An unforgettable New Year's Eve

Nicaragua 2008.

New Year's Eves come and go. Some are more, others less impressive celebrations of a new year. But one New Year's Eve, in particular, has stayed in my memory, 31 December 2008, in Poneloya, Nicaragua.

I was sitting on the balcony of our hotel room overlooking the beach, looking out for my husband, David. I had not accompanied him to the beach but was working on my dissertation. But now I felt I had done enough and wanted to join him on the beach. After a while, I saw him among the waves; he was swimming back to shore. Good timing! I went to the beach to wait for him with a towel when he got out of the water. Then we would do something together.

Dave diving into the waves

Dave coming out of the sea

David and I had just spent four weeks on holiday in Central America. I wanted to show him where I had worked and lived in the 80s and 90s. At the same time, I could use the holiday to write my doctoral thesis in a warmer climate.

David waved, and as he was still wading through the knee-high sea towards me, he suddenly flinched and gave a slight cry. He looked down at his slightly bleeding foot, frowning.

What had happened? Had he stepped on a piece of broken glass? That would have been quite possible, as young people had been partying here on the beach for the last few nights.

He limped to the shore, and I could take a closer look at the injured foot. There was no broken glass or cut, just two small punctures that were bleeding. What could it be? Possibly a stingray?

David confirmed my suspicions. He had registered a vague movement in the water just before the pain.

Stingrays often dig themselves into the sun-warmed sand in a bay when the sea is calm. If someone then happens to step on them, they quickly wriggle out of the sand, erect their long spike and sting. That was most likely what had happened here.

I knew from a friend stung by a stingray years ago, also in Nicaragua, purely theoretically what the course would be. She had suffered a few hours of enormous pain but had no further health complications. Hopefully, that was the case with David too.

I supported David, and together we limped back to the hotel.

Nicaraguans have their eyes everywhere and register everything that is happening around them. At the time when I lived and worked here, we often joked about always being under observation. This time was no different. Fortunately!

Some hotel employees, the hotel owner in tow, rushed over curiously and wanted to know what had happened. Immediately there was a flurry of more or less helpful suggestions from all sides as to what was best to do under the circumstances.

Some saw only one chance for David's survival: I had to take him to the hospital in Leon, 26 kilometres away, to have his foot amputated on the spot because the poison would quickly spread throughout his body and probably lead to death. Haste was the order of the day.

Others suggested doing nothing and waiting to see what would happen. One could still decide whether to go to the hospital the following morning.

The Spanish hotel owner's suggestion made sense to me. He recommended putting the foot in a bucket of hot water and scrubbing the sting with soap so that the poison would be rubbed out of the sting wounds and washed away. In my eyes, this was a treatment similar to that of an annoyingly painful insect bite. I knew that.

Curious neighbours watch David scrub his foot in hot water to ease the effect of a stingray bite

No sooner said than done. The hotel staff brought a bucket of hot water, soap, and a brush. Meanwhile, I had sucked on the puncture site to get some of the venom out of Dave's bloodstream. Then I brushed the foot with soap until it was completely red.

David willingly let everything happen to him. He must have been in much pain and was pale, but he tried not to let it show.

Nevertheless, after the procedure, he was happy to lie down on the bed and rest. I didn't even have any aspirin or other painkillers to give him. But knowing him, he wouldn't have taken the tablets anyway. So slowly, we relaxed and were now ready to wait for improvement.

But soon, there was a knock. Two of the hotel staff were at the door. They wanted to talk to me. They said they disagreed with the hotel owner's proposal. He was not from here but from Spain and did not know the local customs. He couldn't assess how dangerous such a stingray could be anyway. They suggested I go to the local healer. He would be able to advise me properly because he would know how to deal with such stings and other ailments. They would take me to him and introduce me to him.

I followed the two young women and was curious about what would come.

The healer lived in a small hut at the end of the village. I had to duck to enter the house through the low door. The old bearded man who sat at the table and was introduced to me as the healer was probably not as old as he looked. I estimated him to be around 60, only a few years older than I was then.

We were sitting in a kind of living room. In the corner was an old chest of drawers. I had expected the healer to be surrounded by herbs, roots, tinctures, etc. But nothing of the sort was to be seen.

The two young women told the healer about David's injury and asked him for help on my behalf.

He swayed his head thoughtfully back and forth. Then, finally, he pointed out to me that hospitalisation was unnecessary. He could help. Then he opened a drawer and rummaged through the medicine packs until he found what he thought would be helpful in this case. He gave me a small bottle and a syringe and told me to draw up the syringe with the liquid from the bottle and inject it into David's lower back near the spine. I looked at him wide-eyed and checked that I had understood him correctly. Was I supposed to inject my husband with a completely unknown drug?

Yes, precisely that. He confirmed it again. The pain would go away quickly, and soon my husband could walk again. When I asked how much of the medicine I should inject, he indicated about 2-3 cm of the liquid in the small bottle.

The consultation cost me US$ 5, including the medicine. (In dollars, please, not in the local Nicaraguan Cordoba currency! After all, I was a gringa with dollars in my wallet, and dollars were always welcome.) Afterwards, we were quickly escorted out, and I stood in the street, bewildered. However, the young women were pleased with themselves and their role as mediators, convinced that the healer had been a great help to my husband and me.

I, however, was highly alarmed because I had read the label on the medicine bottle. It was an epidural steroid medication, usually injected into the epidural area around the spinal cord by doctors or trained nurses. The drug is given for pain relief and as a local anaesthetic during childbirth, caesarean section or certain types of surgery, or severe back pain caused by a herniated disc or sciatica.

I wanted to look closer at the medicine (unfortunately, there was no information leaflet), but I never considered giving it to my husband. As far as I knew, improper use's side effects and after-effects were dangerous and could lead to allergic reactions, short-term or even permanent nerve damage and paralysis.

I could not understand how recklessly this healer administered such medicines himself and gave them to people like me who were not in the least qualified to give such injections. This was irresponsible and damned dangerous.

I know such methods are common in developing countries where access to doctors is difficult. Still, I couldn't just accept it. Instead, I resolved to discuss this practice later with a Nicaraguan doctor I knew who worked at the Ministry of Health. Perhaps she could initiate appropriate training for the healers or community nurses.

Back at the hotel, I showed David the syringe and the medicine and pretended to treat him with it. Despite his pain, he ran away from me, and I chased him around the hotel room with my syringe. No. Not to worry! I would never have done that to him. By now, he was feeling a little better, and we were able to start planning our New Year's Eve.

Just as we were about to head to a restaurant, the lights went out.

It was pitch black not only in our hotel room and in the hotel. The whole village was plunged into darkness. We knew from experience that it always makes sense to have candles or torches ready in Nicaragua. So we lit a candle and waited.

However, it remained dark, and after an hour, we were so hungry that we set off for the village anyway.

We limped along the street, David leaning on me. It was pitch dark. Not even a moon to shine on us. The only lights were candles or fireplaces in the huts we passed. Some of the inhabitants were rocking in their rocking chairs on their patios in the dark and called out a greeting to us. The locals seemed to have better eyesight than we did because we hardly saw anything. Only the torch showed us the way.

When we arrived at our favourite restaurant, Salinas, we saw a candlelight flickering in the kitchen. The cook and his helper were preparing food in this sparse lighting. So the kitchen was functioning, albeit rudimentarily.

What had happened? The owner knew. A drunk had partied too much on the beach with his friends. He had crashed his car into a power pole on the way home to Leon, knocking out the power supply for the entire region. There was no chance that an engineer would come and repair the damage that New Year's Eve. We were told that that would only be possible the next morning in daylight. So the whole region would have to spend New Year's Eve in the dark.

Okay, then we'll make the best of it, we said to ourselves. So we ordered something to drink and eat and sat down on the restaurant's veranda, waiting for things to come. A small, thin candle came with the beer, but it burned down far too quickly. It would not shine on us for long.

Then came the fish we had ordered. We couldn't believe our eyes, not because of the darkness but because of the sumptuousness of the meal. We had expected that the chef would only be able to improvise makeshift dishes in his poorly lit kitchen by candlelight. What we had here, however, was a crispy fried fish about 50 cm long with the usual coleslaw, black beans and fried plantain chips on the side. That was impressive! Great! That was more than enough for both of us. Our mouths were watering. We hungrily gorged ourselves on the fish. But the dim candlelight was not enough to detect any bones. But David had an idea. He had cleverly brought a head torch with him. It was now very helpful. So we moved closer together, and we enjoyed our fish by the light of his torch on his head.

In the meantime, more guests came into the restaurant, attracted by our candlelight or the torch's glow. They were also creative. They enjoyed their beer and New Year's Eve meal by the light of their mobile phones.

We praised the chef and restaurant owner for the excellent food. He was pleased we had enjoyed it and had not let the blackout stop us. But he was also very annoyed. He had put a lot of money and effort into preparing a New Year's Eve meal, from crab cocktails to lobster and many other delicacies. But few guests had come for dinner. Most had probably already gone to bed in frustration. He said disappointedly that he would close the restaurant now because no one would come anymore.

You could have frozen the food at normal times, but you can't do that during a blackout. So, unfortunately, the fish and all the seafood had to be thrown away in the morning. The owner was furious. This would cost the drunk driver dearly. "Wait, lad, you'll regret this!" he threatened, already calculating in his mind the damages he would claim from him.

We slowly made our way home. Strengthened by beer and fish, David felt much better. His leg no longer hurt so much, and he was only limping slightly.

When we got close to our hotel, we were amazed. We saw lights and heard music. Did the hotel have a generator?

No. The solution to the mystery was more straightforward. The hotel owner was dancing with his girlfriend in the glow of his pickup truck's headlights to music from the car radio. Genius! The atmosphere was good. A group of neighbourhood kids sat on the wall and curiously watched the spectacle. The two revellers invited us to their party.

And so it was that at the end of an eventful day, six hours after David had been stung by a stingray and not had his foot taken off, we were dancing to salsa music from the car radio in the glow of a car headlight.

It was all good. So, despite all adversities, we were able to bid a fitting farewell to the old year, which had given us a fair amount of trouble on its last day, and welcome the new one laughing and dancing.

This was indeed an unforgettable New Year's Eve. A night to remember.

(LL)