I´ve been in Nicaragua for almost 24 hours (day 1 of 63) and I can already tell I´m going to love it. We didn´t get up to much today; aside from a small walk around the managua airport I took part in two meetings (both in spanish). The first was sort of an introductory meeting with the Director of Aso Fenix (the local NGO I am technically "working" for) and the other two interns I came with. The second meeting was a planning session with another NGO about going to a rural community tomorrow for a site assesment. I´m not entirely sure what was said in either meeting, but I do know that I´ll be able to help out in more ways than one. Several times today I´ve reffered to projects I´ve worked on in the past that will be helpful here.
As far as the languag barrier goes, it is definitely going to be a rough week or two (or two months for that matter) getting my spanish back. The good news is, if I´m eavesdropping on a conversation, I can usually discern 60% of whats being said. The bad news is, as soon as someone asks me a question or starts speaking directly to me, my ears seem to clog up at the same time as my brain slowing down and I can only understand 20% of what is said. Worst of all, when I feel I have something to say (or its time for me to say something) I stumble more than a sixth grader at his first school dance. It will be slow going, but I´ll get my tongue back eventually; its already a good sign that some of my thoughs are starting to come out in spanish.
Tomorrow I get up by 7 and pack up my rain gear to head into the mountains to tag along on the assessment. Lucky for me, there are at least two other english speakers in the group so I might be able to give some input on what I know and see (provided they´re willing to translate it for me). We´ll see how it goes!
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