The intention is not to be mysterious but a combination of tropical rain, dark roads, and a little sleep deprivation means I really have little idea where I am.

The good news is that I am on a coffee farm (with buildings somewhat bizarrely built in a Bavarian ski lodge architectural style - don't ask) so a little pick me up is close at hand.

Politics is everywhere you go in Nicaragua. This is perhaps not surprising considering the country was in the throes of civil war just 25 years ago and current president Daniel Ortega is a former Sandinista revolutionary.

The cut and thrust of politics since the 1980s (when Ronald Reagan's US Presidency supported the right-wing Contra revolutionaries) has been all ebb and flow, mimicking an end-to-end football match.

Intriguingly, baseball is the most popular sport in Nicaragua.

Part of the reason is that British railway workers didn't have the influence in Central
America that they did in the rest of Latin America and so soccer floundered.

"I think Nicaragua and maybe Panama have the worst soccer teams in the entire world," said my friend Chico.

I didn't tell him about American Samoa.

Nicaragua is a country split by a mountain range (where I'm now sitting) that entertained strong British influence during the 19th Century. Cricket was the number one sport on the Atlantic coast until a sporting rebel (that word again), American Albert Addlesberg, intervened in Nicaragua's history.

Addlesburg's baseball got the lead on cricket and several years later a league, of sorts, bloomed.

Here's the fun part. The tradition in Nicaragua was to name sports teams after contemporary wars.

One team was known as "Boer" after the conflict in what would become South Africa. "Russia" and "Japan" were also popular teams of the time.

There you go: War = sport.

While George W. Bush once owned a Major league Baseball team, perhaps Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin might enjoy taking up baseball - although he seems at home with judo.

Putin celebrated his 56th birthday this week launching – literally - a how-to-judo DVD. It's title? Let's Learn Judo with Vladimir Putin.

The Russian PM is a black belt and already authored a book on the sport. It puts the sporting aspirations of former Australian Prime Minister John Howard, a cricket tragic, in some perspective.

Howard's, successor may want to take notice.

If Kevin Rudd really wants to make an impact on the world stage he should put the Mandarin books back on the shelf and learn Kung-Fu.

Politicians learning martial arts can only be a step toward world peace. Would the current situation in Iraq be as messy as it is if George W. Bush had a one-on-one throwdown with Saddam Hussein?

Does Putin's judo know-how make him the most powerful man in the world?

And where would US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, an active hunter, fit into all this?

It's enough to make remaining on top of a mountain in Nicaragua even more appealing.

Amigo - un otra cafe con leche.