Home Is Where the Heart Is

A snapshot on my experience living with a family for 2.5 months in Leon before making my recent move to the northern city of Matagalpa *Note: names have been changed for privacy, but those used could be commonly found in a Leonese neighborhood

What $100/month buys you in Leon

At the beginning of May I left the house where I had lived with my NGO affiliate—and the wonderful young activists and friends that work there—for the first three months of my Fulbright grant period. That is, I cut the umbilical and moved about a half a block away. I found my new house while shopping for a bicycle; there was a sign on the door announcing that they had one for sale. After some attempts to talk the owner down, I bought the bike at a fair price, and on my way out the door the young woman who sold it to me on behalf of her absent husband asked, “by the way, how much are you paying for the room where you live now?” In the next few weeks we worked out the details and I moved in.

 I soon learned that my new roommates name was Mariela; she is 26 a mother to a two year old son named Jeffrey. Mariela was the house’s caretaker before its US-based Nicaraguan owner became her “mother-in-law.”  I also learned that when she said “husband” what she meant was the father of her son, who is supporting her and his most recent child from his and his mother’s home in Miami. He seems to be doing well enough for himself in the States, where he has lived for 30 years as a legal resident.

When I finally met Eduardo, my partner Nathan had arrived to stay with me for several months in Nicaragua. We did an odd double date dinner with their small “family” one night, and it was abundantly clear that he considered his career as a parent to be over just as Mariela’s was beginning. Disappointment, anger, and resentment hazed the table, and vitriolic interactions built up to a climactic moment in which Mariela commented loudly to me that if I decided to have kids I should make sure Nathan was a good partner because if not I couldn't count on any help, any parenting, just money and that’s all. You could have cut the tension between them with the dull steak knife Eduardo used to hack away at his over-cooked filet as he commented to us in English that she should be happy he sends anything, considering that she tricked him into getting her pregnant. Sadly, there was some truth to this comment when it’s considered in the context of a society that suffers from chronic alcoholism, infidelity, machismo, and absent fathers.

The Dona Florencia on
her birthday

I also learned soon after moving in that living with Mariela meant living with her grandmother full time, her aunt part time, and later her cousin, who moved in with her baby a few weeks after I did. Between visitors, unexpected house mates and the children between them it’s a house that’s full of movement and mucha bulla (much commotion). It’s also a house that’s full of feminine energy. Doña Florencia, the abuelita (grandma), sits intently watching women wail on her Telenovelas in the living room each evening; in the dining/play room the boys pass a ball (with all the single mothers I know here, the presence of even male children also takes on a feminine air); I type or read away in the first bedroom; Mariela coos or harps at her son in the next one over the blaring cartoons; and Aunt Aura serves up the rice and beans in the back while her sister Catarina rapidly  rubs clothing across the scrubbing board, her chubby baby boy watching her intently from the floor.

Living with Mariela meant making friends with the neighbors, like our vibrant and flirtatious young neighbor India who allowed me access to her wifi at a small monthly fee. She has a good internet service because her Colombian husband requires her to be on video chat 24/7. He wants to know what she’s doing and who she’s with, even when she’s sleeping. They have an “agreement” that neither leaves the house unless the other goes out. Like Mariela’s and many other Nicaraguans’ spouses and family members, he currently lives in Miami and sends money home. On the rare occasions India does leave the house to chat with us on the stoop in the evening, her US-purchased iPhone inevitably chirps Skype’s rhythmic do-do-doo do-do-doo, calling her back to solitude. I learned recently that she was hoping to move closer to her mother, from whom she was estranged, but he wouldn’t permit it. Nor would he permit her a female roommate for some company. He pays the rent, after all.

When we finally moved out of Mariela’s house in June it was sadly in a flourish of frustration and bad feelings. My partner Nathan had moved to Nicaragua, which pushed the house beyond capacity. He and I slept in one room, while three women and two little boys slept in the other. Day and night, one of them was usually crying. We all shared the same kitchen and bathroom with each other and a host of uninvited guests: mice, rats, cockroaches, ants.

One morning, Nathan and I discovered his phone missing, and by the afternoon were sure that the cousin, Catarina, has swiped it. In the weeks before I had become something of the house bank, paying too much for Catarina to wash our clothes because she needed an income and lending money here and there to cover unexpected expenses. For that reason it felt like more of a slap in the face when we heard the phone ringing in her room and had to confront her about it. After getting the phone back, we left that night, 5 days before our planned move to Matagalpa.

Mariela did not defend her cousin. Instead she told us that she had also been stealing from her, which was one of the reasons she had needed to borrow money. Of course she failed to mention that to her tenants. From time to time it has crossed my mind to visit when in Leon to check in on Mariela, but I don’t know that I ever will. I regret that the relationship ended poorly, but what is more troubling is that, considering the dynamics of that house, in the end we were just treated like family.