Directions

Anyone who knows me back in the States knows, I am bad with directions. I need more than just verbal directions to get to somewhere I have never been before. A map, a GPS system and don't worry I can still manage to get lost more times than I would like to admit.

The people who live here have a remarkable sense of direction. I notice rather often as I try and orient myself that there are no addresses in some communities, no house numbers, yet the people who live here, even if they are not from the particular community we are in know where they are going. They know how to get to all the communities Amigos works in (over 100 communities in and around the Western coastline side of Nicaragua mainly with a few dotted closer to the center of the country), and how to follow the directions of community members how to get to certain homes. And trust me, this is an accomplishment because these directions we get in community are very vauge; go that way (insert hand gesture here), down 2 cuadras (sortof like blocks but they are not equivalent in size), then its not the first house but the one on the other side. Good luck! I listen to the first part and get stumped, and its not an uncommon occurrence that the family has moved and the directions aren't quite perfect, but they are generally pretty accurate.
Needless to say its good luck finding places if you are used to living in a place with maps, addresses, concrete directions and GPS systems. I can remember lamenting about not having an exact address for something in the States to plug into my GPS system on multiple occasions, and I know how silly that seems now.

I watch so many great kids back in the States and have a ton of fun doing it! There is one kiddo in particular who I know would find a great challenge to learning directions down here. For those that don't know him, he is a human GPS system. Don't believe me? He spent a morning giving me turn-by-turn directions on how to get to all the places we were going with street names from the third row of the minivan. I was in awe. At first I was thinking that he would despise the Nicaragua style directions, but then I was thinking there is a logical method to understanding them, its just not one I am able to grasp (terrible sense of direction, check!). I bet that if he was living or visiting a place like this for a long time he would have the lay of the land down in no time. As for me, this is my 5th trip to Nicaragua and I have now been here over 2 weeks (so over 9 weeks in total) and can say with all honesty I am glad that I am not responsible for getting myself anywhere solo because I would struggle!

I am also at a point in my life where I am looking for more than just directions to get somewhere, I am looking for a direction for my life to take. That one is a little more challenging to solve. For now I will just stick with trying to learn Nicaraguan directions :)