Sunday, Feburary 27

I got up early this morning (5:30) to go with Santa Elena to help prepare for a birthday party at the neighbor's house. When we got there at 6, Santa Elena left me in the front room to help some kids blow up balloons. We blew up like 200 blue and white balloons and then decorated the tent set up in the front yard with them. I learned how to make a bunch of decorations and got fed a relatively normal-sized breakfast (yay!). When the yard was decorated and the rented chairs were set up, I rode along to pick up the cake.

You can imagine my surprise when I found out it was a 5 tier cake and that the party was for a one-year-old! We were greeted by a rehearsing band and a gathering crowd when we returned to the party house. Before the party really began, there was a 2 hour church service complete with a gringo “Shine, Jesus, Shine.” After church, everyone was fed a mountain of “Chinese Rice” and bread. Lunch was followed by the demolition of a massive “Go Diego, Go” piñata. Once the candy was collected and gift bags were handed out, most of the 100 people (church members, family and friends) in attendance left.

We stayed to watch the mom open all of the gifts and a group of girls asked me to teach them English tomorrow. I'm not sure how I will do it yet, but I agreed to give a lesson to their religion class tomorrow night. It should be a fun experience.

When we finally made it home around 4:00, we went inside the 90º house to cool off. My host mom showed me the duck nest in her bedroom and I got the coloring supplies out for Luz Marina and the neighbor girl to play with. Santa Elena passed the rest of the afternoon reading her Bible, and I wrote, read, and tried to prepare for tomorrow's English lesson.

Luz Marina helped me make some posers and practiced her English numbers and colors in order to help me tomorrow. When my host dad came home, we all sat together and talked about English and the US. Eventually the conversation turned to illegal immigration. Oh, the binds my limited Spanish vocabulary gets me into! We talked about how difficult it is for Nicaraguans to get a visa and then how long it would take to walk to Texas. My host dad kept emphasizing that you need lots of money to get across borders illegally. I was exhausted from the long day and excused myself to go to bed to avoid inadvertently encouraging illegal immigration.