day 8: language barriers and packed cars
today might be the best day in nica yet. for sure one of the best.
it started off at 7am with me doing some laundry—and then going back to bed—and then waking up at 8 to eat and take care of fresh clothes. so fresh and so clean, clean. bookin it to la chureca for child sponsorship (not child support… haha) and for class, lauren and i found out that we’d be spending a few hours at juntos to teach literacy to some 5-8 year old kids. talley and robert played games with the kiddos, so we brough our game face and dove in. it turns out that chureca kids don’t know a whole lot-go figure- and it really demonstrated how far manna has taken these kids. after struggling for 90 minutes to keep a few students’ attention spans captive, we left out exhausted but super content. i spent a lot of time with carlo, a super sweet kid who may or may not of have huffed glue- i can’t really tell.
kids in chureca often huff glue to stop being hungry (it’s an appetite suppressant) and to get a quick cheap high. because they don’t have the capacity to see the long term damage of this neurotoxin, huffing is one of the biggest problems i’ll encounter down here.
after chureca, we came back to the house to prep arts and crafts for creative arts. robert, talley, and i had the kids make puppets at el farito. i got a few sweet memories with armando, dayana, maikol (spelling unknown, pronounced michael), and a few other other incredible kids. lindsay and i supervised a table- and i gotta say- it was a keeper.
robert and i came back to the house while the rest of the gang (aka all the girls and andrew) went to the land for womens excersize (and whatever andrew did… haha guys are not allowed at fem. fitness). we got some chill time to finish up laundry, work out, and (finally) take a swim and a shower. so sweet.
quick dinner of pasta and chicken. it was like mom’s cooking… but with a spanish twist. per advice of josh e, i put some hot sauce on it and it rocked my world— so good. whenever rice, beans, and chicken gets boring, just toss some hot sauce on and drink some orange gatorade, and it’ll be the best meal in the world.
advanced english was INCREDIBLE. i got to sit with cassandra, lindsay, and three nicas: josue, dayana, and scarla. we went over super hard stuff, even for native speakers, like the difference between “it’s” and “its,” “beside” and “besides,” “shadow” and “shade”—which is actually nearly impossible to decipher, considering the word is the same for both. once again, we got to see the nicayuda people again (norman, fabricio, elena, et all) in class and i learned that josue is a “troublemaker”- laura taught him that- and that norman is a HUGE prankster. and also, i learned that lindsay (in addition to lauren) is very easy to frighten.
we returned to the house and kicked it for a bit, reminiscing on the crazy packed car rides and fun that we had in class today. for sure another day for the record books, and i can’t wait for more teaching tomorrow.
paz,
**nican fun fact- the word for screw is turnillo… which i say tu anillo, “your ring.” and when you say ring instead of screw, it’s not only really funny but the nicas make sure you never forget it.
