I got back fom my site visit yesterday! It was really great. The town is really beautiful, in a valley and surrounded by mountains. I went on a hike one day with my site mate, Owen, to a big stone cross above the city. It was a nice, pretty quick hike and gave a great view of the town. Apparently there are lots of outdoor attractions and pretty lagunas, rivers and stuff like that nearby. The pictures below are me and Owen at the cross with Yali below--I have pictures of the actula cross, but I'll put them on later.

The town is about 7000 people in the city center, I think, and there are lots of surrounding (very poor) communities. It has a cyber (!) and a pool and my host family has a hot water shower head!!! Noone here has hot water heaters, not even the hotels. To get hot water, you either heat it on the stove or you have an electric shower head, that heats the water as it comes through. It is so nice, esoecially in the mountains, where the water comes pretty cold. I'm definitely gonna be spoiled while I'm living in this house. It's just a man and woman- they have kids but one is married and the the other two study in Leon and arent home very often-so it's pretty laid back and I'm pretty sure I'll have my own bathroom when I go to stay, like in Teresa, and that is very rare. I only have to stay with them for 6 weeks, but it seems like I want to stay there longer, as long as I get to cook some of my own meals.

One of the days I went to one of the surrounding communities and watched while one of the nurses did like a census kind of thing. They go house to house (on foot, hiking-it was hard work) asking how many people live in the house, they record the state of the house, what it's made of, how many rooms there are, what they do with their trash, what health problems they have. It was really interesting and eye opening b/c these people are poor. We went to about 15 houses and every single one them had dirt floors, the majority had 1 bedroom with on average 5 inhabitants, about half had no toilet or latrine at all, and almost everyone complains of respiratory problems and headache because they all cook on their wooden stove inside the house which lets out tons of smoke and no one drinks water. Below is one of the ladies we talked to--when she was asked how much schooling she had had, her answer was "I don't know anything" and as we were leaving she showed us her ID card and asked us if we could please tell her how old she is. (69)

Anyway, I'm very excited about my site and ready to get started!! 3 more weeks!Tomorrow we are going to the beach to hang out and then next week is our last reall week of training where we have work to do, and then it's getting ready to swear in!

In case I don't get back to the cyber in time-- Happy Birthday Everett!! Love you!

♥Danielle

San Sebastian de Yali, Jinotega

...is where I will be living for the next 2 years!! We found out Mon. where we will all be placed and I think for the most part everyone is pretty excited. I got a site that was one of my top 3 choices, so I am very happy. I don't know a ton about it- but it is in the mountains ( coffee country!) and there are about 7000 people in the town and about 12000 in the municipality. I will have a site mate named Owen who is a Small Business volunteer and he doesn't leave until Aug 2010 so hopefully we'll get to work together on some stuff. Elisa has visited Yali and she really liked it- so hopefully so will I. It's cold though, apparently. I'm going to have to buy some more clothes. Or just put on all the ones I have!

I'll be the second volunteer there in recent years and the girl that is leaving did alot of work with maternal/child health and nutrition, so I'm really excited about that! And she's a really good drawer and is leaving me some of her charla materials! Yay! I am a terrible drawer. Also she apparently has a larger board game and puzzle collection that she's going to leave me, so it sound slike I'm pretty set. We meet our counterparts on Fri. with is the person appointed to us that we are supposed to colaborate with on projects. And then we leave with them and travel to our sites to spend the week meeting alot of people and checking out the town, etc. We come back on Thurs. and it's all downhill form there. Not too long and I'll be done with training and on my own

Below is a picture of me, Amanda, Elisa and Lorna being very excited to recieve our sites



So I have been thinking this whole time that I might be one of the few that escape the curse of the female volunteer in Nicaragua and avoid gaining weight from all the sugar, oil, and starch. That was until this weekend. Listen to what this little gordita ate: I've told some of you how my host mom often gives a bowl full chocolate sandwich cookies for breakfast ( I would call them Oreos, but are soo not). That's what I had Sat. morning, then for lunch we had...lengua!! ahhh. It wasn't that it tasted bad, it was just that it still had taste buds on it. With a mountain of rice and beans, of course. Then that night, I had 3/4 of a whole avocado, a big mound of gallo pinto ( rice and beans fried with alot of oil) and wait for it...breaded and fried bologna!!!! But it was delicious and I ate it all! So needless to say I'm feeling a little chubby this week. But I'm doing well and I hope you all are too!! Take care

♥Danielle

OK Dad, I used a shoelace

So I brought a lot of stuff with me to Nicaragua. Among the 4 of us, my family and I managed to cram in 100+ lbs of junk into 2 suitcases, a backpack, and a bag. I've 3 types of lighting devices, every size battery there is plus chargers, a year supply of plastic bags, a sewing kit, extra makeup, extra toiletries, more tampons than I have used in my life yet...if for some reason I am am unable to reach any kind of store for my entire 2 years in Nicaragua, I will still be fine. So you can imagine my annoyance at 4 am, the morning I left, when my dad is behind me shoving more things in my bag as I'm trying to lug them out the door. "I found a couple shoelaces that you might need", he says. Of course we all laugh at him and I'm pretty sure I've made fun of it at least once since being here.



So I hate to have to admit that I used a shoelace!! I dropped my headlamp and the little thing that holds the batteries in broke. I have medical tape that I tried first, but that just wasn't cutting it, so I tied a shoelace around it and it works great! Thanks Dad!

So I still didn't take any pictures of my family like I promised but I have a picture of me and Elisa and of a couple of the kids in the youth group. The sassy girl in the pink in the 2nd pic is my host sister Maria Isamar.

I did think up a couple things to say about Nicaragua:

-It is true that they say "Adios" in passing on the street, instead of hola or whatever else

-No one ever points at something with thier finger. You point with your lips. Even if you are mid sentence and you want to talk about that girl over in the corner you just pucker your lips in that direction and keep talking.

-Everyone has a name that is not their name. It might be based on their appearance, something they sell, something they once did... for example there is the pelon-the bald guy, the dienton-the person with the big teeth, la divorciada-the divorced lady, and of course gordita, chelita, gringa all of that and poor Nick gets alot of Chino and chinito and all that.

It is true that people eat rice or beans or both at pretty much every meal and there's alot of frying going on. Lunch and dinner must include a bastimento which is either a tortilla, bread, platano, or guineo( a platano like thing, but smaller and absolutely no flavor. like a stick of starch) Rice is not a bastimento, unfortunanately.My favorite combo so far has been pasta, with a side of rice and a tortilla. And they drink coke, coffee or supersweet (but freshly made) juice at every meal. Not a lot of water gets drunk. And it is customary to drink hot drinks with hot food. Mondays most people eat soup for whatever reason, and usually people drink coffee with it.

So there's a couple of observations. I hope you all are doing great. We are all going to Chinandega this week and are all pretty excited for a change of scenery (and the beach!) Take care!

♥Danielle