For the past several months, another intern has been doing research about migration in Nicaragua for her Masters program. At this point in her project, she is putting her work together into a report for her internship and for school, and she is also talking with people in the community and working on future plans based on the needs that she is finding for migrants and their families. This includes programs with the goal of reducing migration, including community organization, micro finance, and job training. At the same time, we recognize that migration is a means of survival for many people in Nicaragua, so that is where addressing the needs of migrants and their families becomes important.
My internship is a migrant rights project. I will be researching and presenting information about migration policy, labor laws, and migrant rights to different communities in the area. We work with a former squatters´community called Solidaridad, which is now a near-complete housing project with Casa de la Mujer. About seven years ago, Solidaridad was a community of people living in an area prone to flooding, and who were often made to leave the area by the government as they were considered squatters. Over time, people organized and got involved with Casa de la Mujer, and eventually started to receive funding from organizations in Spain, Germany, and Italy (I believe this is correct, but I will check).
The housing project aids people in building their own houses. In order to be a part of this project, individuals must provide a foundation for their houses as well as people to work on the house and a payment for the house. This instills a sense of ownership for the houses, which cannot be sold but can be passed on to another family member after a period of time. The community now is full of sturdy-looking houses, but work is still to be done to bring electricity and water to the area. Another thing that has happened is that some people are unable to build houses where they live if they do not own the property or if they have sold it, which is a difficult situation.
One young person who works in Casa de la Mujer is also a teacher and organizer in Solidaridad, and he does a lot with the children in the community. The other day, we went with our project coordinator to present soccer jerseys to the young boys in Solidaridad. Apparently, we are going to play a game with them in a few weeks, which should be interesting considering I don´t know anything about soccer and these kids have been playing for years. I loved seeing them interested in a community activity and hanging out together. I also got to see the kids´club upstairs, where the children learn different crafts and where they hope to compile a library.
Another community that we work with is called Valle de Granada and is close to the old hospital. This is where we had a focus group with the children on Friday, and another one with adults on Monday. When we arrived on Monday, the woman who does a lot of community organizing brought me around the neighborhood to remind people of the focus group. A dog was following us, and she explained that he follows her everywhere and that she calls him ¨el guapo.¨ There is another dog called ¨amiga¨ that also follows her, which she says is because she gives them food. She knew everyone in the community, and we stopped by one house where a man gave her a bag of mangoes and then gave me one as well. Then, she showed me a plant that she said was good to make a tea out of if you have a cough, so she was going to bring it to another house where someone had a cold. She told me that it is difficult to organize the community, but that she hoped in the future that more organization could give the community more opportunities.
The people in the focus group, some of which had previously been interviewed, shared their thoughts and experiences about migration including their own travels as well as those of family members. One woman shared the sadness of leaving her children behind, and the difficulties she faced with her employer abroad. Others shared their hopes of obtaining transportation for their sandal shop, but expressed their frustration at the amount of sandals they would need to sell in order to be able to afford the transportation to sell so many sandals. A lot of questions came up about the process of migrating legally, the requirements, and the costs. People told us that migrating legally and illegally are equally difficult for different reasons, and that they cost roughly the same amount.
After the focus group, the woman who had taken me around the neighborhood shared stories about her life with us. Then, she told us about her hopes for the young people in the neighborhood. She said that people grow up very fast and talked about some of the difficult situations that arise within families including her own when people get married and have children and then fall out of love. She said that she would like to see the young people enjoy their youth and wait to have children, so that they can go to school and then have a stable family when they are older.
After Monday, I had a better idea of the kinds of questions that people have and I began my research yesterday. There is a lot of information out there, so I am trying my best to get as much work done as possible during my short time here. I also met with my project coordinator and the other intern yesterday, and we talked about our current work and ideas about projects in the future. One of the ideas that came up was a very focused micro finance program in Valle de Granada, with the goal of keeping the program very focused within the neighborhood, which would make the project manageable and hopefully more successful than it would be if we tried to have a larger program. Apparently, there is a government micro finance program for women, and I am going to try to find out about any other options we may have.
We also talked about different activities that we could do with the children in the community, and I´m excited about the possibility of doing this in addition to my migration project. All in all, I have a lot to do! I try to stay focused throughout the day and set goals for myself. I plan on making my presentations and creating an informative brochure about the legal process of migration. Next, I want to make a contact booklet or card for different offices and organizations that people may need. I hope that access to the right information and knowledge of resources and contact information will provide people with the tools they need to assert their rights as employees and as residents abroad.
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