Nicaragua, Summer 2008 SST unit

Final Retreat

29 Jul 2008 17:19 EST

The students left the Managua airport early this morning, after a relaxing retreat at Playa Coco beach in southern Nicaragua. During work sessions the students took turns sharing about their experiences on service, as well as describing their findings from individual research topics. Doug marveled at their impressive work. They taught him new things...

Back from Service

26 Jul 2008 02:14 EST

On Thursday (7-24) everyone returned from service and stopped by the unit house for happy reunions with long-lost friends. Friday there was a little more time for sharing over lunch at the favorite hang-outs in Jinotepe, but each student was also assigned to a cooking group for the upcoming retreat, which meant taking some time out for grocery shopping...

Service Visit #10, San Antonio Sur, Managua

17 Jul 2008 23:19 EST

Service Visit #9: La Concepción, Masaya

15 Jul 2008 23:21 EST

Service Trip #8: Esteli city

14 Jul 2008 23:56 EST

Service Visit #7: Jinotega city

13 Jul 2008 22:23 EST

Service Visit #6: Matagalpa city

12 Jul 2008 23:31 EST

Service Visit #5: Nindiri, Masaya.

10 Jul 2008 23:08 EST

Service Visit #4: Leon

9 Jul 2008 23:26 EST

Service Visit #3: San Onofre, Boaco

7 Jul 2008 21:10 EST

Service Visit #2: Candelaria, Boaco

6 Jul 2008 22:26 EST

Reflections on the First Six Weeks

3 Jul 2008 21:43 EST

Journal entries from earlier field trip

2 Jul 2008 23:22 EST

Two Journal Entries from Ometepe

24 Jun 2008 18:54 EST

Service Visit 1: Ometepe

23 Jun 2008 10:32 EST

Despedida from Carazo

19 Jun 2008 01:52 EST

On Friday night (June 14) we had a despedida (good-bye) party with the families and Spanish teachers at the Club Social in Jinotepe. The students, the teachers, and family members prepared different acts for the event, and Michaelâ€™s mother prepared the food for the roughly 100 people in attendance. And, of course, there was cheesecake made...

Last Days in Carazo and Women’s Basketball

15 Jun 2008 23:26 EST

Yesterday (Saturday, June 14) the students all arrived safely at their service projects. Before that, we didnâ€™t have time to post several pictures from their last three days in Carazo when a mixture of melancholy and anticipation invaded the group. One of the highlights was Thursdayâ€™s (June 12) basketball game between the #1 ranked...

2 Journal entries, from Nathan and Sarah

11 Jun 2008 22:21 EST

Field trip to northern Nicaragua

9 Jun 2008 22:52 EST

On Friday, Saturday and Sunday (June 6-8) we took a road trip to the northern mountains of Nicaragua, a region known for its natural beauty and coffee, as well as having been the battlegrounds for the contra war in the 80's, the Sandinista guerrilla movement in the 60â€™s and 70â€™s, and, long before that, where Sandino had fought against...

Coyuntura and Party

6 Jun 2008 01:00 EST

This week it was Maria Bâ€™s turn to celebrate a birthday during our weekly Coyuntura (on June 4). This week we also had lectures on Nicaraguaâ€™s Atlantic coast (it has a Caribbean culture that is very different from the Pacific side of Nicaragua were we and most Nicaraguans live), early Nicaraguan history (which was very well illustrated...

World Cup 2008.5

4 Jun 2008 23:18 EST

Tuesday night (June 3) Rusty organized a soccer game with some of the kids in his neighborhood that he regularly plays soccer with on the street. Actually, it was the kids who challenged Rusty to a game of Nicaragua vs. the U.S. We rounded up every SSTâ€™er we could, rented a small playing field, and braced ourselves for the worst. In the...

A Journal Entry from Alli, May 27

3 Jun 2008 23:37 EST

Since I am feeling kind of homesick and culture shock is starting to set in, I am going to take one of Kohlâ€™s suggestions [from a required reading] for overcoming culture shock. Number 8 on page 104 makes the suggestion of making a list of the positive things you can identify about the present situation. Itâ€™s true that in situations...

Nica music and dance lessons

31 May 2008 19:00 EST

On Friday (5-30) we had a DJ come and play snippets of the different types of music heard in Nicaragua: national folk music, bachata, ranchera, electronica, vallenato, reggaeton, pop, quebradita, merenque, salsa, cumbia, etc. Of course, the students also needed a few dance lessons to learn how to dance to the different types of music. In Friday...

Cold and Wet

29 May 2008 21:20 EST

"My First Three Weeks"

27 May 2008 22:42 EST

Karissa shares a journal entry. Tomorrow (May 21) it will be three full weeks since we arrived in Nicaragua. It has been a very busy three weeks. Iâ€™m surprised at how much Iâ€™ve learned in such a short time while communicating with my family isnâ€™t nearly as easy as it is in the states. Weâ€™ve learned to enjoy spending...

Mourning a friend

27 May 2008 03:35 EST

Saturday morning we received the tragic news of the death of one of our own, Deanne Binde, a GC student killed in a car accident on her way home to Minnesota from campus. Deanne was a gifted student who participated in three Theater Department productions over the past year and many other campus and community activities. Some of us in the group were...

Mombacho Trip #2

27 May 2008 00:54 EST

This weekend was the turn for the other half of the SST group (Karla M, Libby, Jill, Kyle, Josh T., Michael, Renee, Alex, Anna, Amanda and Maria B) and Doug to go to the Mombacho Natural Reserve. [See http://www.mombacho.com/]. Accompanying the group was Tom Meyers, GCâ€™s Director of International Education, who was here visiting the SST unit...

Xilotepelt Dance Group

24 May 2008 11:37 EST

During our weekly Coyuntura meeting on Wednesday (5-21) a local folklore dance group performed several pieces from El Güegüense , a famous Nicaraguan satirical play from the period of Spanish rule in the 1500’s. The main character of the play is the Macho Raton , or the ‘Brave Mouse:’ brave, because he dared to trick the local Spanish rulers...

San Juan del Oriente

24 May 2008 01:16 EST

On Monday (5-19) we took a field trip to San Juan del Oriente, a small town where pretty much every family in town has someone who works digging clay, mixing it, shaping it, glazing it, firing it, or selling the final pottery products. Not only is this the best town in Nicaragua to buy pottery, but the best work from the town is shown in international...

"La Chureca"

22 May 2008 00:09 EST

Mombacho Trip #1

20 May 2008 00:30 EST

Managua field trip

16 May 2008 23:29 EST

Yesterday we started our day-long Managua field trip with a visit to the offices of the Nehemiah Center, a collaboration of nine Christian service agencies working to help Nicaragua rebuild. Begun by Christian Reformed churches, the Center focuses on training Nicaraguan lay leaders. We also visited the Nejapa Nicaraguan Christian Academy, a model...

Visit to a farming cooperative

14 May 2008 21:44 EST

On Tuesday after Spanish classes we got out of the city and into the countryside where we visited a farming cooperative composed of 24 campesino families. This is one of the few farming cooperatives left from the 1980s when the government had sponsored an agrarian reform and helped the cooperatives with credit and technical assistance. The campesinos...

Nicaraguan literacy crusade

12 May 2008 22:40 EST

On Friday we had a stirring presentation by Jesuit priest Fr. Fernando Cardenal, who in the early 1980s was the countryâ€™s Minister of Education. He planned a famous Literacy Crusade that recruited and trained 100,000 volunteers to spend 5 months teaching reading and writing to illiterate Nicaraguans in the cities and remote rural areas. It...

Classes and School Field Trip

9 May 2008 08:26 EST

Has it really been a week since the plane landed? Weâ€™ve had 4 days of Spanish classes and it is beginning to feel like we have a routine now. Even the fact that the taxis and microbuses (they pick up passengers for specific routes) are still on strike feels like a part of the regular routine. We wonâ€™t know what to do once the taxis...

First Day of Classes

5 May 2008 22:54 EST

Everyone spent the two-day weekend with their families. Some played soccer or went to a soccer game, some went to a Hipica (parade with horses), some went to the festival for the patron saint of Dolores, and some just hung out with their families. To most it seemed like a pretty long weekend, but many said that theyâ€™ve noticed that their Spanish...

Arrival and Orientation

3 May 2008 10:39 EST