desde nicaragua

the park is not for you

old news in the united states, but a striking thought here: The cyber café as the new playground.

I turn a street corner in a middle-class neighborhood in Cusco, Peru, and all I hear is boys laughing and yelling. It is Saturday afternoon and it sounds like they`re playing soccer. But this is a busy street and I already passed the soccer field and playground.

Approach, and to my right a tiny room with 24 shiny black computers, a man with glasses and a button-up shirt looking up every few minutes, and barely a space to move. So many boys! All of them, boys! All of them between oh I don´t know 8 and 15, all of them playing or watching somebody play a game called War Craft and another called Star Craft. They are all playing in the same world, yelling into black headsets, looking over a few screens and yelling at each other's faces, and the man with the button-up shirt tells me to wait! 10 minutes! then it can be your turn.

Outside again. This place is packed and I don´t know if I can handle such a noisy little room. But the café down the block looks the same! and I am using so many exclamation points all of the sudden but where did all these children come from and why are they all boys and why was nobody at the park I passed earlier on my way to here.

Peru is special, and Cusco is no exception. Internet penetration here is tremendous due mainly because of places like this, which began booming in popularity in the mid-1990s because they´re relatively cheap and accessible and novel.

There´s more though, at least here in Cusco. Yesterday I tried to find out why more children weren´t playing outside, and this is what I discovered:

The city has grown and not enough green spaces have been created to handle the new population, (from 1993 to 2005, it grew by some 11 percent, according to the nation´s census.) More people also means more cars, which means less road space for street soccer.

And about 5 years ago, the city began fencing in parks and sport fields to protect against vandalism. That´s what Cusco`s environmental director (who is in charge of parks and gardens) told me yesterday. Neighborhood groups that directly manage local parks decided to start charging admission, too, in order to pay for upkeep and security.

¨And it´s one thing to pay the park admission, it`s another thing to rent a soccer field. There´s no guarantee you´ll even be able to play soccer if you pay to get in,¨ one 15-year-old boy (on his way to the cyber) told me. ¨On the other hand, there is more security that you´ll be able to play at the cyber.¨

Capitalism respects his money.

So discussing this with the family I´m visiting here, we start thinking: poor kids who can´t afford to pay to get into a park (less than a quarter U.S.) and can´t necessarily play in the streets because of the cars are kind of out of luck. Cybers are about as out of the question as pay-to-play parks.

The parks director said the city hasn´t conducted any studies on park usage, but that it´s safe to assume the same number of children are playing outside as before -- you just have to remember there´s the same number of parks for a lot more people. Her worries aren´t like so many in the States about children leading sedentary lifestyles (obesity, diabetes, etc.) Because the altitude here forces bodies to work harder to stay warm and the diet is pretty natural, you don´t see many fat kids running around.

¨But if they´re living in virtual worlds, spending hours and hours every day in front of a computer and not interacting with other children or their environment, I worry about what kind of adults they´ll become.¨

I wonder whether they´ll be that different than kids in the States.

money gets you places, but only if you bring it

This city is overwhelming (to me).

I felt like a little country mouse flying into big Caracas city. Me, in somebody else's white T-shirt and torn jeans, a tiny backpack and laptop bag, less than $75 U.S. in pocket. Not a clue about where I'm going from here, barely an idea of how the city is laid out.

To my right on the plane? The two chatty women with gold around their necks and wrists, shiny purses from Egypt and Panama on their laps, paging through those Air Mall or whatever they're called magazines I never actually believed anyone bought anything from. They did. Two perfumes each. Plenty more dollars than what I've seen in a single moment in months.

Here's how and why they work it, because one has lived in Venezuela for 50 years and the other grew up there and is 32: the dollar stretches a hell of a lot farther than the Bolívar, and you can get your hands on some and exchange it on the black market, you might do okay. And if you can sell some stuff, some name brands, you bought abroad (the States),then all the better.

So these ladies come back loaded with suitcases: new clothes, jewelry, perfume, a computer, shoes, etc.

"I sell it mostly to my friends," the younger woman explained to me. "That way I can make back some of the money I lost on the plane ticket."

* * * * *

Back to me, the country mouse. We arrive, and immediately I feel scandalized, absolutely horrified, by the cost of everything. A cab ride to a neighborhood where I'm told there may be some hotels at? $60 U.S. Okay, that might seem reasonable for folks used to getting rides to the JFK or whatever. But in Managua I argue with drivers until they agree to take me to the airport for under $3 US. Besides, 60 bucks is practically all of my money! I breathe deep, say that's the most ridiculous price I have ever heard of in my entire life, and turn around, back into the airport.

I'll just go to the ATM, right? I'll just pull out some dollars and go from there ...

You're joking, Mouse Girl. Forget dollars, the ATM will spit out Bolívars at a harsher rate than what you can get for your bills on the street. You should have come prepared.The sweet old lady pays for my ride into the city, and once we arrive I learn most hotels are booked, even the down-and-dirty, pay-by-the-hour ones with shiny lighted words like "My secrets":

Eventually I find one for the U.S equivilant of $45 a night, which is definitely more money than I can spend in a week of pampering myself in Managua.

* * * * *

At the moment, inside a fancy hotel lobby in the Altamira neighborhood. Here is what is happening, take your pick of opinions:

“The Inter American Press Association (IAPA), which existed in the 40s, was kidnapped in the 50s by North American forces and, since then, it has become a North American intelligence product”. (x)

"They claim we have a dictatorship. But they are in Caracas saying whatever they want to say. This is cynicism turned into communication. There are very powerful forces trying to prevent our union," said Chávez. (x)

The owners of the mass media of the region, who will hold soon an assembly of the Inter American Press Association ''IAPA'' in Caracas, pretend to evaluate the 'freedom of speech' in the hemisphere and ratified their rejection to the progressive governments of Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela, among other nation. (x)

IAPA President Earl Maucker said ... “We will not only have an excellent opportunity   to meet in that beautiful country to debate press freedom issues in the Americas   but also to deal with other matters of importance to members of the press.” (x)

I'm still forming mine. Of course, the IAPA is funding my grant in Nicaragua. That complicates things. I'm curious about this counter meeting against media terrorism. Need to check it out.

Adios beautiful San Salvador, oi mi Managua fea

After being away from it for several days, I now realize that Managua is one of the ugliest cities I've ever been to.

Two friends coming into town inspired me to take a trip north, to visit my aunt in San Salvador. My former roommate in Miami was going to be surfing at El Sunzal, one of tiny El Salvador's beautiful beaches, so that added further purpose to the trip.

Our first day of traveling, we did everything exactly how everybody told us not to. We left Managua around 3:30 p.m. Sunday, took an expresso to Chinandega, and from there another to Somotillo, a town on Nicaragua's border with Honduras. Don't go to Somotillo, people told us. There's prostitutes and drugs and violence and you just don't want to go to that place. Especially not with a pair of gringos; folks there will think you have money and try to rob you. Spend the night in Chinandega instead.

If you absolutely have to go to Somotillo tonight, they relented, check into a hotel and don't leave it.

We arrived, checked into a fancy roadside joint, and gingerly stepped outside. The night was tranquil, quiet, and at a dirt road intersection in front it looked as if the grown-ups were waiting for something.

Timidly, perhaps, we began walking toward where somebody said was the central park. The streets were so quiet, the houses were dark, there was nobody walking. But then there were children sitting against a house, calling out words in English, and a handful of drunks in a corner. Still, night had fallen and the town was not well-lit. A Sunday evening: where was everybody?

A turn, and then lights and music and gleeful children screaming. A carnival in the center of town, seemingly run by children from Chinandega. This one had the eyes of a pícaro, and I paid him 5 córdobas to throw cheap metal rings at bottles.

We were an odd sight in this plaza full of ten-and-unders. The parents, where were the parents? Perhaps watching from the doorways, perhaps in bed early for the night. Adam paid for 16 ferris wheel tickets, and we barely made it on the rickety frame.

Sure, we were laughing, but we were afraid of dying. Luckily, the wheel did not collapse this time, and we survived the night.

Two border crossings followed the next morning, and then we were in my mother's city: San Salvador. She left her home country when she was a child and has never returned. Recently she discovered a half-sister she never knew, Deisy, and it is with her my friends and I learned about the city.

Several things struck me about this city, details that sharply contrasted with what I've grown accustomed to here. There are real streets here, with names and with cars and not full of holes. Buildings follow buildings follow buildings, and neighborhoods and districts are not overgrown with weeds or falling down. I'd heard it was Americanized: this is true. It's not just the fact the dollar is currency here, but U.S. investment is obvious with the names of businesses and the number of passengers in buses. More people own cars, which means they don't depend on public transportation, which means said public transportation isn't saturated.

On the buses, the biggest shock: drivers here wait until passengers are completely inside of the bus and in a seat, or off of the bus and back on the street, before driving off. In Managua it's like an aggressive, shoving competition where if you're not strong enough you just might end up clinging to the door as the bus flies away, or getting pushed out the back door.

The most beautiful church I've ever been to looks like some sort of mistake. Iglesia El Rosario is a monstrosity in the center of the city, on Parque La Libertad. Construction on this church, designed by Salvadoran Rubén Martínez, finished in 1971.

Color streams in from above in this industrial-looking, calm sanctuary. Religious figures are carved out of hulks of metal. Concrete walls don't block the sounds of traffic outside.

Around a school for the blind wrapped a wall covered in graffiti.

The toothless angel shocked my aunt, a religious devotee. Here she is below, at the beach on a hammock.

Our last meal in the city was obvious. We ate at a pupusa restaurant near our bus stop. That's the most traditional Salvadoran food. Here's me with the biggest jar of curtido (salad that goes with pupusas) I've ever seen:

Ometepe, and my place in the world

I meant to write in this earlier, but several friends have been coming in and out of Managua on visits, and it's been hard to juggle everything the right way. Recently, I'd written about a trip into Ometepe, and I wanted to add a couple of photos from the trip.

This is a tree in front of the Morales family house in Las Pilas, Ometepe. This is the family whose children I live with in Managua. Past this tree, where my friend Devin is gazing out one coolish morning, is the village's central plaza, a large square of dirt with a couple of soccer posts and a pretty school at the end.

Devin, Mason and I know each other from university. They stopped in Nicaragua for about a week on a longer, Central America agriculture tour. (I hope you guys made it to Guatemala safely!) The family cleared out a bedroom for us that the three of us shared. "Bedroom" is an abstract word. There's the idea of doors, of walls, in order to deliniate spaces and provide a degree of privacy. But sound travels through thin boards and over the top. And the animals, including a large sow jokingly called a relative, freely roam in and out of the walled spaces.

All of our meals there were the same: sweetened coffee, beans, rice, cheese and plantains. Everything they eat comes from products they grow themselves on the island. Even the fish a nephew brings for stew or to fry comes from his morning's catch, which he sells to other villagers.

Here, my friend's mom squeezes the stuff that soon will become a salty, traditional Nicaraguan cheese. She makes every night when her husband comes home from their mixed-crop finca, bringing home about a gallon of fresh cow milk. The family grows several varieties of bananas, oranges, mandarins, cucumber and other fruits and vegetables — for export or internal consumption, via el Mercado Mayoréo.

You are easily in shape by living on Ometepe. Incer, one of the brothers in the family, used to live in my house in Managua, but returned to the island a month ago when he couldn't find a job here. Since then, he's lost a solid 10 pounds and his muscles are more defined. All you do is walk, and he walks fast. He hurried us (I had to beg for him to slow down) to and from his father's finca, about an hour away, up and down dirt paths, pausing to grab interesting fruits or tree "products" along the way: oranges, mandarins, tamarindo, these sponge things they use for bathing, a coconut-like fruit the size of a strawberry.

It was a good trip, and on the way in and out. The Kapuzcinski book has me thinking about doing journalism and writing about the world you see, and what it means or feels like to do that job now versus 50 years ago, when the famous Polish foreign correspondent did, or even versus a couple thousand years ago, when Herodotus did. Check this:

Man does not obsess about memory today as he once did because he lives surrounded by stockpiles of it. Everything is at his fingertips — encyclopedias, textbooks, dictionaries, compendia, search engines. Libraries and museums, antiquarian bookshops and archives. Audio and video recordings. Infinite supplies of preserved words, sounds, images — in apartments, in warehouses, in basements, in attics. If he is a child, his teacher will tell him everything he needs to know; if he is a university student, he will be informed by his professors.

Of course none, or almost none, of these institutions, devices or techniques existed in Herodotus's time. Man knew as much, and only as much, as his mind managed to preserve. A few privileged individuals started to learn to write on rolls of papyrus and on clay tablets. But the rest? Culture was always an aristocratic enterprise. And wherever it departs from this principle, it perishes as such.

In the world of Herodotus, the only real repository of memory is the individual. In order to find out that which has been remembered, one must reach this person. If he lives far away, one has to go to him, to set out on a journey. And after finally encountering him, one must sit down and listen to what he has to say — to listen, remember, perhaps write it down. That is how reportage begins; of such circumstances it is born. (p.75-6)

...

I want to keep copying down the words from the book, but hopefully that gives you a good enough idea of what this is about. Travels with Herodotus is a book that is making me think very hard and profoundly about my job, about foreign correspondence in 2008 and beyond, in my place in the world.

A story with pictures.

We started slow. Somoto is a quiet town and the weather is cool, and we savored the morning. After breakfast, conversations with kind people and packing our lunch/adventuring gear, we made our way to the bus station.

The 9:30 a.m. bus took us to Soni, a tiny town on the Panamerican with an entrance to the canyon. Twenty minutes later we were off, chattering animatedly and wondering how to turn the spike-y nopales along the dirt road into delicious meals.

We were happy, energized and ready.

That's Javier, my dance partner and fellow adventure seeker. He carried the backpack. I carried my camera.

That's me. The sun wasn't very high yet and we were still dry.

We paid 10 córdobas to a kid sitting under the shade of a tree at the beginning of the canyon. He said it was for the alcaldía, or the city. There's some sort of conflict between the folks who live along the canyon's edge and the city about who should keep the admission, and what that money gets spent on. One thing the alcaldía is definitely not spending the money on is signs. Besides one on the Panamerican (sponsored by Palí, the country's Wal-Mart chain), there weren't any signs or helpful directions/ information on the way in.

Although, this guy on the horse did offer to guide us for a price. We politely declined his services.

In the beginning we were careful. Nobody wants to slosh around in wet hiking boots, so when the sides of the river ran into unhike-able boulders, we looked for stepping stones and gingerly hopped across the ankle-deep water. But the walls began to narrow in, and the depth of the water rose.

We reached a point where climbing along the sides of the river got dangerous. A few guys offered to take us in a boat and we scoffed. Obviously, we were brave. We then reached a point where the guys were now were unloading people from the boat and transferring them onto life rings. We couldn't go any farther without getting the backpack wet, so we asked for one. They gave us two, and we were pulled across by a brown-skinned guy who swims like a fish.

The water was cool.

A couple of kilometers later we were alone again, and breathing heavily. It was getting hard to hop across the stepping stones without slipping. We stopped for lunch (tomato-and-cheese sandwiches) and a 20-minute nap. We walked in our swimsuits and hiking boots. Javier's skin began to burn.

It started to get cool and I put on my T-shirt. Then I fell in the water. Then the sides got impossible again and the water was higher than ankle-deep. Then knee-deep. Then belly-deep and chest deep and oh my god it reached my neck and Javier is shorter than me and I hope he can keep the backpack out of the water.

It was around 4 p.m. and I was tired and it was cold and wet and getting dark and we didn't know how far it was to the bridge at the Panamerican. I felt like a mountain goat. Some boys sitting against a boulder eyed us suspiciously as we scaffeled the walls behind them. I think they wanted us to fall in.

Finally, some women washing clothes in the river told us the bridge was just ahead. We pranced up the side of a hill, threw on our wet clothes and entered a totally different landscape.

I don't know if it was less beautiful.

Long hours on a bus to León, and the ocean

I seem to have many random encounters, particularly in airports or on airplanes. The night I arrived from Mexico City I met a very nice guy from Los Angeles who'll be living in Granada for the next few months. We've hung out a few times since, and I invited him to come with me to León on Wednesday night for a concert by Philip Montalbán, a reggae artist I wrote about recently.

We accidentally took the wrong bus.

Well, not exactly the wrong bus. I mean, we got to the right city. But we took a cheap bus (5 córdobas less for the ride — or about 25 cents US) without realizing the cheap bus goes down the "old road" to León. The old, very bumpy, very tiring road. At least it was a beautiful sunset.

The streets were quiet when we arrived, sometime after 7 p.m. León isn't as suffocatingly hot at night, so we walked for a few hours and ate chilaquiles (how I miss Mexico) at a Spanish tapas bar before heading to La Olla Quemada for the show.

It'd be a nice bar/restaurant/venue ... except for the people there. Montalbán seemed pleased with the crowd, and I'm pleased for him. But they made it hard for me to enjoy the performance.

There must have been 150 tourists. Good people, I'm sure, because it takes a certain kind of adventurer to come to such a disjointed country like Nicaragua, blah blah blah. Everybody is fascinating and beautiful and drunk and trying to dance and confident they look good while they're doing it (they don't). I didn't take any photos, but the scene reminded me of one my friend Daniel recently described from Oaxaca. You can look at his and laugh.

Early the next morning, yesterday, we took another bus to the beach.

The woman who sat in front of us packed her four children next to her. When the bus attendant comes to collect their fare, she pays only for her own.

"Can you pay the fare for at least one of the kids?" he asks her, pleading.

"No," she declares and it sounds like a challenge.

He rolls his eyes, smiles and walks back to the front.

We got off the beach town of Las Peñitas. This sign advertises tortillas and cuajada, a salty white cheese that used to gross me out and is now a staple in my diet.

The locals didn't seem interested in going deep into the water, at least not for swimming. They're the sane ones. The waves were scary big, perfect for surfing and looking at.

After a nice run on the hard sand, a quick dip in the water and a traditional Nicaraguan breakfast (greasy rice and beans, cheese, and bananas), we left. This time, we took the right bus down the "new road" back to Managua.

Would you pay to see this?

Another 10K run yesterday morning in El Crucero, a mountain village directly west of Managua. Actually we discovered it's 11.4K. It's kind of fun to measure in kilometers because the numbers seem so much higher.

The sign says, "A thousand flowers for sale. 5 córdobas each." A thousand flowers aren't actually for sale. That's the name of the flower.

Marlon doesn't own a pair of running shoes. This pair belongs to his brother, who bought them used at the Mercado Oriental. They are a couple sizes too big for Marlon, and, as you can see, the soles are nearly worn through.

We were walking back and I was shaking my head because some military guy had been taking pictures of me with his cell phone when this animal stepped in our path. I started laughing. My knees fell to the dirt in front of this noisy creature and Marlon just stared at me. Laughing, still, uncontrollably, and dirty now, like this pig. Am I really this easily amused?

Would you pay to see this? Would you pay to go on runs like this in a country you don't really understand with someone who can't find a job? I'm sort of helping Marlon, who has a university degree in anthropology, start a business doing what he does with me — only with people who will pay him. Here's the flier we created. Thoughts?

* * * * *

"If you're not telling yourself whoa now," my friend Devin tells me, "then you're not really living."

So many days I don't know anything, or I feel confused about what I'm doing professionally, or I worry about where I will be in some distant future, or I fear never knowing when I've found satisfaction.

Today I feel sure I'm living. Today I'm telling myself "whoa."

Managua-Managua-Managua-México-Managua!

When things make sense here, they really do. Like wireless Internet at the airport. Totally free.

I'm sitting at the Augusto C. Sandino International Airport in Managua, sipping a sweet black coffee before flying out. I'll be in El Salvador, my mother's home country, for a pair of hours before flying into Mexico City, where I'll meet the family, ride some buses to the state of Guanajuato, and eat real food, not this tasteless gallo pinto stuff.

True, I'm starting to really enjoy living here. It's helped to make friends, to do work I'm proud of, to live in and learn the capital city. (I finally moved to Managua this weekend.) But home is where my family is.

And later today, home will be Mexico.

* * * * *
In between packing and unpacking and repacking and riding a bus and starving and drinking beers and church-going and walking and napping and film-making, I didn't have time to post yesterday. I wanted to recognize the 23 of December, though. Thirty-five years ago yesterday, an earthquake tore through Managua and killed more than 10,000 people. (Good anniversary coverage by Radio La Primerísima here.)

The city was never completely rebuilt. Hundreds of thousands were displaced. Some $100 million in foreign aid poured in but, thanks to the corrupt Somoza dictatorship, most never reached the victims:

Many parts of Managua give the impression of having had a variant of the neutron bomb dropped on them ... The city does not seem to be there at all; it can be found in desultory forms. Block after block of wasteland and brick pules will be followed by three movie theaters, two vacant lots, a marketplce chocked with people buying and selling. More vacant lots and rubble-strewn blocks are succeeded by a contemporary shopping center with airline offices, real estate firms, a government bureau, jewelry stores. Then a hill with nothing on it, an army base, a few block of one-story middle-class homes, a gaping ravine, and a working-class barrio pieced together from beaverboard, tin, flattened beer cans, an ocassional prized plywood door. (Peter Davis, Where is Managua?)

Today, this a sprawling, gritty mess with no city center, is home to more than a million and a half inhabitants. Here's to the people of Nicaragua's capital.

On merit and adventures

The conversation quickly turned to dating, sex and extra-marital affairs.

It was Monday afternoon and we were not working. My friend Eric and I decided against playing journalists for the day, opting instead for hours at the lake, drinking beers and riding bikes.

He told me he can't wrap his head around how casually some of his friends sleep with women who aren't their wives. How, even after telling people he's married, he's still asked why he doesn't have a young, beautiful Nica girlfriend on the side.

There are loads of white American/European men here with gorgeous teenage locals. The kind of guys you'd classify as "scum" back home (where these girls would definitely be too good for them).

But to be a foreigner in such a small, poor country means to have access to people and a social set you might never have access to back home.

Then enter romance.

Can you imagine what it's like to know that, if you wanted to, you could hang out with/date/sleep with just about anybody you wanted to — and not because you're pretty or brilliant or funny but because you're gringa?

It can screw with your head a bit — especially if you don't wanna think of yourself as scum, if you don't want to take advantage of anybody or if you fear compromising your ethics.

Then Eric proposes I set the most impossible goal for myself this year, something so ridiculous that my ego can be kept in check, so unlikely I won't feel bad for having my undeserved and supposed access. The target: Get a helicopter ride from Nicaragua's richest citizen.

I'll keep you posted on the progress.

* * * * *

I hate the word surreal, but it's appropriate for the past couple of days. Just an hour after dropping Eric's bike off at his house, I am shocked again by the sheer luck/privilege I am granted. I am stumbling back to my house, clumsily punching a text message into my phone when an old man calls something out to me.

He's in front of his house, a beautiful colonial-style building that faces the central park. He's obviously wealthy, white (the richest Nicas are), and watching the sun set from a rocking chair.

"Are you sending a message to your boyfriend?" (In Spanish, of course.)

I don't have a boyfriend. But this man is nosy and I am drunk. "What do you care?"

Then in the space of what seems like a minute he tells me he left during the revolution, he once lived in Miami and New York and Washington, The New York Times interviewed him recently and would I like to come inside to see the proof?

I don't know whether I've been in such a luxurious place. The NYT photo does Gabriel justice:

 

* * * * *

The following night I am with a friend in the backseat of a cab in Managua, on our way to Art Café, a trendy "alternative and cultural" venue for live music, poetry, drinking and hanging out. It is closed and so we decide to walk around Parque Las Palmas until a friend picks us up.

I am with a guy who is expecting a phone call ... from the president's wife.

We find a bench. She calls. They talk.

I touch my face, shake my head, stand up. I know this is happening because I am here but I can't believe it and can the country really be this small and my friend really have all these peoples' numbers in his phone?

Plans are made, the call ends, and my friend's friend Roger (who runs the tourism site, Via Nica) shows up. We head to another bar, El Grillito (The Little Cricket), for 40s and more conversation. It is my first real night spent in Managua, and I think I can live here. There is life here greater than the tourist scene Granada offers. I am comfortable. I will move to this city.

* * * * *

The next morning is total disorder. We stop by the president's house/compound, eat tajadas (delicious fried bananas with fried cheese and salad) and drop off documents at Central America's biggest and dirtiest market, el Mercado Oriental. Then a bus takes us to León.

When you ask people about this city they will tell you it's hot before they say anything else. They aren't joking. It hits you hard the moment you step outside. It hurts to sit anywhere but in the shade.

I took some pictures.

The central cathedral is pretty. I am stupid and kept asking why there were lions everywhere, including inside guarding Rubén Darío's crypt. Oh, right. León means "lion" in Spanish.

The Museum of Traditions and Legends was closed, so we walked around the courtyard looking at sweet murals depicting traditional myths.

Like La Llorona, who drowned her children and now walks through the streets, wailing at night in regret.

Rubén Darío — Nicaragua's beloved poet and national hero — lived in León. This is his house. Read one of his most famous poems, Ode to Roosevelt.

* * * * *

We left León late in the evening and on the two-hour bus ride back to Managua I meet a guy with tattoos down his arm. There's a globe with the words in English "The World is Mine." I ask him in Spanish for its meaning.

He responds in Spanish with the translation. He tells me he used to live in the States. Without blinking we switch languages. It's much easier since we both think in English.

Dennis Montealegre left Nicaragua when he was 2 in 1986, during the country's civil war. His parents came from money. He is shy when I pry this out of him. His parents split and he lived with his mom in a rough Philadelphia neighborhood. He was a U.S. resident but never went through the naturalization process out of sheer laziness.

He was too busy with the drugs. They landed him in prison for 18 months. Then he got deported. He came back to a country he barely knew. He spoke Spanish like a Puerto Rican. It was a tough adjustment but he's happy now. He loves Nicaragua and makes a living repairing copy machines.

Dennis doesn't blame anybody for his problems and wants to stay in this country. But he wishes the U.S. legal system took into account people like him who are American in all but status.

"When they first told me I was gonna be deported, I was like, 'Fuck. Cause this is what you made me.'"

He isn't the first deportee I've met in Nicaragua. I interviewed a guy named George a few weeks ago and wrote about him here. Dennis tells me he regularly gets together with a half-dozen guys like him who were born in Nicaragua, left for the States to avoid getting drafted or because their parents hated the Sandinista government. None of them became U.S. citizens, and they all got into drugs. After serving time in prison, they were sent back to the country of their birth. Strangers in a strange land.

We made plans to hang out soon, and it was a comfortable bus ride back to Managua.

* * * * *

It has been a good week of discovery, and I am happy.

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.