I know no body wants to hear it but, ‘I told you so.’
Since my first trip to Nicaragua in 1997, I saw something special and unique about the country and its people but couldn’t put my finger on it–just one of the feelings you get from extended periods of ‘off-the-beaten path’ travel.
It wasn’t for another few years that the opportunity presented itself to set up Al Campo International and include high school students from abroad in these priceless experiences. Along the way I received a lot of resistance from people interested in our service/learning trips but skeptical of the safety of Nicaragua based on its infamy from the 1980s fallout of Oliver North, the Iran/Contra scandal and the US State Depts political defamation of the country. As much as I tried to explain that the Nicaragua of the 80s (like many countries) was a different place than the Nicaragua of today, people generally chose Costa Rica(which has a higher rate of crime) as a ‘safer’ alternative.
Well, I guess thirty years is about what it takes because a recent article in the New York Times on the attractive environment for Americans in Nicaragua says it all . No, its still not the perfect democracy, but whose is? What it is, is a safe, welcoming and exciting country whose people are only interested in moving forward from its past history of revolution and capitalizing on its breathtaking beaches and jungles, vibrant culture and growing opportunities for locals and foreigners.
In 2008 tourism brought in an estimated $944 million (nearly one-sixth of the G.D.P.), and it has grown by 8.2 percent in the past year, with almost 24 percent of visitors hailing from the United States.
For Al Campo International and our village communities this is encouraging as more investment in the country gives rise to improvements in infrastructure, health care and environment. Unfortunately, these changes are always last to arrive in rural agrarian villages but as Al Campo’s projects continue to fill this void with few resources and lots of local initiative, government acts more quickly as they see what is accomplished by a few volunteers and a unified community.