A Political Party...Nicaraguan Style

Buses full of Nicaraguans travelling from one town to the next to hear politicians speak (from the FSLN)...and then there was dancing. Lots of it.

I'm sure this is the cure to political apathy.

Miradas Introspectivas

A Pictographic Exhibition

Artists Jaime Mastranzo and Guadalupe Sum

"I like to paint from nothing. To have a blank page. That's how children draw. Not from direct observation but from their reality. In the moment, spontaneously, subconsciously. With sincerity."

I met Jaime in Granada, Nicaragua, in the middle of a poetry festival. I liked him the moment we started talking and he let one thought fall from another with such insight and observation. Which is funny, because his figures don´t have mouths. They express themselves with their eyes, or at times, their music.

We met again by chance at a concert in Xela, Guatemala. He was sat beside one of the figures I'd seen in his drawings - his friend Jafael. The three of us went to the park where Jaime and Jafael took it in turns with the guitar.
 

In the drawing, Jafael has lines of movement and energy that come from him and his guitar and reverberate throughout his surroundings. As he played, three drunk men who had been asking us for money gathered around and started clapping and dancing. One by one they each gave him a coin. Then they all hugged each other, drunkenly sharing some truth of brotherhood.

That's how Jaime paints - not just with technique, but with life. His reading, his living, his experiences all pour into his art.

As we head to the gallery, I notice he's holding a book called Oceano Mar. Then there it is in his work - the sea. Turquoise is his favourite colour - I see both his travels and my own painted within it. Water colours capture the fluidity of a life lived in motion. 

But throughout the recurring images of travel - sea, boats, different types of architecture - is the grounding of home. The houses beneath the gazer, the small town on a boat, the six stars that represent his family, the trees that show the roots of a rich Mexican history and culture. 

And the image throughout it all - a spiral, a shell. Jaime says he's interested in semiotics - in the language of signs. The shell represents time. It's a movement inwards or outwards depending upon the gaze. It has a connection with the rest of the world. Its part of his obsession with fractals - segments which contain the whole. 

For me, this simple form ties together his work. It's a balance I find myself trying to make - between movement and stillness. It's a home you take with you.

Jaime Mastranzo's work can be found in exhibition Friday 15th March at 18:30, 3 Ave. 7-35, Zona 1, Quetzaltenango (Xela). His work will be shown alongside that of the Guatemalan artist Guadalupe Sum whose work aims at capturing the magic and mystery of the city.

Nothing To Lose

'Welcome, Poets of the World' Graffiti during
Granada's poetry festival

I have this travel philosophy of pack light and don't take anything you couldn't handle losing.

After months of snail pace travel, this theory gets put to the test. I'd been working, spending weeks with the same people and knowing where I was spending the night. In other words, not much movement. In other words, not so much packing up and moving on with all those opportunities to lose something along the way.

End of February arrived and I left my job at the reception of Sonati in Leon. I'd read in a guidebook that you'll fall in love with Granada but leave your heart in Leon. I hadn't fallen for anywhere, and yet, leaving Leon was like leaving a part of my heart.

For 5 months it had been my reference point. The place to come back to. The place to tie together the other places. Home.

It was night when I got to Granada. I stepped off the bus into the brightly coloured streets, the sound of music and the feel of water somewhere in the air. At last I fell for Nicaragua.

And then, following a darker image of Granada's children sniffing glue and a refreshing stop on the island of Ometepe, it was time to go.

Costa Rica - San Jose - Heredia - La Fortuna
Nicaragua - Granada - Cosiguina - Chinendega
Honduras - Choluteca
El Salvador - San Salvador - Costa del Sol - San Salvador
Guatemala - Guatemala City - Antigua - Xela

March has brought a splurge of Spring craziness. Its been go go go and some wonderful stops along the way.

Angry Snake

Like the two metre long snake that blocked my path and had me scared witless in the cold and rain after I'd gone for a short stroll from the hotel spa. It had me stood there talking to myself about how fast snakes could be, concluding probably not very. They don't have legs. Then I got into a debate with a rock about whether or not I should throw it before deciding I didn't want to end up in an it's you or me situation with a venomous snake.

Or the family who welcomed me into their house when I got lost in Northern Nicaragua. The next morning we went to pick jocote (a small green or red fruit that's served with salt).

Or the family who welcomed me into their house when I got lost in Northern El Salvador. I should probably stop getting lost tho'.

Or the truck driver who gave me a ride across a country, discussing culture and politics and history and religion - what religion do we have in my country? Many, I reply. Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity... It's pretty diverse. Like here. He replies. We have the Christians and the Catholics.

And all along the way I get asked: ¿Solita? Alone? Aren't you scared? And the truth is, yes I am. But scared like skiing where you know you'll make it the the bottom somehow and have a lot of fun along the way. You just have to face down the mountain at each turn. You have to let go for moments to keep your balance.

So I made it, from Costa Rica to Guatemala. Beautiful Antigua that knows it. Small Xela with its cool cafes, its 30 Spanish schools and something magic that escapes me. And before I prepare for a final land crossing into Mexico, here are some of the things I've lost or left behind along the way:

3 tops
2 pairs of shoes
Moisturizer
Make-up remover

Antigua, Guatemala

A bracelet that took me hours to make
A pair of earrings I bought in Leon
A pair of earrings I bought in Morocco
All my make-up
Tweezers
A pair of jeans
A book by Iris Murdoch
A wealth of beautiful people and places
A flight home

And here are some of the things I've gained:

A sweater
2 pairs of shoes
Coconut oil from Granada
2 pairs of earrings from Antigua
A drawing of someone blowing dandelion clocks on rooftops from a Mexican artist
My new favourite Spanish word: escalofrios (goosebumps)
A French book called A Treaty On the Immensity of the World
Photographs
Memories
Freinds
A ticket to go home by boat

The truth is, no matter how light you pack, you always have something to lose. It's sad when it's friendships or places that steal your heart. But along with the flow of items through my backpack, is a flow of life. Parts of myself I've left behind that I don't need anymore. New parts I've picked up. And more than anything, I'm not so afraid of it - that rushing tide of coming and going. I know it goes both ways. I know that with the next turn life will reveal more of her riches. And with such a small amount of things, I've never felt so rich.

The Pineapple Christmas Tree

People had been asking me for weeks: How long have you been travelling for?

The first few times it was confusing. What do you mean travelling? Which might seem like a strange reaction from an English person in a hostel in Nicaragua, but the past couple of months hadn't really felt like travel. I'd been in the small town of Tonala in the north of the country. No one's heard of Tonala, and why would they? It's a very self-contained community. People trade among themselves. Every window is a shop and every back yard a farm. Not the kind of place I would normally choose to travel to.

Mid December arrived. Tonala was behind me.

'Will you miss it?' someone on the bus had asked.

'No.' I replied without hesitation, thinking of the one rubbish bin at the edge of town that was the only survivor of two attempts to install bins to tackle the litter, and the second to last night when my host dad had tried to kiss me. Both sum up the experience.

The few weeks since in Leon had been something else. Leon I would miss. Its people, its comedors, its colonial buildings on crumbling roads. But it was time to leave. The plan: cross Nicaragua and three more countries to get to Palenque in Mexico for a hippie celebration (or a Rainbow Gathering) of Baktun.

I was travelling with an Alaskan. It didn´t take me long to realize how much cooler it is to be from Alaska. When we introduced ourselves, I would say England, followed a lot of the time by 'it's in Europe' and Kevin would say 'Alaska' to which people would really get excited. Do you eat walruses? Do you have water holes with magical healing properties? Do you live in iglus?

It took us 26 hours on a chicken bus to arrive in Guatemala City.
25 very uncomfortable hours.
7 of which I preoccupied myself with whether or not I could say I'd been to Honduras. I'd seen some dogs and some trees. I'd got the stamp in my passport. I'd eaten a local dish of tortilla made with cheese in the dough and served hot and melted ...and as I was later told, actually from El Salvador.
10 of which were unnecessary waiting for made up reasons.
An hour of a filmed drug search,
The driver's attempt to jump ship...
and a few hours of actual driving.

In Guatemala we headed straight for Antigua. It was another world. Clean cobbled streets, pastel colour houses, intensely coloured artisan work, and music and documentaries in the streets. We were interviewed by a TV crew when sampling the local cuisine. What does it taste like? They ask as I bite into the disappointingly cold banana in chocolate sauce. Mmmmm. I say, unconvincingly, blinded by the light they're shining.

By the second day I feel some how done with Antigua's perfectness. I want something more gritty. And more importantly, The Hobbit is out. So off to Guatemala City. After the slight glitch of iphone being stolen on one of the infamous Red Buses, Kevin's attempt to retrieve it as I get off with the bags, the bus driving off with him inside and a still iphoneless reunion, we make it to a shady hostel in the city.

An artisan shows us the way, offers us cereal in crisp packets, and it's all going ok. We buy camping supplies, watch The Hobbit... and then realize nearly $2000 has gone missing from Kevin´s bank account.

Police reports, embassy visits and failed MoneyGram attempts, make getting out of Guatemala the first thing on my list of priorities. In a long chain of bad luck, we under estimate the distance and miss the last bus to the border. There are five of us by the side of the road including a girl and grandmother who are going to Mexico in search of her father.

Eventually we hitch a lift with a man who turns out to be a Guatemalan football player. Striker, he tells me shortly before hitting a dog. I didn´t mean to, he shrugs, as we drive off with the sound of its dying yelps behind us.

The border is closed. The girl and grandmother cross anyway. Me and Kevin are a little surprised. You can do that? We ask someone if we can cross anyway too. Yes! They say encouragingly. And when we come back? Oh, no, you won't be able to do that.

So, accepting the situation, we get out our makeshift camp gear: two tarps and a mosquito net. Locals start telling us enthusiastically about Sam. He's from England too so apparently I should know him. He also spent the night on the border. They ask where we traveled from but have never heard of Nicaragua. At last we lay down in our tent, hug our bags towards us and then burst out laughing at the absurdity.

Fast forward hours of bus rides, long dirt tracks and more waiting. Hello Rainbow! Or rather we get there at midnight and find ourselves experiencing the most intense culture shock yet. Through the dark a girl throws herself on us for the world's longest hug, or as it was called, some positive energy sharing. Then we're in an old school bus where people are smoking hash from an apple, and a man is playing guitar with nothing but a jumper tied around his waist and everything hanging out. The ceiling is covered with writing like the MLK quote 'we must live together as brothers or perish as fools' as well as lines like ´knowledge is bliss' and the very sage advice 'don't play leap frog on a unicorn'.

But the next day comes with the discovery of free coffee, free chai, free chocolate, free food and free things that aren't quite so legal. A swim in the river, a dance by the fire, some incredible massages, music and lots of singing later, and even the near flooding the night of solstice just leaves me with a feeling that everything is right with the world.

And all the sharing... so much sharing. Mostly in a good way. Except for when I ask how much a pair of earings cost and someone patronisingly takes me to one side 'Honey, this is your first rainbow, isn't it?' It turns out I can only exchange. I like this in theory, except what it really means is that I have to use my money outside of the camp to get something to exchange for the thing I really want. But the result is me spending much more time thinking about what I can give than what I can get - which isn't so bad.

Then somehow it's Christmas and we're in the jungle. It doesn't feel like Christmas - we're in the jungle. Something has to be done about this. I resolve to make a Christmas tree. I tie together some thick palm branches into a tripod, put leaves in the gaps to give it shape and then more leaves for colour, hmmm...orange peel in place of baubles?

As I'm working, I realize part of me is waiting for compliments. When they come I feel good. When they don't I feel bad. Climbing onto someone's shoulders, I place the top of a pineapple as a star. While I'm gone for another round of massages, music and skinny dipping, someone adds lights to the tree. As it gets dark and the path gets busier, more and more people stop to look at the tree. Some of them say thank you. Others wish me a merry Christmas. Most don't say anything at all to me. They either simply stop to look, or walk by.

On my present free Christmas, I have a mini epiphany: That's why we give and receive. That's why we create. It's nothing to do with the person making or giving. It's the hope that someone might enjoy what has been shared.

Welcome to Nicaragua

In Leon - Nicaragua´s second largest city - I had no doubts. It was crumbly in places, but it was interesting. There was colour and art on the walls. There were places to visit and cafes to sit in. I was where I was meant to be.

Then I reached Tonala. A small town an hour from Chinendega. No roads, no cars, no one passing through. The skyline was gorgeous - palms, papaya trees, bananas hanging over bridges.

But it took me three days before I could see it. My eyes couldn´t escape the dirt ground. The rivers of water from the houses filled with rubbish and dead rats. And the smoke from the burning plastic.

I´d always believed poverty is the result of how much we´ve screwed people over. The cultures and people we´ve destroyed for land and gold. The governments we´ve corrupted for more of the same.

But life is too interesting to be so simple. This town has a rubbish collection twice weekly. That´s more than my hometown. And yet they literally kill themselves by burning the plastic. Outside the school was a pile of chairs three times my height - all broken by students. And one of the rooms had more holes than wall - all broken by students. A Casa de Cultura had been built in the town and wrecked within weeks. The organisation Plan had stopped building toilets in the schools because they got vandalised. And I was getting endlessly frustrated with myself for not being able to understand. But I couldn´t.

Then someone suggested that it wouldn´t look so bad if we hadn´t half imposed ourselves. Plastic with a culture used to banana leaves that rot, ends up with streets full of litter. Living in a house with a dirt floor wouldn´t feel the same way if there wasn´t a TV showing mansions in the States.

Anyway, ´progress´ is slowly ambling into town. Palm roofs are being replaced with iron. Roads are being built. Electric pumps installed. And the continuous reconstruction - the classroom above was being rebuilt when I left.

I´m glad Tonala is behind me, but I have no idea what is ahead of it. Maybe I´ll go back someday, but for now I´m happy to be taking a break. In a hostel called Sonati in Leon, where bottle caps don´t clog the rivers but have been turned to art on the walls.

Good bye Tonala - I hope you´re classroom walls last a little longer this time.

The Vain Traveller: Hair

I was recently given some cringe-worthy travel advice: dye your hair.

      1) Never have I found blonde hair to be a problem when travelling. (People I meet tend to overcompensate for the ‘dangers’ of me being a female traveller, the result being I get a lot of help).

      2) In Nicaragua, or anywhere else in the world, never will I ever pass for Latina.

My initial reaction was pure self-righteous scorn. Then I got thinking… how about if not standing out as much makes me look a little more local? How about if I could pass for half Spanish? How about if it gets me in touch with my ‘black swan’? And then the cosmetic industry’s foundation: How about if changing my hair changes me?

And so I did it. I dyed my hair darker.

Later that day I got harassed by a group of fourteen year olds in Bristol’s Victoria Park. After ‘can I have your number?’ failed to work and I bent down beside my dog, I got the oh-so-romantic chat up line:

‘If I shit, will you pick it up?’

Gotta lurrve Brizzle. Surprisingly (I mean, come on, have you seen this face?) that was the first time in a lifetime that I have received any interest while walking the dog.

Then evening arrived and I went to my Spanish/English language exchange. As I was talking to an Argentinian man, the light hit my hair. ‘Wow, your hair is so blonde! Is it your natural colour?’ I tell him my actual colour is in fact lighter. His heart visibly breaks. But by the time I get home, I find his comments all over old photos of me on Facebook.

Conclusion: I guess I have to wait until I’m in Central America for the real verdict. But for now, I think getting malaria tablets should have ranked higher on my To Do list than dying my hair.

Fly Down to Mexico

20/12/11: All is not going to plan. It just so happens, to my surprise, that in Mexico, they speak Spanish. I tell people I love their laxative instead of their accent (an easy mistake to make). They tell me to stop molesting them. At first horrified, I search through my dictionary and find reassurance that I’m not about to be processed by the Mexican legal system for sexual harassment. This comes as a relief to someone who is tired after having spent last night in Orlando’s airport terminal trying to speak Spanish to a young woman from Columbia as she tried to convert me to Mormonism. She then hid beneath her jumper with her bible as the cleaner proudly informed me that McDonald’s stays open until 3am. Phew.

22/12/11: After having come close to calling my mummy to drop by and pick me up, things take an upward turn. Yesterday I cycled through a jungle looking at Maya ruins and at last managed to get out some cash. So I can now eat. I write this from a beautiful old building still being decorated; I had tequila with grapefruit on the way over, walking past the sea. I compose an ode to morning alcoholism. I’m where I want to be.

25/12/11: Apparently jelly is a typical Christmas desert. I ate it last night with my makeshift family that had come together on the beaches of Progreso (swimming not recommended, barbecues for a recently retired vegetarian, highly recommended). After our Christmas jelly, we went out to dance along the streets. There was an Italian who spoke to me in Spanish and at last I understood. The language made sense. I could speak it. But more importantly, I discovered something better than tacos: banana dipped in nutella. Warning: for the unsuspecting consumer, infatuation with the chef is a likely side effect.

26/12/11: I need to plan where I’m going, where I’m turning back, what I need to see. I want to swim in a cenote. I want to go to the ruins on the rocks of Tulum.

28/12/11: The year is nearly at a close…what have I learnt? Two kinds of doors, two kinds of paths…two ways to look at a situation.

View Over San Cristobel

30/12/11: I’m on the bus to San Cristobel. I stopped writing the last entry when my hammock neighbours said hello and then yet again my world changed. Especially after the mushroom tea. A voice of wisdom told me ‘Be where you need to be and you’ll meet who you need to meet’ as the burning logs began to move and the shadows became snakes. The day after I swam beneath a waterfall and spoke to a Mexican about health care and education and crime. He wanted to live in Mexico. And I’d let myself be fooled into thinking they were all desperate to cross the border anyway possible to reach the Promised Land.

3/01/12: First entry of the new year, being written on an 18 hour bus journey. No toilet on board. I plan my life. Someone behind me throws up. I pick apart what I’ve learnt and how I can be the person I want to be. I try to grasp the moments I left in the last place. I realise I keep writing in the in-between moments. I’m not capturing the moments themselves. They have to be lived.

04/01/12: In white sands, turquoise waters and coconut trees beach paradise, and I want to be elsewhere. Last night I slept in a hammock, freezing cold as I wrapped myself in dirty, sweaty clothes after having been chased along the road by a Mexican man on a bicycle with a hole in the crotch of his jeans shouting ‘Quieres novio?’ (want a boyfriend?)  

05/01/12: Perhaps the cold last night weakened my immune system. I appear to have been struck by a severe case of travel snobbery. Symptoms presenting include: thinking that somewhere is too touristy (hey, I’m not a tourist, I’m a traveller), and inwardly tutting every time someone gets out their camera (still bitter that I lost mine). I decide my Spanish is suffering, as I ignore everyone around me, and resolve to return to Merida.

08/01/12: Last day in Mexico. On the bus here I was told about a man who started out with a red paper clip and made one trade at a time until he ended up with an island. Now I’m back in the town where I began. I feel I should have something profound to say about Mexico. About how the journey along side streets to the Zapatista university with mud walls, or the strange church with no pews where they drank coca cola to cleanse their souls, or the cenotes where tree routes and sunlight fall down through holes into caves of electric blue water whose light reflects off rocks, left some deep impression. But I can’t make anything coherent.

Its beauty isn’t a clean, straight forward one. There’s a lot of mess and car fumes. But there’s the beauty you stumble across– the court yards, and the places where the disorder gives birth to something.

The colonial buildings and Maya ruins and cheap new buildings with palm trees surrounding them and loud music blasting out from tacky clothes shops and the mountain views of San Cristobel and the thrill of dancing salsa and the deep poverty and a large middle class and in some ways it’s not all so different from the States except for I felt freer here and less of a need to prove myself through success and more of a need to learn from, build upon, value and get to grip with the relationships I form.

14/01/12: On return I confess to a friend that I carelessly lost my camera near the beginning and spent too much time making out with Joses (well, two – one of them had a moustache and some hot salsa moves) or chasing Italians, when I should have been getting to know the culture. He wisely assures me: there are many ways to get to know people. One of them is with your mouth.