Sweltering, stuffy, & so sweaty. It's been hot in Managua: 95-100 degrees during the day and 85+ degrees throughout the night. It's the hottest time of year here, the worst part of el verano (summer), and we're just waiting for the rain to break. Nicaragua has 2 distinct seasons, the dry and the rainy, which is expected to start in the next couple of weeks. 

On a cooler note . . . We moved to a home with a family in Managua in April and are really enjoying the home environment. The house is never empty and we come home to Urania, her husband Roberto, her best friend Angeluz, her cooking partner Norma, Norma's sons, her nephew Ernesto, and frequently a visiting neighbor. Being surrounded by kind & caring people is wonderful. Urania is a cook and makes meals for local businesses, so the kitchen is often in full use and rice & beans always in supply. We love having a bigger kitchen space and tools to cook a variety of foods; we've been playing with recipes for pizza, pancakes, and curry with local ingredients. 

Everyday, we are greeted at the iron gate - typical of Managua homes - by Tessa the dog, who is so excited to see us that . . . she pees. (Tail wagging in addition to this causes an unpleasant situation, but we keep petting her anyway, she is a cute dog after all). While I'm petting her, Joel hilariously narrates Tessa's thoughts; probably pretty accurately too. Video by request.
Our new home is in a barrio (neighborhood) called Bello Horizonte, about 30 minutes bus trip from the AsoFenix office, which puts us a bit closer to the center of the city. It is a very safe area too. 
Honestly, we do not like Managua much. And no one else seems to. But at least we have elements that we like, namely our new home.
We also miss you all a lot! We have internet in Managua and we would love to plan a video or phone chat to catch up!  
- Becky

A glimpse of Managua

Can’t believe it? Neither could we.

The Thursday after our backpacks were stolen, we received a call from Marina, Becky’s host-mom when she was in Spanish school. At 6am, Marina calls, talking a kilometer a minute about how someone found Joel’s passport in the woods. What?! Someone had called her in the wee hours of the morning, reporting to have found some stuff scattered throughout the woods, including a passport and a notebook with her phone number in it. We call up this fellow; Darwin is his name and he says that he has found two backpacks, passports, some money and various other items scattered in the forest near his home in Ostional. Slightly suspicious and very excited, but enough motivation for us, we head down to Ostional the next morning. Before we go bounding into Darwin’s home, we talk to one of the community members of Ostional that we had met earlier, Julio, to learn what the town thinks of Darwin. Julio says that Darwin is a stand-up individual, but offers to accompany us to pick up our backpacks anyway. Once there, Darwin is excited to see us and immediately brings out two backpacks and a couple smaller pouches and lays them at our feet. Our stuff! Pretty pumped to see some things we thought were gone for good, we look through the backpacks to see what’s there. Passports, packs, water filter, money, notebooks, clothes...Everything except the SLR, iPhone, and other camera. Awesome. We get the story from Darwin of how he was searching through the woods for firewood, and came across my passport pouch, then later found a backpack, then another, all sprinkled through the woods. We came to the conclusion that the robber must have been running through the woods while simultaneously rifling through our things, taking the valuables and pitching the rest. That sucker didn’t want our beat-up pink frisbee! What a fool! Feeling a amazing sense of gratitude for this honest guy and a little giddy to have our things back, we give Darwin a reward and we much more contently leave Ostional once again. We thought we could put this behind us, but no, there is more to the story.

Exhausted and ready to return to Managua, we board the bus and put our recuperated backpacks on the rack above our seats. More and more people board the bus along the route out of San Juan del Sur, until it is completely sardined, with no standing room even. After a long day, Becky has dozed off, and I feel like it too. However, I notice that my backpack has started to slide towards the back of the bus about one foot, not normal for these buses, so I keep an eye on both packs. With the bus so packed, the standing people have to hold on to the luggage racks to keep their balance. The guy near my backpack seems to be a little too touchy for my taste though. So when we make a stop in the city of Rivas, I say enough is enough, and get up to move my pack. I grab my pack and slide it back to be right above our seats, and look over at Becky’s pack, and see that it is GONE.

You’ve got to be kidding me. Time to go into search and destroy mode. “Where is our backpack? Someone took our backpack!” yelled in Spanish. The bus passengers try to help, “Someone stole a backpack.” We start rushing off the bus, trying to find the pack and the person who took it. Someone starts running through the market with Becky’s pack. Becky and the bus attendant take off running behind him, weaving through the market. More and more people start running behind them, either trying to help or to see what happens. They are sprinting through vendors’ stalls and alleyways, until the bus attendant is able to reach out his arm and snatch the backpack off the back of the thief. Becky grabs it really quickly, holding it like a child. All the while, the thief slips into the market, free, but without any goods. We walk back onto the bus to a cheerful reception, and sit back down in our seats, packs in our laps.

Robbed two times in one week. We’ve had enough. The same backpack that we had just recovered that same day from the last robbery, no less. Shock. Disgust.

The result: two chase scenes and two captures (kind of), and an incredibly bitter and vulnerable feeling permeating our existence. The audacity to take something right above us, and the shame on our part that he almost succeeded. Just makes you want to scream and shake your fists in the air, like right before an epic middle-ages battle scene. Can’t stand the feeling of being seen as a dollar sign, and at the same time as fresh fish in prison. 

All in all though, no one was hurt and we had recovered our things once again.

Fast forward another week and we have more news to share regarding this mess of events. We had been calling the police in San Juan every few days, with each response being either they have nothing new or that the investigator in charge of the case will not be working for the week. Every person we talked to about the police said the police basically do nothing and that we should not invest any hope in our case. We still kept calling. All of a sudden on a call, the policeman tells me they have caught the robber and have the professional camera as well. What?! Yes! Awesome. Nicaraguan police are good for something. Score one for justice! We skipped down to San Juan once again, this time with glitter raining down and a permanent rainbow above us, and return to Managua with Becky’s camera, tightly gripped in hand.

Apparently, the police were able to get the robber’s address in Managua from the other two thieves we had caught, and were able to recover the camera in San Juan, where he had sold it before returning to Managua. He will remain locked up for a year or so, depending on the ruling, which we will be a part of, since we will probably be asked to give a testimony in court in about a month.

So that’s all for that story at the moment. To sum it up, I think George W. Bush said it best, “There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again.”

Take care folks. Love to all.
Joel