Interning at Food for the Hungry

Well the week of October 4 is the week I started my internship at Food for the Hungry. I was super nervous to start there just because I was unsure what I was going to do and how I was going to do it without knowing much Spanish. My first day was Tuesday and I traveled from the bus terminal in Leon to the Chinandega office with Marlen, an FH worker early in the morning. It takes about 45 minutes to get there and we took a 15 passenger van type thing (they call them short buses) and we arrived around 8 am. I met the people in the office, they all seemed super friendly, only 3 of them speak English, and then right away went out with Marlen to a community. We got there and right away I noticed some white people and it was a church group from Grand Rapids, Michigan…what a small world they even knew of Dordt! I chatted with them for a bit and they were in Nicaragua for a week visiting a few communities to see which one they were going to help sponsor with their church back home. We got to see the school in that community and then Marlen and I did a few family visits there. There were about 90 families in this particular community. We got to give out Bibles to some families; one for the parent and a story Bible for the children, it was really neat to see them receive them because most of them voiced that they had attended church but not had their own Bible ever. Marlen also asked some questions to the parents of the kids in the child sponsorship program to see how they were doing to give an update to their sponsors. I didn’t understand all of it, but I picked up bits and pieces of what their conversation was about. Marlen also helped explain to me better later, still in Spanish though, ha. We ate lunch with a family, and then headed back to the FH office. The road to the community was about 10 minutes long and super bumpy and rough, so that was an interesting time. Back at the FH office, I got to translate child sponsor cards for the rest of the day. These cards were from the sponsors so I had to translate from English to Spanish, which was pretty difficult, but Nancy, a bilingual worker at FH, told me she was just glad I was here because they were really behind in translating so I was helping whether my translating was perfect or not. That was good to know. I worked until 5 pm, and then left on the bus back to Leon with a few other girls from the office. The bus didn’t go right to the terminal in Leon, so Meybelline, another intern at FH who only speaks Spanish, had to explain to me that the stop I got off at was 2 blocks from the terminal. She didn’t get off at this stop, so I was pretty much on my own from there. Once I got off I was dumbfounded because I did not recognize where I was, but soon enough I started walking and after asking which way the terminal was I found it and from there I knew where to go. It was kinda scary for a little bit being somewhere I really did not recognize, but I guess its good for me to learn on my own! I got home and was super tired but hung out with my family a little, but went to bed early that night.

Wednesday came, and I got up bright and early to head to Chinandega again. I pretty much translated child sponsorship cards all day, but this time they were the cards from the children in Nicaragua, so I translated from Spanish to English, which was much easier for me and it definitely was good practice. It was kind of a long day, but the others in the office were fun to randomly chat with and observe. 5 pm came and I was ready to head home. I did some homework that night but was again super tired so went to bed early!

Thursday I again went to Chinandega (I will be going to the FH office for 3 days a week for the next 3 weeks). I went out to another community with Libeth, a social worker at FH, and we did lots of walking that day! Ha, other than walking we visited with families, teachers, and children just getting a sense of how they were doing. I think they had worked in this community for awhile now, as many of the people knew Libeth and she knew many of them as well. It was quite a large community with over 70 families. For awhile in the afternoon we went around to a couple families getting information about their child that was going to be put in the child sponsorship program, so we took a picture of the child, had them write a note and draw a picture to their sponsor and got information about their family for records. It was a fun time, and I got to listen in and see how they did this program. One family that we hung out with for awhile had a few rambunctious kids and so I entertained them while Libeth got the information from their mom. I taught one of the kids the alphabet and he was showing me his drawings, it was adorable. Libeth also introduced me to a few of the teachers of the 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd graders in this community that I will probably work with to do art with the kids in a few weeks. It was overall a really fun day just hanging out with the members of the community, and learning what all is done in a typical day for a social worker at FH. It was a very valuable experience, and I am learning a lot by just talking in Spanish with the social workers so far that I hope I will learn even more throughout the rest of my weeks interning there. My bus ride on this day was a bit interesting as well as I thought I knew my way from the first day I did the same thing but I took the wrong turn as I was walking back to my host home and was lost for a bit. It was crazy because I didn’t know where I was at all but I stayed calm and eventually recognized the intersection I needed to cross and I was so relieved that I had found it! I think I will know my way for next time for sure!

My three days of interning at FH were very tiring and so Friday was nice to sleep in a bit until we had class in the afternoon. Also, Friday morning I woke up to find a chicken with a bag around its feet chillin in our kitchen. I was surprised to watch mi mama take it back to the back room sink and bring it back with no head or feathers. They informed me that it was “una gallina sin pelo”, a hen without feathers. I laughed and then at lunch on my plate was the leg of that same chicken which was live in my kitchen only a few hours earlier, funny how that works. Another story of my family’s differences here was when I started to get a stuffy nose and sore throat my family told me that I should not take a shower at night. I asked why that would matter and they told me that as you are really hot during the day and then take a cold shower after that, it is bad for you because of the extreme heat and then cold, and that is how you get sick. So, I didn’t shower that night to put their superstitions to the test, but I didn’t really believe it would work because I have always showered at night and have just now gotten sick. It was just different to hear this being something that they believed was a reason people got sick, because it doesn’t make sense to me at all and isn’t even given a thought in the United States. 

I don’t have any pictures of this leg of my journey, but my next blog will be of Corn Island and I will for sure add pictures of that beautiful place!

Cara.