pre-Costa Rica & Nicaragua update
Hola amigos y enimigos,
Well, I'm off, for real this time. I'm on the plane to CR as I type, although I imagine I'll be sending this from CR. (Be warned, this is a long message, as usual, I guess) My stay in Toronto was fun and busy. Saw a lot of old friends (getting older by the minute :) and met some new ones as well. It's a time of mixed emotions (what else is new?) - excited to be going, a new adventure, new learning and development to be experienced, new friends to be made - sad to leave, leaving behind friends and family in Vancouver, Toronto, worried to lose contact with their lives, worried I'll lose touch with the Canadian "reality" :)
While I was in Toronto, the main purpose, theoretically, was orientation to my new job, along with some initial work on the program evaluation system that I'll working on in November. This was accomplished, of course, although it always seems like there is more to be done.
More importantly though, I had several other "tasks" to accomplish while in the thriving metropolis of "Greater Toronto" (although I still fail to see what is so great about it :) I wanted to visit my family, especially my grandparents and my nephew. I wanted to re-acquaint myself with as many friends as possible and of course, do a few FOG things to take some pressure off of Ramin.
Well, I spent both weekends in Oakville/Burlington (Burlville) visiting my family. It was nice to see them, hadn't seen them since Xmas. Matthew, my nephew, is speaking a mile a minute and is the center of attention in any crowd. He is the only grandchild/great-grandchild so far (and the only one in the near foreseeable future) so he's got the monopoly on our collective attention.
Seems like all my free time in Toronto itself was spent seeing old friends and meeting new ones (at least, I know Ramin would complain that that was the case :) - I managed to see most people that I wanted to.
We even managed to squeeze in two FOG board meetings where I divested most of my previous responsibilities... Things are still busy with FOG, but things are starting to look up. (A FOG update will be sent out soon)
There's not too much exciting to report for now....
I am now in Costa Rica. The weather seems not that different from Toronto, although it is more humid. It rained quite hard for 10 minutes after I arrived, reminding me that it is indeed the rainy season. Stephanie picked me up in the YCI truck, so we had to stop and throw tarps over my stuff, getting us both soaked in the process.
It will take a while to adjust to things here and re-orient myself (I already got lost trying to find Ticabus, but a friendly Costa Rican straightened me out).
For now, I will test my ability to send email from here...
Take care,
Rob
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Well that didn't work, so here is a not-so-brief update on my rapid visit to Nica and stuff here...
Rob
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Well, I arrived on Thurs in Costa Rica. Things here have changed since I was last here, as usual, I suppose, when one is away from the country for several years.
I was picked up at the airport by Stephanie, one of the project management team, here at Reto (YCI). I had met her once before maybe 6 or 7 years ago, so it was interesting trying to find her, especially since I wasn't sure who was going to pick me up. But, she found me and dragged my stuff, of which I am still convinced there is too much, in spite of many tries to reduce my load.
We loaded up the Reto truck and started off to the Staff House, where I will be staying during the orientation. We started catching up on the invening years, using all the people that we mutually know, which turns out to be quite a number of people. Unfortunately, 10 minutes down the road, it started to rain and my cardboard box was imminently un-waterproof. So, we stopped on the side of the road an threw on a couple of tarps. Welcome to the rainy season in Costa Rica, it seemed to be trying to say...
Then, we arrived at the spacious mansion known as the "Staff House". It has 4 bedrooms, a lovely kitchen, dining room, living room, phone, 2 bathrooms - all the amenities. It seemed miles above what I was used to in Nicaragua, although, of course, it was still not quite at a Canadian standard of living. Still, I was pleased.
Next, I had to run out to arrange my passage to Nicaragua the next morning, for a quick visit and to drop off a donation of books for the library project in Posoltega. So, following the map that Stephanie made for me, I promptly got lost, but a kind-hearted woman took pity on me and directed me to the right place. On arrival, it turned out that they didn't seem to have the reservation that Jennie had made for me. Again, it reminded what things are like when living overseas - things never quite seem to work out like us gringos plan it...
So, I ended buying the last spot on the last bus the next day. Whew! Went back home and unpacked a bit. Actually, I was trying to find my towel so I could have a shower, but got distracted by each thing as I unpacked it, and ended up unpacking almost everything in the end... Oh well, it worked. Then, Stephanie came back and showed me the ropes in the kitchen, so I made a quick supper of pasta for everyone. Soon after, a friend called and we went out for a drink. She is studying dentistry at a private university in San Jose. We went to a nice bar that some Columbian friends of hers owns...
Got home late-ish, and got up early the next day for a 9 hour bus ride to Managua. Four movies and two lineups at the border later and I arrived. (The movies were what I usually like to refer to as the worst of Hollywood - Leprecaun in the Hood, Big Mamma is Trouble (or something like that - not sure of the English title), etc.)
Arrived, and tried to reserve my return bus on Sun, but was told that all the buses were full until Tues. Yikes! Paid $1 too much for a cab, started visiting with people. It was really nice to see everyone. I visited almost everyone in El Recreo that I had hoped to. Unfortunately, one of our friends, her husband has started drinking again and was beating our friend and their children again. It is so sad to see. Apparently he's not making much money because he can't sell as many frames (he makes picture frames) because many of his customers are around Masaya where there was a recent earthquake. I tried to convince the husband that his anger was misplaced, and I may have succeeded, except, he was drunk at the time and he did not seem to remember much of our conversation that night.
On the lighter side, the neighbourhood now has full sanitation services and most people are now hooked up with flush toilets and potable water. They also now have street lights, although people still seem to not like to wander around too much after 9pm or so because of the street violence that is becoming more rampant.
The projects in the neighbourhood are going gangbusters. One sign of the progress, besides the infrastructure mentioned above, is simply in the land now owned by the project. Whereas when I lived in the neighbourhood, the community had the community centre plus one other house (the house I lived in), now they had four houses besides the community centre and a farm in the countryside as well... I am amazed at all the changes. But in the end, the people remain the same - fantasticly open and warm and friendly and the same great people that attracts me to work overseas...
My one friend Wilfredo insisted on giving me tortillas on Saturday morning. It was so nice to be back, even if just for a short time. I called Ticabus that morning and found that they had added another bus, so I ran over and grabbed a ticket... It also turned out that Anita, the Spanish woman that worked with me in 1996/7, was visiting and trying to go to Costa Rica on Sunday as well. So I let her know about the extra bus and we ended up reacquainting ourselves on the bus ride the next day. That was fun.
Politically, I got the update from Virginia and the nuns at lunch (and dinner). It seems like the democracy situation is deteriorating fast in Nicaragua. The pact the Aleman and the official opposition (Sandanistas) have made has been signed (a while ago now) and the election changes are just now being fully realised (municipal elections are coming up in Oct/Nov). They have made it very difficult for other parties to register. Several parties have tried to get the 80,000 required signatures (Virginia wasn't sure of the exact number though) but have been thwarted at every turn. Aleman controls the "independent" election monitoring body and they have invented various reasons to invalidate many of the signatures that have been collected. In the newspaper on Sunday, the U.S. has even issued an ultimatum to Nicaragua to clean up its act. It should prove interesting in the next few weeks to see how it all turns out...
Sunday I rushed back here. I managed to see my friend Dave, who has been in Costa Rica for 3 weeks and is leaving on Wed. It was nice to see him. Our training has started and it is a lot of fun. It is basically 9-5 every day and weekends off, so there is lots of time to visit friends. I've just got here, so I haven't done much of this yet, but I am working on it...
I'll quit for now. To be continued....
Rob