Miscellaneous Topics

Saturday, February 1, 2013—Esteli

Since I have gone into a relaxing mode for my time here in Esteli, I thought I would produce a blog enter about various topics that are on my mind:

There were Internet problems yesterday.  When I arrived, the Internet wouldn’t work.  I didn’t try again until about 20:00, and apparently it had been on but went off again just as I was trying it.  Therefore, I couldn’t post the blog entry that I had written in Microsoft Word earlier in the day.  Fortunately it is working today.  I had my doubts, however.  It was a strange situation yesterday; the small monitor screen on my computer indicating a connection via wifi showed that data was passing, but none of the websites worked.  My first thought was that maybe there was a permission page where I would have to agree with regulations, but there wasn’t.  Second, I asked them to consider rebooting the modem and the computer.  That worked once, but only briefly.  The modem is a USB modem for a satellite connection.  They even let me plug it into my computer to see if it would work.  It wouldn’t (although the wifi monitor still showed data flowing.  This is the first place I have had any major problems connecting to the Internet via wifi (although the one place in Costa Rica did turn off its computer at 20:30 so that I couldn’t connect until the morning).

I’m starving for vegetables.  Today, I bought a sandwich for lunch—ham, cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, and thousand island dressing on a soft bun.  As I ate it, all I could think about was how good it was to have the tomatoes and the lettuce. 

Timberland shoes cannot match Clark’s in terms of quality.  I’ve worn Clark’s “Unstructured” slip-on walking loafers made of suede leather for years.  But for some reason, the local Clark’s store told me that they have quit making the slip-on version (which is important to me because of the number of places where one has to remove shoes in other countries—entering homes, entering temples, etc.) in suede (which is important so that I won’t be bothered by shoeshine boys and men).  I bought a pair of Timberlands that look very similar about 1 1/2 years ago.  I wore them a few times at the airport, but this is the first foreign trip where I’ve worn them.  After only 5 weeks of travel walking, the soles are wearing out.  There are holes in the heals and pebbles are getting lodged there. 

I saw a funeral procession today.  A car with four loud speakers on top led it with music playing.  Next came a pickup with the casket inside and flowers around it.  That was followed by about 125 people walking.  Finally, another pickup filled with flowers concluded it.  The procession went down the busiest street in the center of town, a street that has major traffic congestion anyway. 

When I made my reservation for here, I should have said I would be here for 3 days.  I expected to do so, but I wanted to be considerate of the hostel.  I figured it would be better to add a day than to tell them I was leaving a day earlier.  They implied there should be no problem if I wanted to extend my stay.  However, they now tell me that their private rooms are all booked up for tomorrow night.  I don’t want to move to a dorm, so I will change to a hotel.  I’ve picked out two that seem to be fine, but I haven’t tried to reserve a room; I figure if I went there today asking about a room they would have trouble understanding that I would want it for tomorrow rather than for tonight.  Tomorrow morning, I will head to the nearest one and ask about a room.  If they have one, I’ll take it.  If not, I’ll head to the other place.  If neither of them have rooms, there is a third place I might consider staying.  Otherwise, I’ll just head for the bus station, because there is a shortage of decent places to stay here in Esteli.

Although Esteli is supposedly the “better” town up here in the mountains, I think I enjoyed both Matagalpa and Jinotega more.  The latter two were smaller and the mountains were closer.  Esteli, although a nicer town in terms of shopping and eating, is in a bigger valley.  The mountains are not always visible making the place seem more sterile.

Esteli has a movie theater that was still open at the time my guidebook was published 3 years ago.  Now it is closed.  It's an attractive theater that looks as if it is in good condition.  I'm wondering if it closed only because they couldn't afford the upgrade to digital projection that is being required by Hollywood now.  I've read that many theaters in small towns are going out of business because they can't afford the cost.

In Panama, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua, I've noticed that essentially the only ice cream available is factory made ice cream under the Eskimo brand.  In other words, they are the typical novelties that are sold in the US by ice cream companies--Drumsticks, Eskimo Pies, etc.  The larger cities may have a shop that makes and sells Italian gelato, but that's the limit to any variety.  All of these countries have so many fresh fruits--melons, papaya, mangoes, guava, pineapple, etc.  You would think that they might have wonderful fruit-flavored ice creams and bars like Mexico does, but there has been no sign of it.  How sad.  Even in much of the US now, you can get Mexican-style fruit bars.  It's too bad they don't have any sign of such goodies here.  All they have are fruit smoothies made with either ice or milk.