Casa de Cafe

Today I've been max-ing out my welcome at the Casa de Cafe. The CdC is a Managua-based coffeehouse that serves up a good breakfast and lunch...the coffee could be better ; )

I've been hanging out taking advantage of the free wireless internet. Logging like 3 hours on Skype in the past two days and eating plenty of good food at great prices. (Wow am I plugging this place or what?)

My brother Jason always says that if you sit in one place long enough, things will happen. You'll make friends. You'll witness an accident. You'll get mugged. Then you can write about it.

The vantage point from the top floor, and the breeze at the CdC, make all the difference when you are solo in Managua. The cafe has been here since 1998 - so I spent a lot of afternoons working here during study abroad. It is familiar. I have seen an accident out front. I have made friends. I've never been mugged. (knock on wood.)

Over my left shoulder I can see the mountains to the south of Managua and the large distant black profile of Sandino that sits atop Tiscapa where the government sits today. Agosto Cesar Sandino is a (debated) national hero whose leadership in fighting the occupying US marines in the 1920s is respected as a patriotic act similar to the minutemen of New England. He helped unite the country divided by political differences during that time. Pretty much all Nicaraguans respect his legacy which stands at almost mythical proportions. Although his memory has been adopted for many causes (including the revolutionary Sandinistas) his sense of Nica patriotism crosses most political lines. Hence his figure still stands by the government offices as a national symbol. Others say it stands atop the Tiscapa to represent the haunting past of the civil war during the 1980s.

The sky is blue and large white clouds float by.