Foreigners

I got back to Boaco Thursday afternoon and took some time to unpack, do laundry, and took a shower.  I unfortunately did not get a hot shower this past week while in hotels because every time I got in, the water was cold/luke warm.  Bummer!  I’ll just have to resort to bucket baths with water heated on the stove. 

It was nice to see my host bro after being gone for 4 days and it always feels good to come home.  I walked around the town with him, got some groceries, and then went used clothes shopping.  I didn’t find anything for me, but we found some cute baby stuff for my host sister.  Jasser wants me to help him throw a baby shower for his sister next month.  I’m excited for the baby to come!  My host sister, Ruth, lives in Granada with her husband (in Managua during the school year) so I probably won’t get to see the baby often, but it will be fun when I do :)  I’m kind of glad they live in a different house because I’m not ready to live with a newborn crying through the night.  

That night I met up with some students from University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire who are doing some research here in Boaco.  One of them contacted me through Facebook because he had seen I was a PCV in Boaco and he was also interested in PC.  They’re staying at a hotel in Boaco, but working with a company in Teustepe, which is about 30 minutes away.  I invited Steve, my sitemate who is a small business volunteer, to come with us for dinner.  Since the students are doing a project with micro-finance, I figured they’d be able to talk to Steve about his work here.  We ended up going to the Mexican restaurant and we had a great time swapping stories.  The girl had studied abroad here in Nicaragua before and both students have applied to PC and have been given some information about where they might be placed.  The guy is supposed to be starting a project in Latin America in September, so he could be close by.  It was fun talking to them about our experiences here and hearing what they have been doing.  Their university is paying for their trip so we were comparing some things against our volunteer budget… Nicaragua really is a cheap place to travel, but when you’re on our budget, you live a more simple life, as it should be in PC.