A Broad Abroad

I now know that it is NOT worth it for me to stay in a dump for less $ because inevitably I leave in need of a splurge. My room at The Cedar House was inexpensive but stifling hot and pretty darn grubby. I checked out some other places but the more popular hostels were full and hostel tortuga balooda, which looked awesome (if I ever come back I will go there) but it was closing down for some renovations. Check it out if you go to Leon (3.5 blocks west of the cathedral).

I needed so badly to cool down that I splurged for a room with a/c at hotel los balcones. It is awesome. Is it possible to fall in love with a hotel? I’m paying $40 but it is way more than twice as nice as the $20 room I had earlier. To make up for the slurge I went to the la union grocery store (nice!) and got some wine, cheese and crackers for dinner and stayed in and watched a movie on cable tv. This was really timely since in the last day or 2 I had my first twinge of home-sickness. Nothing serious, but I needed to feel some of the comforts of home.

The main activity of the day, before I settled in for movie night, was a visit to the Museo Fundacion Ortiz. It is a really wonderful museum with old world and new world masterpieces as well as more modern art including a wonderful collection of ceramics. I brought my ipod and listened to music while soaking in the art and the beautiful and breezy colonial buildings that house it. I highly recommend it on a hot afternoon.

I arrived here on ash Wednesday to find the city’s youth, en masse (pun intended), in front of the cathedral sporting their ubiquitous catholic school uniforms and ash-smudged foreheads. Not quite like being a catholic at a public school in TX. I remember the questions I got when we still went to mass before school on ash Wednesday, but I also remember feeling sort of proud that I was different and I didn’t want to wipe off the ashes.

The Lenten activities are underway here. Already there are regular processions through town and each church has brought out at least one platform that will be decorated and hold its icons for more elaborate processions as easter approaches. This is just a taste of what I will get in Antigua, Guatemala during semana santa. It’s really very impressive. And now I have a new favorite invocation of el nino divino: fotocopias divino nino. Baby jesus rules over the kinkos of leon. and i’ve also learned nicas believe that jesus had long, brown, shirly temple curls. this is pretty much without exception here and it left me wondering who keeps these icon’s hair styled. i am not wanting to blaspheme, it is just that jesus is represented very differently here and he requires additional attention. the religious figures here are not sculpture, but more like mannequins with hair and movable joins.

onto business – I’ve had my first (and last) evening at the $12 hostel. In some cases one gets what one pays for and in some cases one gets even less. The wi-fi din’t work and I arrived during a fumigation (gasp!). It was hot as hell and I used my sleepsack to provide extra protection ☺. All part of the adventure, no?

Leon is lovely. It was once the country’s capital until the title was given to Managua in 1857, a backwater at the time, to diffuse the rivalry between liberal Granada and leftist Leon. But because of its auspicious beginnings Leon has a plethora of beautiful churches. Today I only made it around to 3, including the cathedral at town square. my favorite was iglesia de la merced. It has a beautiful wood ceiling, arched and finished but not painted and an equally beautiful but colorful alter and rather austere pews.

As with most latin American catholic churches there are nooks and crannies along the sides housing saints, incarnations of the virgin, divino ninos and other religious figures, most of whom are bleeding. I must say they are liberal with the red paint on their religious icons. I love the openness of the churches here, with large open doors at the front and sides to maximize air flow. I sat for a long time in the iglesia de la merced watching the birds fly in and out and appreciating the openness with which people pray. There is a glass case housing the virgin de la merced (our lady of mercy, the patron saint of prisoners and prisons) and people walk up to her or drop to their knees, look at her so intensely and talk to her. I imagined what they were so earnestly praying for. Then a touch of her foot, a sign of the cross and they go back out into the heat of Leon.

This is definitely grittier than Granada. It lacks Granada’s status among tourists,the UNESCO world heritage designation, and the $ that comes with it. The central park, with it’s adjacent cathedral, is not very welcoming. It could use a café or 2. But what it lacks in these areas, Leon makes up for in history and culture. The country’s best museums are here, there are often live performances in cafes and one can still feel the passion from the past decade’s revolutions during which this Sandinista-leaning region suffered mightily at the hands of the brutal dictator Samosa and his Contras. You remember THAT little debacle, right?

Today, starved of fresh and uncorrupted blood, the Nicaraguan government is ineffective. Despite Daniel Ortega’s recent re-election (flashback!), an event that on the surface should be reason for Sandinistas of days-gone-by to celebrate, there is little to be happy about. The cold war’s hand-outs, from the soviets via Castro or the US, created a corrupt government on both sides and no functioning economy to speak of. I’ll quit with the history lesson (find out more on your own!) but Nicaragua certainly has a dramatic past and political passions run deep, something refreshing considering many American’s ambivalence towards their politics (their politics, not their religion. America is pretty good at mucking up its politics with religion). Maybe that is changing? It takes intense discomfort with one’s leaders to spark passion and get people to think? You may say I’m a dreamer…..

I stayed 2 days at anastacia’s by-the-sea. It may be better called anastacia’s soon-to-be-in-the-sea as it is on it’s way to crumbling there. But the a/c and cable worked (miraculously) and I actually watched the super-Tuesday results come in! and while it was quite run-down, I liked it for its great location and good restaurant over the water. It’s there that one can rent snorkeling gear for $5 or so and swim out to the decent reef. Lots of fun fishies to look at. It’s also a great place to lounge in a hammock while alternating activities such as drinking beer, reading and looking out at the turquoise water of the Caribbean.

At regular intervals I would update Anastasia (the owner’s 6 yr old daughter) and her friend Claudia, at their request, on what was happening in the scary book I was reading. They thought the idea of people-eating vines on a mayan ruin was pretty cool. Anastasia had told me the day before that she wanted to be a witch so she could eat people. Interesting career goal. But then the next day both girls wanted to be hanna Montana. I didn’t feel so far away at that moment.

In the evenings I ordered kabobs of kingfish in the open air restaurant and puzzled at the odd combination of entertainment: alternating bollywood and country-western music on the sound system, the movie “the gods must be crazy” projected onto the wall, and lots of moskito fishermen slowly getting drunk on tona beer under a disco ball that twisted in the breeze. I was the only tourist there. I never figured out how that combination came about but it was the same both nights. Well, the fishermen/beer combo is understood, but these are the mental pictures picked up while traveling that one doesn’t forget.

It’s hard to tell which way the corn islands will go: the way of roatan and bocas del toro or…well…the other way….into obscurity after overfishing its lobster and conch and allowing the few tourist resources it has to tumble into the sea. I’d say “to hell with the tourist economy” if I thought they had another long-term option, but I’m not sure they do. Well, if you’re out that way it’s worth a visit. But I suspect it’s a trip better done with company and not solo.

We set out for Managua early. There are nice microbuses that make the leon/Managua/Granada circuits. they stop less frequently than the regular buses and are only about 25 cents more. In Granada they pickup just south of the square and we caught one just as it was pulling away.

Not sure where we got dropped in Managua but we caught a cheap taxi to the airport and soaked up some air-conditioning over in the international terminal before our flight. Once there, the taxis on big corn are cheap but we caught the 5 cent bus that circles the island and eventually found a $15 room to share at “beach view hotel”, a crumbling place but with a stellar view of the light blue carib from the huge back verandah. At the time water and electricity were almost non-existent during the daytime. I was told they are doing a major upgrade to these utilities. I wonder.

Food is not cheap on the island but we had a really good meal at nautilus and the live creole music was cool. The next day we checked out many different parts of the island (called BIG corn yet is pretty darn small) but I was pretty eager to get to little corn so I made my plans to leave after 2 nights. I had also decided to splurge a bit for a hot shower ( I hadn’t had one since costa rica!) and air-con once there. I found this at los delfines after a back-battering panga-boat trip across to little corn.

I had heard many accounts from people who came to corn island and stayed for weeks so I had rather high expectations. There are no cars on little corn, only one small, rambling town that runs along a paved sidewalk. This is where los delfines is located. My plan was to cross the island (10 minute walk) the next day to check out the string of beach shacks and cabanas and pick one out.

I visited the four places to stay over there. The accommodations range from $6 shacks (not secure) to the bit more upscale cabanas at casa iguana with shared bathroom and screened windows ($35) or private bathrooms and more amenities for $60. It is breezier on this side of the island and there are good beaches and lots of hammocks. it’s ALL backpackers. I ran into several people who’s paths i’ve crossed before and we chatted. In the end, tho, I decided to keep my place on the village-side since it’s a huge room with a/c, private bath, hot water and cable tv ☺ for $35. it’s only 10 minutes from the other side and has more restaurants and local flair! Yes, this tactic is contrary to the feedback you’ll receive from just about every visitor to little corn, so do with it what you will.

The string places offering beach shacks reminds me of a place I went to in turkey about 7 yrs ago: Olympus. It’s a well-known backpacker haunt famous for its “tree houses”. I was there with Margie and christophe and we talked to a traveler who was staying for several weeks. We just couldn’t see the appeal, hanging out in the middle of nowhere, in tree-houses, with a bunch of other backpackers when you had an amazing culture and wonderful little towns to explore just down the road. He said because I was American and only had a few weeks to travel I wouldn’t understand – people who are on the road for months at a time appreciate these places and I would too if I had more time. I doubted this at the time but had no way to know. Now I know it is not so. Good to know.

After 2 days on little corn I will go back to big corn and stay at anastacia’s, which is nicer than the last place I stayed on big corn before and has snorkeling right off the dock. It will also be easier to coordinate the flight back to Managua from big corn.

part 1 – playing, originally uploaded by peggydaly.

this is part one of 3 photos. starting with kids playing, moving onto my camera’s detection and ending with the mad scramble to be at the front of the pile of kids posing.