MizBrown

I got the paperwork in to Intur with the help of a kiosk lawyer and a bilingual Gringa, and a very nice woman who waited for us after Intur's official closing time on Tuesday. I'll need to call on September 17th for a progress report.

Now, I find I can spot a gringo from behind and that the people in the street are the non-labeled ones and I'm the exotic. I find this utterly charming, but I suspect that some North Americans can't stand it, just as some people from away in rural Virginia ...

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And as I packed the camera and lenses up to take to the store that's been buying some of my stuff, I realized how heavy the three lens set was. I priced a smaller camera (micro-4/5ths with interchangeable lenses) but decided to wait until I'd had more time in Nicaragua. It is light weight and would look more like a P&S than a DSLR, but the shots I've seen taken with it look quite good. Need cash more than cameras at this point.

Bought the plane tickets -- should be leaving ...

He's 13 and will probably be a permanent foster, but the hassles of moving a separation-anxiety prone dog who has problems with house-training from time to time looked like an additional major problem. His new home is on a 30 acre farm in Virginia's horse country, with two other Border Terriers to play with.

I'm looking for a place in either Jinotega (Suzanne Wopperer is looking there for me) or Esteli (in contact with Jane Boyd for there). I figure my life will be chaotic for ...

What Nicaragua needs is ex-pats who are poets, artists, musicians, and writers, not small businessmen looking to make money from poverty.

Moving to Nicaragua for artists is like moving to the Lower East Side or various hippie enclaves was in the 1960s. The only things that will draw richer people to the poor neighborhoods of the world are vibrant arts community or vibrant gay communities (Asheville, NC, advertises its vibrant gay community as a draw to rich retired people who know ...

Someone thought that I would be rich by Nicaraguan standards, but the reality that I saw in Esteli was that some people were really rich and had either houses with guard dogs or armed guards or lived behind a 16 foot masonry wall topped with razor wire. In Jinotega, people seemed to be more even in status, but the housing conditions seemed comparable to 1960s Lower East Side New York, maybe some better, and at about the same prices ($40 to $150 for rooms and apartment).

I lived in ...