Back to Granada

Day Six – Monday, March 1, 2010

Today we made the journey back to Granada. We took the ferry back and were greeted by our bus driver Alberto and our air-conditioned bus. We rode to our new place of lodging, which was a hostel called Hostal Mochilas. We had the entire place to ourselves, which was a total of six rooms and three bathrooms for the 23 students and Mr. Faloon. Ms. Heneveld and Ms. Del Favero were lucky and each had their own bathrooms. Only one of the students’ rooms had AC (but costs $5 per night), which to us was a big problem. That night many of the students, about 10, all slept crammed in that room. Then we had lunch at Casa Blanca, which is the restaurant that we will be eating literally every meal at for the next 5 days. Then we went to the local Nicaraguan school for orientation. We met up with two volunteers, Jared and Donald. Jared is a volunteer from New Zealand and speaks English and a little Spanish. Donald is a Nicaraguan who speaks very little English. We had to walk through town and the market for about 10 minutes to get to the bus station. The market was amazingly different from anything any of us had ever seen. It was packed with people, fruit, vegetables, fish, and even live crabs. The market is located on a narrow street with tables on either side. We got on the local buses, called “chicken buses” since one often finds locals carrying dead chickens and other produce on them, and rode for about ten minutes past a graveyard until we got to our stop. Then we walked about a mile is the scorching heat on dusty, dirt roads. Here we really experienced the poverty of Nicaragua. There were houses, well shacks, on either side of the street. They were either made with wood, or corrugated tin and only consisted of one room. We arrived at the gated in school and were practically attacked by the kids. Without even knowing us they came up and hugged us. We played with the younger kids during their recess and then met with a volunteer from California who told us what to expect. Part of this experience is to help the children speak English. So, we were partnered up: strong Spanish speaks with weak ones. We then returned to the hostel and had a chance to use the two free computers. We went to dinner at Casa Blanca and then had a meeting to prepare for our English lessons the next day.

-Rose and Isabel