Right out of architecture school, I went to work for a local nonprofit in northern Nicaragua. A professor, who had also lived in Nicaragua right out of college, conencted me to the nonprofit, ODESAR. He had worked with the founders of ODESAR to rebuild the Matagalpa region of Nicaragua in the waning years of the Nicaraguan civil war. I was passionate about humanitarian architecture and also enamored with the work of the now defunct Architecture for Humanity. So I asked my professor if I could work at ODESAR. My request led to a two year stint in the City of Matagalpa working with ODESAR.

Nicaragua

For some background, Nicaragua is a country in Central America. Honduras borders it to the north and Costa Rica borders it to the south. Inevitably, the country conjures thoughts of civil war for many Americans due to the United States’ public involvement in the civil war between the Contras and Sandinistas, which lasted from 1980 to 1988.

Today Nicaragua is a peaceful country, although it still struggles with the economic legacy of civil war (according the CIA Worldfact Book, Nicaragua has the second lowest GDP per capita in the Americas after Haiti); however, unlike Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, it is not racked by extremely high crime rates[1]. Nicaragua is making dramatic strides in reducing its poverty rate; according to the World Bank, the percentage of the population living below the national poverty line was 42.5% in 2009 and was 29.6% in 2014. Unfortunately, there is also a downward trend in the country’s political freedom and democracy scores. According to both Freedom House and The Economist, President Daniel Ortega and his party, the Sandinista National Liberation Front, consolidate power.

Matagalpa

Matagalpa lies in Nicaragua’s coffee country. It is a small city nestled among hills and nature reserves with a slow pace of life and beautiful sunsets. Matagalpa is located in the department of Matagalpa. Agriculture and coffee dominate the economy; a dependence which has led to boom and bust cycles in the region. The last bust occurred in the early 2000s when the international price of coffee dropped devastating the many coffee workers in the region. The local government is now working to diversify the economy by developing eco-tourism infrastructure in the surrounding villages and nature reserves. Eco-tourism will hopefully provide an alternative to coffee-picking for the region’s workers.

Matagalpa is dominated by mountains, rain, greenery, dirt roads, motorcycles, coffee, colorful homes and enthusiasm. There is a lot of native pride for the city. Matagalpans joke that they are a stereotypically loud and enthusiastic people; as with any stereotype this is sometimes true and sometimes isn’t, but as an introvert I often felt a bit alien.

Mr. O….

In Matagalpa I lived with a wonderful host family. The father (Mr. O) worked for ODESAR as a truck driver delivering construction materials to sites in the villages outside of Matagalpa. He had been a fighter during the civil war and, like many Matagalpans, he was a true Sandinista at heart. Mr. O still loves to talk about his revolutionary days and once “borrowed” his policeman friend’s gun to show me how to properly clean it. He could take the gun apart, but had forgotten how to put it back together – much to his friend’s concern.

….and Mrs. D

A remarkable woman, the mother of the family (Mrs. D) finished her degree in psychology while I was there and started her first professional job with the local government in her late 40s. Both she and her husband had grown up in impoverished rural communities and did not have access to much formal education. Mr. O saw a 14 year old Mrs. D walking down the side of the road one day while delivering supplies for ODESAR and “kidnapped” her, as he would half joke. She cooked, cleaned and raised their children as well as put up with Mr. O’s infidelities for many years, but Mr. O has also supported and encouraged her to continue her education. In their middle age, Mrs. D has come to be a strong and controlling presence in the house and Mr. O seems a bit lost without her.

To put things in perspective, Mr. O’s father had at least three different families with three “wives” (a not infrequent practice for his generation apparently). Even today, domestic violence is a fairly common occurrence among families in Nicaragua (29.3% of ever-partnered women reported experiencing intimate partner physical or sexual violence[2]). I often heard rumors that pointed toward this fact, although I never verified any of them. As one example, Mr. O would claim that the neighbor kept his wife under surveillance (with security cameras) to ensure no men visited the house while he is at work. Given the family relations of their contemporaries and parents, Mr. O’s support of Mrs. D’s educational and professional development is a remarkable evolution.

The House

Mr. O and Mrs. D are very cheerful and welcoming people. Mr. O is an outgoing extrovert who loves to put on a show while Mrs. D is more introverted, although she is constantly laughing at Mr. O. They have many friends, including a number of Europeans who came to Nicaragua during the civil war in solidarity and who continue to come back to visit years later. Mr. O and Mrs. D are living in a house that is owned by old friends of the family from Europe. Mr. O and Mrs. D agreed to take care of the house after a flood destroyed their house.

Their house is a cheerful one with flowering trees in front and a verdant backyard at the end of a dirt cull-de-sac near the edge of town. At night the neighborhood is calm and our house always smelled of food. The best part of my day in Matagalpa, Nicaragua was the night, when things were quiet and peaceful and Mr. O would tell stories while Mrs. D shook her head.

[1] According to the UNODC, the homicide rate per 100,000 people in Nicaragua in 2013 was 11.3. El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras had rates of 64.2, 31.2 and 74.6 in 2014 respectively. For context, Honduras, El Salvador and Venezuela have the three highest homicide rates in the world.

[2] United Nations, 2015. The World’s Women 2015: Trends and Statistics. New York: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Statistics Division.