Chris snapped this picure of one of many bird’s nests built atop those deck beams. This one, much sturdier than most, is made from a base of mud.
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This is a long post. The first part, email from our intrepid travelers, is important reading. The rest is of sketchy value.

Many, many people have asked me what Matt meant by Hil’s harassment.
I asked Hil if I could post her response, which was in an email she sent to Peter:

Go for it. definitely post it. a lot of people have been asking both of us what he meant by that. it really is such a societal thing, and i don’t know whether i should blame myself for being the odd one out here, or them for making it uncomfortable, or something else, or in between. ee! so many possibilities!

your brother and i have been talking about it a bunch, yes. i knew you’d be interested, and i figured the blog could use a better explanation.

matt and i are going to leon tomorrow morning, so maybe we’ll email again tonight but otherwise, don’t be worried if you don’t hear from us till monday.

i was really homesick until matt and i figured out that the best way to be ok is to just keep busy. its helping. and the weekend will go by quickly and then we’ll be more than halfway done.

i can only imagine how much sleep you’re losing. i email my dad and talk to him about once a week, and he seems fine. i know i would be freaking out all the time. maybe next year we’ll do something else. or i will. i think going to a place where i didn’t speak the language contributed the most to being a little lonely. cuz normally if i went to someplace with english speakers, i would try to make friends. but here i’m worried about messing up (i know i shouldn’t be like that friend of yours, but i’m self conscious is all!). my favorite parts of the day/week are when we hang out with david or roberto, the 19 and 21 yr olds of matt’s family. david is the best. we went out with him last night to a restaurant and he obviously tries really hard to a) have us understand him and b) him understand us. its really fun. we just hang out, talk about differences in the states, all that good stuff.

much love, and i’ll talk to you soon, Hilary

The attention thing is ok. i’m mostly used to it. although the other day a guy gave me a high five, held onto my hand, wouldn’t let go, was speaking fast (about the revolution, i think), asked me where i lived, took my other hand, asked me if i wanted him to walk me home, and when i said no thanks he took my hands, kissed the tops of both of them, kissed my cheek, called me bella (pretty), linda (pretty), and moreno (brown haired. yes, weird). as i walked the block to my house i reflected that that is solely the way they show happiness and affection. in the states that would’ve happened by someone smiling or, if they were confident, asking you for a drink. as it is, they’re more abrupt, in-your-face about it. but its all well-intentioned. that guy had no intention to hurt me or scare me. that’s just how i take it, its how I have been programmed to respond to how HE has been programmed. society does some funny things to you, mostly fucked up things at that.

my main problem is not being able to have complicated conversations with people, because i cant communicate a lot of my thoughts in spanish. the lawyers that were staying at my house had to leave because mike’s father in seattle had a heart attack. but i was REALLY sad when they left, because they were people i could have really great conversations with. matt’s a wonderful person, but we know exactly what the other person is thinking, meaning its like having a conversation with myself. before mike left he said he wished he could stay so we could teach him how to save the world. i wanted to cry.

well, off i go. much love, Hilary

***************

Matt,

There are too many Dave Princes’ on the internet. Give me a clue about
which one.

Chris is slowly getting better about catching flying tools. I found that it really helps if I first warn him that something is coming.

You’re going to Leon, we’re going to Boothbay, we’re going to have Lobster, and you are going to have….?

Love

Dad

Dave Prince, singer, sung at the olympics, i think i saw him in a movie as well…..
Haha, for a baseball player I bet he can’t catch a hack saw. Give it a try and tell me how it goes.
Hmm… what am i going to have in leon? No idea, for sure a hot shower and a swim. I miss boothbay, good old memories.. who did we bring there? Zack? maybe.

Oh, by the way, dont warn about the saw…

Peace
Mateo

***************

The second part of English Lessons.

“No, Chris, we DONE GOOD!”

“We did well. What did you get in English?”

Like I have a clue what my high school English grades were.

“I did well. But this isn’t about grades or good grammar it’s talkin’ tough. Construction tough. It’s not, we did wellllllll (I raised my voice and strung out the word well . It’s we DID GOOD! (I tried to lower my voice to Matt’s level, but failed.) You see, we did well is feminine and we did good is masculine.”

Chris hesitates for a moment and then asks, “Are there masculine and feminine power tools?”

“Let’s see, the gun that blasts nails into concrete is obviously masculine.” I scanned our workbench but saw only manly tools. “They are all masculine tools….except for maybe the combination square.”

I see. That’s because it’s used for drawing, right?”

“And here’s another thing, Christopher. You see that woman over there driving the steam roller back and forth, flattening the newly laid tennis courts?”

“Yeah, is there something wrong with that?”

“In my day…but that’s a lesson for another day.”

***************

Diane warned me that I shouldn’t post this next bit (yeah, she simply shook her head when I read her the tools-have-genders thing) without the permission of the main character. Chris and I both say, pshaw. But in deference to my wife’s wisdom; I’ll keep it anonymous.

A friend of Chris’s slammed his finger in his car door (beware Honda owners), felt the pain, but walked, “About three feet,” before he looked down at his hand and saw that he had amputated his right index finger from the nail up. He ambled back to his car, retrieved his finger tip from the crease where the door closes, and then went to the hospital to see if it could be reattached.

“It turns out they can sew on larger parts, but nothing so small. There is no arterial blood.”

I’ve had some experience with amputations (Chris now calls us brothers), and A. I cried like a baby, and B. I didn’t finish the cabinet I was building before hurrying to the hospital. This comparison to Chris’s friend comes to mind: An early settler is planting crops with his family. Indians attack killing his family but leaving him unscathed. The sun sets, he walks back to his house, sits down for dinner and wonders where his family is.

Matt’s latest:

Ah,boothbay harbor, i am jealous if that is possible considering i am in paradise. Anyway, we are going back to the school in a few minutes, and i’m just doing some emailing before we catch the bus. Yes Leon should definitely be a good time and i will spend a lot of time in the shower as well as at the beach. But dont you worry because we will be very careful and only swim where the locals tell us it’s safe. On the afternoons that we do not do work, we do excursions for the school, or go out with the kids from my house, who are 19 and 21. Life is good here, and i will talk to you soon
Much love
mateo

The last two weeks Chris and I have been working on what we knew was the worst rot problem at Applewod (intentional, I’d rather not have owners Googling their way to the blog). From a distance we could see the deck was way off level, as if someone had lifted the outside in order to roll the deck furniture through the sliding door. I hoped it was all frost heaves; it turned out to be that and a rotted sagging building.

We dutifully supported this wobbly second floor deck with enough lumber to build an entire suburb. When we finished with the supports it looked like the thing could walk away, centipede-like, but we no longer worried it would collapse and kill us.

We (okay, Chris) then cut the deck away from the building by sawing a two foot channel the entire width. This provided the necessary room to repair the building rotted by years of seeping water. But this isn’t so much an essay about construction work, as construction talk.

Whenever we’d finish an important stage, like freeing the deck without it falling down, I’d holler, “We did good.”

“We did well,” Chris would correct me.

To be continued…. (I was up late last night losing money to my poker friends)

For my birthday, some of the members of my family and I went out for a small dinner and then to a karaoke bar. It was definitely a good time and hil loved it all.

Ah yes, the trip to the quiejos sounded like a good time. And that dessert looked like something i definitely would have wanted in on. In fact, any good dessert or some food from the home front sounds pretty good right now. The hut we stayed in in miraflor had bunk beds. No water of course because there was no running water in miraflor, along with no electricity.

The temperature was unbileavable hot in the day, and really cold at night. So cold that i actually used a blanket for the first time since arriving. Anyway, looking very forward to leon this weekend. I am thinking that we are going to leave on friday morning, and stay till sunday so it should be a good time.

Wow, give adam my good luck, i remember hearing that he was thinking of doing that, but i didnít know that he actually went through with it.

Much love

Mateo

Copied from the last entry’s comments, which I know not everyone reads:

well, i know matt talked about miraflor a bunch, but i wanted to get MY two cents in too!
it really was the most beautiful place iÂ¥ve ever been, and juan carlos was great. Josh and Rebecca, our fellow travelers and hikers, were the best people we could’ve been with. i don’t know if all of you know this, but i got LOCKED OUT OF MY HOUSE FRIDAY and COULDN’T GET IN IN THE MORNING BEFORE WE LEFT. meaning, none of my stuff. rebecca lent me shoes, matt lent me clothes, and it was fine. minus the fact that i didn’t have my baby, my camera.
as matt and i walked up the road from the bus station and on a path, and through cafe plants and banana trees, and into an opening with this nice little house and kitchen, and to the right the forest,dressed in fog and rows of cafe beans, he said quietly to me ®thanks for making me come®. that was practically the best part.
and after the horseback riding, he said that it was worth it. even though he’s complaining ever since he got off the horse about how sore it is. ®hil, if it still hurts tomorrow iÂ¥m going to… to… gah!® was what he said last.
my favorite part was waking up sunday to find the fog enveloping us all, and to get on the horses and just gallop. rebecca described it as feeling like she was a princess. i felt as if i could leave the world behind. matts horse could tell he was apprehensive — when me and rebecca and josh were galloping as fast as we could, matt was trotting and our wonderful juan carlos was just chilling with him.
the waterfall was beautiful, and i managed to make a fool of myself. be warned: do not jump onto slippery rocks. i won’t do that again. i cut up and bruised my elbow like crazy, and got all my clothing soaked. ®whatever®i thought ®doesn’t matter now!®and took off my shirt and went swimming in pants and a bra.
wonderful.
the pictures are great, and i made matt take lots of flowers, knowing that all of you would like to see those.
much much much love, and especially to cortney for being THE CUTEST girl i know.
i¥ll write you an email later.
love and light (amor y luz), Hilary

Wow, was miraflor spectacular, and i saw the pictures from the website and they do not do the place justice. i got a lot of great ones, but nothing but being there can truly describe how wonderful it was. The day we got there we had breakfast, met a wonderful couple named Josh and Becca and then went for a long walk with them and our guide, Juan Carlos. Juan Carlos might have been one of the best things in the place, although it is hard to say because everything was so damn spectacular. He is 20 and just the nicest guy. We got back to the farm and had lunch. Me and hil stayed in a wonderful little hut and it was just a blast. I took a long nap after lunch, and then got up freezing (a new experience for me in nicaragua). Not only was it freezing, but storming as well. We had dinner and a long discussion with the guests (all 6 not counting us) and then went to bed. The next day we had breakfast – all the meals were great by the way – and then went horseback riding. This being my first time i was a bit apprehensive, but it was one of the most rewarding experience of my life. The views were just wonderful, and we stopped and went swimming in this beautiful place under a waterfall. The trails that we took these horses on were crazy, and i have to admit i was a bit scared as we were galloping down them. Although by the end i was able to gallop without holding on for dear life. Got some good pictures of miraflor and hil took some of me on the horse. Just a great experience in general.

At the moment i don’t exactly know where my family is, as they are not in their house and the door is locked…… the little girl next door just said No esta aqui…. so I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do. I expect they will be home sometime soon though. Yes, i expect we will pamper ourselves in leon. God that hot shower will feel great. Anyway, much love from here in nica. and i will talk to you later

Much love
Mateo

P.S, not really all that homesick, and the spanish is getting easier, thank god.

Adios

************

Dear Matt & Hil,

I rode a horse once, or should I say I got on the beast and it walked around while I tried to steer it. I pulled the reins, kicked its side and twisted its ears, but he acted as if I wasnít there. When I finally dismounted, it stepped on my foot. Iím glad your horse was better behaved.

Yesterday we, with Mark, Ginger, Adam, Tricia and Dan, drove to the Queijoís in Hubbardston for an all day barbecue. We arrived at 1 PM and sat and ate and drank and talked until 7. It was then that Jan forced us to get off our ìLazy butts,î and onto the pond. They have two kayaks, one canoe, a rowboat (not unlike the one your uncle Peter and I used on Big Cynthiana Road) and a sailboat. We played on the water for another hour and then headed home.

Below are photos of our incredible desserts: a raspberry cheesecake Mark S brought and Janís homemade blueberry crisp. As good as they were, the best dessert was waiting for us at home – your email.

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Feasting on the above

Some might remember the last time I had to replace those supporting deck beams at Applewod. Then, it was with Mark Queijoís help, this time strong-like-bull Chris and I wrestled with the impossibly heavy timbers.

We replaced four, two at ground level and two over our heads for second floor decks. If you watch this movie youíll see me waltz into the frame and lift the beam as if it were a toothpick -camera rolling, adrenaline flowing. But it gets more amusing after that, although itís mostly a view of Chris’s back. Fortunately, my grimacing face is lost in the shadows. It took three stages to get this beam in place, and Iíve combined the movies from my digital camera into one. At the time, Chris called them Death Scene I, II and III, but unfortunately for the blog, there were no deaths.

This is a 3.7mb Quicktime movie which means you need a fast connection and QT installed.

Peter wonders what Matt will do next summer. Travel to Afghanistan? Clear unexploded ordinance from the Waikoloa Maneuver Area on the Big Island?

If Mr. Clean were allowed to age he’d look like Jock. Tall, shaved head with broad shoulders, but a golf pro’s weathered face and legs that bow out – the result of long ago football injuries. At fifty-three, Jock wed Amelia, a native of Chile, and though he knew some Spanish from his own dogged pursuits, it wasn’t until he brought her to his home in Boxborough that he resolved to learn more. “It just wouldn’t be fair to her.” Often when I talk to his wife, Jock translates.

Yesterday it was time to work on his deck, and as I walked past his open slider I heard, “Work, I love work. I can watch it all day long. I think I’ll bring my chair out here so I can watch your skinny ass slaving away.” Yeah, the funny thing was not so much that he noticed my skinny ass, but that he said something about it.

“While you’re watching me work, tell he how you learned to speak Spanish long after your brain had fossilized. My son’s in Nicaragua (I tell everyone about Matt and Hil), and he’s studying Spanish four hours every morning. He, I understand, but you…?”

“I picked up a thirty year old Spanish vocabulary book and I married it. Conjugated the verbs, completed the lessons and so on. But you know what helped me most? I stopped being afraid of making mistakes. They don’t care if you make mistakes, they enjoy it, it shows you are trying.”

I don’t know who the “they” is he was referring to. Maybe all the Spanish speakers in the world, or more likely, Amelia’s friends and family.

“I don’t care how much you study. If you’re not willing to practice it, you won’t be any good. When I made a mistake that I was aware of, or couldn’t think of the right word, I’d say, I’m a little bit embarazado. I made many mistakes, I repeated it often, A little bit embarazado’. Do you know what embarazado means?”

Wanting to impress him with my own grasp of a foreign language, I paused for a moment and replied, “Sure, it means embarrassed.”

“ No, it means pregnant. I kept repeating, ‘ I’m a little bit pregnant.’ “

As planned, we called Matt at 6 Pm to sing Happy Birthday, but no one answered. We checked the country code and dialed again, but no answer. We thought it terribly unlikely that out of a family of ten (eleven with Matthew), that the house would be empty. This time Diane found Egdelina’s original email and compared it to the phone number on her typed piece of paper. It matched, we dialed again, no answer. We were about to give up when the phone rang. It was Matthew calling from his cybercafe, four blocks from his house.

“Matt we tried to call but the phone just rang and rang.”

“I know. I was home, but the phone is in a room and when they are not home they lock the door. I could hear it ring, but I couldn’t answer it. It broke my heart.”

At 5:20 this morning, Matt and Hil boarded a bus that will take them on this road to Miraflor

haha, whatever it was that i had or have, well…. i am taking the helen route of mind over matter. It makes things a bit easier to deal with. Tonight i am not sure when i will be home. but i think your best bet would be to call around… .hmmm good question. I am going out to dinner tonight, so i would suggest that you call at 11 ur time. That two hour difference doesn’t sound like much, but really makes a difference as to when i will be around. Now that i think about it, ur best bet would be to call around six your time. I will try my hardest to be around. Quiero halbar con mateo, if you didn’t know. this will probably be followed by a large amount of confusing fast words and then by them putting down the phone to find me. No esta aqui, means he isn’t here. at which point you could try again later tonight. I would kill for some steak from the 99 at the moment. Although i do enjoy the food here a lot.
Yes we did start work at the school, although i am not exactly sure of the name, but we are translating letters to american sponsors who give money to the school and to the family of the kids. It is not exactly the easiest thing to read spanish written by a seven year old. But it is doable and pretty fun. Anyways, we leave tmorrow at 520 for miraflor. Should be interesting to see if we can get up that early.

Much love as usual
matt

Hil’s email address – sun_moon_and_hilly@hotmail.com
Matt’s – abstudent16@hotmail.com
Matt’s Phone Number – 011-505-713-3274

°Feliz CumpleaÒos, Mateo!

Globos

Que tengas un buen dia!

(In Latin countries, girls get serenaded on their birthday–when is Hil’s?)

Haha, i bet you are loving the emails, keeps you knowing we are alive. I was sick yesterday and for most of the morning, but i seem to be recovering at the moment(knocks on wood). I agree that the trip to managua is a must, as does hilary so i don’t think that is a problem. We are meeting some wonderful people , such as this couple from the states. They are abagados and have been living down here for the last year, working with organizations. Humanitarians they seem, and are awfully helpful. Tomorrow is not only my birthday, but the revolution celebrations. I am thinking it is going to be a very interesting day. As for today, i am sitting in this internet cafe, looking out the window at a portion of the street that has been blocked off. They are playing music and volleyball and other games. I have no idea why or if it is even a celebration. But it is all very interesting to watch. As to where i am sleeping, no it is not a closet, in fact the room is fairly large. As is their house. They own a new izuzu rodeo and a four wheeler, and i wake up one morning and it turns out they also use the kitchen as a garage. As you will see from the pictures. I think today is going to be our first day of volunteer work at the schooll. If i feel well enough to go. Everything is going great, and as for the connection…. i think it may be a DSL type thing, because it goes faster then dial up… but we are in central america and it still isn’t what i would call fast. 21 days left according to hil.. anyway
much love
mateo

At Johnís non surprise birthday party, Flo mentioned how she had been bitterly disappointed at not having a bathtub at Concord Park. But her spirits had brightened, she continued, when one of the residents told her that indeed there was a common tub, but that it was located in the basement. Cheered by the prospect of soaking her aching bones, Flo had sought out Nancy, the executive director, to ask where in the basement the tub was. Nancy replied, ìNot only do we not have a tub, but we donít have a basement.î

Bob Lewis, Johnís father, was at that party and told me later that he enjoyed Floís story so much heís now passed it on to , ìAbout a half dozen people. But gosh,î he continued, ìsome people donít get it. They look at me like they are waiting for the next line.î

I’ve been calling Chris my right hand man, but he amends it to, “My right index finger.”
Here we are hiding from the rain in what nearby condo owners are referring to as our home away from home.

Dan Downing
In case others have started to wonder, as I have…

Closest Linda and I have gotten is Costa Rica’s northwestern border, to see the giant turtles laying their eggs on the deserted, sandy beaches on the Carribean.

And here are pictures of the school Matt and Hil are attending.