Smiling at Corruption

So Josh's girlfriend just had her gall bladder removed here in Nicaragua and her mom (like any good Mom), decided to fly in from Chile to be here for the recovery period. Josh and I were planning to take Pastor Antonio to the airport at the same time for his first trip to the States so it worked out well. Pick one up, drop one off, it was just a standard trip to MGA and back. That's right, I just called Managua MGA b/c this city has just thrust itself in airport code status. We all refer to Atlanta as ATL and Los Angeles as LAX. I can't help but delve out some love to this country that so desperately needs it. So, back to the airport run. Why do police officers around the world still think that aviator sunglasses are so hot? Yeah, we were pulled over twice on the way to the airport. First, for someone sitting on the edge of the pickup truck's bed and the second for doing 15 kmph over the speed limit. If you haven't done the conversion; 15 kmph is only about 7 mph. Who gets pulled for 7 mph over the limit? The first infraction was a 15 minute ordeal as the pastor began to accuse the officers of their own lack of safety (b/c this how you get people to like you in Nica) and then he pulled his holy god card (note the lack of capitalization) and informed them that he was bound for an Evangelical Mission to the United States and they had better let us go. I wish I could have heard this all in Spanish but I had to wait for Josh's translation. My only contribution was whether or not my bag of skittles would be an acceptable bribe for these two cops......josh thought it was funny. They let us go with no harm done other than the 15 minutes lost on an extremely time sensitive trip. The second cop would not be so forgiving. He went straight for his yellow book of tickets and it was 3 mintues and 200 cordoba later before we were moving again. I'll never forget that scene! An arrogant Eric Estrada wannabe, complete with aviators looking over his shoulder before taking 200 cords and then waving us onward. Ha! I love this country. The rest of trip was anything but uneventful as we handed over the keys to the Pastor's son El Gordo which simply means "The Fatty". This guy had apparently not driven in years as we learned the capability of our Toyota Tacoma's brake pedal. The pastors wife performed a test of her own on the strength of our rear windshield. Unfortunately, she used the left side of her face during the first excessive test of the before mentioned brake pedal. I was forced to laugh later as this collision was sure to leave a mark. I couldn't believe that she didn't break the glass! Don't worry, she was fine. We finally arrived with all of our limbs in tact at the lovely MGA. All of you can rest assured, El Gordo will never touch our keys again.