Author Description

Every year more than 1,000 North Americans travel to Nicaragua to volunteer their labor. These brigadistas, as they are called, spend between two weeks and three months as volunteer agricultural workers harvesting coffee and rice side-by-side with Nicaraguans. Brigadista presents, in their own words, some of these volunteers' experiences and the feelings these experiences generated. The author captures and conveys these experiences and feelings through interviews, articles, journal entries, photos, and descriptive pieces written by the volunteers. What emerges is an important first-hand account of Nicaragua, its people and its politics.