Braving the Tsunami

View from Jesus

Yes, we snuck into a really fancy resort

How serious should you take a tsunami warning? I in no way want to down play the tragedies of the tsunamis from the recent past or poke fun of the devastation that I know that they are capable of causing, but still are we getting a little trigger happy? Ok, I do see their point, there was a magnitude 8.8 earthquake in Chile, one of the strongest in the last 100 years and we all know that the displacement of tectonic plates causes a huge dispersal of energy, but still it was my beach weekend. At times mother nature just needs to learn to heel to my desires and schedule. I don’t have time to work around every natural disaster and I am not going to miss a perfectly good beach weekend for the rare threat of some big wave. In fact, the wave never even made it to my beach. The warning was for 2:50pm and at 2pm they cancelled the warning. It was pretty ironic because the tsunami was supposed to hit at the exact time that a Harley Davidson parade was supposed to pass through town. You heard right, Harley Davidson’s in Nicaragua. Random I know and I believe it was this that saved the town. We all know how loud those bikes are and I believe it was the residual shockwaves of their roar that cancelled out the energy from the wave. Anyways, at 2:01pm I was back on the strip finding a bar to wait for the suspected tsunami wave. By 2:50 I had front row seats at our local bar with a few other friends and still no wave. No biggie, basing on the forecasting abilities of meteorologists I figured it could be give or take 2 hours and we were only on our fifth litro so I just hunkered down and waited. Finally around 4pm I figured it was over and there was nothing. I won’t go so far to say I was wishing for a natural disaster, but I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get to see the ocean recede or at least a few splashes along the coastal wall.dont be fooled, there was no wave

Well the real reason I traveled down to San Juan del Sur was to see Stella. It had been six months since I had last seen her and I was anxious to see her again. It is a pretty scary concept, we had only been dating for less than a year before I left for Nicaragua and have spent the last third of our relationship apart. A lot has changed, I know that I am no longer the same person since I left and my life is full of random events. Stella just relocated down to San Jose, Costa Rica with Root Capital and she too is going through a bunch of life changes. What if we take one look at each other and wonder what we have done? Luckily that did not happen and it was actually pretty natural to go and pick her up from the bus. San Juan del Sur was the perfect meeting spot for the two of us, it is about 7hrs from each of our respective sites and it is a gorgeous beach town. Rather than dealing with an odd reunion Stella and I seemed to pick right back up where we left off. It wasn’t like we were reuniting after 6 long months, but more like I was coming home from a long business trip. The big excitement of the week was the supposedly tsunami that fizzled out and the rest of the time we just got to hang out on the beach and relax. I got to give up my Peace Corps lifestyle for a few days by eating way out of my $200/month salary and Stella got to save a bunch of money by traveling to a third world country. It was a win/win for the both of us.

Ok, I admit this entry is more of my benign entires and is not too exciting. I don’t know why, but I just don’t have too much to say. It was absolutely amazing being able to see Stella, but that basically sums it all up and the rest was just stumbling down to the beach and passing out. We did do a day hike up to the top of the mountain to see jesus. It wasn’t too exciting, just a giant concrete jesus on the top of the hill, but I got us in at national prices because of my Peace Corps id and the view was pretty nice. I thought it would have been a good spot to see the tsunami hit; I am still a little bitter about that.

As for upcoming events. I am in Matagalpa today to help out with an HIV charla. I am working with a few other Peace Corps Volunteers to put on a billards tournament coupled with an HIV talk. The concept is pretty cool. We start off sharing a bunch of information about HIV then we break off into the tournament. The players play normal pool, but when the sink a ball they then have to answer a question regarding the charla. If they get the answer correct, the ball stays, if they answer wrong the ball comes out. Also, my youth soccer team is miraculously still togeither and going strong. The kids love to play and even though I was gone last weekend and this weekend, they are just as eager to play. I feel like I am really accomplishing something and it is a good feeling to be a coach. The kids really do look up to me and I like doing the scheduling of practices and games.

So next week I was invited to a conference with the government and several NGOs to talk about the water crisis. I am hoping to push my water project and may even find some new outlets for projects. I am excited that they see me as an assett to the community and hope that it isn’t a joke like most meetings here. Finally, the end of the month will be here before I know it and that means traveling back to Managua to see Stella again for a weekend and then the following weekend going to see her in Granada before I head off to Costa Rica fro Semana Santa. Again, not too shabby for life as a Peace Corps volunteer.