Time slipping away

We can't believe it's already Wednesday! Time is flying by down here and it's hard to keep up. Yesterday we had a meeting with Milton, who has been promoted to the Granada representative for the Nicaragua Department of Recreation. We told him about our new office and our hope of finding a Nicaraguan Director, and he seemed confident that we could acquire a stamp of approval from the Nicaraguan Government.

We also took some time to sit down with Chepe and Suyen to talk about how the year went and give Chepe an evaluation for his role as Temporary Director. After going over some of the challenges he faced, we've designed some new roles for both of them that fit a bit better with their strengths.

Playing daily, we've attracted a sort of gang of children that holds our hands to and from the fields, babbling in Spanish and spouting random English words and then giggling. Trying to play pickup with other adults, we've had so many kids at the fields that we've run impromptu kids sessions instead. Yesterday Ann and I learned some of the local Nicaraguan games from the kids (think Duck Duck Goose style). Something must have been lost in translation, however, as we found ourselves doing the following:

1) Singing London Bridge while a line of children paraded under our "bridge"
2) Asking the kid that we trapped in the bridge to choose "manzana" or "naranja" (apple or orange)
3) Depending on their answer, that child would have to stand behind one of us (Mary=naranja, Ann= manzana)
4) Once all 20 kids playing this game had been assigned a line, we played tug of war with the kids holding each other's hips and Ann and I pulling left hands until I fell over in a pile of dirt*

My only consolation is that Ann is left handed...sigh.

*I hope it was dirt but it look suspiciously like manure

We're off to practice with the kids now! More later