Last month (May 2011), I was able to travel to Managua, Nicaragua with a team from Florida State Chi Alpha. Saturday, May 7, we drove to Orlando (about 4 hours from Tallahassee) and flew from there to Miami, had a brief layover, and continued to Nicaragua. We landed in the capital, Managua, around 7pm (2 hours behind EST). After going through immigration and customs, we met Nadia, the Chi Alpha Nicaragua missionary and one of her students. They led us to the bus and we began our drive through the city. After months of anticipating and preparing for this trip, it was almost surreal to finally be there and riding through the city. We arrived at Nadia's sister, Carla's house, where we were staying for the week. The house was beautiful and dinner was waiting on the table for us. After traveling all day, we were hungry and tired, so we ate dinner, got set up in our rooms, and fell asleep to the sound of fans.Sunday morning, we woke up and started to get ready for church. Unfortunately, there wasn't any running water, so we packed our things and went to the Chi Alpha house. We went to the International Church, a church of English-speaking people (mostly from America, Europe, and Australia) who are serving in Nicaragua, through missions or business. The families that attend the church have embraced the Nicaraguan culture and many families have adopted
Nicaraguan children. It was a great experience to worship with them. After the service was over, we drove back to the Chi Alpha house and met some of the students. We loaded up bags of juice, cookies, puppets, etc. and drove to a village church about 30 minutes outside of Managua. The pastor asked our team leader, Andrew, to share. He shared the story of Jesus and the children (Matthew 19, Luke 18) and asked if there were any members who would like to accept Christ as their Savior. Three young boys raised their hands and went up front with Andrew. He and Nadia prayed with them to receive Christ. It was a tear-jerker moment for our team, watching these three young boys (7, 8, and 9, years old) become followers of Christ at a young age. The XA Nicaragua students performed a puppet show for the children and gave out the juice, cookies, and candy. We boarded the bus and headed back to Managua. After dropping the XA Nicaragua students off, our team went back to the house for to eat lunch and rest for a little while. We headed to an evening service at a local Assembly of God church. This service was the largest of the ones we attended. During the service, the church welcomed about 30 newly baptized members and the pastor explained to us they were now having 4 Sunday services because their church was growing so rapidly and one service would not be able to accommodate everyone. We also celebrated communion with them. It was so amazing to see how God is moving through this church and how diligent its members are to reach out to the community around them. After the service, we drove out to the airport to meet our campus pastor, Mario's flight. We loaded his luggage on the bus and went back to the house for dinner, talked for a little while, and went to bed to prepare for another busy day.Monday, we enjoyed a team devotion; Nadia shared with our team from Isaiah 43:18 about not relying on the past. We ate a breakfast of eggs, pancakes, bacon, and fresh pineapple outside before beginning our busy day. We arrived at the Chi Alpha house, filled our water bottles, and met the students. We split our team into groups of two and paired off with a Chi Alpha Nicaragua student. The student I was paired with, Eliseo, took Rachel C. and I on a tour of his university, showing us where he goes to class. He then took us on the public bus to his best friend's house. We visited
with them before getting on another bus to Eliseo's house. We met his grandmother and she served us fresh mango (which was very yummy!). We left Eliseo's house, caught a taxi and left to meet the rest of the team. Our team had the opportunity to go to one of the university campuses and talk with students about Christ. After splitting our team into groups, with one XA Nicaragua student in each group, we walked around the campus talking with and praying for students. After leaving that campus, we traveled to another university campus, one where Nadia is hoping to start an XA group soon. We again split into groups and walked around the campus praying for God's presence to fill the campus and for a boldness for the students who have a relationship with God to share their faith with their peers. We left the campus, dropped the XA Nicaragua students off, and headed back to the house for a yummy dinner of steak with onions and peppers, rice, and plantains. We relaxed on the back patio and had some interesting conversations before heading to bed.Tuesday morning, we met again for team devotions and breakfast. Since our bus was
running a little late, Nadia took us on a walk around the neighborhood. The view from the end of the street was beautiful; we could see the volcanoes in the distance. We drove to the agricultural university and were able to visit with the Dean of Students. She shared with us about the students and took us on a tour of the campus. We got on the bus and drove to the veterinary campus of the agricultural university; we walked around looking at the classrooms and talking with students. The team went back to the house for lunch and to rest before visiting two campuses to evangelize and pray for the campus and students. We went back to the house a little early and ate dinner and hung out before going to bed.Wednesday, we spent the day cleaning and painting the Chi Alpha Nicaragua house. We started by raking the front and back yards and prepping the house for paint. There were mango trees in the backyard and since the season was on its way out, the mangoes were nice and overripe. After we finishe
d outside, we began cleaning paint spots off the floor of the front room. We got well-acquainted with the turpentine and rags as we cleaned and scraped the paint off the floor. We took a break for lunch and had pizza from one of the best places in Managua. After lunch, we began the painting job, painting the front and side of the house. The colors Nadia chose were a dark purple and a lime green for the trim; they looked great together and were very eye-catching. Andrew divided our team and got us started painting. We got the front done and half the side before stopping to get ready for an evening church service. We attended the church where Nadia's father pastors and Mario had the opportunity to preach. As with all of the churches we visited, the congregation was very welcoming of our team. After the service, we went back to the house, ate dinner, and went to bed.Thursday, we visited Lake Managua. Since Mario was leaving the next day to fly back to Orlando, we took our team fun day earlier so that he could go with us. After eating breakfast, we got on
the bus, picked up some of the XA Nicaragua students and headed out for the lake. We stopped on the way there to take pictures of a lagoon that was formed by a volcano. There are a lot of volcanoes in Nicaragua and many of the lakes and lagoons there were formed by the volcanoes. We had a beautiful view of the lagoon and surrounding area. We left and continued our trip to the lake, enjoying the scenery. When we arrived at the lake, we got on a boat and went on a 2 and 1/2 hour tour of the lake. Because of the volcano, there are many islands that were formed by explosions. The islands varied in size and many of them had houses built on them. There was an island with monkeys and our boat stopped to watch them. Two other boats came up and they were feeding the monkeys, so we were able to watch them try to get the food without getting wet (I didn't know monkeys don't like to get wet). We came to the conclusion the monkeys had to have been placed on the island intentionally. Our tour guide/boat driver plugged his iPod into speakers on the boat and turned on some dance music for us to enjoy as we rode around the lake. On our way back, we stopped at a restaurant and Mario bought us Cokes to drink. There was a platform you could jump off of and swim in the lake, so after working up enough courage, I jumped in the lake and swam a bit. We got back on the boat and went back to where we got on. On our way back to Managua, we stopped in the city of G
ranada, one of the oldest Spanish settlements in the Western Hemisphere. We stopped the bus in a few different areas for picture opportunities. The buildings in the city reflect the old Spanish style and are very beautiful. We were able to go in a few churches and take pictures. We stopped for a team lunch and ate grilled chicken or steak and tried some local appetizer dishes. The food was delicious and it was nice to relax as a team. We went back to the XA house and got ready for the Chi Alpha meeting that night with about 20 students. I had the opportunity to teach on time management (thanks to Erin W. for her notes :)) and Andrew and Mario both shared briefly with the students. After the meeting was over, we went back to the house and ate dinner before hanging out and going to bed.Friday, we finished painting and trimming as much of the XA house as we could before running out of paint. We got cleaned up and divided the team into two groups to visit the local orphanages.
The orphanage my group visited had children ranging in age from about 10 months to 6 years. We brought toys, bubbles, and chalk with us, so we opened the bubbles and chalk and began playing with the kids. The employees there were setting up for a birthday party for two of the children and we watched as the kids tried to open a Barney pinata. The employees had two cakes with candles and we sang happy birthday to the children. They cut the cake and gave each child a piece. After the children were finished with the cake, we gave out the toys and coloring books we brought with us and spent some more time playing with them. While we were there, it began raining, so when it was time to leave, we had to make a dash through the rain to the truck. We went back to the house and ate dinner before deciding to go to the mall and eat ice cream with Paul, a friend of Nadia's we met on Sunday. He wanted to spend some time with our team before we left Nicaragua. After we left the mall, Nadia took us on a tour of the city and to Lake Managua before we returned to the house for the night.Saturday, we went to the market in the morning. We split up into groups of three, with one Nicaragua student in each group. They were a huge help, helping us find what we wanted to purchase and negotiating with the vendors on the price. I purchased a cross, Nicaraguan flag, and some paintings. We returned to the ho
use for lunch and to begin packing, before going to the agricultural university. We met their XA guys and talked with them for a little while, sharing testimonies with them and praying for their families and campus. The bus picked us up and the guys from the agricultural university rode back to the XA house with us for a movie night. We watched the movie, Tron, in Spanish with English subtitles. After the movie, Nadia and the students thanked us for coming and prayed for our team. We took the guys back to the agricultural university and went back to the house. We ate dinner and talked with Nadia; she thanked us for coming and our team encouraged and prayed for her and Chi Alpha Nicaragua, and the city of Managua.Sunday, we woke up at 4:30am to a thunderstorm; we got up and finished our packing. We found out that our flight out of Managua was delayed because of the storm, but decided to go ahead t
o the airport and check in. We loaded all of our luggage on the bus and began our ride to the airport. We made it about 10 minutes away from the house when the driver realized the bus had a flat tire. He called his boss and asked for another bus. We waited for about 10 minutes before the second bus came, switched our luggage, and got on the bus to continue our trip to the airport. We made it to the airport in plenty of time, got checked in, went through security, found our gate, and got some breakfast. Our flight to Miami boarded and we got settled in. Because of the delay in Managua, we weren't sure if we would make it through immigration and customs before our flight to Orland departed, so when we landed in Miami, we rushed through the airport. We were blessed to find short lines at immigration and were able to make it to our gate in plenty of time. We grabbed some food and waited for our flight to board. The flight to Orlando was short and we met up with Mario in the airport. We rented the van, loaded our stuff, and began the trip back to Tallahassee. We arrived around 10pm and began dropping people off at their houses.It was such a blessing to be able to travel with this team to Managua, Nicaragua and see what God is doing there. He is at work in the city and through the college students. I was blessed and encouraged to see the passion they have for God and for reaching out and sharing Him with others around them.
If you would like to see pictures and a video from my trip, here are the links:
