Stoves Stoves Stoves!

The time has come for my next update! Rainy season once again has begun. I am very very thankful for that. Although the power now frequently goes out and there are HUGE puddles I am known to nearly daily fall in, it is still so much cooler, much better indeed. For all of you who visited me in the hot season.. well, you are missing out not being here now! Today we completed two more stoves. That leaves me with about 18 more to go…. doesn’t include the 20 ladies who didn’t come to the workshop, therefore losing their chance to be in the project. Hopefully I can work something out and do another workshop to give them just one more chance…. It is hard working down here. People are so set in their ways because it has been done the same for generations and they do not want to change. Until they see what you want to do and see that it is working, many times any attempts to convince someone by just talking are fruitless. I am banking on them seeing the outcome and wanting to have that as well. I have already had several of those women ask if there is still a chance for them to do it after all. I guess in reality it will just depend on if I am feeling gracious. It is hard to muster the desire at times after trying to convince people over and over again, but in the end when they finally accept the idea, it makes all the work worth it.

It was awesome having my dad come down and work with me. He brought a TON of amazing tools I am still using daily and have come in quite handy in many things! We were able to build about 8 stoves and also presented all of the donated dictionaries in the high school to the English classes. Thank you all for those who either donated dictionaries or donated funds to help with that project. We had a fun time with the kids!

Me and a group of my friends, other volunteers, just recently got back from a couple days vacation we took to canoe down the Rio San Juan. It is the southern most that you can go in Nicaragua. So southern that while we canoed if we touched the other side of the river we were in Costa Rica. It was awesome. We saw all sorts of animals, including crocs! We swam in that same water, luckily none of us lost arms or legs! We stayed each night at an army base then woke up early to canoe again. Our finally destination was the Atlantic Coast where we spent two days relaxing and getting rid of our sunburns! It was quite them memorable trip indeed!

Lately I have been doing a bit of work with a new NGO (EOS International) that has come to Nicaragua. It was started by a Peace Corp friend in my group, Wes Meier, and some other friends of his in the states. They are working with appropriate technologies here in Nicaragua, such as improved stoves (like I am building), improved ovens, biodigestors, and drip-tape watering systems. If you’re interested in reading more about what they are doing here in Nicaragua their website is: www.eosintl.org

I hope you are all doing wonderful and enjoying life! Come visit, there is still time!