Poetry and Revolution before Breakfast

Hello from San Ramon, Nicaragua! Population: 6,000; location: mountains. My home until Aug. 10. I am here only because Haverford's Center for Peace and Global Citizenship thought it worthwile to sponsor my immersive educational experience here in community organizing and social justice work. And in addition because ProNica, a Quaker organization that suports smaller community initiatives throughout Nicaragua, has a solid network of solidarity-based organizations for me to tap into, work with, and learn from. That network exists at least in part because Nicaragua has auch a rich history of communities coming together to organize and act in times of great difficulty, whether in overthrowing Spanish and American control during colonial times, toppling a dynastic authoritarian regime in the 1970s, or surviving the Contra War of the 80s. The history of Nicaragua is one that is heartbreaking and inspiring, and I am lucky to be here.

I've now spent just over one week in Nicaragua. The first five days were full--our CPGC coordinator and the four other interns and I were herded around by ProNica miracles Ramon and Ada, from one meeting to another, learning about feminism in Nicaragua and the planned construction of the Great Interoceanic Canal and the complex political history and the Nica words all the hip kids are saying these days. Always with huge meals of rice and beans and fried bananas and fresh pineapple and roasted chicken and warm tortillas and fresh cheese and more and more...

Now, I'm living with a host family in sleepy San Ramon, and am spending the week figuring out what work I'll be doing, whether it's helping to develop youth-led ecotourism projects in nearby communities, or a working with an Artesania group of women who make jewelry from seeds, or organizing schoolchildren to be "friends and protectors of the environment." For now, a few of my scattered thoughts on being here:

I am gradually becoming aware of those things I take for granted at home, the things I see as given, now that I sense here their absence. Things like a front lawn, glass windows (or indeed, houses that are able to be completely sealed-up and closed-off from the outdoors), paved roads, indoor plumbing, internet access, and more are rare here, if not nonexistent. On the other hand, there are things here which are impossible back home (home being MN or PA): geckos on the walls and ceilings; cows and horses and chickens and pigs in the street and in the green space next to people's houses, even in town; avocadoes for 10 cents each, mangoes for free if you find them on the ground, or are willing to climb a roadside path of rough red earth, skirting the barbed wire fences that are omnipresent here, and toss green mangoes towards the upper branches to shake down ripe ones. There are green mountains rising up like soft teeth around the nestled town. There is the sound of rain on a tin roof and a piglet in the kitchen next to my room, and frogs outside, which you can hear because none of the walls reach the roof, or try to.

The word that keeps coming up in my mental attempts to articulate what I'm seeing, smelling, feeling, thinking, is "impossible." Impossible to describe, impossibly beautiful, impossibly strong, rich, poor, musical, steep, slow, sleepy, green, etc etc etc...

None of my words match the landscape, and perhaps it's just because I'm out of pratice at writing, or because my brain is too busy waking up it's Spanish side, but I cannot satisfactorily describe this place. And any of my attempts to do so inevitably reveal little about Nicaragua itself, and rather more about me and where I come from.

While the other interns and I were having our orientation in Managua, we were staying in ProNica's Casa Cuáquera, their Quaker House where they host guests and hold workshops. There's a nice little library there, and during some downtime I took Edward Abbey´s Desert Solitaire from the shelf and began to read it. The first line: "This is the most beautiful place on earth. There are many such places." So far that's the best way I can think of summing up my experience.

The one other line that stuck out to me from Abbey's book was short and enigmatic, a quick blip of a sentence without much elaboration: "Poetry and revolution before breakfast." Beyond being a nice line, it stuck with me at least partly because Nicaragua has been described to me, and it seems an apt description, as the land of poetry and revolution. (Also breakfast is my favorite meal--a nice avocado and cheese on a fresh corn tortilla with some sweet coffee--nothing better). I haven't yet begun reading Nicaraguan poetry, although Ruben Dario, I am told, is more representative of Nicaragua than even Augusto Cesar Sandino, the great revolutionary himself. Hopefully this summer will bring lots more poetry revolution and breakfast for me and anyone who might be reading! Sorry for the lack of photos and coherent paragraphs, this blog (as all blogs are) is going to be a really weird mix of public and private. Public since I'm advertising it on facebook and giving the link to my parents who may advertise it all over my hometown, and private since I sit here alone in this internet cafe with my notebook, struggling to organize and articulate my inner thoughts. Read on if you want!