Malaria Dreams

The Nicaraguan border greeted us with light sheets of rain, cold and gray, but still an extreme contrast to the buckets of water that fell for two days and a night in the coastal town of La Cieba, weather that delayed our hiking plans and eventually caused our hasty departure. With water leaking through the ceiling of our hostel, and rain still failing hard we decided to make our escape from Honduras. Cars up to their wheel wells in water, boating through city streets, we caught a glimpse of what the raining season must look like for this part of the country. We caught two buses to the capital city Tegucigalpa, arriving before midnight,  to a city closed down and seemingly deserted. For the first time during our travels there was no room at the hostel of our choosing, or the second, and the third was much too expensive. Our cab driver finally took pity on us and a cool 500 Lempiras (25 dollars) for delivering us to a cheap, vacant room he knew. A British fellow, Sam,  split the cost of the cab and the room with us, Colin and I split one of the two beds in our room. We slept about four hours  and then took off for a bus leaving at 6 a.m. for the la frontera de Honduras y Nicaragua, Sam and the rest of Tegucigalpa still sound asleep.

   

Men with thick wads of multi-colored bills, calling out for money exchanges, tiendas selling chips and drinks, dogs, chicken and geese crossing unchecked by guards across chain barriers. We filled out the necessary paperwork ourselves, while many stood in line to have it filled by workers for a small “tip”. After a brief wait in line, we stepped over the chain the geese had walked under and there we were, in our fourth Central American country in 6 weeks. Two more bus rides lay ahead of us, the second the packed with standing passengers right up to the door. We were among the seat-less for much of the journey, Colin practically the whole 3 hours. Exhausted we walked with our packs a few blocks to Hospedaje Chepito in the city of Esteli. This city is set in a agricultural valley, in the northern Nicaraguan Highlands. The temperature is warm during the day, hot in direct sunlight, but like many of the mountainous regions we’ve visited, clouds and cool breezes keep the peace. Nighttimes cool of a little. After long afternoon naps and late cups of coffee we learned, by talking until the first noises of morning workers, the temperatures after sunset  don’t change much till sunrise.

The city is very alive. Our hostel is located on a street where shops selling shoes, fashionable clothes, cowboy boots and belts, stretch unbroken for several blocks, meeting up with the Parque Central. Like many Central American cities we’ve seen,  a Catholic church sits just off the park, right in the thick of life in the city. Yesterday we wandered through a huge produce market, taking photos, marveling at the bounty, bags of fiery red peppers, tomatoes in heaps, and sampling fruits we had never seen before. We had our first soy here in Esteli, soy tacos at Licuados Anandas, a vegetarian focused eatery, and delicious Cuban sandwhiches at Rincon Pinareno.

Tomorrow we plan to explore Somoto, a area of waterfalls and a river carved canyon, about an hour and a half bus-ride from town. We failed to make the 730 am wakeup call to head there this morning (we blame the late naps and the chorus of roosters, that like to check in long before day break). On Tuesday we head to Managua, the capital, to pick up our old friend and comrade Steven Payne, who is flying down for eight days. We hope to catch a biesbol game in Managua before heading to Leon, one of the more famous and beautiful sounding colonial towns Nicaragua has to offer. Final good news is that Colin and I have been accepted to volunteer for HondurasChildren, an organization that provides housing, educational assistance, and activities for children no longer living with their families. We will head back to the Northern Honduran coast for the beginning of February to begin working. We started taking Malaria medication once we knew it was a possibility we would be living in this area. We’d heard that a side effect can be intensified dreaming, and we both agree that our dreaming has become much more vivid. I have taken to writing down some of the more memorable ones, which recently have been after every night and nap. Speaking of sleep, Colin just woke up as his snoring peaked. We will probably start thinking about food soon, a major occupier of our time here, and source of pleasure. Tonight I think it will be taco’s again, but with the real stuff this time…

5 Weeks Later

Andrew and I have been here for over 5 weeks now. We are in our third country now (Guatemala, El Salvador, and now Honduras). At the moment I'm feeling that life is pretty dang easy here. Broadly speaking, there are two kinds of days. Travel days are spent on a series of cramped, hot, and often stinky American school buses as we ride from one arbitrarily chosen destination to the next. At the beginning these journeys were pretty rough, but I think both Andrew and I have gotten used to them. We typically read, sleep, and/or listen to podcasts, music, and we recently finished listening to Dreams from My Father (Obama's first book) which was really good. Most days we wake up in a hotel/hostel in a city, town, village, etc. and determine what we'd like to do that day. Some of my favorite days so far have revolved around swimming in cool water after being out under the hot sun. We've swam in giant mountain lakes, rivers and creeks, and the big beautiful Pacific Ocean. My proudest moment so far was jumping off a 40 foot bridge into a river (to his credit Andrew jumped first). Often, we spend a good deal of time searching out good and cheap food that comes in huge portions. I think I've had enough beans, rice, tortillas, and fried chicken to last me through the remainder of 2011. We are buying fresh produce (pineapples, oranges, tomatoes, avocado) on the street pretty regularly and even bought apples from the Yakima Valley recently! The signs of globalization are ubiquitous down here. Almost everyday I buy ice cream of some sort- never eaten so much before. Today, we caught a few buses to a big waterfall where we swam, saw multiple species of lizards (some that were nearly a foot long), found some sad caged monkeys, and watched vultures fly overhead.

To slaves of The Man this lifestyle may sound pretty sweet, but as with all things, it can feel boring and is hard to appreciate at times. Funny the way that works. Andrew and I were hoping to be volunteering before we meet up with Steven in Nicaragua January 19th but all our opportunities kind of fell flat. True to character we definitely procrastinated a little too much. Some friends we made while traveling told us about an organization on the coast of Honduras that works with orphans and teaches English to children. They volunteered with this organization for a few months and had a good experience. We are applying over the next few days. I'm looking forward to living in one place for more than a few days, finding a sense of community again, and having something close to a schedule.  In the meantime we are going to spend the next two weeks criss-crossing Honduras.