Chronologically this weekend was before In-Service Training, but I figured you all wouldn't mind!
After coming back from Spring Break, I honestly experienced the worst week ever. My coworkers weren’t listening and weren’t ready to work when I was; my students were soooooo naughty and disrespectful, and the Nica culture in general just got under my skin. It was one of those weeks were I wished I was home in my queen sized bed, eating Thai food and out playing golf. It didn’t bring me to tears, but it frustrated the hell out of me the entire week.
However, the weekend of this horrible week turned out to be the best I’ve had in Nicaragua! It was one of Callie’s last weekends here, so she convinced me to come with her to Esteli…especially because we had a ride, can’t beat that! Esteli is 2 hours away by regular bus and about 1 hour away by car or expreso bus, southeast of Somoto. Sadly our ride didn’t show up due to dead cell phones, so we ended up taking the 7:40am expreso bus and ran into my sitemates Matt and Jess who were with their friend Dana, a doctor who was visiting for a month.
We all went our separate ways after getting off; Callie and I went to the cell phone store to see if they wouldn’t mind charging her phone for a bit. Luckily they did it for free and in the meantime we went looking for a dress and shoes for Callie’s trip to the states. The Fabretto Cusmapa Choir had a planned trip to Connecticut and New York and Cal didn’t want to look like a pauper, haha. After shopping for a bit and not finding much we headed to La Casita which is a restaurant outside of Esteli that makes its own wheat bread, hummus, yoghurt, brie and swiss cheese. It was started by a Swiss guy I believe? Maybe he still owns it, I can’t recall. The idea of the place is to educate others about healthy, sustainable eating, and they have a huge garden and nursery. It is a lovely place, all shady and made of natural, local materials. For $2 you get a mini-loaf of wheat bread, choice of hummus or cheese, with tomatoes and cucumbers. Callie and I hung out there for an hour or so and then made our way back to central Esteli.
Sometime during the day, I had decided I wanted to pierce my nose while we were there. I had been considering it for a couple months and finally the ideal time presented itself. I figured, hell might as well do it while I’m in Peace Corps because no one will mind and my students will probably find it “so tuani (cool) dude”. The cab driver took us to the piercing place he knew of, which is really close by our Esteli PC office. The lady didn’t have the type of stud I wanted, so she recommended us to a place that I always walk by on my way to the Las Segovias Supermarket. A Nica actually sent us to someone else, instead of convincing me to stay and pay her to do it! Fijense (Take note), that NEVER happens here! On the way Matt called me to see if we wanted to do a cigar factory tour. I said, heck yeah… “but can you give me like 10 min. to pierce my nose real quick?” Kind of a funny thing to say to someone, but they waited for us.
So we went to the place, which is also a tattoo parlor and the guy had exactly what I wanted. It was only $7 including the stud to get my nose pierced. At home it’s probably around $20 or something like that…I figured I got a darn good deal. Getting one’s nose pierced does not hurt, course he did put the liquid anesthetic on, but still it wasn’t bad at all. I knew my mother would not be happy about it, she’s very conservative about piercings. Maybe it will grow on her!
A little history about the Nica Cigar Industry…during the Cuban Revolution, all the Cigar Lords moved to Nicaragua to continue their trade. They ended up discovering the valley of Esteli was an ideal growing area for their tobacco plants. It seems like most of the families were about to keep their lands when the Sandinistas swept through seizing property from Somoza and any others who were affiliated with his family. Today, Nicaragua is the 2nd largest exporter of cigars to the U.S. next to the Dominican Republic. Matt had already done this tour with some of the guys from his health group, so he knows the guy who works there and we weren’t charged anything for a tour! There are about 150 employees during busy seasons rolling and pressing cigars, plus hundreds more out in the fields hand picking the leaves and hanging them to dry. The prettiest leaves are saved for the outside layer of the cigar.
After the cigar tour we had late lunch at our favorite Cuban Restaruant in Esteli where you can get a really cheap sandwich for $2. Luckily we able to shove down lunch before Leonel came with his truck and we got a free ride back up to Somoto.
Callie, Mike and I made dinner a couple hours later and then we headed over to the Perro Zompopo concert around the corner from my house at the Hotel Colonial. Perro Zompopo is one of the very few Nica bands that exist and who actually write their own material. Their name is after the geckos that are everywhere in Nica, climbing up every wall of the house and sometimes at night they scare me when they crawl out from underneath a card on my wall! We had our own “gringo table” because Matt and Jess reserved us seats the day before and we ended up sitting a couple tables back from the stage. They played for about an hour and a half, and then we all stuck around to take pictures with them and just hang out. It was fun to talk to the band and catch up with some Somoto friends I hadn’t seen in awhile.
All in all, what an excellent day! Great food, great customer service, great music…drama free - that never happens! It was a very uncharacteristic day for PCVs in Nicaragua to say the least.
However, the weekend of this horrible week turned out to be the best I’ve had in Nicaragua! It was one of Callie’s last weekends here, so she convinced me to come with her to Esteli…especially because we had a ride, can’t beat that! Esteli is 2 hours away by regular bus and about 1 hour away by car or expreso bus, southeast of Somoto. Sadly our ride didn’t show up due to dead cell phones, so we ended up taking the 7:40am expreso bus and ran into my sitemates Matt and Jess who were with their friend Dana, a doctor who was visiting for a month.
We all went our separate ways after getting off; Callie and I went to the cell phone store to see if they wouldn’t mind charging her phone for a bit. Luckily they did it for free and in the meantime we went looking for a dress and shoes for Callie’s trip to the states. The Fabretto Cusmapa Choir had a planned trip to Connecticut and New York and Cal didn’t want to look like a pauper, haha. After shopping for a bit and not finding much we headed to La Casita which is a restaurant outside of Esteli that makes its own wheat bread, hummus, yoghurt, brie and swiss cheese. It was started by a Swiss guy I believe? Maybe he still owns it, I can’t recall. The idea of the place is to educate others about healthy, sustainable eating, and they have a huge garden and nursery. It is a lovely place, all shady and made of natural, local materials. For $2 you get a mini-loaf of wheat bread, choice of hummus or cheese, with tomatoes and cucumbers. Callie and I hung out there for an hour or so and then made our way back to central Esteli.
Sometime during the day, I had decided I wanted to pierce my nose while we were there. I had been considering it for a couple months and finally the ideal time presented itself. I figured, hell might as well do it while I’m in Peace Corps because no one will mind and my students will probably find it “so tuani (cool) dude”. The cab driver took us to the piercing place he knew of, which is really close by our Esteli PC office. The lady didn’t have the type of stud I wanted, so she recommended us to a place that I always walk by on my way to the Las Segovias Supermarket. A Nica actually sent us to someone else, instead of convincing me to stay and pay her to do it! Fijense (Take note), that NEVER happens here! On the way Matt called me to see if we wanted to do a cigar factory tour. I said, heck yeah… “but can you give me like 10 min. to pierce my nose real quick?” Kind of a funny thing to say to someone, but they waited for us.
So we went to the place, which is also a tattoo parlor and the guy had exactly what I wanted. It was only $7 including the stud to get my nose pierced. At home it’s probably around $20 or something like that…I figured I got a darn good deal. Getting one’s nose pierced does not hurt, course he did put the liquid anesthetic on, but still it wasn’t bad at all. I knew my mother would not be happy about it, she’s very conservative about piercings. Maybe it will grow on her!
A little history about the Nica Cigar Industry…during the Cuban Revolution, all the Cigar Lords moved to Nicaragua to continue their trade. They ended up discovering the valley of Esteli was an ideal growing area for their tobacco plants. It seems like most of the families were about to keep their lands when the Sandinistas swept through seizing property from Somoza and any others who were affiliated with his family. Today, Nicaragua is the 2nd largest exporter of cigars to the U.S. next to the Dominican Republic. Matt had already done this tour with some of the guys from his health group, so he knows the guy who works there and we weren’t charged anything for a tour! There are about 150 employees during busy seasons rolling and pressing cigars, plus hundreds more out in the fields hand picking the leaves and hanging them to dry. The prettiest leaves are saved for the outside layer of the cigar.
After the cigar tour we had late lunch at our favorite Cuban Restaruant in Esteli where you can get a really cheap sandwich for $2. Luckily we able to shove down lunch before Leonel came with his truck and we got a free ride back up to Somoto.
Callie, Mike and I made dinner a couple hours later and then we headed over to the Perro Zompopo concert around the corner from my house at the Hotel Colonial. Perro Zompopo is one of the very few Nica bands that exist and who actually write their own material. Their name is after the geckos that are everywhere in Nica, climbing up every wall of the house and sometimes at night they scare me when they crawl out from underneath a card on my wall! We had our own “gringo table” because Matt and Jess reserved us seats the day before and we ended up sitting a couple tables back from the stage. They played for about an hour and a half, and then we all stuck around to take pictures with them and just hang out. It was fun to talk to the band and catch up with some Somoto friends I hadn’t seen in awhile.
All in all, what an excellent day! Great food, great customer service, great music…drama free - that never happens! It was a very uncharacteristic day for PCVs in Nicaragua to say the least.
P.S. I updated my Wish List finally!
These guys go everywhere in Somoto with each other, BFF
Best friends, best friends...
One of Callie's last weekends in Nicaragua...sad times :(
Getting one's nose pierced doesn't hurt at all
Sorry Mom, too late...damage done!
They also had an ocelot, a beautiful large feline found in Central America
I thought it was cute how the lions had cigars in their mouths as well...it seemed fitting since everyone on their staff was smoking a cigar: the security guard, the cook, the gift shop ppl, etc.
On a normal working day, about 100 workers are rolling cigars and putting them into presses
A cigar press
Thanks Matt for setting up the tour!
Cigars are rolled up and then put into presses
All ready to go and ready for shipping
The leaves are hand picked and hung up individually to dry, then they are hand packed into boxes like this. They then go into the rolling process...
We could barely stand a couple minutes in there...it hurts your lungs so bad!
Look who has also paid a visit...the Govenator
...and Rocky!
Callie found a big one, a couple of those I'm sure will give you lung cancer
Worse taxi-dermied deer head ever, the eyes were real marbles instead of marble eyes...can you say "creepy"
I'm sure my mother is so proud of this picture! Cigar and new nose piercing...you can barely notice it... I know at least my Uncle Mike will get a good laugh out of it!
Ozzy with a good Nica cigar and the national beer Toña, can't get more Nica than that!
The only photo I could get of the band playing
Me (can you say Carrie Bradshaw hair?), Rhythm Guitarist, Dana, Jess, Callie
Sound dude whose chair we stole, Me, Lead Guitarist, Ian (thanks for popping in there), Jess, Dana, Callie, Oswaldo
Me with the Lead Guitarist...totally can't even remember their names, I'll get back to you on that one!
Callie, Lead Guitarist, Me, Jess, Lead Singer, Rhythm Guitarist
The girls with Perro Zompopo!
Dana, Me, Lead Singer, Jess 
Ian, Health 46 in Cusmapa, poses with random Nicas 
From one artist to another, Matt autographs his CD and gives it to the lead singer of Perro Zompopo...oh yeah my sitemates kick ass!
Yay! I'm actually darker than a Nica! Wicho is my first host mom in Somoto's nephew. 
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