I was kind of surprised at the volume of unwashed American zen-seekers hanging out on Ometepe Island. I saw a lot of dredlocks, saw a lot of bras, smelt a lot of B.O. Sort of like Woodstock '94, not that I was there. My mom was like, "No way, you're not going, you're not even close to cool enough." I was like, "Mah-uhm! I'm fifteen, I can make my own good decisions now. Also, I just spent my allowance on a toy gun shaped like the Starship Enterprise that shoots foam discs. Can you give more money because I want a fudge pop from the corner store."
These kids didn't have B.O., so I took pictures of them. I don't take pictures of people with B.O. Reduces the lifespan of your camera. We were kicking it on the dock, watching the sun go down. I was taking photos of a stupid heron, hoping something cooler would happen. Then these little kids started jumping off this docked ferry, and I was like, "Schweet, I like it when people exercise poor judgment and it benefits me."
The benefit of kind of having vacation-induced insomnia is that I get bored of lying awake in bed, so I eventually just get up and grab my camera and walk around. I walked around for awhile but didn't really see anything that interesting. Then the sun came up and people started bustling around town, and I spotted this guy riding a cart pulled by two yoked cows coming down the street. I was like, "Schweet, I like it when people haven't yet joined the 20th century and it benefits me." So I sat on the sidewalk and shot as the cows lumbered right past me. I was happy that the guy struck this Marvel superhero pose at just the right moment.
Probably the best thing about Moyogalpa is this hulking billboard of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. It doesn't face town; rather, it faces out into the lake, so that every arriving boat or ferry can enjoy that mustache as they approach. I would be a socialist too if it meant getting to run my fingers over that mustache. That kid at the top of the billboard is thinking, "How can I get down there to touch that 'stache?"
We spent some time at Ojo de Agua. It's a big natural spring that feeds a big pool, and it's an incredible blue color, like the color of whoever Elton John was singing about in that song "Blue Eyes." Probably he was singing about Daniel Ortega. I didn't feel all that inspired to take pictures for most of the day, because mostly there were mostly only foreigners zenning out in the water, and I was like, I didn't come all this way to take pictures of trustafarians from the Upper West Side trying to grow facial hair, you know? But later in the afternoon the locals descended, which seemed a lot more authentic, so I joined them. By the time I got this shot, I'd been hanging around for ten or fifteen minutes, and all the kids were like, "This guy is weird, but he's been here so long he's like our weird Uncle Jorge." Then it was like I was part of the family -- the part that gets ignored and that no one shares their churrasco with, but still part of the family.
Next time I promise I'll actually write about the race. And by "promise," I mean it like public figures mean "promise": if it strikes my fancy.