Chillin´ at the Rancho Part 3

Road to the Rancho Bar...









So I just have to tell this story while it is fresh in my mind. The reason I thought about this was that I was going through some old photos I had from the Peace Corps that I had left in my dresser in Nicaragua that I hadn’t seen for over 10 years.

Anyways one of my fellow Peace Corps buddies told me about how after training he was dropped off with his Nicaraguan family. Now, living in a third world country can be hard on your stomach until you build up tolerances. Let’s just say diarrhea is a recurring theme in a volunteer’s life. Some of the first conversations you have when meeting up w a fellow volunteer that you haven’t seen in awhile will be to inquire about their bowel movements. Gross? Perhaps… but remember we have a lot of free time on our hands too.

Anyways when “said” Peace Corps volunteer was being dropped off to meet his Nicaraguan family which he would live with for the next 3 months he was experiencing a rather explosive version of this common calamity. He was in such dire straits that he basically skipped the whole conversation portion of the introduction and immediately began making the same type of hand gestures I had made when meeting my host family. Gestures that would let somebody know that he needed a bathroom and fast.



Finally after several minutes of hand gestures the family understood his needs and pointed him in the direction of the bathroom. So the volunteer runs past the family, continues running into the room with the bathroom, begins pulling down his pants as he is running and trips due to the fact that his pants are now twisted around his ankles, he then proceeds to fall and hit his head on the toilet, knocking himself completely unconscious. He then proceeds to shit all over himself!
Oh hello Nicaraguan family… Nice to meet you!

Can you imagine the family walking in and seeing this image? A pathetic white boy Gringo passed out next to the toilet, blood puring out of a gash on his head, pants and underwear pulled down to his ankles and well… you get the picture.

Fortunately, Nicaraguans have seen way worse… trust me! They cleaned him up and got him back in shape. Notice, I was careful not to mention any names because that is such an embarrassing story!

Yeah… poor KENNY!!!!!!!! I would later sit at the bottom of a waterfall, after jumping off a high cliff, for close to an hour trying to coax Kenny to jump because it was even more dangerous to climb back down. To his credit…. He made the jump! I have the pictures to prove it.



During my first 3 months of living with my Peace Corps family my outlook began to change. I began hiking with a passion. I would hike up volcanoes, hike to the bottom of craters, hike all around my town… basically I was exploring and I wanted to absorb everything that Nicaragua had to offer. I was seeing clearly for the first time in many years.



My Nica dad turned out to be an asshole. Even though the Peace Corps gave the family a sizeable sum of money to host me he decided to squirrel all the money away. I got a big heaping of rice and beans for lunch and dinner and bread and coffee for breakfast. One night they put this tiny little fish that looked like bait on my plate. I was so ravenous for meat that I ate that little fish with a passion. I licked the little fish bones and scraped every last little morsel off with my teeth.

When the Peace Corps started giving us our stipend each week I would go to local restaurants and eat every night. I remember the Peace Corps had sent me information on Nicaragua prior to leaving. The diet they stated consisted of bean, rice vegetables, beef, pork and chicken. I pictured Mexican food and was ecstatic. I would later find out that the beans were usually undercooked without any spices or ingredients, the rice was usually crispy and barely edible and the meat was as tough as leather. Anything of any value in the country was quickly exported out!

Random little beer shack on some random road...



My Nica dad would take off each weekend to go stay with his girlfriend. The way I found this out was that I asked his wife where he goes each weekend. She told me he goes to stay with his girlfriend. What? I asked her if this bothered her. She said no, why should it? She is my best friend. What???? I remember trying to explain how in our country that most women would not like that. I don’t think it registered!

Lizard on roof...



One night the two of them were screaming and arguing I couldn’t understand about what. Then I heard him pop her and she started screaming and crying. I couldn’t sit back. I got out of bed and came out of my room. He was going off and he was out of control. I grabbed him and wrestled him against the wall. He got really pissed and started going for his wife and I got in the middle of them waiting for a heavy hand to come down on me. He was a pretty big guy. Luckily he thought twice about it and left the house. My Nica mom had a pretty nice black eye… and I was just thinking… what the fuck is this?

I then remembered one night before this whole fiasco he had showed me this bottle of booze that he had that that he was so proud of owning. I found that bottle that night and I sucked it down! I don’t even remember what type of booze it was…. It didn’t really matter at that point! The dickhead didn’t show his face for a few weeks after that! I always wondered if she finally got fed up with his carousing around. Who knows. Like I said my Spanish was pretty bad back then! Dickhead never did ask about his prized bottle of booze!

I didn’t bother telling the Peace Corps. Pretty much my whole life I have handled my own problems. I didn’t really see a reason to go crying, “Oh why me” to the Peace Corps. The Peace Corps staff and I were already having our own issues by this time so I didn’t want to give them any additional ammunition to kick me out.

I remember when we finished our training we were given papers to fill out on our family experience and whether we would recommend them to another Peace Corps volunteer. Let’s just say I put the record straight. Later, I remember my Peace Corps director pulling me to the side and apologizing and asking me why I never said anything…..

Uh, maybe that would have a little something to do with the time in training when I actually implored the Peace Corps for help…. and was basically told to piss off. Well I should be fair and say that it was not the entire Peace Corps that failed me but rather the Peace Corps nurse. And if I could remember the bitch’s name I would put it down right here! Içm sure my fellow Peace Corps buddies remember her well too.

Giant butterfly that cruised into my internet cafe...



My Nicaraguan family did have the coolest son ever, Luis. Luis was about 12 years old at the time. I began taking little Luis hiking with me all over the place. One day we decided to hike Volcano Masaya. This was one of the few volcanoes that actually has a road that allows you to drive up close to the summit, that is if you are fortunate enough to own a car!

It was a very hot day and my Nicaraguan brother (dickhead’s son) and I were about 1/2 way up when I see another guy hiking and out of the blue he says, “Hey are you American?” Woah….hey wait. Hold the phone! Now I had been in the country for about 2 months at this point and outside of my fellow Peace Corps volunteers, I had not seen one American or even one person that spoke English. “Yes, Yes, Yes, I am American.”

If I had a red white and blue flag I would have started waving it at that point! He was with a Nicaraguan friend and he said something in Spanish and the guy turned around and started walking down the volcano. I didn’t ask why. We started chitchatting and I was sucking down water and sweating profusely. Climbing volcanoes can be tough work let me tell you! So about 10 minutes go by and there is the Nicaraguan guy that left us driving a car up the road… The American guy looks at me and says forget this.... I’m driving up. Come on let’s go.

So remember I am in my new zone. I want to explore. I tell him no. I will hike. So he takes off. I bet my Nica brother was a thinking I was a complete nut! Well he probablAfter about another 45 minutes we reached the top. I was about to pass out when I reached the summit and there was a small shack with a pile of coconuts.

I walked up to the little shack and there was the American guy again. He said something in Spanish and the lady started grabbing coconuts and whacking them with a machete and handing them to us.

I soon realized that you are supposed to suck the water from the coconut. I was so thirsty! I sucked down one and then another and then another and then another….

The Masaya Volcano is an actual live volcano. You can stand on the edge and look down into the crater. Way down at the bottom you can see a small fire glowing. Apparently hundreds of years ago they sacrificed virgins at this very point and threw them in. Fortunately I had lost my virginity before reaching the summit and was therefore spared.

The American guy tells me about some cool caves and asks if I want to go. Oh yeah… that is definitely on my adventure list. I remember him talking to his Nicaraguan friend in Spanish and being so jealous that I did not speak the language. He spoke so fast and clear in Spanish. Wow that’s what I wanted!

So we go over to this giant pile of rocks and climb down. He hands me a flashlight and tells me I will need this. After climbing down the rocks a large cavern entrance was there before me. We started to go in. There was a small stream and we walked farther and farther into the cave. At one point the cave turned and the light started to dim… it began getting darker and darker. We turned another corner and we were in pitch black. Turn on your flashlight he tells me.

So we end up going farther into the cave. At one point it opened up into a huge cavern. He told me to shine the light up. I did and there I saw thousands of bats hanging on the wall. The next thing I know the bats start to move around and all of a sudden there are thousands of bats flying all around me. He tells me to turn off my flashlight and I do. All I feel are the bats… thousands of them flying near my face. I feel the wind and the flapping of their wings all around me . Pitch Black.

We continued to walk farther into the cave which began to smell like sulfur from the volcano. The next thing you know our flashlights dies. We had to go back through the cave in pitch black climbing over piles of rock rubble and walking though streams all the while not being able to see your hand in front of your face. Very frightening! Turns out the guy was an executive working for Pepsi. I would later take my fellow Peace Corps buddies into the cave and give them a little scare too.

He ended up giving me a ride back to my house but along the way we stopped at a local bar. He turned me onto Conchas Negras. Delicious black clams popular down here. I remember we were drinking beers and at one point he looks around and says its going to rain. "What I said... It is sunny you are crazy." Oh yeah it’s going to rain and hard within a half an hour. S

ure enough ½ hour later rain came down hard like I had never seen. I saw cars driving through mini lakes with water ½ way up their door. Holy shit! What is going on? Don’t worry he says it will be sunny in ½ an hour. Once again I say no way! Fuck it’s raining like Noah the Ark type rain!

Yet sure enough ½ hour later it is sunny as can be. ½ after that the streets were completely dry. The mini lakes were gone. The roads weren’t even damp! It was like freaking magic. You could actually see the water mist rising off the ground. Wow!

No matter how many times I come to Nicaragua I see something I have never seen before in my life! Every time I come to Nicaragua I learn something new that I never knew before. Every time I come to Nicaragua I feel something that I have never felt before.

One day My Nica dad (the dickhead) managed to somehow squirrel his way back into the house. I remember one night he began to moan and moan. I remember thinking that he was such a pussy. His moaning was so loud I couldn’t sleep. What a baby I thought. I knew he was sick but come on dude get it together. Man up!

A week later I had Dengue Fever (think Malaria) and holy shit did I start moaning! I moaned louder than I had ever moaned in my life. I put dickhead to shame. My whole Monimbo ghetto would hear me! My nica mom began rubbing saves on my forehead and she massaged my head. Dengue Fever gives you the worst headache of your life along with sweats and body aches. You feel as though your head is in a vice! I felt like I was dying.

Finally my Nica mom gave me a pill… not sure what it was but it allowed me to sleep for a few hours. My Nica family was so worried about me that they called the Peace Corps and told them I needed a doctor. I think maybe even they couldnçt handle my moaning. I was told to go to the capitol of Managua and meet with the Peace Corps nurse.

The following day I ended up somehow making it to the capitol of Managua to meet with the Peace Corps nurse. After waiting several hours in agony she finally arrived 2 hours late. After looking me over… she said I was fine and that I just needed to drink liquids and to go back to my Peace Corps family. I told her I felt like I was dying and I could not keep down water or food. She just told me the same thing. Are you fucking serious I thought. I think at one point she may have even said I was exaggerating. Now this is the same wacko lady that told us how she let her kid play with random snakes he picked up on the back of a hill they live on. Remember Nicaragua has a type of Cobra that kills you instantly. This is an American lady too by the way... Freakin nut...

After several hours wandering aimlessly around Managua searching for my hotel room, I finally located it and proceeded to open the door, lock the door and crawl into bed. I had dry heaves all day. I would literally put one drop of water on my tongue and start heaving. I could not move from my bed. Soon my fellow Peace Corps volunteers began showing up and knocking on my door trying to get me to open it… I couldn’t move.

They started leaving juice and water outside my hotel room door. At some point the owner of the small hotel I was at called the Peace Corps and said that they needed to do something. Apparentlt dead Gringo´s don´t make for good business in the tourist hotel industry. Did I mention the moaning?

My Peace Corps program director ¨Diego¨finally came to my door and after several times asking me to open the door he finally began screaming for me to open the door. Something finally clicked and I fell out of bed and crawled to the door and unlocked it.

He must have realized how pathetic I looked because between him and my other Peace Corpse volunteers they managed to pick me up and throw me in the back of the Peace Corps SUV and they rushed me to the hospital emergency room. I remember dry heaving with the side door open with absolutely nothing coming out the whole ride to the hospital.

When I finally got to the hospital the doctor told my Peace Corps Director that I was in grave condition and that I was extremely dehydrated.

They hooked up an I.V. I remember moaning to the doctor and giving him sign language that my head was exploding. He said something to the nurse and they pumped something into my I.V. I felt a warm sensation start at my toes and work its way up my body but it stopped at my chest. My head continued to throb.

The doctor walked by again and I once again grabbed him by his jacket and tried to express the pain I was feeling. "Cabeza Cabeza…. Ayuda."

He said something to the nurse and once again she injected my I.V. and that warm sensation started hitting my toes and this time it worked its way to my head. Yes… Pain relief.

They would eventually wheel me into an air-conditioned room with cable. I remember taking 15-16 IV’s before I even had to pee. Then when I did have to pee… I felt like I was going to explode but I couldn’t go. They had to give me a catheter… more fun! I peed so much at that point that I overflowed the bucket the nurse had!

I spent the rest of that day in my first air conditioned room in several months with my first cable T.V. in sever4al months. I felt like I was in heaven. The nurses gave me sponge baths to cool my body temperature down. I really didn’t want to ever leave! Eventually they sent me on my way…

To this day I credit Diego with saving my life.

Internet Cafe in Pueblo Nuevo...



The Peace Corps nurse would eventually get fired for ineptitude! Such sweek kharma!

After my 3 months of training, Spanish classes and cultural lessons it was time to learn the locations of where we would be stationed for the next 2 years. I had long given up hope of living on the beach. Most business volunteers lived in bigger cities where they could have a bigger impact. One day they finally told me I would be living in Esteli. They told me that it was a big city in the mountains, cool climate and pretty girls. O.K. well… Not bad!



The cool climate turned out to be between 80-85 year round which was actually a godsend from what I was experiencing. I think the lower humidity was also a major factor! They also warned me that I would be the first volunteer to ever live in the city due to all the political problems and the Sandinista population. Oh great! If it is not one thing it is another!

One day my Peace Corps director loads me up in his truck and takes me 3 hours north into the mountains. We end up going to a local park and he tells me, “Kevin, don’t ever talk politics, stay out of the bars, don’t get too drunk and never walk in the surrounding mountains because they may still have land mines in them from the Sandinista/Contra period.”

I would soon end up breaking all those rules. He drove away and there I was with all my bags… literally everything I owned in the world, in the middle of a big city and I was on my own! WTF? Thanks Peace Corps.



I grabbed my bags and began walking aimlessly around this huge city asking people Se alquila, Se alquila, Do you rent, Do you rent? I was just pathetic. At one point I was so tired of lugging my bags around I just sat down and contemplated crying! I finally went to the next store I saw and asked the lady if I could leave my bags with her. She said yes and also told me that her son was renting a small home a block away. Divine intervention?

He was not around to show it to me but I could look at the outside. I said I would take it on the spot! I went back to Managua and then returned a couple weeks later to my new home and all my possessions were safely stored away at the store.



The house I lived in was actually a larger house divided down the middle by a thin 1/8 inch ply wood. There was a lady with a kid who lived on the other side and I could hear her plain as day. Just like she could hear me just like I was right there!

I lived in a great spot. There was a butcher across the street from me. Caddy corner was a vegetable stand. And across the other street was a lady who sold tortillas. I could get everything I needed by walking 25 feet in any direction. About a ½ block down the road there was a bridge and a river flowing underneath.

Laundry day....



I had a bathroom with an actual toilet a backyard with various fruit trees. It was just basically a living room a bedroom and a bathroom… what else did I need? I found a lady or rather she found me that would wash all my clothes by hand for about $2 plus $.50 for soap. Life was good. Other volunteers began to visit me. I began my job working with a small Savings and Loan Cooperative.

In the late afternoon I began sitting on my porch and watching people walk up and down my street. I would say hi to everybody and basically I was like a circus sideshow. I was the only white boy around and I stuck out like a sore thumb. One day a girl walked by and I said hi and somehow I must have said something interesting enough for her to stop for a second and talk to me.

It turns out that she was a teacher and taught down the road. I would watch her pass each day and eventually I would look forward to her passing each day if for only to have her say hi to me. She would eventually stop for a minute then two…

Neighborhood having fun...



We would talk about her school and she would ask me about the Peace Corps. We worked out a day where both myself and Craig would go up to her school and talk about the Peace Corps. I remember that we decided to bring some candy to endear us to the kids.

So we go the her Elementary school and put on a small presentation talking about the Peace Corps and when we finish up we all go outside and we tell them we are going to pass out candy. This is when a virtual mob scene takes place. Craig and I are surrounded by kids practically jumping on us. We soon began chucking the candy as far away as possible to get the kids off of us and the teacher grabbed us and pulled us out of the mayhem!

I would end up marrying the teacher. Her name is Mari.

Check out this guy taking his bike up some hill to his home...




One night I was kicking back at my house and it started to rain pretty hard. Then harder, then harder! I’m drinking beers and chillin’. Next thing you know water starts rolling in under my door. Uhhh… That’s not good. Then it starts to get higher and higher. I’m freaking out because my refrigerator is plugged in. I had just recently rented the refrigerator and that was a major coup for a Peace Corps volunteer. I think in retrospect I may have been more worried about the actual contents of my fridge... the BEER!

The next thing you know the water is up to my calf. In my house! Now I´m getting worried...

Now I have 2 doors to my house and they each have metal bar type doors in addition to the regular wooden door. I had made a point to lock these doors with a key lock each night. So now I start searching all around for the keys.

There I am running around my house looking for my keys when a couple people from the redcross poke their heads into my gated door. You need to get out of herenow they say. Yeah no shit dude. The water is rising and I am stuck inside... well basically a jail. Remember mosat houses down here are made out of cement block or bricks!

The water is now inching towards my knee. The redcross is screaming and I am running practically swimming around my house looking for the fucking keys to get OUT! You just can´t make this shit up!

I finally find the key and relief overtakes m. I run to my gated hell door and start to fumble around trying to get the freaking lock open when what do you know... I drop the key in the fucking water raging through my house.

I mean really you just can’t make this shit up! Now I am down on my knees frantically searching around for the key. I sobered up quick!

I finally find the key and I managed to open the lock and then open up my metal door and I started walking around the side of my house holding on to the bars and anything I can get my hands on as the river is raging down the street. Next thing you know I see a red cross truck up the road and they are tying a rope to the side of my house and stringing it up the hill. They grab me and I hold onto the rope and we all cross the river that is raging around and through my house and I make it to high ground. There I stayed for about an hour as the water subsided.

Then I went back to the house and my neighbor helped me sweep out all the mud on the floor inside my house and then I went to bed.

About 2 months later the exact same type of flood happened. This time I just stayed inside my house. I had long before stopped locking the metal bar door. The second time the flood came I just put everything up high and then I decided to just kick back and drink beers and watch the river rise inside my house and then subside. No panic. Been there done that.

About a month later I moved from that house to higher ground in the middle of the city. I had had enough!

One night a fellow Peace Corps volunteer decided to have a small party in her little town called Ciudad Dario. We all managed to get there by bus. Now back then we had to talk to the other volunteers by teletype. You would go to the local mail station and they would take down your message and then teletype it to the receiving town. At that point somebody would print out the message and deliver it to the person by hand. Now that’s old school! So a party was a major event for us.

Now there we are all drinking and partying and the next thing you know Jason starts talking some major shit. He did a Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. He just started going off… totally belligerent. He then decided to go outside and begin yelling and singing in the streets of Ciudad Dario!

Jason would end up sleeping in the street that night. The curb would be his pillow. Straight out drunk…. Nica style!

Jason is one of the smartest people I know and he was one of my best friends in Nicaragua. I can see his head expanding now as he reads this...We would end up travelling together throughout most of Central America.

Dog hiding out



We would dive together in the Caribbean waters of Honduras, we would travel to the coasts of El Salvador and Guatemala we would travel the length and width of Nicaragua. Most of these adventures also included Mitch.

Jason was also the best man at my wedding when I ended up marrying Mari upon completion of my Peace Corps service. Mari and I would travel back to the U.S. by land. Well… almost. That’s another story!

Jason would go on to obtain his Masters Degree in Business from Georgetown giving hope to even the most pathetic of humanity… proving that you can go from sleeping in the gutters of Nicaragua to graduating from the most prestigious Universities of the U.S. with an MBA! Te amo Jason!

I just fired up a Churchhill which is a giant freakin’ cigar. Whenever Mitch, Jason and I got together we would smoke these. I would bring them from my town of Esteli which is where they are grown and we would sit around and smoke our giant cigars and drink rum and feel like big shots!

Tonight I smoke a big fatty cigar in honor of you guys.I hope all your dreams are being realized.

At one point the three of us made an epic bike ride along the southern coastline of Nicaragua. We camped out in my small tent and bought fish from the local fisherman. We would cook on an open campfire. We would build a bond fire each night from driftwood spread around the coast that we were tasked to collect each night after biking all day.

We mountain biked along a cow path that ran parallel w the coastline for days and when that trail eventually ran out we rode our bikes on the hard pact sand near the surf. There was nothing around for miles except the occasional small fishing village…

We were hard core explorers living in the moment. In fact If I may take the liberty to say, I think we were living our lives like a candle in the wind… never knowing who to cling to when the rain sets in. OK that was cheesy but it came on the my computer playlist... the Eric Donaldson version...

Yes we were kids, young men. Adventure and freedom were our only guides.We lived life with a passion in those days. I remember at one point on our journey we were camping in an especially nice spot and we were near a small town. In the evening we would go out hunting for turtles that we had heard came onto shore at night to lay their eggs. I remember one night we saw the biggest turtle I had ever seen scooching along the coast.

We returned to the tent that night and we noticed one of our skillets was missing. The next night we decide to use our collective intellect and after returning from drinking in the local town that night we decided to bury our cooking utensils under out tent.

Sure enough the next morning we realized that they had stolen our pots underneath our tent as we slept! That did not deter our adventure.

We continued our adventure south down the southern coastline of Nicaragua minus a pot and a couple pans. We determined on that journey that we should buy as much coastline property as possible while we could!

Well, needless to say the life of a Peace Corps volunteer is not riddled with money. So that was one dream that would soon bypass us. Now that same coastline that we biked down many years ago is quickly being bought up by idiot Americans who have never lived more than a few weeks in Nicaragua.

Fortunately I eventually did end up purchasing a stretch of coastline in the northern coast of Nicaragua that my friends and I came close to viewing back then but was inaccessible. Even today it is one of the most inaccessible coastlines of Nicaragua.




At one point we all made a pact that we would come back and live in Nicaragua and not forget the mindset that we had developed after living in this beautiful country for over 2 years.

I am not sure I would hold them to this pack.. I sometimes wonder if I will ever come back and live down here permanently. However I think the larger aspect of that pact would be to live with the mindset that we had when we made that pact.

I think I will always hold them and all my fellow Nica 6 compatriots to the pact which is the freedom and feelings of such a higher and more meaningful purpose that exists in this world. Yes…. I do hold you to that higher standard and you are obligated to fulfill that pact!

I only hope that all people can subscribe to that philosophy one day.
Bob Marley is piping in, Don’t worry about a thing. Cuz’ everything little thing is gonna be alright. Don’t worry.

How fucking appropriate. Are the stars aligning? All you pessimists… just fuck off!
Doth’ says Kev!

Chillin at the Rancho - Part 2

Don Gabino my father in law. Now that´s a cool cat!



So if you need or want to lose weight…. Nicaragua is the place to come. I mean you can’t drive down to the local McDonalds whenever you want. Almost every meal comes with a heaping of rice and vegetables and small meat portions. Although I have to admit, they have discovered French fries and serve them with every meal! I mean even when you order a Filet Mignon, it is served with French Fries. Hey I am a fan of French fries so no worries there.



Now when you add the fact that you walk almost everywhere here in Nicaragua, you can’t help but lose weight when you come down here.

When I first arrived in my little town of Pueblo Nuevo I was driving my little clown car 3 blocks to the local internet café. Typical American right?

Now I have turned over a new leaf and I have started hoofing it around my little town. Hell, you can throw a rock from one side of town to the other… well almost.



I like the little road to get to the Rancho… It looks like a jungle road with a small river to one side…but don’t get too hammered or you will end up in the river for sure! There is no curb at all… just a drop to the river below.

So my buddy Mike told me a story about how he was driving his truck one night with a friend a little… well… Let’s just say… a little inebriated. So he gets pulled over by the cops and not only does he not have a valid driver’s license but he didn’t even have license plates or insurance on the truck he was driving. Not to mention the fact that his Visa has been expired for over 2 years. Yeah… the Visa that actually allows him to be in the freakin’ country!

So after some careful deliberations with the cop, the “said” cop gave Mike a DUI ticket and sent him on his away. WTF? You get a DUI and they give you a ticket and let you keep on driving? Yeah you get a ticket for DUI here! Wow….

Mike now has a driver to take him everywhere he wants to go these days…. Smart!

The Peace Corps flew us to Miami for 3 days of orientation before our departure to Nicaragua. After arriving in Miami and taking a shuttle to the hotel, I opened the door and there was this young white kid in the room on the phone babbling in Spanish. I didn’t understand a word he was saying.

I got nervous thinking that I bet all the other Peace Corps volunteers speak Spanish! That would not be the case. When he got off the phone I introduced myself and he told me he was Craig. I told him how excited I was and how I couldn’t wait to begin this big adventure.

“Dude aren’t you excited?”

He looked at me rather strangely and said “I guess… why should I be”? I took Craig out to a bar that night in Miami and Craig got literally falling down drunk after 2 beers… no lie! Within just a few hours that night Craig got drunk, sobered up and got drunk again… I had never seen anything like it in my life.

Craig would end up living in a small town about 45 minutes north of my town in Nicaragua and we became good friends. He was the closest volunteer stationed near me and we had some good times. I decided to ride my bike to Craig’s house one day down the hairiest mountain in Nicaragua. More on that story later.

Craig would eventually learn how to put down small amounts of Rum and Beer but he never was a big drinker. Now, a big jokester…. YES!Craig would end up living inside a small bank in an even smaller town called Condega. You just can´t make this shit up!

So the next day in Miami I decided to go down to our hotel bar for a beer…. I’m seeing a pattern here!

Anyways, so I am sitting down at the bar at the opposite end from some random guy. I was wearing an SDSU T-Shirt. The guy looks at me and says “Hey did you go to SDSU?”
I said, “No” perhaps not even realizing I was wearing the shirt. Perhaps I should have followed up with some other conversation… but I didn’t.

The next day in my Peace Corps orientation I saw the same guy. It turns out that the guy who asked me about my shirt was named Mitch and he was also a fellow Peace Corps volunteer in my group headed south!

Mitch would become one of my best friends in Nicaragua and he would later tell me that he thought I was a major asshole from that first meeting! I suppose I never was good on 1st impressions!

Mitch… well his name anyways, would one day become the most infamous names in Nicaraguan history. Hurricane Mitch hit Nicaragua in 1999…basically destroying the Northern part of Nicaragua (Yes… my home turf). The funny part was that I was actually traveling in my Ford F250 from San Diego on my way back to Nicaragua when the storm hit! I was on the border of Guatemala when the reports started coming in. More on that story later!

Here is my F250 that has put in some serious mileage and offroading action... now it´s for sale...It has seen better days for sure.



So I am sitting there at this orientation with 12 other people that would make up Nicaragua Group 6. Or as we would later come to be called, Nica 6.

At some point the person giving the orientation looked around at the 13 of us and said… “Look around, at least 3-4 of you will marry a local person… those are the odds.”

I looked around and laughed at these suckers! Man… these guys are going to get married? Luckily it won’t be me!

I mean…. I had decided long ago that marriage and me were not even in the cards! Marrying in Nicaragua? Not even a remote possibility!!!!

Well, the joke turned out to be on me! Out of our group of 13…. 3 didn’t make it past the first 3 months… and out of the remaining 10 volunteers in my group 5 ended up marrying local people… myself included.

When our plane arrived in Nicaragua, I remember walking out the door of the plane and the hot humid air blowing into my face…overwhelming me. I started sweating profusely at that very moment and I don’t think I stopped sweating for 3 months!
Back then they wheeled the stairs up to the plane and I remember walking down the stairs and looking around thinking I was on another planet! Then when we managed to make it through customs and immigration and finally get into our bus… I realized that I was not on another planet....



I realized that I was not on another planet but that I had really just been transported back in time! The airplane I had been on taking me to Nicaragua must have really been a time machine. A time machine taking me back to a time in history that I had only read about in text books.

On our bus taking us to the city of Granada, we passed oxen pulling carts of firewood, we raced past horses and mules. The cars on the road did not look like any cars I had ever seen. It turns out that they were really old Russian cars left behind from when the Russians and Cubans were working with the Sandinistas in the 70´s.

Our bus took us to a hotel in the small colonial town of Granada. Granada is a now thriving tourist town on the shores of a large lake. People take enormous amounts of pride in the city. It has very cool interesting colonial style architecture. An American named William Walker sacked the city in the 1800’s and then burned it! He would later go on to proclaim himself President of Nicaragua. Americans have basically been fucking this country ever since!



When I arrived at my hotel in Granada all I remember was the heat. We had arrived in the hottest month of the year. High 90’s with the same degree of humidity! Tropical hell! I remember taking a shower, getting out, toweling off, getting dressed and then being just as wet as when I got out of the shower.

The heat was unbearable and the pitiful A.C. in our hotel room just barely passed as a fan. I began losing weight that week and it was a steady progression for the next 3months. The Peace Corps nurses would eventually pull me to the side each time they saw me and make me hop on the scale to see if I was going to completely melt away!

So the coffee measurement came up a tad short of the 4 manzanas… so we had to go back to the negotiation table… more fun…. We got it all sorted out and now they are cutting back the weeds on the property as part of the deal. Everything should be finalized on Friday. I come home the conquering hero for making a great deal, well hopefully!



I’m listening to Bob Marley right now…. I’m back at the Rancho a few days after my last blog. I listened to a lot of Reggae when I was in the Peace Corps. I mean a lot. One of my buddies lived on a small Caribbean Island called Corn Island on the East Coast of Nicaragua. Man he had it made! I mean the clearest blue waters you ever saw. Everybody listened to Reggae on the Island. The Caribbean side of Nicaragua has African slave descendants that American and Europeans brought over to work the Banana plantations and extract hard wood in the area way back when. So it has the Jamaican Caribbean vibe. Tim ended up turning me onto a lot of Reggae that I had never heard. He also ended up extending his Peace Corps service an extra year… Smart!

One of the nicer houses in Pueblo Nuevo....



People are once again rolling into the Rancho, just a few. Hey, it is Tuesday after all. I guess people come here to eat too!

So as new Peace Corps volunteers we began going to meetings each day, all day. We were learning about the culture, language, social customs, etc… In the evenings we went to the local bars and drank! One night we went to a circus that was in town. I remember being slightly frightened! The sights, sounds and smells were all new and unique.

The first big question all the volunteers had was where would we all be living for our first three months of training. All we knew is that we would be living in some part of Nicaragua with a Nicaraguan family and we would be studying Spanish and the culture for 3 months.



After much secrecy and meetings and back and forth…Finally they told me I would be living in Masaya. A major city… Yes! But I would be living specifically in Monimbo a small “hood” where the indigenous population lived. One of the last ancestral Indian cultures of Nicaragua. Basically they were putting me in the freaking ghetto of Masaya… nice! Not only that… this is where the Sandinista uprising took hold. Great!

The local carpenter and his shop...



Taking a break...



So now after living for a week in a “nice” hotel with shitty air conditioning and receiving all my meals from a restaurant I was being driven to Monimobo, Masaya to live with a local family. Can you say nervous? I was so freaking scared. I was leaving all my friends and my safety net. This was it!

They dropped me off with my Nicaraguan family said a few words and away the Peace Corps went. Bye have fun!

A big Native American looking man and a pretty blondish Spanish looking lady greeted me. I noticed a baby swinging lazily in a hammock in the living room. They showed me my room that was actually kind of nice. It had a small bed and a dresser and it was all mine. I dropped off my luggage and then went to the living room where we began a pathetic attempt of communication. Basically I didn’t understand a word they said and my Spanish was atrocious. This is when I realized that my 4 years of High School Spanish and 1 year of college Spanish was basically a pile of shit and good for nothing!

All I remember in our first conversation was me having to pee so bad I thought I would bust. I remember trying to talk to them but really just having to go! I finally tried to tell them my concerns in Spanish that I needed to get to a toilet fast...but my attempts were to no avail and finally making some hand gestures that were abundantly clear to all present they thankfully pointing me in the right direction.

The next 3 months would prove to be extremely interesting and at times somewhat dangerous and life threatening!

So they booted me out of one part of the Rancho because there is a big meeting… Although they put me in one of the little Ranchos that seems perfect for me.. better light and an electric outlet for my computer. Life is good! Oh man… I just found out that they are having an AA meeting… no wonder they are hiding me way back here! I should have known when I saw then busting out the coffee maker! Man… I should ask them when the next meeting is!

Eric Donaldson is one of the Reggae bands that Tim turned me onto. Man… one of my all time favorites!



So let’s talk about getting some perspective.

We get so caught up in the running around in the States that we sometimes forget to sit back and get some perspective on life! We are like little rats running around a maze occasionally we get into the wheel and go around in circles. We sometimes are stuck in a rut and fail to progress.

It seems we are always striving for the almighty dollar. This is our main objective within the maze. Find the dollars… and when we actually do find them, we want to find more! Thus, we wage the epic struggle which is the pursuit of money. Hey, I’m in the same fucking rat money maze too. I won’t lie. I want that money too!

I think we all realize that money is not everything. However, we also are smart enough to realize that money can make our lives a hell of a lot easier! Therein lies the dichotonomy.

Therefore I think it is imperative for all of us to find a way to step back, and find some sort of perspective on what is important to us in life. We need to find some sort of semblance of reality. And within this reality we are allowed to visualize that which makes us truly happy! Or so the philosophy goes… I mean I just studied all that right brain shit in college. What do I really know?



Regardless, I personally search for these brief moments of clarity when I visit Nicaragua. Here I am able to clear the various cobwebs from my brain and if for only a brief point in time, I am able to leap over the walls of the money maze and wander freely within my own beliefs, my own happiness and my own feelings of love and hope.

Yes, here in Nicaragua I find my personal freedom. Here I am Kevin… the ideological young man with the same spark for life that I once possessed when I decided to join the Peace Corps many moons before! Man this is getting sappy!

The local Western Union...




GIVE ME THE MONEY NOW!



Well… I must admit, in the beginning when I first returned to the United States after living in Nicaragua for 2 ½ years, I did not relate to anybody.

I mean I had just returned from an extremely mind altering experience. Kind of like tripping on acid for 2 and a half years! Now how do I co-exist in this strange world that I left behind?

The Peace Corps had tried to prepare me for re-entering the United States. They told me that there would be aftershock. They told me that I would not be able to relate to people when I first returned. They told me I would have various feelings of longing for my adopted country of Nicaragua. They told me that I may not feel that I belonged in the U.S.

Well they were right! Fuckin’ A they were right! When I returned to the good ol’ U.S. of A I felt like I had once again been transported back to another planet! A strange and distant planet that I had trouble relating to!

I felt like I could never view the U.S. exactly the same. Basically I felt like Ozzy Ozbourne in the epic song… “I’m going off the rails on a crazy train”. Do you like how I tie heavy metal into my writings??

Now many years later I am rocking to that same song and finding parallels in the words?

So I am 15 years old and my buddy John says hey Kevin let’s go see a Punk Show tonight. Well who the hell am I to say no? So we go up to the local show one night at Wabash Hall. We had both snuck out of the house that night. Black Flag was the band for the night! I remember there was a little stage and all these crazy looking people all around.

Then out of nowhere some crazy drug addict looking guys came walking by John and I and then they jumped on the foot high stage and started just screaming their lungs out!

Turns out they were Black Flag… They just starting going off! Everybody starting slamming and I was scared out of my wits! Eventually my buddy and I jumped into the mayhem and began throwing our bodies around in sync. John continues to be one of my best friends today!

John made a pilgrimage down to Nicaragua with me at one point! Props to him! I was able to show him my other world.

I think everybody needs to journey outside their realm of comfort in order to find meaning. Life is more than money and running through a maze. Life is about finding purpose...

Maybe... right? But then again, what do I know?

Chillin´at the Rancho...

Today I slept about 4 hours… major siesta… that was after sleeping in too… I guess the warm air just makes you tired down here! Here is a picture of my house in Nicaragua and my little clown rental car!



My neighbors...



My street...


My outdoor stove...




Now I am chillin at the Rancho drinking a beer..





So I made some headway on buying 4 manzanas of coffee. I think the deal is going through. Lots of back and forth and points when you think the deal will never happen. Business is done much differently down here. First you sit around and chit chat for about ½ an hour and then you subtly bring up the business at hand. They state their opinion and then you state yours. You haggle some. Then they get mad and threaten to leave then you get mad and threaten to leave. And finally after this give and take...you seal the deal with a handshake. Usually the bickering is about such petty things I can’t help but feel I should just give in but then you won’t be respected and the next deal you do you will get fucked for sure!

Tomorrow we will measure the property to ensure the size is as quoted and then we will have the lawyers do their thing on Monday. 1 manzana is equivalent to approximately 1.77 acres. That will bring us up to about 20 manzanas total or 35 acres of coffee…. Little by little! Of course all my peeps will be the first to get a shot at buying our delicious coffee when we manage to get it to the states! Ha! Crop comes in around December… taking orders now!


Rocking to a little Iron Maiden…. Ear phones dialed in! Man you have to love computers…. My typing becomes so much faster when I bust out the heavy metal! So hard to keep the fingers from doing the devil ears when I rock this stuff… I wonder what my Nicaraguan friends would think to see me just start major head bangin’… devil ears rockin’… tear off my shirt! Fuck yeah! 22 Acacia Avenue! They should rename the Rancho! This just in: Insane Gringo banging his head hard at local Rancho Bar and fingers permanently affixed to the devil ear sign. Must be some sort of voodoo!

Saturday night here in Nicaragua… should get fun tonight. Hopefully I’ll be safely tucked away in bed when all the madness starts going down. Early in early out is my philosophy! Just trying to keep it simple! Ok mixing it up with Jimmy Buffet and The Eagles. Music sounds so good down here. You sometimes feel that you are sooo very far away from everything you know down here. When you start listening to an old favorite like Tequila Sunrise everything comes back into perspective and life is all good!

Small ranchos around the big rancho...


Beer 3 now with Led Zeppelin bringing me up the Stairway….. They leave the empty beer bottles on the table. I guess it makes it easier to total up your final bill, but it also lets everybody else around you know how much you are throwing back! Weird!

Yeah… Nicaragua is a really cool and extremely interesting country. You definitely have to come here with an open mind however. This is definitely not your Club Med experience. Things can definitely be tough! The weather can be hot, humid and depending on where you are and what time of year it is, outright unbearable. The food can be great one day and the worse crap you ever ate the next. The bathrooms are an adventure every time! You never know what exactly you are walking into! You could walk into a normal toilet or it could be a hole in a cement slab going down into the most stinky pit imaginable.





Different philosophies on life too: When I was staying at the beach I saw the coolest neon red crabs with bright yellow spots constantly cruising everywhere around the property. Then you would see Mike come running by like superman and splat! Smashed crab guts all over! He would stomp on the craps with his foot and then kick them to the side… apparently they eat all his tropical plants and foliage that he spends hours planting. They also dig deep holes all around the property. Now a regular person may freak out on this…. I don’t mind… and when I saw a couple crabs one night creeping to my feet... well I just kicked them out of the Rancho… but I spared the guy’s life.

I nicknamed Mike, “Crab Killer”! He said these type of crabs suck to eat or make soup out of so he doesn’t mind splatting them! Stacey gave me some gigantic shrimp one night with this honey jalapeno dip that was out of this world! The shrimp were caught just up the coast… fresh and yummy and cheap! Crab is in abundance down here too! Hopefully we can get the kind we want to eat next time!

The northern part of Nicaragua… specifically the Esteli region is famous for cattle, cigars and coffee. The cigars are so smooth you don’t really feel like you are smoking. You don’t inhale the smoke to begin with, so you are just left with this really mild taste. They blow away any other cigars in the world! Cuba? Yeah, whatever! Most of the owners of the tobacco here are from Cuba! They know a good thing when they see it, or when they smoke it… in this situation!

Now if everybody can just Stop, Collaborate and Listen! Oh boy……… Now that party is jumping…. I may need to switch up to some Gran Reserva (Rum).

Now this is a roof....


Change is so slow in Nicaragua. It is so slow that it is hard to see. Yes there is definite change but for the casual observer you can almost miss it!

I think I need to make a trip back down to Granada and Masaya soon where I began my Nicaraguan journeys. This may put some perspective on the change. I first came to Nicaragua in March of 1995. I was an idealistic young man searching for meaning in my existence. I had been working in the Department of Social Services for the previous 2 years after graduating from college from Chico State with my Business Degree.

I graduated in a recession and I soon became convinced the cards were all stacked against me. I mean I had gone to college and graduated fulfilling all the preaching I had been subjected to since I was basically in the womb. I took the tough route in college… with my Business Degree. I didn’t do the Communications or Physical Education Bull Shit… sorry to those who did. But I took the tough route… hard math classes and right side brain bull shit!

When I graduated I held that fucking piece of paper… (my business degree) up like a torch. High in the sky expecting the world to lay down before me. Here it is…. Throw your money at my feet now! Man was I in for a rude awakening. People could have given a shit less about that piece of paper. When things are tough in the States… that piece of paper represents money that somebody can’t afford to pay you! OVER FUCKING QUALIFIED!

So I got my little government job doling out the welfare. My first actual real job and one of the few jobs I am actually proud of by the way. The job allowed me to work a 4-10 week. Basically 4 days a week 10 hours a day. So I had 3 days off each week. I soon began traveling south into Mexico the very minute my 3 day break began. I began traveling further and further south each week in my little VW Camper Van. I would surf and camp out, drink beers… I was really searching....

There I was searching and searching for some sort of meaning to my existence. I eventually came to the realization that I needed something more…. I’m not sure exactly how it came to me. Yet one day… the Peace Corps started to burn into my brain! The more I looked into it the more the Peace Corps started to fill the void for me and my quest was on! I began filling out all the forms and paperwork that was required. I took some exams I believe and I finally got my interview set. I put my best suit on and travelled up to L.A. Imagine my surprise when I hit L.A. traffic! Shit.

I called to say that I was running late. I got there about ½ hour late knowing that I had probably blown all my chances of making it into the Peace Corps. However the girl that interviewed me was so cool and laid back (an ex-peace corps volunteer… but I didn’t know what that meant at the time). Even as I apologized profusely for arriving late she just said no worries. She asked ne a series of questions basically to determine if I was a fucking nut case for wanting to go into the Peace Corps and give up 2 years of my life!

Her final question to me was this simple one, “Kevin what are you running from by joining the Peace Corps”? I didn’t hesitate, looked her directly in her eyes and said, “I am not running from anything, I am running to something. The Peace Corps is calling me and has been calling me for many years. I am running to the Peace Corps.”

“WOW I never heard that answer” was her response. At that moment I knew I was in.

Everything I had said was true. I had opened my heart to the Peace Corps and there was no other destiny for me! A month later the letter came in the mail.

Easy E is now telling me to Fuck the Police… now I do subscribe to that philosophy on occasion… but now that I am older and wiser I don’t trip that hard on the policia. Especially down here! The Rancho is definitely filling up! Down here you only need to be 18 to drink… and the young bloods are coming in getting their drink on! Thankfully they are listening to the melodic music of Vincente Fernandez… if I started piping my Ozzy through their speaker system this crowd may get out of control! Out of fucking control for sure!

Me and my computer...



There is a special bicycle section for the bar…. Nice!



Reminds me of a DUI on a bicycle I once received in college in the small town of Chico, CA. Where the judge laughed and asked if that was an actual crime and he had to open up his criminal code book! More on that story later! Ozzy is just going off right now… man I love guitar riffs! The Rancho is filling up… I’m getting buzzed….almost time to smoke my cigar and get out of here! Oh…. MR. Crowley…. I mean Cromley…. Ozzy missed this song by one letter!

Man… my music is so heavy tonight! Moving away from the soft stuff! Ozzy can definitely throw down!

OK Time to switch to rum! Down here you just buy the whole bottle. No messing around and they kick down a bottle of coke a bucket of ice and away you go...




So I will let you in on a little secret! I brought my mom with me on this trip! Yes my mom passed away recently. I was given her ashes. And well I am spreading those puppies all over Nicaragua. I want her to see my travels. I put some in the ocean where I stayed down in Mechapa Beach. I will put some in the cemetery here in Pueblo Nuevo and I will spread some around my house down here in Nicaragua. Ashes to ashes dust to dust… now rock on!



I’ve found that the back of a wooden match makes for an excellent poker for a cigar! I don’t know if it is positive or negative but the younger crowd seems to have learned how to drink and hold their booze and the weird violence that used to pervade in Nicaraguan bars seems to have subsided. However I think this has more to do with economics and the fact that most of the young men here seem to have money to buy beer and not have to split a bottle of cheap alcohol which generally leads to more violence…

micro-economic solutions to major problems such as early pregnancy, violence to women, etc…



In fact looking around, I am the only person sucking down the RUM…

Cigar is fired up… a slow burn…. Smooth and controlled!

Now the night draws to a close….

Closing in on last call………. My personal last call!
The electicity just went out here at the Rancho…. Only my computer is shedding light on the topic… Iron Maiden is now busting hard.

Now the electricity is back on. It was only a bref moment of obscurity! Or was it rather a brief moment of clarity?????

Now there I was standing there with my Peace Corps letter in my hands... I was so nervous! Even though I knew the result… I still opened it with trepidation.

There were the words laid out before me…. Congratulations Kevin, you have been accepted into the Peace Corps. If you accept you will be stationed in Nicaragua and will be leaving in 2 months. First thought... FUCK YEAH!!!! Second thought: O.K. Where in the fuck is Nicaragua?

Now my first choice had been to go to a Caribean Island followed by South America and finally Central America. I had been surfing awhile and I wanted to be near the coast. After busting out every map I could get my hands on I finally said, Oh hell yeah I will go to Nicaragua!

I had heard all the rumors about Ollie North Iran/Contra scandal, Sandinistas, etc… I actually imagined living in a jungle with rebels carrying AK47’s patrolling all around my hut.... But I really didn’t care. The Peace Corps would not steer me wrong.

My life changed drastically that very day. I have been reaping the benefits of my decision ever since. Life is all about forks in the road… Often times picking the less traveled, tougher path can make all the difference in your life....