Christmas in Nicaragua

My Christmas 2011 will be spent in Boaco, Nicaragua with my old host family.  Once again, the holiday is celebrated by over-drinking and setting off bombas at all hours of the night.  Unlike the States, the festivities take place on the evening of the 24^th and roll over to the 25^th at midnight when gifts will be opened (drunken unwrapping party?).  I myself have been patiently waiting to open the gifties my family has sent me, which I have placed under the tree that I made out of a wine bottle and poster board!

I have adorned my refrigerator with some gel molds that my sister sent me:

And I was able to decorate the Casa Materna with some foamy paper, glue and glitter! 

The women at the Casa Materna are much like me this holiday season in that they are not at home with their families.  So I decided to have a little Christmas celebration with them.  I began with a charla about the birthing process (very Christmasy!), handed out gifts, facilitated a craft project, and attempted to bake cookies.  For the gifts I decorated some old envelopes and stuffed them with baby clothes which were donated by a medical mission group out of Grand Rapids Michigan run by Nancy and Bob Gillette (blog post to come).  Although they did not quite understand what they are, I led my pregnant ladies in making gingerbread men out of foamy paper.  They turned out beautifully!

opening gifts

making gingerbread men

13 newly-baked gingerbread men, and 13 buns in the oven

The Cookie Fiasco:

  

I figured it would be a nice gesture to bake some sugar cookies at the Casa Materna to demonstrate my holiday spirit.  The dough was ready-made from my kitchen and all I had to do was bake it.  Unfortunately there was no baking rack in the oven at the Casa Materna, so I had to move to plan B.  I will bake them at a neighbor’s house and bring them back the next day.  Logical, right?  


Since moving to plan B I have concluded that about 1% of the oven-possessing community of Nicaragua know how to operate them.  I brought the dough to my neighbor’s house and actually found COBWEBS in her oven!  Upon asking how to turn it on, she confessed she had never used it, and when trying to light it (being a match-starting model) there was a benign but frightening mini-explosion.

I did eventually find a woman who knew how to turn her oven on and I was able to make the cookies by 10 o’clock that night.  My experience has inspired a self-conducted verbal survey.  So far, of the four oven-owners I have asked, ZERO know how to turn them on.

Donations?

I will be visiting friends and family in Alameda, California for the first week and a half of January.  If anyone has been feeling the urge to donate, I would be happy to fly back to Nicaragua with any (or more) of the following donations:

Lightly used or new:

     baby clothes

     baby blankets

     maternity tops

     twin-sized sheets

Craft supplies:

     construction paper

     permanent markers

     beads or jewelry supplies

     yarn

Email me or call the house in January to let me know!

Volunteer Service

So it has been almost a year in-country and I have yet to mention in my blog anything about my volunteer service.  That is because up until recently I haven't been completely sure what my assignment really is.  Not that we are not given a set of goals, but the means by which to achieve them are not specified.  So I (like many of my fellow volunteers) have been groping around in la oscuridad, trying to find my place.  Where can I make the biggest impact, where am I happiest, where am I needed, what fits my schedule?  After 9 months of service, I have finally figured out how I want to be spending the next 15.

In general, I am a “health educator” and have been giving health charlas to patients in the waiting room at the Health Center, Health Posts with brigades to more rural sites, health fairs, and to pregnant women at the Casa Materna.

Casa Materna, Boaco

Casa Materna is a refuge for underprivileged rural pregnant women who do not have immediate access to health care.  Ordinarily, these women succumb to midwifery or arrive at the nearest hospital many hours after labor has begun.  Unfortunately, this practice has resulted in many maternal and or child deaths due to infections, hemorrhages, or a high-risk condition called preeclampsia.  Women who stay at the Casa Materna two to four weeks before they are expecting decrease risk of complications because they have direct access to a hospital or health center.

I like giving charlas to the women here as opposed to waiting room patients because I have the opportunity to befriend the women.  They are not gone the next day like the patients in the waiting room.  I also like to conduct interactive activities after to the charla to see what the ladies have learned!  The atmosphere is much more relaxed and the audience more attentive.  When I am not giving charlas I like to do crafts with the ladies.  In turn, they show me how to make corn tortillas!

I have also enjoyed making informative posters for the Health Center.

The truth is that I am really just getting started now that I know how I want to serve and what I want to accomplish as a volunteer.  Not to mention I am trying desperately to perfect a foreign language as to be taken more seriously by my listeners. . . So much to do in so little time! 

Charlas Topics I have given:

Nutrition for Pregnant Women

Personal Hygiene

How to Take Care of a Newborn

Breastfeeding

PAP Tests

HIV/AIDS

The Birth Process

Warning Signs for Pregnant Women

Visitors!

I received my first visitors, Mom and long-time friend of the family Wendy, in mid-October just before the elections.  Luck would have it, however, that they visited just in time for the first tropical storm to hit Nicaragua since I landed in January!  Not to worry, though.  A little hurricane can’t stop a group of eager travelers!

We first visited Granada for some fine dining, massages, and island-hopping.  Being one of only two colonial towns in Nicaragua, Granada is known for its beautiful architecture, its plethora of competing restaurants, and its influx of foreigners (residents and tourists alike).  Granada sits on Nicaragua’s largest lake (fittingly named Lake Nicaragua) which is home to hundreds of small islands inhabited by local fishermen or rich family summer homes.  Some island properties are currently for sale at half a million dollars!

We then visited the slightly less glamorous town of Boaco to unload the 50 pounds of gifts that my mom and Wendy had brought from friends and family in The States.  Clothes, home decor, cleaning products, homemade cookies, towels, potholders, peanut butter, and chocolate (oh the chocolate!)  I got an Italian home-made dinner, help with my barrel-filling, and an audience during one of my health lectures.

Coincidently, my mom and Wendy not only made it for our first tropical storm, but also the 2011 Small Business Masquerade-Cocktail Party at the Holiday Inn in Managua!  After a fun and eventful night, we headed to the coast.

A great big thanks to those who sent gifts!

Mom

Wendy

Jerry

Katie

Dad

Aunt Denise

Nita

Dr. T

Juddy
Jill!

I tried to stretch the chocolates out as long as possible!