5 Hours A Night: Off To Nicaragua

We get to meet the man in charge!

This week I thought I’d take you all with Ellie and I to Nicaragua instead of boring you with some small details of the house like we finally were approved by the city for our plumbing inspection. It wasn’t so much because the city was that far behind or that the plumber was bad (because I AM the plumber in question), rather it was just that I couldn’t really find time to do the small little things left over that were needed before calling in the inspector (mainly get the master bath tub running without leaks). So this past week Tuesday, the inspector stopped by and gave the thumbs up on everything and even commented how well he thought the house turned out. I give all the credit to every volunteer that gave your sweat and hard work to make that happen. It’s been just over two years since we started this whole thing and I would never be where I am today without you! So with the news that the plumbing is good to go, I will move on to more exciting things of Nicaragua.

It began with a call to ‘Uncle Jonny’ who has spent the last 2½ years there teaching High school math to kids of local missionaries and some local Nicaraguan kids as well. His birthday was the 29th of March and for his birthday I thought ‘wouldn’t that be cool if Ellie and I went to see him?’ To make a long story short, within 24 hours I had decided to buy the tickets, throw caution to the wind and spend a week with my brother-in-law and share an Easter and Ellie’s 4th Birthday with him.

This was made a bit more challenging as I decided this last Saturday, giving me only a week to acquire Ellie’s passport (after realizing that just a birth certificate wouldn’t be enough). Okay, well as in most cases, it’s all about being organized and willing to pay a little more for things when you REALLY need them. For those of you that don’t know (or have a reason to know) there are places online that provide up to overnight delivery of passports if you want to pay for it. How it works is those cities that create the passports (i.e. D.C., Chicago, etc.) have agencies that literally walk you apps into the office to get your passport. So with 24 hours before the plane was due to leave, the passport arrived via FedEx.

Off to the airport and Ellie’s flying high in spirit. She asks no fewer than 16 times “are we there yet?” throughout the trip. Getting past that question wasn’t so difficult when pointing out the many other wonderful distractions of how planes work, who stewardesses are, where the pilot sits (which she got to experience), who the kids are in the seat behind us and the many other things that I tried diligently to ‘discover’ for her. She was her adorable, well behaved and the perfect little lady to all that we met. She introduced herself with ‘Hi, my name is Ellie’ to every person we sat next to and every flight attendant that passed by. Needless to say Ellie made quite a few friends along the way.
A quick pic before we go/We meet the pilot!?

Say howdy to everyone around us/Brush our hair before bed

Finally arriving in Nicaragua was great. The temperature at 9 p.m. was about 75 degrees with a soft wind and fragerence of flowers and a touch of diesel fuel from the air planes. We passed through customs without a problem and then hit a speed bump waiting for our luggage. Poor Ellie, by this time she hadn’t had her usual nap because she was so excited to see Uncle Jonny and was finally hitting the wall. She was so tired, but a perfect lady, that she just collapsed next to the luggage turnstile and sucked her thumb and waited paitiently as seemingly everyone else retrieved their luggage and we continued to wait for our last piece to appear. It’s in those simple moments that I realize just how blessed I am to have been given this little angel who has taught me so much about my faith and a out love and about being a father. I know for a fact that the Lord hand-picked Ellie for Leslie and I because He knew the road we would be traveling and knew that Ellie is the only one that would make it possible for me.

Finally our last bag appears and we hustle through our last customs check and go outside to find Jon waiting for us in the crowd and Ellie’s face once again lights up. It was great to finally be at the end of our travel and time to get a bite to eat and get some much needed sleep. We hopped into the borrowed 4Runner from a church friend and set off to get a bite to eat. I don’t remember the name of the place but we had a great meal of grilled chicken, rice and beans, a cold beer (Ellie of course had juice) and a piece of fried cheese. We were introduced to the different culture immediately, not by the little kids looking to load our bags into the car and then looking for a small tip, or the concrete and tin housing, or the random dogs and people walking here and there as we drove, but by the resturaunt bathroom not having a toilet seat and me having to hold up Ellie above the bowl and then washing our hands in a sink that was outside the bathroom in a random place that was pretty much in the middle of the restaurant. Of course there were the questions by Ellie of “why is this and why is that and what is that man doing that or why isn’t there a sink in the bathroom Daddy?” and thankfully Ellie would take the answer, process it and then just move on and accept the different world she’s now in and keep moving on. Her flexibility and personality to roll with the punches amazes me and I’m sure at times I take for granted.

Waking up the next day at the house of the family that is hosting Jon, we are awakened by Elllie at 6:15 and the sounds of the local birds, trees swaying and the fans blowing. The casita we are sleeping in is relatively large for what I expected and well maintained compared to what I have experienced before in Latin America housing. The floors are clean and the craftsmanship is well done. The usual brighter earth tones of brown, oranges and yellow are everywhere and the bed is surprisingly comfortable. The temperature feels like it’s already climbing to the upper 70s and it’s time to prep for church at the small Christian school Jon teaches at. Taking a shower with a shower head that has been locally named ‘the widow maker’ due to the electricity being hooked up literally to the shower head, makes for a bit more tense shower. Jumping out of there, clothes on for church off we went to church about a mile a way – if that. The main roads really aren’t that bad, sure a few pot holes to watch for here and there, but for the most part it’s the side roads that you could lose an axle on.

After church we were invited to lunch at Papa Johns by our host family and I thought it might be like grandpa’s house (theres the Dutch training coming out) but no, it was actually the Papa John’s pizza we all know – I felt a bit sheepish. It was a family-style restaurant which was different but stil the same great food. Then we played at the local mall arcade and won enough tickets fromt eh skee ball and ball shooting game to NOT win a single toy. So we told Ellie to give her tickets to another little girl and she was destroyed. The hanging head, shuffling the feet and everything so we quickly thought to go for ice cream. All was better and we were on our way to take a nap as the temperature was nearing 90 and we were starting to feel the effects of the warmth and lack of water. After taking about an hour nap we jumped into our suits and headed to another church friend’s house to play in their pool. What a beautiful house and a great pool that hit the spot for everyone. We stayed for a home-cooked dinner or roast, mashed potatoes, green beans and super chocolatey brownies. I thought I was still in the states and our tummies were full the brim. Meeting a lot of people that Jon has come to know over the past few years makes this trip feel more than just a tpical vacation at an exotic location, but a visit of friends and family in a far away place. It’s really been a great start to an impromptu trip with my little girl to see a family member that I Ellie and have missed so much over the past 2 ½ years.
Uncle Jonny is excited to see Ellie/WE all head to the pool