Saying Goodbye

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...