A few days have passed since site announcements (see previous entry) and I while I should be packing for the next two weeks in Bocas, I am plugged into my computer and listening to the music that I already miss (there is too much reggeaton here). Beyond the fungus-turn-rash, training is going very well, and things like latrine smells don’t bother me so much anymore. And yesterday when I poured milk into my ‘corn flas’ (every cereal in Panama is ‘corn flakes’), no less than 20 ants floated to the top. I hesitated for a minute debating my next move, and then picked up my spoon and dug in.
My fellow trainees marvel over the Panamanian diets in our training community, where in most houses there exist only two food groups: fried and starch. Sometimes these overlap (i.e., fried plantains). Some host moms take their frying creativity to new levels, by frying bread, hotdogs, corn patties (lovingly called hockey pucks by the trainees), etc. If Panamanians ate vegetables, they would fry those, too. But according to Panamanians, they do eat their veggies: yucca, otoe, ñame, and other root tubers. As for more examples of starch affinity, my fellow trainee Julliette offers a meal she was served a few days ago to illustrate: spaghetti with a side of mashed potatoes. Luckily for me, I rarely encounter these food woes. My food always tastes good and is generally nutritious. Even if there are ants floating on top.
Technical training classes are the highlights of my days here. We spend much of our time doing hands on activities, and my machete swing is finally getting dangerously good and new blisters are forming on top of the old ones. In previous weeks of training we have made lots of compost, organic fertilizers, and organic pesticides. Organic production techniques are stressed in training because the farmers volunteers work with often do not have the financial resources to buy chemical fertilizers/pesticides, which hopefully will make promoting organic alternatives that much easier. And this week, thanks to training with a level A frame, I can now define contour lines (without a laser level) and can tackle the basics of hillside soil conservation.
I am growing more excited about site placement, and I am looking forward to my first visit to a Naso community this coming week, culture week. For which I should be packing.
Hasta luego!
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Site Announcements
From Wednesday...
What a day! And what a range of emotions. Firstly, the (terribly strong, yet terribly ineffective) anti-histamines that I am taking for the perpetually spreading rash have made me a walking zombie. But owing to a fabulous lunchtime siesta I revived enough to enjoy the afternoon’s suspense-riddled site announcements (albeit feeling all kinds of itchy).
The Peace Corps certainly did their best to build up the occasion by bringing all of the PC/Panama regional leaders, showing an ever-inspirational PC video, and then bringing out a map of the country dotted with little stars marking the locations of our future sites. They worked across the country’s provinces, starting in the east and moving westward, announcing the name of each community, describing it and potential project work there, and then revealing the name of the volunteer selected for the site. It was great to see the reactions of my fellow trainees as they exalted at receiving coveted beach sites or shrugged at the description of a two hour hike into site. My community was the last placement to be announced, making it the Western-most site and the farthest from Panamá City. It is located in the northwestern reaches of the Bocas del Toro Province close to the Costa Rican border.
According to the information packet that I received tonight, my eventual home in Panama will be a “charming” community of about 600 people. Its people belong to a small and periled indigenous group, the Naso (a.k.a. Teribe). I will be the first volunteer in this site and the only PC/Panama volunteer working with the Naso indigenous group. I currently have many questions and few resources available, but my trusty Lonely Planet Panama (2007) guide book offers a little information on the Naso, which I will share:
It is estimated that there are only a few thousand Naso remaining in Panama, the majority of which live in the Bocas del Toro province and survive as subsistence farmers. Although they have remained virtually autonomous for generations, the Naso have recently started losing their cultural self-sufficiency due to missionary activity, Latino encroachment, and youth migration. Today, most Naso are bilingual (Naso and Spanish), wear Western-style clothing, and practice some form of Christianity. However, strong elements of ancestral Naso culture remain, especially considering that they are one of the few remaining indigenous groups in the Americas to retain their traditional monarchy.
While the work that I will be doing will depend largely on the information I will gain through completing a community assessment during my first three months in site, the Peace Corps has already identified many potential projects. These include working with existing fish and rice tanks, goat husbandry, grain farming (e.g., corn and bean), fruiticulture (e.g., orange, mango, lemon), cacao production, and sustainable agriculture techniques for traditional crops (e.g., rice, maize, otoe, yucca, plantains). Secondary work could include helping market local artisan work such as woodcraft and natural fiber baskets.
I will be fairly removed from modern conveniences (20 minutes in taxi plus 45 minutes hiking from closest bus line/border crossing) and other volunteers (2 hours), but I will still enjoy mountain fresh water from an aqueduct and have cell phone reception. I will build my own stilted home with donations of wood, thatch, and labor from my community (at least that is the plan). I will not have electricity.
It is hard to digest what all of this will mean for me. I finally know the name, location, and some of the needs and wants of my community. I know the names of the people with whom I may be living and working. Yet I know nothing about their culture, language, or daily struggles. I also know that this community has asked for a Peace Corps Volunteer, and so I will go, happily and hoping not to let them down.
But I will not be going just yet. Six weeks of training still remain before swear-in. And the next two weeks will find me once again in Bocas del Toro for culture week (Ngobere and Naso cultures) followed by tech week (cacao training). Hopefully a weekend island hiatus will fall in between, funds and time permitting.
What a day! And what a range of emotions. Firstly, the (terribly strong, yet terribly ineffective) anti-histamines that I am taking for the perpetually spreading rash have made me a walking zombie. But owing to a fabulous lunchtime siesta I revived enough to enjoy the afternoon’s suspense-riddled site announcements (albeit feeling all kinds of itchy).
The Peace Corps certainly did their best to build up the occasion by bringing all of the PC/Panama regional leaders, showing an ever-inspirational PC video, and then bringing out a map of the country dotted with little stars marking the locations of our future sites. They worked across the country’s provinces, starting in the east and moving westward, announcing the name of each community, describing it and potential project work there, and then revealing the name of the volunteer selected for the site. It was great to see the reactions of my fellow trainees as they exalted at receiving coveted beach sites or shrugged at the description of a two hour hike into site. My community was the last placement to be announced, making it the Western-most site and the farthest from Panamá City. It is located in the northwestern reaches of the Bocas del Toro Province close to the Costa Rican border.
According to the information packet that I received tonight, my eventual home in Panama will be a “charming” community of about 600 people. Its people belong to a small and periled indigenous group, the Naso (a.k.a. Teribe). I will be the first volunteer in this site and the only PC/Panama volunteer working with the Naso indigenous group. I currently have many questions and few resources available, but my trusty Lonely Planet Panama (2007) guide book offers a little information on the Naso, which I will share:
It is estimated that there are only a few thousand Naso remaining in Panama, the majority of which live in the Bocas del Toro province and survive as subsistence farmers. Although they have remained virtually autonomous for generations, the Naso have recently started losing their cultural self-sufficiency due to missionary activity, Latino encroachment, and youth migration. Today, most Naso are bilingual (Naso and Spanish), wear Western-style clothing, and practice some form of Christianity. However, strong elements of ancestral Naso culture remain, especially considering that they are one of the few remaining indigenous groups in the Americas to retain their traditional monarchy.
While the work that I will be doing will depend largely on the information I will gain through completing a community assessment during my first three months in site, the Peace Corps has already identified many potential projects. These include working with existing fish and rice tanks, goat husbandry, grain farming (e.g., corn and bean), fruiticulture (e.g., orange, mango, lemon), cacao production, and sustainable agriculture techniques for traditional crops (e.g., rice, maize, otoe, yucca, plantains). Secondary work could include helping market local artisan work such as woodcraft and natural fiber baskets.
I will be fairly removed from modern conveniences (20 minutes in taxi plus 45 minutes hiking from closest bus line/border crossing) and other volunteers (2 hours), but I will still enjoy mountain fresh water from an aqueduct and have cell phone reception. I will build my own stilted home with donations of wood, thatch, and labor from my community (at least that is the plan). I will not have electricity.
It is hard to digest what all of this will mean for me. I finally know the name, location, and some of the needs and wants of my community. I know the names of the people with whom I may be living and working. Yet I know nothing about their culture, language, or daily struggles. I also know that this community has asked for a Peace Corps Volunteer, and so I will go, happily and hoping not to let them down.
But I will not be going just yet. Six weeks of training still remain before swear-in. And the next two weeks will find me once again in Bocas del Toro for culture week (Ngobere and Naso cultures) followed by tech week (cacao training). Hopefully a weekend island hiatus will fall in between, funds and time permitting.
Monday, May 12, 2008
The Rash and Casco Viejo Pictures
Grinding corn for empanadas at my house
The rash
Along the shoreline in Casco Viejo
More of Casco Viejo
Part of the SAS (sustainable ag sys) crew in Casco ViejoFriday, May 9, 2008
Demystification Weekend
I left last Thursday evening for what my country director fondly calls demystification weekend. My fellow aspirantes (trainees) and I were each given a current volunteer site to visit for the weekend. We were given our volunteer’s name and some information on where to meet or find him or her. For some, the trip ended up being an outlandish adventure waiting for a man with a horse that didn’t show up, hiking two plus hours through Panama’s pouring rain and clay mud “roads”, or bouncing four hours down the pot-holed stretches of the Pan-American highway in an retired American school bus. Some aspirantes’ travels led them to unwittingly discover that some provinces have two towns of the same name. Some folks found out first hand that Panamanians love to help so much that the will even offer you directions when they have never heard of your destination.
Although my travels took me to the far-flung Bocas del Toro Province, my getting there was a very mild journey. Nine and a half hours in a comfy air conditioned overnight bus (next to a man who insisted upon calling me ‘Barbie’) and an additional half an hour in a mini-bus brought me to the foot of the hill upon which my volunteer lived. I scrambled up the hill as the sun began to peek over the islands of Bocas del Toro behind me. It wasn’t until I reached the top that the sunlight was bright enough to illuminate the panoramic postcard picture I was standing in the midst of: the fog-hazed mountains of the binational Parque La Amistad before me and an expanse of the island-dotted Caribbean behind me. How does a trainee keep her site expectations at none when she sees a site like that? Aye, Peace Corps, what are you doing to me?
After waking up my unsuspecting volunteer, we passed the morning learning about eachother and what had brought us to where we were, and I learned through a series of anecdotes what I could expect as a volunteer in an indigenous Ngöbe community in the cacao-rich Bocas. My volunteer showed me her tactics for how to eat well and stay healthy (despite the occasional bout of dengue) in the absence of electricity and running water. We made stove-top brownies from the block of cacao bought from a family in the community, and I marveled at the staying power of processed American cheese while munching on a grilled cheese sandwich.
I had the chance to take a few hour long hike to a transmission tower constructed by the U.S. in WWII with another volunteer that lived just down the highway. The hike was refreshing in a sweaty kind of way and little poisonous dart frogs were just about everywhere. The climb up the tower was reminiscent of climbing up the Harvest Store silo back home and I got a little fearful of the heights, but the view made it well worth it. I wish I could share it with you, but I guess my camera battery decided that it would be better for you to see it first hand.
After the hike I returned to my volunteer’s site for my inaugural quebrada (stream) bath. One of the neighbors was down at the stream washing her clothes and her husband was resting on a rock nearby when I made my way down to the steam. Not knowing the protocol, I hung out with them, striking up conversation about the community, the volunteer I was visiting, and cows, mainly. After about 15 minutes, the neighbor finished the washing and told me to go ahead and bathe. She and her husband gathered the clothes into 5 gallon buckets and started heading up the hill. I started dumping water over my head and was about to bid them ‘hasta luego’ when they took a seat on another rock overlooking the stream. Hmm. So I finished my stream bath with a small audience, said goodbye, and climbed up the hill to ask my volunteer about what just happened. Apparently, bathing with an audience is something that I may be getting used to in my future.
I leave you with some pictures.
Although my travels took me to the far-flung Bocas del Toro Province, my getting there was a very mild journey. Nine and a half hours in a comfy air conditioned overnight bus (next to a man who insisted upon calling me ‘Barbie’) and an additional half an hour in a mini-bus brought me to the foot of the hill upon which my volunteer lived. I scrambled up the hill as the sun began to peek over the islands of Bocas del Toro behind me. It wasn’t until I reached the top that the sunlight was bright enough to illuminate the panoramic postcard picture I was standing in the midst of: the fog-hazed mountains of the binational Parque La Amistad before me and an expanse of the island-dotted Caribbean behind me. How does a trainee keep her site expectations at none when she sees a site like that? Aye, Peace Corps, what are you doing to me?
After waking up my unsuspecting volunteer, we passed the morning learning about eachother and what had brought us to where we were, and I learned through a series of anecdotes what I could expect as a volunteer in an indigenous Ngöbe community in the cacao-rich Bocas. My volunteer showed me her tactics for how to eat well and stay healthy (despite the occasional bout of dengue) in the absence of electricity and running water. We made stove-top brownies from the block of cacao bought from a family in the community, and I marveled at the staying power of processed American cheese while munching on a grilled cheese sandwich.
I had the chance to take a few hour long hike to a transmission tower constructed by the U.S. in WWII with another volunteer that lived just down the highway. The hike was refreshing in a sweaty kind of way and little poisonous dart frogs were just about everywhere. The climb up the tower was reminiscent of climbing up the Harvest Store silo back home and I got a little fearful of the heights, but the view made it well worth it. I wish I could share it with you, but I guess my camera battery decided that it would be better for you to see it first hand.
After the hike I returned to my volunteer’s site for my inaugural quebrada (stream) bath. One of the neighbors was down at the stream washing her clothes and her husband was resting on a rock nearby when I made my way down to the steam. Not knowing the protocol, I hung out with them, striking up conversation about the community, the volunteer I was visiting, and cows, mainly. After about 15 minutes, the neighbor finished the washing and told me to go ahead and bathe. She and her husband gathered the clothes into 5 gallon buckets and started heading up the hill. I started dumping water over my head and was about to bid them ‘hasta luego’ when they took a seat on another rock overlooking the stream. Hmm. So I finished my stream bath with a small audience, said goodbye, and climbed up the hill to ask my volunteer about what just happened. Apparently, bathing with an audience is something that I may be getting used to in my future.
I leave you with some pictures.
Where my journey began: Dayton, OH
My host nephew with his cake (I forgot to buy candles, but I decorated the cake with raisins)
Sunrise in Bocas del Toro
180° from the above photo
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