Nicaragua: New project, same team!

The team have moved to Managua and are deep into their project already! Here are some snippets of info to fill you in

• We are living in a really nice space full of greenery and amazing trees.
• Our accommodation was full for a few days so we got moved to an amazing hotel nearby with a pool just outside our rooms!
• Everyone’s Spanish is getting so much better
• We’ve got 2 denim hammocks
• We just did up our last calendar of the tour and saw the finishing date… dun dun duuuunnn

One of the projects we are working with is Casa Alianza. This is a place for teenagers from about 13 – 17 years old who come from vulnerable backgrounds. We are working with a group of “Phase 1” teens who are fresh to the programme. Despite being so fresh, they have positive attitudes towards each other, us, working as a team and learning in general. For me, this shows that the programme they are running is super good. They listen to each other when we ask what they learned in the session, they sit out and take time when they feel that’s what they need and in general, work as a big family despite having lots of things running around in their own minds, I’m sure. I have felt both nourished and challenged coming out of each of these sessions.

Helen & Will with upcoming diabolo superstars

Project two is in a school six minutes away by car. We are working with about a million children with an average age of about 9. These kids are really well behaved and because of a mixture of their good behaviour and the team growing in confidence, we have had the chance and courage to try out some new workshops. This week’s specials included a rhythm workshop with lots of clappy numbers and a magic workshop with the infamous “paper bag trick”. The kids run around, so do we and we have a great time teaching them what we know.

Darine teaching a macho routine with devil sticks

Project 3 is a village down a bumpy road that makes me feel car sick. We were told that this community is relatively new and they are having issues with togetherness along with drugs and violence. We go there once a week to do 2 sessions in the back garden of a lovely man called Done Jose who sits on a chair and smiles as everyone runs around and has a great time. These guys don’t have major experience with circus and are quite young so it’s a real treat to be able to introduce them to our little tricks.

This week especially, I’ve really been appreciating our team and all of the amazing things that they bring to the vibe. Here they are with 3 little facts about them (in alphabetical order)

• Darine – (that’s me so as told by Jacob) gives lovely head massages, 
• Helen – laughs a lot, never drinks her fresco and recently has become a badass base for acro.
• Ivy – is a ninja in everything you can classify as a board game, always has very tidy facepaint for shows and we have discovered, loves throwing water around.
• Jacob – is an expert at washing his clothes by hand, loves wearing leopard print and will usually finish food you don’t want
• Kit – has an amazing collection of quirky facts, takes amazing photos at the right time and always comes back with a story after days off.
• Sara – juggles anytime she has a spare breath, gets her hair cut most often and is great for little chit chats
• Will – loves bopping his head to cheesy Nicaraguan pop tunes, says random funny words in his sleep and once had clean sweat bands.

During bootcamp, we were all fresh and hyper and eager to get to know the personalities of the team. In Leon, we were starting to figure out how a group of 7 people who previously only knew each other’s Facebook page, can manage to work together. San Marcos, things were starting to settle, and here in Managua, I feel like we are all fitting together like a little jigsaw.

Back of the camioneta cheekiness

I’d be telling fibs if I said there were never frustrations but frustrations are (usually 😉 ), not at each other directly and just at the situations that happened. We’ve got a team that I feel is really emotionally intelligent and know what they need when they need it. We’re really open as a team and are free to express what we feel and always try to accommodate needs of whoever in the team is having difficulties.

I’m so glad I’m working with people that will jump in and run games for me if I’m feeling really tired after a show, that will check in a little bit extra if I mention I’m feeling a bit tender that morning, that will tell me they disagree but do it with love, that teach me, let me teach them AND have really funny cheeky banter in the back of the camioneta. It has only been when I stepped back and looked at our amazing team without a mind full of workshops and shows that I realised how much I appreciated this bunch of energisers.

So I’m taking this blog post to publicly tell this amazing team that you are amazing, we’re all doing a perfect job at being ourselves and we are all playing a really important part in this mind blowing project doing heart warming activities for groups of superstars full of potential. GO US!

Well done team Nica 2018. Looking forward to the next few weeks.

Darine xx

Team Nica 2018 pre show being their amazing selves