Adios, Nicaraguita

I definitely failed to update you all on the actual goings-on of the project when I promised…two weeks ago? It should come as no surprise that I have had literally no time to do so between hopping through rural Nicaraguan communities, working virtually non-stop on paperwork, herding people around tourist cities, formally putting things to an end, and just generally being busier than I ever have in my entire life. But I am pretty darn content about it.

The responsibilities that came with this job have challenged me and excited me from the beginning, but something about the end of the summer—filling out evaluation after evaluation, witnessing the drive that my volunteers put forth in the last week of the project, planning debriefing, the typical dramas of Staff House intensified, seeing all of my volunteers together again—simultaneously weighed down on my shoulders like a ton of bricks and left me feeling invincible, and like a proud and influential mother. As I assessed my volunteers’ and superiors’ performance this summer and came up with feedback on how each of them could grow as leaders, I really felt like a professional for the first time: busy, authoritative, constructive, influential. It was such a blissful thing to watch all of my volunteers finish up their projects, reflect on their summers and feel so genuinely proud of what they had accomplished, no matter how difficult it had been for some of them at times.

Pictures of cool stuff that happened in communities recently:

Volunteers and community members in La India with a trash can they made this summer!

Baby Camilo Harrington Garcia Masis, named after two of my volunteers.  Most awesome thing ever.

With dozens of hours of educational activities completed, gardens planted, bricks laid, fences in the ground, memories made, lessons learned, my volunteers left their communities after a jam-packed summer, excited to get home to share their experiences with everyone they know, but also teary-eyed and feeling alone. Even my emotions were intense as I empathized so much with parting volunteers and host families and relived a bit of my own experience in Paraguay. But after a short goodbye party complete with 150 Nicaraguans of all ages, a Latino-style talent show, tacos, and cinnamon-roll hugs, all 70 volunteers and staff crammed into a single bus and rode off to Granada, mostly cheerful, for a day of debriefing and some lovely times in the city. (Minus the part where we all boarded the bus again at 2 am two days later to get to the airport, only to discover that the volunteers’ flight had been delayed three hours and that almost everyone would be missing their connecting flights. That sucked! But…the unexpected is to be expected on an AMIGOS summer, right??)

The next day, supervisors went back on route to do our final community close-outs and evaluations of the projects with community members (in my case, that meant waking up in the dark for the second day in a row, at 5 am, to catch a 6 o’clock bus…after sleeping for only 6 hours between the two nights prior). Strangely, I was totally nervous about closing the projects out; I was supposed to organize meetings in all four of my communities with as many people as possible to get an idea of what went well, what didn’t, and what could be improved upon. And—welcome to Latin America—the largest meeting I was able to get together consisted of 15 people, despite frequent reminders and PRINTED invitations made by a local youth counterpart. In two communities, I ended up having to go door-to-door to get information because 3 people or fewer showed up to my planned meeting. Normally in this kind of situation, I would be bothered. I would be really disappointed in myself for not being able to stick to my plan, for not preparing well enough. But in one way or another, I got the information I needed, and I just had to accept the fact that I’ll have to figure something else out for next time. That is fine. Being unsuccessful is okay—who knew?!

Last moments with Denis and Yunior, two fantastic youth counterparts in the community of El Jocote, after my only slightly successful participatory evaluation.

After those two long days in communities, on the 12th, we all returned to Staff House to finish all of our remaining paperwork and get everything ready to be officially done.  By 3 pm on the 13th, we were completely paperwork free and had the entire house emptied; we squished our 9-person staff team and 18 backpacks/pieces of luggage into a small jeep and hit the road! Destination: Laguna de Apoyo, where our staff spent the next two days lounging in the beautiful lagoon, napping to make up for all of that lost sleep, surfing around OKCupid, and intentionally violating a large majority of the Standards of Conduct that we were required to abide by as AMIGOS workers. A ridiculously interesting way to close out the project and the summer, to say the least.

Currently, Seth and I are thousands of feet in the air somewhere between Managua and Atlanta, Georgia. This is the first time I’ve been in transit home this year and thought that I’d be happier staying where I was. It’s sad, having to leave so many people and things that I have grown to love so, so much. It makes me feel empty. But it’s also kind of a nice feeling, being absolutely certain that the past two months were worth it.

It was hard for me to hear that most of my fellow staff members—and even many volunteers—were so excited to see such a stressful summer come to an end. I can’t say I loved having to use a maggot-infested latrine in the pitch black of night, sitting in front of computer for a consecutive 12+ hours doing paperwork on a handful of occasions, having to deal firsthand with the gender inequalities in this country, or experiencing a lot of the difficult feelings that come from working so closely with the same group of people for so long. But I am leaving this experience a more responsible decision-maker, a more effective communicator, a better team-worker, a better leader, and a more confident person. And I never, ever could have foreseen the affection and warmth I felt these past two months. I have laughed and smiled so much and been taught more than I could ever imagine, and am leaving Nicaragua thirsty for more adventure, knowledge and love.

A year ago today was my first full day in Ecuador. I start college in two days. Life is so quick.

Birthday Week! (A Belated Entry)

I am pretty disappointed in myself for not having posted last week, after the most incredible and legitimate BIRTHDAY WEEK of my life! It's been crazy busy here, as always, which leaves very little time for social media ;).

Starting from where I left off, last week's theme was definitely love and appreciation...and cake. I visited my four different communities and was showered with surprise birthday festivities in all of them.

On Tuesday, I was totally surprised by a birthday cake/dance party in El Jocote with Josh, Brandon, Yunior, Denis, and other community members. They were super sneaky--despite various obvious hints they gave my by accident, I didn't notice a thing!

On Wednesday, something similar occured in La Lagunita with Sara, Lynn, and our friends in the community-- despite having already been surprised, I was not expecting a second celebration. It was just as awesome!! We danced in Sara's host family's fiesta attire.

On Thursday, the night before my birthday, I spent the night in Agua Fria with Camille, Brenna, and Kenzie. They had been scheming with our friend, Nora, and she woke us up at 5 in the morning to the loudest, cheesiest Latin American birthday music imaginable. (Blast this at the highest level through your speakers and you'll probably get about half the sound we experienced that morning...!) We crawled back in bed to savor our final moments before the sun came up, and Nora got us out of bed again at 6:15 for a "birthday surprise!" So, at the buttcrack of dawn on July 29th, we each cut ourselves a thick slice of Nica-cake and happily consumed it for Birthday Breakfast.

Later that night, I was surprised in an entirely different way when my volunteers poured talcum powder all over by body, apparently a Nicaraguan birthday tradition (I felt lucky though--it was better than raw egg, in my opinion, which I have seen done for birthdays here!). So...that happened...and then I took a lovely bucket shower in the dark.

When I came back to staff house on Saturday, we had an awesome taco dinner, another cake (not complaining ;) ) and an awesome piñata-- with UVA colors!!

In conclusion, I don't know if I have ever felt so loved. Most exciting and eventful birthday week ever! And...I swear I will update with more legitimate project-related stuff tomorrow--there's lots of it!

Growth and Progress

The past two weeks have been nothing less than a whirlwind. Time has passed so ridiculously quickly here; moving between communities daily and then just starting the process all over again each Tuesday makes weeks feel like days and days feel like hours. Last week especially, the flying time meant feeling rushed, overwhelmed, not thorough, and often at fault, both at staff house and with my volunteers. This week, lessons learned, it meant excitement, productivity, making confident decisions, feeling pressure to succeed, and pushing my volunteers and communities to do the same.

Rewinding to where we left off: I started Week 2 a bit of a mess, if I do say so myself. Some unfinished business at staff house left me a bit preoccupied when I went out into my communities. A phone call from Senior Staff in the middle of the week made me (pretty irrationally) feel like I wasn't being trusted to do my job. For some reason, I was being asked a lot of questions that I felt like I didn't have good answers for, which stressed me out on top of thinking about these other things that were also out of my control. The whole time, I was on edge, thinking that at any moment I could make a really terrible decision and get myself or volunteers in trouble. I was under the impression, after leaving for route on uncomfortable terms with a few staff members and after having received the phone call in the middle of the week (that seemed like a big deal in the moment, but really wasn't), that I had a lot of explaining to do when I got back to staff house. The stakes of my job and the responsibility that I have this summer really hit me hard; unlike any other time prior this summer, I had a moment of panic when I remembered just how many people are depending on me to make smart choices.

I got homesick for the first time; my life would be stress-free right now if I just hadn't done this, I thought. I needed someone to tell me I was doing a good job, that my feelings were valid, that I had made the right decisions, even if it wasn't true. When I got back to staff house, I couldn't figure out how to start talking to people about my emotions, so I just didn't for a while, and people noticed. Others in the house were angry at for some of the same reasons I was, and I was feeding off of them.

While being coaxed to discuss issues with my directors, I had a realization: I was not handling my discomfort and stress well. I was too nervous to talk about it because I didn't want anyone angry and I really didn't want my problems to be deemed ridiculous. But something that has been stressed a lot this summer, obviously, is giving and receiving feedback in a healthy and constructive way, so I decided to challenge myself to be open. It took me a while, but while half the staff was still up brooding at midnight on the first night home last weekend, I sat down with my Project Director and tried to tell her everything that was on my mind. I was nervous to hear what she had to say, and I was also worried about the reaction I would get when I gave her the feedback that I felt was necessary for me to feel supported. But it felt great to be honest, and she seriously took what I had to say into account. It showed throughout the weekend, too, as personal issues between staff members were resolved quickly after. In addition, throughout the weekend I was pushed--in a good way--to make decisions confidently and to take things into my own hands without a second thought. "Why should I be doing this?" turned into "Why SHOULDN'T I be doing this?!" basically overnight.

That weekend, I organized with my communities the ordering, pick-up and transportation of project materials to their respective work areas. I went with community leaders to hardware stores and troubleshooted issues that arose with money, missing construction supplies, and other random hiccups that honestly seem much bigger than any 18-year-old American should really have the privilege of dealing with. Throughout the process, I was really appreciative of the brainstorming I could do with my Project Director-- she made it so clear that I was capable of doing everything I needed to do and that she could support me without making decisions for me. She trusted me to do all of this, and while I imagine that was true from the beginning, it was really clear to me all of the sudden. Because she made a point to show that she was confident in me and support me in problem-solving when I needed it, I left for Week 3 refreshed and ready to do my job better than ever.

Just between this week and last, I feel myself growing. I am so much more comfortable giving people feedback and communicating openly. I obviously still feel a great deal of responsibility weighing on my shoulders, but I don't feel like I'm being watched or like I have to explain every move I make. I am trusted to do what is best because I know the communities, I know my volunteers, and I AM qualified to be asserting myself.

This week was lovely. Almost all project materials were taken care of, but of course not without issues arising here and there. But I was able to avoid thinking "if _______ hadn't happened, then I wouldn't have to go out of my way to _______," and rather just considered each extra errand I had to run as part of the process. It felt good not to be bogged down by silly things that don't matter; I am learning to be more flexible. I have a lot to improve upon this summer still, and I am excited to actively solicit feedback and push myself to be a better teammate and leader for the rest of my time here.

I am so happy, and it feels so great.

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EDIT: Here's a map of the AMIGOS work area this summer! Staff lives in Matagalpa-- the communities I visit are El Jocote, Lagunita, Agua Fria and Santa Cruz de la India.

Route Week 1: Done!

For me, this week marked the REAL beginning of the summer, what I came to do here, what I'll remember when I leave. For the first time, I traveled to each of my communities and actually saw volunteers in action, gave them feedback and suggestions, dealt with their diarrhea and homesickness (I can now discuss my and others' bowel movements/other bodily functions with the same comfort and ease that I talk about what I had for dinner last night. And, don't worry, everyone is alive and well!), and was able to really start connecting with volunteers and community members. This week, I think, was even more empowering than survey.

Things that made my heart leap with joy this week:

1. Sleeping in my exceedingly awkward "portable bedroom" in random people's houses.  This is one of my least intrusive and uncomfortable set-ups of the week.  I wish I had gotten pictures of them all!

2. Seeing volunteers with their host families and partners and knowing that they are--or soon will be--closer than they ever imagined.

3. Everyone--volunteers and kids--getting SO excited about educational activities and games.  Also, volunteers working healthily together and stepping out of their comfort zones.

Of course, there are some lows: taking sick volunteers to the clinic, chasing people around to collect things and get work done, having to take responsibility for so many things, being expected to know the answers almost all the time, living out of a camping backpack (surprisingly stressful) and generally being unsure-- I'm still so new at this and every day scares me a little. But I actually think that's good (which goes without saying). And nothing can compare to the feeling of arriving in each community and being greeted with the most ginormous smiles and hugs from volunteers and community members alike who are genuinely overjoyed to see me. I love the work and I love my volunteers and I love (almost) everyone else. ;)

Today will be errands, errands, errands. Sending mail, buying volunteers' forgotten items, meeting with staff and partner agency, exchanging money at the bank, other little things. And tomorrow, we'll be off again to begin Week 2!

Quick, Warm, Fuzzy Update

Our 59 volunteers (including three nationals) arrived on June 28th to begin a 2-day briefing on the 29th. We were so thrilled to finally welcome the volunteers to Nicaragua, and were teeming with energy at the airport as we got as close to the glass customs doors as possible waiting for everyone to arrive. Briefing itself had its ups and downs; as fantastic and as close as our Project Staff is, the whole week was high-stress and things certainly got more tense than we would have liked at times. Personally, I really surprised myself by how confident I felt as I facilitated activities, and how effective my training and advice really were. It's only the very beginning, and I can already feel myself growing as a person. It's lovely.

Since January, I've known that I'd be in Matagalpa at this time, and I knew that I'd be assigned some communities and have a route and have volunteers to train and support. But everything was just hypothetical--I was learning to lead a dozen blank faces and a group of rural locations that were fabricated by my imagination. Two days ago, as the Project Staff pieced together partnerships and community placements in one long, tense, nearly-all-nighter, those empty spaces in the picture were filled--and I am literally overjoyed. The nine volunteers I'll be overseeing this summer are some of the most insightful, articulate, thoughtful, capable and energetic people I've met in a long time, especially of their age. I really admire each one of them. I think they really do respect and look up to me as their supervisor, too, which will make for some fantastic work and healthy relationships.

My route (The Velawesomeraptors...!) and youth counterparts from all of their communities!

And to boot: we're getting a new supervisor tomorrow afternoon!! Meaning all of these extra responsibilities that many of us thought we'd have to take on this summer will be lifted off our shoulders. It is encouraging to think that at this exact time last week, I--well, all of us--were essentially panicking; right now, I, at least, couldn't be a single bit happier. I am looking forward to a (hopefully) relatively smooth summer of bragging about what awesome stuff my incredible vols are doing in their communities!

My Life is Crazy.

For the past four days, I have spent hours asking favors and questions of complete strangers, many of whom have families and lives and for no explicable reason should be conversing with some 18-year-old foreigner like a peer or coworker. I invited myself into people's communities and homes, asking them to feed me three meals a day and bathing myself with their bucket water. I wouldn't have trusted me if I were any of the people whose houses I slept in this week!

Words I have thought of to describe survey: long, nerve-wracking, empowering, emotional, exhilarating. I can't quite find a word or emotion to describe the being shoved off a bus in an area you've never visited, slinging your backpack, sleeping bag and cot over your shoulder and blindly searching for one or two people in a 300-family community that may or may not actually know you're coming. To spend the night in their house. I always found what I was looking for within a few minutes, insanely enough.

Also worth noting: I get to hang out in awesome communities this summer. They are all so different and interesting and stunningly beautiful.

After a week of cold bucket showers and beans & rice three meals a day and the ten thousand bugs swarming around inside my mosquito net and holding the latrine door shut while simultaneously trying to wipe myself and not let my butt touch the toilet seat in the pitch black of night (rarely a success, FYI), I was ready to come home on Friday afternoon to exchange stories with the rest of staff, relax a bit, and rejuvenate for the coming weeks. But, since my return, shit has hit the fan, as they say. Unexpected complications have led to a lot of extra work--I'll be overseeing five communities this summer and up to 12 volunteers rather than the anticipated 9. Between Friday and yesterday, I spent 15+ hours on the computer typing up all of the information I collected on survey and translating it into Spanish. Tonight, I have to go back to one of the communities I visited last week and spend the night again because I found a bat in the room I slept in which deems it unacceptable for volunteer housing. In addition, all of the 2-day volunteer training has to be planned today. It's so strange to be completing assignments and meeting deadlines and stressing out over things, but I'm pretty much okay with it. We're all supporting each other and keeping each other calm (well, everyone else is keeping me calm-- I don't know how much I'm doing for them!) and we always find time to cook together and tell crazy stories and laugh a LOT. :)

So they say it only gets easier from here. I can only hope it's true! I'm super lucky and glad to have such a fantastic and energetic group of coworkers, and I can't wait until the volunteers get here on June 28th-- when the summer REALLY starts!!

And Now...The Real Deal!!

After one more day in Leon, which three of the five of us spent lazing around the hostel and hovering over the toilet, we bussed to Selva Negra, a beautiful rainforest preserve and coffee plantation near Matagalpa, for one final, relaxed evening before beginning work in Matagalpa on Thursday. We splurged on this place and had our own room in their Youth Hostel, which was super classy compared to our other experiences that week.

The weather was much cooler and more pleasant than it had been in any other city. We decided we had to be outside, and took a short hike through the gorgeous cloud rainforest preserve. I was thinking we wouldn’t see much wildlife—it was late in the day, and why would these animals approach humans on their own volition? But I was totally wrong: the second we stepped onto the trail, we heard the monstrous sound of the howler monkey! A crew of them stared down at us and scrambled through the trees right above our heads. A pretty promising omen for the rest of our hike, I thought!

We walked through the jungle, talking, taking pictures, and stopping occasionally just so soak it all in. It was pretty freakin’ great to finally be out of the hot, humid cities. We decided to take a break, and sat down on some rocks in a small clearing. I decided to try to mimic the howler monkey sound, and in doing so, I joked that I would lure them in. As the others tried to suppress their laughter, I gave their deep, throaty growl my best shot as loud as I could. I must have been pretty spot on, because when the giggles subsided, we sat in silence for less than a minute before we heard rustling in the trees!! We saw one…then two…then THREE monkeys less than 100 feet above us. Trying to stay as silent as possible (or not let our excitement and disbelief overcome us and scare them away), we documented this ridiculous event on our cameras before they spotted us and hurried off. So, basically, you may now refer to me as The Monkey Summoner.

After a calm and relaxing Wednesday night, we finally made it to our beautiful staff house on Thursday (after Seth and I bussed two hours to Managua and back to pick up Megan, the last supervisor to arrive!) to start work with AMIGOS! The senior staff actually had to find a place for us that morning (!!!) because of some safety issues they’d had near the original house, so it was all of our first nights here yesterday. It.is.AWESOME: very spacious, super comfortable, seems extremely safe. Some of us have to sleep on cots, but I couldn’t care less. It is just SO fantastic to finally be here with everyone…and to UNPACK!!!!

We’ve been training all of yesterday and today, doing activities ranging from how to manage the AMIGOS budget to scavenger hunts around the city to how to work together effectively as a team. We met with our partner agency, CARE Nicaragua, this afternoon, and they are so enthusiastic and friendly and lovely. We were also assigned a “route” (AMIGOS lingo—you’ll learn many of these special terms throughout the course of the summer) of communities whose projects and volunteers we will be overseeing! Each supervisor has four communities; mine are about 45 minutes to an hour outside of the city by bus, I’m told. There is a Peace Corps volunteer working on community gardens in one of my communities, so that should be really interesting, although I’m not sure what to expect. Another one of my communities is completely new—an AMIGOS representative has never even set foot there, so I may or may not be surprising them when I should up for what AMIGOS calls “survey” (spending one night in each community, gathering information, meeting people, finding host families, emergency contacts, etc.) next week. Basically, this experience means talking to strangers in Spanish, eating their food and sleeping in their houses for five days. :)

We are all SO pumped and energy in the house is tangible. I am anxious and nervous for the next two months, but nothing could possibly compare to how completely THRILLED I am to be a part of AMIGOS in Matagalpa this summer!!!