Dia 3

Today we woke up early, again, had a quick breakfast and got on a bus headed for Chinandega. The main group split with our group going to Chinandega and the other will stay at the same hotel and work in Masaya. The bus ride was at least two hours and was pretty uneventful except for one experience. We stopped on the side of the highway to take pictures of an active volcano, there was a group of men nearby on the side of the highway. I don’t know exactly what happened but as we were getting back on the bus the men started yelling and I saw them run up to the edge of the road and fire a rifle at some people further down the highway. I don’t know exactly what happened because I was already in the bus and I couldn’t hear them yelling but it gave everyone a pretty good scare. Also on the trip we saw a lot of poverty, I’ve never seen such skinny cows and horses! They also drive pretty crazy. The road is filled with bicycles, small motorcycles, and guys that peddle people around in a type of man-powered carriage.



Once we had checked into our new hotel, Hotel Los Volcanes, we made our first visit to an orphanage, Hogar San Juan. What a great experience! They are all girls that range in ages from 4 to 14 more or less. Of course none of the girls have parents or anything in this life, but it seemed like a great place and the girls were so friendly and well behaved. They were so excited to see all of the women soccer players from BYU. I think each from our group had one girl on each arm taking them around and showing them their rooms, etc. The girls also sang a song for us when we arrived which I got on video. The soccer team and the Rose family had brought some things for the girls including new Nike shoes and BYU soccer balls, the girls were so excited. It was a great experience to meet these wonderful children.

Next we went to the CFH office in Chinandega which is where Paul W. and I will be staying after the group leaves. From there we received our assignments and left to visit the businesses we will be working with. Our family is a husband and wife. Luis is the bishop in his ward and doesn’t have steady work. His wife, Esperanza, is a school teacher in a public primary school. Their business is that Esperanza teaches children in her home after school that need extra help or who’s parents want them to learn more. Esperanza is an amazing woman, she feels that teaching is her eternal calling and making money really isn’t her primary motivation. In fact, up until about four months ago she was doing work similar to this with adults, for free. The received a loan from CFH in order to buy some whiteboards, small desks and chairs, and other supplies so she could begin teaching in her house. She charges 100 cordoba per student per month ($5). We have the next day and a half to come up with ideas to help her business and prepare a report and present to our whole group. We have some good ideas and it should go well. I have also taken some photos of Esperanza and her class, the children are so cute.

So it was a great day. The new hotel is also very nice and we have had good meals. We ran into another set of missionaries today, we also met a companionship yesterday. It is soo hot, I think I sweat all day long. Maybe I’ll lose some weight. I’m also tired, good night.

(my internet connection is pretty slow here and I'm having a hard time uploading photos asi que I might have to wait a few days and see if I can't get a better connection)

Dia 2

Today started with a buffet breakfast here at the Hotel Las Mercedes followed by meetings all the way till lunch. We had a short devotional given by Coach Rose and then business training from the various leaders of Cause for Hope: Dan Gibbons, Dean Curtis, and others. We had a buffet lunch at the hotel and then the exciting part of the day began. We split into three groups, loaded into vans and went into the city. My team and Paul W's team went together along with Jordan, the camera guy. We visited 5 families/businesses. The first was a woman who received a $100 loan and training from CFH and sells 10-15 different fruits and vegetables. She takes the bus to the market everyday and purchases her products to sell them out of her house. Her sale are about 3 for 10 cordobas.(20 cordobas = 1 dollar) This is a picture of her house, she has her goods set up just inside the front door. The gentleman to my left is William, he works for CFH in their Managua office.
Next, we visited two businesses that were next to each other. One was a woman who sells juice drinks from her house. She also received a loan from CFH in order to repair a refrigirator she had in which to keep the drinks. She sells the drinks in small plastic bags to go or in a cup which the customer can't keep. She still needs to repair her blender so that she can blend the fruit used to make her drinks. Sales price is about 5 cordoba. She bore her testimony of the gospel and gave thanks for all her blessings, especially for CFH. The other business was a woman next door, also a member of the church, who sells bananas. It is a difficult season for her because it is not banana season so they are harder to come by, but she purchases 100 bananas twice a week and sells them within two days of purchase.

Oscar and Flor were the next family we visited. They are both artists that make paintings as well as clay figures. They seem to have a very successful business which they have been operating for a number of years. Their products have a high profit margin and are quite nice, Oscar has a real talent for painting.

The last family we visited was that of Pablo. Pablo and his family definetly lived in the most humble circumstances that we saw today. You can see from the pictures the path we had to take to get to their 'house.' Pablo and his family peal and fry bananas and then sell them in small bags and dried banana chips. He has 10 salesmen and has identified his costs and profit margin as well as how many bags he can get from one banana, etc. He had a strong testimony. He said he keeps the sabbath day holy and pays his tithing. He gave thanks for CFH, which gave him a loan in order to buy his burner, a roof, and walls for his 'kitchen' where he makes his product.

All of the families that we met today were members of the church who had strong testimonies and gave thanks for all of their blessings. They all lead better lives and are more self suficient thanks to CFH. Also, Paul W and I got to translate for our group at each of these visits, it was great.

Finally, we went to the Managua office of CFH. There we met three young men who have all received their mission calls and are prearing to leave in the next couple of weeks. These young men live in a small village two hours away, but they made the trip because they wanted to meet all of us and thank CFH. Two are going to Chile and one has been called to Argentina. Two of them are the only members of their families and are receiving no support regarding their missions. Thanks to CFH they have received the help they needed in order to serve missions. I had the opportunity to translate for each of them as they bore their testimonies to the group. You could certainly feel the spirt and strength of their testimonies. CFH had some gifts for them before they left on their missions including new glasses, suitcases, white shirts, and ties. It was a great experience.

We finished the day back at the hotel with dinner and then more meetings. Dinner was really good again. Rice, fish, and different pastas, and flan. All very good. It was great to get out today and see what conditions are like and also meet such wonderful, humble people. They have so little yet they are still very happy. They have beautiful little children some of whom you will see in the pictures which I have attached to this post as a photo album.

On the right is a slide show which should update everyday with new photos. It has photos of all of today's visits. If you click on the photo it should link you to a larger slide show of the photos.

Dia 1

Today I left for Nicaragua! I'll be in Nicaragua for the next few weeks working with an organization, Cause for Hope, which works in Central America to provide business and technical training, micro credit loans, and other resources to members of the church and others who are looking to break the cycle of poverty and improve their standard of living. This is a social venture internship sponsered by BYU and the Center for Economic Self Reliance. I will be spending my time with Paul W., another 1st year MBA student from BYU and we will be working out of the office in Chinandega. I'm sure we will have a lot of fun together. Check out Paul W's blog, it will probably be much better than mine since I have never done this before.



For the first week that we are here we will be participating in an event that has been planned for a number of BYU student athletes from the men's basketball team, men's and women's soccer teams, and the women's vollyball team. We traveled with all of them today and will be providing translation as well as leading teams in a business plan type of competition that all of the athletes will be participating in. A couple of camera crews have also made the journey in order to document everything that the group does this first week.



We are spending tonight and tomorrow in Managua, the capital city of Nicaragua, and then we will head out to Chinandega for the remainder of our time here. I haven't seen much since we arrived so late, but it is hot! 85 degrees when we landed here at 9:30 pm and very humid.