Past post from Zoey

Written March 14...

So...it´s my turn to blog, and here it goes. I know there is absolutely no way I will be able to explain how amazing this experience has been so far in 8000 words or less so I´m going to do my best to touch on some highlights so far this trip.

Vamos a ver...right now I´m sitting in the local internet cafe eating a little snack, and this is a newbie for me. I got it from a man in a cart around the corner and it´s called ¨vigoron¨- it consists of a banana leaf folded in a small plastic bag, which acts as the bowl. At the bottom of the bowl rests the yuca (which is sort of like a potato) and it´s cut into cubes and boiled. Atop that, there is a salad of cabbage, carrots, various types of peppers, vinegar and spices. And the ¨cherry on top¨ is a mysterious crunchy fried piece of meat which I am embarrassed to say I just devoured and I have absolutely no idea what it was. Carne? Pork? Pollo? No se. But it is absolutely delicious, not unlike many of the other small plates and snacks that are packed up in banana leaves and sold all across the city of Granada, from morning til night.

At the moment, I am waiting for Kaleen and Dwyer to arrive so that we can go with Chepe to the mercado. We walked through once before on our way to the school bus station to go and spend an afternoon in a small town called Catarina (which overlooks the Laguna de Apoyo), and let me tell you, the market is an incredible place to explore. The streets are lined with carts that sell everything from queso seco (white, dry cheese) to big slabs of meat, vegetables, exotic fruits, and snacks. You can find CDs of musica de Nicaragua (pardon the Spanglish), shirts, shorts, dresses, souvenirs of all kinds, and various handmade crafts. I am excited to go again, especially with Chepe because we know he is going to help us get the best deals. No ripping off these gringas!

Afterwards, it´s back to office for another session at the fields con las ninas. We are going to run the same session as this morning - Juegos Olimpicos! The translation is pretty easy - the Olympic Games - which consists of various stations like, a three legged race and an obstacle course with a ball. They are designed to incorporate the skills we've been working on all week, and perhaps more importantly, to get the girls to work together. Because, like our t-shirts read "Trabajando en equipo aprendemos mas..." (Working as a team, we learn more). The girls compete to accumulate the most points and the top six receive patches and pins for which they are infinitely grateful.

It´s unbelievable how much the popularity of Futbol Sin Fronteras (Soccer Without Borders) has grown, even just in the last week. We will walk down the street, and young girls and boys will just appear out of the woodwork, ¨Hola! Hola!¨ they´ll say with huge smiles on their faces and before we know it we have a band of kids walking behind us through the calles. We laugh and carry on, and I don´t think I´ve ever gotten this many hugs and kisses in one week ever in my life. I am truly spoiled. They are so giving - constantly trying to shower me with rings and earrings and temporary tattoos. I´m currently sporting a glow in the dark Ronald McDonald tattoo on my upper arm which was given to me by Larissa, my younger ¨sister¨, and I am constantly catching Daus, Dwyer, and Kay eyeing it up - wishing they had one like it - wishing they could be so lucky. Haha.

My spanish has served me pretty well I am happy to report. I was able to communicate all of the drills for the Juegos Olimpicos this morning - which is good. Alas, there have been a few incidents that have made us all smile. Oh, the miscommunications...Our first day here, Kay and I woke up at 6 to help our ¨mother¨ Xochitl cook the Gallo Pinto (rice and beans) which we eat together as a family every morning. Xochitl put crema out on the counter, which is equivalent to our sour cream and is meant to be dolloped atop the gallo pinto, and beside it the cafe and hot leche to use for the coffee if we´d like. We all make our own plates, and inadvertently, my dear friend Kay committed a huge error, which I can say she will NEVER live down. While making her coffee, she squirted a blob of thick, sour, (delicious?) sour cream into her coffee cup, thinking it was just the Nicaraguan form of cream. Xochitl caught her attempting to dissolve the crema in the coffee (stirring vigorously, I might add) and began to laugh, and I don´t think she´s stopped laughing yet. By now the whole barrio must know about Kay´s mistep that first morning in the kitchen, and it brings us endless amounts of amusement.

Que mas? Oh, yesterday, our ¨sister¨ Alexa invited Kay and I to come speak in an English class at her school, so that some of the students could ask us questions about Los Estados Unidos, what we thought of Granada, what we thought of the food, the climate, etc., etc. It was a huge success. By the end of the class, we are all laughing hysterically, especially after one of the boys agreed to come up and demonstrate his salsa dancing skills so that we could be once again reminded how uncoordinated we, as Americans, truly are. Sad but true. How do they move like that??!! The teacher was forced to shoo us out eventually, but I think we could have stayed and talked til the end of the school day if we'd been allowed. Later that afternoon, about 12 of the kids from the class showed up on our doorstep (all between 14 and 16 years old) and the girls asked if they could start coming to Futbol Sin Fronteras practices and the boys challenged us to a few games of futbol in the street.

Jeez, it seems like I could write forever. It seems like I haven´t even been able to touch on half the things I want to. Every day is just so full - every encounter so memorable - I could write a book!

Today is the final day of camp for the girls, so tonight's practice will be a little bittersweet. Thankfully, we are going to have a mini-fiesta in the office tonight at 5:30 for all of the girls to finally present the rules, regulations, mission, and a few other surprises I have to say even I am not privy too, which I'm sure will be amazing.

Okay dokey, time to run. Many things to do, and not much time remaining. Thanks for reading and one of us will be sure to update you all again soon! Adios!