Standing on the edge...

Perhaps some of you are wondering what a 63 year old woman with bad knees is doing roaming around Central America. Having a damn good time for one thing. Learning Spanish for another and meeting lots of folks who have ´voted with their feet´after the last election and are moving out of the country permanently.

For the last 4 years I have been going to wonderful cities and countries to learn Spanish. I have enough certificates that say I have completed ´Curso 1´to paper a closet. I am so happy to say that I have finally made it into ´Curso 2´and have mastered verbs in the present and past tenses! Woohoo!!!

I am at a lovely B&B on the outskirts of Granada, Nicaragua called ´Casa Doña Pilar´( it has a website.) It is everybit as lovely as the pictures depict. Yesterday was glorious and I had the pool to myself. Ahh, decadence. As part of my package deal here, I got a full day of touring with a guide/ driver. I was the only one on the tour. We startd out by visitng the Masaya Volcano National Park. It is still active and the smoke was billowing up and out of it. Picture Thelma and Louis drving off the cliff into the crater and you have some idea of what I was staring down into. Rumor has it that hundreds of years ago the indigenes people would throw in women and children to appeased the gods of fire. ( I always find it interesting that the chiefs are male and never seem to throw in men- but I digress). High on an adjoining hill was a cross and the remnants of an old monastery. The priest called the volcano" boca del infierno" or mouth of hell. He spent a lot of years having ceremonies to 'exorcise the devil´ that he thought lived in the fire. Today it is just smoking but they do hand out warnings that "it could erupt at any time and to hide under your car if rocks are thrown up and out." Right, I can see me crawling under a car.... Last time it erupted was in April, 2001 so they think it could happen, well, any time. Nicaragua apparently sits on what is know as the " ring of fire". It is completley surrounded by several very active fault lines. I´m only here a week so am hoping I get out before the next ´big one´.

Edgar, my green eyed, movie star handsome, semi- English speaking guide was a happy man when I told him he could give me the tour in Spanish. I can't tell you how happy it makes me when anyone tells me my Spanish is very good. Even if they are lying or just being nice, I'll take it.
We visited several of the wonderful Markets in Masaya a town known for its artisans. I would have to return with a huge empty trunk to fit in all the beautiful crafts that I liked. Of course, there is the usual tourist schlock, but every once in a while there would be exquisite hand made wooden boxes or trunks or lamps or tables or salad bowl sets. The workmanship truly that of artists. Then there were the weavings, the embroidery, the paintings. I had to get out of there as I have no room to carry anything home.
We went from that market, which I gathered was for tourists, to the one that the people use. It was grubbier, less well lit, surrounded by horse buggies that were taking old ladies home, and of course the parking shills. These are, in case you have never come across them, young boys or men who will watch your car while you are shopping. The more ambitious ones have a bucket of water and will wash your car if you give them the ok. It is always wise to ´hire´them for a few coins. You never know what your car will look like if you leave it " unwatched". There is a fellow here at the B&B that told me a story about when his father and some friends were in Glasgow, Scotland attending a soccer match. They had 2 huge Newfoundland dogs in the car. When asked if they wanted their car watched while at the game, they replied that the dogs would prevent anyone from breaking into the car. When they returned to the car all 4 tires were flat. On the windshield was a note asking if the dogs changed tires. Lesson learned.
I have been told by every Nicaraguan that I have talked to that it is the safest country in Central America. I have to say that I don't see anywhere near as much of the fortress mentally that I saw in Costa Rica where homes were surrounded by tall wrought iron bars usually with razor wire or pointed hooks on top. Everything was behind locked gates. The area I am in here is wide open with not even a fence around the yard. There is a ´rent-a-cop´who watches the neighborhood but mostly he looks pretty bored.

Today I witnessed a lovely site. We were on a road that can only be compard to a game by son had when he was little. It was called' Digital Derby'. You used controls to avoid obstacles in the road. The road today was pocked with so many potholes that people stood at the side of the road with shovels and you could pay them to fill the holes in. Along the side of the highway were untethered bulls and cows just munching away oblivious to the traffic. Some fellows were riding their horses and at one point there was a fellow in a wheel chair. As we slowed to pass him, a horseback rider threw a rope down to him and gently startd to pull him along. There wasn't a word exchanged. It was a completely generous gesture. When I commented to Edgar about it he said " The people of Nicaragua are very kind. They will always help you out."
One of the gifts of traveling is to really learn about other people. I remember meeting a fellow in Peru who told me that the way he evaluates a country is by watching how the people treat their children and their dogs. I might add to that , how they treat their handicapped.

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