Wedesday 1/14

Now that the students are back in the Casa because school has resumed, access to the computer is greatly lessened. We{ll do the best we can with messages.

Today we write about life in general. Action begins around sunrise with traffic of very loud pickup trucks and buses beginning their routes for workers and students. Voices and barking dogs add to the morning buzz. The women workers at Casa rise early and move quietly like shadows, preparing breakfast and getting ready for the day. They work past sunset taking care of family, house guests, employees of the Bishops office, and many others who come through during the day.

A truckload of food was delivered at the end of last week to prepare for arriving delegations. 50 and 80 pound backs of rice, beans, corn meal, fruit were unloaded into the kitchen. Sincce then we have frequently noticed guests of the unwanted kind in the bedroom and bathroom. We hope we do not bring any of them home in our luggage. Leaving our suitcases in the garage for a few days might help but we are not sure if these critters will die in the cold or if they are the hearty kind of pest.

Our drive to the community in Nejapa often confronts us with women, children and often the disabled begging in and along the busy city streets. The round-abouts are congested with commuter traffic. Pickup trucks full of noisy and active political campaigners add to the chaos with loud music, slogan shouting, and often jumping out of the trucks to run around in the trafic jams handing out party propaganda. They are travelling rallies. The campaign blitz increases daily as the election is on this coming Sunday. We have left one very emotional campaign behind us only to step into another intense one of a different kind.

Last night we went to the Radison Hotel to register with the TSE -Tribunal Supreme Elecciones - and receive our observer creditionals. Tomorrow the training meetings begin and we will receive our supplies and site of observation.

A closing word about the sanitation project - yesterday the final trenching to the Pan American highway was completed at 12.05 pm, the final pipe was laid in the afternoon to connect to the pipe under the highway and the east side of the project is completed! The west side in La Granja began simulateously on last Thursday so the project could continue moving. We will tell you more about the piping under the highway at another time.

We leave at 6.30 this morning to attend the Club Rotario meeting, then onto La Granja for a transitional meeting. The EWB team leaves Saturday so there is much information to share with the community leaders who will continue the work in their absence.

Adios,
David and Nancy