Am I late?

So I've been in Managua, Nicaragua for about a month and a week now...I think a blog post is long overdue. Sorry, this is probably going to be unnecesarily long because it's the first post...

Recap of the last month(ish) in brief: I spent the first two weeks of my 13 months with Manna Project International in language school beginning the overwhelming task of tackling the Spanish language. Coming into this I felt like a big shot...you know, having high school Spanish 5 under my belt and all...but of course as the Good Book says, pride ALWAYS comes before the fall. What's funny is that Nicaraguan Spanish is at times significantly different than Spanish everywhere else. For instance, instead of "tú" for the word "you," they use the word "vos." This conveniently brings with it a completely new conjugation for every verb. Gracias for that little tid bit public education. Anyhow, my Spanish is most certainly coming along everyday and hopefully soon everything will be tuani (Nicaraguan slang for "cool")!

On top of taking Spanish classes we spent the first week taking trips around Managua exploring what the city and its surrounding areas have to offer. I won't waste time now talking about that because that's not what I'm here for (just check facebook if you want some photos). The second week and beyond we spent working with Manna programs. Since moving back into the Manna House (which I will post pictures of), we have now become well acquainted with all of Manna's programs and are running them full time! As of now these are the programs I'm heading up:

Beginner's English: By far one of the programs I am most excited about this year. I'm co-teaching this class with my teammate Amelia who spent the last year teaching English in Thailand! She's internationally certified to teach English so I'm essentially learning from the best. Just to give you an idea of how much interest we had...we recently decided to split up the class into a "Beginner Beginner's" class and an "Advanced Beginner's" class. We held a placement exam to see who should be in which class and had 50 people show up!!! Awesome.

Literacy: I teach a couple younger guys named Armando and Ulyses how to read in Spanish. Seriously two of the cutest kids ever, but I've now found a whole new respect for teachers who have a class of 20 of these little guys!

Math: I co-teach a small math group of local kids.

Microfinance: Long story short we have decided that MPI isn't the type of organization that should be handing out loans so we are changing the program to "Business Development." We are going to have a business class covering a broad array of topics every Friday. We will also help community members get in touch with other microfinance organizations that will be able to offer them loans to further their business pursuits. Assistance with applications and business plans will of course be available as well!

I'm incredibly excited with what God has laid before me here in Nicaragua and I cannot wait to pour my heart out into these programs over the next year! Please continue to pray for what God is doing in this country. It is so easy to see him working around me every day and for that I have a lot to be joyful about! In the future I will post stories of how crazy and disfunctional Nicaragua is, but how at the same time it is one of the most amazing and captivating places on this earth.