The truck ride was bizarre, brutal, and surreal. How could something so physically rude and sometimes painful with branches whapping us be so much fun? Then the volcano climb was way beyond what many of us thought we could do. But we did it anyway. It took exactly an hour to climb it and about 5 minutes to run back down the face. What an awesome experience!
Thank you This is awesome Allison! I will make every 1st -timer read your bolg so they will better know what they are getting into! It is so refreshing to sit back and see everthing from a new perspective. I laughed, I cried - I want to go back! I am already pplanning next year's trip.
Tessa
Book idea So, can we use some of the photos for the "books" we want to create for the kids a Villa Catalina? I like how well you captured the image of the children waiting outside. Playing with them was crazy, but we managed.
Wonderful, thoughtful, and beautiful! Speaking of you, and your journal. It's a great gift to us all, and to send out to folks who want us to tell them about the trip. (Bob and I didn't even take a camera!)
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Jo
THANK YOU AWESOME ALLISON Allison, thank you so much for this gift of reminiscence and your perspective. You are such a blessing to us all in SOOO many ways! Thank you for taking the risk to "expand your comfort zones". You are the epitome of generosity and I am so grateful that you were there. nance
Apologies to my folks It's taken several days for me to even begin to process what we saw and experienced in this village. My overall impression remains
MOM AND DAD -- OH MY GOD -- WE HAD NO IDEA HOW HARD YOU HAD TO WORK
- to catch the chicken
- to kill the chicken
- to get the damn feathers off the chicken
- to get the guts out
- to get it cut up
- to find the wood
- to boil the water
- to haul the water to boil
No, I didn't have to do this in Nica but I watched the women work and every day it would take them all day to cook 2 meals: breakfast which was beans and rice and cut up fruit (watermelons, and paypayas) and dinner which was beans and rice and some kind of stew with veggies and sometimes meat in it.
When they weren't cooking, they were washing down the eating area (concrete floor) with left over dish water or washing clothes by hauling water into an old sink and plastic tubs. The sink had a built in scrub board. Then they slopped the clothes over the line or a fence or a bush.
and on and on it went. Not a SINGLE thing was wasted. I mean not a single thing. If the kids didn't eat it, which they usually did, the horses did or the dogs did or the chickens did. There was no packaging so not much trash but what there was was burned to keep the mosquitas away.
Whew.
I'm just sorry it took me until I was 50 years old to appreciate all that it took to just survive back "in the good old days."
Rosann
Country life Allie, thank you for capturing this experience. It was my favorite part of the whole trip -- even though the conditions were physically more demanding -- no running water or electricity, bathing in the bay and cooking on a wood fire. The kids were happier and definitely easier to manage.
The families were very poor in that they only had huts and not houses but they also had the sea to fish in and could gather plums or plantains from the fields. There were also a few chickens and more guineas (sp?), pigs here and there, and cattle. Almost everyone had a horse, even if you could see its ribs.
This was country life as my parents and grandparents lived it right here in Georgia and Alabama -- and not too long ago at that. I left this village with a better appreciation of what the older generations have worked so hard to give us. Here is what my mother wrote after seeing these pictures.
"I was reminded about the world in which I grew up. It was like another world too. Always, always lots of work to do. Went straight to the fields after coming home from school. You could grab a sweet potato, but not tarry a minute. There was always work to do in the field except during cold winter. There was always lots of work period. Feeding the mules, cows, hogs and chickens. milking, churning, cooking, canning, sewing, mending, washing, ironing, drawing up water from the well, the stove wood, and fireplace wood. Don [her brother] would cut the wood and I had to bring it in. Sweeping the yards, front and back. It was sweeping because first we had to go down in the woods at the branch and cut some gaul berry bushes to make a bundle for a broom to sweep with. Everyone hoed the yards and that was another thing we had to do. And you know what? It was thought of as being virtuous to work hard and do all that. If one did not do any certain one of the chores, they were thought of as lazy or as mother use to say, "sorryness'"
Sylvia
Blessings
creative spirit*artist*friend*crafter *quilter*painter*cook*baker*whirl wind mess maker*vintage stuff collector*listener*animal lover*joker*reader*knitter*broadway song singer*dreamer*activist*traveler*forgiver... full info
Debbie
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Queen for the Day
They look so beautiful...not sure who is queen though!