The Flood - a picture narrative

the rain

swollen river - day 4 of rain

same spot - day 6 of flooding

The path for vehicles (and pedestrians in their absence) leading to my site. Water was knee deep when I got out Sunday. It rose to chest level that evening.

unloading a Columbian plane lent to Panama to help fly in aid, at Changuinola airport

highway into the province

open to general traffic (?!)

a landslide in my community. take a close look at the house.

where I used to cross the river

a landslide near my host family´s house

but still almost business as normal for the host fam ... posing with piglets

Pilgrims and Refugees

Happy belated Thanksgiving! Thank you for all of your comments, emails, and phone calls that brightened my holiday. Even in the midst of a natural disaster, I had the opportunity to celebrate in good company. Wednesday night when returning from serving up food at a temporary shelter, I arrived at the Bocas regional leader’s house to find it full of Peace Corps volunteers from all over the province. We had been consolidated to Changuinola for an air evacuation from the province set for the following day. Despite the somber mood in Changuinola, we had a premature Thanksgiving celebration complete with mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, and … bean soup.

Since Thursday I have been in David with the other evacuated volunteers, where we have been visiting agencies, helping sort and pack clothes, and preparing and organizing ourselves for returning to our damaged homes. I have been in contact with several of my community members. On Wednesday, the flood waters subsided and the landslides lay still, the devastation was made visible, and the sadness of my community members rang clear in their voices. Their backs were against the wall. Several aqueducts laid in ruins with five broken spring boxes and thousands of feet of PVC tubing splintered and missing. Three houses were destroyed, and they had a near complete crop loss. Filled with guilt of my impending community abandonment (i.e., evacuation) I spent a frantic Thursday morning at the government agency coordinating disaster relief trying to arrange aid delivery to my community, which flood waters had cut off from the outside world. I boarded my plane out of the province with remorse; that evening I received a call from my community counterpart. His voice was firmer, lighter. A helicopter had arrived in the afternoon to deliver food aid.

I am sad to think of the work we put into planting fields that no longer exist and am scared when I think about the food shortages we will see in the coming months. I know my community is hard working and will pull through. The rebuilding has even already started without me. Friday I will arrive to contribute my hands to the effort.

Rain, Rain Go Away

From yesterday...

It has been a week since I have seen the the slightest hint of sunshine. An entire week with the constant drumming of rain drops, the deafening roar of churning rivers, and the lingering question of when will the rain ever stop? Saturday I was to leave my community for a Peace Corps conference in one of Panama’s central provinces, but by Saturday morning the flooding was severe. The same peaceful river I normally cross a half dozen times a day was wildly carving out a new path, undercutting banks, carrying away trees, rolling the boulders I used to wash my clothes upon, and sending the people living near its banks fleeing to their relatives’ houses. I put my travel plans on hold, came to truly appreciate living on a hill, and resigned myself to being mother nature’s prisoner.

Saturday came and went, but the downpour stayed on until the wee hours of Sunday morning. I woke to the din of rain diminishing suddenly unable to sleep in the absence of the white noise that had filled my ears for the last week. After a sleepless hour of mere drizzle, I sought my ipod to lull me back to sleep. By 8am the rain had returned, cell phone service was out, but the river had gone down to waist and chest level and some of my neighbors were crossing. It was my chance! Although taxi service into my site had stopped when flood waters became too dangerous for the vehicles’ electrical systems, I was still eager to get to my conference. I would make the hike. I grabbed my plastic covered pack filled with my double-bagged travel necessities and slipped on my very loved rubber boots. One treacherous river crossing, one washed out bridge, one swim across what was once a path, a half mile walk through knee deep water, and four rainy, muddy, dreary hours later I arrived to the road, flagged down a pickup, and settled in the back, happy to have put that part of the journey behind me. I was only an hour away from boarding a bus to David in Changuinola. I was home free!

Almost. Upon arriving to the bus terminal I heard that there had been come landslides that took out sections of the only road in and out of the province. The bus boy said they couldn’t get me to David, but they would take me as far as there was road. Other buses would be waiting on the other side. He said he didn’t know how long it took to pass through the washed out portions of the highway. Maybe twenty minutes he guessed. Would I be getting on the bus? The last one would leave in a half an hour. I told him I needed to think about it. And eat. If he didn’t know how long it takes to cross, did than mean that no one was crossing?

After changing out of my dripping clothes and eating warm food, my adventurous spirit returned. I boarded the bus and started asking other passengers what they had heard. Two hours of hiking. Six sections of highway affected. Someone mentioned a five hour hike and sixteen landslides. It was still raining. We would be arriving to the troubled stretch about an hour before dusk. Red flags went up. I got off the bus.

I would call up Peace Corps Panama to check in and see what was really going on. My cell phone still didn’t have service, so I tried a pay phone. No luck. I tried another. Again, no luck. After four more, I found out there was only local phone service. At the internet cafe I tasted defeat. The province was completely cut off. No road. No means of communication out, only radio. No Peace Corps training conference. No Thanksgiving day celebration with other volunteers. Just rain.

A day later the rain continues through its seventh day. The little news that makes it here says that a stretch of 15 kilometers (9 miles) of highway was affected by about 60 landslides. It will be days before they can open the highway for emergency supplies and personnel and months before it can be reopened to traffic. Meanwhile in Changuinola, the largest city in the province (pop ~50,000), people have been collecting rain water since water stopped arriving to the tap on Thursday. The gas stations are out of fuel. Parts of the city are out of power. Communication lines are still out, but reports of missing and dead and more landslides and flooding are trickling in. My community has been evacuated. I have stocked up on food, and collected gallons upon gallons of water. I am feeling caged and going little nuts, but I hear that there is a relief effort going on, maybe they could use me.

El Rey de la Selva

Alas, a blank day in my calendar! I slept in until 6:30 and would have the chance to do some laundry and get a start on germinating seeds for my garden. I had just finished up planting some squash in an egg carton and was debating whether my unsettled tummy could be the product of a disagreeable breakfast or amoebas when four breathless children came running up the path to my host family’s home.

–Janelly, ¡Apúrate! Préstanos tu camera.
Before I would commit myself and my camera to the wild goose chase that was sure to ensue, I tried to extract some details.
– Mataron un tigre… Lindo, mi primo, y mi tío. Están en la casa. ¡APÚRTATE!
Ay ay ay, the air in my lungs got caught mid inhale. They killed a tiger. For weeks of I had heard of a ‘tiger’ stalking about the outskirts of the community with an appetite for pigs (having claimed five); however, I hadn’t seen this coming. I gathered my camera and told my nerves not to betray me.

The cousins and uncle trio left that morning to hunt a tapir (a large, rare mammal, a relative of horses and rhinos) and had just retuned with a tigre pintado (‘a painted tiger,’ a jaguar). They were obviously still high on adrenaline and full of excitement, but still humble. In a state of culture shock and saddened, I hid behind my camera, taking the pictures they requested, restricting my comments to ‘There is better light over there. Remove your hat; your face is coming out too dark,’ and writing down picture orders while my eyes lingered on the gaping machete wounds on the jaguar’s neck. Hunting dogs had helped the hunters locate the jaguar, they had shot at her twice with their shot guns, and when she tried to hide under a fallen tree, she was claimed by a machete blow through her spinal cord. When the time came to dress the cat, I took my leave. My tummy’s unrest was coming to a peak.

They jaguar pelt is now hung and drying in town next to the school, and the hunter trio plans to sell it. They think they can make about two hundred dollars. The meat was smoked and deep fried and consumed by the hunters and some of their family members (some opted not to eat it). I have been told that traditionally Nasos did not eat cat meat as cultural belief is that it could lead to mental insanity. They said that the night following the kill, the cries of a cat were heard coming from the mountain. Saturday will mark a week since the kill, and it will be celebrated with chicha fuerte (a fermented juice, yucca juice in this case) and a traditional song and dance to scare away the tiger’s spirit.

The Aftermath

The misery of dengue has loosened its grip; its associated depression, debilitating pain, and feverish nightmares have passed, and it was promptly followed by more amoebas, which I am still working to rid myself of. My persistent health problems are a bit uncanny and have severely cut into my productivity as a volunteer. When I am not working on getting healthy, I am teaching English (we are conjugating verbs and making sentences already!), participating in school activities and meetings with my farmers, and working on my house (or ‘hut’ as some of you prefer).

House construction was put on hold while I was recovering from dengue, but we are back on track. The only work left on the house is to finish a window, install plumbing, and make the furniture (a bed frame, shelves, tables, and chairs). We have cut wood for the bathroom (my washing hut) and the latrine. The next official work later this week. In the meantime I am hauling in a stove, pots, dishes, a sleeping pad, plumbing needs, etc. and starting seeds for my garden to prepare for my move. Yea!

The world’s giddy excitement for the U.S.’s president elect spilled its way into my community. The day after elections several people asked me if I had heard the news and whether I had woken up dancing. While I had been bummed about my no-show absentee ballot and may have not busted a move in the early am, I coundn’t conceal my excitement and did whistle for the duration of the hike into my site.

my nearly finished abode, with its huge porch and neighbor

finishing the roof

a folkloric dance at the school

from the bridge entering my site