I’ve lived in Nicaragua for over a month now and in 2 parts of the country, so I feel at least a little qualified to write this. So here’s a glimpse of what it’s like to live here:
- Chickens and stray dogs are everywhere. All the time, just walking around.
- Everything here is really cheap. It’s insane. Like a bottle of pop is equivalent to about 60 cents or a scoop of ice cream is like 75 cents
- They have the best ice cream sandwiches here.
- Like most countries besides the U.S., you can’t flush your toilet paper. I’ve only made this mistake 3 times (so far)….
- We eat a lot of beans, rice, and plantains.
- Everyone looks at you like you just walked out of a spaceship. They like to remind you that you’re white, by yelling “gringa” or just whistling at you.
- Nicaraguans really value cleanliness, especially sweeping and mopping, which seems kinda unreasonable to us because it’s currently the dry season so it’s very dusty. But still, we sweep for our hosts because we love them.
- Don’t drink Fanta Rojo. You may think it’s strawberry, but it actually tastes like bubblegum and it’s kinda nasty.
- In class, if a student needs the teacher’s attention, they won’t just raise their hand. They clap a few times, say “profe”, and raise their hand. And if s/he doesn’t respond, they do it again, but this time with more clapping.
- Here’s a fun list of everything we’ve found at some point in at least one of our houses:
- So many bugs. Flies, gnats, ants (biting and not biting), walking sticks, praying mantis, mosquitoes (only in the northern part of the country), cockroaches, crickets, grasshoppers, and centipedes.
- Spiders. These vary in size, from small jumping ones to ones about the circumference of a tennis ball. I’ve gained a lot of street cred on my team for killing these by hitting them with the palm of my hand.
- Reptiles. Mainly just little lizards, but one time we had an iguana and that was so funny. She wouldn’t leave our house even though we literally chased her outside, but she ran back in as we were shutting the door.
- A scorpion. One about the circumference of a softball and one that was smaller than my fingernail.
- A bat.
- There aren’t the same garbage and air quality regulations here like there are in the U.S., so people just burn their garbage and leaves in their backyard or on the side of the street.
- Speaking of the sides of the street, people will just picket their horses or donkeys along the side of the road. I don’t know what the regulations are for not stealing other people’s animals, but I guess it works for them.
- We’ve never been in danger of running out of water, but sometimes our sinks or showers sputter when the house’s water tank is low. Also, the water is never really clean (especially when we lived on the island and it was pumped every morning directly from the lake where people wash their cows) so we question how clean we actually are after a shower.
As usual, thank you all so much for your love and support. I’m living the dream and I love Nicaraguans so much. It’s so crazy to me that we’ve been here for a whole month already.
Soli Deo Gloria
Bailey
