Happy Holidays from the Caribbean!

Since last time I wrote, everything (at least in my region) has dried up! The region of Bocas del Toro is still recovering from the damages from last months floods, however. Where I live, we are officially in summer which means no rain for the next 3 months. My umbrella is now primarily used as a parasol. The days are scortching hot and the nights are relatively freezing. It's a welcoming change from the gloomy rain.

For Christmas, I'm heading out to the beautiful white, sandy beaches of Kuna Yala with a few friends. A pickup truck will drive us from Panama City to the boat launch. They tell us only reachable by 4x4 vehicle and about 4 hrs to get there. Kuna Yala is another indigenous group in Panama that are probably the most famous (there are 7 altogether in the country). Unlike the Ngabes that I live with, the Kuna Yala are extremely organized and set up for tourists. The cover of the Lonely Planet guide to Panama features an island from this region. Pictures coming soon!

Merry Christmas to all!

Be Thankful

Panama is currently suffering from severe flooding, mostly in the Bocas del Toro and Chiriqui regions (including my area of the Comarca Ngobe-Bugle). It hasn’t stopped raining in 14 days. Our director made all volunteers in those areas consolidate to their regional capitals for safety reasons, but many bridges and roads had already been washed away, so some were stuck in their sites. About 20 volunteers are currently working with government and international agencies to help out with the relief effort. Those in communities that have been washed away are being trained in disaster response, as their work will now focus on rebuilding their communities. Cerro Iglesias should be fine because it is high on a mountain and not prone to flooding (unlike my house, which I’m afraid to see).

I am heading back to my site after being gone for 8 days, my longest stint away from Cerro Iglesias since I made it my home 5 months ago. My group reconnected for a required Peace Corps event called in service training. Many months have now passed since those intense first 10 weeks together. When we arrived in Panama we all had different backgrounds and experiences. Now, we share similar hilarious stories about explosive diarrhea, flesh-eating parasites and awkward host family moments. We also visited a few farms to learn more about tropical agriculture topics: Robusta coffee, permaculture techniques, how to vaccinate chickens, etc.

Due to the floods, our original plans to celebrate Thanksgiving in the beautiful mountains of Chiriqui were changed last minute to another touristy mountain town called El Valle del Anton on the other side of the country. It was amazingly well organized given the last minute arrangements and considering that many people were unable to attend due to the weather/response efforts . We had an American-style turkey dinner with all the delicious fixings.

The message I wanted to send home was that I am so thankful for all of my friends and family that are constantly reaching out to support me, no matter where they happen to be in the world. Especially in a time of disaster, like we are having here in Panama, it is important to be grateful for even the basic things like access to clean water and shelter. To my friends and family out there, I am forever grateful to you.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/WFP/4072d4281e82e2c593234bc6aa248882.htm

(I met this enormous photogenic pig on a school farm last week)

Todo bien

I've received several emails today from friends and family concerned with the 6.2 earthquake that happened in Panama last night. I had no idea it was that big until I read the report! I was a few hours away from the epicenter, up in the mountains with a few other volunteers giving a seminar about HIV/AIDS to teenagers. We all stayed in the health center and woke up in the middle of the night to a pretty strong rocking and my friend saying "Earthquake! Earthquake! Should we get under the doorway?".  We were all too tired, so no one moved and a few seconds later it was all over. Everything was fine! 

The HIV/AIDS seminar went really well though! I can't believe I'm about to say this, but I actually really like working with kids. More updates on that later, I have to get back to my hut and see if it survived the earthquake. 

Four months in

I’ve been in Cerro Iglesias for 4 months now and in Panama for nearly 7. I should have been updating this blog more in recent months, but in my defense, I’ve needed that time to process my new life before I could reflect on it. Or maybe I’m just lazy.

Recently, my life here has changed, somewhat drastically. Two volunteers that each lived about 15 minutes from me, completed their 2 years and left Cerro Iglesias to travel the world and return to life in the U.S.A. Adam and Jessica were, in their own separate ways, very special to me and pivotal to my integration in this community. They completed some incredible projects and left me with big shoes to fill. I miss them dearly and am so grateful to them for sharing 3 amazing months with me. As sad as I was to be the only gringa in town, life goes on, and my community has only embraced me more since their departure. (maybe they just feel bad for me?) Thanks to so many wonderful people in my community, I have rarely spent a moment feeling lonely or bored.





























I no longer live with a host family, which has been great for my personal space and eating habits. I now cook what I want, when I want. For all that were previously concerned, my peanut butter consumption has been significantly reduced. Cooking has always been a creative outlet for me, so between the limited ingredients and no oven or refrigerator, I’ve been experimenting with all kinds of crazy, half-baked concoctions. I moved into the house that Adam (previous volunteer) built which, I’m sure, in it’s prime, was a fine structure, but is rapidly declining in its livability. After being there for a few weeks, I have decided that building a new house is more practical than fixing the old. It will be constructed out of the same materials (bamboo with thatch roof), but half the size with a big front porch that will overlook the gorgeous Pacific ocean view from my hammock. Finding materials and organizing people to bring them from the forest is proving to be a huge challenge, but it will be worth it. Patience is everything here.



In work-related news, last week, I hosted a 2-day seminar for cacao producers in my area. With the help of fellow volunteers that live on the Caribbean coast of Bocas del Toro, we were able to bring 3 experienced cacao producers that have been trained in the sustainable management of their farms to teach their fellow producers in Cerro Iglesias. We received a small grant and a donation from my local political leader to help make this happen and it was a success!

We are in the height of the rainy season, which also happens to be when the coffee is ripe for picking. The beneficio (where they process the beans) has been busy buying coffee from local farmers that is then de-pulped (by hand), washed (by hand) and dried (in the sun) in the new greenhouse-like structure (secadora) that was built thanks to a grant that Adam received last year. The secadora allows for the coffee beans to dry under a plastic roof which maximizes the little sunshine that we have right now before the coffee molds.

In a few weeks I’ll be giving a charla (like a lecture, only less formal) on safe ways to dispose of the skins of coffee fruit. They are extremely acidic and many times they are disposed of near rivers, causing a lot of pollution. I hope to teach some community members (or at least myself) about how to use these skins to make rich soil compost, which can then be used as a natural fertilizer or soil enhancer.

(Pictures Above: Adam and me with a giant papaya, Me and Jessica lounging in the hammock, My temporary hobbit-esk house, Below: Bocatoreño teaching my community to graft cacao trees, Jorge spreading out the coffee beans to dry in the sun, note new secadora in background)

Hello out there

Cerro Iglesias is a great place to live. So great, in fact, that I have completely neglected updating this blog. I apologize. For now, check out some recent photos, including those from a brief visit to the USofA:

http://flickr.com/photos/53265254@N00/

Meet: Jorge Guerra (Head of my host family)

Jorge was the first person I met from my community. He traveled several hours by bus to pick me up at our counterpart conference and took me to Cerro Iglesias for my first visit way back in May. He met me as a favor for his father, who was originally supposed to be my community guide (before he found a job that moved him out of the community). I have now been living with his family for nearly 2 months and he has opened up substantially since those first awkward days. Most mornings he is up and about by 5am. While his wife, Liliana, is getting the 5 kids ready for school and attending to the infant, he is usually chopping wood for cooking or sharpening his machete to get ready for work. All day, every day, he is working. He dedicates himself to the production of corn, rice, beans, coffee and more recently, ají peppers. Jorge only went to school until 6th grade, as did most men his age in Cerro Iglesias, but he is a smart man. He spent a few years working outside of the Comarca, as a migrant worker on Latino farms in the fertile region of Chiriquí. He also spent a short time working in construction in Panama City, but says he prefers life in the campo because it is more tranquil: less noise, pollution and more room for the children to run around. Basically, he chose to work his family’s land because he did not want to work for the ‘man’; not an easy path by any means. Similar to most New Yorkers I know, Jorge works hard, but plays even harder. After a week of long days in the field, he will get together with his buddies and they will drink themselves silly on homemade chicha fuerte. These gatherings, usually Sundays, are planned in advance, because it takes several days to for corn to turn into alcohol. They will sit in front of the house under the mango tree, sometimes as early as 7am, and stay there until the liquor runs dry or they pass out. (The women, for the most part, do not drink). Can you blame him?

During the week, Jorge is constantly trying to keep up with the different crops he has planted and finding ways to put food on the table. The ají project, if successful, will be one of the only ways (aside from the coffee harvest) that he has to earn a living for his family. He is very dedicated to his family, in ways that somewhat defy the stereotypical ‘machismo’ description of Latin American men. In the evenings, he spends quality time with his 6 children. We usually sit with the kids and chat or help them with their homework. He quizzes them on multiplication while I help the older ones with English and reading comprehension. What Jorge wants more than anything is for his children learn English. (That goes for about every Panamanian I’ve met). It is hard for me to imagine that learning English is more important than basic math skills and Spanish literacy, but I do the best I can to mitigate the Panamanian fascination with learning English.

Despite the stresses of his life, Jorge has been gracious enough to take me in and live with his family during my first few months in Cerro Iglesias. I have already shared many unforgettable moments with Jorge and his family. Although there have been some tough and/or awkward situations, the overwhelming majority has been positive. Living with this family has been an incredible learning experience for me and a very important part of coming to understand the local culture. I just hope I can return the favor in more ways than teaching kids English...

(photo of Jorge with his 9 mo old son who they just call "Bebe". Photo by Arden Sherman)

When the peanut butter runs out

July is a tough month in the Comarca. There is a saying that goes something like: "Señor Julio le roba la pila" (Mr. July robs the pot). July and August is the time just between the harvests and there is not much paid work for unskilled farmers, so families struggle to put food on the table. It’s not nearly as bad as a true famine that parts of the African continent must experience, but nonetheless, it makes for a stressful time for poor Panamanian families.

I was feeling a little guilty about not spending enough time with my host family, so I decided to go work out in the field with them one day. Our task: plant 1200 aji plants. Jorge has been trying to finish planting 15,000 aji plants on a hectare of land. There is an aji planting craze in my community right now because of the new contract with Tobasco (yes, like the sauce) that is buying peppers for export. After a full day of working in the intense sun followed by a torrential downpour, and only eating a few oranges from the nearby tree, I was starved. A few nights had gone by over the past weeks with no dinner. When this happened, I would go back to my hut and snack on a secret stash of (crunchy) peanut butter and crackers - my new staple. The peanut butter had recently run out, leaving me feeling anxious about how to control those desperate moments of hunger. I realize that this all sounds completely ridiculous especially when my host family just goes to bed hungry (although I have a sneaking suspicion that the kids were fed by the grandparents). I will contest that their bodies are more accustomed to not eating as often as most gringos. We are notorious snackers and I am the worst of them. If I had time, I’d look up some hard facts to support this claim. Anyway, as we were leaving the field in the afternoon, we stopped to harvest some yucca planted along the trail. Yucca is a tuber and requires ripping out the plant from the ground and collecting the roots, similar to a potato but with a thicker trunk. This delicious starch provides virtually no nutritional content, but serves its purpose as a filler. As we started pulling up the plants, looking for roots, they were still stuck deep in the ground and we had no tools for digging. So, I got down on all fours with my 12 yr old host brother and started digging for dinner. I was so exhausted, dehydrated and hungry, but was furiously clawing at the soil with all my might. Half laughing at myself, it suddenly occurred to me that this is what happens when the peanut butter runs out: subsistence living. Perhaps this was a fine lesson in integration. We are now more than half-way through August, and are enjoying the new harvests of corn and rice, so things are much less stressful. The other day they killed over 100 chickens in town to sell and my family got the heads to cook for dinner. I had to decline. Looking back, I should have at least tried the chicken-head soup, but I had a full jar of peanut butter and crackers waiting for me back in my hut. Maybe next time.

Highlight of the week: meeting the honey bees!

Here is what I have read about the Africanized honey bees that we have in Panama (and in most parts of Central America):

“Africanized bees acquired the name killer bees because they will viciously attack people and animals who unwittingly stray into their territory, often resulting in serious injury or death.

It is not necessary to disturb the hive itself to initiate an Africanized honey bee attack. In fact, Africanized bees have been know to respond viciously to mundane occurrences, including noises or even vibrations from vehicles, equipment and pedestrians.

Though their venom is no more potent than native honey bees, Africanized bees attack in far greater numbers and pursue perceived enemies for greater distances. Once disturbed, colonies may remain agitated for 24 hours, attacking people and animals within a range of a quarter mile from the hive.”

Victoria, the master beekeeper and president of the artisan group, invited me to meet the bees this week. We met at 7am because the meanest bees are usually out gathering pollen at that time. She dressed me up in a ridiculous bee suit that made me look like a giant marshmallow. I wish I had a photo of this. We hiked out for about 15 minutes into the jungle to a safe distance away from civilization to reach the hives. Just a few yards away, she stopped to tell me that, because I was new, I would more than likely be attacked. She added that these bees were incredibly smart and would be able to get into my suit and/or sting me through it. It is not in my nature to turn back, but I was seriously considering it this time. Victoria, a devote Christian, suggested a prayer and for the first time in my life, I was more than happy to join in. Moments later, I was surrounded by millions (or maybe just thousands) of furious bees. Every drop of sweat that came rushing down my face felt like bees crawling on me. Terrifying! Deep breathing was the only thing that kept me calm (perhaps the ultimate yoga experience?). We used a smoker to supposedly calm the bees while we feed them a sugary-water mix. When it was all over, I de-suited without a single sting! Victoria commented that the bees had treated me very well and each time I go back they will be nicer. Bee keeping can be a lucrative business for this group if they can continue to have healthy bees. Each hive produces $100 dollars of honey per year. I want to work with this group to get their organic product sold in smaller bottles to tourists in nearby towns. The honey harvest will not be for several months, however, so there is time to plan.

Other highlights:
- A few volunteers from nearby sites hiked over to Cerro Iglesias to celebrate my birthday with me! We made a delicious no-bake peanut butter cheesecake that turned out amazing. It is astounding what one can still do without electricity!

- I have an official Ngäbe name! Mego. Pronounced: meh-gough. I know, it doesn’t sound very feminine, but it has become my new identity. It’s growing on me. A community leader gave me this name after the late corregidora (mayor), who was the first woman leader of the district many decades ago. They tell me that she was a very powerful and respected lady, so who can argue the name with a story like that?

- Discovered a nearby river with fun rockslides, waterfalls and swimming holes!

- Have spent a lot of time working in the children’s nutrition center garden. We have been using all natural techniques to improve the soil quality, which will hopefully serve as a good example (granted everything grows) for those who only believe in the power of chemicals.

- Homemade chocolate experiment! I finally found ripe cacao pods and am in the 2-week process of fermenting, drying, peeling and grinding the seeds. With a little sugar and spice it should turn out to be some delicious chocolate. Yum!

(photo: nearby views in the Comarca)

Hi Friends!

I realize that some of you might be trying to contact me and are having no luck. I am equally as devastated, believe me! All I can say is: keep trying! I have perfect reception in my site, but for some reason, only international calls are not coming through (Skype included). I am pretty sure it is a conspiracy by the phone company (Movistar) because they do not make any money from incoming calls. I miss hearing from everyone and hope this gets resolved soon.

ps- note new address on the right side of screen (2 addresses: one for letters, one for anything bigger)

Where do I even begin?

Everything is off to a great start, all things considered! Although I still have my doubts as to how effective of a volunteer I will be, I am nonetheless, very happy here in my new home. Everyday never turns out as I expect, but always turns into a new adventure. I have learned that no matter what time I leave the house I should carry lots of water, a flashlight and a peanut butter sandwich, just in case.

I arrived with too much stuff and a stressed out kitten just minutes after my host family had killed a massive poisonous snake (see large thing dangling off stick in above photo). I was just glad they remembered me, as two weeks had passed since my 4-day visit. My daily activities range and will continue to be all over the board until I get a firm understanding of what exactly I will be doing over the next 2 years. Some days I walk around door-to-door, getting to know the community. (I say that, although many families, including my host family, do not have doors or walls, just a thatch roof). This very important task called, in Spanglish, “pasearing,” is the essential way of building trust and relationships in the community. It typically involves hanging out and making small talk over a cup of something they call coffee. Here in the Comarca, coffee is really just a juice made with tons of sugar and a hint of coffee concentrate. It is maybe 20% coffee, at best, served lukewarm. You get used to it.

I am also fortunate enough to have several volunteers that live within an hour walk away from my site and have been able to help them on their projects or at the very least, have their support in this semi-awkward time in my new community. We have worked on painting a world map mural on a nearby school and started laying the foundation for a composting latrine. My hands are getting some nice blisters after a few hard days of working with my host family in the rice field or in the community garden at the children’s nutrition center. I was finally able to meet the artisan/beekeeping group and we are meeting next week to build a new bee box. It will be my first chance to meet the scary African bees that produce some delicious honey!

Other than that, I am adjusting to the slower pace of life in the Comarca. If one thing is accomplished in a day, such as a meeting or even laundry, it is a success. Before coming to Panama and even during training, I had idealistic plans about projects I would be working on. Even though I just arrived, I already see that patience is essential and efficiency is not in Ngäbe vocabulary. Peace Corps has been preaching to us during training that the first three months should be dedicated building relationships and trust in the community. For example, on day two, I decided to go with the coffee association to “cargar madera” (translation: haul wood). They needed 2X4 boards to construct new dryer beds for the upcoming harvest of coffee beans. Home Depot does not deliver up here, so if you want wood, you have to go to the jungle and cut the trees down yourself. In an all day adventure, 10 men and 2 women with the help of 1 chainsaw cut and carried only about half as much wood as was necessary for the job. Let me emphasize that I was only physically able to haul one 10-foot 2X4 up the mountain, but it was a several hour climb through jungle, steep cow pasture and narrow trails. So, my point is not exactly that things are not as efficient here in the Comarca, just life here is much tougher than it is back in the States. The strength and determination of my community is humbling and inspiring. I think Greg Mortenson, author of Three Cups of Tea, put it best:

“We Americans think you have to accomplish everything so quickly. We’re the country of thirty-minute power lunches and two-minute football drills... Haji Ali taught me to share three cups of tea, to slow down and make relationship building as important as building projects. He taught me that I had more to learn from the people I work with than I could ever hope to teach them.” (Three Cups of Tea is a story of a mountaineer who, after a failed attempt to climb K2 in Pakistan, decided to build a school for the community and then went on to build over 55 schools in the region.)

Coming into Peace Corps, I knew that I would be forced to live life at a slower pace and that I would probably gain more than I could ever give. The only difference is that now it is actually happening! Finally.

Pictures: Vicente with his snake, World Map mural project, My host brothers and sisters (photo by Arden Sherman)

Summer camp is over. Real life begins!

In the short time since my last post a lot has happened down here.

I visited my site, Cerro Iglesias, for 4 days. It was awkward and awesome at the same time. Ladies and gentleman, I will be roughing it for the next 2 years! My host family for the first 3 months in site has given me my own 'house' so I am very fortunate to have my own space. My house is made of bamboo with a thatch roof (see photo). I hope to build my own house with the help of the community, but those details haven't been worked out yet. The town is very spread out and each family has a compound of huts that are separated by thick forest with steep muddy trails connecting neighbors.

After returning from the site visit we had a one more week of training in Santa Clara. In our final days, I spent a lot of time with my fellow trainees, as this is our last time all together. The friendships I have made over the past 10 weeks will be my support system over the next 2 years. We've played a lot of ultimate Frisbee, slack-lining and swimming in the river. There was even a capture the flag game one night that ended tragically when I nearly decapitated myself on a barbed wire fence. Whoops! I'm hoping it won't leave a nasty scar. We organized a huge goodbye party to thank our host families. It was tough to plan to cook and entertain 200 people but we pulled it off! As a going away gift, my host family gave me an adorable kitten. They were so excited to give it to me, so there was no way I could refuse the little guy. After a tearful goodbye with the host family, we were whisked off to Cuidad del Saber (PC headquarters). We stayed there for a few days and "swore in" as real volunteers on Thursday evening. The world director of Peace Corps, Ron Tschetter, was here to administer the ceremony and celebrate 45 years of Peace Corps in Panama at the ambassador's house in Panama City.

We, the newly initiated volunteers of group 61, are having one final celebration this weekend at the beach before we disperse throughout the country. I am very excited for my real Peace Corps experience to begin, but am devastated to say goodbye to my fellow gringos. We have become a family over the past 10 weeks. So, tomorrow morning, I will take all of my belongings for the next 2 years, along with my kitten, and try to make in the mountains of Panama. If I could make it in Manhattan, I can make it anywhere, right? Goodbye internet, electricity, running water. Hello adventure!

(Photo of host brothers and sisters plus kitten)

Life in Santa Clara / training community update

I feel the need to take a moment to apologize for not posting about my awesome host family until now. My previous posts have been about trips we have taken within Panama, but my host family has been taking care of me for almost 2 months now! I will post some pictures soon (before I move to my permanent site, promise). The family is much like my real mother’s family in that all of the children (all 7 of them), although most are grown and have their own families now, live within shouting distance from the house they grew up in. Although it can be overwhelming, it is wonderful to have a house full of family all the time. Until recently, I was still unsure of exactly how many people slept in our house (final count: 9). Santa Clara has been the host training community for 3 years now so my family is well-accustomed to the needs of us gringos (personal space and more fruits and vegetables than the average Panamanian, to name a few). My room here is 3x as big as any room I ever had living in NYC! My host father is the local political figure (Honorable Representative) here in town so my accommodations are relatively more luxurious than most of the other volunteers in our training site. For example, my family has a car, flush toilet and tile as opposed to concrete floors. Santa Clara does not have cell phone reception or landlines so my host parents also serve as the community ambulance drivers. On several occasions they have left in the middle of the night or day to rush someone to the hospital. They are truly incredible people and I am very grateful that they have made me feel like a part of the family since day 1! (On a side note, politicians are very much like celebrities here and their photos are posted all over town. See attached billboard photo of my host father. More photos coming soon.)

Ngäbere class:
I graduated from Spanish class a few weeks ago and am focusing my time on learning the indigenous Ngäbe language now (along with sustainable agriculture techniques, but more on that another day). Panama has 7 indigenous languages, but Ngäbe is the largest group with almost 200,000 people. There are only 3 of us in the class so we are lucky to receive a lot of 1x1 attention. Our teacher conducts the Ngäbe lessons in Spanish, so there is an added level of complexity in trying to grasp the language. The multiple meanings that nearly every word contains are a constant source of laughter. For example, the Ngäbere word “Kä” means: land, name, year, weather, place. The word “Ü” means: father-in-law, ax, yucca. The word “sulia” means cockroach and Spanish language (I’m sure there is a great story behind that one but I don’t know it yet). One phrase that we learned the other day while struggling to concentrate in our outdoor classroom was: “Ti bike se antlan kamike biombo bti”. Translation: I’m going to kill that rooster with a slingshot. Seriously, those roosters are more distracting than the NYC M14-A bus that used to shake my entire apartment building. Between the roosters, semi-wild dogs and the delicious mangos that come crashing down like bombs on the zinc roofs around us, it is a miracle we get anything done. Who knew the campo would have so many distractions!

Today we are traveling to a conference center a few hours away where we will each meet our community counter-parts. All I know about mine so far is that his name is Jorge. I imagine that he works with the coffee cooperative, but not necessarily. After the 2-day conference, Jorge and I will travel together to my future site, Cerro Iglesia in the Comarca Ngäbe-Bugle. I will spend the rest of the week in site getting to know my community and compiling their expectations for the upcoming 2 years. I have no idea what to expect, but I am very excited to find out. Stay tuned!

Coffee Training Week in Boquete

Directly after culture week (see last post) 6 volunteers including myself met in Boquete for a week of coffee training. Boquete happens to be a top tourist destination but for good reason. It has a cool climate and is located in a beautiful valley surrounded by lush forests and raging rivers (think eco-tourism). Boquete is also at the base Panama’s only volcano, Volcan Barú. From the top, on a clear day, you can see both the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea! I will be back to make this trek!

The Peace Corps Panama coffee program is only 4 years young. It´s goals are to work with Panamanian coffee growers to increase their production using sustainable techniques and to improve the post harvest processing of the beans. We also work to empower community members by linking them with organizations, agencies and companies to find the right markets (local, domestic and/or international) and fetch the best prices for their coffee. My group will have 6 volunteers working with coffee farmers and 2 of us will be in indigenous coffee sites.

The week was filled with visits to many specialty coffee fincas in and around Boquete, which is known for producing the finest coffee in Panama. I won’t bore you all here with the details of the coffee industry (that will come later), but in a nutshell we covered how to: select seeds, prepare the soil, sow, grow, prune, identify pests and disease, harvest, de-pulp, ferment, dry, store, peel, roast, grind, cup to determine quality and price, find markets, sell, export and finally, drink coffee (preferably con leche).

We also met with coffee producers who are in the highest specialty market here in Panama. Even though the coffee production in Panama is just a drop in the bucket when compared to world production, it was interesting to speak with roasters and industry players to get an idea of the potential for Panamanian coffee abroad. For example, most farmers in Panama received between .85 cents and 3 dollars/ pound this year for their coffee. A special variety of coffee called Geisha that grows best in Panama received between $150-180/ pound. That means that each cup would have to be sold for around $25 each just to break even. Insane! Who buys this stuff? Apparently, the White House and high-end restaurants in big cities throughout the world were big buyers this year.

There were many exciting revelations this week but perhaps the best moment was finding out that the volunteer who is serving as our coffee coordinator is constructing a bicycle coffee grinder! This is the perfect combination of a practical tool and a farmers’ spinning class (ok, maybe just for me)! Grinding coffee by hand in large quantities is strenuous and the campo of Panama does not have electricity, so this could be an excellent tool for campesinos to utilize in their communities. Check back within a few months, I intend to make one of these and think it is necessary to fulfill my bicycle withdrawal! If anyone has any designs or ideas, please send them my way!

Culture Week

More stories to come, but here is a quick photo of my host family this week (more on Flickr). I stayed in the pueblo of a volunteer married couple here in the Comarca Ngabe-Bugle. Highlights were: studying the local Ngabe language, learning how to build a latrine, helping to dig a fish pond on a family farm, giving the local elementary school kids a lesson on the importance of handwashing and of course, absorbing the indiginous culture by staying with a host family and being exposed to local customs (arts, dance, language, food, life without electricity, cold bucket showers, etc).

Next, I´m heading out to Boquete for coffee training this week. There, I will learn everything there is to know about coffee: from seed to cup! Updates soon!

p.s.- I have a cell phone now! Call anytime! +011-507-6645-1908

Site Announcement!

Comarca Ngäbe-Buglé, Panama. This is my home for the next 2 years! For now, we are still in training, so we will not be moving to our sites until the beginning of July. Nonetheless, site announcement for a Peace Corps "aspirante" is a very exciting day!

Here is what I know so far:

My site is an indigenous site. The native cultures of Panama differ greatly from the latino culture. I do not want to speculate on those differences right now, as I have not had enough exposure to comment accurately. My current training site is latino, so I am in for a big change!

This is an agri-business assignment in a beautiful mountain town of about 500 people. I will be working in a pueblo that has a fairly progressive coffee cooperative. They even have their own processing plant to dry and peel the beans! I will be working with these farmers primarily to increase their production of coffee (and other crops) using sustainable growing techniques. My secondary projects will be working with the artisan group that produces and sells handicrafts and bee honey!! The cooperative has apparently had a great impact in the community over the past few years. It has been involved in developing activeties such as: coffee roasting and trading, chicken projects (that means I hopefully get to eat protein and not just boiled bananas) and developing microcredit loan programs! This community also has a contract with 34 local farmers that produce hot peppers for Tabasco, so I will be involved in maintaining those relationships and improving pepper yeilds.

Anyone who knows me well can probably conclude that I could not be happier with this placement!!

I will be traveling around the country during the next two weeks to learn more about the culture of the indigenous region I will be working in and to get more technical training on sustainable coffee growing techniques. Hopefully I will have lots of new stories to share then. Ciao, it´s time to celebrate!

Site visit

This past weekend we each visited a current volunteer for 3 days in order to get a better idea of what life might be like for the next 2 years. I stayed with a agribuiness coffee volunteer in an indigenous region called the Comarca Ngöbe-Buglé in the west of Panama.

Trip highlights:
-Amazing exposure to indigenous culture and language- I think I may also live in this area!
-Organic coffee production- 5 farmers have recently been certified organic in this community
-Wildlife- Battles with scorpions, tarantulas and the hunt, catch and slow death of a Boa Constrictor
-I taught my first English class (more on the merits of this activity below)

Read on for details!

The trip there was classically Latin American. A good friend of mine (it’s amazing how close you get to someone in 3 weeks of PC training) and I traveled on a bus that was suppose to leave at 8:30pm, but left at 8pm instead. Apparently buses can do that here. We were supposed to arrive at our destination around 11pm, but the bus had some major complications and we ended up at our stop around 3am. From this point our only directions were to walk "up the hill for about 30 minutes" until we saw a bank and from there we could use the payphone to call the regional coordinator who lived in the area. Here in Panama the streets do not have names, directions are vague at best, and time is an abstract concept that should not be taken literally. “Ahora,” for example, typically means “now” in normal Spanish, but in Panama it means “later”, which could be anytime in the next few hours or even days. HA!

To arrive to the volunteer´s site (Nate), he and I hopped on a chiva for about 2 hours up and down a half paved, half dirt, mountainous road. A chiva, for those of you wondering, is simply a pickup truck with 2 long benches in the back and a cage around it so that baggage (or people) can go on top. Picture 38 people in the bed of a Toyota Tacoma (I counted, and yes, this was a record). From our drop-off point we had a 2-hour hike ahead of us to reach his site. We are now in the land of the indigenous group of the Ngöbe-Buglé. Most speak Spanish as a second language after their own Ngöbere language. The hike was strenuous; we climbed over 3 mountains, but well worth the views! His community has about 150 people living there, small for PC standards.

After spending the afternoon pasaering (Spanglish for going house to house to chit-chat) with every family in town, we had dinner with the matriarchic figure in the community, Rosa (La Famosa). Families are large, about 10- 15 people (mostly young children) all sleep together in a one room, dirt floor house with a zinc roof. There is no electricity for hours around. Our dinner was a simple soup made from a local root vegetable that was cooked over a open-air wood fire that is burned inside of the house. Now I now why this is the toughest job I will ever love.

That night, just before we went to sleep, I killed my first scorpion (with a shoe, no less)! It was about to enter Nate’s house through one of the many holes between the wood planks. I was glad to be sleeping in my hammock with the built in bug net! BYO if you plan to visit me in the next 2 years!

The next day we went to the monte (mountain) to work with one of the coffee farmers. They have already finished harvesting the beans for the season but there is always work to be done. Their coffee is grown on hillsides under the canopy of the forest at 1200m. We made barriers that will protect the topsoil from being washed down the mountain when the rainy season begins. They also showed me where they de-pulp the coffee, which is then used as compost that can be used to add nourishment back to the soil. Beautiful recycling system! The farmers are organically certified now, but only receive about $ 1-2 per pound for their product! Think about how much you pay for coffee per pound in the US? The difference goes to the intermediaries and to transportation costs. We, as agribusiness Peace Corps volunteers, are working with farmers to improve their post harvest process, eliminate the middlemen and hopefully earn a more reasonable price for such a laborous bean. I’m not sure if my particular assignment will be identical, but I think I am heading for a similar project.

That afternoon a small child informed us that they had spotted a boa constrictor and needed our help. We weren’t really sure what that meant, so I grabbed my machete and my camera and we followed the kid. Sure enough, 100m away from Nate´s house, there was a boa hissing at us from a not very safe distance. A man, I’ll call him the Matador, was attempting to catch him with a long stick that had a slipknot tied to one end. After a long battle, the Boa was captured and we followed our Matador back to the main part of town where another man was waiting to kill him by putting tobacco in his nose and down his through. Apparently, it is bad luck to just hack it up with a machete, so death by tobacco is used instead. I was planning to prepare a delicious soup with the fabulous piece of meat, however, everyone laughed at me when I suggested this. Must have something to do with bad luck. After several hours, when the boa was good and dead, a boy was instructed to haul it off to the next mountain where they have a special place to dispose of all dangerous snakes. What a waste of protein! We could have feed the whole town! There are a lot of pictures on Flickr in case anyone doesn´t believe it!

Saturday evening Nate informed me that I would be teaching an English class at 8:30 the next morning. What? Uh, I´ve never done that!

Me- Are we doing this together? Nate -No, just you
Me- What topic should I teach? Nate -Whatever you want
Me- Who is our audience? Nate- Whoever shows up

Fabulous. I would have killed for cell phone reception (you must hike straight up a mountain for an hour to even get a signal) to call a school teacher friend that could help me through my first lesson plan. I’ll pause here for a quick note on teaching English: I am the first to admit that I think it is ridiculous to be teaching English to kids in rural Panama for any practical purpose. Now, however, I am starting to realize that it is less about fluency and more about volunteers integrating with the community. First of all, its fun! Kids are learning in a structured format! This is progress! Second, I am learning their languages (Ngobere and Spanish), so it would be selfish of me to not satisfy their curiosity about English. Two out of the three goals of Peace Corps relate to exchanging cultures, so this is one way of making that happen while gaining trust in the community. Enough about that. What is the world was I going to teach? I decided to go with the colors of the rainbow. ROYGBIV. 10 kids showed up to class! I have nothing to compare it to, but I thought it was a success! I gave them the vocab words to start out, then split them into groups to make their own rainbows out of construction paper. Each group wrote and presented the colors of the rainbow in English, Spanish and their native language, Ngobere. Success!

I was very pleased with my site visit and after speaking to my director it appears that I will be in a site that is also in this indigenous area, working with coffee! I find out for sure on Wednesday! Stay tuned! I’ll post as soon as I can. Ciao, for now!

ps- I was finally able to post a few pictures on Flickr if anyone is interested. Enjoy!

One week of training in the Peace Corps is equivalent to 1 month of regular life. At least in the beginning. Last Sunday we moved in with host families in a small, rural town outside of Panama City. We spent every day this week having 4 hours of technical training in the morning and about 4 hours of language training in the afternoon. After ´school´we are encouraged to hang out with our families to practice language skills and start soaking up the culture.

I do not have enough time to explain all the details of my new life, so I will just run through a few highlights:

-My host family is awesome (stories and photos coming soon)!
-We live in the land of milk and honey! The following can be found within site of my house: mango, banana, plantain, orange, mandarin, coconut, avocado, cashews, yucca and more that do not have English names.
-Panamanian love chorizo (AKA deep fried HotDogs). The gringos are having a harder time adjusting to the fried spam and triple carbs diet (ironic if you consider the milk and honey comment)
-The technical training is going great so far! I find out where my site will be in 3 weeks, Ill keep you all posted as I find out more!
-Oh yeah, we have a beautiful waterfall and swimming hole that is about a 15 minute walk from town!

Life is good. Ciao for now!

I've been in Panama for 3 and 1/2 days now... I guess it's only fair to update my friends and family on what is going on here. I suppose it all started on Monday afternoon in Miami with 1.5 days of "staging." This mostly entailed getting to know the fellow volunteers and logistics information. Within 1 day, I made 47 new friends! Our group has volunteers from 3 sectors including: Sustainable Agricultural Systems (mine), Community Environmental Conservation and the new program, Tourism and English Advising. I am very impressed with the diversity in our group. They come from a variety of different backgrounds: a few years work experience, fresh from college, a professor, 2 lawyers and of all ages: (23-50s).  There are even 5 married couples!

We arrived in Panama City on Wednesday afternoon after the 3 hour flight from Miami (so close!). The Peace Corps headquarters are in the Cuidad del Saber in Clayton, not far from the airport. It used to be an old military base and was also once the location of the infamous School of the Americas. Fortunately, the location in now in use for international agencies with a more humane mission: Peace Corps, UN, Red Cross, etc. 

The first 2.5 days were spent getting to know the staff and a few current volunteers (they are all incredible), vaccinations, safety precautions, paperwork, language training, culture training, learning to make a life jacket out of a pair of blue jeans (it actually works!) and finding out more about our programs (of course!)!

As I mentioned, I will be a sustainable agricultural systems (SAS) volunteer. Within this sector I will be working in agri-business. More specifically, I will attempt to work with farmers to improve their livelihood through the implementation of sustainable agricultural techniques that maximize production with minimal environmental impact. I indicated that I would like to work in a site that includes: coffee and/or cocao production, an interest in microfinance groups, women artesania (crafts) groups, and beekeeping. Aimee, my boss, thinks she has the perfect site for me! AWESOME! Vamos a ver (We'll see)...

Today we took a field trip to another SAS volunteer's site to see her what a "typical" site might look like. I'll post a few pics on Flickr for anyone interested. The volunteer showed us a ton of things that we will be learning about in great detail over the next 2 years: local fruits and vegetables, eco-friendly wood burning stoves (estufa lorena), the use of live/dead barriers to combat soil erosion on hills, beekeeping, worm boxes for composting, raising goats, natural bug repellents, rice 'tanks' or small scale rice production. 

After a great day on the farm our trainers took us to the local hardware store to purchase our first machetes! Even though I got a smallish one and many people tell me that it will be laughed at, it still feels pretty macho to own such a massive knife. I have the urge to name it. Any ideas? I was also able to finally purchase a panamanian hat which I promise to wear everyday from here on out. 

Tomorrow we move in with our host families and Monday starts our intense technical and language training. I have no idea what to expect, but I'll be sure to give a full report by the end of next week. Ciao for now!

Backtracking a little:

Hello everyone! I'll be honest, I have no idea how to keep a successful and entertaining blog. Bear with me! I had high hopes to blog about the bike trip down HWY 1, but alas, I didn't even look at a computer for a solid 2 weeks! My brother, Doug, and I rode from Eureka to Santa Cruz or about 400 miles a few weeks ago. It was an incredible experience and I know there will be many more bike touring trips in my future. I will try to post a photo here on the blog, but if you want to see the full set, check it out on my Flickr site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/53265254@N00/ .  For now, my directors at Peace Corps tell me that bikes aren't too common in this country and a horse will be a more practical form of transportation. So perhaps I will be buying a horse in the next few months! Nice! 

Good things are happening here..

March 15: Move out my apt in NYC, duration: 1 hour 

March 25: Bicycle trip down the Pacific Coast Highway, CA, duration: 2 weeks

April 14: Move to Panama with the Peace Corps, duration: 27 months

Check back soon for updates!