Verano Feliz Verano Seguro

I love the one that says avoid an excess of passengers. The Salvadorans that were behind us on the Panamerican were given a ticket for having too many people in their mini van. There were 3 adults, 1 teenager, and 2 kids, and you know a mini van can safely hold more than that. They also did not stop all of the pickups with Nicaraguan plates full of people in the truck bed (not so safe). I also like the one that says drive with all of the doors closed. Why, may I ask, is this a problem?!

What You Should Know about Traveling to Nicaragua

1. Don't break any traffic laws, ever. Always have your fire extinguisher and triangle handy. Buy the stupid car insurance. If you have Salvadoran license plates, you will be stopped approximately every 15 minutes. Nicaraguans know how to drive like "normal" people. This is happy, even though donkey carts and horses are mixed in with cars.
   
2. Phone service sucks.
3. 70 sunblock does exist and is a worthwhile purchase.
4. You can spend cordoba or dollars. Why change, as long as you're good at doing conversion rates in your head?
   
5. Nicaraguans make good food. And they have international food. Yum, gyros and bibimbab.
6. Medicine is cheaper in Nicaragua than El Salvador.
7. Gas is more expensive (even though they're getting part of it from Venezuela?)
8. Malls are much more interesting. I actually found clothes I liked, even though they were outrageously expensive.
9. Buy the $1 map and don't get "lost" in the Selva Negra with the crazy howler monkeys.
10. You can't buy the isletas in the lake by Granada, even though there's signs saying you can.
11. Volcano fumes can make you feel really sick, or even pass out. A comforting thought for all of those who were tossed over the edge as sacrafices...they probably didn't get to the bottom before they were unconcious.
    
12. San Juan del Sur is nice, but nothing special unless you want to surf. The road to "one of the most touristed places in Nicaragua" especially during semana santa sucks.
    
13. Queso ahumado is awesome, as is Flor de Cana.

This was an excellent trip, and we got to see a lot. It was a good idea to come back on Friday, since we avoided traffic just about everywhere, and I got to see people making alfombras in Soyapango as we looked for a way that wasn't blocked to go to Edwin's house. Edwin went to the beach yesterday with his family, and said what is normally a 30 minute drive took 2 hours going and 3 hours coming. Glad I stayed at home with the cat!

NicaTESOL Trip

I just got back from yet another conference trip, this time to Managua, Nicaragua to NicaTESOL. It was a fun 8 or 9 hours in the car. Going down, there was supposed to be a lot of bad weather from hurricane Felix, none of which I ever saw. I also saw the actual end of a rainbow for the first time in my life. On an amusing note, we were stopped a good 7 times by the police in Honduras, and maybe another 3 times in Nicaragua, just on the way there. My personal favorite was when they threatened to take the driver's license away because he had no car insurance, which apparently really is a law in Nicaragua. I want to know how many Nicaraguans have car insurance, though, or if it's just for foreigners. I also saw lots of fun animal crossing signs: snake, cow, armadillo, iguana, small child, and best of all, a large unidentified rodent that kind of looked like a sloth.

I stayed in the Los Robles area with another friend from work, had some good Korean food, watched other people's faces as they tried sushi for the first time, and yes, went grocery shopping (every other Central American country has a better selection of international import food items than El Salvador, like Craisans). I also spent the whole time limping around UCA with my jellyfish wound, which was/is amusing and painful at the same time. People were soooooo nice there, though, and really helped a lot! Managua was hot, but not that bad, and once you get used to the fact that the streets don't have names (or if they do, they're not written on the streets), it's not so bad. On Saturday we went to Masaya, about 30 km south of the city, and with a much more pleasant climate, where I bought some nice painting and eyed the hamacas that I have no where to put at this point. Next time...