Nicadventures

This will be my first blog in Nicaragua, written in English at request (shout-out to you mate!). I arrived in Managua the 28th of November where I met up with Jasper and Loes. Our internship in the hospital, which was the ultimate purpose of this journey, would start in December 2nd. So with still some time on our hands we directly went to the beach at Las Penitas where we relaxed, swam and put our surfing skills to the test. In the evenings we watched the sunset from our hammocks and made a campfire on the beach. What better way to prepare for an internship?

We went back to León to La Residencia where we are lodged during our stay. There are also some other students, 2 girls from Germany and 2 girls from Spain who all speak fluent Spanish. So good practice for us! There is a big shared kitchen where we can eat and cook and have the occasional party with the Nicaraguan trademark drink ''Flor de Cana'' which is rum.

The beginning of our internship did not go as smoothly as we expected. We had to go to the university like 4 times to see this ''dr. Bustamente'' to get the right information out of him or her. He/she was never there and the secretaries could only tell us that he either just left, or would come in 3 hours. Eventually we got some papers and phonenumbers and the next day we were on our way to the hospital! We started every day with the reunion. The first day I accidentally went to sit on a chair that apparently was reserved for one of the big bosses of the surgical department so when they came in I was abruptly ordered to move. Our days in the emergency department were not quite as long as we were used to in Holland but this way we had more time to learn Spanish. This is still a touchy subject because even with all the classes we took it still is very difficult to understand people. The way they treat patients here is... unusual. The doctors sleep on their desks, hardly look the patient in the eye, ask at most like 3 questions and give them antibiotics. But the patients don't seem to mind. When I asked our Spanish teacher in a doctor-patient conversation if she was worried about something she told me that question would not fall well with the Nica's. Ofcourse they're worried, she said, why the hell would they come to the hospital if they weren't worried? She got a point there.

When we're not in the hospital saving lives and being heroes (cause that's what we're all about here...) we drink juices, go out for dinner, have parties and go to the beach for relaxing, surfing and just enjoying the good times. We visited several beaches already, one at Jiquilillo where they released a bunch of baby turtles every evening! It was really impressive watching them make their way to the ocean and, most of them probably, to a certain death.
In december we went with some German students to Isla de Ometepe. There was a electronic music festival which we were visiting. Our hostal was right at the beach and had a great peer of which we could dive off. In the evening we went to the 'festival' which was more like a decent sized beach party. It was heaps fun and eventually we walked back to the hostal alongside the road through the forest when all of sudden this Nicaguy jumps out from behind us with a machete and started to bash it in the ground! He saw a snake next of us and apparently saved our lives. When we were back at hostel it was already light and we had the amazing idea to 'borrow' their boat which was on the beach. It didn't have a motor or paddles so we used our hands to paddle

We've recently started in a Centro de Salud (Healthcentre) which is kinda like a general practicioner. We attend to chronic patients with diabetes or hypertension and loads of pregnant women. Here the doctor and the Nica students are way friendlier and willing to help us than in the hospital where they couldn't be bothered to even look at us. Not only that, but in the Centro de Salud they actually tell patients that's it is important that they know which medication they take. Rather than in the hospital where they just give everyone an infusion. The other day we went to an orphanage to see sick children and also check-ups from ones who got the results of their urine , blood and faeces test. One of the nurse students asked me if I was married and when she heard I wasn't she asked if I wanted to marry her. To her it seemed like a very good idea and she showed me a buttload of 'sexy-pose' selfies on her phone. It politely declined but the next days she didn't speak to me that much so I think she was kinda upset with me.

Last weekend we went to the volcano Cosiguina. The last eruption was over 100 years ago and now there is huge lake in the centre of the volcano. Our Spanish teacher Kenda knew the way so we didn't need a guide she said. We took a few chicken buses (the local buses) to Potosí and from there we started walking. It was a good 3,5 hour walk and with this heat all we could think about was how awesome it would be if we had an icecold coke... At the top of the volcano we had an amazing view of the surrounding lands and we could other islands and volcanos of Honduras and El Salvador. We ate our home-made pasta while watching the sun set over the volcano. For the night we went down a bit to a open space in the jungle. Here we made a campfire, ate marshmallows, drank rum. After a heavy night of wild parties we spread out our sleeping bags on the ground and fell asleep at the crazy hour of 20:00. I slept surprisingly well on the jungle floor and the way down was easy as pie. Once we were down we finally had our icecold coke and walked to a spring where all the locals were swimming and playing. The water was really clear and it was nice to wash of layers of dust, sweat, sand, sunblock and repellent. We played water volleybal with some Nica's and Jasper and I joined in building a human pyramid which ended up 3 persons high!

This week we had to make a poster about hypertension and present it to the patients. We made it exactly like the Nica students with colours and hearts and everything. We presented it in our best Spanish but I'm not sure how much they actually understood... But at least we made clear that they have to exercise more. The doctor was so happy with our poster that she asked us to make another one. With hearts and glitters as well.

This weekend we'll go on another volcano hike, three volcanos in two days! Vamos a ver...

Hasta la proxima!

Sjef,