Walking to Esquipulas
Mama about halfway into the trek
The madness of the bus station
Just way too many peopleI guess there is no way to really mentally prepare you for the “walk” to Esquipulas. I am reluctant to call it a stroll because I think my mom would kill me, but I am hesitant to call it a hike or a trek because walk is just such an understatement and juxtaposition to feat that we actually completed that it works so perfectly. I will do my best to set the scene for you. My town is focused around the Catholic Church and the adjacent concha which is a park and basketball court that is more frequently used for futbol. There is one road that splits at the point of the park and envelopes the entire area. As my mom and I walked down into from my house you can see the concha and park from about 4 blocks away. The normal scene is to see a school bus passing through and a group of 5-6 chavalos sitting on the corner doing nothing. Well… let me tell you, today it was like walking into the center of a refugee camp. It is horrible to use the analog but it is the best way to describe the madness, the filthiness, the garbage, and chaos that ensued. The road was lined with about 20 buses on either side of the park, I guess people had been pouring in since the night before and there were shanty tents and hammocks still set-up from where they decided to squat for the night. In addition there were vendors selling water and any type of food accompanied by the mandatory plastic bag. As with all Nica things all the garbage ended up right on the floor and by the time we walked down there around noon it was like walking on a plastic carpet. I don’t mean to bash them and I understand large festivals in the States have the same problem, but it was pretty disgusting as it was accompanied by the exhaust of all the buses.
The main herd headed out around 12:30, but I got a tip from one of my Nica friends to wait a little so it wouldn’t be so congested and I was told it was mas tranquilo. Now you may be asking yourselves why there would be about 2000 people in my town ready to march to the next town and more importantly why is this a big deal? Good questions and I am glad you asked… one is that it is the patron saint festival in Esquipulas and for some reason all the towns within 60 miles decide it is worth celebrating. Also, it is a huge deal because even though Esquipulas is the next town, it is a 20km walk away on dirt roads and ascending and descending countless hills.
I don’t know how, but I convinced Mama to take on this odyssey with me and we headed out with my Nica friend, Jason, (yes we have the same name) and his two friends. It started off all dandy, I was in high spirits and I had the chance to point out two of my schools along the way. Given the closest school is a 30min walk and the following one is an additional hour. Either way, we were in high spirits by the time we made it to the turnoff to my second school and I figured if Mama was tired we would just hop a bus. Well, poor planning on my part. The buses that went by looked like living hells, imagine cattle cars but with an additional 20 cows somehow squeezed in and another 30 stacked on the roof for good measure. There was no way Mama was getting on one of those buses and I wasn’t either. It was also funny because both of us were stubborn and unwilling to give up. I figured for sure that Mama was going to kill me and walking did get pretty old after kilometer 6 or so. I mean there are only so many dirt roads you can stare at and deforested cattle land you can take pictures of. There were some highlights of the trip… I got to take some pretty funny videos of Mama interview style asking what she was thinking signing up for this, we got a huge plume of black smoke blown on us from a bus, we had aching feet from the constant pounding of rocks, and it was cute seeing my host family waiting for us around 2/3 through the trip to walk the last leg together.
Four and a half hours later we finally made it to the entrance of Esquipulas, did I mention that we forgot to bring any water and were relying on oranges for nourishment? I was pooped and I am sure Mama was near exhaustion. It just so happened as we were walking into town that I spied Icia and Angus, two volunteers and the people I was supposed to meet up with later. I said by the my Nica friends and we ducked into the house to just sit down and ponder what we just accomplished. We were staying in another volunteer’s house, Stephanie’s, and it made me feel a little more at home to be meeting people in a house. Angus made a surprisingly good dinner of rice and beans and retold some stories about how he has either spent all his Peace Corps money on going out with his buddies or how he built a gym out of trees and cement blocks. My mom got to see what true volunteer life was like and I got to rest my weary feet. However, it wasn’t all relaxation yet. I promised Jason and his family that I would meet them out in town and I had to live up to my word. My mom and I ventured out into town and it was the scene from San Dionisio but at a much larger scale. Now, the town is only marginally bigger but there were an additional 5000 people there set-up for the long haul. People actually constructed plastic shanty houses, there were vendors selling anything fried, and the crowds actually seemed to be exhibiting tidal patterns. It was sheer chaos and I was truly overwhelmed. I was tired of getting pushed around in the crowd especially by a population a head shorter than me and it was grotesque how much worse the garbage was, you could feel it all crunching under your steps. I finally told my friend I had to get out of there and we retreated back to the house.
Some other notable events from the day was that Icia was getting her bed delivered during the worst possible time and it was coming in on a bus. Of course Icia also didn’t have any money and we stiffed the cobrador 100 cords, in our defense he was blatantly overcharging. He then threatened Icia that he would get his money and this ties into another event later in the night. Also, I pulled a classic move and got sick. Now, I was already sick, I was getting fevers at night, but this is Nicaragua and I was in an uncontrolled shiver all night. I had to breakdown and buy the warmest thing I could find which was a Ecko false double-layered long sleeve shirt. Mama and I shared and bed and other than my shivers I was able to sleep, until… Until the incessant honking of bus horns that sounded like each driver decided to park right in front of the house and give off a 10 blast salute. Now the connection with this and the anecdote earlier is that the first time I heard the beeping I thought it was early morning and it was the bus driver with the mattress coming to kill us. I remember bolting out of bed, running to the front door, and making sure the door was locked. I quickly learned by the next barrage of honks that this wasn’t the case and it was in fact 1am in the morning, but I was still scared. You might think this is pretty bad, but it gets oh so much better. Icia made some joking remark during dinner about a street parade for the past week and I remember from Masatepe some kids would run around with drums. Nope, at 4:30 in the morning I was awoken again by what seemed to be a full marching band company passing right through the center of the house. It was like Nicaragua collectively decided to make my night a living hell and was doing one terrific job of getting it done.
As my father’s son I could not let my mom rest too long, even if we did just walk 20km the day before. I had plans for us to get to Leon and I would be damned if we didn’t keep to the schedule. We walked all around the aftermath and finally found a bus leaving for Managua. Luckily we were able to reserve seats, but it was packed and Mama got her first experience of being squished by people’s hips in your face, bodies pushing up on you, and the stench of way too many humans in one place. From Managua we were able to take a more comfortable micro express to Leon. By now it was only day 3 of Mama’s visit but we were in our 4th city and I had even more planned for the next day. The one plus is that in Leon we got to meet up with even more volunteers for what was our planned joint birthday parties. We all went out to the legendary “La Rosita’s” which is a little café that serves…. Bagels! Now I know this is no big deal in the states, but they don’t believe in any type of bread besides white here or tortillas so it is shocking to see bagels. I actually got a bagel with cream cheese and lox. It was beyond words and I topped it off with a slice of carrot cake, was I in Nicaragua?
The main herd headed out around 12:30, but I got a tip from one of my Nica friends to wait a little so it wouldn’t be so congested and I was told it was mas tranquilo. Now you may be asking yourselves why there would be about 2000 people in my town ready to march to the next town and more importantly why is this a big deal? Good questions and I am glad you asked… one is that it is the patron saint festival in Esquipulas and for some reason all the towns within 60 miles decide it is worth celebrating. Also, it is a huge deal because even though Esquipulas is the next town, it is a 20km walk away on dirt roads and ascending and descending countless hills.
I don’t know how, but I convinced Mama to take on this odyssey with me and we headed out with my Nica friend, Jason, (yes we have the same name) and his two friends. It started off all dandy, I was in high spirits and I had the chance to point out two of my schools along the way. Given the closest school is a 30min walk and the following one is an additional hour. Either way, we were in high spirits by the time we made it to the turnoff to my second school and I figured if Mama was tired we would just hop a bus. Well, poor planning on my part. The buses that went by looked like living hells, imagine cattle cars but with an additional 20 cows somehow squeezed in and another 30 stacked on the roof for good measure. There was no way Mama was getting on one of those buses and I wasn’t either. It was also funny because both of us were stubborn and unwilling to give up. I figured for sure that Mama was going to kill me and walking did get pretty old after kilometer 6 or so. I mean there are only so many dirt roads you can stare at and deforested cattle land you can take pictures of. There were some highlights of the trip… I got to take some pretty funny videos of Mama interview style asking what she was thinking signing up for this, we got a huge plume of black smoke blown on us from a bus, we had aching feet from the constant pounding of rocks, and it was cute seeing my host family waiting for us around 2/3 through the trip to walk the last leg together.
Four and a half hours later we finally made it to the entrance of Esquipulas, did I mention that we forgot to bring any water and were relying on oranges for nourishment? I was pooped and I am sure Mama was near exhaustion. It just so happened as we were walking into town that I spied Icia and Angus, two volunteers and the people I was supposed to meet up with later. I said by the my Nica friends and we ducked into the house to just sit down and ponder what we just accomplished. We were staying in another volunteer’s house, Stephanie’s, and it made me feel a little more at home to be meeting people in a house. Angus made a surprisingly good dinner of rice and beans and retold some stories about how he has either spent all his Peace Corps money on going out with his buddies or how he built a gym out of trees and cement blocks. My mom got to see what true volunteer life was like and I got to rest my weary feet. However, it wasn’t all relaxation yet. I promised Jason and his family that I would meet them out in town and I had to live up to my word. My mom and I ventured out into town and it was the scene from San Dionisio but at a much larger scale. Now, the town is only marginally bigger but there were an additional 5000 people there set-up for the long haul. People actually constructed plastic shanty houses, there were vendors selling anything fried, and the crowds actually seemed to be exhibiting tidal patterns. It was sheer chaos and I was truly overwhelmed. I was tired of getting pushed around in the crowd especially by a population a head shorter than me and it was grotesque how much worse the garbage was, you could feel it all crunching under your steps. I finally told my friend I had to get out of there and we retreated back to the house.
Some other notable events from the day was that Icia was getting her bed delivered during the worst possible time and it was coming in on a bus. Of course Icia also didn’t have any money and we stiffed the cobrador 100 cords, in our defense he was blatantly overcharging. He then threatened Icia that he would get his money and this ties into another event later in the night. Also, I pulled a classic move and got sick. Now, I was already sick, I was getting fevers at night, but this is Nicaragua and I was in an uncontrolled shiver all night. I had to breakdown and buy the warmest thing I could find which was a Ecko false double-layered long sleeve shirt. Mama and I shared and bed and other than my shivers I was able to sleep, until… Until the incessant honking of bus horns that sounded like each driver decided to park right in front of the house and give off a 10 blast salute. Now the connection with this and the anecdote earlier is that the first time I heard the beeping I thought it was early morning and it was the bus driver with the mattress coming to kill us. I remember bolting out of bed, running to the front door, and making sure the door was locked. I quickly learned by the next barrage of honks that this wasn’t the case and it was in fact 1am in the morning, but I was still scared. You might think this is pretty bad, but it gets oh so much better. Icia made some joking remark during dinner about a street parade for the past week and I remember from Masatepe some kids would run around with drums. Nope, at 4:30 in the morning I was awoken again by what seemed to be a full marching band company passing right through the center of the house. It was like Nicaragua collectively decided to make my night a living hell and was doing one terrific job of getting it done.
As my father’s son I could not let my mom rest too long, even if we did just walk 20km the day before. I had plans for us to get to Leon and I would be damned if we didn’t keep to the schedule. We walked all around the aftermath and finally found a bus leaving for Managua. Luckily we were able to reserve seats, but it was packed and Mama got her first experience of being squished by people’s hips in your face, bodies pushing up on you, and the stench of way too many humans in one place. From Managua we were able to take a more comfortable micro express to Leon. By now it was only day 3 of Mama’s visit but we were in our 4th city and I had even more planned for the next day. The one plus is that in Leon we got to meet up with even more volunteers for what was our planned joint birthday parties. We all went out to the legendary “La Rosita’s” which is a little café that serves…. Bagels! Now I know this is no big deal in the states, but they don’t believe in any type of bread besides white here or tortillas so it is shocking to see bagels. I actually got a bagel with cream cheese and lox. It was beyond words and I topped it off with a slice of carrot cake, was I in Nicaragua?
No comments:
Post a Comment