Where The Streets Have No Names
21 October 2009 at 09:59 Victoria 18 comments
By Victoria Kabak, KF9, Nicaragua
In one of our training sessions for the 9th class of Kiva Fellows at the end of September, a staffer told us that we might be living and working during our fellowships in places without street signs–because the streets are unnamed. He described how, in small towns, a direction might be given simply as “past the banana tree” or something similar. He even had a hand-drawn map that he got when he visited one of Kiva’s partners; the microfinance institution had sketched the diagram to indicate the locations of its clients, since they didn’t have addresses.
I was very interested in his anecdotes and expressed a degree of fascination along with my fellow trainees. In thinking about the challenges we all might face as Kiva Fellows, this particular obstacle hadn’t occurred to me. But I was going to the capital city of a country, not a small rural village. It was certainly intriguing to hear, but it wasn’t going to be directly relevant to me, I thought.
So I did a double take when I was reading my guidebook during the second of my two plane rides to Managua earlier this month and came across the piece of information that most streets in the city don’t have names. The guidebook had highlighted it in one of those boxes, for visitors to take special note. Addresses are given in relation to the nearest landmark, followed by some number of “cuadras” (blocks) to travel al lago (north), al sur (south), abajo (west), and/or arriba (east). (Those last two are based on the sun, which goes arriba in the east and abajo in the west.) In order to be more precise, addresses also sometimes include a number of “varas,” a Spanish form of meters (Wikipedia has deemed this unit of measurement “obsolete,” but I’d tend to disagree after being in Managua for three weeks), to signal how far down the block to go.
To explain by example, the location of the administrative offices of AFODENIC, the microfinance institution where I’m a Kiva Fellow, is indicated in relation to the nearby Banco de Finanzas branch; from there, it is one cuadra al lago, two cuadras arriba, and 20 varas al sur. AFODENIC’s nearest sucursal, or branch, is down the block–one cuadra al lago and 1.5 cuadras arriba from the Banco de Finanzas. Fortunately, buildings are numbered, so that helps.
Thinking about it now, I’ve probably been to at least one place before where the streets have no names. But this was a small town, where almost any destination would be very near an easy-to-find location, like the market or the fire station or the elementary school. I had never imagined that a major city – the capital city of a country! – might not have names for its streets. Especially as a native New Yorker, it seemed almost silly to entertain the notion of what it would be like if our addresses were something like “10 blocks south of the Empire State Building, 3 blocks toward the East River.”
You might think that a capital city without street names and with more than 1 million inhabitants might be stressful and chaotic. But the thing is: it works. One of the lessons I’ve already learned – in a number of respects – from my time in Nicaragua is that you can get used to anything. When not having street names is the norm, you become accustomed to it. It’s just a fact of life.
And while it wasn’t something that had occurred to me before I got here – and maybe it’s hard for you to imagine too – what ultimately matters is locating the clients. As long as microfinance institutions are identifying and reaching out to the people in need, whether they find them with a homemade map or with directions based on the sun, who needs street names?
This is the street where my MFI, AFDOENIC, is located. It doesn't have a name.
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Victoria Kabak is currently a Kiva Fellow at AFODENIC in Nicaragua. Lend to current AFODENIC borrowers on Kiva now, or join the AFODENIC lending team!
Entry filed under: AFODENIC, Americas, blogsherpa, KF9 (Kiva Fellows 9th Class), Nicaragua. Tags: Kiva, Kiva Fellows, Managua, Victoria Kabak.
1. finfuryinaime | 29 May 2011 at 22:24
http://www.facebook.com/Tyler.Texas.DWI?sk=app_190322544333196 – Tyler TX Lawyer
2. Drew | 31 October 2009 at 08:18
Fun post Victoria. Thanks for posting the link on the NY team page, its a great way for people to know more about the Fellows. Good luck out there!
Drew
KF7
3. Les bijoux en toc au service du développement économique ? « Kiva Stories from the Field | 29 October 2009 at 09:02
[...] les rues des villes sont en terre, se transformant souvent en torrent de boue et n’ont pas de noms. Il n’y a pas non plus de système de ramassage [...]
4. adapting to armenia (…still?) « brian's fellowship musings… | 26 October 2009 at 00:11
[...] feeling lucky” function, and hope for the best. Street signs exist about 50% of the time (so I feel you Victoria), and when they do, about 50% of the time the street name is recognizable. Those are quickly [...]
5. Adapting to Armenia (..still?) « Kiva Stories from the Field | 25 October 2009 at 23:23
[...] feeling lucky” function, and hope for the best. Street signs exist about 50% of the time (so I feel you Victoria), and when they do, about 50% of the time the street name is recognizable. Those are quickly [...]
6. Howard Zugman | 25 October 2009 at 05:40
Great post, Victoria. And here, I still get “lost” WHILE using my GPS. Go figure! With regard to Wikipedia, I think you’re already covered. In the “obsolete Spanish and Portuguese units of measure” article under the “discussion” tab there is the note that “many of the measures”…”are still in use in many countries of Latin America”. Or as Rodney Dangerfield used to say, “Just keep on going a few miles down this road and then take a right hand turn where the old schoolhouse USED TO BE”.
7. Wayne"s World | 23 October 2009 at 06:06
Great post….a perspective I’ve never seen or considered.
8. Kimia | 22 October 2009 at 14:41
I totally relate!! Im directed by Co-op, manzana (block), solar (buiding number) based on pictures! but it totally works!
9. Webdesign | 22 October 2009 at 13:19
nice article, her in germany all streets have curios names, and all the names are very “german” but better than no names on the streets
10. Jennifer Gong | 22 October 2009 at 09:21
I can relate a little… Though big roads usually have names in Dar, Tanzania, a lot of them dont or people dont know what they are called. I spent the first week in a hostel on Libya St., near the office, and a lot of people didnt know where that was… Keep up the good blogging!
11. Stephen | 22 October 2009 at 07:47
Personally, it may be an improvement over what goes on in more sophisticated countries like the US given the fact that there are Thomas Guides now replaced by GPS systems for common use so we as Americans can find our way to the next whiskey bar. As for myself, I’m hoping all roads lead to the Bronx next week to begin the World Series and ending with the the sign New York Yankees, Wold Champions – 2009. Buena Suerte, V….
12. Marsha | 22 October 2009 at 06:44
Great post. Who would think that the capital city would not have street names? How do people get mail?
13. Viktor | 21 October 2009 at 23:13
Taipei, while very well developed, was still pretty scary for a white boy. Chinese writing isn’t easy to pick up, and when I was there they were in the middle of changing the method of transcription, which was inconsistent to start with.
That meant that say the subway map and the street map disagreed on the names, and what was actually on the signs could be a third string of text. I got into the habit of reading the signs out loud to try and match the different romanizations.
14. robpacker | 21 October 2009 at 19:45
I feel your pain. Kyrgyzstan has a different version of the problem: too many names! Most streets had a different name during Soviet times, and have been renamed since. The rule of thumb seems to be to take the catchier name (Sovietskaya rather than Abdrakhramanov). Street signs aren’t that common though…
15. karlbaumgarten | 21 October 2009 at 13:36
ha, my MFI’s address is simply Parque Central, contiguo a Farmacia Miravalles. Not nearly as frightening as yours but still a little nerve racking the first day…Great post
16. mgray2noti | 21 October 2009 at 13:27
Oh how I can relate. Great post Victoria! Being in Managua has also made me realize how addicted to Google Maps I was. Even Google is confused by Managua’s street system.
-From the CEPRODEL office (Address:Rotonda de Plaza Inter, 1 block abajo (west), 1 block al lago (north) on the street with the Cementary of San Pedro)
17. Jan & John, KivaFriends | 21 October 2009 at 10:59
That is something I have never thought of. Even the rural logging roads in ‘the wilds’ of Canada have numbers. Do enjoy your Fellowship and we will look forward to your next blog. jan
18. Where The Streets Have No Names « My Blog While I'm In Nicaragua And Argentina | 21 October 2009 at 10:03
[...] No Names October 21, 2009 at 12:03 pm | In Uncategorized | Leave a Comment I just published my second blog post on the Kiva Fellows Blog. As I mentioned before, it’s about how the streets in Managua [...]