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I found some pictures I was drawing on the flight from Madrid to San Jose, Juan Santamaria. It was a really long flight and I was running out of things to do, so I whipped out my sketchbook and drew random things whilst listening to Johnny Cash and Elvis Costello.
This was the hardest part, saying our farewells to the families we'd lived with and gotten so close to, the locals we made friends with, the 'rudboys' with the machetes strapped to their belts, to the little kids that always followed and played with us in their curious ways (Alfredo included, the little 7 year old that chopped off the head of a snake with 'his' machete in his living space, the pig castrations we had to listen to for half an hour which were done on mature pigs without any anaesthetics, Armando the man with a name on his high white horse and womanising charms, mr president of the community with God knows how many mistresses who fell in the spell of his attraction hidden behind his thick beard and buckle belly, the many skinny cows I took pictures of, the smoke that would suffocate the air at 4 am followed by the cockerel and hounds orchestrating their own music with the birds, pigs and the chickens. It was a very emotional early morning, but we set off eventually with our giant rucksacks into the hills and to a small town 7km away called Yali to catch a public bus to Esteli and from their back to field base to get our next project...
Pictures of my house and kitchen, taken with my 'Olympus Trip 35' camera.
More pictures can be found on my flickr account.
Progress with the community centre was going well and by this stage we were almost finished with the first half of the construction, which would be carried on by a second group coming in after changeover to finish the beautiful work we'd built together with the locals...
On our last Sunday we were curious to see monkeys which could be found higher up in the mountains amongst the tall trees. So we thought it would make an interesting adventure, so that's what we did. A local took us up to a part of the forest high up which he explained was where the battles of the last revolution with the Sandinistas was fought, and home to many bunkers now lost and forgotten in that very jungle. It was an interesting day, but unfortunately the wrong time of the day so no monkeys were spotted. But the trek and the views from the top made everything worth it.
"We met the local craftyman, builder, engineer, legend called Noel. This is the day we began building the foundations for the building after a brief introduction to the communities way of building, measuring (using their unique measurement called vara) with strings and sticks, making wires from scratch and mixing concrete the traditional way."
Just over a week ago I retired from the magical landscape of Costa Rica and Nicaragua and the great people I was fortunate enough to meet in my travels and volunteer work there. For the 3 months of my expedition I had brought with me an Olympus Trip 35 camera, an old point and shoot from the 70's, in almost pristine condition. I also brought with me a small sized Moleskine sketchbook which I brought almost everywhere. I kept a journal in it as well, and now is my chance to upload everything and share the places I've been, the things I've done and the people I've met.
When I arrived in Costa Rica, I stayed in a Hostel in San Jose for two days, where I met up with some friends and volunteers before heading off to the fieldbase in Turrialba, 2 hours eastwards to meet up with the rest of the volunteers and project managers and co-ordinators.
After a short week of jungle and survival training I was on a bus heading to Miraflor, northern Nicaragua which became a 2 day bus journey. There I was to live and work with an indigenous community in some valleys within the Miraflor region called San Ramon. We were to help build a community centre for the adults, right next to the school the charity organisation helped build back in 1997. This would be my home for the next 3 weeks, living with a family inside a shack, sleeping on a wooden bench with potato sacks.
These are just a few pictures from my arrival on the 2 days (you can find more on my flickr account).
