Alive and Stuffless

This post is going to take forever to write, and is most likely going to be my last post for this trip. This is partly because I no longer have my lovely ipod to carry with me to type whenever I have time, and because I am typing on a Spanish keyboard that is just a little bit difficult to get used to. This post is also going to probably be the most exciting (and awful) post you will ever read from my blog...I hope anyway. Somehow though, I doubt it will be true...my traveling adventures may never end, though hopefully I will never have to relive this one.

I was hoping that after my few days of excitement things would calm down and everything would go smoothly for the last few days of my trip, but here I sit wide awake at 1:30 am after paying $5 for a couch just to get eaten by bedbugs. After a few itchy hours, I switched to a hammock where I tried not to fall out for a bit, and then the nice young Nicaraguan guy working here offered me a room telling me it was really no problem. I was pretty excited, thinking I could get a few good hours of sleep before having a long, stressful day getting a passport and trying to return to Costa Rica so I agreed, just to find out it was his private room. Ay yi yii...I guess the safest option now is to pull an all nighter, writing this blog post that I would rather push from my mind. 

So, I think that I can now say that I am (becoming an) experienced traveler.  I don't think that being an experienced traveler comes easy, and for me, thankfully, it hasn't happened too fast. But, thinking about everything that I've experienced; and now after having everything of value stolen, getting threatened with a knife, running like a mad woman (barefoot) through the woods after some guys, giving a police report, having to deal with having absolutely no money and no passport....I think I am getting there.

My mind is still in shock days later. I can't really wrap my mind around what happened, or mentally, where I am at now. I keep going between being completely happy and fine - I had mentally been prepared to lose everything which helped a lot, and after being in Central America for so long I was lucky nothing had happened this far - and then emotions switch and I am completely angry, sad, and offended.

After volcano boarding on Monday, I spent a lot of time debating whether or not I wanted to stay in Leon. I loved it there and had met a ton of friends for the first time since I came to Nicaragua. But, after talking to several people and realizing that I only had one week left of my trip, I decided that there was too much to do and see to stay in one place too long. So, Tuesday morning I packed up and jumped on a bus to Esteli. A few minutes later, my dear friend Sophia climbed on! She had been considering going to Esteli at a different time, so I was surprised to see her - but soo happy!

We spent the two hour trip talking and laughing and discussing our trips and taking pictures. We kept saying how glad we were that we happened to be going at the same time to the same place, and after the next few days, we were even more thankful to be together.

We checked into Hostel Sonati with our group of backpackers.



I felt so cool walking down the street with five others with giant backpacks. I fell in love with the Sonati hostel and the people and staff who worked there. It is small and comfortable, and the same group had been here the whole time, so it really just felt like we are one big traveler family. We took turns making dinner and hung out all the time.. just a ton of fun and such a great atmosphere with great people. The place is also completely run by locals which is always better because you get the inside look at the place, whereas if the hostel is run by foreigners, its most likely a party place. Not always, but I have found that I like the local-run hostels a lot better.

Wednesday, the group decided to go repelling at some waterfalls. I spent a lot of time considering going or staying and checking out the town. I didn't want to pay to go repelling since I had done it before in Costa Rica, but I did love waterfalls. So, I went along, my camera and most valuable things packed safely in my backpack - I had heard so many stories of people having their stuff stolen from hostels so I never wanted to take the chance. Ha. Sometimes my decisions are definitely the wrong ones.

We caught a little chicken bus, then walked for about an hour through beautiful farm country. Then, our group split and half went to the top of the falls to repel down, and the other half and I went to the bottom. I chose a comfy little spot on the rocks with a perfect view of the waterfall. Besides one small group of locals, we were alone at the falls. A few minutes later, the locals left and it was only our small group.

A friend asked me to take some photos of him while he repelled, so he let me use his amazing wide angle lens! I stuck it on my camera and took some pretty sweet pics...unfortunately, I can't show you, but I did borrow this one photo from a friend...

Pretty cool, right?? It definitely was for awhile...

After taking a few photos, I left my comfy seat on the rocks and headed to the main area with Sophie. Our friends repelled down, and then since it had gone quickly, they decided to go for one more round. Sophie decided to stay at the bottom, but everyone else left, leaving just us two girls on shore and one guide in the water beneath the waterfall. Since they couldn't take their bags while they repelled, everyone's bags were in two piles for us to watch, one pile was a few feet behind us and the other right next to us.

One thing about Nicaragua is that there is trash everywhere - cigarette butts littered the ground, plastic floated in the water, and countless soda bottles littered the place. I found a bag and decided to clean everything up while we waited for our friends to return. I left my bag beside Sophie and walked a few yards to the side to pull slimy bags out of the water. As I stood, I noticed two people walking down the hill behind us to the right. The waterfalls were quiet and empty, and because it is so common for locals to come and swim and show off to foreigners, I disregarded them. I started to pick up trash and didn't see the guys again, so I figured they must have gone up the other side of the valley.

I filled the bag with gross trash, really sad that people felt the need to litter, really annoyed that people threw their cigarettes on the ground, and amazed at how much trash littered the place compared to the other Central America countries I had visited.

Then, I heard shouting. At first it was just one person, but then every single person in our group started yelling. My first thought was that there was some awesome thing to see, so I stood up and turned around.

Definitely nothing awesome to see. Almost in slow motion, I saw a male, red shirt, holding my bag in his right hand. My thought: why is someone moving my bag? However, after another moment, I realized that he also had Sophie's bag and one other and there was another guy a few feet away. They seemed really relaxed, but a second later, they both started to run. I dropped my bag of trash and took off after them.

I know what every one of you is thinking, and I'm probably going to get a million moms and friends lecturing me, but right then, I didn't exactly think about anything besides the fact that some dude was running away with MY bag and MY money and MY passport and basically everything that I absolutely needed to survive. Seriously, your brain does some weird things sometimes and makes you believe that you have super powers.

So, with my newly found super powers, I started running barefoot through the Nicaraguan jungle after these two dudes with our bags. A few feet in, I tripped, but apparently I didn't realize it and kept running (later, the guys repelling said I had fallen and they were amazed I kept going. I don't really remember that...) We ran over rocks, logs, sticks, thorns, up little hills and down again, and I was catching up to the skinny guy holding my bag. I tried yelling something to convince the dude to stop, but I'm pretty sure he was deaf because he kept running. And, he moved my bag from his hand to his back. Of course it was mine on his back. Amazingly, he dropped one of the other bags. I jumped over it, and I think I fell a few more times, but my superpowers kept me going. 

Then, miracle of miracles, the Nicaraguan dude fell face down, putting me pretttyy close to him. I hadn't considered what I was going to do when I caught the guy, but him being male gave me one good option.......but then, apparently the kid (kid meaning my age) never had anyone teach him to play fair, because as he was on the ground he turned around, threw a few rocks, and pulled a knife out. I stopped. I stared at him, seriously annoyed, and starting to realize that everything valuable that I had with me in Nicaragua was soon going to be gone forever.

After a few minuscule moments of staring at each other and me trying to memorize his face, he turned and disappeared, leaving me standing alone in the middle of nowhere. At that point, I didn't think about my stuff. I had been mentally preparing myself to lose everything from the time I started considering going to Nicaragua. I did, however, start to think about how much pain I was feeling. I started shaking and looked down to see my leg completely bloody. I had smashed my knee, cut my feet, smashed my elbow (I would show you the bruise that takes up my whole arm, but I don't have a camera...) and sprained my wrist pretty badly. 

I turned to walk back to my friends, and started to realize how far I had run. I couldn't stop shaking, and started to do some sort of sobbing cry. My mind was numb. I was numb, but I kept telling myself it was okay as my heart threatened to beat out of my body.

After a few minutes walking, I heard my friends yelling for me. They ran to meet me, asking questions, saying they were worried, wondering what I was thinking...My friend Jezreel helped me walk back, taking our time, and comforting me as I sat on a rock and tried not to hyperventilate while crying. It's funny what happens when your super powers (adrenaline) wear(s) off.

The next few hours (and days, now that I think of it) were a blur. We headed back to town, thankfully in the back of a truck because my feet hurt so bad I could barely walk. We canceled our credit cards, went to the police station to file a report which consisted of pretty unofficially joking, handing out free condoms and saying how important they are, then a very bored looking guy writing down our information. When we got the reports back, it was the exact sheet he had written on, with a few signatures and a stamp. Who knows if anything was even copied or actually reported. 

Surprisingly, at that time, I was okay. I told myself I was prepared. I had no passport or money, but you can wire money and people lose their passports all the time. However, that proved to be more of a challenge than it was worth. Apparently you can't get a passport without money. And apparently you can't get money without a passport. Thankfully, my dear friend Sophie still had her ID and helped we got some money sent to her. 

The hostel was incredible and let us stay for free, and we got so close to everyone through it all. Everyone shared dinner duty, and I have definitely gotten to meet and see how incredible people are -- even if there are two bad guys who try to ruin everything.

The next morning, I could hardly move. I walked like a cripple for two days, and couldn't put any pressure on my left hand or right arm. I kept telling myself it was worth it for the one bag the guy had dropped - at least one friend didn't have to worry about loosing his camera or credit cards.

Sophia had a hard time the first few days; I hadn't realized it, but as my back was to her and I was picking up trash, she had been holding her bag when the guy came and grabbed it. When she didn't let it go, he pulled the knife and calmly said, "suave, suave." Having a knife pulled on you changes things somehow. Because Sophia (19) was trying to work through everything, I think I just blocked it out and just dealt with the facts and what had to be done.

For some reason (probably just because it's Nicaragua) the embassy, of course, was closed on Friday, so the soonest time I could get to get a passport was Monday - two days after I had been planning to return to Costa Rica. I shrugged it off and decided to enjoy the rest of my time in Esteli, and I definitely did. The longer you stay somewhere, the harder it is to say goodbye, and of course there were amazing people to fall in love with in Esteli. Some of our friends left a day before we did, and it was so strange to be at the hostel without them.

We basically just hung out for a few days, but Saturday we realized we needed to get out and do something, so we headed to Miraflor, a reserve about an hour from Esteli that is known for being "natural" Nicaragua.

 

We rode horses all day and ate two wonderful home cooked meals made by a family who lives out there. We had two guides...

...and I had a pretty great horse that liked to run...

So, we ran through some absolutely incredible land, and despite everything, I couldn't help but be in awe of the beautiful country.

So anyway, there it is. Part one of the story. The next two days will probably be the most intense days I've ever had traveling: Goals for the next three days: Get to Managua. Get to US embassy by 7:00 in the morning. Get a passport, fill out a ton of paperwork, get to immigration to get an entrance stamp, get to the bus station by 1:00, get a bus to San Jose, make my few dollars stretch enough to get me out of the country, (no food for the next three days!) make my flight on Tuesday, and bring Wisconsinites warm weather. Not really holding my breath for any of it. My life should be a movie. Ha

But I'm not really worried. I've made it this far. I'm still alive, I'm still breathing, so I am okay. And amazingly, as terrible as it was to lose everything; passport, money, cards, drivers license, ipod, camera, three lenses, batteries, favorite backpack, etc etc, there is also a small bit of relief in it as well -- I no longer have anything to lose, so I don't have anything to worry about! Hah, okay, not exactly true, but it holds truth. It's just stuff, and now I have a story to tell, and battle scars to prove it. 

And I know you all probably have a million questions, so I'll answer one. I still love it here. Despite everything, I still wake up every morning, happy to be alive, and happy to be in Central America. I've had my moments of being incredibly angry that I lost my stuff, offended that anyone could disrespect anyone that much, and sad that people feel the need to do that. In my mind, I hope it is justifiable by thinking he is just trying to feed his starving cow or something, but deep down I'm pretty sure he is just an adrenaline junkie who wants to buy drugs. 

Now the biggest decision: Should I sleep with bedbugs or a well meaning Nico. Ha. If only all decisions were that simple. Hammock wins it.