deacachimba

I needed that. Thanks!

I wake up at 5am under my mosquito net. My host mom has been up for an hour already and I can smell the coffee and my lunch being made. I go take a cold bucket shower. Our shower is a small room surrounded by cinder block walls with a 3 inch PVC pipe in the corner of the floor for the water to drain. There's a 50 gallon tub in the corner which I filled the night before because there usually isn't water between 4am and 6pm. I get dressed, grab some coffee and some bread then head to the bus terminal to take a bus to one of my 3 rural, multi-grade schools. The bus drops me off and I walk with my students and two other teachers about 15 minutes to the 2-room school. I teach from 7pm to noon, then walk back to where the bus drops me off. The bus doesn't come until 2:30 so I have about 2 hours to kill. I listen to music or read. I get back to my house, strip all of my clothes off, dying of heat and sit in front of my fan until I've cooled down. I eat, then depending on the day, I teach a free community English class in the afternoons, or I'll go get a coffee and the national paper at the local comedor (cafe). I spend the rest of the day shooting the shit with my neighbors, writing, playing guitar, or spending money at the local cyber cafe. I eat dinner around 7pm and then it's back under the mosquito net at 9pm or 10pm.

[deleted]

Well, at the moment we've got running water and electricity, so it's just peachy. Broadly speaking, my life for the past 10-11 months has been on a pendulum swing of emotions. My perspective of how successful I am can change day to day or sometimes hour to hour. I'm currently dealing with a mild bacteria infection, but too many PCV's like to talk about what's shooting out of their butt-holes, so I won't get into that.

I went through several phases. At first it was a bit of a shock I will admit, but also new and exciting. Then I felt guilty, because even though I come from pretty humble backgrounds in the USA, the number of opportunities I had growing up far outnumber what is available here. Then after reasoning with my guilt, I tried to wrap my head around the culture of Nicaragua, which is quite complicated. There are a lot intricacies that you can only pick up if you live here with a Nica family, and I'm still struggling with some. They are very family centered and there isn't much personal, private time allowed, so as someone who is naturally introverted, coming from a culture where personal space is valued, it has been difficult. Being the only 'gringo' in my town, I definitely feel like I live in a fishbowl. People are always staring at me. I have no anonymity. There are people in my town that yell out my name when they see me in the street and I have never met them before. One last thing that I still struggle with is the Machismo or misogyny. My life is probably a lot easier since I'm a male, but the machista behavior is sometimes pushed on you, which makes me uncomfortable. With time though, as I have gotten to know my community better and have bettered my language skills, I can advocate for my beliefs and start a conversation about gender issues, which is rarely talked about here.