A smiley visit to Cafe de Las Sonrisas

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"Mucha gente pequeña, en lugares pequeños, haciendo cosas pequeñas, puede cambiar el mundo" -Eduardo Galeano
"Many small people in small places who are doing small things, can change the world"

Granada is a beautiful town. It has colorful colonial buildings, old churches and lively market. Most of the colonial buildings are now hotels and cafe, which are used by many tourists as getaways from the noon heat. However, some of them are quite expensive and most of the dishes they offer are internationals... or americans. So, I rarely go to the cafe, unless if they have great coffee (which I can refill freely of course haha) or they have something unique that I have never seen before, like this one.

Cafe de Las Sonrisas or cafe of the smiles, is the first cafe in the Americas and the fourth in the world that is staffed entirely by people with hearing of speaking disability, or deaf-mutes. I read an article about it in the local magazine. It is said that its menu has sign language on it and people can come, enjoy food while learning how to order in sign language. Knowing my dream (yes, i have sooo many dreams! And if you're my friends, you already know this :P) to learn sign language, I was curious. I wanted to know how it looks, how the foods are and most importantly, can i learn the language with them too?

I know you must be thinking, geesh Dissa, you're not even fluent in Spanish yet and you're learning another language? The one without voice??

But yes, I really wanted to go, see and hopefully, learn. So after a spanish class in Parque Central, the central park, I packed my bag and went to the address written on the magazine. Cafe de Las Sonrisas located half a block away from La Iglesia de Merced, one of the oldest churches in town. It is not far away from the Parque Central, which made it easy to find.. supposedly. But I was lost, I passed the church, saw some beggars sitting in front of it, and saw some of them decided to pee behind the parked cars.. don't know why, I didnt stay to ask haha.

Then, after a great help from the local security guard named Jose, who asked me about my headscarf and nicely told me that I can ask him for any help during his working hours (he gave me the details!), I found out that the cafe is before the church. So I came back and I found it!
The cafe and the yellow wall of sign language codes
It was very quiet. There are some people working at the hammock workshop room, but I only saw one customer eating. As the magazine told me, the cafe has a hammock workshop room, where disabled people make hammocks. They have launched a new initiative to create a cleaner Nicaragua, by making hammocks out of plastic bags, they call it the never-ending hammocks. People can donate plastic bags they found in the street or participate in the workshop and get a certificate of participation!
The never ending plastic hammock!
Hammock on the top left corner can be made by one person in only a week!
So, feeling hungry, I went straight to the table and saw a card, showing how to say "Gracias (Thank you)", "Por Favor (Please)", "La cuenta (bill)" and other useful phrases for ordering and paying the food. A waitress with a lovely smile came to me and brought me the famous menu! I can point which food I wanna eat and I chose burrito with mango juice, yum! Couple minutes later, she came back with my food and I managed to tell her "Gracias" with my hand. Achievement unlocked!
My burrito, mango juice and the instruction card to say "Me gusta" ;)
After finishing the burrito, I asked the able staff whether they can show me around and teach me how to weave the never-ending hammocks. They told me that it is one project of a non-profit organization called "Tio Antonio", found by Antonio Prieto in 2007. He is a chef from Spain and when he arrived in Nicaragua, he intended to open a restaurant. He met a young deaf-mute boy and decided to help. He found out that there were more disabled people he could help, so he decided to make Cafe de Las Sonrisas. And as the name said, the cafe does put smiles on many people's faces.
Hammock workshop, the non-plastic one
More hammocks
The staffs are paid and the younger workers are still going to school as a requirement of their jobs. There are total of 45 workers in the cafe whom receive training and earn salary. They also take classes from a special teacher who comes to the cafe to teach.

Ha! Another of my curiosity! I decided to ask them whether I can learn the language as well. Fortunately the teacher was there and they asked her. She said she will teach me next week from Monday to Friday from 11 to 12. Gratis! Yay!

I was so happy that I could actually learn something new! I am very excited to come to the class next week and see how it is. I know it will be difficult, as we will learn in Spanish, a language that I am still learning as well. But I gotta take the chance! What are the odds that you can learn sign language in Nicaragua?

And just like that, a visit to cafe de las sonrisas put a smile on my face, for the rest of the day :)

Sonrisa! :)

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