La Chureca

Last week, I went to La Chureca (the dump) in Cuidad Sandino with a translator and a boy who used to live there that now lives in Furia Santa, the center for addiction that Project H.O.P.E. runs. It would not have been safe to go without him. When we arrived in the morning, we drove through fields of trash until we found where people were working that day. As the trash trucks come into the dump, children and youth climb up on top of the trash load and start going through the pickings as the truck drives back to the dumping site. When the trash is dumped, everyone rushes over to see what of worth is in the load. They put what they want in the bags or carts that they carry. Metal and plastic items are the most desirable.  The first woman we talked to was cutting the metal buckles off of a tattered purse with a machete. She did not want to be surveyed. When we found willing participants, we stood in the trash and interviewed them, running out of the way when trash trucks came flying through to dump more trash. The people we interviewed were tough and weather worn, their arms and legs almost black from sorting through the trash with their bare hands. I could tell some of the guys were in the local gang by the way they dressed and acted.

 When we returned in the afternoon after our lunch break, about 20 people stopped our truck and jumped into the bed as we drove into the dump. When we got into the dump there were over 100 people waiting for us. The people thought we were bringing them food. We tried to remove ourselves from the mob by walking up a hill of trash, but everyone followed. I found myself standing 4-5 people deep in the middle of the hill with dogs sitting on my feet and between my legs (I guess they also thought I was going to feed them). Our intent was to interview the de facto leader of the group about the needs of the community, but we couldn’t get away from all the other people so it ended up being more of a group interview. We found out that they were squatters on the land at the edge of the dump. When I asked about the strengths of the community, they told us that they were hard workers and took care of each other. Their biggest expressed need was food for the children. The children work in the dump at least half of the day. 

As we were leaving, a huge storm was coming in. So as we tried to walk out of the dump, a strong wind was blowing trash and dirt all over us. We were picked up about a minute before a monsoon-like rain began. 

 

Please pray for these families.

 

 

 

 

Pictures from Dos Santos and Futbol

Click here for pictures

Creative Transportation in Nicaragua

Census in Gruta Javier

This week I have been doing a census in a barrio up the hill, Gruta Javier. We didn’t really know anything about the community, besides where it is and that it appears to be very poor. Eduardo, one of the Project HOPE staff, is helping me. We are doing a short survey that asked for names and ages of household members, as well as monthly income and the type of house they live in (i.e. corrugated metal, cement block, etc.). I also take a picture of the family for Project HOPE to use in the future if they decide to partner with the community. In the middle of the community is a huge building project; the government is building apartments for single mothers that will cost approximately $30/month. This means the community will be growing significantly in the near future.

Eduardo is hilarious. He is in charge of children’s ministry at Project HOPE and used to be a professional soccer player in Nicaragua. He is learning ventriloquism, so when we see kids in the community he talks to them in a funny voice with his mouth closed (this produces amused looks from the older kids). When a kid was looking at the truck we came in, Eduardo pretended his voice was the truck talking and the child looked confused and walked away. Eduardo is learning English, so he is always keen to learn new words and their pronunciations. He will make me repeat words he doesn’t know and write them down. Since we are both learning each other’s languages, sometimes our conversations are quite entertaining. When we were driving up to the barrio yesterday he pointed out a woman we had interviewed for the census the day before and said, “We censed her yesterday”. When I saw two men using roosters for a cock fight, I said, “look they are fighting with the chickens!” and Eduardo responded, “no, it is like boxing”.

Eduardo

Picture links

Pictures from my mini vacation: click here
Pictures from the new barrio I have been working in: click here

Lessons from a beginning surfer

Surfing is hard

They’re called rash guards for a reason

The surf board is heavier when you are leaving the water

If you don’t lift the front of your board when a wave comes, the board will hit you

If your board drifts sideways as you are going out, the board will hit you

When you fall off the board, come up from the water with your hands over your head, or the board will hit you

If you want to be a surfer, you have to watch the tide

Lots of big waves are not a good thing

You have to be very selective when choosing your wave

Getting back on the horse

 I haven’t ridden a horse since I was about 12, so it took me awhile to remember how when a local rancher took me down the beach and through sugarcane fields on horseback. After about 15 minutes,  when my thighs were screaming at me and I was terrified of falling off, I remembered I could raise myself off the horse and hold on with my legs. Things went much more smoothly after that. While riding, I got to see fishing Nica-style. The men stand in the waves about knee deep and swing fishing line above their heads lasso style, then cast it out into the water. The line resembles a kite string in the way they have it wrapped. This was part of a great mini vacation I had this weekend at Los Cardones Surf Lodge. The lodge is an eco-friendly and socially responsible retreat. There is not electricity in the cabanas, and they have composting toilets. Everything is on the beach, so naturally, the view is amazing. I spent a lot of time swinging in the hammocks and relaxing. I saw countless iguanas and large red and blue crabs. The toads come out en mass after dark, so I had to watch my step. I also learned how to surf (for my thoughts on that, you can see the next post). Now I am back at Project HOPE and quite sore. I will be starting a census in a barrio up the hill from the base that we haven’t worked in before.

Clinics

Yesterday I got to hold babies. I was assisting at a clinc that the Project HOPE phycisian, Dr. Melba, runs twice a week in a clinic that the government could not staff. I did heights and weights for the patients as they were being seen by Dr. Melba. I got to hold the babies while I weighed their mothers. I also helped in the pharmacy, since I'm a pro now :-). The day before, we ran a clinic out of someone's house in the new community that Project HOPE is building houses in. A family has offered their house for clinic once a week. While seeing patients, Dr. Melba also teaches as the opportunity arises. A mother came in with her baby and Dr. Melba explained that he could get tangled in the necklace that he had on and choke. The mother removed the necklace before she left. I enjoy going to the clinics, because for many people this is the only access to healthcare that they have.

Dr. Melba teaching in the Xiloa clinic

Pictures

New pictures! Click here

       

Goodbye to Adelia Blanco

Today we finished surveying in the barrio we have been working in, Adelia Blanco. I am somewhat sad to leave because most people recognize us and many of the children know me (and hug me). There is one 4 year-old boy (see below) who every day without fail will yell at me what I assume amounts to “na na na boo-boo, you can’t catch me!” Whenever I turn around suddenly and reach my arms out pretending to “get” him, he screams hysterically and runs away. Yesterday when he started yelling at me I just took off running after him down the street and I thought he would pee his pants when I grabbed him and picked him up.

We have had several run-ins with scary dogs in the last few days. I found myself wishing more than once that I had just shelled out the money for a rabies shot before leaving the US. There are numerous stray and pet dogs in the barrio but only rarely will you see a cat. Nicaraguans believe that cats eat your soul while you are sleeping.

Now that we are finished surveying, I will get to work with the physician on staff, Dr. Melba. I will be helping her with clinic in a couple of nearby villages and be going to pregnant mother and abstinence classes (not with the same women, LOL).

You know you're in Nicaragua if:

1. Clothes lines are made of barbed wire.
2. There are 6 year-olds wearing 3 inch heels.
3. To fit in with the locals you need to remove the letter "s" from your vocabulary.
4. Taxi drivers wear one long sleeve (the arm that hangs out the window of course).
5. You see horse carts, overcrowded bicycles and cars on the same road.
6. Men on the street don't hesitate to call out any english words they know to you (including "love you", "good night", "where you from" and "whiskey").
7. Babies wear bracelets to protect them from evil spirits.
8. The sewage pipes empty into the street.
9. Men on the street are making kissing faces at you wherever you go.
10. Everyone who is anyone has a guard and a gate.

A few pictures

I will write a proper post soon, but in the meantime here are a few pictures: click here

Being a pharmacist

So, the other day I got to be a pharmacist. I find this pretty amusing. In a one of the villages, the government built a small clinic, but no doctors would take the post. So, when Project HOPE's doctor volunteered to run a clinic twice a week there, they all but gave her the building. I went this week to help the staff physician and two visiting nurse practitioners. When we got there, the physician said, here are the medicines, they are not in order. So I commenced to organize the medicines and fill the prescriptions that the patients brought out from the exam rooms (many of them in spanish). Luckily, I had some assistance from one of the nurse practitioners in figuring out what some of the medications were and a translator that made instruction labels for me. Just a reminder of how you make due with what you have when you're in the developing world.

Things that have migrated from the US to Nicaragua

80's music
school buses
relay for life t-shirts
A love of Hollister and American Eagle

The women's cancer hospital

Yesterday afternoon, I went and visited the women’s oncology ward as well as a shelter for women. Women who are on the waitlist for cancer treatment have to stay in the shelter, or they will lose their place in line. This means they cannot be with their families while they are waiting to be treated. The shelter does not receive funding from the government, so it is run on donations by an amazing woman named Marta. She said anytime they didn’t have food or clothes or shoes, she prayed, and God gave them to her. She has incredible faith. The conditions in the hospital ward itself were not what would be considered acceptable in an American healthcare facility. It was dirty, hot and understaffed, there were six or more women in a room, nurses had to walk down the hallway to empty bedpans. All down the walls of the hospital were President Daniel Ortega’s propaganda posters. They have pictures of him and say things like “peace” “love” “solidarity” "christian" "with all and for the good of all" (similar to the billboard below). I found myself getting so angry at him, at his corruption, at the fact that he is worth hundreds of millions of dollars and runs one of the poorest countries in the western hemisphere where people have to be on a waiting list to get cancer treatment.  

An excursion to Granada

I got the chance to go to the historic city of Granada for a few hours. Here are the pictures: click here

Ten things I have learned so far in Nicaragua

1. Truck tire ruts make convenient trails for sewage to run.

2. There are very few diapers, so you stay naked or go in your pants.

3. Most Nicas under the age of 3 are terrified of gringos (i.e. me).

4. Those Nicas will generally scream less if you recruit another child to follow you and hold your hand.

5. It is not an insult to say, “oh you are so fat!”

6. If you have a scale and a measuring tape, some children will assume you are trying to give them a shot and wail accordingly.

7. It is impossible to eat too much rice and beans, and you can eat them at any meal.

8. Electricity and a satellite dish in a 10x10, corrugated metal, dirt floor shack is not unusual.

9. Old bed springs make great fences.

10. It is acceptable behavior to honk wildly and yell out the window to women walking down the street (i.e. me).

A trip to Leon

Yesterday, we went to Leon. It is one of the oldest cities in Nicaragua and was primarily built by the Spanish. It was great to see more of Nicaragua, even though Leon is the hottest city! We took one of the local buses from Leon to the ocean, which is about 20 minutes, but on a bus it ended up being an hour and a half. Just getting on the bus was an adventure, there were so many on it that we had to climb up through the back door (its an old american school bus) and fight our way forward. There is not really the concept of "personal space". When we got the sea, it was beautiful. We got to eat at a restaurant on the beach and then walk along the beach and the bay. I got to be a tourist, which means I took lots of pictures: click here to see them

Children do the darndest things

It has been an eventful week. We have completed 37 surveys so far, and I am happy with our pace. My role during surveying has become to play with the children so they are not terrified when I try to weigh and measure them (besides answering any questions that come up). There was one little boy (a tiny 3 year old) who thought it was hysterically funny to try to tickle my feet. But of course, when I looked at him funny or tried to tickle him, he would scream and run away. This went on for about ten minutes until he somehow stumbled when he was running from my hand reaching out to him and ended up with powdered milk all over him. Which we all thought was pretty funny. After one of my translators (Shyanne), was finished with her part of the survey, he tried to rub the tattoo off of her arm, and when it didn’t work he just rubbed harder. He couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t come off. When it came time to measure him, we wandered across the street to find a straight post to measure him against. When I walked back to where I had left my scale, there were several women crowded around it weighing themselves, giggling, and saying, “you are so fat!” “muy sexy!”. This, of course, made us all laugh hysterically.

Our survey team has an addition, the daughter of community health educator that is working with us. She is probably five or six, and she sticks by my side, always holding my hand, leaning on me or helping me get out my measuring tools. She tries to carry the bag with the scale, but it is quite heavy. I think her presence has made the children generally less scared of me measuring them. Sometimes they think I am going to give them a shot!

I may also be surveying another village that is closer to the project HOPE base, and much poorer than Audilio Blanco. It may be somewhere that Project HOPE starts working. So I will go and see what the situation is and make a map of the area.

And the surveying begins!

Today is my third day in Nicaragua and I have been busy. We went out into the village, Audilio Blanco, where we will be doing the needs assessment and the follow-up surveys from the diarrhea intervention. Project HOPE’s doctor, Melba, introduced us to the Community Health Educators (CHEs) in Audilio Blanco and they agreed to help us with our surveying. When they go before us and explain why we are there, the families respect us more and it goes smoothly. Audilio Blanco has one dirt road that has sewage running down the middle of it. The houses on one side of the street were built by Project HOPE, and are cinder block to the waist, then wood, with a metal roof and cement floor. Many of the other houses (on the other side of the street) are pieced together from whatever could be found and have dirt floors. The first surveys went ok, but the 2 year-olds screamed bloody murder when we tried to weigh them. We have decided that tomorrow we will weigh the mother holding the child and subtract the mother’s weight. Hopefully that will work better! We will go out to the village again and survey all day tomorrow.

I am staying at Project HOPE’s base, and it is beautiful. It includes dorms, offices, a clinic, a dining room, library, and houses where missionaries and some staff live. The buildings form a square, and we have a lovely courtyard in the middle. I took some pictures: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.599727061776.2055933.177502257&type=1&l=8f8da2e880

I'm leaving, on a jet plane...

Did you know that Nicaragua is the second most impoverished country in the western hemisphere? I will be on my way there on Sunday. To prepare for the work there, I have developed a needs assessment survey that we will administer verbally in each household. We will be doing this in a neighborhood called Audilio Blanco which is close to Project HOPE's base (the organization I am going with). It is a community that all of the houses were built in cooperation with Project HOPE. We will be gathering the data in order to show the need for a daycare and feeding center. I will be involved in lots of other projects as well, I will let you know as they happen.

Please pray for my last preparations and saying goodbye to my husband for a month.

New Project in Nicaragua

This summer, as part of the internship for my master of public health program, I will be working in Nicaragua with an organization called Project H.O.P.E. (their website is www.pjhope.org). I will be working on several exciting projects. The first is a needs assessment for a daycare and feeding center. The daycare will be instrumental in helping mothers work and keeping teenage girls in school. I will also be doing follow-up research on the effectiveness of an intervention that taught mothers how to take care of children with diarrhea, a common condition because of poor water quality. Diarrhea is a leading cause of malnutrition among these children, and it can affect their physical, mental, and emotional development. Some other things I may be involved with are free health clinics, Community Health Educator (CHE) visits, a program to educate young new mothers and children's ministry. I am looking forward to these projects, because this is the type of work I would like to make a career of. I appreciate your support, and I could use your prayers. I leave June 10th.