Newly arrived
Well, this is my first blog entry, and I am not sure what to do. I am sitting currently in a crowded internet café in matagalpa, nicaragua, surrounded by people speaking spanish (not a big deal) and preparing tomorrow to move to el campo (a slightly bigger deal).
This morning I climbed out of bed and into a taxi to a bustling bus station, where I was hustled onto the "express matagalpa jinotega" amidst crowds of people vending gaseosas and balancing trays of plates of chicken on their heads, while remaining all smiles. As the bus pulled out, I felt comfortable and at home, the whole atmosphere semi-familiar, resembling some of my other experiences in latin america.
The landscape however, differs completely. I was breathtaken and awestruck as we moved through glistening green valleys towards tall majestic and lush mountains, the part of the country that I will be calling home for the next couple of months. Clouds rolled in over the hills, as we wound around two hours into northern nicaragua.
On the bus I ran into Wendy, a graduate student who went to U of Oregon (what a small world!), who helped me find the coop office. Here I met a horde of people, one of whom, Felicity Butler, this lovely english woman, took me to lunch and told me all I need to know about Matagalpa. We´ll see tomorrow how much I have managed to absorb!
Tomorrow I am on my way to my first coop meeting, related to the agro-ecotourism project in which I am participating. I must introduce myself and what I am here to do, which freaks me out a little bit. It is the realization that the grand plans of mine must now be made a reality; I must discover how I will actually come to understand the theoretical questions I have posed. I must walk in and meet farmers and their families, travel with them, figure out what to ask to learn some of what it is I need to know. All this on top of just realizing that I am actually sitting now in the places that I have researched and written about, this adventure is actually happening; I am on my way. Day 2 of 365 and I am already spinning. Hard to imagine where I will be a year from now, both physically and mentally. Eek! =)
This morning I climbed out of bed and into a taxi to a bustling bus station, where I was hustled onto the "express matagalpa jinotega" amidst crowds of people vending gaseosas and balancing trays of plates of chicken on their heads, while remaining all smiles. As the bus pulled out, I felt comfortable and at home, the whole atmosphere semi-familiar, resembling some of my other experiences in latin america.
The landscape however, differs completely. I was breathtaken and awestruck as we moved through glistening green valleys towards tall majestic and lush mountains, the part of the country that I will be calling home for the next couple of months. Clouds rolled in over the hills, as we wound around two hours into northern nicaragua.
On the bus I ran into Wendy, a graduate student who went to U of Oregon (what a small world!), who helped me find the coop office. Here I met a horde of people, one of whom, Felicity Butler, this lovely english woman, took me to lunch and told me all I need to know about Matagalpa. We´ll see tomorrow how much I have managed to absorb!
Tomorrow I am on my way to my first coop meeting, related to the agro-ecotourism project in which I am participating. I must introduce myself and what I am here to do, which freaks me out a little bit. It is the realization that the grand plans of mine must now be made a reality; I must discover how I will actually come to understand the theoretical questions I have posed. I must walk in and meet farmers and their families, travel with them, figure out what to ask to learn some of what it is I need to know. All this on top of just realizing that I am actually sitting now in the places that I have researched and written about, this adventure is actually happening; I am on my way. Day 2 of 365 and I am already spinning. Hard to imagine where I will be a year from now, both physically and mentally. Eek! =)
posted by Hilary King at
2:56 PM
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