So, the PC is putting me up in a hotel! I might get hot running water! I’m pretty excited for it, although Chinandega is also the hottest department in Nicaragua, so I might not want hot water. The other three plusses are that it’s a big city (which is the type of place I’m hoping to end up); there’s another volunteer in the same city, so I get to travel the whole way with Claire, an awesome trainee from West Virginia; and that it’s super close to the ocean, so I might finally get to swim in it!

Last night I got to do my laundry, and watch V for Vendetta with Megan and Liz. It was definitely an eventful movie watching experience, as we first saw a mouse skitter across the floor of Meg’s room and into a drainage pipe, and later were attacked by a giant flying cockroach. I tried to squish it between my two sandals as it was crawling up Meg’s mosquito net, but was unsuccessful; she got it to crawl out into the open on her floor after it had taken refuge under her bed, and whacked it mercilessly with her sandal. I cleaned up, since she was too shaken up to look at it again afterwards. I’m sure eventually I’ll get used to hitting giant flying disgusting bugs with my sandal, and do it like it ain’t no thang, but I’m still pretty freaked out when they start flying at me right now.

I’ll be sure to update about all my travels when I get back on Wednesday!