Nicaragua: Where’s the Blogosphere? · Global Voices
GV Contributor

Second Blog Roundup for Global Voices Online. The first one can be found at Barricada and here Global Voices Online
Where's Nicaragua's Blogosphere?
From Florida
When we started collaborating with Global Voices Online, we thought there wasn't a real blogosphere in Nicaragua… and there isn't, but one does exists in the Nicaraguan Diaspora.
In this case, we'll talk about Martha Isabel Arana, a Nicaraguan resident in Florida USA, who writes in her introduction: “I'm interested in everything about technology, art, music, literature, and cultural interchange with other countries. As an immigrant living in the USA, one of my major desires is to promote the culture of my country for all the readers who want to know more about us.”
In her blog she publishes videos, poems, short stories and reports about Nicaraguan culture. In regards to this work Martha says [ES]:
Nunca pensé compartir al mundo mis planes, era más que todo un proyecto personal. No conocía el mundo de los blogs o bitácoras, ni la herramienta de comunicación tan importante y poderosa que representa. Después de “copiar y pegar” un par de leyendas vistas por allí, los primeros comentarios comenzaron a llegar. Me di cuenta que otras personas en diferentes partes del mundo estaban leyendo mis pequeñas historias y la necesidad de buscar una nueva leyenda para mi bitácora nacía apenas publicaba una anterior…. Me atreví a dar un paso mas adelante y quise recopilar nuevos testimonios. Los nicas me inundaron de vivencias y relatos y me enamoré de sus historias, sus cuentos, del tesoro que estaban poniendo en mis manos. De pronto habían 10, 20… 80 mil visitas de diferentes regiones del mundo leyendo las historias mágicas que nacen en nuestros ríos, explotan con nuestros volcanes y desembocan en el mar.
From Costa Rica
Mi Patria es Ticaragua [ES] (My homeland is Ticaragua*) is a blog edited in Costa Rica that tries to unite both Costa Rica and Nicaragua past any territorial or political differences between the two countries.
* Ticaragua = Is a combined word, from TICA, the short name Costa Ricans gave themselves, and RAGUA, for nicaRAGUA, Ticaragua.
Mi Patria Es Ticaragua posts news, opinion articles, and events which promote positive interchange between both countries. For example, they posted the concert of Nicaraguan singer/songwriter Perrozompopo (Ramón Mejía) and Esteban Monge (see event) or to listen to some songs by Elsa Basil, a Nicaraguan, at her MySpace page.
Nicaragua Actual [ES] compiled a bunch of mp3 songs (some by Nicaraguan authors) in honor to Mother's Day in Nicaragua. It calls itself the “Informative Magazine of the Nicaraguan Community in Costa Rica”.
Nicaragua y su blog
Nicaragua y Su Blog [ES] introduced itself in Barricada some months ago, on April 28 to be exact. We visited them again and we noted that their work had advanced.
Their objective “is the promotion of all the Nicaraguan blogs in the blogosphere. To succeed in this “mission” we'll write a little review of the Nicaraguan blogs that we find along the way and we'll also add them in our link area”.
Their blog began February 22, 2007, and have since published 46 posts to date, reviewing, indexing, and sharing videos or other blog matters relevant to Nicaraguan blogs.
About Barricada they wrote this:
Hoy le presentamos el blog de noticias de Nicaragua “Barricada”. Este nombre pertenecía a un diario que existio en los anos ‘80. Hoy, hablamos no del periódico, sino del blog que lleva su nombre, según ellos nada que ver con el periodico.
and more recently they reviewedour sister website, MarcaAcme.com:
Hasta el momento, después de Barricada, (Marca Acme) es uno de los blogs con diseño profesional y uno de los mas importantes en Nicaragua y porque no decir en Centroamérica
They have blogs we haven't listed yet in the Wiki Marca Acme, but we'll add them in the future.
Mother's Day
We cite three fragments for different blogs published in the month discussing Mother's Day, or by extension about being a woman and their difficulties.
Karla Castillo, from El Nuevo Diario [ES], published the text titled Freedom to Nurse
Hace poco, una conocida de mi familia dio a luz a una niña. Pese a que la madre tiene 38 años, era su segunda experiencia en la maternidad, y sin embargo, la criatura casi se le muere por deshidratación, tres días después del parto, porque los médicos le dijeron que si quería tener una hija sana, inteligente, con las defensas elevadísimas, sólo la alimentara con su leche y que en los primeros seis meses no le diera a beber ni siquiera agua.
El resultado fue catastrófico, aunque la pequeña sobrevivió, y no quiero pensar que la mujer intentó en algún momento someter sin necesidad a su hija a este tipo de carencias. Pero ¡Por Dios! reflexioné, si ella ya había parido hace algunos años, pecó de confiada, al creer todo lo que los médicos dicen sobre la leche materna.
Just a short time ago, one family friend gave birth to a baby girl. Even the mother was 38 years old, it was only her second time giving birth, but the little creature almost died of dehydration three days after birth, because the doctors told her that if she wanted to have a healthy and smart baby with powerful immune system, she should only feed the baby with her milk. During the first six months she didn't give the baby anything to drink but milk, not even water.
The outcome was catastrophic, even though the girl survived. I don't want to imagine this woman putting the baby through this kind of suffering. But… Jesus!, I said to myself, if she was already a mother, why did she trust the doctor's advice about the milk so blindly.
The post continued to examine various issues on this topic.
Therapeutical Abortion
A PDF file was transmitted trough various email chains with this text in it:
37 Muertes Maternas en el 2007, 80 niños y niñas sin madre
37 mothers died in 2007, 80 boys and girls are now orphans
and the next image counts the dead, which was a consequence of the banning of therapeutic abortion or the fear of the law.
The figures speak for themselves.
Mother is Merchandise is Marketing
Martha Cecilia Ruiz [ES] posted a sincere and straightforward blog entry on the celebration of Mother's Day in Nicaragua (May the 30th)
Mother to buy for, to sell to, to give birth to and to forget..
Otra vez el día de las madres. Nuevamente las rosas rojas anunciando la venta de electrodomésticos y los productos de belleza para que las madres cumplan de mejor manera con sus roles –dentro y fuera de sus casas. Con mayo, más que lluvias, caen torrenciales de propuestas comerciales para convertir a la madre “en reina por un día”, pues para servir, obedecer, callar y parir los hijos que “Dios mande” está el resto del año. Y por si alguien duda del mandato, ahí están las canciones que confirman los cánones que dicen que madre buena es aquella sufrida, resignada, con vida sexual solamente para la reproducción y que vive la maternidad como un apostolado.
Hernaldo Zuñiga, fan-blog
“Official” blog for the fans of Hernaldo Zuñiga.
Bio, discs, lyrics and news about Hernaldo… the great nica trovador
The blog is edited by Marcela, who she says: “I'm married with Jaime, and I have three sons: Jaime, Ignacio & Sebastián”. She lives in Chile and posts videos, reviews, concert dates, lyrics, news and song of the Nicaraguan author that lives in México working as songwriter. He recently released a new album called Nomada (2007).
The blog is part of a Yahoo! Group dedicated to Hernaldo Zuñiga. Visit the official website.
Why there is not a Nica blogosphere?
Actually, it exists, but not as blogosphere. Many users have accounts on social networs as Hi5 or MySpace, but the main space for dialogue in internet is in the forums.
Here we give account of some formums, somes with hundres of users, others with a few loyal visitors, and others dedicated to local audiences only
Foros Bacanalnica, it seems to be the biggest. 5 years working and more than 6000 users and 30 subforums.
Foros Rocknica, dedicated to local music scene.
Area 505, for the nicas in Miami.
Foros de Nicaragua en Skycrapercity, a Nicaragua community discussing developments in the construction and architecture fields in Nicaragua.
Foros de Computación de la UNI, used by ingeniering students, experts and open source communities.
Forums for local cities: Jinotega Life (Jinotega), DBakanal (León).