Granada, Nicaragua, 9:30 am

I'm sitting in Granada's central plaza on my second day in Nicaragua. A procession of uniformed schoolboys is walking by, and a selection of mid-ninties American music is blasting from a nearbye radio. I've already been approached by a child selling bird-whistles, a man selling tours, and a student from my parents' Spanish class. A man across the square is yelling what sounds like "echo, echo, echo" over and over again, and a bell rings repeatedly, anouncing the sale of ice cream. It's 9:30 am.

Later, I walk to Lago Nicaragua. It looks like it could be an ocean - I can't see all the way across. I walk along the Malecon until I pass an older man in blue briefs doing his laundry in the lake. I turn around and head to the market for bananas.