| Learn Spanish, Make a Difference
International Living Postcards--your daily escape Thursday, Feb. 9, 2006 Dear International Living Reader,
Juan Carlos pointed with his chin to a teenager in the front room of the old house, sitting on a second-hand sofa, watching television. My first day of Spanish lessons at Casa Xalteva, and the resident manager, Juan Carlos, was introducing me to the young people staying there. Walter is the oldest at about 16; the youngest is 9. They're here because they're lucky. Casa Xalteva offers Spanish classes as a way to make enough money to provide a place to stay (and offer support) for kids in Granada, Nicaragua, who have run out of other options. Abusive families…no family at all…drugs (especially the pega--shoe glue--the poorest of the poor sniff to get high)…these kids would have to deal with it on their own, or ultimately with the police, if not for Casa Xalteva. I'd found out about Casa Xalteva on the Internet (http://www.casaxalteva.com/) and had signed up with one of the founders, Ken Carpenter. He and his partner, Gregory Calvert, were professors in the U.S. who were casting about Central America 10 years ago, looking for some way to put their old '60s student radical ideals to work in a positive way for the poor of the region. They happened on Granada, fell in love with the place and its people…and Casa Xalteva was born. My profesora, Vanessa, explained it to me in Spanish on my first day of class, and I caught about a third of what she said, which seemed to impress her. In three years of living in Mexico (and one in Ecuador), I'd garnered enough restaurant and taxi Spanish to understand most conversations, if held at about half-speed. Vanessa was patient with me, but the local accent in Granada sounds uncannily like Italian at times, and locals often drop letters--even entire syllables--from the ends of words when they're conversing naturally. Vanessa, it turned out, was consciously challenging my listening skills to see what I had. I was exhausted after 20 minutes…and I'd signed up for four hours a day, for five days. No rest before or after classes, either. I'd opted for a home stay with a local family. Ernesto Diaz Ortega and his wife, Iliana, were my hosts. They had a house with a small tienda (store) in front, about five blocks from Casa Xalteva. Three meals a day with the family, and a private room in their home, was included in my tuition for the week. Total cost for everything (lessons, accommodations, meals, and all the conversation I could stomach for a week): $225. But, as tiring and challenging as the classes were, I couldn't feel too sorry for myself when I saw the kids at Casa Xalteva. Some of them were walking the line between going back on the streets to fend for themselves, or being sent to jail or rehabilitation centers. Juan Carlos keeps them constantly busy--the old house is large, and there is always something to clean, repair, or modify. One of the co-founders, Gregory, passed away recently, and the other co-founder, Ken, is back in the States working to raise enough money to keep Casa Xalteva going. The tuition for language classes helps pay the bills, I was told, but it takes a lot to keep the house up, pay the teachers and staff, and keep the kids fed, occupied, and out of trouble…and there are always more kids than they can afford to take in. I took my guitar to class one day, and Walter's eyes lit up. I pulled out a harmonica, and we sat in the front room and traded some licks. He turned out to be pretty good. It would have been a great way to spend the afternoon, but I had class. And by that time, I was feeling like I should get my money's worth out of my time at Casa Xalteva. Not just for myself, but for the kids as well. I can't say I made huge progress…but I have more irregular verbs in the simple past tense than I did a week ago. I also have a bunch of kids in Granada who smile and wave at me when I walk by the school. Your roving scout, taking some time out from property-finding, Dan Prescher Related articles: - Ten-thousand bikes, 20,000 smiles.
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