Change of plans

Megan:
As it turns out, sandboarding down the fine debris of an active a volcano requires a pretty different technique than snowboarding, but Jon and I managed to figure it out, and as you can see from the photos, we had a great time. During our hike up Volcán Cerro Negro, we had a very interesting conversation with our guide, Carlos, who has lived in León, Nicaragua all his life. He shed some light on the unstable political and economic situations in this country, and shared some disturbing recounts of the US involvement throughout their history. A serious issue here is the growing number of foreign owned businesses who do not reinvest back into the local community. This, along with other factors, has contributed to a tremendous lack of infrastructure in Nicaragua. Carlos' unique perspective on his own country gave us a lot to think about.

After saying goodbye to León, we arrived in Granada on Sunday prepared to do another week of Spanish classes while staying with a local family. Well, there has been a slight change of plans. At the end of our first day of classes on Monday, it was clear that the school wasn't a good fit for us. We didn't get a good vibe from the place or the people and Jon had some particularly bad experiences with a few of the teachers. They did a really poor job of explaining things, and if you know Jon at all, you can see how this may have been a deal breaker.

When we told the mother of our home stay family that we had decided to not continue with the program, she took it upon herself to tell us how wonderful the school was - most likely the best in all of Central America. Jon and I both feel pretty comfortable taking our chances on that one. This most recent living situation was a little odd too. While we were there, we only ate one out of five meals with the family - the other four consisted of Jon and I eating by ourselves in the quiet dining room. I think going through this process and being faced with a few confrontational conversations (some of which were in Spanish) has really been a good learning experience for both of us. It also feels good to move on.

We are now looking for a new school in a different part of Nicaragua which could begin as early as next week. In the meantime, since we were planning on being in classes anyway, we are taking advantage of the motivation we currently have to practice Spanish with each other and review old notes from our previous schools. It's amazing how much material we have from past classes that we never fully learned. I think Jon and I have spoken more Spanish with each other in the past few days than we did all last month. Here's hoping we can keep that up.