Nicas and Casas

Our first week back in Las Vegas since our Nica Vacation has been eventful; here is the news with us....
Foremost, Nicaragua was fantastic, equally as interesting and culturally stimulating as our previous voyage out of Honduras into Guatemala. As Crystal demonstrated with her earlier posts, we started in Leon, which is the educational and artistic heart of Nicaragua. Leon is known for its famous poets like Ruben Dario, its murals of national heroes and civil wars, and as the socialist center which spawned the plan to assassinate Somoza and gave rise to Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (The Sandinistas of the Iran Contra fiasco). We then traveled to Granada: early Spanish colonial settlement, one time Nicaraguan capital, and long time rival of Leon for the rest of Semana Santa. Semana Santa means ¨holy week¨and is the principle vacation season in Latin America, as many cities have traditional processionals, drape their streets in colored sawdust carpets, and of celebrate late into the night. It is said that Semana Santa separates the population of Latin America into two groups, those that go to church to commemorate Easter, and those who go to the beach to soak some rays. Granada’s large fresco cathedrals, ancient architecture, friendly residents and international cuisine make it a great place to visit in an unassuming country like Nicaragua. We found the Nicas (as they call themselves) extremely passionate and proud of their history, which was a breath of fresh air from the usually apathetic attitude towards history and politics found in Honduras. We have some more pics from our trip which we will get up on the blog shortly... The year before we came down to Honduras, Crystal and I had changed our residence some six or seven times, changing states, staying with each of our parents, essentially living a transient lifestyle. During the constant packing and unpacking, I remember anticipating the stability that moving to Honduras would provide, surely we would be forced to stay put for two years, and put the constant motion behind us. That being said, we are now making arrangements to move into our fourth different house and to rent from our fifth different landlord since we moved to Las Vegas, a period of about a year and a half. So much for expectations... To recap: The first house we left because it was half constructed when we moved in and remained so for six months, the second we vacated after it was burglarized while our friend Ben was visiting from the states, and now we are being expelled from our third and current house. What happened is that our landlord started showing people the house, but assured us that he wouldn’t sell it until after we left. Then about a month ago, he appeared with the apparently new owner, who basically demanded our absence. We tried to work it out with her and bought ourselves another month, but last night push came to shove as she demanded an arbitrary increase in our rent to 125% of what we normally pay. We smiled politely, told her that she was trying to take advantage of us, and then told her that we are moving out. What she didn’t know is that we had an ace up our collective sleeves. The previous day, sensing that a showdown was eminent, we checked out coolest house in all of Las Vegas. It’s twice as big as our current house, has a beautiful view of the mountain, and is the same price. Today we locked up the deal, and will be moving in May.

I guess it just goes to show that expectations can be dangerous, and that perhaps we are not so good about setting down roots. One of the most frustrating aspects is that we have to tell our friends in town that we have a new house, yet again, and people that are looking for us will have a harder time figuring out where we live, and we now have a whole new neighborhood of curious people who will come over just to examine our ¨gringo treasures¨. The offer still stands for people to come down and visit us, just make sure not to ask anyone in town where our house is, you might get a couple of different answers.

It doesn`t get much more accurate than this.

So being down here with volunteers from all over the u.s, over the past 20 months Simon and I have really caught alot of flack for our accents.

The second Simon opens his mouth everyone knows where he`s from. People can`t always figure my accent out. They just know its strange. (As I type this, our good friend Delfo is standing behind me laughing and doing impersonations of me asking for a bag-which does rhyme with vague by the way.)

We found this quiz, courtesy of my friend (thanks amy) and after taking it, this was my result.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North   You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
The Midland
The Northeast
Philadelphia
The South
North Central
The West
Boston
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

And I do get asked those questions.

Simon`s result: Straight up tried and true Minnesota accent.

And he says I talk funny.

Yous guys should try it out!

Leon, Nicaragua...Great Success!

So the first city on our whirlwind tour of Nica was better than we had imagined. The people of Leon were strong supporters of the Sandista movement, and there were relics of their long history everywhere we turned. Leon is a beautiful colonial city. Population: 117,000

Here are some pics from our trip so far....















Crossing the border from Honduras into Nicaragua. To get across, the bus dropped the 4 of us off and from there some guys pedaled us across on little bikes, kinda like a gringo parade on rickshaws. Strange, but kind of fun. Too bad they ripped us off afterwards.















This is Parque Central In Leon at Dusk. A colonial town founded by the Spanish, the
Architecture maintains a colonial european look.














A lone Sandista flag waves above a building in town.

One of Leon´s many murals, this one steeped heavily in the symbolism of the Civil War and ensuing US clandestine and overt involvements.

Day 2: We took a trip to the pacific ocean. This was the warning on the beach.















And Simon and Delfo ignoring that warning.

We are now in Granada, longtime rival of Leon and another completely beautiful colonial city. We will post some new pics as we get them!
Cheers!
crystal and simon

Want a vacation? That`s fine, but you`ll have to fight for it.

Hey everybody,

We are safe and sound (and sweating to death) in Leòn, Nicaragua. Simon and I, and our friends Delfo and Kathryn decided to spend Semana Santa (Holy Week-the most important of Latin American holidays), here in Leon and in Granada. On the itinerary will be pacific beach time, volcano climbing, people meeting, rainforest exploring and plenty of r&r.

That being said, the first day was a nightmare. This little bit was written by Kathryn. We couldn`t have said it better ourselves so enjoy:

what's that fuss? everybody move to the back of the bus

I'm spending the week in Nicaragua with friends Crystal, Simon and Delfo. We arrived late in the afternoon yesterday and it has already been interesting. First, we ask a cab in Tegucigalpa how much it would cost to take us to the bus station for the buses headed south and the cabbie simply replies, "I don't want to drive there." Alright then. A minute later, we do find a cab driver that will take us there, and after a quick stop to use the bathroom at McDonalds's, we get to the bus stop and see a mass of people trying to get on one of the buses headed south. It's insane. The bus was already packed but more people kept trying to board the bus and squeeze their way on.
People that were on the bus were holding seats for their family and the people that were outside were passing their kids through the bus windows to make sure they got on. After about 2 minutes of pushing, we realized that we weren't going to get on the bus, so we walked over to another bus that was headed south but didn't really stop for anyone. A guy tried to get on while it was slowly moving but was thrown off by the assistant. After about 5 minutes, another bus enters the parking lot and this one was empty and headed south. We start following the bus and try to position ourselves with 50 other Hondurans and chaos follows.
The bus stops, the door opens and everyone starts pushing forward...."Make a line! Make a line!"

Yeah right, lines don't exist here.

More shoving to try and get on the bus. Crystal was the closest to the front, so she does her best to position herself to get on the bus, but it is difficult because so many people are just shoving their way on. I'm right behind her and we're both getting pushed and grabbed but neither of us really care because our main focus is to get on that bus. Crystal was at the stairs of the bus and this guy shoves his kids under her arm to get them on the bus. Not just 2 kids, but 5. Then he pushes in front of her to get on too.

"Excuse me." Now you try to be polite after shoving your kids past us?

Finally Crystal gets on and I'm right behind her, though I'm pretty sure I flashed a few people with the top that I was wearing just because I kept getting shoved. We get to the back of the bus and save seats for Simon and Delfo. Simon gets on without a problem but the driver didn't want to let Delfo on because the bus was already full....after Simon pleaded with the driver by telling him that Delfo didn't speak any Spanish and was scared (lies), the driver agreed to let Delfo on and we were on our way.

A stressful way to leave Honduras.