staring

i missed my bus this morning. i couldn't stop staring. a bad habit, i know, but i think averting ones eyes is also a bad habit. i was standing there, waiting for the 105 to come along after one passed me on my walk to the bus stop when a man of 20 years crossed the street towards me holding the hand of a boy of 5 years. they were both wearing chinelas, cheap rubber sandals, and here as much as anywhere in the world one can tell more about a man by his shoes than almost anything else. i was supposed to be watching for my bus, but instead i was watching the man of 20 and the boy of 5. i wondered if the man was his father, in which case i was a little impressed that he was caring for him, or maybe the man was his brother and they took care of each other, but more likely they were street companions--begging together, brought together by common circumstance. the boy of 5 flipped me off. smiled. then cursed and flipped me off again. the man of 20 had not noticed me or had chosen to ignore me. either way, i stood watching still. then the man helped the boy up onto a yellow bus that had pulled up and left him there. maybe the two didn't even know each other and crossed the street holding hands just because. or the man was going to wait at this bustop while the boy begged on the bus and would come back on another... a yellow bus... the boy of five... yellow bus... 8:15... damn. the 105. the boy of 5 just got on my bus and they drove away together. missed my bus. another will come soon. maybe in 8 min. but it will not have the boy of 5 on it, and the man of 20 has already re-crossed the street.

a sunday

sundays can seem so beautiful to me. today is. i have finished 3 books today, each i was quite close to the end, and they were each interesting in their own direction. although, i am still inebriated with reading theology and spiritual books. a theology of liberation, by gutierrez was the first i finished. this is a book that everyone who loves reading overly complicated theology should delve into, but anyone else should just avoid, because it is a little on the dry side. if words like eclesiology and eschatology don't excite you, look elsewhere. the second book was the first book written by leo tolstoy after his radical conversion to the heart of christianity. he titled it, what i believe. it is just that, a summary of tolstoy's beliefs in regard to how we are meant to live, how the gospel and life of jesus enlighten that quesiton and how most people are totally in the dark, especially the religious, when it comes to that question. this is a wonderful little book that i plan on following up with his second book, the kingdom of god is within you. tolstoy was famous for books such as war and peace, but after discovering the true message of the gospel, he transformed his life towards non-resistance, simplicity, and love for others and died with a great following of people fascinated with his life. the third book i finished i began a little under a year ago and had to put it down for a time. it is called the tao of pooh. written to be an introduction to taoist thought and way of being through the familiar character winnie the pooh it is a fun read that reminds me to slow down, do nothing, look deeply, appreciate the birds and trees... essentially everything good in life. which is why i'm in such a good mood and why i will be leaving the internet now--to go love some living. keep on.
james

a house

every day, on my way to work, i ride in small moto-taxi. these european contraptions were designed to hold upwards of 3 people and the driver. i think i have been on one that had 11 people, plus the driver--mind you, some of the people were children, but there were still full grown men hanging off the sides. somewhere during the first 10 minutes of this ride we pass a house under construction on the right side of the road. it is the largest house i have seen in nicaragua. it is around 3 times the size of my parent's house in the states. a mansion. it is slow moving, still concrete, and hasn't changed much in the last 4 months. but there are men there every day working on something. that house encapsulates much of what is wrong with the world. although, i am making some assumptions. i assume the house isn't going to be a hospital, or a commune, or a convent, or exist in some other way to serve the community. given that i am right, and the house is being built as a family's home, this house is just too much to believe. not 10 minutes from the house one could visit people who live in houses smaller than your average american bedroom and here someone has the audacity to build a house some 40 times that size. not to say that the american houses that are so big are any better, but i usually assume that if people see the extreme poverty, maybe they will understand their participation in it and work to a more just society. in reality though, many people think that money and construction, in a word, development, is what the 3rd world needs. but thats not it at all. it wasn't the lack of development that sent many places in the world plummeting into desperate poverty, but rather the development in other parts that required slave labor and stolen wealth and the continued sustaining of this wealth using war, unjust work, and globalization. what has disappeared--and that which is truly killing the people of the world, body and soul--are the communities. people have no sense of 'community' in the sense it would be used to refer to the apostles in the acts where they shared everything in common. or 'community' in the sense i would use it to refer to a small town of 40 families here in nicaragua where all the families have contributed money to send one boy, just one, to cuba to go medical school in hopes that he comes back to serve the community. no, these communities are rarities. rather we think that the problems of the world will be addressed through development and we build giant mansions and we applaud ourselves for giving work to the 20 men that temporarily will be able to feed their families because they are building another wealthy man's home. these men will do all the work and will have no access to the products. and so every day i see this house and see the destruction of communities. people who strive for their own well being and have forgotten what it means to be truly blessed--filled with joy. blessed are the poor... or as gustavo guiterrez says (i paraphrase), in spite of the laws of nature, we must move our center of gravity outside of us so that all of our selves, spirit, heart, mind, body, is drawn to others.

james

visits

i have started visiting some of the families of my students. i'm doing this to get to know their realities a little better and to feel less like someone that comes to school and then leaves without ever being a part of the community that i work in. i live over an hour from where i work, so this is a problem.
the first family i visited was of my 11 and 13 year old students, leimon and ana marie... they are cousins. leimon's house was about the size of my bedroom growing up. dirt floors. chickens and pigs running around. leimon is the oldest of 5 kids and as far as i could tell there was no father around, but who knows. it was very good for me to see this. i want to know better where all of my students are coming from, because some of them are much better off financially than others living in larger brick houses having cars and other amenities. one of my bosses was telling me that the school program that i work with was started this year to serve more of the former, the students and people living in worse conditions, but have gotten a lot more people from urban areas. this is creating interesting class conflicts. as i was riding on the bus on the way home from school, two girls were sitting in a seat, and normally students squish to make room for a third. i encouraged them to scoot over and they made room for me. instead i invited one of my students to sit, he kindly refused, and then another, and then i asked another to sit and the girl, one of the better off students, said to me... "no teacher, not with him. i won't sit with him." she put her nose in the air, literally, and refused to share her seat.
i think what bothered me most was that as the people here in nicaragua have certain "developments" and increased economic opportunities (though not many), those that benefit from them become less community oriented and more individual wealth oriented... as much as it can be called wealth. so the influx of american "opportunity" is destroying nicaragua in a much deeper way dividing people into more class divisions with a growing "middle class." its just kind of depressing sometimes.
2 days later i visited another student with a house 4 times the size of leimon's. but still many many people living in it--one room, dirt floor, 3 beds which are in the kitchen/living room/dining room. it is good to see though. i can better see my own wealth living in managua in a nice clean house and understand how separate and distant my experience of life in nicaragua still is from my student's experience. this bridge may never be crossed. but it doesn't mean we can't keep trying, and if nothing else, swimming is always an option.

james

dear friends and lovers,

i have realized that updating weekly is a problem for me and that they are usually long and rambly about stuff i do and other boring things. so i'm going to try to transition to updating more than once a week and with smaller more focused entries dealing with thoughts and issues. i make this commitment based on my belief that when something is apparently faltering, instead of cutting off energy to it, redouble the energy commited. and so we begin.

holy saturday. i watched judas burn. in the local park, every year, there is a 3 hour easter vigil mass and at the end they hange a large effigy, human sized paper and plastic doll, in the image of judas from a tree, stuffed with small firecrackers, and light him on fire. i'm not sure why. maybe as if, somehow by burning the "betrayer" we no longer associate ourselves with him... a source of purification for easter. it just felt all wrong to me. exploding and burning what looked like a man and was said to be judas, a good friend of jesus, even if, like almost all of us, he betrayed jesus for a little money... but how often do all of us support and prosper from economic and social structures as we allow and encourage the suffering and death of so many people. maybe the burning of judas is a symbol for the nicaraguan people to cast off the ways in which they still benefit from injustice, to recommit themselves to the people and community around them, and not to bags of silver. i hope so. but as we walked away, watching his head still drip flaming drops of plastic, it wondered... what does this really teach the children running around, fascinated by a hung, burning man?

james