Mixed metaphors

Behind the ping of raindrops on corrugated ceilings, over the rumble of the Pacific -- the heavy surf breaking over the jagged boulders scarring the beaches at Las Peñitas, the asthmatic wheeze of water sucked back to sea -- the perceptible sizzle made me grimace, my body tensing the way one does anticipating impact, being struck.  Like incandescent gashes suddenly torn into the night, electrical surges lurched across the black, horizontally, branching out and crookedly out, like NCAA tournament brackets from a Parkinson's afflicted hand unfurling in reverse, the spiderwebbing of cracking glass radiating away from the point of origin; then, extinguished, ocean and heavens remarried in darkness, the only remnants the etherial singes on unblinking irises.

Alone on the unlit street, power in Las Peñitas having gone out some time ago, I decided my life was worth more than seven dollars, approximately what I'd budgeted for a going away feast of pescado frito, tostones, y arroz, accompanied by either a cold Toña or Coca-Cola, the latter to this day concocted with real sugar in Central America.  With beach spread to my left and nothing in the way of trees or houses for several hundred meters,  I moved from a walking to jogging lightning rod.  

Back in my beachfront hostel, the same one that advertised "Horse Ridding" as an activity coordinated for visitors -- and someone must have taken them up on it; I saw nary a horse in my two days at the beach -- I reclined under a thatched roof and scarfed down the package of ten Oreos in my pocket, admiring the most violent display of lightning I've ever seen.  

The sky was ablaze.  It was like sitting inside a tent that light could hardly penetrate as an army of Samurai warred on the outside, frequent and errant sword strokes tearing gashes into the walls, unpredictably scattering across the canvas blinding streaks of light that were, inexplicably, cloaked anew in an instant.  In the moments between sharp flashes a dull glow would pulse on all sides, like the night sky of a city under siege, a city in flames, observed from a distance, evidence that beyond, behind clouds and obstacles, the storm raged.

The next day I was back in León, wandering the city one last time, in the evening catching a microbus to Managua, then a cab to the airport.  The cabby and I chatted the whole fifteen minute trip, which cost me under five dollars after tip, and he gave me his phone number -- another friend the next time I'm in Nicaragua.

At the airport, going through security, I inexplicably thought back to the bottle of Smirnoff Ice someone had left in my hostel room in León.  "What a waste," I thought, "How hilarious it would have been to hide the twelve ounce and thus not carry-on legal bottle in my carry-on, and then explode with a 'You got iiiiiiiicceedd, bbiiiiiiiiiiiiiittcchh' when bag-screening security personnel uncovered it in my bag."

I wonder if they play that game in Nicaragua.  I wonder if Nicaraguan airport security personal are allowed to have a sense of humor.  I wonder if sometime I'll get so intoxicated pre-flight that I'll think it's a good idea to ice airport security.  I hope so.

Delta Air Lines plays an instructional safety video before flights, during which passengers are advised that "most seat cushions can be used as flotation devices."  One would presume that Delta knows which particular seat cushions are floatable and which aren't, considering that all distinct cushion types -- headrests, seat backs, seat bottoms, etc -- should be constructed according to identical, type-particular specifications.  Yet, the company chooses ambiguity, promising survivors extra post-crash insanity -- amidst flames and wreckage and scattered limbs and torsos, screams and wails -- a mad and savage scramble to figure out which fucking seat cushions will keep your legless torso afloat until rescuers arrive.  

More likely than anything, Delta knows, should your plane crash into the ocean, nobody is going to survive.  So it really doesn't matter.

Toward the end of my trip, after my Spanish had edged out of rusty unpracticedness, I was asked, by native speakers who had known me for several days, once if I was Spanish, another time whether I was Argentine or Spanish.  And there was no asterisk, nothing about me being latino but retarded.  Which felt nice, complimentary without being an intended compliment, and it almost made me forgot an encounter weeks earlier in Masaya, when I was getting back into the groove of español 24/7; I'd unintentionally indicated to two  chatty and obviously gay teenagers, after having clarified I was a connoisseur of titties, a fiend for the latina, that I would consider joining them in a romp of the homosexual style.  "Pero no sos gay, verdad?"

Indeed not.

So now I'm back in the States, with a trip booked to Guatemala just after Thanksgiving, a little mission work.

That mission: to educate a few café-colored, Católicas Chapinas about the advantages and pleasures of contraception, a pocketful of Trojans and a healthy libido my teaching aids.

Barbecue's Revenge

With the end of humanity now in sight, courtesy rebellious barbeque, I hope women will start throwing themselves at me. And less in the 28 Days Later we-wanna-share-the-plague-and-pain type of throwing oneself as the let's-get-it-on-in-these-last-moments type of forwardness.

Yesterday in Managua, on one of the many inner-city bus rides I took between Mercado Huembes, Plaza Inter, and Mercado Oriental, a girl near me vomited violently several times. Later a guy, without first assessing the floor, plopped down in the seat, his black boots swimming in the white sea of clam chowder -- of a chunkiness to which Campbell's aspires. I was gonna warn him but I felt like I needed a laugh. Mostly because riding city buses in Central American capitals, supposedly, is the russian roulette for muggings, so everybody is constantly mad-dogging everyone else, brandishing bags of mangos as if they were bricks, making sure the thorns of those dozen roses are prominently displayed.

Anyway, I figure I witnessed the introduction of barbecue's revenge to Nicaragua, and being on a packed, vomit-sloshing US school bus has probably ensured my quick demise. I'll be dead next week. So be it. So far, though rather quickly, said virus has only manifested itself as brutal purgings of the bowels -- which are making me suddenly thrilled horrible karaoke is blaring from the bar next door. Every time I fall upon the toilet seat is sounds like the Gremlin who squeezed into my anus is being skewered.

At least, before I die, I've rediscovered the joy of tipping. Which is to say rewarding good service when it isn't an obligation. I typically eat street food or in grungy market comedores, or I'm buying fruit by the bagful. Minimal service eating where tipping is unheard of. But yesterday morning, at a random comedor stuck in a dirt-floored, covered space between the long onion and watermelon galleries in Masaya's public market, I was spurred to generosity.

Of course the breakfast I wanted didn't correspond to any of the dozen covered pots of various meats and vegetables and concoctions atop the woodfire stove. I rattled off a short list of what would satisfy my cravings: gallo pinto, queso, y maduro. I was assured my demands would be met and was pointed to the plastic table with the rice and bean residue-soiled tablecloth. The ladies went to work.

After ten minutes appeared a heavenly platter of greasy gallo pinto, maduros y queso frito, mas la mitad de un aguacate, dos huevos fritos y un cafécito. The family chatted me up, Everth, the father of two-year-old cutie Belinda, had his daughter walk over and kiss me on the cheek, and proceeded to bill me C$30. Which is to say there was absolutely zero concern I was being given a gringo-weighted bill. Which is to say, in several emergency situations, I have literally considered wiping my ass with larger quantities of money. So I dropped a Pedro Joaquín Chamorro. BAM. Fifty Córdobas.

It's an incredible feeling to stuff yourself on a made-to-order feast, all in gracious company, then, in a place where tipping doesn't happen, dtop 66% of the bill, all this and walk out only US$2.50 lighter. Though, now that I think about it, my intestinal perturbance might have something to do with the family's use of avocados as the tool with which to soften and flatten raw steaks.

To top off a nice dining day I visited my first Nicaraguan taco stand. Nico tacos are like taquitos, rolled tortillas filled with spiced, shredded meat, served with cabbage salad. I had two chicken tacos, pulled fresh from the simmering oil-vat. They were intensely flavorful, all that crispy fattiness balanced by a pineapple sweetness, hot peppery bite, and juicy meat.

Today I breakfasted again in the market, treated to the same fresh feast at whatever hour I arrived (frickin' McDonalds, and all you have to do is reheat some frozen shit!). Afterward I chatted for hours with Everth, and carried his daughter around the market while he purchased a variety of fruits I'd never tried, so I could eat again. The guayabana with its incredibly sweet white flesh; nisporo, with its sapote but smaller, juicier imitation; hocote, simple and sweet. Tomorrow I've been promised anona, a red-skinned, sweeter take on the guayabana.

When I returned to my hotel, the owner delivered a note my good friend Marbel had left in my absence. I hadn't seen her since she suddenly stopped appearing for work at the quesillo stand, at which point I stopped eating quesillos. I called her up, her husband scooted over on the mini-moto and scooped me, and I spent the afternoon eating homemade baho and chocobananos in the humble family home. I got to hang out with Marbel's awesome kids, mom and sister, share laughs and compliments over old photo albums, and then share the majority of my 1800+ photos on the viewing screen of my digital camera -- many from parts of Nicaragua they'd theretofore, well, only seen in pictures.

And I was reminded again of one of the trillion reasons I'll regret dying soon, without having the pleasure of returning to NC for an eastern style BBQ-sandwich: People making you feel at home far, far from home. Good ol' southern hospitality.

The Managua Family and Philosophy on Animal Fighting

They might well have been a family as claimed. In retrospect, they had all the makings of a cult.

I'd smiled at Elizabeth a number of times during our 24-hour TicaBus transit from Panama City to Managua, Nicaragua; when we'd cross paths disembarked for yet another border crossing, or crashing down the aisle toward the busback bathroom -- solamente para orinar. It wasn't until the TicaBus station in Managua that we exchanged words, and a ten minute conversation in which I revealed I was undecided as to my next destination ushered an invitation to spend the night in Elizabeth's household of fluctauting family, minimum fifteen.

I was going to say no, and I really intended to do so, but delirious and motivationally sapped after twenty-four mostly sleepless hours, I was overwhelmed by the enthusiastic arrival of her escort party: mom, a sister and brother. Mom shuffled up and -- her head swiveling between me and Elizabeth like a speed-addled gore freak trapped between two concurrent crashes -- and implored nobody in particular, "Y es cristiano él?" Harm rarely results from lying, so I answered with an affimative nod.

They flashed judgment blinding smiles and grabbed at my hands and luggage like geriatrics grappling for a basket of free Viagra samples. We crammed into their Toyota model Hot Wheel and belched and bucked our way across town, Christian music blaring at an unbearable volume all the way.

Their house turned out to be a number of rooms attached to the family's church, where a sermon was in progress. The living quarters had one well air conditioned room into which everyone around crammed themselves, rocking in chairs, leaning against walls, splayed across the floor or atop the bed. Christian music pulsed at a decibel level that made conversation impossible and almost drove me to accept the existence of a deity merely for someone to supplicate for miraculous intervention. The hand of God twisting the volume knob. People came and went and sang for the glory of god. It was asked if I was baptized. Shortly thereafter it was declared I would accompany the family to a rural retreat the following week, Semana Santa. Everyone squeeled with glee at the prospect of baptizing me. I excused myself to the bucket shower, which might well have been holy water, and contemplated drowning myself...but I can't execute a handstand for long, so dunking my head in the bucket would've resulted in me toppling over onto the hard tile, suffering some debilitating injury that would have imprisoned me in these eager Christian hands for much, much longer. A combination of frustration and cranium-rattling from the bumping bass vibrated free a river of tears that ran so thick I could've passed on the shower if it weren't for the sticky salty skin feeling I'd have been left with.

Day turned into night and the godspeak raged on, tainting my gallo pinto and pollo frito. I'd informed the family, to the disappointment, that I'd be leaving for Estelí for a bout of womanizing the next morning. "Pero, por supuesto voy a regresar para la Semana Santa. Quiero que pase un sin fin de tiempo con Ustedes."

Once I arrived in Estelí I took the coward's route, sending a thank you email that outlined how, suddenly, circumstances had changed and that Semana Santa reunion, regrettably, would be impossible.

Now I'm back home, Hospedaje Chepito in Estelí, Nicaragua. The girls are still the sexiest I've encountered and liberal with their eyelash-batting and smile-flashing. I've reestablished my nightly fritanga routine, a sagging plate of gallo pinto, cabbage salad, tortilla and chili with a carnivore-pleasing portion of marinated pollo o cerdo. I caught a Estelí vs. Granada baseball game yesterday, and am hoping to experience another national pastime, cockfighting, within the week. Now, animal fighting seems cruel and heartless and morally vacuous until you consider what it really is: just like Gummi Bears battling in your fingers, the loser banished to your mouth, animal fighting is just two pieces of meat competing for the honor of feeding you, titillating your tastebuds, first.