This past weekend I made the trek to Estelí, a much larger city located approximately 40km from El Sauce. However, this is a very, very, very looooong 40km. But we´ll get to that. I made the trip with a friend that I met on the bus from Leon to El Sauce my very first day here in Nica. She was squuezed in next to me on that packed bus and we struggled to carry on a conversation between my rough spanish and the incredibly loud music in the bus. She was trying to tell me about this radio program that she works for that is somehow involved in health maintainence, but that was about as far as I got. But most importantly she helped me find my hospedaje and gave me her email. After emailing back and forth - which was sooo much easier...wish I could converse as well as I can read! - she invited me to Estelí where she has family for a little cousins birthday. A little strange, but I figured it would be a great opportunity to do something very different - and it was. On Friday we made a cake to then take with us on Saturday morning. Cakes are hugely popular here and they are sooo ornate. However, due to the heat and general lack of refridgeration icing is whipped eggwhites and sugar rather than butter based - an unfortunate change in my opinion. (Pictures to follow on Monday or Tuesday...) However, I was rather skeptical that an iced cake would amke it in one piece to Estelí given the state of the road we were to travel. The road to Estelí passes by the hospital and I run it regularly. It is nice and hilly and makes my runs more like a trail run than a road run - in fact if I were to encounter said road while driving I would be pretty convinced that the road had simply ended! But no, this is the road that leads to Estelí and we were going to bring a ´well´decorated cake with us in the big yellow school buses that haul people all over Nica. Unfortunately this bus also left at 5am. So we boarded at 445 with our cake and arrived a bit after 8am - but remember that bit about it being about 40km away? yup - that is a looong and slow trip. But the cake arrived, albeit a bit worse for wear.
My friend´s family was incredibly friendly and generous - welcoming me into their home and feeding me more than anyone should ever be fed. But it was an experience very different from my host family in El Sauce. The house had 3 parts: the main was a wooden structure with hard-packed wooden floor and a open-fire cooking pit in the corner. Then in the back there was another wooden structure and off to the side a brick house with 2 rooms, but still with hard-packed floors. There was light in all the rooms - but definitely a different feel than my current house here in El Sauce!
The party was interesting - loads of little kids dressed to the 9s running around. Fiestas of any sort are a prime opportunity for Nicas to bring out all the finery. There was a piñata made by a relative of the family which was supremely entertaining to watch - both for the kids attempts and the adults reactions. We ate and ate and ate some more and then talked - cause that is how we roll here in Nica.
But the best part of Estelí? I went almost 2 days without sweating! The climate is sooo much fresher there it was incredible! Also hilly, beautiful, and bustling. The main street is packed with stores spilling their wares out onto the sidewalk and full of people. It really was a nice change of pace - although I think that El Sauce is a better place for me for this year - even with the crazy heat!
Unfortuantely it rained throughout most of Sunday so the day was spent in true Nica fashion - sitting and chatting. If ever there was a way to improve your Spanish, this is it.
The return to El Sauce was less eventful but even longer given that it was a Monday morning and all the school kids needed to be picked up so they could make it to school. Good thing the landscape was beautiful...
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