[Originally from Idaho, Becca Renk has lived in Ciudad Sandino, Nicaragua, for more than 20 years, working in sustainable community development with the Jubilee House Community and its project, the Center for Development in Central America. Becca coordinates the Casa Benjamin Linder solidarity project in Managua.]

“Yes, I’m Nicaraguan,” answers the gray-haired man in the seat next to me on the flight to Managua, adding with a smirk, “by the disgrace of God.”

I recoil involuntarily. He’s taken the common saying, “Nicaraguan by the grace of God,” and twisted it into something ugly. When I ask him why he would say that, he answers with a litany of mata mama phrases I’ve heard before from people looking to ingratiate themselves with foreigners: Nicaraguans are always late; they fight over everything; they steal.

When I don’t respond to his casual racism, my seatmate asks what I do in Nicaragua.

“I work with a small non-profit in Ciudad Sandino, in the barrio of Nueva Vida, the one founded after Hurricane Mitch.”

“Hurricane which?” he asks.

“Mitch, in 1998?” I answer, puzzled. Even now, the legacy of the second deadliest hurricane on record still haunts Nicaragua

“Oh, Mitch,” scoffs Mr. Disgrace. “That didn’t do much in Nicaragua.” My jaw drops.

“I was in Nicaragua right after Mitch,” I say, teeth clenching. “There were 19,000 people killed and a quarter of a million people lost their homes in Nicaragua and Honduras. Even months after the hurricane in Nueva Vida, 12,000 people there were living in plastic shacks.”

“Huh,” he shrugs. “My cousin was in charge of housing in Nicaragua at the time.”

I was raised to be a pacifist, but in that moment a real desire to do violence washed over me. It’s hard to even think about, let alone put words to the tragedy of Hurricane Mitch and the terrible suffering of the people in its aftermath. But perhaps the hardest part for me is the impotence I felt – we were one small organization struggling to do anything while those in positions of power, who should have been working to help Nicaraguans rebuilt their lives, did nothing. They didn’t even deign to visit the refugee camps.

I look over at my seatmate. At the time of Hurricane Mitch [October 1998], his family was running the country like it was their own personal business. Neoliberal President Arnoldo Alemán put his buddies from Nicaragua’s oligarchy in charge of various ministries. [Neoliberalism in Nicaragua was enforced by the US, the IMF and the World Bank and meant austerity policies including privatization of state functions, and fees for public schools and primary health care.]  When they’d looted the coffers of one ministry, they moved on to another. They threw parties, drove giant cars, and gave themselves raises – Alemán’s personal wealth increased by 950% during his tenure as president. His apathy toward the people of Nicaragua was such that when the Sandinista mayor of Posoltega called during Hurricane Mitch to tell him that Las Casitas Mountain was going to collapse and they needed to evacuate people, he called her a hysterical woman and hung up on her. His careless attitude cost 3,000 human lives, and his negligence afterward cemented a societal trauma that has continued to claim lives.

While Mr. Disgrace’s family and the former president were living the high life; a few miles away, Ivania was living underneath a piece of black plastic with cardboard nailed on as a roof. Ivania was one of the first people I met when I arrived in Nicaragua in 1999 a few months after Hurricane Mitch. She, her husband and their three tiny children had one hammock to share to sleep on.

One of my friends that summer was Bernarda: her seven children were always clean, with their thick dark hair brushed neatly, sharing brilliant smiles. Their school was a piece of theater: two tents with a few desks piled inside with no teachers and no classes.

After weeks of paperwork to get scant materials from the Red Cross, our organization built houses for 144 families, including Bernarda’s. Made of four posts, a piece of tarp and a galvanized metal roof, the “house” really only amounted to a better tent than they had been living in before. Bernarda had been given only a piece of black plastic by the neoliberal government, however, and was eternally grateful for the tiny shack. She thanked us by handing us mangos that had been put in a freezer for a few hours. Standing in the mud with sweat dripping down my face, I had never tasted anything as good as that cold mango.

“I never imagined I would suffer so much in my life,” María, a single mother of ten, told me one day as she wept openly. María was a community leader with whom I spent innumerable hours traipsing around Nueva Vida to organize the construction. Twenty-five years later, I know that María’s suffering continued to compound in unimaginable ways: in 1999 she was pregnant with a baby boy who would grow up to be viciously murdered by a gang at eighteen years of age.

Perhaps its thinking about Nueva Vida that fills my eyes with tears of frustrated rage when I see my seatmate smiling smugly out at the clouds on top of Nicaragua’s chain of volcanoes marching south. Over 25 years, my life and our organization have been tangled up in the lives of many people in Nueva Vida. I have seen firsthand how much people struggle in that place built for victims of natural and human disasters. Today, those first babies born in Nueva Vida now have their own children, and some days it feels as though that neoliberal curse has followed them down those generations.

While in the rest of Nicaragua women are now having two or three children spaced five or ten years apart; in Nueva Vida, many families still have eight children, spaced a year or less apart. Around Nicaragua, young people are now graduating high school and going to university or vocational school; in Nueva Vida, children are still struggling to get through the sixth grade. All over Nicaragua there is access to sanitation and paved roads; in Nueva Vida there are pit latrines and used wash water runs through the dirt streets. It feels like for every step a Nicaraguan family must take to climb up out of poverty, a family in Nueva Vida must take three steps.

The neoliberal government in 1998 not only didn’t care that the victims of Hurricane Mitch were suffering, but those in charge at the time purposely made the poor poorer. They needed an uneducated docile labor force to work for cheap in their many businesses. What better way to accomplish that than to make children hungry and sick? Desperate parents are so easily exploited.

I know that the folks I work with in Nueva Vida were made poor by the wealthy of Nicaragua, who in this moment are being represented by the man sitting next to me. I want to tell him that Nicaragua is as ashamed of him as he seems to be of Nicaragua. In the end, perhaps my courage fails me, or perhaps I just sense that my words would fall on deaf ears. I stay silent.

Back at work, I deliver a food package in Nueva Vida to a woman I’ve known for a quarter of a century. Her house, which once perched precariously on the edge of an arroyo where people threw trash and dead dogs, is now a sturdy concrete house; the arroyo is paved, ditched, and lined with street lights all the way down past the three free public schools filled with children, including a school for kids with special needs – all improvements thanks to the Sandinista government.

Her compassion for others is huge – she has nursed several neighbors during their dying days, and she is currently looking after three people with serious health issues. When she has nothing left to put in her soup pot, she sends me a voice note – she’s never learned to read and write – and asks for help. When I arrive to drop off provisions for bone broth, she hugs me, makes an off-color joke and cackles uproariously. A visit with this tiny tower of strength never fails to lift my spirits.

With a jolt, I realize that she has more dignity in her little finger than Mr. Disgrace has in his whole being. Maybe we will never be able to make these callous bankers pay for what they did to the people of Nicaragua during the neoliberal years; but, by the Grace of God, this woman has survived and continues to show indefatigable kindness. That in itself is a victory.

* * * * *

Briefs
By Nan McCurdy

Nicaragua-China Maritime Route Inaugurated
With the arrival of the ship Sunny Fortune at the Port of Corinto, the commercial maritime route between Nicaragua and the People’s Republic of China was established August 1. During the inauguration, government officials and representatives of the Asian nation spoke of the desire to strengthen their economic and commercial exchange with the arrival of three ships on a monthly basis. The first ship that anchored at the Nicaraguan maritime terminal transported machinery that will be used to start the construction of the Punta Huete International Airport which will become the largest in Central America. (La Primerisima, 1 August 2024)

Thousands of Pilgrims Accompany “Minguito” in Exodus to Managua
The celebrations of the patron saint of Managua, Santo Domingo de Guzman, occur every year on the first and tenth of August. First, there is a pilgrimage taking the patron saint from Santo Domingo Church in the Sierras de Managua to another church in the city of Managua; then on the tenth another pilgrimage returns the saint to the Santo Domingo Church. The days include festivities honoring Minguito: People dress up and some even walk on their knees as a petition or promise. Vice President Rosario Murillo greeted the families in the procession and highlighted that the August festivities are a way of thanking God for peace in Nicaragua. She said, “Here we are in the midst of the August festivities of Managua; our people joyfully celebrating the tradition, culture and faith.” She added, “Let us celebrate the joy of living in peace throughout our territory and let us celebrate in a big way here in Managua, greeting these traditional festivities of Santo Domingo de Guzman who arrives here at his temple in the capital.”  The pilgrimage of Santo Domingo de Guzman began in the very early hours of August 1st accompanied by thousands of faithful. [The celebrations in honor of St. Dominic of Guzman, the founder of the Dominican Order, began in 1885 with the discovery of a small statue of the saint in the Sierras de Managua.] See photos: https://radiolaprimerisima.com/miles-de-promesantes-acompanan-a-minguito-en-exodo-hacia-managua/ (La Primerisima, 1 August 2024)

Government Begins Evaluation to Strengthen Management and Efficiency
On August 2, the Nicaraguan government of released a statement announcing that, “after evaluating programs and their successes and challenges at the end of the first half of this year 2024, it has decided to evaluate the work of each institution, its directions and projects.” The statement went on to say, “This evaluation implies ordering, restructuring and redesigning in order to promote savings and efficiency in spending and public management. The measure is aimed at generating greater availability of resources from the General Budget to promote greater progress in each of the proposals under development and to address and resolve pending challenges. This revision will allow us to mobilize more resources from the savings obtained, in order to speed up responses. It will also optimize our human capital with stability, quality, professionalism and higher performance in public service. The Government of Reconciliation and National Unity will start the second semester of 2024 with more strength and capacity for rapid action in the face of tasks that require greater promptness and efficiency.” (La Primerisima, 2 August 2024)

Nicaragua Recognizes the Election Victory of Nicolás Maduro
On August 2, President Daniel Ortega and Vice-President Rosario Murillo released a statement recognizing the reelection of Nicolas Maduro in the Venezuelan elections of July 28, saying that they extended their solidarity and permanent support in all circumstances in the face of the challenges of the cruel aggressions of the empire and its lackeys. They added that “justice, reason, light and truth belong to the peoples of the world who battle for a model of fraternity and respectful cooperation in favor of the common good.”  (La Primerisima, 2 August 2024)

Delivery of 575 Property Titles Begins
On August 5, Vice President Rosario Murillo reported that the Attorney General’s office is handing over 575 property titles in Juigalpa, Acoyapa, Tipitapa, El Cuá, Teustepe, San José de Los Remates, Tola, San Jorge, Estelí and Condega. She also announced that the National Police will be inaugurating two new Women’s Police Stations, one in La Sabana, Madriz, and the other in San Isidro, Matagalpa. Also, a citizen security unit will be inaugurated in Ayote, Chontales. Murillo also reported that a public lighting system was inaugurated in the José Benito Escobar neighborhood in the 6th district of Managua, benefiting 23,600 people. Public lighting was also inaugurated in the Manuel Fernández neighborhood in the seventh district of Managua, benefiting 12,300 people. (La Primerisima, 5 August 2024)

Bluefields Hospital Receives High-Tech Equipment
The Ernesto Sequeira Blanco Regional Hospital in Bluefields in the South Caribbean Region received new medical equipment ensuring quality care for mothers and newborns in the region. The investment was for the acquisition of two transport cribs for newborns, a fetal monitor, a ventilator, a portable ultrasound (abdominal and vaginal), three multifunctional thermal cribs and ten dopplers to listen to the fetal heart rate. The Ministry of Health staff celebrated the arrival of this equipment, which is the result of the efforts of the Sandinista Government through Central America Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI). (La Primerisima, 6 August 2024)