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Nicaragua to Los Angeles

I am a Cuban-American that was sent to Nicaragua to work on a legal project to assist banana workers that were once sprayed with a deadly pesticide known as DBCB commonly known as Nemagon. I once resided in the town of Chinandega from August -2005 through July 2011. I returned to my home state of California after the legal project ended in Chinandega. While residing in Chinandega and since I spoke and wrote very sufficient Spanish I got along well with the Nicaraguans in that area.

Everybody knew me as “el cubano” I even knew the police chief of Chinandega and the mayor. Even though they were both sandinistas (just about everyone in Chinandega is) I got along just fine with them even invited them into our home for coffee. When I first bought the home, I did not realize that you needed a water tower and an electrical power generator. Both were up and running in no time. Especially with the water tower. Where I lived in Reparto Los Angeles area of Chinandega it was the exclusive area with very high end homes but in bad area were the water always went out in the morning and would return in the evenings. The water tower ended that problem. And remember before Daniel Ortega took office was under the administration of Enrique Bolanos and there was the programmed power outages and was the need for the electrical generator. Here in Los Angeles we are lucky if we get 7 days of rain for the whole year. I remember the rain in Chinandega from May through November.

I have married a wonderful Nicaraguan and have given birth to two boys both born in Managua at the Hospital Vivian Pellas. My two sons have dual US and Nicaraguan Citizenship. My wife was granted U.S. residency. I currently carry with me my residency card from Nicaragua. I am familiar with Granada, just as Leon, Managua in which my wife is from and San Juan de Sur.

I bought a home in Chinandega that was appraised at about 180k. I ended up selling it for $155k since there are very few qualified buyers in Nicaragua. And two, I needed to sell home quickly after putting it up for sale. Luckily our house was sold in about 6 months time. I found a qualified buyer that went through the bank (Bancentro) for the mortgage. The buyer was a high end employee at the Monte Rosa sugar plantation in nearby El Viejo.

I once met the former ambassador of the U.S. Robert Callahan when he had a town meeting for U.S. residents residing in Leon/Chinandega. It was a wonderful experience for me to live overseas. Since the legal project ended there was no need for me to be there. I would gladly return again possibly to retire down the road. I brought my family here to California (Los Angeles) so I can give my two sons a good future. My wife, Maria Mercedes who is from Managua does not mind me retiring in Nicaragua since she still has immediate family there to include her mother. We have not returned since we left Nicaragua in July – 2011. We might be making plans to vacation there this year if time and money permits. I am the only sole income earner here at home.

My wife has her hands full with our two sons and due to her lack of English is not working to help support. With the sale of the home in Nicaragua I was lucky enough to put a down payment. The glitch to getting the mortgage here was the two year income requirement. However my older brother who is a prominent attorney here in Los Angeles put in a good word for me with a mortgage banker friend and with the large down payment was able to get a home. I bought a nice three bedroom two bath home in a very desirable area of Downey, California. I work in the Mid-Wilshire area and my commute to and from work is less than 30 minutes in the morning and about 50 minutes in the afternoon. I also have the option of taking light rail which I do on work days when I do not need to work overtime.

Oh yes,  I was one of the few that climbed the tallest volcano in Nicaragua “San Cristobal” which is located just outside of Chinandega.  I did the climb to show the world that at age 48 (at that time) you can still do a lot of things in life.  It was a hell of a climb.  We had two guides, one of them works for the Nicaragua National Weather and is in charge of monitoring the volcano itself.  This guide climbs it twice a month and has the trail marked the entire way up.  When we got to the top we were very low on water and was practically fighting with each other for ½ liter of water.  We sent one of the guides down ahead of us on our decent and he left us water at about the half way mark down the volcano on the other side.  It was a very welcome relief to have water then.

This was in 2008. I have since returned to a normal life here in Los Angeles, California. I have lots of pics when I was living in Nicaragua. I know Chinandega very well since that is where I lived.

Sincerely

Eddie Dominguez

Law Office of Juan J. Dominguez, APLC
One Park Plaza
3250 Wilshire Blvd. Suite 2200
Los Angeles, CA 90010
O: 213.388.7788 x210