Jenevieve's Wild Ride

Normally, I plan at 8:30am on Thursdays. Normally I try to make it home before dark. Normally I take taxis if the sun has gone down just for safety. Yesterday however, nothing was normal. Since today, Friday, was the monthly planning meeting for all of Nicaragua's teachers, I did not have class. So that meant I did not need to teach today, and therefore had a day free of planning yesterday. Except one of my counterparts wanted to get ahead on planning so I decided to meet him at school at 4. By the time we had finished it was quickly getting dark and I knew that if I took the bus I normally took I would also need to take a cab (since I normally walk home from the main park). So I decided to walk a few blocks (before it was dark) to try and get me a cab to take me to the other side of the city where I live. But to no avail, no one wanted to go that far, etc. So I grabbed a bus to the main park (which was a new one for me) and the cobrador (the guy who takes the money) was very kind and told me when to get off, a gentleman on the bus offered me his seat so I did not have to stand. Overall it was an adventure, trying a new bus, but it was a pleasant one.

So I have to comment. If you are not familiar with buses in most latin american countries, they are either mini-vans that have been refurbished to fit 25 or they are large yellow school buses that are refurbished to fit 100. These buses can get so crowded that the air can get knocked out of you by just trying to squeeze out of them.

So once at the main park, I had two options, wait for another bus that took me only two blocks from my house, or I could take a cab that was twice as much (and yet in retrospect it was only $0.45 USD oh well, talk about being frugal!!!). So what did I do? I took another bus I had never taken before. And while this bus filled up to maximum capacity, and I almost lost my shoe trying to get out, several people on the bus also helped me figure out where my stop was, if we were even going in the right direction (I asked before getting on the bus, but you never know), and were overall very kind. I must say I was very overwhelmed by the Nicaraguan hospitality yesterday. It made me happy to be here. Good day overall.

This weekend is the corn festival. I have several friends that are coming in town so I am very excited. We shall see what type of fun we encounter!

Keep making good choices! I know I will. Haha