Days 20 & 21: Luz Solar campaign

Saturday was the day of our big campaign. We had spent all Friday afternoon preparing for it and had almost everything planned out when Saturday came around. According to Tim, the SEC country director and team leader, a lot of people from the community we where about to visit had already signed up to buy solar lamps. It is therefore with great expectations and a little bit of apprehension with regards to our abilities to manage large crowds that we entered in the small white van and began our three-and-a-half-hour-long journey to Esquipulas. The ride was extremely uncomfortable and bumpy but we got a chance to observe the rural parts of the Northern Highlands of Nicaragua. Mountains, hills, herds of horses and cows, modest little houses with people, dogs and chicken, banana trees, coffee plantations, tropical landscapes and of course...volcanoes accompanied us visually along our trip.

When we arrived in Esquipulas, a sizable town even further up in the mountains than Matagalpa, we started setting up everything we needed for the campaign: tables, chairs, products etc... We hung up the posters we'd put together on Friday afternoon and organized the campaign by setting up separate stations for the different types of products. Pauline and Peter would be working at the "vision station", perform eye exams and sell glasses, Ben would be in charge of the water filters, and conduct surveys about them, Jerren would attempt to light a fire in the "Estufa" (stove) and conduct surveys to figure out if the stoves had potential to become SEC products in the near future and Maddy, Emily and I would be in charge of the "solar" station. Tim and Greg would be helping out at the different stations and handling the crowds. 

Preparing the campaign...

La "Luz Solar"

Ready!

After finishing setting up the campaign, we opened the doors and let people in. Soon enough a decently large crowd arrived and  we offered them seats to accommodate the wait until the start of our presentation. Once most people had arrived, Tim opened the presentation by introducing SEC ( Social Entrepreneur Corps) and our general mission with regards to remote communities in Nicaragua. Then, our group presented each one of the stations and the products we were selling that day. 

People waiting for our presentation

Since most of the people in that specific community had regular problems with electricity and were here to buy solar lamps, we expected a lot of people at the "solar" station. Indeed, when the presentation ended we got a large amount of people  coming to our station all at once. It was time to apply my newly learned Spanish skills to a real-life and somewhat hectic situation.

We had previously assigned roles and while Maddy was welcoming people to the station, writing down basic information and conducting surveys to investigate how our solar products were perceived, Emily was answering questions about the solar lamp and the other solar products and I was making the sales, taking client's contact information and reminding them of basic rules  and requirements regarding the solar lamps. 

People checking-out our "solar" station

Maddy working it!

Greg and a woman from Esquipulas

Pauline performing an eye exam

Emily explaining how the solar lamp works

Peter performing an eye exam

Maddie at the solar station

Vision station

Women waiting for their free eye exams

Maddie helping out at the vision station

Peter working at the vision station

Even though my spiel was somewhat hesitant at first, it got better after each sale and was pretty solid after the first couple sales. The only thing I kept struggling with throughout the campaign was the "writing down names" part. It is unbelievable how complicated Nicaraguan names are! At least three names per person. When I was lucky it was something on the lines of "Jose Andres Ramirez" or "Maria Josefina Gonzales" but in most cases it was much more challenging than that. I tried my best to listen as carefully as possible and it turned out ok in the end. It even generated a couple of laughs amongst the clients and loosened the atmosphere a little bit. 

My solar poster!

Tim talking about reading glasses

Maddie, Ben and Greg at the water station

Maddie and Ben with the water filters

Me and Tim explaining how the solar lamps work

Greg and the old lady

Jerren taking a break

Emily and the old lady

Jerren and the "tulip" water filter

The campaign ended up being pretty successful and even though there are definitely ways to improve in the future, we were very happy about the number of sales we had made at the end of the day. After having eaten lunch, which the people helping out with the campaign had prepared for us, we packed up all the products and began our journey back.  Soon after we had gotten into the van, it started raining and deprived from the view of the Nicaraguan landscapes, we decided  to play "20 questions", which ended up lasting the entire trip back to Matagalpa.

When we woke up the next morning, it was raining again so we decided to stay in and enjoy a relaxed morning at our comfortable hostel. In the afternoon however a couple of us decided to confront the rain and went on a hike through the natural reserve "Cerro Apante". We were trying to climb up the volcano but our lack of a map made us go up a sketchy looking and soaking wet path in the middle of nowhere that we thought would lead us to the top. It didn't. We went along empty cabanas until the path suddenly ended near an abandoned house far away from any human life. So we hiked back down the volcano and when it started pouring rain again, made our way back to civilization. Regardless of our failed attempt to climb to the top it was a pretty cool adventure and we got to see some of the flora and fauna of the natural reserve. As we were waiting for the bus, we even met a super nice  older couple working for "Bridges to Prosperity", an organization that "Duke Engineers Without Borders" happens to work closely with as well. We got to meet a woman from Atlanta as well as a girl from Canada who were working with them and had a very nice exchange of our impressions of  and our different experiences in Nicaragua. We finally said goodbye and climbed into the bus that took us back to our hostel. 

That night, Tim (the SEC country leader in Nicaragua) took us all out to eat surprisingly delicious pizza at Matagalpa's probably only Italian restaurant, which was a lot of fun. We then packed our bags and got a good night of sleep before traveling to Leon, the Lion city, on the next day.