This weekend I have really had a “Nica-weekend”. Firstly I should tell you that I live in a house with two other girls, one who is Nicaraguan and one who is Dutch. There are in total four bedrooms on the house.

I spent most of the weekend speaking Spanish (in which I have very basic knowledge) and getting to know the family of my Nica-housemate. On Friday we got ready to go out to see the carnival. Im guessing that this is of bigger interest to girls than guys but many Nicas really dress up when they go out to bars and clubs here. This is something I did not really expect which is why I left all of my heals at home.

In any case, we went out and met up with three of her siblings (two brothers and a sister, she has three brothers and two sisters in total), two of her friends, her cousin and her sister in law. We went into a little place not far from the street where most of the tourists eat (called “la calzada”) were they served chicken, beef or pork with banana (but the type of banana you use for cooking which is very common in Latin America) either fried crispy with a savory taste (verde) or fried greasy with a sweet taste (maduro). When the plates with the food arrived I started looking for cutlery and saw that the others started digging in with their hands. The lady that served us must have observed me because she came up to me with cutlery. The rest of the table looked at me and smiled. I decided that I should do this the Nica-way so I took the cutlery but started eating with my hands and got thumbs up from the others. It felt a bit strange, I was dressed up from head to toe (aside from the fact that I was wearing flipflops) and was having a messy but delicious meal. After dinner we went to a club were they played, among other type of music, salsa and bachata (a quite romantic and “intimate” type of dance if I am going to explain it somehow). Here we spent the evening talking, dancing and drinking the Nicaragua rum “Flor de Caña”.

The next day we went up, had a quick breakfast with the cousin of my housemate, and while we still were eating my Nica-housemates´ brother arrived with two friends and we were soon off to my Nica-housemates parents house. Here we were going to have some “Sopa de Mondongo” for lunch (a soup made with vegetables and slow cooked diced tripe) and some cake with the same people from the evening before plus the parents of my housemate, the aunt of my housemate and her two nieces. The soup was really tasty even though I was a bit skeptical before I tried it. Before everyone were finished one of my housemates´ brothers took out a guitar and started singing songs in Spanish. Some of them I actually recognized as songs by Gypsy Kings (a Spanish group). When everyone was finished eating we had some cake and sang birthday songs in Spanish (thanks to my grandmother I actually knew one of the songs since she sings it when someone in my family has their birthday). After this we hitched a ride to the center of town to see the Hipica which is like a parade with cowboys and their horses that are taking a specific route through the city to show themselves with loud music and people selling snacks everywhere. The city center was packed with people and as we were walking on the street we really had to watch out for the somewhat nervous horses that kept on passing by. We spent hours walking around looking at people and listening to the music. Eventually we sat down and had a couple of glasses of the local beer “Toña”. When we got to the restaurant my housemate went up to the headwaiter and told him how many we were. All of the sudden (in the already packed restaurant) he brought out a table and within 5 minutes he had arranged chairs to everyone. We spent a couple of hours here until me and my housemate decided to walk back to our house. Back at “home” (its still going to take a while before it feels natural to call it home) we watched a movie in Spanish and when I went to bed I think I was dreaming in Spanish after a full on weekend with speaking it more or less all the time.

This morning I had my first briefing at the hotel in what I will be doing here for the upcoming months. Tomorrow morning I will start by taking part in the breakfast service in order to observe and learn how its done here.

Now I have to go and do some groceries since I have to make a salad for the 20 people that will be attending the birthday dinner of my housemates’ mother tonight…