Hi all! So this has been an interesting week. I have been on a mission to make jam with my family, as well as dehydrated fruit...éssentially for selfish reasons, because I miss eating good dried fruits and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Not that I ate these things all the times in the States, but when you suddenly can´t have something, or it is very expensive, you want it VERY badly.
So, my mission to make jam. My host father is an organic farmer, and always looking for new ways to make interesting foods, so he loved this idea. We started on Sunday, using a fruit called Guyaba, which I have never seen anywhere other than Nicaragua, and is delicious. It is green and typically sweet, about the shape of an apple, and you can eat the entire thing. Right now, there are so many in the trees that it goes to waste rotting on the ground. Well, we spent Sunday making our first batch. Without typical store bought preservatives it was not as jelly like as jam in the States, more like applesauce texture, however, I think it tastes great...or did think it tasted great...
For lunch Sunday my host mother made a Nicaraguan specialty, a soup with chicken and all sorts of fun things that I happily ate and enjoyed before making more jam. Come Sunday night I was feverish and feeling miserable. I am not sure if it was the jam, soup, or pizza I had had in town two days before, but I do know that having a bacterial infection in a foreign country where there is no air conditioning and bucket showers is pretty miserable. Luckily, my family and the PC doctors are incredible, so I was on antibiotics the next day, drinking lots of fruit drinks, and feeling better within a day or two.
In case anyone was wondering I continue to prove to the people of my town that I am a Gringa, their word for white girl, in so many ways. I also get called Chela, referring to my white skin, and Gata, as in cat, because my eyes are the color of a cat´s. For example...
1. I am afraid of spiders the size of, or larger than, my hand...sorry I don´t think this will change...and I will continue to ask if they are poisonous.
2. I can´t play soccer...sorry, futbol
3. I always hit my head getting out of the really small, overcrowded bus in which there are ten too many people.
4. I say I like people using the verb which means you like someone in that special kind of way, when I just mean they are cool...pretty sure I have told most of the town I have a crush on them
5. I can´t carry a bucket of water without some of it spilling...women here can carry them on their heads...
So anyway, I´m getting there. Today was our Site Fair, in which we learned about all of the possible locations we could be sent to for the next two years. I am already in love with a few, but really trying not to get my hopes up too much. I find out in two weeks where I will be, so cross your fingers for the Departments of Boaco or Maltagapa. Both have lots of mountains, horsebackriding, and lovely people. Though I´m sure I would love them all..
Ok, that´s all for now. Lot´s of love! xox
