Dear lovely folks back home (and around the world),
I apologize,
as I often do when starting these emails, because it's been a while
since I've written everyone. I have had trouble finding words lately, so
i'll do this reporter style and stick to the facts--at least that way
you know i'm alive down here.
The rainy season has begun in full force, which means transportation
is harder and harder to come by. The trucks don't like to travel in the
afternoon because they're afraid to cross the stream, of which there
are 3 passes. This week, no joke, the driver stopped the car in the
middle of a stream and had the passangers (just the 3 of us) move rocks
to make it easier for the car to pass. He wouldn't take us home until
the work was done, then complained the whole time about how it wasn't
worth the money to take us home. He's like that though, Maestro Him.
He's my least favorite driver- pisses me off most every day but i'll
probably miss his incessant bitterness and negativity when I leave.
He'd be a great movie character, the sour old grump. One good thing
about the rain, however, is that I (generally) have water to bathe in
and my garden is finally growing (thank you, seed donors! i'm super
excited!!!!) And I admit that it's lovely to spend an torrential
downpour reading or doing yoga or exercising....or napping!! Oh man do I
love rainstorm naps. Tigre likes them too. We nap together
sometimes--so much for keeping him off my bed.
As for work, things are moving along at lightning speed, which is
really just too fast for the rainy season, but it's good for me. The
stoves committee I've been supporting with got funding to build
fuel-efficient wood burning stoves over the next few months- I
painstakingly dragged them through the grant writing and group
organization process, and it actually paid off big- $1600 from the
Energy and Climate Change Alliance of the Americas--Thanks, Obama!
We're ordering all the materials and starting the training sessions this
week- Si Dios Quiere we will finish building all the stoves in the
summer (December/January).
More rewarding, however, is the progress with the bread shop. I was
pleasantly surprised to return from the united states and find out that
the women, in my absence, have self-organized and sculpted the business
into a much smooth(er) running machine. They made a weekly work
schedule that's posted up on the wall, they've upped the quantity of
bread they make each saturday, and between the president, secretary and
treasurer they are tracking all their ingoing and outgoing costs.
They've got their funds separated into "maintainance" and "savings," and
they are buying new ingredients as necessary. All of this without me
looking over their shoulders for nearly 2 months, all of this when they
told me not all that long ago that they were at the point of giving up
entirely. it's quite remarkable how much can be done when you pair 8
strong-willed women with a mud-oven, a $60 dollar investment, and a
brief business management course..... and I've started to wonder if this
will not be the most successful aspect of my service when all is said
and done. After all, building stoves and planting trees and growing
vegetables is important, but there is nothing quite like having an
income. And not just an income, an income for women who have never before had their own spending money.
I asked the women yesterday at what point they would like to divvy up
some of their money (they have already saved over $100) and they said
they want to keep building up the "seed", and then all take their share
and go to the city and buy themselves something nice. Here in the
Panamanian campo women have to ask permission to access the family's
money (if there is any), and they tell me that if they save money little
by little in the house it's sure to disappear, which is why it's better
to wait until they can take a good chunk at once and spend it quickly.
I'm so proud of them- and admittedly, proud of myself. I hope to help
solidify the business before I go, and to see that each woman has the
pleasure of pocketing and spending her own money.
What else???? The organic gardens are still up and going, though
the extended dry
season was rather brutal for those of us without running water. Most
everyone has finished harvesting their first planting and are starting
to turn the beds, or have already done so. The rice harvest has delayed
all other work quite a bit- it's hard work and long days for everyone
right now, and many nights of drunken calls (salomas). The drink of
choice here is Chicha fuerte- it's basically fermented corn beer.
Rather than water, giant jugs of this juice are hauled to the fields and
drinken throughout the day (and what is left over is quickly downed
throughout the night). Someday I will film the men salomaring for you
and send a video-- it's quite a site to behold and words cannot do it
justice, but you absolutely must see this drunken spectacle at least
once (though it's not very fun to see every night...). Which leads me to
the health stuff....
This week I will be giving the second
health and cooking class with my friend Bianca- we're making collard
greens (mustard leaves), habichuela and egg salad, and rice, and we're
going to teach about diet-related diseases and how to prevent them
(diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and liver problems, to be
specific--these are extremely common ailments here). I was awarded a
small grant from the peace corps to continue giving these classes and
have been seriously considering developing them into a "traveling
seminar" to give in sites around the country that are doing garden
projects. Ideally I'd like to integrate other health topics too (like
ALCOHOLISM among men, women/children's health, sexual health, etc), as
well as permaculture and more "hands-off" methodologies for gardening.
The possibilities are endless really...we'll see how far I can get in
these next 9 months.. Time is a lot like water.
Inhale....
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Saturday, July 28, 2012
July 2011
Crecer. To Grow.
Growth is a cycle, not a continuum. It begins with birth: think seedlings, think rosy red infant cheeks, think squeeling newborn kittens on a rice sack in the attic, think the very first day I stepped foot on the Isthmus. Maduration follows: ripening mangos, ripening minds, hormonal young boys and wiser (sometimes) old ones. And then death. Think Tio Amado, a good man who passed away this last week, brittle brown tomato stalks, think of those same kittens, cold, stiff, and silent. Add time, add heat, add earthworms. Repeat.
So much has happened in the year I have now been serving in the peace corps.... (Yes! One year has come and gone!) So much has happened since my last blog entry, since last week, since yesterday. How do I even begin to catch you up on what has been, what is, the story of constant growth.
In the last few months our community, as well as a few neighboring communities, have sprung alive with organic home gardens. First there was one (my own), now there are 27. Supporting and promoting the vegetable gardens has become a cornerstone of my service. Somedays, usually Mondays, I walk for hours, from dusk to dawn, visiting the gardens. If I dont make it to all the gardens in one day, I do it again on Tuesday. Those visiting days are the best days. Sometimes I do it just to pat backs, give a thumbs up, and keep the excitement alive--(you should see how excited people get when they show off their gardens.) Other times folks ask me questions about problems theyve been having and we pick a day of the week for me to return and work with them. And I do.
I love everything about gardens. I love planting them, I love talking about them, I love the look on peoples faces, that beautiful beam of pride and natural wonder when they finally have get to harvest something or see the first flowering tomato plant. I love the dirt in my fingernails and in my hair and under my toenails. I love the smell of compost. I love hiking for an hour to help make an insect repellant in five minutes. And of course, I LOVE eating from the gardens. Right now we are just begining to get the first of the tomato and cucumber harvests. Our gardening group is done with their training (a FAO program) and now we have been left to our own devices. Im taking advantage of the momentum and enthusiasm, and this week I will be doing my first nutrition and healthy cooking class. We are going to talk about the health benefits of these veggies and healthy, diverse ways to prepare them. This weeks menu is...... Bean Burritos with Pico de Gallo and steamed corn on the cob. Delicious, no? My one rule for cooking class is that nothing will be fried. ever. period. and no ingredients will come from the city (which is 2 hours away), and everyone will learn that rice and macaronis and fried meat is not a complete or delicious meal no matter how much grease and MSG you throw on it....Sooo heres to gardens, to better health, and taller children, ie. heres to growth in the physical sense. But theres oh-so-much-more growing here in Panama.... its not all physical, nor is it not all external.
Im growing, too. I play back memories of myself, my life before this life. I see myself in the mirror and on the outside its mostly the bugbites and sunburns and gnarled hair and sweaty everything, but when I look at my eyes staring back at me from my ductape-rigged mirror I see inside myself, too, and I know that Im not the same there, either. I wonder if others can see it, or if Im seeing what I believe and feel rather than what is visible. I think Ive gotten older here. I look at photos from before I arrived and I see a young college girl, smiley, giggly, part girl-part grown up, happier among children than among adults, blissfully naive and pretentious. And now? Probably still just as pretentious and smiley, but a lot less naive, a lot more like a woman than a girl. In fact, I feel like I lost something of the child in me while Ive been here. I dont want to say thats a sad thing, because there is a magic in the world of women that is different from that of the childs world. I really enjoy working with women here. I love their silent power and their hugs, the way they take passerbyers under their roofs and nurture them. I love the quaint things they do to bring beauty into their lives and imminent surroundings, they way they love children and one another, the constant sacrifices they make to bring serenity and comfort to others, the comments they make to one another when men arent around that leave them giggling like a bunch of little girls. For the first time in my life I find that I enjoy being among the women than among the children. Could it be that Im really becoming one of them or is it just cultural? (Afterall these campo children are a lot crazier than our well-groomed, well-trained kids back in the US....and there are a lot of them!) Its hard to tell from here, but the fact is that Im happy to be one of them. Im happy to be growing.
What is strange is to think I am officially ¨over-the-hill¨ of my service. The realization of this fact has led me to speculate about what is to come...My next life. I suppose I should get a masters degree, pay off some debts, and echar pa delante, but I fantasize that I will sustain this momentum forever. Continue to travel, live in a foreign land, promote gardens and health and harmony with nature. When the light is just-so I can see myself someday working for the FAO or USAID, and when it changes I see myself just as clearly as an artist promoting social and behavioral change, or a photographer for National Geographic, or a journalist, or a farmer. I wont stay here, though. As much as I love my home here (and I do LOVE this life so much), like any living entity, this experience, too, must come to its dying day. And on this day, I feel like I will be ready to move on from Latin America, to start fresh. After all, growth is a cycle.
-------------------
P.S. Some exiciting news. Si Hay Pan! (Yes, there IS Bread!) I should really send out some pictures of the mud oven we built for the bread shop (yeahhhh woman power! hauling sand and packing mud like you wouldnt believe we could...it was AWESOME). We finished a business seminar recently and now make two hundred breads two days a week and sell them for a nickle a pop. Our goal is to have 2 recipes down-pat by mid august and to start trying cake recipes in September. Fun, eh? Just wait till we get zucchinis from the garden. Im about to rock their world with zucchini bread....hehehehehe.
P.S.S. Will send photos the next time I get internet access.
P.S.S.S. I love you folks.
Growth is a cycle, not a continuum. It begins with birth: think seedlings, think rosy red infant cheeks, think squeeling newborn kittens on a rice sack in the attic, think the very first day I stepped foot on the Isthmus. Maduration follows: ripening mangos, ripening minds, hormonal young boys and wiser (sometimes) old ones. And then death. Think Tio Amado, a good man who passed away this last week, brittle brown tomato stalks, think of those same kittens, cold, stiff, and silent. Add time, add heat, add earthworms. Repeat.
So much has happened in the year I have now been serving in the peace corps.... (Yes! One year has come and gone!) So much has happened since my last blog entry, since last week, since yesterday. How do I even begin to catch you up on what has been, what is, the story of constant growth.
In the last few months our community, as well as a few neighboring communities, have sprung alive with organic home gardens. First there was one (my own), now there are 27. Supporting and promoting the vegetable gardens has become a cornerstone of my service. Somedays, usually Mondays, I walk for hours, from dusk to dawn, visiting the gardens. If I dont make it to all the gardens in one day, I do it again on Tuesday. Those visiting days are the best days. Sometimes I do it just to pat backs, give a thumbs up, and keep the excitement alive--(you should see how excited people get when they show off their gardens.) Other times folks ask me questions about problems theyve been having and we pick a day of the week for me to return and work with them. And I do.
I love everything about gardens. I love planting them, I love talking about them, I love the look on peoples faces, that beautiful beam of pride and natural wonder when they finally have get to harvest something or see the first flowering tomato plant. I love the dirt in my fingernails and in my hair and under my toenails. I love the smell of compost. I love hiking for an hour to help make an insect repellant in five minutes. And of course, I LOVE eating from the gardens. Right now we are just begining to get the first of the tomato and cucumber harvests. Our gardening group is done with their training (a FAO program) and now we have been left to our own devices. Im taking advantage of the momentum and enthusiasm, and this week I will be doing my first nutrition and healthy cooking class. We are going to talk about the health benefits of these veggies and healthy, diverse ways to prepare them. This weeks menu is...... Bean Burritos with Pico de Gallo and steamed corn on the cob. Delicious, no? My one rule for cooking class is that nothing will be fried. ever. period. and no ingredients will come from the city (which is 2 hours away), and everyone will learn that rice and macaronis and fried meat is not a complete or delicious meal no matter how much grease and MSG you throw on it....Sooo heres to gardens, to better health, and taller children, ie. heres to growth in the physical sense. But theres oh-so-much-more growing here in Panama.... its not all physical, nor is it not all external.
Im growing, too. I play back memories of myself, my life before this life. I see myself in the mirror and on the outside its mostly the bugbites and sunburns and gnarled hair and sweaty everything, but when I look at my eyes staring back at me from my ductape-rigged mirror I see inside myself, too, and I know that Im not the same there, either. I wonder if others can see it, or if Im seeing what I believe and feel rather than what is visible. I think Ive gotten older here. I look at photos from before I arrived and I see a young college girl, smiley, giggly, part girl-part grown up, happier among children than among adults, blissfully naive and pretentious. And now? Probably still just as pretentious and smiley, but a lot less naive, a lot more like a woman than a girl. In fact, I feel like I lost something of the child in me while Ive been here. I dont want to say thats a sad thing, because there is a magic in the world of women that is different from that of the childs world. I really enjoy working with women here. I love their silent power and their hugs, the way they take passerbyers under their roofs and nurture them. I love the quaint things they do to bring beauty into their lives and imminent surroundings, they way they love children and one another, the constant sacrifices they make to bring serenity and comfort to others, the comments they make to one another when men arent around that leave them giggling like a bunch of little girls. For the first time in my life I find that I enjoy being among the women than among the children. Could it be that Im really becoming one of them or is it just cultural? (Afterall these campo children are a lot crazier than our well-groomed, well-trained kids back in the US....and there are a lot of them!) Its hard to tell from here, but the fact is that Im happy to be one of them. Im happy to be growing.
What is strange is to think I am officially ¨over-the-hill¨ of my service. The realization of this fact has led me to speculate about what is to come...My next life. I suppose I should get a masters degree, pay off some debts, and echar pa delante, but I fantasize that I will sustain this momentum forever. Continue to travel, live in a foreign land, promote gardens and health and harmony with nature. When the light is just-so I can see myself someday working for the FAO or USAID, and when it changes I see myself just as clearly as an artist promoting social and behavioral change, or a photographer for National Geographic, or a journalist, or a farmer. I wont stay here, though. As much as I love my home here (and I do LOVE this life so much), like any living entity, this experience, too, must come to its dying day. And on this day, I feel like I will be ready to move on from Latin America, to start fresh. After all, growth is a cycle.
-------------------
P.S. Some exiciting news. Si Hay Pan! (Yes, there IS Bread!) I should really send out some pictures of the mud oven we built for the bread shop (yeahhhh woman power! hauling sand and packing mud like you wouldnt believe we could...it was AWESOME). We finished a business seminar recently and now make two hundred breads two days a week and sell them for a nickle a pop. Our goal is to have 2 recipes down-pat by mid august and to start trying cake recipes in September. Fun, eh? Just wait till we get zucchinis from the garden. Im about to rock their world with zucchini bread....hehehehehe.
P.S.S. Will send photos the next time I get internet access.
P.S.S.S. I love you folks.
June 2011
Hey friends and family,
Hope this email finds you all well. I am just heading back to my community after an amazing vacation with my mom!...Tomorrow I´ll be back in the thick of the campo life but while I still have internet I´ll take a second to tell you about our trip.. It was only ten days but it felt longer....We spent the first night eating delicious fresh ceviche in the city, then headed over to the beach in Guarare to enjoy the beautiful pacific ocean. After that we dove right into the peace corps life (or should I say we rode into it, in the back of my overly crowded pick up truck) and spent 3 nights in my community. On two of the days we were there we did an environmental youth camp with a handful of excited elementary students, which they LOVED and I´m sure that I will never stop hearing the ram sam sam song now that they know it. and mom had the kids come up with chants for our camp slogan, which was Yo Cuido a Mi Comunidad....they were soo excited to present their chants in front of the group. adorable! :) we went and visited most of my community members during the afternoons, and bunked up in my little ranchito at night. Of course my latrine was not finished by the time we arrived and the water kept running out, but hey, the latrine got down in a flash and every morning i filled up the shower buckets at the crack of dawn, so we made it through alright. (And now I have a composting latrine!! Thanks, mom!) After adventures in Ciprian we headed to a mountain town to rest up for a day, take a hike, swim in a river, and wash the campo funk out of our clothes. We got a car at this point (wow! such freedom! i forgot how cool that is) and we drove over to my friend Kendras community in the indigenous reserve Ngobe Bugle. We went to the cacique´s house but she was on an important mission, so we didnt actually end up meeting her, nonetheless it was awesome to see kendras village and learn about the ngobe people. Our next adventure was an archeological dig in Nata which was totally random and unplanned and absolutely amazing.... here´s the national geographic article about it. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.
anyway, the same day we went hiking in gamboa rainforest reserve in panama and saw monkeys and trogons and toucans and frogs and probably a lot of other things that were well camoflauged :) and our last day was spent checking out another volunteer´s site in an indigenous embera wounaan community on the banks of the river gatun, followed by a stroll through the spainish ruins in the city. oh and did i mention, a microbrewery. that´s right. REAL beer. and all along eating GREEN things and CHEESE and WINE and APPLES. ;) yesssss what a life.
it was such an awesome trip...i cant believe we managed to do all of that in just 10 days...i feel so well fed and well loved and lucky to have had this vacation with my mama. we will get some photos out to yall soon (sweet new camera!! thank you to all you who helped me to get it. i LOVE it, and my other one is officially muerto so it was perfect timing. )
i love you all so much and miss you and wonder which of you will be my next visitor....come on down!
xoxo
Hope this email finds you all well. I am just heading back to my community after an amazing vacation with my mom!...Tomorrow I´ll be back in the thick of the campo life but while I still have internet I´ll take a second to tell you about our trip.. It was only ten days but it felt longer....We spent the first night eating delicious fresh ceviche in the city, then headed over to the beach in Guarare to enjoy the beautiful pacific ocean. After that we dove right into the peace corps life (or should I say we rode into it, in the back of my overly crowded pick up truck) and spent 3 nights in my community. On two of the days we were there we did an environmental youth camp with a handful of excited elementary students, which they LOVED and I´m sure that I will never stop hearing the ram sam sam song now that they know it. and mom had the kids come up with chants for our camp slogan, which was Yo Cuido a Mi Comunidad....they were soo excited to present their chants in front of the group. adorable! :) we went and visited most of my community members during the afternoons, and bunked up in my little ranchito at night. Of course my latrine was not finished by the time we arrived and the water kept running out, but hey, the latrine got down in a flash and every morning i filled up the shower buckets at the crack of dawn, so we made it through alright. (And now I have a composting latrine!! Thanks, mom!) After adventures in Ciprian we headed to a mountain town to rest up for a day, take a hike, swim in a river, and wash the campo funk out of our clothes. We got a car at this point (wow! such freedom! i forgot how cool that is) and we drove over to my friend Kendras community in the indigenous reserve Ngobe Bugle. We went to the cacique´s house but she was on an important mission, so we didnt actually end up meeting her, nonetheless it was awesome to see kendras village and learn about the ngobe people. Our next adventure was an archeological dig in Nata which was totally random and unplanned and absolutely amazing.... here´s the national geographic article about it. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.
anyway, the same day we went hiking in gamboa rainforest reserve in panama and saw monkeys and trogons and toucans and frogs and probably a lot of other things that were well camoflauged :) and our last day was spent checking out another volunteer´s site in an indigenous embera wounaan community on the banks of the river gatun, followed by a stroll through the spainish ruins in the city. oh and did i mention, a microbrewery. that´s right. REAL beer. and all along eating GREEN things and CHEESE and WINE and APPLES. ;) yesssss what a life.
it was such an awesome trip...i cant believe we managed to do all of that in just 10 days...i feel so well fed and well loved and lucky to have had this vacation with my mama. we will get some photos out to yall soon (sweet new camera!! thank you to all you who helped me to get it. i LOVE it, and my other one is officially muerto so it was perfect timing. )
i love you all so much and miss you and wonder which of you will be my next visitor....come on down!
xoxo
May 2011
First of all, I miss you. It has been over 1 year now since I left
the united states, which has me in a nostalgic place. It´s crazy to
think how quickly time flies, how much I have or have not accomplished.
It´s hard to keep track of all this, to be honest. The concepts of
time and accomplishment are very relative things which I have not yet
learned to measure accurately.
In short, all marches well here. I am working and growing and
experiencing all of the pains and pleasures that come with each. It´s a
constant rollercoaster ride, this peace corps life, but I am loving it
just the same. To be honest I struggle most when I leave and then come
back again--it´s hard to readjust. The modern world has some strange
affect on me, and when I re-settle at home I always pass a few days
dazed and confused and jetlagged. After a few rough mornings I sink
back into the comfort of village life, complete with green
mangos, nonstop social interaction, dirt from my head to my toes that
never seems to wash away, a million giggling children that never grow
bored of me, and all is great until my next interruption.
Instead of telling you about all the work and the water and the
scenery and whatever else I usually tell you about, this letter, I´m
going to tell you a story... it´s not a happy story, so don´t get your
hopes up. it´s a true story though and i´d like to share it with you.
hope you enjoy.
Maria de la Cruz.
A new day and little Yeli is waiting for me outside the door
again. It´s 6:30 in the morning on a school day. I can hear her water
tanks clinking, though she doesn´t say a word. It doesnt matter how
many times I tell her to just go check to see if there is water in the
faucet and if there is to go ahead and fill up with asking-- she still
waits silently outside my door. Most days there is no water, but she
comes anyway, and in the event that there is, she fills the tanks and
then waits for Maria de la Cruz to come haul the tanks up the hill on
her head.
Maria de la Cruz is her mother, and she is also my neighbor. On
Tuesday two of her 9 children showed up on my patio with a slice of
papaya and that look they always give me when they really came to ask
for something but are too shy to just say it. I ask Yeli what she wants
and she tells me it´s her mom´s birthday, and could she please use my
colored pencils and some paper to make a card. Of course I give her a
big sheet of red construction paper and I cut it in the form of a big
heart for her, and she goes to work. Maria de la Cruz is 42 years old
and has 7 grandchildren. Her children and grandchildren are at my house
almost daily, which at times can be inconvenient but I don´t have the
heart to send them home. I know what home means for them. For one
thing, everyone in the community knows that Isaiah beats Maria de la
Cruz. Yelizabeth tells me about the times when he has hit her with
liquor bottles, leaving enormous egg-sized welts on her body. One
night, Yeli says casually as she washes her baby sister in a bucket on
my front porch, they both grabbed machetes and threatened to kill each
other, so Yeli took the baby out to play by the mango tree. I tell her
she did the right thing, and that it´s not okay that her dad hits her
mom, and then I continue washing my clothes, but my mind wanders and my
heart sinks.
Crucita, the older sister arrives and stands over me, her belly
swollen although her breasts are still not fully formed. She is 15
years old and pregnant with her second child. I don´t want to make
hasty assumptions but I cannot help but to speculate as to how Crucita
first became pregnant at the age of 13 in a culture where young women
are not allowed to go out with men alone. I don´t want to make hasty
assumptions but I find it odd that Crucita lives unmarried in the
neighboring community of Las Playitas with her sister rather than at
home. Could it be the father again? I dont want to speculate anymore. I
continue washing clothes. Maybe if I scrub harder these terrible
thoughts, too, will wash away.
I´d like to think that I could talk to Maria de la Cruz about all
this. In the US I could tell her that she has the right and power to
report this, that there are agencies and people who can help her. But
here, metido in the campo of Panama, I know that we are too far in the
thick of it for anyone to save her. And she knows it. Here without
cell phone service, with a road that is only passable for certain months
of the year, what agency would possibly be able to help? And what
would become of the 16 children who depend on her for food and shelter
and safety? And what would become of her extended family that stays
behind to deal with the fury of Isaiah? And what would become of me,
the neighbor who enticed her to escape? It´s not only a bad idea, it´s
an impossible one.
All I can think to do is fill the water tanks for Yeli and carry
them up the hill when I have time, let her and the rest of her siblings
stay late at my house to read stories (especially on the nights when
Isaiah is drunk), and give them left over vegetables to take home when I
leave town. It pains me to know I cannot fix this family, nor can
I make their lives any safer, but there´s something to be said for being
a good neighbor, so I do my best.
------------------------
Sunday, April 1, 2012
The Eleventh Month
Sun, wind, water, love.
Dear family and friends,
It's been a while since I've written. Honestly I can't even remember the last time I wrote, or what it was about....I hope nothing I write today is a repeat offender, and apologies if it is. What can I say? The last few months have been jampacked. Mostly it's been an amphibian's life, between the city and the campo, travels, visits and visitors, birthdays. Currently I am out of site, just finished helping with the training of the new group of environmental volunteers. I was asked to be part of their training, which is pretty cool and an honor, really. All this week I've been in a small town called Pilon, another volunteer's site- there's a schedule and a plan and a dress code and a boss again. It's fine and good to be working, but to be frank I'd rather be sitting by the river with friends cracking open palm nuts with a rock and looking for crawdads to roast over a campfire under the shade of the flowering mango trees, which is exactly what I did last saturday.
This is summertime in the campo....
By 9am the wind is usually quite strong, though not as strong as the heat of the sun. The days are filled with sunshine, the air is filled with the sweet smell of warm pine needles, and river is filled with children. They've dammed a portion of the river with sticks and logs and rocks and palm leaves to make a great swimming hole. It's location next to the road and the kiosk bring it to life as the local pool- kids spend the afternoon jumping in, climbing out, sunning themselves, checking out the cuties, struttin their stuff, buying candies and juice.
In the mornings there are kidney beans to be picked and cleaned and sorted, at midday there are hammock naps, in the heat of the afternoon there are more kidney beans -this time to be beaten with sticks (this is how you deshell them). Every evening there is baseball. While the parents are beating the hell out of the beans or napping in a hammock, the kids go into the monte to find gacho- it's a soft and flexible vine. They wind it up in a ball and wrap a rubber band and an old sock, and bam! We have a softball. Our bats are sticks- mostly balsa wood because it is so much lighter but any old stick of a certain length and thickness will do the trick. A base is a shoe, or is a pile of cow poop, a big leaf, or maybe just a dirt patch scratched out among the weeds. And the game is on! The sun sets, it rises, and repeat.
Today, when I return, all will have changed, sadly. School will have resumed session, the beans will have been cleaned and stored away. The men will have begun to chop down the monte to prepare for the planting of rice, I will begin to harvest more tomatoes and cucumbers and onions and carrots from my garden (and more!), and the children will be disheartened by afternoons filled with homework rather than games and rivertime. The water might run out, things will get drier and hotter still, and the work, I anticipate, will pick back up.
Ah yes work..... Im still fighting for a stoves project- not with the community but with red tape. Paperwork and indifference on the part of the companies are my current battles, but I'm not giving up. Looks like it may be a long struggle, and I will probably have to bribe some powerful people with cookies and other baked goods before I see any movement....should the rainy season arrive before this thing gets funding, it means we will have to wait until next summer.. Just like the electricity project which has still not seen any movement since August, it will be yet another long wait.
In other news, I've been working with a youth group....my friend mirna is actually in charge of it, but she went back to finish up highschool in the city, so I'm filling in. We learn about being a good person, morals, values, the environment. We pick up trash and play games and have fundraisers. It's good for them, and it's good for me, too. I look forward to it every saturday afternoon...I do, however, worry about what will happen if Mirna does not come back. Most young women in this part of the country get out and stay out, and I would not be surprised if Mirna follows the same pattern. (I would not hold it against her either. Life in the campo is duro, and the waiting game grows tiresome). In the next few months I will be doing a lot with the school garden and my awesome friend Raul, I'll be amping up to do semester 2 of the girls' leadership and environment program, and I'll be helping 5 families set up an organic farm project. I'll also be working to teach basic business skills to the women's group so that they'll be able to move forward with their bread business- I'm starting with the president, taking her to a leadership and project management conference in April. (She used to be my host mom/sister, and her and her husband are by far some of the most progressive and hardworking people I have ever met in my whole life, so im very excited to take her on this 4 day conference)
Changing the subject...
Let's be frank about work. I don't believe that all of this work is sustainable, nor do I believe I have found the true purpose of my being here....Would it really be any different were I not here? What do I have to offer? I wish I could say that in my 9th month I have figured all of this out, but it's not so simple. True, some of the youth will catch on to new ideas and grow into individuals touched by the thoughts and habits of an outsider, and there is certainly some sustainability in this. True, business skills will benefit the women in my community, whether or not the bread business fails or succeeds. The stoves project, though? Yes, there is a direct and enormous benefit to be gained for the entire community, but I am building stoves, not skills, which makes it my least sustainable and least fulfilling project (it was the #1 priority for the community, though, which is why I am so dedicated to pulling through).
In considering the role of the volunteer in development, I honestly believe the best “aid” I can offer is my heart first and foremost, a pat on the back to those who deserve it, a little peptalk when the going gets tough, some free labor, and my public recognition of a job or idea done well. Perhaps that's exactly what we as volunteers ought to be doing, though. It's about leadership, sure, but that does not mean that we are or should be The Leaders, and to think otherwise is a rather egotistical and sadly, promotes an already prevalent belief in racial hierarchies that I find quite disturbing. It is equally, perhaps moreso, important that I be a follower. That's the true key to sustainability. Without a follower, a there are no organic leaders, just progressive but invisible individuals. So here I am, honing in on a mission to make the invisible visible, to being not the firewood but a microscopic spark. There is a quote from the Tao te Ching that puts it perfectly. It says, “to lead the people, walk behind them.”
So there you have it. i will try to write again soon- I realize I've left a lot of blanks in the picture, but use your imagination (and the photos which i will send momentarily) to fill them in. In the meantime, I have a visitor coming to visit from peace corps ecuador, which will be fun, and I have a lot more walking to do....
Lots of love to each and everyone of you,
Until next time.
Thursday, January 5, 2012
12/24/2011
Feliz navidad hanukkah and new year a todos y todas!
Good lord do I miss you all! I hope that you are all in good health, eating some amazingly delicious food, enjoying the company of friends and family, and loving every minute of the holiday spirit. I bet it's gorgeous where you are right now...i am imagining all the lights and decorations and cheerfulness....
I can't say that my community is equally as adorned this time of year. In fact, it's not adorned at all! it's not just not having electricity, but no trees, no music, no special foods, no gifts, no parties, no mention even of the word "navidad" which makes it quite different. turns out we do not celebrate Christmas, nor any other holiday really, so I am certainly a bit disconnected from the season this year... It's not clear to me whether the avoidance of the holiday has more to due with the lack of monetary resources or with their religious beliefs, but either way, it is what it is. Funny enough it's almost easier to be there, peddling along, than to be here in the city, surrounded by Christmas fervor, apple-eating (yes, apples are the season's treat!), flashing lights, glowing trees, and english christmas songs translated into catchy spanish variations. if it weren't for the heat of the summer and the abundance of tropical fruit it would sure look like home, and that's exactly what makes it harder. i miss christmas at home. i miss the way the fireplace glows, the smell of the tree, the way light reflects off the ornaments, the getting together, the cooking, the cookies, and most of all, you wonderful folks. i'm dealing well with it though. my strategy is to stay as busy as possible through the holiday season.....so far i have been extremely successful. today i am in the city for a meeting, tomorrow i will be traveling back to my training community to see my old host family and spend christmas with them. not only is it christmas, but it's the little girls' 3rd birthday, so that will be fun! afterwards i am off to see a teacher and her family, and then back to my community in time for a busy week of work, and an even busier month. if before i said that things were going slowly, i revoke the statement. things are flying finally. which is both good and bad.........i'll try to give you a brief explanation, though i doubt it will be brief and most likely does not explain the half of things.
the good
+i love my people!!!!! love love love love them.
+work is taking off!...... i finished up the girls' afterschool science program for the year and culminated with the school's holiday party/ mother's day party/ teacher's going away party. it was great! got a lot of great feedback from the parents and the girls. ALSO i put in a grant application and got funding to continue this program next semester! now the boys want their own program though, so we will see what i can do.
+our worm composting at the school is up and running (wiggling, really). now that the teachers and students are gone it's up to me and the school manual laborer to take care of the babes, but they are pretty low maintainance and seem to be doing just fine on their horsepoop diet, occasionally supplemented by a banana peel from the gringa.
+i went on an epic horseback ride to the ANAM office with my friend and former host dad fanol. we saw monkeys and an ocelot and a snake along the way! and when we got there i convinced him to go hike the trails with me and he was super into it. we are going to try to bring some of our other friends with us there this summer to spend the day and roast a chicken and some corn and suck some oranges. also, fanol is just plain amazing i have decided. we had some great conversations along the way about how he wants to grow vegetables and wants to learn about everything there is to know about organic agriculture and how he knows that the kidney bean projects are bad for the environment because all the chemicals are going to destroy the soils, and how much better coffee is. smart man, that fanol.
+i have been helping my friend mirna on saturdays with her youth club, club de la ninez. we did an activity on water contamination that was pretty awesome last week and in january we are going to take them to the trails at the ANAM office to learn about the watershed, along with the 5 highest placing students from the school.
+the cooperative has been finishing up with this enormous UNDP grant, which included a bunch of solar composting latrines, fuel efficient stoves, and soil conservation parcels, so we have been busy trying to get alll the work done before the report is due in january. we finished all of the latrines except one (MINE of course, i am still pooping at the neighbors house) and all of the stoves except 2 or 3- i can't recall, and we did about 1/4 of the soil conservation work.
+as luck would have it, i got a ride from a random government employee one day and incidentally mentioned that the community is interested in stoves, so he recommnded i talk with his boss at the PAN office. i went there today and turns out this director studied abroad in Kansas and is super friendly and wants to help the community out. he seems to think asking $3000 is no big deal and so he's going to start working on the budget and im going to work on the budget and we're going to write it up and take it to panama city for a meeting with the national director in january.... if this goes through we will be able to get fuel efficient stoves for every house in the community...wild, right? some days it's good to be a hitch-hiker!
+the garden is still alive! so far i am still winning the battle against the pigs. thank god. i have planted carrots, watermelon, squash, cilantro, green onion, tomato, bell pepper, cucumer, lettuce, spinach, eggplant, celery and cabbage. yum yum yum.
the bad
-i have not once yet had time to weed my garden. good golly it needs some love. and my celery is begging for a transplant, and my fence is made of palm leaves and sticks, which is a very temporary defense mechanism against my neighbor's highly-destructive pigs. at any moment the fortress is bound to fail me and i don't even want to imagine the havoc that will ensue should the fatties get in there and start digging things up.
-my tolerance for clothes washing, here at the end of my 5th month, has dropped to zero. i believe it is in my best interest to start paying a friend to wash my clothes. i know that sounds so lazy and northamerican, but i really am terribly slow and i just have so much other stuff i would rather and should be doing. like weeding, or better yet, helping my friends Fanol, Facundino, and Avelina to start up their own vegetable parcels.
-there is never enough time in the day, week, or month, to do all the work i would like to do, nor all the playing-with-children, nor the visiting-of-friends, that i would like to be doing.
-i reached an all-time low today. i walked into a nice pharmacy, smelled 5 different types of very fine organic shampoos and drooled for about 10 minutes in the health food section, then left the store like a dog with my tail between my legs without a single purchase. but i admit it was worth the visit. if heaven smells i am sure it smells just like those organic shampoos.....a-mazing.
-i feel like i am never at home, and when i am at home, i'm busy doing home-stuff, like trying to prepare a meal that includes the color green or orange or purple or red. (pretty much any color other than white and yellow and brown......) its discouraging for everyone- those who visit me when i am not there, those who visit me when i am there but am busy, and myself because then i dont get to eat or i do eat but then have to wash clothes in a 5 gallon bucket while several wishful-eyed children hover around me watching my every move as though i were a television set.
-i am always leaving! this next month will be especially hard because i will be in and out and in and out.....all of it is work related, but then life gets put on the backburner, people start asking where i've been and when i'm coming over next, children leave candy wrappers on my porch (evidence that they have been waiting there for me and given up), pigs find their ways into the garden, ants in the house, work gets left behind, money gets spent. asi es la vida of the volunteer.
-i miss my folks. since i have been busy there are some invididuals i dont see for weeks at a time. there are folks i havent seen for months....i live there and i miss them. crazy, huh? plus my male buddies are all working outside the community right now, my teacher friends are home for the summer, and my best female friend is going back to highschool in february. and then there's all of you, who i also miss.
ya que the body aches, the heart yearns, the sun rises and sets in the blink of an eye, but the soul is content, which is the most important.
well my friends and family, i wish i had time to pass on some of the deeper thoughts and reflections about the new year to you all, but unfortunately i am off once again. i will, someday, try to send you some new photos and a more satiating account of the internal state of things- thoughts, feelings, projections, etc. but for now i will leave you to enjoy the holiday season.
Know that I have you all in my heart and mind. I love and miss you.
Best wishes for 2012 to each and every one of you.
Good lord do I miss you all! I hope that you are all in good health, eating some amazingly delicious food, enjoying the company of friends and family, and loving every minute of the holiday spirit. I bet it's gorgeous where you are right now...i am imagining all the lights and decorations and cheerfulness....
I can't say that my community is equally as adorned this time of year. In fact, it's not adorned at all! it's not just not having electricity, but no trees, no music, no special foods, no gifts, no parties, no mention even of the word "navidad" which makes it quite different. turns out we do not celebrate Christmas, nor any other holiday really, so I am certainly a bit disconnected from the season this year... It's not clear to me whether the avoidance of the holiday has more to due with the lack of monetary resources or with their religious beliefs, but either way, it is what it is. Funny enough it's almost easier to be there, peddling along, than to be here in the city, surrounded by Christmas fervor, apple-eating (yes, apples are the season's treat!), flashing lights, glowing trees, and english christmas songs translated into catchy spanish variations. if it weren't for the heat of the summer and the abundance of tropical fruit it would sure look like home, and that's exactly what makes it harder. i miss christmas at home. i miss the way the fireplace glows, the smell of the tree, the way light reflects off the ornaments, the getting together, the cooking, the cookies, and most of all, you wonderful folks. i'm dealing well with it though. my strategy is to stay as busy as possible through the holiday season.....so far i have been extremely successful. today i am in the city for a meeting, tomorrow i will be traveling back to my training community to see my old host family and spend christmas with them. not only is it christmas, but it's the little girls' 3rd birthday, so that will be fun! afterwards i am off to see a teacher and her family, and then back to my community in time for a busy week of work, and an even busier month. if before i said that things were going slowly, i revoke the statement. things are flying finally. which is both good and bad.........i'll try to give you a brief explanation, though i doubt it will be brief and most likely does not explain the half of things.
the good
+i love my people!!!!! love love love love them.
+work is taking off!...... i finished up the girls' afterschool science program for the year and culminated with the school's holiday party/ mother's day party/ teacher's going away party. it was great! got a lot of great feedback from the parents and the girls. ALSO i put in a grant application and got funding to continue this program next semester! now the boys want their own program though, so we will see what i can do.
+our worm composting at the school is up and running (wiggling, really). now that the teachers and students are gone it's up to me and the school manual laborer to take care of the babes, but they are pretty low maintainance and seem to be doing just fine on their horsepoop diet, occasionally supplemented by a banana peel from the gringa.
+i went on an epic horseback ride to the ANAM office with my friend and former host dad fanol. we saw monkeys and an ocelot and a snake along the way! and when we got there i convinced him to go hike the trails with me and he was super into it. we are going to try to bring some of our other friends with us there this summer to spend the day and roast a chicken and some corn and suck some oranges. also, fanol is just plain amazing i have decided. we had some great conversations along the way about how he wants to grow vegetables and wants to learn about everything there is to know about organic agriculture and how he knows that the kidney bean projects are bad for the environment because all the chemicals are going to destroy the soils, and how much better coffee is. smart man, that fanol.
+i have been helping my friend mirna on saturdays with her youth club, club de la ninez. we did an activity on water contamination that was pretty awesome last week and in january we are going to take them to the trails at the ANAM office to learn about the watershed, along with the 5 highest placing students from the school.
+the cooperative has been finishing up with this enormous UNDP grant, which included a bunch of solar composting latrines, fuel efficient stoves, and soil conservation parcels, so we have been busy trying to get alll the work done before the report is due in january. we finished all of the latrines except one (MINE of course, i am still pooping at the neighbors house) and all of the stoves except 2 or 3- i can't recall, and we did about 1/4 of the soil conservation work.
+as luck would have it, i got a ride from a random government employee one day and incidentally mentioned that the community is interested in stoves, so he recommnded i talk with his boss at the PAN office. i went there today and turns out this director studied abroad in Kansas and is super friendly and wants to help the community out. he seems to think asking $3000 is no big deal and so he's going to start working on the budget and im going to work on the budget and we're going to write it up and take it to panama city for a meeting with the national director in january.... if this goes through we will be able to get fuel efficient stoves for every house in the community...wild, right? some days it's good to be a hitch-hiker!
+the garden is still alive! so far i am still winning the battle against the pigs. thank god. i have planted carrots, watermelon, squash, cilantro, green onion, tomato, bell pepper, cucumer, lettuce, spinach, eggplant, celery and cabbage. yum yum yum.
the bad
-i have not once yet had time to weed my garden. good golly it needs some love. and my celery is begging for a transplant, and my fence is made of palm leaves and sticks, which is a very temporary defense mechanism against my neighbor's highly-destructive pigs. at any moment the fortress is bound to fail me and i don't even want to imagine the havoc that will ensue should the fatties get in there and start digging things up.
-my tolerance for clothes washing, here at the end of my 5th month, has dropped to zero. i believe it is in my best interest to start paying a friend to wash my clothes. i know that sounds so lazy and northamerican, but i really am terribly slow and i just have so much other stuff i would rather and should be doing. like weeding, or better yet, helping my friends Fanol, Facundino, and Avelina to start up their own vegetable parcels.
-there is never enough time in the day, week, or month, to do all the work i would like to do, nor all the playing-with-children, nor the visiting-of-friends, that i would like to be doing.
-i reached an all-time low today. i walked into a nice pharmacy, smelled 5 different types of very fine organic shampoos and drooled for about 10 minutes in the health food section, then left the store like a dog with my tail between my legs without a single purchase. but i admit it was worth the visit. if heaven smells i am sure it smells just like those organic shampoos.....a-mazing.
-i feel like i am never at home, and when i am at home, i'm busy doing home-stuff, like trying to prepare a meal that includes the color green or orange or purple or red. (pretty much any color other than white and yellow and brown......) its discouraging for everyone- those who visit me when i am not there, those who visit me when i am there but am busy, and myself because then i dont get to eat or i do eat but then have to wash clothes in a 5 gallon bucket while several wishful-eyed children hover around me watching my every move as though i were a television set.
-i am always leaving! this next month will be especially hard because i will be in and out and in and out.....all of it is work related, but then life gets put on the backburner, people start asking where i've been and when i'm coming over next, children leave candy wrappers on my porch (evidence that they have been waiting there for me and given up), pigs find their ways into the garden, ants in the house, work gets left behind, money gets spent. asi es la vida of the volunteer.
-i miss my folks. since i have been busy there are some invididuals i dont see for weeks at a time. there are folks i havent seen for months....i live there and i miss them. crazy, huh? plus my male buddies are all working outside the community right now, my teacher friends are home for the summer, and my best female friend is going back to highschool in february. and then there's all of you, who i also miss.
ya que the body aches, the heart yearns, the sun rises and sets in the blink of an eye, but the soul is content, which is the most important.
well my friends and family, i wish i had time to pass on some of the deeper thoughts and reflections about the new year to you all, but unfortunately i am off once again. i will, someday, try to send you some new photos and a more satiating account of the internal state of things- thoughts, feelings, projections, etc. but for now i will leave you to enjoy the holiday season.
Know that I have you all in my heart and mind. I love and miss you.
Best wishes for 2012 to each and every one of you.
11/24/2011
Dear friends and family,
Just wanted to let you all know that I am so grateful for each and every one of you. Thank you for your love, support, for just being you. I am so lucky to have such amazing people in my life. I mean it.
I think being away from the states makes me appreciate Thanksgiving even more than when I lived there. I tell my community members about it...the idea that we have special day once a year when we take time to be grateful for one another, for our health, etc. It's actually a very beautiful tradition when you think about it that way.
I am actually spending this thanksgiving relaxing in the private comfort of a hotel room, not because I don't have anywhere to go to celebrate with others, but because I wanted to. It's nice to get some alone time every once in a while, plus this way I can spend some quality time writing and calling friends and family back home, which to me is very important. I have made some wonderful friends here, both within the Peace Corps circle and in my community, but the truth is that I feel like YOU ALL are just a step above. I love you guys so much.
What can I tell you in this email? Things are going well. Slow of course, but well. Not a whole lot has happened since I last wrote you, especially considering that I've been out of site for a week and a half for a training course. the moon and sun was right, though, so my rancho is completely done, dry, adorable, homey. I have 2 benches and a hammock, which is great, and the children have totally covered my outside wall in nature drawings.
I also finished making 2 parcels for my home garden, built the fence, started a seedbed, planted some seeds directly...i've got carrots, watermelon, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, green onion, and celery going. i havent been there to actually see what's growing and whats not, though my friend mirna tells me things have sprouted. i'm going to do this garden organically, and with any luck, get the children involved and the parents interested. use it as a tool for teaching. during training we went to this man's farm, his name is Santiago Gomez. He is a radical panamanian with just a 6th grade education who, as an adult, self-educated by reading and attending free seminars and classes, and decided some 20 years ago that for the health of people and the health of the planet in general, he had to stop using chemicals and make a radical shift to organic agriculture. he says the first 5 or 6 years were hard and he suffered a lot of losses, but now he's got it all- he makes his own organic fertilizers, organic repellents...he grows organic corn and rice and yuca and coffee, oranges, mangos, coconuts, cashews, papayas, cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, celery, etc etc etc. He spends $0 on chemicals and his only food costs for his family are sugar, oil and salt-- impressive, right?? he gave me some recipes for making organic fertilizers and repellants and also gifted me some composting worms. I already have worms, but it's always a good idea to mix up the gene pool ([plus I am afraid that over the last week and a half they might have died!) He's going to donate some seeds to my cooperative, too, when they are ready to be harvested in january. i am hoping to bring some community members with me next time I go so they can see the farm with their own eyes.
What else? The girls club is still going. I love it. I wrote a grant to get some funding for it for next semester. If it fails we'll have to do some fundraisers, but that's okay. We did a really cool worm composting activity the other week, and I had the girls teach their classmates about it the next day and then the next week again. They did great! next semester i am hoping to get some support from ANAM with this club, and hopefully be able to do a field trip.
I've also been helping my friend Mirna with her children's program, Cruz de la Ninez, which is funded by the Social Development ministry. it's centered around learning children's rights and values and morals, but it's fun and I enjoy helping her. it's important, too, that these kids have something else to do rather than killing birds all day long.
Summer is approaching, which means school will be let out. I haven't exactly decided what I will do to take advantage of this opportunity, but I'd like to start working with the middle-schoolers a little more since they will be in the community every day. summer vacation is from january to march, so there's a large window of opportunity. we'll see what i can come up with.
I'm working on bringing wood-efficient stoves to my community as well. This is kind of a big endeavor, which I am halfway excited about and halfway dreading. It means getting a rather large grant, which I see as a rather unsustainable solution, but it also means reducing wood demand in my community, which is super important considering our location (top of the watershed, inside the forest reserve). my community members really want this, so i am going to see what i can do. it will be a long process i think.
Other than that, life marches on. I'm happy, healthy, and well taken care of. I'm still trying to navigate my role as a volunteer- it's harder than it sounds. Slowly but surely I think I'm starting to understand more and more of what I should be doing. Our training was a good opportunity for reflection. Today I plan on going to a coffee shop, sitting at a table, and writing up a list of good ideas, a timeline, and some motivational words to keep me on track when I head back into the wilderness tomorrow. Everything seems so clear and straightforward right now, but its easy to lose site of things out there. So wish me luck!
Lastly I will leave you with some photos. i'll attach just a few this time for those who just want to see a few and send you a link for the album later for those who want to see more.
1) me with the girls and a handful of composting worms at my house
2) i had a lot of visitors before the house was even finished...here they are reading books and drawing pictures
3) my friends putting the roof on the rancho....
4) home sweet home!
5) for Mirna's youth club she had to do a lesson on responsibility and afterwards we took the kids on a hike up through the forest up to this hill overlooking the fields and let them use the binoculars to check stuff out. i started casually picking up trash along the way and of course they all got into it and started handing me all sorts of stuff they were finding, so we talked about how we were practicing responsibility by taking care of our community and our environment...i actually ended up having to tell them that we could not pick up any more trash because we didnt have enough bags but that they could do it on their own any day they wanted but that it was a very good thing to do. :)
Okay, well, that's all for now. I hope you all have a great holiday and eat some delicious grub, and I hope you all have many wonderful things in your lives right now to be grateful for. I love you and miss you and hope to hear from you soon!
Just wanted to let you all know that I am so grateful for each and every one of you. Thank you for your love, support, for just being you. I am so lucky to have such amazing people in my life. I mean it.
I think being away from the states makes me appreciate Thanksgiving even more than when I lived there. I tell my community members about it...the idea that we have special day once a year when we take time to be grateful for one another, for our health, etc. It's actually a very beautiful tradition when you think about it that way.
I am actually spending this thanksgiving relaxing in the private comfort of a hotel room, not because I don't have anywhere to go to celebrate with others, but because I wanted to. It's nice to get some alone time every once in a while, plus this way I can spend some quality time writing and calling friends and family back home, which to me is very important. I have made some wonderful friends here, both within the Peace Corps circle and in my community, but the truth is that I feel like YOU ALL are just a step above. I love you guys so much.
What can I tell you in this email? Things are going well. Slow of course, but well. Not a whole lot has happened since I last wrote you, especially considering that I've been out of site for a week and a half for a training course. the moon and sun was right, though, so my rancho is completely done, dry, adorable, homey. I have 2 benches and a hammock, which is great, and the children have totally covered my outside wall in nature drawings.
I also finished making 2 parcels for my home garden, built the fence, started a seedbed, planted some seeds directly...i've got carrots, watermelon, tomato, cucumber, lettuce, green onion, and celery going. i havent been there to actually see what's growing and whats not, though my friend mirna tells me things have sprouted. i'm going to do this garden organically, and with any luck, get the children involved and the parents interested. use it as a tool for teaching. during training we went to this man's farm, his name is Santiago Gomez. He is a radical panamanian with just a 6th grade education who, as an adult, self-educated by reading and attending free seminars and classes, and decided some 20 years ago that for the health of people and the health of the planet in general, he had to stop using chemicals and make a radical shift to organic agriculture. he says the first 5 or 6 years were hard and he suffered a lot of losses, but now he's got it all- he makes his own organic fertilizers, organic repellents...he grows organic corn and rice and yuca and coffee, oranges, mangos, coconuts, cashews, papayas, cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, celery, etc etc etc. He spends $0 on chemicals and his only food costs for his family are sugar, oil and salt-- impressive, right?? he gave me some recipes for making organic fertilizers and repellants and also gifted me some composting worms. I already have worms, but it's always a good idea to mix up the gene pool ([plus I am afraid that over the last week and a half they might have died!) He's going to donate some seeds to my cooperative, too, when they are ready to be harvested in january. i am hoping to bring some community members with me next time I go so they can see the farm with their own eyes.
What else? The girls club is still going. I love it. I wrote a grant to get some funding for it for next semester. If it fails we'll have to do some fundraisers, but that's okay. We did a really cool worm composting activity the other week, and I had the girls teach their classmates about it the next day and then the next week again. They did great! next semester i am hoping to get some support from ANAM with this club, and hopefully be able to do a field trip.
I've also been helping my friend Mirna with her children's program, Cruz de la Ninez, which is funded by the Social Development ministry. it's centered around learning children's rights and values and morals, but it's fun and I enjoy helping her. it's important, too, that these kids have something else to do rather than killing birds all day long.
Summer is approaching, which means school will be let out. I haven't exactly decided what I will do to take advantage of this opportunity, but I'd like to start working with the middle-schoolers a little more since they will be in the community every day. summer vacation is from january to march, so there's a large window of opportunity. we'll see what i can come up with.
I'm working on bringing wood-efficient stoves to my community as well. This is kind of a big endeavor, which I am halfway excited about and halfway dreading. It means getting a rather large grant, which I see as a rather unsustainable solution, but it also means reducing wood demand in my community, which is super important considering our location (top of the watershed, inside the forest reserve). my community members really want this, so i am going to see what i can do. it will be a long process i think.
Other than that, life marches on. I'm happy, healthy, and well taken care of. I'm still trying to navigate my role as a volunteer- it's harder than it sounds. Slowly but surely I think I'm starting to understand more and more of what I should be doing. Our training was a good opportunity for reflection. Today I plan on going to a coffee shop, sitting at a table, and writing up a list of good ideas, a timeline, and some motivational words to keep me on track when I head back into the wilderness tomorrow. Everything seems so clear and straightforward right now, but its easy to lose site of things out there. So wish me luck!
Lastly I will leave you with some photos. i'll attach just a few this time for those who just want to see a few and send you a link for the album later for those who want to see more.
1) me with the girls and a handful of composting worms at my house
2) i had a lot of visitors before the house was even finished...here they are reading books and drawing pictures
3) my friends putting the roof on the rancho....
4) home sweet home!
5) for Mirna's youth club she had to do a lesson on responsibility and afterwards we took the kids on a hike up through the forest up to this hill overlooking the fields and let them use the binoculars to check stuff out. i started casually picking up trash along the way and of course they all got into it and started handing me all sorts of stuff they were finding, so we talked about how we were practicing responsibility by taking care of our community and our environment...i actually ended up having to tell them that we could not pick up any more trash because we didnt have enough bags but that they could do it on their own any day they wanted but that it was a very good thing to do. :)
Okay, well, that's all for now. I hope you all have a great holiday and eat some delicious grub, and I hope you all have many wonderful things in your lives right now to be grateful for. I love you and miss you and hope to hear from you soon!
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