Roughing It

By Julia
Jinotega, Nicaragua

  I didn´t realize it until now, but Tom and I have had it pretty easy on this trip so far.  We´ve enjoyed electricity every night, our health, a variety of fine (alright, maybe only good) cusine, available internet access.  We are now in the midst of a volunteer stint that is testing our manual labor prowess, abilities to find our way down rickity steps to a compost toilet in the dark and the courage to chase CORAL SNAKES out of our boudoir.  To boot, Tom has an intestinal parasite and I have a cold...but a cold sounds so mundane so let´s call it Dengue fever. 

   We find ourselves at La Biosfera, an eco-lodge and retreat center still under construction in the breathtakingly gorgeous green hills above Jinotega.  La Biosfera is the branchild of talkative and energetic Suzanne, an American ex-pat who relocated to Nicaragua five years ago.  Also in the cast of characters this week are Ellias, the sweet but lazy 20-year-old caretaker of the lodge, Orlando, a strapping, Nicaraguan carpenter, and five recovering drug addicts from the Jinotega chapter of Narcotics Anonymous.  Yes, it´s been quite the week.  Wait, it´s only been 3 and a half days?  It feels longer...

   I can´t begin to relay how beautiful the view is from the lodge.  From our bedroom, you can see into the valley of tiny terra coda and corugated tin roofs that make up the city of Jinotega.  The valley widens into a patch work of coffee farms, cow pastures and family owned fincas.  The mountain walls steepen and rise into sharp emerald points 2,000 feet above the valley.  The sky trransforms the view throughout the day - from the misty mornings to bright middays to shadowy afternoons to magically glowing twilights. 

  The work-exchange option at the lodge gives us a half-price discount for our room in exchange for four hours of work a day.  Our first project has been to inlay some natural stone steps leading to the backpacker´s veranda.  Our first day we hiked up Suzanne´s property for twenty minutes that brought us through her horse pasture, to the clearing where she one day hopes to build a ¨Great Hall¨, into the tall grasses that lead into a thick, ancient forest.  After crossing small streams we finally came to the bat cave - the source of Suzanne´s water for the lodge (and home to hundreds of little batties).  Next to the bat cave Orlando and another hired hand were bagging some red rocks taken from a wall on the side of the cave.  We helped for a few hours hauling the rocks back down to the base.

  The next two days we have laid the foundation for the steps and started cementing the red rock into place.  While we enjoy the work, the view and the company, we have both been battling some illnesses and this has caused us to become a bit grouchy.   Feeling crummy is made more tolerable when laid up in cush conditions with someone to pamper you.  While La Biosferea may be beautiful, it is only a step up from camping, with no electricty on the premisis, open air accommodations and kitchen conditions that would make Rich Levine faint from horror.  Por examplar, Suzanne generously brought us ice so we could keep some milk and butter cold up at the lodge (she lives in town at the moment) but neglected to tell us she would be defrosting chicken in there as well.  In the dark of the lantern-light, I melted butter into our dinner without noticing it had been floating in a Salmonella sea of melted ice and raw chicken for the afternoon. 

  Now imagine this: you wake up in the middle of the night face-to-face with your beloved.  You half-open your eyes, expecting to see this beloved peacefully sleeping like a little cherub on a cloud.  Instead, he is wide-eyed and staring at you.  He says in a rushed, panicked whisper "It´s right in front of us..."

  If that´s not enough to give you nightmares for the rest of your life, I don´t know what is.  But I knew what he was muttering about in his waking-sleep delusion: the four-foot long coral snake that made a beeline for our room earlier in the day. 

  That afternoon, the red, yellow and black snake saundered up the deck of the veranda and past about ten terrified individuals before attempting to slither underneath the door to our room.  Luckily, Suzanne prevented it from doing so by blockading room with a saw.  The snake ssssssssed its way down the side of the deck and into a bush next to our window.  After much hoopah and discussion as to "relocation"or "termination", its fate was all but sealed as Suzanne´s boyfriend lifted his machete.  But it got away.  And now, just like rats in Tanzania, I am doomed never to sleep through the night at La Biosfera again.  But the difference is now my sleep is affected by Tom´s - he would not want me to say fear - extreme distaste for snakes.  The locals told us to put garlic outside our door to keep the snake away.  We´re hedging our bets by clogging all he holes in the room as well.


....slow connection...pictures to follow soon!