My Homestay Family

While studying Spanish in León at the Casa de Cultura, I´ve been staying with a homestay family, the Sirias family. There are currently four people from the family living in this house. Though none of them speaks a word of English, getting to know them has certainly been one of the most interesting of my trip thus far.












My homestay mother Maria is a charasmatic, garrolous woman. She has a way of speaking to me in a somewhat conspiratorial manner, drawing me into her confidences. She also has a habit of laughing at her own jokes; I like people who do this. She clearly cares about my well-being and offers a high-five to her ¨chico¨ (that´s me!) every time I master a new Spanish phrase.

My homestay father Nedar is a small, affable man, always smiling. He works as a professor at the university in the sciences. Often we share nights of American music videos from the 70s and the 80s, of which he (and the rest of the country) are fond: Especially the rock band Chicago: you may (or may not) remember the hit ballads, ¨Hard to Say I´m Sorry¨and ¨You´re The Inspiration.¨It´s wonderful to sit there with him while we rocked out on our air guitars together. Lest you think that he only enjoys American music, he and has friends have a band called the Los Fermons. They break out their instruments every Thursday at 7 PM, playing salsa, merengue, rock, and a variety of Latin beats; Nedar plays the drums. They´re actually really good, and I like to sit on the porch in the gathering darkness and listen to the music.

My homestay sister Cony is my age, 23, but seems to regard my existence with cordial indifference. She is a university student but is on holiday at the moment. Therefore, she spends her day hanging out and watching TV. In the evening I sit with her and we watch American melodramas that have been subtitled in Spanish. Together we laugh at the stupid people. Our favorite is the show "NEXT!" on MTV, for obvious reasons.










Likewise, my homestay brother Anibal is a couple of years older. He is also on some type of semi-permanent holiday at the moment. Turns out he submitted his thesis and is waiting for results. In the meantime, he turns up every few days, wheeling his motorbike into the living room. We enjoy similar music and films and get along well. Often he brings his mattress and drags it into front of the TV so he can take a nap while watching TV. He´s a pretty ameable and helpful guy.

In addition there are two other older brothers in their late 20s who have moved out: William and his wife live in another part of León. And Nadar is a doctor for the army in the capital. I have met them on a couple of occassions and they are quite friendly as well. Grandma also seems to be hanging around the house a lot lately: knitting, moving about real slowly, and watching her Mexican soaps.

They also have some pets in the house: Rufo (the dog that follows me everywhere), a tiny cat (which I call el gato pequeño), and the omniscent bird Flor, the green parrot who is 29 years old, speaks fluent Spanish, and acts a bit like he runs the place.










The family lives a couple blocks from the center of town.The exterior is painted the blue color of the Nicaraguan flag. The neighborhood is mostly residential, aside from a couple of small shops. The house is across the street from the bombed out shell of the San Sebastian church, and, of course, the melodious new San Sebastian church located adjacent to those ruins. The San Sebastian church was bombed in 1979 by Somoza, and he was of course using artillery provided by the U.S. government; I never imagined I would be living across the street from a church bombed because of my government´s policies. But I am.

The house itself is rather spacious by Nicaraguan standards. My room is comfortable, what I´ve come to expect from my homestay experiences in foreign countries. The living room and the kitchen are both quite large. Everyone shares one bathroom. There´s a nice garden out back, about the size of a basketball court and bordered by a high wall. There´s a wood shed with tools in various states of rustification. And luckily for me, there are hammocks strung up between the coconut and mango trees. I wash my clothes by hand in a basin out there. We often eat in front of the TV.









Come to think of it, the entire household spends a lot of time in the house watching TV.