Day 9 (Sunday, 01/07/07)

Sunday we attended church at ___.  Afterwards we talked with the pastor,  the femail bishop(?) of ____.  She told her story of___and of the transformation of the Salvadorian Lutheran Church in Exile into the Nicaraguan Lutheran Church.  Afterwards a group of kids arrived in the back of the church and greeted their families, each name called out as they entered.  They had just returned from a retreat.  Very moving how even the teens were hugging their parents in front of the congregation.  We all ate, church basement style.  Sang Amazing Grace w/ kids & parents.  Someone from our group later remarked that these kids, so vulnerable and affectionate, were the same age as many of the violent revoluntionaries.

In the afternoon we hopped back in the tour bus and were taken on a driving tour of Managua.  The original downtown had been flattened by an earthquake in 19__ and many blocks remained abandoned, grassy fields or rubble - __ years later.  We drove through a slum and passed the crumbling remains of an appartment building; people still lived there, we learned.  People also lived in the remains of what was once the hotel where visiting statesment stayed.  In these slums, red and black Sandinista flags were flying everywhere.  Memorials to the revolution were scattered everywhere in the city.  The present was inendated with the past.  We drove up a hill where the Samoza palice used to be... remains of tanks... memorials... the giant Sandino siloette that looks out over the city.  The elevated lake where people were dropped after being detained in the torture dungeon.  Sobering.  We visit the old national cathedral and assembly, destroyed in the earthquake... that boy gives me a palm leave grasshopper.  (<---THIS WOULD SOUND BEST LAST LAST)  We stop by the new national cathedral built with money from the founder of Dominos who also supported the Contras.  Kids outside hamming it up for the cameras.  Cute, except for the one yelling "bitch" to anyone who wouldn't buy the gum she was trying to sell.

We drove past the first maquiladora in central america.  The workers there earn minimum wage, which is $140 a month.  The cost of living for a single mom is $350 a month.

All the new FSLN ads are bright pink.  Daniel has gone "metro"!

That night, I wrote down my first impressions of the country.  See FIRST IMPRESSIONS pages in notebook.