¡Feliz Año Nuevo!

Jess and I would like to wish everybody a fantastic 2009! We have some new year´s resolutions to share with you all, but first we´d like to describe the festivities that took place in Somoto.

As we explained earlier, the holiday season in Nicaragua stretches from the 7th of December, with the celebration of Purísima, until the 1st of January with the New Year. Other than church activities the 24th and the 25th were very low-key, which is unusual for any Nicaraguan holiday. The New Year, however, was nothing of the sort.

We had thought about leaving town and spending New Year´s with other Peace Corps volunteers, but with all of the traveling with Jess´s parents, we decided to stay in Somoto and spend time with our ex-host family. We met them at another relative´s house in Somoto about 8ish. Silvia is getting ready for their 3rd child, who is due on the 16th of January. She was at her sisters with the two girls, Adriana (10) and Ena Sofia (5). The new baby is a boy and will be named Akhnatontito, or little Akhnaton, after his father. Big Akhnaton did get to the party until later. The family just received a big loan to start building a house. They´ve had a plot of land in Somoto for a while now, but with building costs so high, they were waiting until the right time. Since gas prices have dropped a bit down here, they jumped on the opportunity to get started. Akhnaton, who is one of the most orderly Nicaraguans we know, has been ordering all of the materials from Managua, where it is cheaper to buy them in bulk and ship them to Somoto than it would be to buy locally. New Year´s Eve he was waiting for a truck loaded with 120 100 lb. bags of cement. Since they don´t use wood to build here (it rots to easily in the heat and rain) the main building materials are concrete, concrete blocks, and iron to tie the whole thing together. I don´t know if it make the building go faster, but it sure seems like it. Now that the building materials are here Akhnaton´s contractor is going to finish the 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom house in 2 months. We´ll see about that…

Anyway, Silvia and the girls were at her sister´s house with the rest of their family. Jess and I have had the opportunity to get to know most of the extended family, and even work with a few in a professional setting, so we´re very comfortable with the family. Visiting at the house were relatives from all over Nicaragua as well as Donald and Alison who now live in Boston, MA. Alison was the Peace Corps volunteer in Somoto before Jess and I. She met Donald, a Nicaraguan, during her service and they got married about 6 months before leaving. So, Donald has had only a few months less than us to learn English (when we were learning Spanish) and he´s doing great. His favorite thing about living in the States is the variety of food. He really likes Chinese food. The thing he hates most is the cold weather. I think Boston got hit pretty hard with ice and cold in the past few weeks, so it´s justified.

At Silvia´s sister´s house we were served Relleno (pronounced Ray-yay-no), which literally means ¨stuffed¨. So, it´s kind of like our stuffing that we use to fill a turkey on Thanksgiving. This stuffing is make of pulled pork and shredded chicken. Next they had a bread and milk pulp to give it a little body. Then come the spices and veggies, which include potatoes, carrots, olives, capers, raisins, and prunes.
Then the whole thing is cooked down and served over rice with bread. It´s tough to compare the taste to anything we have back home, except for maybe a pulled pork sandwich without the barbecue sauce. It was very rich, to say the least.

There was a piñata in the street about 10:00 and all the local kids took a swing. The poor guy got pretty well beat up, but that´s just the way the cookie crumbles in Nicaragua.



We stayed at Silvia´s sister´s house until about 11, when we walked back to Akhnaton´s house to put Ena Sofia to bed. Most of the family stayed at the other house, but a few of us walked over to watch the festivities more towards the center of town. There isn´t a particular television program that people watch to know when it´s midnight, but you just kind of know it´s the new year when all of the fireworks start going off. Out in the streets, anybody and everybody was lighting things that flew, things that sparked, things that blew up, etc. Old people, kids who couldn´t have been more than 6, and everyone in between. Chaos would be a nice way to describe it. Then came the viejos. A few families on each block donate old clothes and dress up a scarecrow like figure. The figure sits outside the house for the day, usually with a bottle of alcohol in his hand to express the festive spirit. Then, just before midnight he is stuffed with fireworks and moved into the street. Once he´s there, he gets doused in alcohol or gas and he waits. After the clock strikes 12 he gets lit on fire. Pretty soon, the fire works catch and man…it was quite a sight. Hopefully these pictures will demonstrate the event. Perhaps we should add piñatas and viejos to our list of afflicted peoples in Nicaragua.

Jess saying goodbye to a viejo who lived down the street from us. By the time we walked home at 3:00 he was just a pile of ashes...
A viejo being lit near Akhnaton and Silvia´s house.

1 minute after ignition.

2 minutes after ignition.

3 minutes after ignition....so sad.

Unlike the States, the party doesn´t end at 12:30 or so. Our Nicaraguan hosts told us that we weren´t allowed to go home until 5 in the morning, or we´d risk bad luck all year long. We made it to about 3, and then decided to take the risk. It turned out they were just pulling our leg and as soon as we left the party shut down. Everyone else was asleep by 3:30. We woke up around 7 the next morning to take Astro for a walk, and I´ve never seen Somoto quieter. Today is the 3rd and it seems like people are still recovering. Monday, however, things are back in business and we are back to work, with hopefully a bunch of fun adventures to come in 2009.

The New Year´s cake: Sopa Borracha, which actually means drunken soup. But it´s a cake...go figure.

Kids in the street with their sparklers.

Astro hanging out with some friends. He stayed home for the night.

Astro stayed home, but the fireworks kept him up. This is the morning after (10am), still recovering.

Jess´s New Year´s Resolutions:

1. Write more.
2. Work on my Spanish

Matt´s New Year´s Resolutions:

1. Keep in touch with friends from home.
2. Play more guitar.

Combined resolutions:
1. Exercise more.
2. Read more in Spanish.