As with any place, if certain realities are noted but not respected at the beginning, there is always a chance that they will come back to strike later on, as is the case with this blog post. I'm writing about my most recent "raw" experience that really spoke to me in ways that can leave a much deeper sensation and memory of a place, much more than simply seeing new sights and tasting new and interesting foods.
Kathy and I had been warned many times, by most any living and breathing soul in Nicaragua and outside of Nicaragua, Nicaraguan, or from another country, they all tell you that this place is Dangerous! Take taxis, trusted taxis at that, ones recommended by others or that have a running track record of not robbing you while you are in their cab. Aside from that, never walk in the wrong neighborhoods, at night (after 5:30pm), etc etc etc. And we know this, and are aware of it, but we also were going to continue living our lives, without bubbling over with fear of this new impoverished city in which we found ourselves; one must carry on and live without fear as is our personas, or else we probably wouldn't have taken these internships in Nicaragua, and would probably have chosen to find something a little closer to home, with a slightly lower risk factor than living here, in Managua, the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Anyways, I digress.We were out gathering some groceries from the supermarket at the shopping mall closest to our house, and decided to take the bus back as it was dark, and although we had walked the 30 minutes to and from the mall a number of times, we usually did it by daylight. So we proceeded to search out the bus that we needed that took us past our house, but first needed to walk a few blocks to where it picks us up. We made it about half of the distance to where we needed to get, and, to be honest, were not situated in the best of places of Managua, actually, adjacent one of the most dangerous neighborhoods.... woops :s
Almost as in slow-motion I spotted the 5 little hoodlums cross 'Pista Juan Pablo' (a major street) and walking towards us with a certain determination in their step... I knew what was happening immediately as I saw them approaching, looking into the eyes of these 5 boys (between the ages of 14-16 if I were to have to guess). I also noticed that at least one, if not two were already reaching down the front of their pants to pull the all-too-Hollywood/gangster-slick motion of the pistol grab from the crotch area... And there we all were, them surrounding us, pistol drawn on me first, with 2-3 more behind me, and one on Kathy (at the moment). As he drew it on me he cocked it right in my face and I took note of the very plastic sound that it made. I had a very strong suspicion already that they kids were bluffing to some extent, but even if they were, in the heat of the moment, you can never be too sure, and who is to say that the other few behind me weren't armed with knives.
Gun in face/chest (Can't really remember as I was more focused on the ones beside me already) The others began to reach into my pockets prompting me to hand over cellular and wallet. At this point I decided it was time to drop the grocery bags that I had been holding to this point and started to shove back and forth grabbing their hands from my pockets, and fighting to keep the cell phone and wallet in my pockets (where they belonged), as I yelled at them in Spanish as clearly as I could that we didn't have cell phones or wallets, just spare change and groceries. To my sweet lady luck they were not able to gather my phone, nor my wallet, as my own combative hand jerks were making the point clear that I wasn't going to hand them over without a little scuffle. Therefore, my pocket least guarded (I really wish I had a third hand), was that of my keys. I felt them grab hold, and pull out of my pocket before I could send one of my other hands to the rescue. It hadn't made it in time as their hand had already pulled out and away from my pocket. At this point, almost as if the whole quarrel had only been a split second, I saw the same 5 guys bolting back across the street, holding a couple grocery bags, as they disappeared on the other side, slipping into the darkness of barrio Jorge Dimitrov.
I turned to see Kathy, and felt my heart sink as I saw her standing, arms slightly raised from her side, palms opened forward, and tears beginning to run down her face. The feeling that came over me at this moment was something deep, real, something that I rarely feel in my day to day routines, even here in Managua; this raw feeling had hit home and I knew that Managua had flared up to remind us of where we are, how some people live their lives, and how we needed to raise our guard from now on and respect the streets and how things work here.
They had managed to get her wallet (with more money than usual due to a recent withdrawal, debit, and credit card) cell phone, and a couple of her grocery bags, which would not have mattered all that much, except for the fact this was the hiding spot for her wallet, as who would have thought that thieves would go for the grocery bags. Luckily for Kathy, she had forgotten her passport, which was actually one of the main reasons we had gone to the mall, to renew her tourist visa.
We gathered the remaining grocery bags and I hailed a cab to take us home. Upon arrival I climbed outside my room to break into my own room, as I had lost my keys, and opened it from the inside. Kathy began phoning credit card companies etc., and notifying those who needed notifying. As we finally decided it was time to eat a little dinner (as it had gotten late), I began cleaning out the remaining grocery bags we had, and much to my surprise, at the bottom of the last bag were... my keys.... I hadn't been robbed a single thing. I recounted my blessings at this point.
As the cards were cancelled, and the keys recovered, the only real loss was a lump sum of cash that Kathy had in her wallet, and beyond this we were unharmed, still with our lives, and all things of real importance in our lives untouched. We knew we were blessed and that God had watched over us, but also that we were going to take many more precautions to prevent a re-occurrence in the future, and would take cabs at night, especially while carrying large sums of money or passports.
Thank God, and Nicaragua, for this lesson, and for the sparing of our lives. In the end, we truly were blessed.
-Adrien
