Nicaragua:
Our first stop after Ometepe was Esteli. A pretty little city with much to see with great energy on every street corner. This city was right up my alley of our investigation. We delved into the cities history during Nicaraguas civil war in the late 1970's. It was a battle between U.S. backed conservative Dictator Anastasio Somoza and his notoriously ruthless National Gaurd and the revolutionary forces of the Sandinstas (a socialist guerilla group). Esteli was in the center of the fight experiencing some of the worst bombing in the war. According to an interview with a veteran Sandinsta/Archeologist teacher of Esteli, every family in the city had a relative die in the war. Still today the bullet holes of past can be seen on every block.
We also visited an amazing womans collective organized near the outskirts of town. They have three different gardens 1) a garden for the school children to learn to grow plants and then take seeds back to school to plant 2) A medicinal garden full of herbs 3) a garden for the collectives personal use, making food consumption more sustainable. As well as three amazing gardens they make recycled paper which is beutiful. This requires old paper, fiber and lots of water. Each member of Team Parrot was able to make one sheet of paper. These women sell their paper to local tourists and online at http://www.ambientalistas.biz/. I stongly recommend purchasing some paper from here, its quality and by purchasing it your helping Mama Earth.
Honduras:
We arrived in the capital of Honduras (Tegucigalpa) after a 6 hr bus trip from Esteli, Nicaragua. This was exhausting but we still managed to check out the city. Tegucigalpa is city which has a reputation as being dangerous and I believe it, on almost every street corner there is a minimum of 2 to 3 soldiers with fully automatic assault rifles and a couple of security gaurds wielding machetes, they supposedly have a terrible reputation for taking off arms.
In Tegucigalpa there are signs of a resistance movement which started in 2009 after a leftist president Manuel Zelaya was overthrown in a coup, it stinks with CIA slime. You can see signs of the resistance everywhere with hammer and sickles, viva mel, and viva la resistencia plastered on every block. Also the day before we came teachers shut down the highways to ensure economic justice, there was clashes with the police and of course there was injured.
I wish we had more time to investigate here but our team decided it would be better to move on to Copan on the border of Honduras and Guatemala.
Copan is famous for its Mayan ruins which of course we went to. To me it was amazing that a civilization could create such pyramid structures without cranes to assist with the construction, also that one ruler could make a people do it for him! The city of Copan was a little different then most in Honduras I think. Its economy seems to be based of tourism and I would say most of the stores are geared towards tourists. I enjoyed Copan but it wasn't my favorite.
Guatemala:
We left Copan to Antigua, Guatemala on yet another long bus ride. Antigua is a beautiful little city with loads of history. In the 1500's the Spanish made it the first capital of their rule in the Central American region. It is litered with 500-300 year old churches some very colorful and some broken down with a mysterious feel. On the weekend we were there it was the start of holy week and we got to witness various processions. To me this was a very interesting experience, thousands of Maya were on the streets, worshipping in the churches, selling holy items to be offered to god, making the best foods and most interesting making gorgeous art on the streets that in an hour or so after completing gets trampled on by the processions this art shows devotion to god.
Currently I'm in San Andres Itzapa at an amazing organization called Maya Pedal. They build machines with bike like: blenders, rope pumps, corn graders and more be sure to look them up. Now is my first dull day here so I will have to post more later about my experiences here.
Until next time
Brian
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