November 5, 2011
I’ll start where I left off from the previous post and pretend that today is November 5th. But before I do, here is some background information to add to your understanding of the our experience:
Manuel lives in the farm section of Iguana, which is not Playa Iguana proper, but is inside the first guard station on the main road. I’ll need to write at another time about the logistics of Playa Iguana, the guard stations, who lives where, the natural boundaries, and the varying degrees to which the foreigners and Nicaraguans live both together and apart. For the sake of this blog entry, what you need to know is that Manuel lives just 5 minutes from us in a poor Nicaraguan community where the people are mainly affected by foreigners if they are employed by them, receive donations from them, or hitch a ride with them. Manuel is a middle man with a cooler attached to the back of his motorcycle. He purchases fish from a fishing village roughly an hour away where the prices for fish are cheaper. He cleans, fillets, and packages the day’s catch for you. I assume his prices for us are higher than what a local Nicaraguan would pay, as I don’t see how anyone would spend two or three’s day’s pay for one fish. He’s friendly, helpful, and speaks only Spanish. His prices are roughly $0.50 less per pound than Zack’s prices and he does not charge a delivery fee.
Zack is from the local fishing village, Gigante (He-gon-teh), which is a 40 minute walk along the beach at low tide and a 25 minute car ride along the main road. Zack is an entrepreneur to the extreme, and has quite smartly figured out how he can make big money off of the tourists and relocated Gringos. He has a boat from which he employs fisherman to fish with him and also charters both fishing and surf trips, both of which run $45/hour, regardless of the number of people. He also has an SUV and multiple drivers with their own cars who work for him to shuttle visitors to and from the airport and other nearby destinations for half the cost of the better known shuttle companies and local taxis. Zack dabbles in real estate as an agent for foreigners, having two condos and several lots for sale. He’s friendly, schmoozes easily, and plays it cool with the foreigners. He speaks English very well. Strictly comparing Zack to Manuel as fish dealers, Zack catches the fish himself (or his fisherman catch them), and like Manuel, he cleans, fillets, and packages the fish. His prices are roughly $0.50 more per pound than Manuel’s and he charges a $5 delivery fee.
We left off yesterday evening just after dinner when we purchased a 5.5 pound mackerel from Manuel.
Late this morning, around 11:00, Zack pulled up in his small gray SUV.
We had ordered 5 pounds of mackerel and 5 pounds of red snapper from Zack two days ago, and here he was with 4 fish, each weighing in at 3 pounds. Sadly, the last thing we needed was fish. I tried to purchase just one of the red snappers, but the look on his face said, “Say what?” So I explained again that we expected him yesterday, he didn’t come, Manuel stopped by, and we bought mackerel from him. I actually thought that maybe he had sent Manuel. He said he didn’t take his boat out yesterday so he didn’t have fish for me, but he took it out today and the fish was caught just hours ago and …here comes the hook…he caught it just for me.
I totally got it. He was a day late but not a dollar short. He had my fish and he didn’t know who else to sell it to. I wasn’t about to completely burn a bridge, so I bought both the red snappers hoping he could find someone else to buy the two mackerels.
The red snapper was EXCELLENT and very much worth the extra day’s wait. A family staying here recently requested information on how to locate a driver in order to visit to the double volcanic island of Ometepe. We contacted Zack for them, and based on his response, it appears that a bridge has not been burned.