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Lunch in the market
We ate this food and fortunately it stayed down Real quick aside... that steaming pile of dolphin excrement they refer to as an airport in Miami is a disgrace to the entire state of Florida. Thank you.
In the Managua airport all arriving passengers are required to stand in front of a thermal camera after departing the plane and before being allowed to head to customs. While you stand in front of the camera you peer at a huge screen that displays a thermal inprint of your body with all the associated colors listing your body temperature in Celsius. Two ladies in medical uniforms and wearing masks would look at the screen and stare for a while, then motion us on. I assume they were monitoring body temps looking for fevers to prevent the spread of swine flu. I do not want to know what the next step would be if one were running a fever.
The sun had set and it was dark by the time I caught a cab from the airport to the hostel I would meet Rob at. Along the road there were people in random buildings that didn't appear to be establishments playing pool, drinking, dancing, or just gathered and chatting. The night
was very hot and humid but most places were with walls and a roof but open air.
I have never seen so much neon lighting on cars as in Managua, and they take it over the top there. I saw several vehicles with not just a couple of neon lights under the carriage of the car but full-on neon all over the body - the front, the hood, the roof, the sides, and the back (and some on the interior as well). Also, drivers in Managua are pretty nuts - there were serveral occasions where I thought the cab I was riding in was going to get into a wreck, but somehow it didn't.
A guy named David runs the hostel that Rob and I stayed at in Managua. He hooked us up with his friend Roberto who is a taxi driver. Roberto took us to a terribly cheesy disco bar called "Moods" last night - the scenery was nice though. We made quick friends with the bartender (she hugged us when we left to head home) and drank many many many Victoria Frost cervesas!!!! We were the only two gringos in the place and most people just
kept their distance. However anyone that we did have contact with was friendly. I think the girls were afraid of us. Smart girls.
Walking to the hostel the 1 block from where the cab dropped us off after our night out, we saw a couple of homes with body guards sleeping outside on the front porches. I hoped as we walked by that they wouldn't wake up and start kicking us in the teeth. Fortunately they didn't.
Today David and Roberto took us to see the Masaya crater in Roberto's air conditioned cab (worth every penny) - the Masaya crater is the 4th largest active volcano crater in the world. The sulfur vapors were intense on the part of my one lung that is still functioning. We also went to a market in the town of Masaya. The market sits within a fortress built in the 1700's. A lovely French girl named Matilda that was staying at the hostel joined us. I think she was scared of us, as we kept asking Roberto to stop and get cervesas for us and were steadily washing them down as Roberto drove us around. Well, maybe she was just scared of
Masaya market
Outside the market fortress walls me. Smart girl.
Okay, that's enough for now - I'm out... next I will be reporting from Granada.
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Mama Gretch
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What a Hole!
I hope your BAC wasn't too high up on the edge of that crater - jeez, one misstep... Glad you're enjoying the local wildlife. I'd watch out for French girls. They're mean.