On Monday morning we were greeted with a traditional Nicaraguan breakfast for the student's last meal before heading to the airport - gallo pinto, eggs, chorizo, salsa, cheese, tortillas, fresh watermelon & pineapple, orange juice, and coffee. After loading all the luggage on the bus one more time
On Friday morning students said a final goodbye to their host families and loaded all their luggage on the bus. There was a lot of conversation as students continued sharing their service experiences with each other. We started the 2½ hour journey south to Playa El Coco, 17km south of San Juan del Sur. Due to a dryer rainy season, we had no problems getting to the beach as two of the three rivers we needed to cross were dry. We enjoyed a lunch with the sound of the waves crashing behind us and then finished up project presentations in the early afternoon. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing on the beach and playing in the water. After a beautiful sunset, we spent some time reflecting on the SST experience and our expectations for going back home.
On Thursday July 19, the 33rd anniversary of the end to the Somoza dictatorship, we met at Quinta Goshen after students had a few free hours with their host families. Due to the national holiday and the lack of public transportation, students returned from service a day early so…
All students arrived safely back from their service locations yesterday. The day was filled with lots of laughter and story telling. Students enjoyed a pizza lunch with fresh dragonfruit drink. All students spent the night with their Jinotepe, Dolores, and Diriamba families. After some free time in town this…
For our last service visit, we headed back to Volcan Mombacho, where the group had gone for a field trip earlier in the semester. Luke is a short 30 minute bus ride away from Jinotepe on the road to Granada but works mostly on top of Volcán Mombacho. He has been helping and participating in a variety of activities. At the park entrance there is an orchid display that the park is trying to get finished as well as a butterfly garden. Part of finishing the orchid display includes finding the orchids on the mountain and then making informational cards in English and Spanish. Luke explained
Our journey to visit Caleb and Lynelle started out early as we left on a 6:15am-ish flight to Bluefields from Managua. After arriving in Bluefields, we took a panga (speedboat) to Pearl Lagoon and got in just before it started raining. We met Lynelle at the hotel and started hearing her stories of life on the East Coast. Caleb soon joined us and we went to see where Caleb is working. Caleb is working with several doctors at the local Centro de Salud.
Erin is working at the Fortress of Hope children’s home on the outskirts of Managua. The seventeen children and youth in this home have been abused either emotionally, physically, or sexually and been taken from their homes and placed at Fortress of Hope by the Nicaraguan Ministry of Family. They have three separate houses on the property that house
Kelsey lives in the small rural community of Santa Julia outside of El Crucero. El Crucero is only about a 30 minute bus ride from Jinotepe but then the 6 km down a bumpy, muddy road takes another 30 minutes in a pick up truck. Kelsey has walked the road a few times and agrees that it’s easier to go down then up the road if you have to walk. Santa Julia is named after
Andrew is working in the rural community of Candelaria in the Boaco department (state). Normally it is a 30-45 minute bus ride and a 20 minute walk if the road is in good enough shape for the chicken bus to make it in. We were fortunate enough to be able to get a ride to Candelaria with some Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) volunteers in their truck. We enjoyed beautiful scenery driving in as well as seeing how the houses are constructed in this part of the country - more mud and sticks than cement. We met Andrew
After visiting students in and around Matagalpa, we enjoyed a scenic 1 ½ hour ride to Jinotega, the City of Mists. Nearly 100 years ago, Nicaragua’s German immigrants brought coffee to the mountains, and this region is the site of most of Nicaragua's coffee farms. More recently, Jinotega experienced some of the heaviest fighting during the revolution and Contra war in the 1970s and 1980s. After our arrival on Sunday,
