Nicaraguan Quicksand

"I'm looking for a piggy bank."

"A what?" retorted the Nicaraguan market vendor.

"A piggy bank." I didn't think the literal translation ("Banco de Cerdo") would serve me well, but I gave it a shot.

 "Listen," I continued, "I'm looking for a plastic or porcelain container that kids use to save coins. It is often in the form of a pig."

"Why?" he replied.

"I want one for my desk. I find coins on the street and I want to put them in a piggy bank."

"No," he countered, "Why is it in the shape of a pig?"

Geez, good question. I made a mental note to look into it when I got back to my computer.

"I have no idea why it is in the shape of a pig. If you don't have any, can you point me in the right direction?"

The gruff, unshaven man, with a super-long-stringy moustache and piercing deep brown beady eyes gave me a puzzled look and pointed haphazardly to his right.

Ugggghhh. "What I mean is . . . can you tell me exactly where I might find a piggy bank? Can you be more explicit?"

"Well you said 'point'," he shot back defiantly.

"I know, I know, but it a manner of speech."

I was in Spanish quicksand and sinking fast. It is a place I have come to know very well. Call it my home away from home.

His puzzled expression had no signs of abating.

"Never mind. Next time I'll come with a picture. Gracias." (to be continued)

Macho, Macho Man

His name is Manuel and he is my handyman.

When I need something fixed up, something painted, something repaired, something unplugged, or something rewired, Manuel is my man.

He's a tough, working-class, beer-swillin', lady-lovin' macho Nicaraguan guy.

AND, he is the absolute last person on earth that I would expect to see . . .  at a Friday evening POETRY reading here in Masaya.

But, amazingly that is where I saw him, and that is where he was.

I sauntered up for a closer look to confirm that the person I spotted was the person I thought it might be.

He notices me. "BOXER!" (I say "Walter", he hears "Boxer", so depressing, but I'll save that for another blog.)

"What are you doing here, Manuel, is there an open bar? Is Toña* sponsoring? Ladies' night?"

"No" came the upbeat reply.

"I came to a reading last Friday. And it was beautiful."

"Oh," suddenly feeling incredibly narrow-minded for the "open bar" joke.

Nicaragua continues to surprise me. There is a genuine fondness for the arts here unlike I've seen elsewhere. Amongst all.


My beloved handyman probably eats quiche, too.


 *Toña is the name of a national beer.

Time Wasters

One encounters timewasters running a non-profit.

And then one encounters real time wasters running a non-profit.

And then one encounters Twitter.

Experts told us that BECA should be taking full advantage of social networking. "It's how the new generation of non-profits network."

Well, I drank the koolaid.

And after a six month Twitter trial all I can tell you is that it tastes like crap.

I can't for the life of me figure out any utility here. At least not for a start-up non-profit like us.

RIP Twitter. I'm going to really enjoy removing that blue bird from our website.

It's Not What You Know but . . .

I was taught early in my "business" career the importance of having good professional help.

"Never skimp on professional fees," I was told. "An excellent lawyer and/or accountant is worth his or her weight in gold" said another. Blah, blah, blah . .  .

Who is this Man?* (answer below)

It isn't so easy to put into practice. Who in their right mind feels good about forking over $400 or $500 bucks . . . AN HOUR???

I learned to pay it and usually -- not always, but most of the time -- the advice I received paid dividends.

Back to present day Nicaragua.

What a nightmare.

BECA is now moving on to lawyer #6.I can't for the life of me find a decent, dependable lawyer here in Nicaragua.

This leads me to the premise of this blog.

I DON'T KNOW ANYBODY *#$&#(&$#!

It's one of the challenges I face working on BECA.

Back home, you pick up the phone. You phone a friend or family member. Someone whose opinion you trust. You get a reference. Boom, you're in business.

I can't do that here. There is no one to phone.

I'll tell you one thing. It makes me appreciate like CRAZY what our ancestors went through when they immigrated at the turn of the century.

Cripes they couldn't even speak the language.


Hmmm.

I guess that kinda applies to me too.

*About that picture. Do a Google image search for "lawyer nightmare." He's a lawyer whose pic comes up right near the top. Poor unsuspecting guy probably wrote an article at some point on some kind of complicated legal case he had. Too funny!

He Shoots, He Scores (High in Poverty)

I've talked about this poverty thing before.

To me it remains a four letter word. But no matter how much I dislike it, the concept remains very relevant for the work we try to do here in Nicaragua.

Here's an example.

BECA is about giving opportunities Nicaraguan high school grads. But not all of them. We want to lend a hand only to those that want to go to school, but can't afford it.

That's the easy part.

The hard part is . . . how can you tell how poor someone is?

Here is what we used to do. Go visit the scholarship applicant at home, eyeball the situation, and make a subjective call. "Yeah, this looks like a pretty rough situation. Juan deserves a shot."

I remember arguing with one of my Latin American workmates. I saw a newspaper in a house we were visiting. BINGO! That was enough for me. "This family doesn't need any scholarships . . they can afford to buy the newspaper!"

Not very scientific, and, ultimately, unacceptable.

So this year we are trying out something new. A score card. You can check out the English version here (pdf).

Last weekend we visited 21 families. And we kept score. The initial results were encouraging. Well, not encouraging of course . . . but, you know, I think this scorecard concept has potential.

Now the question is . . .

What to do with all these numbers?

[sigh]

Why are We Staring?

Why are we staring all day at our computer?
 
Is it because we’re working?

       or 

Is it because we’re trying to figure out what to work on?
 
They’re not the same thing.

Hat tip: Sasha Dichter's Blog

The (non)Giving Season

If you are wondering how the donation season went around here at BECA.org, don't ask.

It sucked.
  
Donations were down at least 50% from holiday season 2009.

The conventional wisdom in the U.S. non-profit universe is that 90% of your donations come in the last two weeks in December. I guess it's a tax deduction thing.

Anyway, if that really is the case, then we are in for a very long year. [gulp]

Not sure why the December fundraising went so poorly.

I thought we had all our bases covered.

We produced a nifty video campaign.

We reached out to all our newsletter subcribers.

We reached out to our previous sponsors.

We bugged our Facebook fans.

I phoned my Mom. (No panic there, she stepped up. Always does.) :)

Maybe we'll send out a poll to find out why people weren't interested in chipping in.

It could be that the peer-to-peer sponsorship model doesn't have any legs and is not sustainable in the longer term. This is a possibility.

Nevertheless, none of this is in the least bit disheartening to me personally. The program here in Nicaragua is going good and we still plan to expand to two more cities.

If it means changing gears and eventually coming up with a different sustainable funding mechanism, so be it.

Rest assured. There is no way in the world I'm giving up that easy.

Besides, I'm having way too much fun.

For those of you who did chip in, thanks a lot. Thanks for believing in what we are doing. Every buck or two really goes a long way here.