In July of this year, two Chapel Hill students, Gillie Weeks and Lena Cohen, decided to take their Rural School Partnership a step further and visit their sister school, Río Negro, for a week. These amazing girls stepped out of their comfort zone and into the world of these rural Nicaraguan children. The result was… Read More →
Sharing across cultures: Reflections from Larry Gomez, San Ramón Tourism Coordinator
Apologies for the radio silence over the past few months; I have been on maternity leave, but it’s been business as usual for SCSRN in San Ramón! We’ve had at least one ecotour every month since January of this year, and one arriving next week. These ecotours are an important way we meet our goal… Read More →
April in rural Nicaragua
April in Nicaragua is hot and dry. In a blog post from October 2016 I referenced a poem by Nicaraguan poet Ernesto Cardenal called Hora Cero, in which the poet contrasts the dry and rainy seasons of Nicaragua. Here is the stanza where he describes the month of April: En abril, en Nicaragua, los campos… Read More →
First-time international traveler visits San Ramón, Nicaragua
Christopher Jones was a traveler on our UU and Friends Ecotour this year. It was his first trip outside the U.S., so we thought he could offer an interesting perspective on what it’s like to engage in an international cross-cultural exchange for the first time. Below are his reflections on his experience in San Ramón…. Read More →
Back to school
All over Nicaragua, students are getting back in the daily routine of waking up early to head to class. The Nicaraguan school year starts in February and ends in November, so students are finishing up what in the U.S. we would consider to be “Summer vacation.” The majority of the projects we support here at… Read More →
UNI student talks about her transformative experience in San Ramón
This month we invited Allison Bailey, a student from the University of Northern Iowa, to be a guest blogger on our page. Allison visited San Ramón in December 2016 while completing the UNI study abroad course “Socioeconomic Reality of Central America.” We asked her to share a little about her experience staying with a host… Read More →
Prepping for your trip to San Ramón, Nicaragua
Trip season is upon us here in San Ramón – our first group arrives from the University of Northern Iowa on December 26th, and we can’t wait to receive them! As our calendar slowly fills up with groups coming to visit, we get lots of questions from anxious newcomers who want to know what to… Read More →
Calling all High Schoolers: Five reasons you should sign up for a Cultural Immersion Ecotour to San Ramón
Since SCSRN starting bring groups to San Ramón back in the 90’s to experience life in this rural Nicaraguan community, some of our most faithful visitors every year have been from high schools like East Chapel Hill High, Greensboro Day, and Durham Academy. Visiting a foreign country, especially a poor country like Nicaragua, can seem… Read More →
Halloween in Nicaragua: cross-cultural exchange or “malinchismo”?
Halloween is just around the corner in the U.S., and though Halloween is not a Central American holiday, the tentacles of U.S. culture are showing signs of creeping in. In the capital of Managua, bars and restaurants throw Halloween parties to attract customers. Halloween has even made it to Matagalpa, the large city closest to… Read More →
Five things Nicaraguans do when it rains
In Nicaragua, we have two seasons- wet and dry. The dry season runs from about December to April, and in May the first rains start to fall. As the rainy season progresses, the scorched, parched earth slowly turns green again. September and October are the height of the rainy season in Nicaragua. This year, as… Read More →
Coffee, through the eyes of San Ramonians
As September comes to a close in San Ramón, the berries on the coffee plants are turning bright red, and families all over San Ramón are preparing for the flurry of activity that coffee picking season brings. It’s impossible to talk about life in San Ramón and not talk about coffee, yet coffee is an… Read More →
Nicaraguan Olympic stars, and the stars that never shine
This year Nicaragua was proud to send five competitors to the Olympic Games in Rio, competing in four sports: swimming, weightlifting, shooting, and athletics. It takes a true athlete to qualify for the Olympics, so though no medals were brought home, our Olympic stars are champions in our eyes! As I watched the Olympic Games… Read More →