Folks...

When I share our days with you, sometimes I think I concentrate too much on the “tasks” we may have had to do and not enough on the people we encounter on the way. The people are why we’re here. They make our day…and they break our hearts. I want to try to give you a better picture of who we see just in the course of a normal day.

Saturday, we had our second M.A.T.H. class in Tipitapa. Those of you who have received this month’s printed newsletter know what I’m talking about, but in case you don’t, let me explain. This acronym stands for Means to Acquaint others with Truth and Hope and that’s what we’re wanting this English class and Bible study to ultimately achieve…we want it to be the tool we use to introduce others to Jesus Christ.

We left the house early as we had errands to do before our class in Tipitapa. On our way to our first stop, we have to pass by our fruit man. Although we didn’t stop by there on Saturday, I want to tell you about him. He’s a short, stocky guy, who always wears a ball cap and has a little corner fruit and vegetable stand not too far from our house. We pass him every day we leave the house. He and his elderly father tend the stand and he was one of the first people we met when we first moved here…although, now that I think about it, I don’t even know his name. Shame on me.

What I can say is the first time we got up our nerve to go visit him, shortly after we moved to our first house, I was able to tell him I wanted bananas…not too difficult seeing that the word is the same in both Spanish and English, just pronounced a bit differently. The rub came when I couldn’t understand how much he was telling me I owed him. So I did exactly what I never should have even thought about doing…I held out a handful of money and let him pick out what he needed. He chose a few coins and I’m assuming he was honest about it as he gave a few coins back to me in change . He looked at me for a second and then told me very simply and slowly that I needed to learn to speak Spanish!

Good advice…and since then, I’ve learned enough workable Spanish to buy fruit from him and pay him what is due…without holding out a palm full of coins. I think I was more embarrassed by the chastisement than I was worried about him taking several cordobas more than he should have. Either way, it was a good prompting to get me to start learning this language and its money system.

When we stop to buy fruit from this ornery little man, we pull up in the one-car opening off the main street and Jim rolls down my window. The fruit man always greets us with a gleam in his eye but with a very serious face. He reaches in the car to shake hands. Saying he is shaking my hand is being generous…his hand is limp and doesn’t even close around mine…I’m always a bit afraid I might have hurt him when I realize I’ve grasped his hand firmly.

He is a business man through and through and he loves to tease, although it takes awhile and some work before we see a smile. We usually stop to buy bananas, pineapple or watermelon, but the fruit man always tries to talk us in to either a larger quantity than we’ve requested or something else in addition to our “order”. After some bantering back and forth, we finally are rewarded with his smile and he walks to his stand to bag up our order for us. Our fruit requests may change, but the process is always the same…and I find some sense of comfort in that. Life here for us is so unpredictable that I find I welcome the “routine” things…like having to banter and barter for our fruit!

The corner where we turn to go in to Managua is a busy corner. Not only is our fruit guy there and the corner where we turn to go to the bakery, it’s also the corner where our gas station is located…a Shell station, at that! Of course, like all the gas stations here in Nicaragua, it is full service and like many of the places we frequent on a regular basis, they “know us” there. We not only get our gas there, but it’s also the place we buy our ice as they carry “clean” ice.

They are always so friendly and helpful there…and very patient with slow language learners, like ourselves! There used to be an old advertising jingle that said “You can trust your car to the man who wears the star”, referring to the Texaco stations with their trademark star. We have used both and I will say that in our opinion, “our” Shell station attendants are all stars! Even though we didn’t stop to get gas that morning, several of the young men who work there saw us driving by and gave us a smile and a wave…a good send-off for the day!

Our first stop was to get money changed. We have two different places where we go to have that done but it happened to be with Mario that day. He always has a smile for us and a hand-shake. He recognizes our car when we pass by and waves every time he spots us. Our first trip to see him upon our return from the States, Mario let us know that he had missed us and wanted to know where we had been. That was a warm and fuzzy…it’s nice to know you’ve been missed.

Mario’s location is very convenient for us as we pass him every time we have to go down in to Managua. He sits in the same spot every day but Sunday, waving his wad of money at the cars passing by. His “office” is a plastic chair placed under a shady tree that is at the edge of a small parking area of a building that shares a beauty shop and some other little business. His assistant quietly sits in the background, acting as his guard and his runner.

The procedure is simple…we pull off to the side of the busy road, Jim puts on the flashers and rolls down my window, Mario walks up to my side of the car and we tell Mario how much American money we want changed to cordobas. He begins his rapid-fire counting of his bills and hands the money to Jim, who repeats the counting…only this time, it goes much slower.

Meanwhile, I’ve handed Mario our bills and he carefully examines each one of them, looking for any kind of marks, tears or significant wear, none of which would be acceptable. Mario then shows us on his little hand-held calculator the total of how much we are to receive and proceeds to finish out the transaction. We thank each other, wish one another a good day and off we go. The whole thing is simple and quick…far more pleasant and efficient than going in to one of the brick and mortar banks.

Our next stop was our copy place to get the copies made for our day’s lessons. The copy place is

one of maybe a dozen other similar places, all in a row, located across the street from one of the city’s universities. I’ve told you before how busy it is. Recently, there has been an older man, obviously of little means, who has been acting as a parking attendant in the congested little parking lot. His clothes are ragged and look as though they need a good washing. He always has a dirty, red rag with him that he uses to direct traffic or to wipe down a customer’s car.

I don’t believe he’s paid by any of the businesses, but rather works for any tips he might receive or perhaps beg, which are few and far between from most of the folks there. It’s not hard to see life is difficult for him. Because we have tipped him the few times we’ve seen him there, he now, not only recognizes our car, but also tries to give us the best parking spot available…and if a spot is not available, he then “creates” one for us right smack dab in the lane of traffic.

This life-worn man always greets us with a wide, mostly toothless smile, extending his not-too-particularly clean hand to Jim for a handshake and then, after exchanging his greetings with Jim, he bows his head and tips his hat to me in a very dignified manner.

I’ve told you a little bit before about the people who run the copy shop. They’re a young couple, I assume they’re married, who work hard at their business. She is a very pretty woman with a warm and welcoming smile, who seems as genuinely nice as she is attractive. He is a small man, as most Nicaraguan men are, but he's muscular, like someone who lifts weights...and he wears tight fitting shirts which spotlight his physique. He kind of reminds me of a little banty rooster who wants to make sure he's huffed and puffed big enough to get a good bluff in on anyone who might want to mess around his chicken coop! That's probably not the most flattering analogy but I think it's probably pretty accurate.

We’re regulars there now and are greeted as friends when we go in, again with handshakes and smiles. They have even begun to relax a little bit more in front of us and Saturday we were privy to them teasing one another. It was neat to see this serious, hard-working couple having a bit of fun with each other, smiling and eyes twinkling. We always enjoy going in there but Saturday, there was more than smiles, there was laughter and that did all our hearts good.

As usual, when we left, Jim gave the parking man a tip for watching our car. The man continues his service to us by “helping” Jim back out of the parking spot and then sends us off with a wave. This tattered gentleman has captured my attention and I hope to get to know him better. I’m sure he has a story to share and I would like to be able to share with him. Please, Lord, grant me favor in learning this language!

After the copy place, we headed over to Metro Centro to eat some lunch at the food court. We went back to the far corner to one of our favorite “fast food” places…a Chinese food restaurant. Another place where the people know us although we don’t go there very often anymore now that we don’t have language lessons in that part of town. The women behind the counter smile at us and before I can even finish ordering my usual sweet and sour chicken, one of them is dishing it up while another is asking if we want our soda in a bottle or can and a third is asking if Jim is getting the same thing! Wow... I guess we are pretty predictable!

Chinese food here is interesting. It’s prepared by Nicas with Nica vegetables…many more vegetables than chicken, but that’s okay, it’s delicious! And of course, there’s rice…mounded up on the plate. It’s fried rice but it still has a Nica flavor, there’s no doubt. This is accompanied by three of the tiniest little wontons I think you’ll find. The filling is a little dab of some sort of minced meat…it has a bit of an odd flavor. I’ve eaten it several times before and have yet to become sick so I’m good with whatever it is. I think I’m much better off not knowing everything I stick in my mouth…as long as it’s not my foot…I know how it tastes and it’s not appetizing, believe me!

Time was flying by so as soon as we finished lunch, we hurried out to our car ‘cause we had one more stop to make before we headed to Tipitapa. There is a La Colonia that is close to Metro Centro so we ran in there. We didn’t have much time so we buzzed through, buying beans, rice, oil, tuna, fresh fruit, veggies and chicken...and a bag of ice. We were going to surprise Miguel, Elizabeth and Danelia with some much-needed groceries!

That morning, we had stopped by Susanna’s house to take Pixie home (she had come to our house the night before for a “sleep-over”…okay, we might be slipping a bit here…I know she’s a dog…) and while there, we borrowed a small cooler from her. We knew we would be buying some chicken and we would need to keep it cold for about three hours.

Just as Jim had finished emptying the bag of ice in to the cooler and placing the chicken in there, the black clouds that had been rolling in suddenly boiled over. It didn’t just rain; it came down in torrents, so much so that traffic came to a standstill. There were stalled cars and flooding streets and it all happened in just minutes. I called Miguel to tell him that we were creeping along on the North Highway and that we would most likely be late. Just the edge of the storm had passed through there already and he knew how heavy it had been there so he had a good idea of what we were facing.

Really, the deluge part of the storm didn’t last that long although it did continue to rain pretty hard. Traffic may come to a halt in these kinds of rains, but life certainly doesn’t. Here are just a few examples of how hard life is here…even the rains don’t stop people from doing what they have to do. I’m afraid the quality of the pictures isn’t that great but hopefully, you can get a pretty good idea of what we saw that day. We were several cars back in the line of traffic but up ahead, I could see up somebody out in the rain, going from car to car. It was a little boy, out begging…even when it was raining relentlessly. Once traffic started going again, he sought what little bit of shelter he could find next to the building waiting for the next group of cars to be stopped by the red light. Rain is no respecter of the hungry.

The next photo is of a street vendor on the North Highway. Normally, the corners are crawling with vendors and window washers but all of them had run for cover from the storm…save this lone woman, standing there waiting for the next string of cars to come, in hopes of selling her slices of mango. I wondered how many hungry mouths she had to feed to keep her motivated enough to stand out in the street in such a storm…

This picture is a bit difficult to make out. We were at a red light when we noticed a man with his horse cart on a grassy little median area. It was still raining, although not nearly as heavy as it had been just a few minutes prior to that. The old man was cutting the grass with his machete…he wasn’t doing it as part of his job…he was doing it to have grass to feed his much-too-thin horse.

These are the kinds of images we see every day as we travel the roads here. We can’t escape the poverty as it is everywhere we look. Each time we think we’ve seen it all, God pulls back the veil of privilege and abundance that blinds our eyes and allows us to see what life is like for so many people here. It still makes my breath catch and my heart pound.

What would we do if we had to live like that? Could we even survive such a life? What astounds me now is not so much the amount of poverty or the degree of it, but more so, the resourcefulness and the resiliency of those who live it, day in and day out. I would venture to say that these ordinary folks are probably a lot more extraordinary than what we might give them credit for being.