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....