Word of the Day:
nebliselva- cloud forest  (nuble- cloud + selva-forest)

Lucky me. I was able to go see a bit of the Northern part of Nicaragua this week, and I loved it. Mountains? Coffee? Chocolate? Yes, please. Because I want to mix things up, this is going to be part travelogue, part journal and part travel guide.

We had a meeting called "Re-Connect" with all of the 30 or so TEFL Volunteers up at Hotel Selva Negra, just outside Matalgalpa City. It's a gorgeous coffee-farm/nature reserve/eco-friendly hotel, owned by a German man with lots of cute cabanas that show off the German influence of the region, where many Germans moved in the late 19th century to farm. For this reason, and because it was cold, it reminded me of Southern Chile, the parts of German influence at least. It was a really great time. It was so good to have quality advice from our bosses and people who've been working for a year already for how to get the school year started right, work on additional projects in our communities and report all the work that we're doing. It was also just wonderful to be reminded of how strong our support system here is, from our fellow TEFLeros all the way up to our bosses. It was an emotional few days, but we also had some great outlets, like early morning hiking in the cloud forest, unlimited coffee and tea, and good food (VEGETABLES!!!!!!!!!)Seriously, you can win over a Peace Corps volunteer pretty easily with chocolate and vegetables. Catcalls, no, but a well- cooked carrot, maybe.

After Reconnect ended, TEFL 60 (my pledge class, for lack of a better descriptor) wasn't quite ready to bid adieu, so we stayed in Matagalpa City for a while to hang out. It's one of the bigger cities in Nicaragua, nestled up in the mountains. Lonely Planet's description of Matagalpa is pretty spot on. I loved it there. There's a gorgeous white cathedral in the center of town that is impressively white, beautiful parks, gorgeous hills you can climb up to look out over the city. The air is clean and crisp. It's kind of cold. There's good grub to be had, hip night life, cafes and just all the city-bustle that I've really missed, compounded by people driving like maniacs through the small streets. There are a fair number of tourists, but it's not as overwhelmingly touristy as Granada or Leon. It was just interesting to observe the social dynamics at play. Perhaps because of the nature of coffee farming, there was a feeling of social inequality and unrest that I haven't quite sensed in the same way in other parts of Nicaragua, perhaps because the mountains render everything visible...shacks high on the hills were visible from the city streets where the occasional Mercedes or fancy convertible roamed.

We stayed at a cool relatively hostel, Buena Onda (Good Vibes), which featured cheap but clean accomodations ($7 nightly plus free coffee and water, $1 towel rental). We got some welcome variety in our diets- eating Mexican food twice, delicious Italian food and some good ole comedor style deliciousness...rice and beans, cuajada, cream, and the freshest tortillas you could want. We also ate a ton of chocolate. There's a company nearby, El Castillo de Cacao, that makes artisanal Mexican style chocolate,which is a little bit bitter, but incredibly rich. Spent way too much money eating that, and the factory wasn't even open for touring. And lots of rosquetas, graham cracker tasting corn snacks, and rosquillas, which a friend dubbed "the cheese-its of Nicaragua" were eaten too. NOMZ. Nicaragua's corn products are soooooooo good.

In between all the eating, we got in a little bit of nature time as well. Early one morning, we climbed Cerro Apante which is just outside the city. Quite literally, the directions to get there are: just keep walking straight.  You climb through a neighborhood up to a dirt path that just keeps going. There are two roads to enter. There's one turn-off, through a gate, that's first, which is the harder way to climb up and a second, about 10 minutes later, that's paved most of the way up. We wandered into a coffee farm and then into this area where these men were working, but if you follow the dirt road you come to a small look out hut. The view of the city is amazing and it's a really cool area ecologically too. Be forewarned though, a random man, who may or may not be legitimate, will charge you C$30 to enter or exit, depending on the route you take.

We also visited the Santa Emilia waterfall, about a 1/2 hour busride outside the city. It's owned by a super friendly Bolivian man who used to work for the World Bank. There's lot of trails to hike, although we came late in the day. (C$200 taxi ride to get there or C$15 bus ride- take from Cotran-Norte towards La Dalia/El Tuma, C$30 to enter).

I was scared to leave. I hadn't really had that kind of anxiety about going back to site before, which I think is natural after so much bonding time. It's hard not to feel that you're starting over from zero in your relationships with everyone in your community when you haven't been there for very long. Part of what didn't help was that I have a giant (and admittedly very romanticized) obsession with mountains and coffee and that whole scene, and had been hoping for a site up that a ways. But when I finally did get back to San Miguel, it felt right, unexpected but natural somehow. A sense of belonging that is perhaps undeserved but at the very least, a calm that I can work with.