Back to School...

Hello Everyone,

As our Central America adventure nears its end, we are experiencing a string of awesome trips with friends and family. Last week we returned to Costa Rica after over two months of adventure in Nicaragua, and met my mom at the airport the next day. We then drove to Monteverde, Costa Rica, where mom took spanish classes for the week, and the three of us had a great time.

The main joke of the week was "Nina and Paul practicing their parenting on mom." The night before the first day of school, mom pointed out that she didn't know how she would get to the school since it is out of walking distance. We chimed in, "We'll drive you, of course!" We were amused by the concept of the two of us taking my mom to school and picking her up everyday. On the first day of school, we made sure to leave the house with time to spare, and we documented the occasion thoroughly (see picture below). All week long we practiced our parenting on mom, and now feel adequately prepared to take our own kids to school someday.

With mom in classes every morning, we saved all our exciting activities for the afternoons. The first day, we visited the Monteverde cheese factory, which was founded by quakers and is the longest running business in Monteverde. We learned the entire process that they go through to make their cheese (which is not entirely appetizing) and at the end we were able to sample various cheeses produced at the factory. Our tour guide was a friendly guy named Ronald who moved from Wisconsin, and is now giving cheese tours in Cosa Rica. Needless to say, he likes cheese and knows more about it than anyone we've ever met.

Tuesday, we went on a nature hike over beautiful hanging bridges in the Monteverde cloud forest. However, we saved the most extreme activity for last. Wednesday afternoon, Nina and I were somehow able to talk mom into going on the "Extremo Canopy Tour." There is something in the Banks family genes that is immediately skeptical of anything with the word "extremo" in it, but luckliy mom is very open-minded and adventurous, so it didn't take much convincing at all. The canopy tour has fifteen ziplines, ranging in length and height. The longest runs nearly a kilometer, and is really, really high off the ground. I'm not sure how high you are precisely, but it feels like you are an eagle soaring over a huge valley. Cows, farms, and trees look like little dots below you, and it is probably the closest you will ever feel to flying. I am happy to report that mom was able to overcome all her initial anxiety and take flight. I'm not sure how much she "enjoyed" it at the time, but she has since reported that her appreciation of the experience grows with each passing day!

Other than mom's spanish school and our awesome afternoon activities, we mostly relaxed and enjoyed amazing food. Mom also quickly reverted back to her type-A student ways, and studied her spanish lessons vigorously in the afternoons and evenings. I think that she might have become slightly addicted to Costa Rica, and I would not be surprised if she comes down for another round of classes at some point in the future.

The day that we dropped her off at the airport, we immediately picked up our friend, Paige Blake. The next day, Kathy Rowings flew in, and I am happy to report that we are successfully into the last leg of our trip, which I like to call, "Paul and the girls," or "Paul listens to much giggling," or possibly, "Paul in danger of growing a uterus." Stay tuned folks, as our next post is bound to be interesting...

Now, pictures!

Dropping Mom off on the first day of school. She's not even crying!:

Silliness at the cheese factory:
Watching the cheese process:

Showing our dignified side as we sample cheeses:
Mom and me:
Looking at wildlife from the swinging bridges:


Sunset from our beautiful cabin:

Nina ziplining:

Me ziplining:

Mom after the last zipline, very happy that she made it through alive:

Mom and her spanish teacher:

A pretty hummingbird:

Thanks for checking in! We will be back in the USA soon!

Paul and Nina

Pictures from my parents' trip

Thanks to Becca, my parents' pictures are online. Here are a few for you to enjoy!

In Matagalpa, Nicaragua on the Selva Negra Coffee Farm (available at Whole Foods!)

Horseback riding on the farm:

The workers sorting the coffee:

One of our many meals on the farm:


The children collecting mud from the boiling pits:


Fresh fish on the beach:


Fresh fish (see the pattern?) in Granada:


Lucy, the monkey, stealing our nuts!:


Nina with Lucy on her lap:


Paul and Nina with Whitman and Junior:

Out to dinner at Rodney's wonderful restaurant on my parents' last night:

´´Human beings are the only creatures on earth that allow their children to come back home´´ - Bill Cosby

My parents (Nina is writing) could not wait the 3 more weeks until we come back home, so they came to travel around with us during our last week in Nicaragua. Where to begin...

Unfortunately, I can´t post any pictures because a.) our camera was stolen, b.) our borrowed camera doesn´t have a connector cord and c.) we will be home before my dad learns how to post his pictures online. So therefore, just imagine ¨Chevy Chase goes to Nicaragua¨ when you read the following stories. We will get pictures up at some point!

My parents flew in on February 12th to Managua and Paul and I had our rental car and sanity ready to go. Whenever my dad sees anything remotely dangerous back home, his famous line is, ¨that guy has a death wish.¨ Needless to say, we heard that line several times on the first ride from the airport to the hotel as they witnessed 5 people on 1 bicylce, men sitting on top of cargo on a truck, children inbetween street lanes, and so on.

We spent our first day touring around Granada. My parents got to meet Junior and Whitman, and even see their new school. Even after several reminders, my parents kept speaking English to them and other children thinking they would understand. After blank stares, they would continue trying to ask in a slower, louder voice, as if that would help. Luckily, our spanish is now up to a decent level where we could translate for my parents all week so we wouldn´t have to witness these painful encounters. We have a basic vocabulary and can get by, but when my dad insisted on me asking people about their water pipelines and electrical meters, I struggled a bit.

We took a boat ride to little islands off of Granada. When our boat reached Monkey Island, our guide asked if we were scared of monkeys. When we said that we were not, he started calling, ¨Lucy¨ and the next thing we knew, a monkey came swinging from the trees and landed in our boat. She immediately walked down the aisle and climbed into my lap! Everyone knows I am a germ freak, so I was trying to enjoy the moment and not think of the countless diseases or necessity for an immediate shower. The guide asked if we had any food for Lucy. Paul took out our salted almonds, kindly brought to us from Becca a few weeks ago. Lucy wasn´t satisfied with a handful, and next thing we knew, she swiped the bag! My mom did not like how greedy Lucy was acting and started pulling the bag out of her hands. Once she was holding the bag and Lucy´s entire body weight on the other end, my mom won! Well, Lucy began hitting my mom and screeching. We all saw her teeth and were yelling at my mom to just give Lucy the bag. Luckily, she listened and we escaped any monkey bites. Lucy left our boat and swung through the trees with her imported almonds from the good ol´USA to show her friends and family what the stupid tourists brought this time.

We laughed about Lucy as we ate whole, fresh fish (we´re talking head, eyes, teeth, tail, and fins on our plates) from Lake Nicaragua at a restaurant nearby. This is my dad´s favorite type of thing. He loves to eat the most local and/or strangest food he can find. This means that we had to request plantains (pronounced as plantin´ by my father) in all fashions for every meal at every restaurant on the trip. He even made us ask a local guy at the market if he could chop a coconut with a machete. The guy looked at us like we were crazy, but he performed this tropical trick, which pleased my father. Don´t worry, my dad was also able to find cow tongue later in the trip. He wanted to find iguana soup after seeing countless iguanas being sold along the highway, but luckily, we never found it. Otherwise, he would have made us try it, too!

The next day, we went to the market in Masaya, where you can find all sorts of handicrafts. My dad was in his element...HAGGLING. My mom wanted to buy a cute dress for my niece and the lady wanted seven dollars. After my dad suggested four dollars, the lady just laughed. He put five dollars on the counter and they lady still was not interested. He told us all to walk away because this lady was clearly being ridiculous. Next thing we knew, the lady was calling us back! We thought, wow, it worked. We walked back to the counter and she said, ¨you left your five dollars on the counter¨ with a snide grin. Next, my dad was very interested in finding a painting for Lake Barkley. Unfortunately, he loved all the ugliest, tackiest, paintings involving parrots, and my mom could not agree on one she liked. Finally, he settled for a coffee painting my mom enjoyed and thought was more appropriate, considering Paul and I worked on a coffee farm. Paul and I found a painting we liked, owned by the same guy. My dad and this guy began the fun sport of haggling. My mom, Paul, and I were not helping the situation by laughing. Paul and I were selectively translating in laughter, as my dad and this guy were both frustrated. We walked away once again, this time with our money in hand. Over an hour later, as we started the engine of our car, the guy knocked on our window and was ready for my dad´s offer. Looks like we got the last laugh! As we purchased the painting, the guy rolled his eyes and told us our dad was ¨muy duro¨ (very tough), which was a great ending to our day in the market.

The rest of our trip involved driving to Leon, the pacific beach, and to a coffee farm in Matagalpa. While on the drive, we stopped by boiling mud pits, where we were lead along this unofficial, dangerous park by five kids 12 years-old and younger. We cringed as they reached down to scoop up some extremely hot mud with a spoon, to give us a closer look. My dad felt the urge to express his admiration and said, ¨mucho _(made up spanish word)___¨ to one of the boys. Of course, the boy didn´t understand. When we asked what he was trying to say, he said ¨I don´t know, it just sounded right.¨ Of course, we all couldn´t stop laughing.

We had a great time and were sad to say goodbye to them on the 19th! Man, we hadn´t laughed that hard, so often, in a while. It was great comic relief! We spent our last night in Nicaragua, being spoiled once again by Rodney. He dropped us off yesterday morning at 6:30 am for our bus to Costa Rica. We arrived in San Jose around 5:30 last night. We barely slept and instead watched the Disney movie ¨college road trip,¨ which the bus driver put on repeat. Finally, he stopped the movie and we were then entertained by MTV music videos from the 80´s and we were surprised when the Nicaraguans and Costa Ricans knew the words! We were relieved to get to our hotel after a long day. The guy at the hotel informed us they no longer had a room for us because their door fell off our room. So much for a reservation! Luckily, we found a new hotel and slept like rocks last night.

We´re off to the airport right now to pick up Bobbie Wrenn. We´ll post about our trip with her next week!

See you soon,
Nina and Paul

Update...Oh So Belated!

Beautiful food at Sally's 70th birthday:


Dear Faithful Blog Followers,

We would like to first apologize for the extreme delay in updating the blog. A few weeks ago, we were finally the victims of crime down here (we got robbed...blind), and that took some of the wind out of our blogging sails. Don't worry, there was nothing traumatic involved like knives or guns. We just let our guard down for a few minutes and left our backpack unattended in a car in Managua. Somebody broke in and took our backpack, complete with laptop (with many important files, including all pictures from the trip!), digital camera, iPod, Nina's glasses, and other valuable stuff. It was bad, but we're over it. We would like to give a shout out to our Nicaraguan "Tio," Rodney, who spent days investigating the matter, shaking down police and security companies, offering rewards, and literally doing everything humanly possible to help us get our valuables back. He is the best.

Anyway, without the camera and computer, we have been slightly blogging impaired. Therefore, there's way too much information for one post. I'll give some highlights, and we'll save the next post for info on the trip with Nina's parents (in progress, and hilarious).

We had a great visit with Sally and Manny Debono, and their daughter, Becca (Our sis-in-law). Sally was born in Nicaragua, and came to visit for her 70th birthday. Sally and Manny stayed at Rodney's house (her first cousin, thus our excellent connection) and we stayed nearby with Becca. We had a birthday party for her with her Central American family, toured a volcano, went to the beach, went to more parties, hung around Granada, hung out at Rodney's place, ate Rodney's food, slept in Rodney's hammocks, mooched off of Rodney, and tons more! We all had a great time, and as usual, Rodney was the perfect host. It will be very sad when we have to say goodbye to him next Thursday!

The past month in Granada has consisted of finishing our volunteer work with La Esperanza. We finally finished our somewhat cumbersome uniform and school supply project, and after that we began teaching art and PE in a local school. However, the biggest thing that we accomplished had to do with Nina's little buddy, Junior. As we approached the end of our stay there, Nina became more and more frustrated with the fact that Junior would not get the services that he needs after she leaves. School started at the beginning of February, and after we saw his school in action, it became clear that we wanted to send Junior and Whitman somewhere else. Nina spent many hours online looking at schools, and found a great one in Managua. However, moving to Managua was going to be very difficult for the family, so we started looking for new schools in Granada. Nina finally found a place that is a dramatic improvement over their current school. We paid their tuition for the year (a pittance compared to US private schools) and got them ready to go for the year. We plan to stay in touch with La Esperanza in the coming years so that they can continue to go there for school. We hope that they will both be able to focus and learn at the new school, since it was clear that these things were very difficult at their old school.

Currently, I am writing from a beautiful mountain lodge in Matagalpa, Nicaragua. We are having a ball with Nina's parents, and cannot wait to give you all an update about this adventure! Thank you all for continuing to check the blog, even though we stopped updating. We'll get better, so stay with us for the next month! Here are a few more pictures from the Debono's visit, and around Granada:

The Debonos at Masaya Volcano:


Pictures from the culmination of our uniform and school supply project in Granada:

We miss all of you and can't wait to see folks back in the US in less than a month!

Love,

Nina and Paul

Good Times in Granada

Hey Folks,

Sorry it's been a little while since we updated this thing. We've had a nice few weeks in Granada after my parents' visit. Most of the time we've been enjoying our volunteer work with La Esperanza, but we've also found some time to get away from Granada and chill.

Our uniform/school supply project is coming along nicely, and we should have all school necessities distributed to La Esperanza children by the end of next week. After that, we'll begin spending our mornings in a local school tutoring and helping out.

We've continued to spend our afternoons working with Junior and Whitman. Nina's speech therapy with Junior is coming along really well! He is saying words and making sounds that he never made before, and because of a very comprehensive picture book that Nina made for him, he is learning how to communicate his thoughts and wants with less and less frustration. I am still tagging along to play with/distract Whitman during Junior's therapy with Nina. Luckily, Whitman has not attempted to murder any more birds. He has, however, discovered my iPod, and I'm afraid he's hooked. I think he's approaching his thousandth time having listened to Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie" (see the funny video below). Anyway, I have started to read a chapter book with him by bribing him with iPod use after each chapter. The book is in Spanish, so it's probably like being read to by a third grader for him, but at least it's something!

This past weekend, we got away for a few days to nearby Laguna de Apoyo, a beautiful lagoon less than 30 minutes from Granada. For two days we did nothing but lounge around, swim, read, enjoy free internet, and eat great food.

Back in Granada, we joined much of the world on Tuesday in watching the inauguration of our 44th president. It was great fun watching the event, especially since it took place just steps from our old neighborhood. We know every crack in the sidewalk around the Capitol and the mall, and it was frustrating having to watch it on TV and not be there. In order to support the new President, we cracked open a bottle of Champagne with our roommates and baked a great big chocolate chip cookie, which we dubbed "La Galleta de Esperanza" (in English, "the hope cookie"). In spite of our silliness, we enjoyed the historic event from afar, and sent our best wishes to the new guy. He needs them.

Other than that, not a whole lot going on. We're really, really excited about a slew of visitors over the next month! Tomorrow, we are headed to Rodney's house where we'll spend the weekend with Sally and Manny Debono, and their daughter (our sis-in-law) Becca. Sally is celebrating her 70th birthday by returning to the country of her birth, and we are excited to share that special experience with her. Expect a blog post next week with fun photos! Also, Nina's parents have booked tickets and will visit for a week in February! It's likely that the blog post following their visit holds unprecedented comic potential, so be sure to stay tuned. And just when you think it can't get any better, my mom is coming back down to visit us when we return to Costa Rica! Oh! And Kathy and Paige after that! We are so well-loved!

Before I break down in tears, fun pictures and video:

We went out with the roommates for karaoke. Here, the boys butcher "Bohemian Rhapsody:"
Together at karaoke:

Relaxing at Laguna de Apoyo:

Nice view at Laguna de Apoyo:

Junior working with the wonderful book that Nina made for him:

During a therapy session:

Funny haircut story #2! For my second cut here, Nina accompanied me to make sure there was no funny business. Things went great until the very end, when the guy suddenly dumped half a gallon of gel in my hair to give me some style. Apparently, the porcupine look is in style here. Nina, of course, couldn't help but laugh in the guy's face, even though he was very serious about this:
Finally, some cute video of Junior and Whitman. Junior is riding me like a horse and saying "Va!" (a new word for him), and Whitman is dancing to (and trying to sing) "Hips Don't Lie:"

That's all for now! We'll post next week after fun with the Debonos!

Love,
Paul and Nina

Nothing like family visiting!

Hello Friends and Family!

Bobbie Wrenn and Dave, Paul´s parents, flew in on Dec. 30th for a fun-filled five days of traveling. We greeted them at the airport in Managua where we picked up our mode of transportation for the week, a red pick-up truck. Apparently, car reservations in Nicaragua do not mean you actually recieve the type of car you reserved, but instead insure you will get some sort of vehicle. We needed a 4X4 and the truck ended up being our only option. Luckily, it never rained and our bags weren´t stolen while we drove through the country, which were our initial fears with the truck.

The first day we showed off Granada to Paul´s parents. We climbed to the steeple of a local church where we had a beautiful view of the city. We enjoyed showing them our house, the market, Junior´s neighborhood, and our favorite gringo hang-outs. Later that afternoon, we set off on the road for a quick drive to San Jorge, where we could board a ferry to take us to Ometepe Island in Lake Nicaragua. We thought our only challenge would be the lack of road signs in Nicaragua, but it turned out the police were our biggest challenge! A policeman asked us to stop and proceeded to ask us for our car registration and Paul´s license. As they were checking things over, the policeman asked us where our fire extinguisher and hazard triangle were. We all looked at each other with total confusion as we searched the car for these items, knowing very well this was just a scheme to get our money. We tried our hardest not to laugh during this awkward exchange with the police in fear of making the situation worse, but of course I (Nina) failed at this attempt and couldn´t hold in my laughter. Paul told his parents afterwards, "if you want Nina to stop laughing, NEVER tell her to stop or it will just make her laugh harder." Lesson learned! Anyway, the policeman told us we could either pay $25 in Managua and he would keep Paul´s license OR he could be very sweet and have us pay $45 and he would kindly return Paul´s license, which he reminded us was very important to have when driving. Well, that was the first hit to Dave´s wallet, which we brushed off our shoulders as only an expensive toll road.

We made it to San Jorge only to find mass confusion as cars and people tried to load the ferry. It was new year´s eve afterall, so everyone was drunk and insisted on telling Paul where to park and drive. We decided it was best to listen to the people who actually worked for the ferry when one local man kept yelling at Paul to pull up and the lonely worker kept yelling at Paul to not move. Needless to say, we eventually made it on the ferry and had a pleasant 1 hour boat ride to the island while we watched a beautiful sunset. Shockingly, the adventure for the day wasn´t over! We had to navigate ourselves to our hotel without sunlight as Paul dodged fireworks, small children, old people, drunks, bicycles, oxen and carts, horses, and dogs in the road. He decided that the experience would make a perfect virtual reality driving course for 16 year-olds.

We made it to our hotel safely but unfortunately the kitchen had closed at 7 and were served the one dish remaining, spaghetti. The four of us enjoyed a few drinks and decided it was way too long until midnight and after our long, adventurous day, we headed to bed. Paul and I are officially an old married couple as we slept through the new year. I thought we would be at least 50 before that happened!

We had a good few days on the island reading our books and taking mini-hikes. After another disorganized ferry docking experience, we successfully left the island and made our way to San Juan del Sur. We stayed in a condo overlooking the beach and enjoyed finding hidden beaches nearby where we read, body surfed, and took another stab with the surf board. During our last dinner in San Juan, I (Nina) abruptly ran out and lost my lunch right in front of a lovely restaurant. I was bound to have my first travelers sickness after 2.5 months in Central America, but who knew it would hit that fast! I´m sure the restuarant enjoyed their nice, free advertising. Luckily, similar to Paul´s sickness a few weeks ago, it only lasted throughout the night and I was good to go in the morning when we had to make our way to Managua.

We successfully turned the car back in to the airport and took a taxi for the rest of the evening. After picking up Rodney, we headed to one of his restaurants, which was a real treat. We ate the best food we´ve had in Nicaragua, besides, of course, the food we´ve had at his home, and were treated like queens and kings with 3 waiters for our table. Bobbie Wrenn and Dave enjoyed getting to know the man who has taken such good care of us in Nicaragua. It couldn´t have been a better way to end our trip.

We were sad to say goodbye the following morning, and a big part of us wanted to hop on that plane with them! Of course, we resisted the urge and are still happily enjoying our life in Granada. Thanks for being patient...on to the pictures!

Bobbie Wrenn and Dave taking a stroll on the beach:

Paul and his dad, Dave, walking back from a swim:

Paul and his parents on the Mirador de Diablo (Devil´s look-out) on Ometepe Island:
Bobbie Wrenn sharing the front seat with a stranger in a taxi in Granada. A taxi is never full:
Our cute bungalow on the island overlooking the lake:
Nina with the new in-laws on New Year´s eve:
Paul and his Dad pretending to have celebrated New Year´s the old-fashioned way, prior to being old and married:
Dave navigating his way through ticket payment on the ferry:

Our view from our condo in San Juan del Sur:

That´s all for now. By the way, we never did get stopped again from the police due to our clever efforts to not look like a car full of gringos with Dave´s hat down low and others ducking. We DID find it interesting to learn that it wasn´t a true scam afterall. Apparently, every car must have a fire extinguisher and hazard triangle, but of course seatbelts and carseats in the cars are optional.

The old-married couple,
Nina and Paul

Feliz Navidad a Todos!

Greetings and Merry Christmas!

It's been an eventful week and a half in Granada! I'll try to keep it to the point, but there's been quite a bit going on.

Overall, we are off to a good start with our work as volunteers in Granada. Our organization, La Esperanza, works with local schools and communities to fill educational needs. On our first day in the office, we were immediately given the job of outfitting 80 kids before school starts (it's their summer break now). Quite literally, that's all they told us. "We would like you to find uniforms, shoes, backpacks, and supplies for the kids in this school." We were given minimal information about where to go, what exactly to buy, what specific kids to outfit, etc. We quickly learned that La Esperanza is very disorganized.

So, our mornings have been spent trying to organize this project. We found a tailor and seamstress in the village to make the clothes, a guy to sell us shoes, got most of the kids measured, and have learned various ways to track down kids who are not at summer school. None of them have phone numbers or addresses, so it's tricky.

Little by little, we're making progress on our morning project. There is another volunteer from North Dakota named Nick who is working with us on it, so we've made a good friend in the process. We hope that we can track down the remainder of the kids and get them all what they need before the start of school.

The afternoons are a bit different. Much to our amusement, Nina is once again working as a speech pathologist, only now in Spanish! There is a six-year-old boy in the village who can't speak, and because of Nina's expertise, La Esperanza has sent her to work with him in the afternoons. His name is Junior, and he is extremely cute and smart. Upon hearing a description of his problems, Nina thought he might be autistic. However, after meeting him, it was clear that he is not. He definitely understands what's going on around him, and understands spoken language easily. Nina thinks that he probably has Apraxia of Speech, which I think means the connection between his brain and his speaking muscles doesn't function properly. That is my very amateurish explanation, but you get the idea. Ask Nina for scientific details.

I have been assigned to a soccer program in the afternoons, which has been a lot of fun. However, there are lots of volunteers who play soccer, so the past few days I've gone with Nina to Junior's house. He has an eight year-old brother named Whitman, and I have been playing soccer and hanging out with him while Nina works with Junior. We are thinking about making this a permanent arrangement since Whitman wants to play during the therapy sessions, but Nina really needs one-on-one time with Junior. I've enjoyed creating a diversion for the last few days, so we might keep it up.

Yesterday was wonderful. We started the day by visiting a local orphanage for girls and delivering homemade cookies and toys. The girls were tons of fun! We sang Christmas carols in Spanish and English, and of course got into some camp songs, which was bound to happen. We really loved this orphanage, the girls in it, and the Nuns who run it. They expressed interest in some extra help in the afternoons with English instruction, so we're hoping to do that as well.

After the orphanage, we went to Junior's house so that Nina could do her afternoon speech therapy. While they worked, I experienced a funny cultural clash with Whitman. We were playing soccer, when Whitman suddenly told me to stop and be quiet. Very slowly, he took a sling shot out of one pocket and a rock out of the other. He started creeping toward a tree, and carefully took aim at an innocent little bird on a branch. Let me tell you, this was no Fischer Price slingshot, and he came within inches of cutting that little bird in half! The bird, of course, flew away fast. Whitman then went over to its nest, looking for something. In Spanish, I asked him what he was doing. "Looking for eggs," he said. Then I asked if he's ever killed a bird with his slingshot, and he said, "Of course! 140 so far!" He then started creeping through the woods, telling me to follow him. He repeated the shooting/egg search ritual about four times, while questions danced through my head. Should I be stopping this kid from killing innocent animals? It doesn't seem like he has any adult supervision anyway, so will he even listen to me?

After about the fifth attempted murder, he went over to a tree and got really excited. "Look, Look!," he said to me. He came down from the tree and I saw that he was carrying a nest with two baby birds! He was really excited and ran off, shouting about how he wanted to show it to Nina! On the one hand, I knew I should stop him and tell him to put the nest back, but on the other hand, I really wanted to see Nina's reaction. So I followed the kid, laughing quietly to myself. He wouldn't have listened to me anyway.

Nina's face did not let me down. Whitman was so proud, and Nina had a look of utter disgust. After the initial shock wore off, we both started telling Whitman that the fun was over, and that he had to put the baby birds back. "They need their mother or they'll die," we said. "If they stayed in the tree, snakes will eat them," he said. We went back and forth for a long time, until finally Whitman let out a loud sigh, rolled his eyes, and said under his breath in Spanish, "how can I explain this to this guy?" Once again, he told us emphatically that the babies would be eaten if they stayed in the tree. He then ran to his grandmother and gave her the baby birds. None of this seemed strange to anyone but us. Nina just looked at me and said, "we're in a different culture." Toto, I don't think we're in Indiana anymore.

Anyway, all is well with our adventure. I am writing this blog from the comfort of Rodney's Managua home. We arrived here this morning to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas with him. Tomorrow he has lots of family coming in for a huge dinner, and we are so grateful to have a family for Christmas! As always, Rodney is being way too good to us.

We hope that everyone has a very merry Christmas! And now, some pictures/videos:

A street in Granada, looking toward the volcano:

The girls of our house:
Junior!:
Junior practicing his signs/talking with Nina:
Whitman with the cussed bird nest:
With Junior:
At the girls' orphanage:
Leading a camp song at the girls' orphanage:Today (Christmas Eve) at Rodney's house:

Rodney, in the Christmas spirit!:

And now, a video of some fun songs at the girls' orphanage:


And a video of a random Christmas parade that happened by our house the other day:



That's all for now! Feliz Navidad!

Love,
Nina and Paul