Internship at Hogar de la Esperanza (Home of Hope) & World AIDS Day

Hola Todos!

Tomorrow is my last day as an intern at Hogar de la Esperanza, a super cool organization that works with carriers of the HIV virus, and since today is 'World AIDS Day', I thought it was a good time to post about my experience these past 3 weeks at the Hogar.

            Hogar de la Esperanza was founded 24 years ago (yesterday was their birthday!) by M. Sc. Orlando Navarro Rojas in 1992, and currently serves 28 permanent residents as well as a women's group. The residents are all HIV+, but that does not mean that they all have AIDS or that they are all dying. Many of them are managing their condition and living their lives. Aside from HIV, the biggest health problem is smoking and drug/alcohol consumption among some of the residents.  Over the last 3 weeks I have learned so much, and I am so thankful for the opportunity to have met these people. During my time at Hogar de la Esperanza, I have done a few Bible studies with small groups, and each time I learn something new about the texts. We have studied the stories of, Amnon & Tamar, David & Bathsheba, and Rahab.

Some Information about HIV:

It is NOT AIDS, it is HIV

It is NOT a death sentence, it is a life opportunity

It does NOT exclusively affect homosexuals

It is NOT a sickness, it is a health condition 

It is NOT caught, it is transmitted

Today we had a special meeting and we read and discussed various Bible passages, including: Proverbs 19:1-8, Psalm 41, and John 12:20-26.

This was taken by Daniel Espinosa (the administrator of Hogar de la Esperanza), and I may or may not have stolen it from his Facebook page J

This is the picture that I took J

Today we made Christmas decorations... with glitter. I still have some glitter on me, and somehow when I was done with two pictures, I had glitter all the way up my arms and I felt like a five-year-old.

 

Longo Mai

Hola todos!

I know I haven't written in a while, I've been crazy busy with my lit. class that ended last week and starting my internship this week (more on that to come).
This weekend I visited Finca Longo Mai with Alfonso and his family. Longo Mai is a community of Salvadoran immigrants who grow various crops in what was originally going to be a co-op. This weekend was an amazing experience and I had a lot of fun talking to doña Edith, who is in charge of tourism at Longo Mai.

while I was there, I made a friend

On Saturday we went on a hike around the 'finca' (farm) and I ate a termite (kind of a weird taste wood mixed with mint), as well as the meaty stuff surrounding a cacao seed.

The green pod has the seeds that I ate
the meat off of, the yellow one is riper and
 better for drying the seeds

how to eat a termite: disturb the nest, lick your finger and
grab one of the termites that comes out to see what happened,
stick it in your mouth and swallow (too small to chew)

On Sunday I learned how to make chocolate.

Once the seeds/beans are dry, cook them until they are uniformly dark brown

 Once they are all dark brown, let them cool, and grind them.

Doña Edith is the one adding more seeds to the grinder.

The result is a paste that is a bit bitter since it is pure cacao. After we finished grinding the seeds, I went to church, and while we were gone, doña Edith made the paste into little patties of chocolate. Doña Edith made us hot chocolate before we left and it was super good, and I got to bring home some of the chocolate for my host family to enjoy.

Hasta luego!

Caylyn Anne

Cuteness Alert

Hola Todos!

Sorry I haven't written in a while, I've been really busy with classes everyday, and commuting to and from class takes forever...
Last week, my sister was given a puppy by a boy who likes her, his name was Tito, but it has since changed to Mickey. After being in the house for 4 days, my host mom was ready to give him to her niece. We are a busy family and don't have a lot of time for the puppy, and she really doesn't like cleaning up after his messes in the house. Also, Bobby (the other dog) was here first and is not a fan of Mickey. However, Kendall really wanted to keep the puppy (it was a gift to Ashly), so Mickey is now staying.
Mickey is super cute, and looks like a newborn german shepard puppy, except that he is 2.5 months old and his paws are itty-bitty. He is a great homework doing companion and to put him to sleep we flip him on his back and rub his belly (works every time). I have to say, I'm happy that the puppy is staying.

... Pacific Coast the Next!

¡Hola Todos!

            This weekend I had the pleasure of spending time with the Macartneys for 2 whole days! I was most nervous about traveling there, since it involved finding taxis and taking a ferry. As it turns out, it was super easy to get there, and it was less than $12 on the way there. Something that I learned, was that when I go visit for Thanksgiving, I should take the 11AM ferry home instead of the 2PM ferry, because it was dark and I had to take a taxi all the way home from the bus stop in San Jose (which bumped up the cost to around $17).

            On the ferry to Paquera, I saw 2 (double) rainbows, it was super cool. Sadly, my camera does not capture all the colors that God allows my eyes to see, so the better pictures have the saturation and contrast turned all the way up. The colors were amazing and I could see each individual color! 

            Also on the ferry ride I saw something that disgusted me, trash in the ocean. It did not necesarilly come from people in Costa Rica, it could have come from the other side of the world for all I know, but it is disgusting, and I wish we lived in a world that could take care of its trash better.

When I got to the Macartneys, Yoda was super excited to see me and spent a lot of time sitting in my lap.

We saw another super vibrant rainbow right outside the house, and of course had to take pictures.

            On Friday, I went to school at Escuela Futuro Verde with everybody and got to hang out in the 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th grade Spanish classrooms. With Megan’s 4^th grade class there wasn’t much to be done in the early morning, so I helped the 6^th graders with writing stories in Spanish. I went back to the 4^th graders when the 6^th graders had PE, and copied text from the computer on to the white board for the kids to copy since the copy machine was broken. During snack and lunch, the kids had fun showing me off to their friends, Molly especially. Molly would grab her classmates and drag them over to me for introductions before allowing them to go back to whatever they had been doing. After lunch, I sat in on Jonah’s Spanish classes and listened to the 5^th graders tell the class what they think ‘revolution’ means (lots of war), and Jonah talked about the Revolutionary War.

            Escuela Futuro Verde is completely different from any other school I’ve ever seen. All of the classrooms are “long term temporary” tents or rough buildings, the entire library fits on a wall, and the computer lab has like 10 computers. I wasn’t able to take pictures because I was busy, but you can find the school on Face Book (Escuela Futuro Verde) to see pictures. One thing that is super cool about this school is that all of the kids are either bilingual, multilingual, or on their way to becoming so. One of the girls in Megan’s class is Chinese, and is learning Spanish and English (the main languages spoken in school) at Futuro Verde. Something else that is different culturally, is that the students call their teachers by their first names, something that could get a student in major trouble in the United States.

            On Saturday, we spent the whole day at the beach, and I learned how to surf!! BJ showed me the basics on land, and then helped me figure it out in the water. I spent most of my time wiping out, but I stood up 3 or 4 times. The only bad thing was that I rubbed all the sunscreen off of my thighs and now have a really bad sunburn, thankfully, BJ gave me his rash guard, so my stomach is not burnt. 

Getting started!

Standing!

Wipe out!

            I also built a sand volcano with Jonah, and it was lots of fun dribbling wet sand to create rocks. On the way home from the beach we saw 3 largish caimans in the river, and they were the small ones according to one of the guys who keeps track of them. I also saw the blue macaws that the neighborhood is currently breeding, and the red macaws that were recently released. There were 3 macaws right outside the house Saturday evening, and I got some good pictures of them.

            Sunday morning, we went back to the beach before I had to leave, and I tried surfing on a smaller board (did not go well) as well as stand up paddle boarding (did not end very well either). I spent a lot of time just playing in the waves with Jonah and Molly, which was great.

            I can’t wait to go back in a month to celebrate Thanksgiving! If you are interested in seeing more pictures, here is the link to the google photos album: https://goo.gl/photos/dQcpEMquCHzeG88t9

Hasta luego!

            Caylyn 

Atlantic coast one weekend...

Hola Todos,

     Sorry I haven't written in so long, I've been super busy with my homework (which I probably should be doing right now...) Friday and Saturday I was on the Atlantic coast of Costa Rica, in the city of Limón and in the town of Cahuita. It was really nice to get out of the house and have a change of scenery, even though I had to work on a paper.
     On Friday, we (Heidi, Erika, one of Heidi's house mates, and Maya, Erika's 5-year-old daughter, and I) left around 8:30 and got to Limón around lunch time. After a quick tour of Limón, we were back in the car and on our way to Cahuita. During this trip, Maya finally decided that I'm not scary and talked my ear off, claiming that I am her BFF :). Once we were in Cahuita, we went to the beach, and played in the water (sort of). We never went past ankle deep because of strong rip tides, and we couldn't make it to the green zone before the beach closed at 5pm. Maya and I played in the sand, and dug a hole all the way down to the water (not very far), she especially liked that she was almost as tall as me when I stood in the hole. After a short "rest" (read: homework time) at the hotel, we went out for dinner at Soda Sola Fe, a 'soda' is a small, family owned restaurant.
     On Saturday morning, we ate breakfast and saw (and heard) howler monkeys at the hotel, there was even a mom with a baby. I wish I had had my camera, but my phone was in the room, since I didn't want it at breakfast. After breakfast, Heidi and I went on an animal tour with Fernando, Heidi's favorite guide. We took a boat to Cahuita point, and then hiked back into town. On the hike I saw: monkeys, snakes, more than enough spiders, crabs, a sloth, and a basilisk (Jesus Crist lizard). It was amazing, Fernando was able to spot all these animals that Heidi and I only saw with a telescope, or when he pointed them out. At one point, Fernando stopped and said, "there is a poisonous snake, you have ten seconds to see it before it sees you." It was a yellow eyelash viper, sitting on a tree less than 15 yards away, and I didn't see it until I looked through the telescope and then followed the telescope to see it with my bare eyes. Fernando took the following pictures, without a zoom lens.

Now we are going to find, spot the animals, feel free to zoom in, the answers are at the bottom.

     We also saw lots of monkeys, how many can you spot? (The camera did not capture all of them since some were behind leaves, there are at least 4)

After seeing the monkeys and the snakes, we saw lots of spiders, can you find her?

Then, after a lot of searching, we saw a mommy sloth with her week/week and a half old baby. Unfortunately, I missed the sloth in my big picture, so lets play, point out the baby.

Finally, we saw the basilisk, a green lizard that blends in really well. (hint, he is looking up)

    No cheating now, here are the answers.

Thanks for playing!

You can see all of the photos here: https://goo.gl/photos/kDAb8q8HJSU2hiev9

Hasta Luego!

Caylyn

Weekend at Savegre

Hola todos!
   
     This weekend, I went to Savegre with Heidi, Alfonso, Moisés (father), Moisés (son), José, José Manuel, and José Luis. It was a lot of fun, and I got to meet 2 boys from the Sola Fe community (where Heidi and Alfonsos' church is). Saturday we had some conversations about creation and how we are stewards of the earth, and we need to take care of it. Moises (father) read us various bible passages that have to do with creation, and/or caring for the earth, and then Heidi talked to us about ways we can care for the earth with the decisions we make. So we talked about fabric (reusable) diapers, re-using waterbottles, rechargable batteries, buying local fruit that is in season, refillable deoderants, and using washable plates/cups/flatware. The resulting skits about using these items were cheesy, but entretaining. After dinner and and a documentary about gangs in El Salvador, Alfonso and I led a devotional, except that we had already talked about the psalm that I had chosen, and I think I had heartburn, so I wasn't much help, and I went to bed as soon as it was acceptable. Also, it was COLD, like two pairs of pants (jean capris and sweats), a light sweater under my big sweatshirt and two (3 in the AM) pairs of socks cold. Luckily there was a wood buring stove in the middle of the main room that I could sit close to.
     Sunday moring I was up at 5:20 (5 minutes late) to go find quetzals, unfortunately, we only heard them. After breakfast, I went on a trail ride with 2 trail guides, Jose Manuel, Jose Luis, and Moises (son). The horses were typical trail horses, but the trail its self was actually kind of challenging. We crossed the river 4(?) times, and for the first time in my life, I was on a horse who did not balk or decide to play in the middle of the water :). There were parts of the trail that were really steep and I got left behind in the saddle when my horse jumped a bit to get started, and these saddles were not particularly comfortable (my butt and legs feel bruised), and I probably would have felt safer in a jumping saddle with jumping length stirups. On the way back, we got to gallop, and it was so much fun! I haven't had the chance to really gallop in a long time, and at one point, the trail guide who stayed toward the front yelled like a cowboy and the two of us raced for a ways (who knows who won). My only regret is that I did not get the guides' names, or the name of my horse.
     After the trail ride, we went "fishing" for trout. I say "fishing" because there were a whole bunch in a small pond. Granted, I only caught one (with help from an emplyee) while one of the boys caught 5. The trout that we caught became our lunch and it was delicious. After lunch, we cleaned up, evaluated the weekend, prayed it up, and left. On the way back, I mostly slept, but I woke up and started singing when "Message in a Bottle" by the Police came on the radio.
     Overall, it was a wonderful weekend, spent in and around nature, to relax and forget about everything I have to do for school on Tuesday. Here is a link to all of the photos from my phone, as well as the video on youtube. When I get ahold of the pictures of me with my fish and other pictures, I'll add them to the album.
https://goo.gl/photos/B7QkZboR1nuw1Vsi9
https://youtu.be/O-hlXQuZb4E

Hasta luego!
Caylyn

Feed the birds

Hola todos!

     Yesterday, I took the 2 O'clock bus to San Jose instead of the 3 O'clock, anticipating having an hour of extra time to do a bit of shopping. Instead, I got an extra hour and a half, and I didn't know what to do with myself after purchasing my sweater and rain jacket. I walked around a lot and ate my first POPS ice cream sundae (delicious). I eventually made my way over to the plaza in front of the national theatre, where there were lots of pigeons, and a woman selling dried corn. She imediately reminded me of the bird lady from Mary Poppins who sells bird food on the steps of the cathedral, so I asked to take her picture.

I will admit that I bought some and fed the birds, some even sat on my hand/arm while they ate (and then I washed my hands).

Nicaragua Trip

Hola Todos!

     I have returned from my trip to Nicaragua, and am happy to say that it was AMAZING. Heidi and I went on this trip with another study abroad program, ICADS (Institute for Central American Development Studies) since I am the only one in my program with Valpo. Since so much happened, this will be a long post, so I will break it down day by day and include a link to all of the photos that don't appear here, the album will be updated as I get ahold of the group photos that were taken on the trip. 

SUNDAY 9/18

     Today I had to leave with Heidi at 5:50 AM to get to ICADS and leave by 6:20 AM. We rode in a bus for 7 (ish) hours, not including our lunch stop, and stopped in Managua for the night. Before stopping in Managua, we made a pit stop at la Laguna de Apoyo, a really cool lake in the crater of an old volcano. At first, it was pouring, but then it mostly cleared up, and was beautiful, and we could see parts of the city of Granada across the lake.

MONDAY 9/19

     Today we spent the morning talking to former banana workers (bananeros) from Chinandega who are living in Managua to protest their situation. These people worked on big banana plantations owned by multinational companies like Chiquita, Dole and Del Monte, and were severely harmed by the use of Nemagon (one of the dirty dozen pesticides). The bananeros were not warned of the dangers of working with Nemagon and were not given protective clothing. Many now have cancer, and deal with hair falling out, tooth loss, infertility, miscarriages, blindness and birth defects in the children that they manage to have. They are protesting because the companies have not given them any kind of compensation, or even an apology. Personally, I am disgusted at the treatment these people have received, and will no longer but bananas once I return to the states. I urge all of my readers to please do more research regarding this topic and consider writing a letter to these companies letting them know that citizens of the United States know what is happening, and aren't happy about it.

     After talking to the bananeros, we visited a museum dedicated to Sandino, one of the leaders of the revolution against the government in the 20s and 30s. This museum is located next to the ruins of the Somoza family's national palace, which was destroyed in an earthquake in 1972.

The museum also has information about the torture of Somoza's prisoners, one of which involved keeping prisoners in a room adjacent to a room with hungry pumas, and removing the wall between the rooms. According to Heidi, Somoza would have his guards dress up as roman centurions and invite his friends to watch this "entertainment". Today was full of hard information to process, but it was incredibly important.

     After visiting the museum and the bananeros, we traveled to Matagalpa, where I met my host mom, Paula, her daughter Erika, and her granddaughter, Andrea.

TUESDAY 9/20

     Today we visited a co-op coffee farm in San Ramón (about 30 minutes from Matagalpa) called Danilo Gonzalez, and we learned about their history. They named the farm after a local boy who was killed during one of the revolutions in Nicaragua, and it was founded 9/6/1986. The co-op is now part of UCA (union of agriculture and livestock co-ops) San Ramón, to learn more, you can visit their website, but it is in Spanish. About 3 years ago, they lost around 80% of their trees and crop due to some kind of leaf rot. After removing all of the infected trees, the co-op planted new, more resistant trees, and are getting their first crop this year. After the talk, we went for a 3-hour hike around the farm, some parts were super steep and muddy, but it was lots of fun. Especially since our other leader, David, is a biologist (this meant stopping to look at birds, plants, and poop).

 

WEDNESDAY 9/21

     Today was mostly just talks given by various people, one woman talked about the Nicaraguan Communal Movement and its organizations, and another woman talked about a program for kids who have been taken out of school so that they can work full time. The program works with the parents and educates them about the importance of sending their kids to school, and provides full scholarships (uniform, supplies, tuition) for 21 kids. The other kids in the program get basic school supplies to help lower the cost. After lunch, 2 Nicaraguan women who migrate to Costa Rica for work talked to us about their experiences. Today was full of really interesting information, but not much movement.

THURSDAY 9/22

     Today we left Matagalpa at 7AM and traveled to León, where we met a war veteran, Francisco, who fought in the revolution during the 60s and 70s and again during the contra wars during the 90s. His talk was incredibly interesting, but one of the things that surprised me most was his openness. Not only did he talk about something that must be very difficult to talk about (the death of his girlfriend in their first battle) but he was also very open about his PTSD, his triggers, and his medication. This was very different for any conversation in the US, because most people keep their mental illness and medications a secret. Francisco also spoke to us in English, it wasn't perfect, but he is self-taught. He taught himself English by reading book both in English and in Spanish, and by reading the subtitles in movies.

     Thursday afternoon, I climbed the youngest volcano in Central America, Cerro Negro. It was definitely a challenge, but it was also a lot of fun. I discovered that if you sit on a volcano for too long, your butt gets burnt because it is so hot. The view from the top was incredible, and the pictures don't quite do it justice. As we neared the top and at the top we saw the heat vents where the smoke was escaping (the technical term has escaped my mind) and we could smell the sulfur. The scariest part was that a friend, Bianca, and I went down the way we went up, and realized too late that we were alone. It was really stressful as we raced down the volcano as it grew dark. When we got back to the trailhead, we had to run and search for the bus, luckily I chose the correct fork and we made it to the bus. Unfortunately, we missed out on sliding down a volcano :(

FRIDAY 9/23

     Today was pretty uneventful, we visited a honey co-op, and I bought wild honey for my Costa Rican host family. Friday night was miserable because I got food poisoning. Thankfully, I feel much better now.

SATURDAY 9/24

     Today was full of traveling, and I'm very thankful that I was no longer sick, because we had an 8-hour bus ride, plus a boarder crossing. On the Nicaraguan side of the boarder, I bought a hammock for my host mom, and some leather key chains for souvenirs.

FINlAL REFLECTION

     This trip was amazingly eye opening and I loved (almost) every second of it. One thing that I noticed right away when we entered the country is the propaganda, it is everywhere. You can't walk 100 feet without seeing a poster with Daniel Ortega's (or his wife's) face plastered on it. In the cities, there are bilboards with their campaign slogan (something about going forward in victory, I dont quite remember). It was very different than in the United States, where people are very outspoken against the government. Here, the people seem to be afraid to speak against the government. This is very diferent from Costa Rica, where I have never seen a picture of the president. Another thing that I noticed, especially in León, is the difference in modes of transportation. There are cars and trucks and buses, but I also saw a lot of carts pulled by horses. And this wasn't just in town, we passed a couple horse drawn wagons/carts on the highway. One of the biggest problems that Nicaragua (and the reset of the world) is facing is climate change. The last few rainy seasons have received very little rain, making it hard to grow anything. I also saw crops of corn on super steep slopes, as well as places where there was so much errosion that the land is no longer suitible for growing anything. This was a completely new experience for me, and it's one that I won't quickly forget.

Hasta luego!

Caylyn

https://goo.gl/photos/VrRzZm3tMKxqdjey9