End of October and Current Reading List

Went for a hike on one of my days off with Julianne, a Health Volunteer in Jinotega capital. She knows all the best places that aren't in the book. And then there was this lizard on the trip into the mountains...

And we found an old fort (note the cool spikes!) with downtown Jinotega in the foreground and the moutains with green coffee shades to boot.

Me in the fort

 The were the most massive spiders I have ever seen on this mountain! We almost walked into them at least 4 times. Julianne says they are nice and actually one lived in her room and she tried to feed it, but it didn't like gallo pinto.

One of the mountain barrio neighborhoods surrounding Jinotega city.

Two of my youth girls making pan de guineo, or banana bread, with me! It's a big hit here!

Current Reading ListTwo 

Confessions of an Economic Hit-Man

Not great, but not terrible. Better than the first time I read it, but that was for school. The book is sadly already beginning to seem dated as there are several NGOs and individual whistleblowers who have pulled the corporate conspiracy curtain away in the day of blogs and Internet. It’s much harder to hide but the real question is why the general public still stands for it? I also think as a Peace Corps volunteer I am at the wrong end of the development spectrum. My commitment and ones like it are limited by the technical knowledge and financial support imparted by the same politicians and companies that want the raw materials to have the same prices and people to stay illiterate. Nicaragua is a little different because it’s in bed with the United States and Venezuela and yet still can’t feed itself. John Perkins looked for philosophical and political solutions, but what about the family in the developing country? What about the community right in front of me? What do they do? They can’t pick up the phone and call their congressman. Do they continue to let others make decisions for them, by simple advantage of geography and money, continuing to react rather than chart their own plan of action? I also don’t see the projects of Peace Corps making a significant difference in the long-run in the greater picture, which makes me a little skeptical that I’m just window-dressing, a guilt assuage for corporations and the government. This is not a new feeling; I’ve read and written several papers on similar feelings amongst Volunteers throughout the Corps existence. It does bring to mind the problem of scale and perspective. The trick in Nicaragua is that the people are very much educated and aware of political happenings, but there is an understandable confusion in the carrot of aid programs followed by the sticks of cutting projects and refusing to renew waivers for debt.

Linda Brent: Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

Not a book you would think of reading in a developing country, but I picked it up out of curiosity in a lending library in a hostel in Matagalpa and found myself finishing it before I got home. This is a relatively authentic historical narrative of one black woman in the South. Linda (not her real name) is surprisingly literate and an excellent storyteller. Her voice and style pull you in-she is genuine with her diction and cadence of a self-taught slave whose primary source of reading material is the Bible. It was a little difficult to keep track of all the family members and their relations (much like Nicaragua). Linda is a house-slave who never actually experiences the typically horrible fieldwork with overseers and whips, but you still sympathize with the harassment she suffers by her master, including when he tears her family apart. It is hard to believe, but there is still a time in history when one race considers itself above others and believes it is by design. You can still see this today.

The Blind Side

I really liked this one, proven by the fact that I finished it in less that a week. I watched the movie first (which was also very well-done) and I was impressed by how sports media is mixed with the individual story of Michael Oher and the overall philosophy of the left tackle in the NFL. I’m nowhere near a football fan, but even I was able to follow along and enjoy the historical and statistical banter. As an athlete, I also enjoyed reliving those moments of time measured by seconds on the field, before the play, after the hit, making split decisions that seem to take minutes but are actually less than seconds. I only wish it didn’t take famous athletes, or dead could-have-beens, to draw attention to the public school system and continued racial discrimination.

Also read…War by Sebastian Junger (same guy who wrote Perfect Storm), Lady Knight and the whole Protector of the Small Series by Tamora Pierce (blast from the past)

But you Know So Much…

It’s all relative. In one world, you need certificates, diplomas, and degrees to be an expert. Classes and practicums to get a piece of paper saying you know what you are talking about. In another world, my nationality and the stereotype of prosperity is immediately linked to expertise, of knowing everything. It’s exhausting, terrifying, and dangerous. It was funny in college, but here it puts you on a precarious pedestal with only half the balance. I was talking to one of the mothers in my community, sharing my experience as a babysitter feeding and caring for young children and caring for my little brother when she exclaimed, “Meghan knows so much about children and health!”

I’m not a nurse or a doctor; I have babysat a lot of kids and have gotten plenty of scrapes myself. But when you are considered an expert, you are responsible for those who look up to you for “the answers.” And heaven forbid you don’t know or get it wrong. Then you fall from grace, if you want to call that grace. No, no, no. I am not an expert. It’s all relative. I don’t know firsthand what it is like to have kids of my own, or to make rice and beans, or make tortillas without burning my fingertips, or hand-wash all the soap out of clothes. I have not actually had my own family or built my own house or farmed my own land. In this, and more, you are not the expert either, for there is someone who knows more than both of us. It’s all relative and it means relatively nothing. Working as equals, complementing each other is far less stressful and much more enjoyable. Let’s do that.

An example of modern-day colonialism…Banana Bread

Aside from the fact that there are something like 20 more varieties of bananas, or guineo, than the one golden yellow Dole that frequents the markets states-side, you would think that all Central America knew this recipie or that perhaps, banana bread even came from the same region as the number one ingredient. Turns out no. Turns out this recipie makes me look like Julia Childs and everyone wants me to visit their kitched for a special. The people have guineao, tons of it! They have eggs, oil, sugar, and you can even buy basic baking soda and baking powder in the pulperias in little rolled paper tubes that look like funny cigarettes. And yet nothing happens without the recipie; the ingredients stay separate. And not just the recipie-the experience. With something like a 50% literacy rate, learning by doing is the essential way to go. There is an incredible capacity for memorization as a coping mechanism in the wake of this illiteracy. So I simply stand to one side and read the directions aloud. They know how to cook; they do it at least 3 times a day. They have the equipment and the raw materials, but lack the developing step, the mechanism that changes one stage into the finished product. Sounds like something I read in my American History textbook in 3^rd grade, about how one group had all the raw materials, and the other had all the knowledge and machines. And with one oven and one recipie, an added-value product enters a new market, a group is enlightened even in just a culinary sense and a door is opened. Connections are made and trust is gained. And it’s high in potassium too.

No School

There are 3 classrooms at the local school; one for preschool, one for grades 1-3, and the other 4-6. They each have at least one day off a week and these aren’t frequent holidays. The teachers have families, someone is sick, there are meetings or community commitments conflict, or whatever. There are even weeks when it’s the opposite and there is only one day of school. Any American kid would jump for joy and any administrator would cringe at the inevitable gaps in learning. But the school is local, so there are no busing or lunch issues. The kids walk to school all polished, wait or play in the front yard until 8, and then run home or loiter with their shirt untucked and backpacks flung to one side. And when there is no school what to do in Nicaragua? Watch telenovellas, play with cellphones, or play pick-up soccer. Very American. Or work hard in the fields to help your family scrape by, carrying more than your body weight in firewood or bags of corn. Because you don’t know or it doesn’t matter that somewhere in the world there are learning standards and United Nations Millenium Goals for Education or child labor laws. The family’s gotta eat. And when all else fails, we can always watch the gringa. And maybe she’ll give us another word search or other strange math and writing games. There are 4 kids sprawled on the ground outside my house all working on English sopa de letras (word searches) because they are all bored out of their minds.

Ode to the Chinela

For reference, chinelas are the plastic slap-on sandals that every Nica worth their salt has for housewear.

You can quitar the chinela in emergencies, like an itch or the ever-annoying and painful ant bite. They are sturdy enough you can leave the house in them, but they won’t do your arches any favors over any length of time or distance and they have no traction in the rainy season mud (trust me).

They are plastic, plastic, and more plastic, coming in blue, green, orange, and pink, in case you ever have trouble finding them or your feet. But for hanging out, peasearing tiempo in the casa or the hammock, cooking in the kitchen, or half-drowning your bottom-half while doing laundry, there is no better choice. Kids wear them until they walk out of them, and then they keep wearing them. Teevas and Chacos got nothing on these.

Totto the Soldadura

So I needed a solderer for the improved ovens my community wants to do. There is a soderer in Cuatro Esquinas, but he only does lamina. Apparently, there are different types of solderes. But, he knows a guy who knows a guy. Totto. I immediately think of Dorothy and red shoes, but I follow my guy, Don Sergio, into town.  Everyone knows Totto. Well I don’t and you’d be surprised how many people will change their names to Totto just to talk to the gringa for a few more seconds. We walk down an alley close to the Centro de Salud, my home away from home. We almost pass a huge truck, but Sergio stops and says we’ll wait until he’s done working. There is someone under that thing?! He pulls himself out from under the truck and walks around to us, smiling confidently and greeting Sergio like an old friend. I didn’t know the human body could hold that much grease and oil. Work makes it impossible for me to tell his age but he has an interesting seafaring mustaches. Totto, or Cristobal if you want to be formal. I reach to shake his hand, and while trying to wipe his hands with an even dirtier rag, he offers his wrist as an alternative. After a short explanation of the job, he asks briefly if the oven looks like this, pointing to a barrel in the abck of his workshop (a shack of wooden slats and boards). That’s exactly what they look like. Perfect. He offers 300 cords per oven and I could kiss him; it’s one-third what the other guys in town asked for. I ask him to sign the price recipt. No he saysand I can’t tell if he’s kidding or yanking my chain in front of his fellow grease-buddies. I ask again and again he says no and looks around the shop with eyes that seem say and smimling at the same time. I’m flustered and ask why, thinking I’ve missed something. I have-he doesn’t know how to write, he says, and doesn’t want to get my paper dirty, calling one of his cleaner friends over. Together they figure out how to phonetically spell his name. Welcome to a developing country.

Echar Tortillas

My boss informed my that women here are not able to marry until they can echar (do/make) tortillas. Granted, this is the staple to all the meals of the day, but he didn’t really have to prick my competitive personality and womanly pride to encourage me to integrate even more. This is a two-day process. The night before, the less-than-sanitary water is boiled (the color changes-it’s interesting) then the corn from the field or the silo is added and pushed around with a long wooden paddle, soaking for several hours. There is a musty corn-husky smell to the kitchen as the pot is emptied into another container which is topped off with cold water to cool and further absorb overnight. Early (like dark early) someone takes the corn to the Molino where it’s ground into masa or dough. Depending on the desired size (I have been told I will be working small until I can handle it) you take a decent size glob of masa, and using both hands like a pot-maker, you form a disc with a dimple in the middle. This is then placed on a pre-cut cellophane page and then the rhythmic beating begins. Pat-pat. Pat-pat. The sound echoes through the house and even out to the street, with the slight swish of the moving cellophane. One hand pats, and the other expertly (unless I’m doing it) keeps the circular shape. I am getting better at this part, thanks to my familiarity with ceramics. The next step is to flip the paper so the tortilla is in the palm of your hand, using your other hand to peel the paper away carefully. The paper likes to stick or hold bits of my tortilla, and the tortilla also likes to cave-in between my fingers. Quickly, the tortilla is palmed between both hands and placed from front-to-back on the comal, or a ceramic cooking-disk. It doesn’t matter how many times I watch these incredible women deftly put 50 or more tortillas on a comal, the anxiety that the tortilla will cave or the heat of the stove or my nerves over my fingers make it impossible for me to complete this final step. I honestly think, and several volunteers agree, that Nica women have burned the feeling out of their fingers with the practice of picking up and flipping the tortillas with their bare hands. It’s a source of pride and somewhat of a competition of will and pain for the women within a house and the community. But today, Dona Martha told me to try again. The 1^st one she placed on the comal for me, giggling that my hands were so debil (delicate). After wetting them (trick for newbies) I made a big tortilla but it crumpled like a bad turnover when I practically dropped it on the comal, to the laughter and tsking of all the women now watching in the kitchen. Start small, she says, as she scrapes the one that se dano (sickened/died). I have the last one of the morning, small enough to almost completely fit in my hand. I hold my breath and gently slide both hands under the edges, gliding the pressure of the dough circle from my pinky to my thumb, putting the tortilla on the rest of the comal. I did it!!  Fist pump and little shout of joy, to the delight of my fan club. Now flip it, they say, grinning. Oh God! They take pity on me and let me use a knife to get started. After a split-second hesitation, they worry it will burn and stick to the comal and they offer to help. No. I can do this. The independent woman in me shouts inside. I hold my breath again and quickly grab the edges with my fingers and flip. It all lands, right-side-up, back on the comal. And the bottom is just tan, just cooked. I did it!! They shout for me! Oh God. Ow. Ow. Adrenaline wears off and my fingers remind me that I have many more mornings of this before I can deftly do it without thought for my fingertips or the inevitable A&D ointment…but I still did it. Best-tasting tortilla yet!