Jeg må ærlig innrømme at jeg ikke har særlig julestemning for tida. Nå har jeg stort sett ikke det i oktober uansett, men i 35 plussgrader og ikke en snøflekk langt fra alt som heter adventsstaker, nellikspiker og kanellukt, enda mindre julestemning, selv om jeg i dag, til min store skrekk så et stort plastikkjuletre med kun røde lys midt i matbutikken nede i gata..
Men for noen minutter siden scrollet jeg meg nedover VGs nettside...og der dukket dette bildet opp...
To flagrende damer i dandige silkegevanter som slanget seg over to begeistrede herrer...jul! Det er jul dere, kom kom, ut av sofaen, på med jakke, luer og votter, tenn et lys eller to og kom og hør på vår tolkning av jul..av julestemning!
Nå høres jeg kanskje litt ironisk ut i min lille beskrivelse ovenfor, men det kom over meg noe av det rareste...blider av jul...snø, slaps, julegavehandling, gløgg, Telemark, kaldt, varmt inne, treff og middager, alt som skal gjøres før jul...det er jo egentlig ganske koselig...spesielt sett langt vekk fra i tropevarme med strand og vann kort vei unna...
Men jo, jeg kommer nok til å savne jula hjemme i år...men nå skal jeg skru av den umiddelbare julestemninga reklamebildet vekket i meg...det er tross alt
Description of Super Sunday - Managua version 2009
wake up not too early not too late - make a fried egg, carrot bread and avocado breakfast with Norwegian friend popping by for the weekend.
continue with a visit to my next door neighbours and landlords for a black coffee and chats about elections, guayaba plants, frauds, pregnant cats and the future of Nicaragua.
return to my little apartment for a hammock session with a book which supposedly shall enlighten - followed by an enlightening hot session frying my white skin in the burning sun.
make fresh watermelon juice in the kitchen
have a shower to cool down and get ready for a catch up with a friend at a newly discovered café with a great view of the city of Managua - including great mozarella wraps.
drop by some friends' house waiting for the next Sunday activities to take place - 30 minutes game zone fun(crazy place in shopping centres where you play silly games and win little coupons which you need 10 000 of to win a sticker of Donald Duck..or along those lines..)
then off to the movies (again as a cool down tecnique...Managua cinemas are nose-freezingly airconditioned)..watching Clive Owen and Julia Roberts as secret agents proved not so secret..
survive a motorbike ride home to my little house...
Super Sunday - welcome new week!
Monday morning schedule: expedition to the north of the country to visit some coffee farmers...
It's been too long since I last wrote, but instead of trying to recap the last 3 months, I'll just share with you my field trip last Friday (it will kind of be like watching the TV-soap Glamour after a 6 months break...not much have changed, same stories, dramas and intrigues - In my case maybe less intrigues and drama, and slightly more changes even:)) As I work for a federation of small scale farmers' cooperatives it's quite curious that I sit in an office (also known as a supermarket - video evidence of my work space can be found here) smack bang in the thickest of the City of Managua. Therefore it is always a relieve when I get to go out and play with farmers around the country. I have been very lucky to have traveled to almost all regions of the country with work - last Friday I headed up north, 6 kms away from the border to Honduras, to a town called Somotillo. Purpuse of travel: visit a women’s cooperative who produce, process, package, sell and export cashew nuts AND serve as a local (!) guide to a visiting Spanish coffee and nut importer on his first visit to Nicaragua, visiting the cashew nut plant.
After 5 months (1 year in total of my Nicaraguan adventures since 2006) of being here, I was really pleased when it turned out I was able to inform our visitor how long it takes to drive from Managua to León, the names of the volcanoes we passed along the way, how the cooperative system works in Nicaragua, what participatory plant breeding is and how it’s being done here, what is a typical nica breakfast and about the challenges cooperatives situated far from the capital experience due to lack of proper infrastructure and resources. I must be learning something :)
So, this Spanish man was quite the character – communist, anti-capitalist, revolutionary – singing revolutionary I must add. And seemingly 100% supportive of any leftist labelled government in Latin-America, including the current Nicaraguan government.
I completely understand the fascination people have with the Nicaraguan revolution anno 1979. I am/was/am/was rather fascinated myself. People stood up and spoke out against the inequality, injustice and increasing poverty Nicaragua was experiencing – and on July 19 1979 the victory was a fact. The Sandinistas had come to power after more than 40 years of dictatorship under the Somozas. Victory of the poor and the marginalized; and not to forget, an inspiration to all those internationalists fighting similar anti- capitalist, anti-fascist, anti-dictatorship struggles world wide. And the illusion of the Nicaraguan revolution lives on today, as the Sandinistas are back in power, …also for our friend the Spanish.
Driving along the Nicaraguan countryside, the Spanish, who shall be called Señor J, was continuously singing one revolutionary song after the other – mainly Nicaraguan and Cuban songs. He laughed arrogantly when seeing spray-painted anti-government slogans on house walls exclaiming “Haha, afraid of the people and the power of the people, ha! Of course, the rich are afraid!”. Meeting with hard working cooperativist women Señor J kept on telling them how they back in Spain worked for almost no pay and that we had to fight together against the global capitalist forces. The women just nodded and kept explaining the process of how to get the actually cashew nut out of its shell...humbleness is a deed..so is adapting to new situations...
There is nothing wrong with singing. There is nothing wrong, rather the contrary, in believing that a former leftist revolutionary would be running the country according to the ideals of his -79 revolution. There is nothing wrong in showing solidarity with small scale farmers and with opposing a capitalist economic order.
However, this is Nicaragua anno 2009. And even though there is a need for singing, believing and solidarity things “they are a’changin” (however maybe not with in the say way Bob Dylan was hoping). Nicaragua is not what it was in 1979, neither are its leaders and politicians. That is an important footnote for all those internationalists who back in the days was waiving the red and black Sandinista flag proudly above their heads, fighting with the people in the country side, picking coffee and digging ditches and following the revolution from the homes in Spain, Norway or the US. We need to update the struggle, face reality and keep luchando (struggling!)..
This is not a protest against the current government of Nicaragua, however more a cry out to those who visit Nicaragua – be humble, open and listen to what people tell you about the situation here today….you will learn a lot more than if you are blinded by romantic ideas of 1979.
So, Señor J, wasn't curious that the guy who drove us to the cashew cooperative, every time you started a new song, turned up the reggaeton/bachata music blaring from the radio...
---
I was also going to share a bit from the visit at the cashew processing plant, however realizing that this is getting too long…lunch was fresh fish “ceviche”(fish “cooked” in lemon instead of on heat, onion and capsicum) barefoot on a Pacific beach (we were offered turtle eggs, but politely turned the little boy down), drove past Nicaragua’s highest volcano (alive and still fuming!), watched the sunset over Lake Managua, trying to hold on the hand rest in the car as the mad traffic and rather liferisking overtakings done by Nicaraguan drivers will outdo my dad any day. And this was just a day out of the office..
Thought I'd take advantage of the brain activity freshly activated after 2 hours in an airconditioned (too cold really) movie theater and write a few sentences...about recent happenings and discoveries.... 1. I have for quite some time thought that it is very time and energy consuming to mail a postcard...as there are about 3 post offices in this town and I have to drive to get to them with the car I don't have and I dont know when they're open + it takes about 5 weeks for it to arrive at their final destination..etc etc..but today, all of a sudden - I found a little card-selling shop in the shopping centre which had: cards, stamps AND a mailbox! I mean really, this place can sometimes be so effective! Love it! 2. Lunch Tuesday: rice, beans, salad, chicken and a drink = 30 cordobas ($1,50) Coffee today: Ice mocca.....46 cordobas (almost $2,50) Bus from Managua to Granada (1 hour): 23 cordobas (a dollar and a bit) Taxi from shopping centre to my house (5 minutes...after dark, no choice): 40 cordobas ($2) ......have a think about it..... 3. What made my day on the 1st of May: buying two plastic shelf arrangements for my walk-past closet and bathroom...yes, small joys of everyday life...1st of May celebrations were cancelled due to the famous pigflu so we ended up at Central-America's biggest and apparently most dangerous(I was armed with scruffy clothes and money in my bra..) roof covered market to buy a much longed for plastic drawers/shelfs to organise my underwear, socks and bathroom items...yes..it seriously made my day...!!! 4. Even though I've been sligthly worried, I have now confirmed that I am not getting dumber by the second or loosing brain cells at a rapid speed ... many fellow norsemen (counting the Danes) are experiencing the same symptoms...short and long term memory loss, fatigue, lack of energy, inability to have a coherent conversation, sensation of brain freeze...HOWEVER...in Managua it is called brain melt...apparently my brain and body do not have the same functions available at 35 degrees celcius + a ridiculous level of humidity...it is seriously frustrating, but something which I suppose we have to get to used to...and gives me an explanation to why I in the middle of a sentence forget what I am talking about...it's an utavdeisjølopplevelese!!!! (out-of-yourself-experience)
However...I am now back in my little house and the great feeling of a brain at a decent temperature is about to wear off...slowly but surely going back to my half-concious state of hot-melted-brain unable to connect...
BIIIIP!!Connection failed...check with you service provider for a solution to this problem....might not be solved for a while...
(Off to Pueblo Nuevo in the north of the country for a few days now..will be back with foto documentation and more stories...)
I believe myself to be an open, respectful and relatively culturally sensitive person. Well, after a few weeks here I still find many things frustratingly inefficient, silly, backwards(aware of the danger of stepping on some politically and culturally correct toes) and just unnecessary...so, I am obviously trying to get rid of my Norwegian glasses(which I for some reason seem to leave on longer than earlier this time around...) One thing in particular which I have found sligthly frustrating is the common idea that when someone asks someone for a favour or for help - IT HAS TO HAPPEN RIGHT NOW....there is no: "Of course, just give me ten minutes and I'll be right there...". Of course this rapid response also has a positive side - making things happen quickly. But anyways, I'll now tell you how my frustration over such things, mixed with a temporary loss of listening skills and understanding the language, backfired almost fatally....(!) Scene 1: Rolando and I were studying some irregular verbs and I was in the middle of explaining some rule which I am sure I partly made up as I went along..being the trained English teacher that I am. Suddenly, this woman comes bursting into the room asking Rolando to come to the directors office. As I had spent the morning waiting for people who were running from one place to another talking on the phone and what not, and was rather fed up with not GETTING ANYTHING DONE, I said: "We are just going to finish this section and he will be there in about five minutes."(probably with a sligthly annoyed voice) Well...the conversation continues as follows: - Kari: ..so, where were we, the verb to catch. How do you conjugate that in past tense? - Rolando: Hmm..I was just thinking about that snake... - Kari: Snake?? What snake? - Rolando: The snake she woman was talking about. The one just outside the director's office. - Kari: Snake??Here? In the office?? WHAT? - Rolando: Yes, that is why she came to ask me for help. To kill the snake. Because I am from the campo (rural areas) I have experience with killing such snakes. - Kari (at this point feeling rather embarrassed): Oh my god ! Go, go! Get the snake!
So off he went to join the large group of our city-living snake-inexperienced colleagues afraid or the pinkish red 2-3 meters long creature....so, finally dismissed from his strict English class, rural hero Rolando came to save them all from the REAL snake swiftly moving around the grass outside the office...
Lesson learnt: I'll try not to expect that all calls for help or assistance at the office should - or can, wait 10 minutes....:):) Oh, and listen better....the word "culebra"(snake) should have rang some bells.....
PS: the snake got away..so stay put for the next episode!
