Somos Personas
IT’S HOT HERE IN NICARAGUA. We were living in Granada— very hot, very humid, and not the easiest place to self-isolate with six kids. So we thought maybe we could find an isolated beach to escape the heat and play in the waves. We climbed into our rented, manual transmission, diesel, 16-passenger HiAce van to go explore.
Driving in Nicaragua is not like driving in the U.S. On the two-and-a-half hour drive to the beach, we dodged cows, dogs, horses, ox carts, horse carts, people riding horses, and people who walk in the road like it is a sidewalk. This is in addition to more standard traffic like cars, trucks, motorcycles, public buses, and bikes. On that day, after lots of wrong turns, we never made it to a usable beach. On the way home, we drove through a very narrow street in a small village called Santa Teresa. THUD! My front tire went into an uncovered drainage hole
We were 100 percent stuck. The younger kids were instructed to stay in the car while I went out to see the damage. A few men were sitting across from us, watching this tragic comedy unfold while my older kids got out to push. Seeing our intent, the men jumped up and helped push. But still the car did not budge. The men went back to their porch to get out of the hot sun.
My mind was creating all kinds of scenarios. We can’t take a cab. Coronavirus. We can’t take a bus. We can’t stay here. We don’t speak Spanish well enough to really communicate. As my monkey mind was dealing with all these dead-end scenarios, among the normal commotion, a farmer went by on his tractor. He pulled ahead of our van and stopped in the middle of the narrow street. Then he jumped from his tractor and looked under the van, kicking the stuck tire.
Without saying a word, he ran to a tiny little-bit-of-everything shop across from us and came out with some blue rope. He grabbed his chain from his tractor’s tool area and wrapped it around our chassis using the blue rope to keep everything secure. In a minuto corto, he pulled us out. I ran to the man, kept my social distance, and with tears in my eyes I said, “Gracias. Thank you. Gracias,” as I handed him some money.
He refused the money, saying, “Somos personas.” I had no idea what he was saying and said in my half-Spanish, “For cuerda (rope) and esposa (wife).” He refused once again and repeated firmly, “Somos personas.” I looked at his tattered, too-long pants, fabric belt, worn shoes, and tried one more time. “You have niños? Chicas?” He smiled and replied, “Sí” as he looked at my four youngest boys, ages six to twelve, whose faces were watching from the van’s broken rear window.
(To add further humor [or is it insult?] to this story, earlier in the day, I had backed into a tree, completely shattering the van’s rear window. The boys thought the lack of glass was cool, and it also gave them a great ringside seat as he pulled us out of the hole.) He possibly sensed the day was not going great. I said again, “For your chico, chicas.” He smiled a bit, as if weary of my persistence and said, once again, “Somos personas.” I asked for a photo. He consented.
My daughter Akasha was in the car, and as I pulled away, she asked, “Dad, do you know what he was saying?” I said, “No.” With tears in her eyes from the grace of the encounter, or maybe frustration from her pig-headed dad who was insulting this guy who was just trying to help, she said, “Dad, he was saying ‘We are people.’ Dad, he was saying we are the same, we are all people. We are here to help one another. We are people!”
I pulled over as some cows were going by and asked the boys in the back what had happened. The oldest said, “We should help each other.”
Not to be outdone, his ten-year-old brother said, “God wants us to help each other and that man believes that.” I said, “I wonder if that man was an angel, sent to us to know that life is good, and people are good.” Michael, who loves his Catholic preschool, wondered out loud, “Maybe he was Jesus!” Then with authority said, “Yes, I think that was Jesus, but his beard was cut.” William, our seven-year-old engineer, said something about how practical it would be to have a tractor.
We drove the rest of the way home, with few words, lost in thought and exhausted from the day, as dust enveloped us from the broken back window. My eyes were dripping water the whole way home. Was it the dust or the awe and gratitude I felt for one man’s love? One man who stopped to help even in the time of coronavirus. He had kids at home waiting for him. He had a wife wondering where he was. I fantasized while in fourth gear about how he would describe his day to his family. “Four gringo boys, two black, two white with yellow hair, staring out the back of the van. Some older kids too. This skinny gringo that had no idea what to do. Stranded. I helped them.”
He was able to help, and he did. It was, most likely for him, a simple act. He had a tractor, a chain, and the knowhow. I think about this man often. I want to be like him. Humble, expecting nothing in return. If I can help, I will stop. I will help. Why? Because somos personas. We are people.
•••
The town this story happened to take place in is called Santa Teresa. Saint Teresa was born March 28, 1515. She believed Jesus Christ presented himself to her in bodily form. Maybe my son Michael was right about the man who helped us that day. S&H