desde nicaragua

An ode to cab drivers

Before Managua, I'd never used cabs on a regular basis. Sure, I'd ridden them in the States — but it was always on visits, to see friends or boyfriends in New York in Chicago in Los Angeles. (Once we even took a cab from a downtown Detroit condo to the baseball stadium, a complete joke if you ask me, but I think it was supposed to be a joke because I could barely stop laughing those few blocks.)

I'd never ridden them enough to:

• know what a fair price is from point A to point B
• bargain
• slam the door after yelling at the driver
• feel sorry that a ride and a conversation was over
• collect drivers' numbers in my cell phone

I write this, an ode of sorts to cab drivers in Managua, now that the national transportation strike is over, while the situation remains tense enough for drivers to tell me that they're willing to do it again soon if certain clowns don't get their acts together.

And there is a personal reason I write this. Over the past several months I've made the conscious decision to treat drivers like the gridded pages of my personal journal, as if each one is my own therapist. I starve for human interaction some days, trapped willingly in my mountain home, and there are days when the only real conversations I have are inside of these moving hulks of metal that threaten to die, that do die, that need to be pushed, that are missing seat belts or mirrors, that are always on empty, and that you need to shake certain parts to start up.

Sometimes — well, let's be honest here: most of the time — I feel more comfortable sharing myself with strangers than people I know. (That's probably why even this blog is raw and personal only rarely.) There are thousands of drivers in the city and only once have I been in the same cab twice.

My reasoning for these true dashboard confessions is that I will probably never see this person again. They'll listen eagerly because I am fascinating to them — I get drivers' attention the moment I open my mouth because I have an accent they cannot place. And I believe most people want to help and honestly think they have wise advice to share.

So I spill stories about work about projects about magic nights and romance about doubts. I rarely exaggerate the truth because the reality, my reality, is complicated enough.

I regret not writing down some of the reactions or pieces of advice I hear. Like this, the other afternoon on a ride back from the airport:

"Lo amás? Lo podés querer, te puede gustar. Pero lo clave, lo que importa es saber si lo amás."

(Do you love him? You can want him. You can like him. But the key thing, what matters, is to know whether you love him.)

Or like the time I had to spend the last five minutes of a ride defending to a 39-year-old man my reason for not wanting him as my boyfriend, even if he was poor and honest:

"Lo que necesitas es un nicaragüense que es humilde, que te respete. ¿Te gustaría salir alguna noche conmigo?" "No." "¿Por qué?" "Emmm ... primero porque eres muy, muy viejo. Hasta podrías ser mi papá. Segundo, porque simplemente no me interesa pa' nada salir contigo, punto, pero gracias."

("What you need is a Nicaraguan who is humble, who will respect you. Would you like to go out some night wiht me?" "No" "Why not?" "Uhhh ... first because you're way too old, old enough to be my dad. Second, because I simply have no interest whatsoever going out with you, period, but thanks.")

Last night, I took a cab home from Managua after a relaxing few hours drinking and watching a children's movie with my bestest friend in the city. For once, the driver barely said a word to me and I didn't try to start up a conversation. We both had our windows down and our hands outside, grabbing the air. Jesus was on the radio, and in a comfortable moment of silence I got an idea for a short story (email me and I will send, if you're interested in reading), which I wrote with sleepy eyes at 1 a.m.

Apparently, then, cab drivers also serve as my literary muses.

Transportation strike continues

Tenth day of national strike. Two people have been reported killed in the violence, including a 28-year-old cab driver who is survived by a wife and seven children.

Interesting telling of the strike here. Check out the photo gallery on El Nuevo Diario's site.

The U.S. embassy here issued a warning yesterday to Americans about the violence. Negotiations don't seem to be going anywhere (government says that transportation sector has historically received major subsidies and doesn't need to demand more; strikers seeking subsidies now want the church to intervene). People are missing work and crowding around street corners for buses that don't pass. Universities, schools and businesses have shut down or opened late as a result.

Several taxi drivers turned me down yesterday when I asked if they could take me to the airport, which is just past the main demonstration. They said it wasn't worth the risk, that they don't want to get attacked by those on strike for working. "I went on strike the first couple of days," one driver told me, "but I have kids to feed, a wife. Where am I supposed to get money?"

The driver that took me to the airport (yesterday) pulled over about two blocks before the demonstration supposedly started, took down his cab lights, I flipped his "in service" sign around on the windshield, and we cruised past. Taxis line the street, men huddle in groups around the cars, but it felt quiet. It was hot and the sun was very strong, very bright. Little commotion, at least then. The real problems are in the north, on the coast.

At the moment, back at the airport, waiting for 2 p.m. flight to Bluefields to check out Palo de Mayo festivities (video here on youtube) and efforts there to preserve/conserve/promote Afro-Caribbean culture. (Oh, my friends there tell me there are no cabs. Should be a nice walk from the airport.) And to watch some kids make a music video. And to pass the days quick, because something very exciting will happen soon. I'll write about that here when I get a tattoo.

* photo by AFP

unannounced stops are the best, sometimes

One thing I enjoy about public transportation here is the sense of community. Sometimes it manifests itself into group outrage when a door is slammed too quickly or when a person is left behind. Sometimes it manifests itself in a collective decision to stop the vehicle in the middle of the road and watch a bar brawl spill into the sidewalk.

Today, on an expresso from Jinotepe to Managua down the Carretera Sur, our driver stops abruptly. No passengers get on or get off. Instead, he shouts to the guy in charge of sliding open the door and collecting money: "Hey, go buy us some watermelon!"

Out he jumps. We all watch him cross the street, and somebody in the back does what we are all thinking about: puts his head out the window and shout an order, too.

More requests are made, more taken, and we all ride back toward Managua with sticky fingers.

rains

Matagalpa, a city a few hours north of here, has been hit by intense rain for the past several weeks. They're so bad and have destroyed so many homes and growing fields and roads that the president declared it a national emergency. I was hoping to go there tomorrow to write a story about how rains and immigration are to affect this year's coffee harvest. The roads may be too flooded to make it. Then I was thinking about going to El Salvador with a group I met the other night. That country is also on national alert because of the heavy rains. In limbo.

movement

I still don´t know how to walk in this city.

It seems more than half the sidewalk space is covered by stands, or neighbors standing around, or parked bicycles, or somebody sleeping or pissing on a wall, or groups of men staring fascinatedly at every uncomfortable young woman who walks past. Stepping past that and into the free space is still an adventure, as uncovered manholes, cut-off sign posts, jutting bits of concrete and fruit peels demand your careful attention.

Bravely, you walk on the edge of the streets, into another circus. You stumble into the gutter littered with bottles and paper and boxes and food scraps and parked motorcycles. Constantly you stop to let by grumbling buses that seem to shudder forward, and the taxi drivers snake through this all with their hands on the horn, honking at every potential rider they see, while dozens of bicycles and motorcycles wrrrrrr past. You see as many skinny horses cl-clunk cl-clunking by as they drag empty tourist carriages as equally skinny wrinkled men pulling carts with things to sell.

Still, you are safe because the other drivers and riders and draggers and walkers are smarter than you, but you feel a little exhausted when you do get to your destination.  And you know it's worse when the streets are unlit at night, and that the city really isn't that big so you shouldn´t complain about the traffic.

But you feel lucky that you aren´t driving because you would never get anywhere on these streets that lack names. You work three blocks up from a statue I´ve never heard of in a corner building that´s blue and white? I might make it on time for our appointment.

My pulse quickens when I think about 51 more weeks of this.