It's been awhile...

So it's been quite a while since I last posted an entry and while I am actually no longer in Nicaragua (cue the tears) I feel that it is still justified to give some updates on what went on during my last weeks in Nicaragua - and there was a lot of stuff that happened!

I guess I will start with my birthday party/depedida(going away party).  By some luck my birthday happened to coincide very nicely with the date when I was going to leave El Sauce.  Then by another stroke of luck, one of best friends from med school and 2 other friends were going to be in Nicaragua and able to swing by El Sauce.  So I wanted to host a despedida in style - and what better way to do that than with a big pig roast.  I had done one the year before in Rochester but it was just a little pig, about 80 lbs or so.  This was going to be big - both for effect and because I had no idea how many people from El Sauce would be coming - I wanted to invite most of the people that knew me and the hospital made that number quite large. So I planned and planned and talked and talked and so there was a lot of hype and a lot of skepticism - in Nicaragua you dont cook pigs whole and you certainly don't do it with the skin still on - you can't make chicharrones if you leave the skin on!  Bottom line - the stakes were high...

It doesn't look it, but this piggy weighs 210 lbs!

The day before the roast was a lot of work.  Tons of stuff the buy and arrange and when you don't have a car it can be a challenge.  But beer is a neccessary part of any pig roast and if you need to borrow a campoñera to get it to your house - so be it.  Turns out they are more difficult to steer than I would have guessed!

Building.

Fiona put her architectural skills to work to construct the oven - granted it was my design...

The fantastic crew getting the pig on the fire.  In order to have the pig ready by about 4pm the next day we had to start the fire at midnight and the pig got on the fire at 1am!

And then we spent the rest of the night stoking the fires, chatting, drinking cold beers and eating delicious chicharrones, cuajada and other Nica delicacies!  Not a bad night.

Nacatamals...with beer!  By far some of the best nacatamals that I had in El Sauce and a cold beer at 8 am trumps super sugared up coffee...just about any day I think.

The sunrise was phenomenal!

Just chillin' - cookin a big pig affords a lot of time for chillin

With Claudia my neighbor - Nicaraguans generally don't trust gringos and especially male gringos to cook things that they like - such as frito (sauteed organ meat).

That pig cooked itself very nicely!

Less than 4 hours after taking the pig off the fire even that head had disappeared.  I have never seen so much pig consumed in my life!

And then the people danced!

The gringo crew.  4 doctors, 1 architect, 2 peace corps, 2 nursing.  I think was a novel thing for so many gringos to be in one place and to be serving all the Nicas, but it sure was fun and delicious.

Mac got along well with everyone.

Fiona was a popular dance partner.  This doctor was really serious that we needed to have some 80s ballads but given our stereo options we were not able to oblige no matter how much we agreed.



Overall, it was a great party!  I was exhausted by the end of it, but I had fun and I really hope that everyone who came, Nica and gringo, also had a good time, ate some delicious pig and got to dance to their hearts' content.  Next posts will center on some of the people of El Sauce and also the travels that took Fiona and I around the southern and eastern parts of Nicaragua.  Hasta la proxima!