While living in Managua, the hardest things I’ve had to balance are my personal safety and my sense of freedom. Everyone I meet here is paranoid about personal safety-often for good cause I’ll admit. A lot of the recommendations are fairly obvious and apply to just about any big city: Don’t walk alone at night, especially in neighborhoods you are unfamiliar with. Be extra alert when you are at the ATM. Other recommendations are more unique to Managua. Never ride with a taxi driver you don’t know; always get a recommendation and call for a driver. Never walk alone anywhere, not even in a safe neighborhood in the middle of the day.
Barred windows on a house in Managua.
As you can imagine, all of these warnings are overwhelming and extremely hard to follow. I get the impression that my co-workers would be happiest if they could guarantee that every night I went straight home from work and locked myself in my house until the morning.
Unfortunately, I really can’t live like that, because after living in the US for most of my life, freedom of movement is like water. My first couple of weeks here, I took all their advice very seriously and ended up feeling like a caged bird (it doesn’t help that most windows here have bars on them). After two months in Managua, I’ve learned to be extra cautious, but also to let myself live a little. It is a balancing act. For instance, sometimes I hale a taxi on the street, but I never do this when I’m carrying my computer or when I’m going to a location I don’t know. When I go for walks, I never bring my wallet with me just a few cordobas and my cell phone. I don’t want to be cavalier about my personal safety, but in the end my sanity is important too. The little things I do, like walking alone to the restaurant around the corner or chatting with the taxi driver, make all the difference between feeling like Managua is a giant jail cell and feeling like I have a life here. It is nice to know that people here are worried about me. So while I don’t always follow their advice to the letter, I’m always thinking about it in the back of my head and am ready to call a trusted cabby wherever I am.
I’d love to hear more ideas on how to balance your safety with personal freedom. What strategies do you have?
Meg Gray recently finished a 3-month stint as a Kiva Fellow in Managua, Nicaragua. Currently, she is working with Kiva partner Fundación Mujer in San Jose, Costa Rica (which thus far seems a lot safer). Learn more by following her or La Vida Idealist on Twitter.
Latest posts by mgray2noti
- Back in the USA - April 26th, 2010
- That is Not the Costa Rica I Know - April 14th, 2010
- Reading List - April 8th, 2010
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- Things I Never Thought I Would Do At Work - March 24th, 2010
- La Lucha Para Ejercicio - March 18th, 2010
- When Body Language Goes Too Far - March 10th, 2010
- My Hips Just Don't Move Like That - March 3rd, 2010
- Life Without a Cell Phone - February 24th, 2010
- Day in the Life: Elections in a Foreign Land - February 10th, 2010
