Tuesday, January 18, 2011

2011 Happenings

1/18/11

Well a lot has happened in the first weeks of the New Year. After I got back from Niquinohomo, I had a chat with Alejando about when I was moving out. It wasn't the most welcoming conversation but I had told him before that I planned to move out after my obligatory six weeks were up, so it wasn't completely unexpected. It did catch me a little by surprise though. I told him that I hadn't had the opportunity to look around as much as I had hoped given the fact that I had been sick in Managua for the better part of December, but I would get right on it. So the next day I hit the streets looking for places to rent. I talked to some the other teachers in town to see if they knew of anything and got a few leads. I ended up going down to the Barrios de los the Maestros (Teacher neighborhood) and asking around just about a how much the average rent is. As luck would have it, one of the teachers I know, knew of a places that was for rent. She said would talk to the owner when she got back to town and see if I could rent it. Great I thought this is working out wonderfully. The Peace Corps had told us that it was better to find a Nicaraguan who could help with the negotiations because you'll end up getting a better price. Sometimes people like to aprovechar de los gringos as they say here because people see a gringo immediately think they can take advantage of him and make some extra money. Not something that is unique to Nicaragua obviously. I told my teacher friend I had to go to a conference but I'd be back in a week.

The conference that I went to was a counterpart training conference. My two counterparts Luis and Marlon from La Dalia came with me to the Vistamar beach resort. It was an awesome place to have a training because it was right on the beach, but also a cruel torture being so close to the water and being stuck in a conference room all day. It wasn't all bad though we had a decent amount of time to relax in hammocks and go swimming in the ocean and pool. The water was lovely!! Nice and warm nothing like the Oregon coast where you feet go numb after the first ten minutes. During our free time my friends and I went swimming, body surfing and picking up shells. It was a lot of fun. We also learned a lot in the conference as well. We talked about teaching strategies, American and Nicaraguan values, the difference between Nica and Gringo time and the importance of communicating and working together. I think my counterparts learned a lot and had a good time. All the counterparts left the day before the volunteers did, because we had more session planned with TEFL 51 the group that came in a year before us. Although we had met them all in training charlas they really hadn't met us. We played some getting to know games and then had more sessions about various topics.

After a nice all expenses paid retreat at the beach it was time to head back to site. I was anxious to get back because Micheal the PC safety and security coordinator was coming on Friday to check out the house that I was going to be renting. The landlord upon seeing that I was gringo raised the price from 800 to 2000. Everybody including myself was surprised that she was taking advantage of me to such an extent. Needless to say I didn't get the house so Micheal and I went to look at some other possibilities that weren't quite as nice. I was pretty depressed over the weekend and worried about finding something in my price range. Monday I went out with Alejandro ready to look again. He said he knew of a few people that might have something available. After looking around in the morning we found a teacher in the Teacher Neighborhood that was going to rent me a room in her house for 600. I was really excited to move. Today as I was packing up my stuff I got a call from another one of the teachers in the same neighborhood,  She said she was moving in with her dad and would rent me her entire house FURNISHED FOR ONLY 1000 CORDOBAS!!! I couldn't believe how lucky I was! The house is great two stories and with a tv, 2 beds, a fridge and even a hammock all though I think I'm going to use my own hammock. The only thing I need to buy is a cooktop and gas tank! In the backyard there is a mango tree and mandarin orange tree!! So if anybody wants to come visit me I'd be happy to host you! You just have to make it up the miserable road from Matagalpa, although it much better in a SUV that in a school bus, haha.

In other news yesterday was the first day of my community English class. It was a good turn out of about 8 or 9 people. Most were English teachers a few university students and one actual first time English student who was completely lost. I am working with a university professor to start a Dalian English Teacher Association (DETA) to improve their methodology and pronunciation and other topics that they want to work on. I'm excited for the prospect of DETA because if everything works out will I leave DETA will continue without me. We'll see in two years from now.

More pictures to come of my house but you can get an idea of what the house looks like in my site visit photo album on facebook

Well that's all for now, hope 2011 is treating everybody well so far!