a bit about babies

dear friends and lovers.

saturday. a day of chores. for people who get high off of feeling accomplished, it is a good day, and for the rest of us... well, clean floors are nice. i've been sitting around this afternoon playing a little guitar. it tends to put me in a reflective mode... i play a song and i'm transported back to the time period when i wrote it... what i was thinking, where i was, how i was feeling (and whether or not i was even aware of those feelings at the time). music has a mysterious power like that. when i was graduating high school, i was obsessed with the band Third Eye Blind (not a secret) and in love with my friend erin (sort of a secret) and i remember asking her one day if she thought that lead singers in bands that do national tours are still transported back to where their consciousness was when they wrote a song, even if they are playing it for the 300th time. she wasn't sure. for a while i haven't been sure either, because the few times that i have gotten up and played in front of people, sometimes i am transported and sometimes i'm so damn nervous that i'll mess up the song its like i'm feeling my way through the song, remembering what i wrote mere seconds before i have to say it. i still don't have an answer to my question, except that for me, on lazy saturdays, i am still taken back to different times and places.

wednesday i was feeling a little sad. the day started out great with our 3 year old neighbor calling me out by name, "Jaime!" but later, when we are driving on my way to my teaching class, we pass by a building with the words "Agro-Tech" written on the front. Those two words sent my mind spiraling out of control. i started thinking about monsanto and how they create seeds for plants that don't produce usable seeds, and in this way farmers have to buy new crops of seeds every year and it keeps rural farmers in a vicious cycle. and then i started thinking about how we use and misuse so many plants anyway and how destructive we are to the soil and the earth in general... and it was all getting out of control on how hopeless it can seem to reverse some of the patterns of domination and then i saw a pregnant woman crossing the street. full of life, probably hope. and a little later that day, as we were leaving our class to go eat in the hotel of our teacher who wanted to have a little cake and ice cream to celebrate us finishing the class and also likes to eat very classy meals, we drive by this area where people stand in the streets selling things--from cell phone covers to peanuts to papayas. and this little girl walked right up to our window, she couldn't have been more than 5 years old, holding this papaya half the size of her body the way you would see a little girl holding her favorite doll... barefoot, rags for clothes, ratty hair... and she's trying to sell this large piece of fruit to us. and i just looked her right in the eyes. it was like looking into the most apparently innocent mirror that just happened to be reflecting the horrors of the west; or of capitalism; or of the darkest corners of my soul. either way i saw my own poverty clearly. the light turned green. we drove on.

josh and i did some exploring and climbed up to look at our roof. we have this cool little air vent thing in the middle of the house. wooden beams crisscross the area and we discussed carving all the names of JV's that had lived in the house from 04' to now. we'll see if that ever comes to fruition. we looked through some of the folders that are around but have never been shown to us and discovered suggestions for spirituality nights, old community member's folders, and the illusive map of the managua busses. it is one of the most amazing things, if you have ever used a bus in managua, its kinda like a floo powder (harry potter) in that if you don't take much caution, you won't end up where you're going, or at least not in one piece... but with a map, the possibilities are endless.

another thing i found was a modern day parable. i'll have to paraphrase it here for you... a young man was once standing by the edge of a river, when to his horror a baby came floating down the river. he of course jumped in and saved the baby and quickly alerted members of the town. soon after two babies came floating down the river, crying, and he jumped in and saved them too. other members of the town began to get worried, and formed a small committee. 4 babies, 10 babies... floating down the river... soon people were diving in and out on a very consistent basis. they were organized and they were saving almost all of the babies. but then there was 30 40 50 and they were still saving most of the babies, but often there was too many. some would float by to their obvious peril. a woman, one of the town members, shouted for the attention of the others and said, 'What if we form a committee to go upstream and see who is dumping all of these babies in the river?' 'no, we'll lose too many babies, we can't afford to lose any committed people' so they went on as they had, saving many, but losing some... who then had greater concern for the babies? those looking to prevent them from being thrown in or those looking to keep diving in and pulling some out?

take it for what you will, but sometimes i feel like so many of us struggle to pull out babies and never look deep to see if we are really a participant in throwing them in. maybe this is all getting confusing, and it is definately getting way too long. but before i wrap it up, i've got two short things to share. the other day as i rounded a corner on my way home a woman about 20 yards from me began yelling at me as if she recognized me and was Pissed at me. she started crossing the street (very slowly) so i walked a little faster. mental illnesses pretty much get left to their own here... although maybe she was a shaman and saw an evil spirit within me. yesterday (friday) on the way home from visiting the school where i'll be teaching, a little girl, about 4, was sitting on her mother's lap, and the little girl smiled at me, so i smiled back, and then she got my attention about 5 minutes later. there was a note sitting on the bus seat next to me that read "hi, do you want to be my friend? call me at (phone #) nadir martinez" ... it was tempting since i don't have a lot of 4 year old friends, but i wrote her a note back that said "hola nadir, sorry but i don't have a telephone, but i imagine that you would be a very good friend, my name is jaime, nice to meet you."

i feel like this entry is incomplete, because its all about experiences and not relationships (which i feel are much more important) but oh well. i'll write about those some other day. i love you all. spend a moment in solitude today.

james

luke or something

dear friends and lovers,

lately i have been living the fachento life. fachento is a word used here that means something along the lines of a little luxurious. class for english teachers with the fabretto program has begun. we sit in what is basically a meeting room, or a board room, if you will. white board on the wall, large table in the middle, air conditioning, coffee always ready, cold and hot water, a large tv, laptops with wireless access... its always amazing to me how much non-profits spend on their own comfort, but cést la vie, right? the change has been interesting since i leave in the morning and come home in the evening, but it is making me appreciate my community mates even more. there is something really really nice about coming home to people that i really love spending time with after a long (boringish) day. but it is useful and good to meet the other english teachers that will be working around nicaragua... a couple of us from the states and a few native nicaraguans. a good mix i would say. our teacher is especially fachento and has changed hotels twice now... i hope this third one is good enough. he's a native nicaraguan that has been staying in the states for a while now and flew down for this class. i made a new friend though, callie from montana, and she'll be teaching about 8 hours away from managua in the northwest of nicaragua with the fabretto program. she'll be teaching choir and english, so we might have to exchange class ideas.

the other day we went to see daniel ortega get sworn in as the new president... after the official stuff, papers, promises, and handshakes, he came out to the waiting hundreds of thousands of people waiting in the plaza. a lot of fancy words from the first wife and then everyone got what they were waiting for. hugo chavez. he spoke eloquently about death to the northamerican imperialists and how capitalism is savage. give me socialism or give me death more or less. i listened. i try to respect his opinion as much as any one else's i've heard speak, from jon sobrino to megan heeney to the drunk men that call out to me to speak about bush. some people draw such a distinction between bush and chavez, but to me they are really just two people who think that by gaining power through the threat of violence they can somehow better the world. in that sense, they are both fools on the same side... the opposite side of they way in which god lived as a human being. when the devil tempted jesus with power over all the nations of the world because they belong to him, jesus refused to accept that. he instead left the desert more committed to living a life of service embracing the poverty of the world in order to sanctify it and transform it. anyway though, it was quite comical after chavez and evo morales were done talking, daniel began his speech and a lot of people started leaving… here there is a saying, “i’m a sandinista, not a danielista” which basically means that one supports the ideals of the revolutionary party, but not the man that has “become corrupt.” it must be difficult to be the president of a country where thousands start walking out on you when you begin talking after listening attentively to one of your “compatriots.” i’m not sure if i believe in corruption though… it makes it seem as if taking money from others that doesn’t belong to you isn’t already a part of the capitalism system. i think it is, but i was raised with money and opportunity earned off of the backs of other peoples, many already dead, slaves, indians, children, and the list goes on. and education? i’m supposed to somehow break the circle of poverty with education? i think rather i can help some succeed within the system that requires poverty, but who knows. thomas merton talked about reading a story about a man that he said was like jesus, was more than jesus, and he said that because in reading the story, his perspective of jesus was renewed and refreshed, while we carry soooo much baggage around with us about the person who is supposed to be the fullest manifestation of god. i have started reading the book of luke in spanish, in hopes of some rediscovery. but i ask you all to pray for me, i am struggling right now with understanding rather than being understood. i will keep all of you in my thoughts as well.

james

january thoughts

dear friends and lovers,
hello and good evening. since my last update little has happened. i still sit here relaxing most mornings. reading a bit, having some oatmeal and coffee for breakfast. monday i will be the first volunteer to start doing something related to my work site, which will be english teacher training with the other english teachers in the padre fabretto program. i'm a little unclear on the history, but what i've picked up more or less is that padre fabretto was an italian priest, part of an order called the salecians (i don't know how to spell it) and he came to nicaragua. he had all these plans and wanted to stay here and work with the people when his order decided it was too dangerous and asked him to come home. instead he left his order to stay with the nicaraguan people. he started a program where he had 20 boys or so that had been homeless or in gangs live and work on a farm. he would wake them up at the crack of dawn, gave them classes and worked them. after their several years of school he basically released them into the world and said, there you have an education, now do something with it. controversial, but now the program consists of multiple schools in nicaragua that do mostly supplemental class work. so in reality, i will be teaching english classes to students that may already have taken some english or english isn't offered at the school they go to and in the afternoon they come to my class for it. i'm quite nervous about my first day in front of a many small nicaraguans, but god help me i hope i do okay.

this past week josh and mary went for their stays in el viejo... a small village where there is no electricity, dirt floors, bucket showers... a classic stay in the country. they thoroughly enjoyed their time there, especially their stay on the beach which was reportedly uninhabited except by the pigs that were swimming in the ocean, the occasional turkey that passed by and the dogs that roamed freely. they bought some fish from a local, mary learned to prepare them by gutting them and taking the scales off. as much as they enjoyed the experience of fresh fire fried fish, apparently the local love for fish eyes wasn't enough to convince mary or josh to eat them... they say they taste like squid eggs. seeing as that i've never had either, i won't pass any judgement on that. while they were gone it was just margie, adri, and me in the house. we had a good old dance party one night, just the 3 of us, the next night a puerto rican man named pedro came to stay with us. he is a friend of ramon, a former nicaraguan jesuit volunteer, and pedro's flight was leaving from managua, so he stayed in our house. it was fun, we played guitar and sang. margie and i spent most of our days sitting and reading, but one day the fumigator came by to take care of small mosquito issue we've been having. its a little better, i think, since he came, but its hard to say. the mosquitos don't number off or anything like that and they generally hide from light which makes it harder to tell.

the house is starting to feel like home as we do our chores and take care of each other. so far we are still in the, what do they call it, honeymoon phase or something like that... so we are all getting along pretty well. yet i hear from others that issues start coming up more and more as we try to live in community and our different ideas about what that means start conflicting... we'll see. issues that will come up soon... how we buy food, do we give food or drink or even money to people that ask us? hard issues, since most nicaraguans give a little here a little there to people that come and ask, but as part of our jv program, we really aren't supposed to give out money, although food is a different issue. some feel we shouldn't give out anything, sometimes i just don't know. i mean, all of the food i'm eating has come through begging... not door to door, but with letters and requests and generous donors. are we being like the biblical character that is given a great gift by having his debt erased only to turn around and demand a much smaller debt from an even poorer man? "give to everyone who asks you for something, and when someone takes what is yours, do not ask for it back" lk, 6.30. damn jesus. really? but doesn't that mean anyone that wants to can just take advantage of us, and take everything we have? maybe that is one more of those things jesus said that we just have to ignore. he was so disconnected from reality anyway.

ownership and possession and freedom are big words and bigger concepts that are bouncing around me head a lot. i guess that is a privilege i have, to sit around and think about big concepts while others work 12 hour days to eat. god help us all. i heard bush is sending more troops to iraq. news is so impersonal and we are so removed from it. maybe its better that way. in the tao of pooh, winnie the pooh bear teaches that news isn't what is really important or even happening in our lives anyway, but that we should be present and aware of our surroundings. in that case, a fan slowly swivels back and forth while margie marches around the house with her ipod singing to only her as she fights back the ever growing dust. annie dillard says the earth is constantly burying and unburying itself--but not without a fight from us! but i have sat still typing this for a while now, and think enough dust has collected, both on my body and in my thoughts. i leave you with love and a quote from a friend, breathe yr alive.

james

not a real entry

i will have a real entry soon... when i make one. but for now i'm on free internet, and i thought whoever reads this would like to know that i have a skype account now, my name is meinert.james so if i get on and you have added me we could talk for free. things are going well, more later.
jaime

a new year

dear friends and lovers,

i hesitate to update write another update, only because i often feel i have nothing to share--nothing from my body, my experiences, my feelings, but only my thoughts that are self-centered and based on theories, not experiences, but as natalie goldberg said, and i paraphrase, just keep writing anyway. we have been moved into the house for a while, and things are settling sort-of. today we did our first official chores, and you better believe that the bathroom is sparkling. josh and adri brought us home groceries, matt took out the trash before i was awake, mary whipped that kitchen into shape and margienuzz is working her way through the living room. as she said, "i've never really mopped before." i wonder how many firsts we are experiencing without realizing it, and yet its things that have always been present, like mopping, yet that we've never done or experienced that catch us off guard the most. of course most of my generation has been babied and kept in a constant state of adolescence until post college. that, i think, is why post college is sometimes referred to as "the real world." not because work is more real than studying, but because we are very close to reaching the limit of when other people will take care of us and we must fight off the ever collecting dust ourselves--a very scary thought for those of us raised in suburban upper middle class lifestyles. but we give margie enough trouble for being from long island while the 3 boys are all midwest raised and corn fed. so many differences. americans think of ourselves as part of one great state, (or country as it is called sometimes) but it would do us well to remember we are from many states that are haphazardly united, and depending on how one defines nation, we are hard-pressed to fit ourselves into that category also. so our cross-cultural experience in a foreign state-nicaragua-is accompanied by cross cultural experiences with our house mates. east coast, west coast, south... but even these are, in a way, just arbitary groupings in a way for there are individuals in all of those places, working, raising families, supporting troops with yellow stickers or meditating their lives away. my freshman year philosophy teacher had us write a paper on community vs. individual... i think i would disagree with my paper from 4 years ago, but moreso today than ever, i don't know what i think.

i found out that the 8th is my first day of teacher training, but i may not start teaching until the 1st of february which seems pretty far away. my real prayer for myself right now is that the teacher training has me well prepared. sometimes i wonder what i'm doing here, not in the sense that i feel as if i'm in the wrong place, but more like, "how did i convince someone that i could be a teacher?" doubts are a normal part of life right?

since christmas we have been to a bar, a pool, and a volcano... simple living is a breeze. all of us have had some form or another of diarrea... when i was tested i had no parasites, margaret, however, has the eggs that hatch into ringworm, which is a rough one to have if you wanna look it up. if not, a highlight is that if it lives and gets big enough it can move to your lungs and crawl out your mouth. mmmm. but we nipped hers in the bud with some tough pills. some others of us have been experiencing slight constipation, and its hard to say what thats from... i'll be sure to let anyone that wants to know find out when we find out, but its probably best to move to other topics. we've had some bug issues, with a scorpion in the shower and a 3 inch beetle in the bathroom too. along with that, our mosquito population is getting a little out of hand. i think the transition is a little rough for matt and adri who were both used to have 4 older jv's take care of them, and now they are left to guide this mess of a group that we are. they need your prayers more than i do, i promise.

i'm currently reading 4ish books, but i've kind of given up on one for a while. and one of which, a year with thomas merton, i won't start until jan. 1st for practical reasons. blindness, by jose saratoga something or the other, is one of the more disturbing books i've ever read, and the other one, "living buddha, living christ" is a book i once bought for my sister, although i harbor doubts that she ever read it. thich nhat hanh has a simple way of writing that puts a lot a lot of meaning in just a few words, so i sometimes wonder how much i'm absorbing. he encourages me to deepen my realtionship with my own religion so that i can better dialogue with others, that and be aware and present in every moment. when i sit, know that i am sitting. how can we be open to accept others if we are at war within ourselves... cultivate peace. challenges no doubt, for a young american boy, raised to be more active than reflective. still, i keep coming back to the prayer we attribute to st. francis of assissi--the one who ignored many social conventions, and lived a simple lifestyle to the fullest--that said, to understand, rather than be understood. how often do we work harder at getting others to understand us? HERE I AM. here are my beliefs. this is important to me. understand me. preists preach from the pulpit so that we understand their perspective, their interpretation. but we sing and pray the opposite. how much pain and death has misunderstanding at the root of it... how much more willing would one who feels understood be to move towards understanding. yet we're so afraid to think for a moment that we may have false beliefs. that we believe things are good that are really at the root of destruction and hatred. holding on tightly to our thought patterns gives us some kind of certainty and strength... opening up to what others think, trying to truly understand others requires some vulnerability... which is scary. and holy. i'm sure this all relates to my feelings towards those who speak "authoritatively" or those who make claims to any sort of absolute truth... but hey. as a final thought, that crossed my mind as i just layed down to rest my eyes, in heaven, does God rule all, or is God the servant of all. i'm sure some will point out to me that God in all of that glory manages to be both, but i have my doubts.

james

merry navidad

Dear friends and lovers,

I write you today from the living room of the JVI house here in Nicaragua. Rocking back and forth in a rocking chair, Josh’s laptop on my lap, as Josh, Mary, and Margaret still sleep. Matt and Adriana are talking with Matt’s friends, Brooke and Ryan. They came in to visit last night for Christmas. Ryan has Dengue, but he’s getting better and last night he actually ate a significant amount of food. Speaking of food, we cooked an amazing Christmas dinner last night. Green beans, mashed potatoes, roasted chicken (that we bought in advance and just heated up) Mexican rice, more chicken (when we realized that with Brooke, Ryan, and Fr. Joe, our in country coordinator were coming over) that I basted with a little homemade dressing… oil, vinegar, salt, pepper, juice squeezed from an orange, a little sugar, a little vanilla, and it turned out delicious. We also baked some vegetables into that little mix that were fantastic. Fr. Joe brought over Ice Cream and we bought some boxed wine. All in all an amazing Christmas dinner. After dinner we were treated to a lively rendition of “the Night before Christmas,” albeit one day late, by Margaret since it is part of her family’s tradition. The rest of Christmas was also a treat, with the neighbors inviting us over for dinner on Christmas eve where it is a tradition to dine around 10pm and then drink and dance until 5am or so. Christmas day is when one sleeps off the hangover. We Americans wimped out and I was in bed by 2am. Christmas morning I was awake before several of the others, which is unusual since I normally sleep in on Christmas morning to the bane of my sibling’s existence. Christmas is really important in Margaret’s family, and when she came out into the living room she had a face lit up, hugged us all, and told us “he came!” Turns out Santa even visits Managua, and he left us chocolates in the fridge with notes that Margaret helped deliver. We did a gift exchange and were all quite pleasantly surprised by the quality of gifts we got. Everyone seemed thrilled with what they got. I myself both bought and received a candle, which is perfect, since I love candles. Mary and I both think that we got another Christmas gift in the form of a parasite! Yay. So we’ll have to go by the clinic and get our little tummy’s checked out. Parasites aren’t really big deals and are pretty regular when the water isn’t exactly potable. A week before returning to the States Mike had two different parasites at the same time. So even after two years in the country, it seems like a pretty normal occurrence. Yesterday we stumbled across a notebook/journal that had been kept by the first JVI’s in Nicaragua back in 1998… it seemed as if the intention was to keep funny stories, traditions, etc. to pass on to the future years… So while it fell off for a few years there, we think we might try to renew the journal and thus be able to keep memories alive. Although, we aren’t really sorry that we were unable to have the 3^rd –first two being in 98 and 99—throw sugar canes from the back yard to the basketball court competition. Sometimes there are traditions that are okay to let go of. I hope all of your times with your families has been blessed and that you thoroughly enjoy every moment. Peace within you.

james

welcome

hello friends and lovers, and welcome.

i never thought i would do a blog. it seems so trite. but it really allows me to bother you less and allows you to read on your own free time. so here is where i will share, i guess.

after a week of homestays that was uneventful to say the least, we had a huge party. i am not even kidding. it was a going away party for the 4 jv's that we replaced and the 200 plus people they had met and learned to love in the last 2 years. we served tons of food and drink and i went to bed around 11:30... fell asleep around 12:30 or so only to awake to the sound of a mariachi band in our living room. thats right. at around 2 in the morning. so the party didnt end until 4ish or so... and the day after the party myself margaret mary and josh left for león. its a small touristy city where we are learning spanish but we get to do fun stuff too like climb volcanos, watch campesiños make sugar the same way it was made 300 years ago, and swim in the ocean. yesterday there were 15 foot waves crashing onto the beach. the pacific ocean. she was pissed about something, but who could say. so we just kept diving back in and fighting to stay above water. then we sat, read, and relaxed. today we learned how to dance.... more or less, of course. but tonight or tommorow we are going to try out our new skills with each other, i don't think any of us are brave enough yet to dance with any of the locals. one day maybe. this past sunday we went to mass in the main cathedral in leon. its gorgeous and old and spanish and stuff. there were quite a few people there for a 5pm mass on a sunday. right around when the priests homily was getting a little too long for the 92 degree heat a man dressed in near rags comes from the front left. he starts down the aisle with his hands out to the people, imitating a traditional catholic collection. the priest ignores him... most of the people do the same. but a few foolish souls give to the special collection this week. later during the normal collection nearly everyone gives. something about this contrast struck me. the charity of it. how many people give to support a building and a priest but hesitate when a man puts his hand in your face. and if he rose up off the ground, i pondered, and revealed the face of jesus... how many would have tossed their coins his way then. maybe nobody, maybe all of these people are wise enough to realize that jesus didn't come to ask for our donations, but i have my doubts. but then again, when the world needs a revolution, whats 30 cents from my pocket? we may go back to the beach again this saturday. there is nothing like passing time with those you love in beautiful places. i hope you all have a beautful week also.

james