Nubia Saballos: the light-hearted cook at MLR Forestal

During breakfasts and lunches in the MLR Forestal dining room one voice resounds above the rest. It is a voice that greets with genuine enthusiasm and that generates conversation with each person who arrives. It is the voice of Nubia de los Ángeles Saballos Montes, one of the company’s kitchen collaborators.

A conversation with Nubia is always full of jokes, anecdotes and laughter. Like when she remembers that a university professor told her that she could speak “even at the United Nations” or when she says that she would make “even a mute” speak. However, her story reveals her as a hard-working person who came to MLR a bit by chance.

“I came to Siuna looking for a better life”

This dark and slim woman was born in Managua in 1972, was orphaned when she was very young and, when she finished studying Mathematics at the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua (UNAN), she left for Siuna with a friend “looking for a better life.” That happened thirty years ago. Back then in Siuna there was only one secondary school, the Róger López Borges School where the teacher Nubia taught for 18 years.

“I was a secondary school teacher for twenty-nine years and ten months. Apart from the 18 years at the Institute, I taught Mathematics for ten years in the El Hormiguero community and in recent times I gave classes on Saturdays. My vocation was always teaching. to young people and, to the best of my ability, to support them. Many of my students are now doctors, engineers, architects and most of them when by chance we meet, they greet me”, she recalls.

The constant path between teaching and learning

However, Nubia has not settled for teaching, but has also dedicated herself to learning. In addition to having a degree in Mathematics, she is a business administrator, pedagogue, Physics Professor of Secondary Education (PEM) and if she did not finish her master’s degree in Methodology, it was only because her health prevented her from doing so because she was detected cervical cancer, she was operated on and received chemotherapy. The entire process took more than a year and a half of convalescence.

“I remember when the they opened URACCAN (University of the Autonomous Regions of the Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast) There were not many students and with a small group we set about the task of searching to complete a section of 35 and that is how I studied Business Administration, I am one of the first graduates of URACCAN and right there I studied the degree in Pedagogy on Saturdays”.

“This job was offered to my daughter”

Regarding her arrival at MLR Forestal, Nubia says that the job was initially offered to her daughter, but that she could not accept because she has three small children. “So I asked if I could take it myself, I came to the interview and was hired. Right now I have four months and it has gone well even though I have only cooked at home and at the schools where for all birthdays I had to organize the food,” she says smiling.

Nubia, who has three children and three grandchildren, describes herself as “sociable and helpful.” About her relationship with her co-workers, who are much quieter than her, she says laughing that they have fun because she is “a cockatoo and never stops talking.” In the mornings and at noon, this is evident because all the staff greet Mrs. Nubia with good cheer, she joked or asks a question to everyone, so apart from preparing food, she also cooks joy and smiles.