Working in the Chocolate Farm

I'm pretty sure that Solomon put some crack in my coffee last night because I could not sleep. Maybe I was just excited to actually do something constructive the next day and couldn't stop thinking about it, but whatever it was I was not sleeping a wink. I've been growing quite tired of sitting around. Literally. The thing about being in the jungle is that there is an endless amount of time here. Once work or school is done which takes about 4 hours tops out of the day, people kind of sit around and listen to the radio or bang clothes on rocks to wash them. I opted for an adventure in the farm today to fight my boredom. The first part of my day was pretty constructive and started with me waking up at 6:30 am.

I opened my eyes to the rising sun and realized that I had eventually fallen asleep at some point during the night. The mat I had borrowed from my future community counterpart was better than just the boards which I had sleeping on the previous two nights, but something else had kept me up. This is a strange place and sleep is sometimes hard to come by when your mind is constantly trying to familiarize itself with new environments. Laying on my side staring at my phone wondering what time it is I realized that I had not spoken English in 4 days and wasn't going to today. I checked the time. 6:20 am. Shit, well my alarm is going to go off anyways so I drag myself out of bed by rolling under my mosquito net and try to find some clothes that I don't care about. They are for sure going to be ruined before the day is done.

No one is up in the house and I didn't really expect there to be a strong presence this early in the morning on a Sunday. I cram my feet into my size 10 work rain boots and start the trip down the hill. I have never had a pair of boots like these and really had no reason to own a pair before. They are necessary here. More than tuff heals with plenty of traction, super high sidewalls to keep out the bugs and snakes, and easy to clean and keep. Everyone here has them and I can see why. The mud is unforgiving and one wrong step and you could be a foot deep in mud. If your wearing sandles you can forget about it. You'll never see them again.

I arrived at Solomon's house right on time found him lounging without a shit in a hammock under his house. He seems surprised I'm there and I explain that I didn't get much sleep and had no breakfast so as not to expect much from me. He laughs and hands me a bowl of food. I take the fish from the bowl and hand it back to him. “No me gusta pescado, lo siento” I say. He looks at me like I'm crazy and I can see my meat options here dwindling. I eat the two hand ground and fried tortillas and down my coffee. Solomon eats his bowl of food plus my fish and we are ready.

Climbing the steep grade behind Solomon's house I realize that there are kids following us. “What are these kids doing here” I say winded and almost passing out from the climb. “Work” Solomon says back again with grin on his face. I find out the kids are his nephews and are ages 7, 8, and 9 and its pretty much a given that if you don't have homework and your able to walk here that your working. I said nothing but couldn't help but think that my ex step dad must have grow up here. We make it to the top and Solomon uses his machete to hack off the branches on a long stick. After jimmy rigging an axe end to the end of the pole we are ready to start working.

There are only two rules for harvesting cocoa. One, cut off the fruit that has yellow in it. Two, cut off the fruit that is dead because it is infected and will infect the others.

We are working. Hard. And I'm sweating through my clothes. The air is so thick I can taste it and jungle is everywhere. This cocoa is the definition of shade grown organic. It is literally growing in the rain the rainforest. The slope is steep and standing up is hard even without trying to hack off the melon sized fruit. I've got the long stick with the axe end and Solomon is getting dirty with the machete hacking off fruit without even looking, picking them up off the ground using the machete and cutting into them just a little to make sure its not rotten. He has been doing this his whole life and can't remember a time when he didn't have a machete in his hand. He has the scars to prove it.

The kids have large sacks made from a plant here by the artisan group and they are carefully following behind us picking up the grounded fruit. The sacks are large and must way upwards of 50lbs. The common way of carrying them is putting the strap over the forehead and laying the sack across the back leaving both hands free and this makes my neck hurt. I'm slashing and getting fruit way up in the trees and just going full steam. At this point everything is wet and everything is dirty. The shards of plant and dirt smeared on my face and is starting to make my eyes swell but I keep going. Can't make Solomon think I'm not cut out for this. I need to prove myself as a good worker to gain the respect of the locals.

I've started to take chances to get fruit that could have been considered impossible or at least hard to get before. I stand on the stump of an old growth tree and reach my pole for a fruit so high up I can barely touch it. I can see Solomon's eyes get larger and he tells me to be careful. I'm reaching and reaching and look at Solomon and he is just staring. Success. I cut down the highest fruit I can see and look to Solomon for his reaction. Nothing. Blank stares and not even at me. Solomon is looking directly past me and in a moment I freeze. “What” I say not wanting or able to turn around on the narrow stump. “Its an animal. An animal I've never heard before” Solomon says with a straight face. I jump off the stump and turn to look. Nothing but thick jungle. “Want to go see what it is” Solomon says curiously. “Hell ya” I say in Spanish and not directly translated. If this guy who has grown up in this jungle and in this area wants to look for an animal that he has never heard it must be good.

Solomon is leading the way with me behind him, the dog behind me, and the kids behind the dog. I've got my fruit tool which I'm now holding like a weapon and I'm so excited that I don't realize that we are now cutting through real thick jungle that is crawling with things that want to hurt me. We tunnel through some heavy vines and bushes and come out under a grove of giant old growth trees covered in vines. “Up there” Solomon says while pointing. I look and see two black raccoon sized animals skimming the tree tops so fast they look to be gliding. “Tigres” Solomon says as if its a question but not really. I've never seen anything like them but I'm pretty sure that not only do tigers not live here, but if they did, they probably wouldn't be all place and have long black fuzzy tails.

Solomon had never seen them before and was convinced that they were going to for the chickens down below. I agreed to look it up on the computer and he nodded. On the way back I pointed out an ant about the size of pointer finger. It had to be the largest ant I’d ever seen. Solomon told me it was really poisonous which he says about everything and we moved on. We go back to work and I'm still trying to impress Solomon and the kids with my extensive skill with the stick axe. Solomon points out a group of cocoa fruits that are straight up from me and really high up. I go for it. I get the first two go for the last one which is so high up that I'm standing on my tip toes. Crack. I've got it. Crack. It hits a branch on the way down. Crack. It lands straight on my head forcing my teeth to clinch and slightly knocks me out. I open my eyes hunched over staring at the ground and Solomon is trying to ask if I'm okay, but the pain hasn't hit yet and I'm focused on the largest brown tarantula I've ever seen directly below me. Solomon tells me that is super dangerous and machetes the back end of it off and then asks me again if I'm okay. I say yes trying to act strong and he picks up the fruit that weighs close to 2lbs. “You broke the fruit open with your head, I've never seen that before” he says while laughing. I try to tell him that I have a tough skull but I've also already told him before that I broke the right side of my face so I'm sure that he thinks I'm just a walking disaster.

We keep working and I shrug off the fact that I've got a bump on my head, my eyes are swelling up from some type of allergies, and I'm now tired as hell from exhausting all my energy trying to show off. We keep going I ask when we are going to be done. This stirs Solomon and he goes into a speech about how long he sometimes works and how the last volunteer tried to work for a day and did the same thing. I say okay we keep going. I'm chopping and not really paying attention when Solomon tells me to look directly above my head on the tree branch that is about a foot above me. It's a sloth and big one and he is eye level to me. The sloth slowly moves his head towards me while saddled in between the branches of a cacao tree and closes his eyes for a second then turns back and rests his head back on his arm. Not a real exciting creature but I've never seen one this close. I could probably pick him up out of the branch and hold him in my arm and he wouldn't move. They do have entire eco systems of growing organisms in their fur so picking them up would probably not be that good. In fact it was one of the things we were told in training not to touch. So I touched it. I'm not dead yet there is always tomorrow.

I finally convinced Solomon that I was going to hurt myself again if we didn't stop and we headed back down the steep grade. I took a good hard bucket shower, threw on some clean clothes and headed back to Solomon's house. We sat and talked for awhile until he finally brought up a question I could tell had been on his mind for quite sometime. “Why do gringos like animals so much” he asked me while I shoveled sauteed tofu into my mouth. This was a good question and one that tells so much about the difference in cultures. These people see these animals as food because they are poor. They eat everything they can that doesn't cost money and until the day they are able to go to the store and buy whatever they would like, they will continue to do so. I answered “ because we like to see animals that we have never seen before and we like to see them in nature.” I went on “if there are enough of these animals here then you can also make money by showing them to dumb gringos too so maybe we shouldn't kill anymore.” I could see Solomon thinking. How do you tell someone to starve for awhile so that the white people will come and give you money to see them. It's a hard concept to grasp and eating boiled plantains 3 times a day is my idea of hell so I don't blame them for trying to get a little protein in their diets at least once every couple days.

I hate to say it but to save the environment, clean up the trash, and bring the animals back into this place it is going to need a reason to do so other than its just bad. They are going to need tourism and enough of it to make it worth while. I know I saw a lot of stuff today that I would pay someone to see and if you told me I could make my chocolate on top of that I would for sure put down some money. Working with tourism is going to be big part of what I'm going to do here because it will not only bring money, but it might save this place from complete deforestation, and desecration. It might even inspire some of the locals to learn other things such as biology, and English.

The rest of my day I spent sleeping and walking back and forth to the small little store to buy cookies. I leave for the big city tomorrow and come back here in two weeks to stay for two years. I better find a good past time.........

Giant Bambu and Turtle Meat

It's just getting dark outside and I'm camped out in my mosquito net. Apparently I've set it up wrong because there are now mosquitoes trapped inside. I've definitely got a couple bites already but nothing compared to what I should have. Maybe they don't know the taste of gringo yet. Maybe they are waiting to strike and have been planning for days. Maybe the mosquitoes inside have been in contact with the others and at midnight they are going to strike. Maybe not, but I need to get these blood thirsty bastards out of here before they do any damage.

I spent most of my day sleeping, laying around and walking up and down the street. Within that time I've done a lot of contemplation. Sitting on an old growth stump next to the dirt banked river I contemplated how I was going to get through this. It was this kind of thought that took up most of my day again this spot I found next to the river seemed to be a great place to come to some kind of conclusion. The scene really was picturesque with the giant groves of bamboo taking over the once rain forest and stretching out over the river to touch each other on each side. The ground that was once covered in jungle now layered with bamboo leaves as the sun fails to reach the ground here. Tranquil. I sat and pictured myself in place where people go into deep thought next to giant bamboo on a regular basis. Maybe somewhere in China. I sat and contemplated if I was going to be able to live this life. A life where food is scarce, time is plenty, and the seeds of hope are just sprouting. I can see why the Peace Corps has us go to our future site for this week. I can also see why they tell us many times that if we are going to be going directly back the states to bring our shit back. I sat and watched the bamboo sway in the wind and wondered what my life would be like back in the states. What would I be doing. Would I be a bartender again working the tireless night shift somewhere and doing computer work in the day? Would I be partying three times a week and falling over my friends and brothers at 2am? I would probably be doing both of those things. The problem is that the grass is always greener on the other side. This one statement can explain most of my life by the way. This whole Peace Corps thing is supposed to remedy that because there is no grass on the other side for these people and they now depend on me to help. I then came to the conclusion that taking this one month at a time will be the greatest solution. I got up and walked down the street to where the kids were playing baseball.

After another nap and some exercise I walked out into the common room to find my Nabere host mother standing in the kitchen boiling something. She then turned to me and asked if I would like a special meal tonight. Tortuga. I thought she was joking so I laughed and the little girl in the house laughed too. I asked her if she was serious and she said yes. They had just caught a fresh turtle in the creek and it was already boiled up and everything. I looked into the pot and saw what looked like the feet of my pet turtles back home. I tried explaining to her that turtles back home are not a common food because there are not enough of them around. She laughed and said that the community here eats many turtles. I guess that is why it so special. Because there are not many left. I left the house telling her that I would try some tonight when I returned.

I showed up at Solomon's house which is the brother of my host mom and my hopeful future counterpart. Solomon is great. He has a two story hut/house with an 800 dollar solar panel system that can power a T.V. Brian, the last PC volunteer in this site lived and worked with Solomon and I plan on doing the same. I can tell that Solomon is tired and has many things to do so I've offered to help him in the farm tomorrow at 7 in the morning. He told me that Brian had only come to help once for about 2 hours the entire time he was here so in doing this I'm hoping to prove my wanting to help and also my desire to really learn about the chocolate. We talked for hours about the plans they had for a better system of grinding the chocolate and some possible new opportunities in the future with tourism. At one point they put together a business plan to construct a 40,000 dollar eco lodge and restaurant. It was quickly turned down. There selling point was that people would want to see some of the water falls and climb the mountain to see the rest of Bocas. That is nice but not really a selling point. I tried to explain to Solomon that people need things to do. Especially gringos. I can remember when my dad and my brother and I went to a Nabere site where they had a little building for us to stay. They took us on a hike and saw nothing. I can remember my dad saying “where the hell are the animals. I better see a tucan or a monkey or something”. We didn't see crap, but we went fishing with the locals and it was great. I went on to explain to Solomon that things need to be set up for the gringos in a different way. First of all, we have to clean up all this trash. Second, find some damn animals in the jungle and not eat them. Third, find things to do like horse back riding or boating down the river. He liked the ideas. I then explained how in the states that people like to go to the top of a mountain with a bike and ride down as fast as they can. He told me that they would have dead gringos if they did that her and I told him that we could use the bodies to feed the catfish that I plan on growing. He laughed and his wife served me a spectacular meal of tofu, chicken, rice, and black coffee. I had him call his sister and tell her I wasn't going to be eating tortuga tonight. I finished up my time by explaining how my mom once spent 400 dollars to get her iguana's leg fixed. He almost fell out of chair he laughed so hard. They eat those too here. I left feeling better about the day and my time here. If I can get good coffee, at least one good meal, and one good laugh a day, I can make it.

Boild Corn Drink and Full Latrines

The sleeping situation last night was not optimal. The jagged boards stabbed my back and my makeshift pillow using my mosquito net bag full of my clothes came apart in the middle of the night. For that reason I slept off and on all day. Its been a hard day but not the kind of hard that comes with work or learning or anything of that nature. Its been the kind of hard that makes you ask yourself tough questions. Questions like “why am I here”, “can I last the full two years”, “did I make the right decision”, “what am I missing back home”, and “do I have what it takes to do this”. These are all important questions and before today on most days I would have answered favorably to all of them. There are many contributing factors to me asking myself these questions and at the risk of sounding like I'm complaining here they are:

1. I got sick twice, broke my foot, and can't figure out why my allergies are so bad.
2. I miss the female gender in general already and it's only been about 3 months.
3. I had boiled corn drink for dinner and boiled plantains for breakfast and I'm hungry as hell.
4. I keep having this damn reoccurring dream about a certain person that makes me want to punch myself when I wake up.
5. I miss my family.

I need to take it one month at a time and I know the first month will be the hardest. Especially since I will be living here. In the house that I'm visiting the first month. There are a crazy amount of animals living directly under my floor, the food is worse than terrible, and the latrine is bad. The worst I've seen yet. It's completely made of wood, open on one side, smells terrible, and is almost full. So it should get better from there and the entire time that I'm living with the families for the first 3 months I can work on my house.

When I step back and look at myself here I feel proud even though I haven't done anything yet. When I strip away the loneliness and the selfishness which I have to admit is hard, I see so many people that really need help. These people really do have nothing and they still smile every day. Ya the food sucks. That is because they can only afford to buy bags of rice and what comes from the trees. Ya the latrine is terrible, but how would one fix it? The girls' room that I took over has almost nothing in it. In fact the mom was able to move everything out of it in 5 minutes and I think most of that time was spent taking down the pink mosquito net. She has some posters in her room or what someone would call posters here. They are more like random clippings of newspapers or pamphlets she was handed in school that are unfathomable to her so she has put them up on her walls. There is a write up about a large marionette that someone built, the tops of the packaging of different toys that an aid group brought and that she grew out of, and an educational document showing the importance of getting the H1N1 vaccine. The strangest or saddest clipping on the wall has to be the ad for a new resort in Boquete. This ad is obviously directed at gringos and the pictures look amazing. So amazing that a little girl that lives in poverty only a mountain range away from it would put the ad up on her wall.

It's 7 at night and almost everyone is home now. The radio is on and the kids have lit the oil lamp and gathered around it. The station is a news station and is one of about 3 that actually come in. After the news a T.V. Soap opera comes on and I have to say that listing to them is not the same as watching. Especially since the women are so good looking on them. I do get to concentrate on my Spanish more which is good. Speaking of that, I my Spanish is definitely getting better. One of the kids had me read a story out of a book last night in Spanish and I was doing pretty good.

I know things will get better here as time goes and I need to hang in there. The first couple months will be the hardest. When all else fails I just put my headphones on and listen to my buddy Jack. The only thing I'm missing is my other buddy Jack. The kind I can drink.....

First Day in Site

I'm at my new site sitting inside my mosquito net flat on my back because I seem to have made a grave mistake. I forgot bug spray, didn't bring a pillow, and don't have a sleeping mat. I traveled for 2 days to get here and didn't get much sleep so I will go ahead and blame it on that. I don't really see how I'm going to get any sleep now seeing that I'm just going to be sleeping on boards, but at least I have my mosquito net and I can hide here.

This place is tucked into the mountains a little and I will have plenty of time to describe it over the next two years so I will not try to right now. The house I'm staying in for the next 3 days during my visit has two rooms and 6 people plus me sleeping in it. Chickens and ducks seem to be living under the house and the smell of urine and feces flows between the large gaps in the wood panels after a gust of wind comes through. At first I thought it was something in my bag that smelt and I searched through the entire thing looking for the culprit. The house is surrounded by trees and growth and it really feels like the jungle here. Strange sounding birds and frogs fill the air along side the distant sound of kids playing. There are now so many mosquitoes outside my net that I can here them. The sound reminds me of a tea kettle just about to start boiling with the low whistling sound getting louder. I don't know how I'm going to get out of this thing and make it to dinner. I also don't know how or where I'm getting dinner being that there is only a little girl here playing in the common room. She just came home from school and I'm pretty sure I took her room.

The sun is almost out and I can barley see out of the window. The swarm of mosquitoes just outside my net have grown and they seem to be getting hungrier. I'm pretty thirsty and ran out of water awhile ago, but putting the large government issued water filter together right now sounds impossible. So this is going to be where I will be living for the next two years uh? Well, I guess I won't be living in this particular house the entire time. In fact at the most, I will be at this house for about a month and then two others for a month at a time before moving into my own place. This “house” or hut doesn't seem too bad. The bucket shower room has a sheet that blows in the wind so I will be taking my showers at night or just in the river, and I can get used to the smell that seems to be seeping from the ground. The host mom is nice and two of kids are so far. The dad doesn't say much but seems to be a nice guy and so far they have not talked about me in Gnabe yet. They will speak Gnabe when they want to make sure that you won't know what they are saying. I don't know why they don't just speak in Spanish. I can't understand them anyways. This community is pretty small and the people seem as friendly as Gnabe can be. One thing I will have to get used to is the silent game which they love to do. They will sit there and stare at you for hours even if your not doing anything. Even when they talk to each other they take long sometimes 5 minute pauses and stare into the jungle. They also do not look straight into your eyes when talking to you.

I will have to keep busy here because it could get lonely. These people are very different than the society I'm used to and keeping myself entertained and busy will be key. I've already came up with a great way to keep myself on track when my mind starts to think “what am I doing here” or “I want to just go home”. I slap myself in the face. This is great because not only does it wake me up from what could be a slippery slope of Early Termination, but it also makes the locals laugh. Another thing I will have to start implementing here is a work out plan. I've dropped about 7 lbs since I've been in Panama mostly due to being deathly ill twice and poor diet and getting that muscle back will be another key to my happiness here. Plus I want to look good when all of you come visit....

Tranquilo, Its Just Mold and Rain

I walked in at about ten to my host family's house and pushed the door open making the sock that holds it open fall to the ground. As reached down to pick of the sock and lock the door behind me I noticed that there were two bodies laying on each “couch” passed out. Abel, my host brother out cold curled up in a ball on the larger couch and Marta, my host mom, sleeping on the small floral colored couch barely able to curl up tight enough to fit. As I closed the door softly she awoke with a concerned look on her face and surveyed the room for the cause of the noise.
“lo siento” I said in a low tone as to not wake Abel.
“no no, tranquilo” she replied as to imply that it was her fault for acting so startled when I awoke her.

That's how it is here. Everything is “tranquilo”. I want to come home late? Tranquilo. My buddy Kyle wants to have dinner and ice cream here unannounced? Tranquilo. I Forget to ask my host mom to the major event that we are hosting tomorrow and she reminds me because everyone else is going and she didn't get invited? Tranquilo. Everything is will be alright. I like that attitude and I'm adopting it. Not that I haven't used it from time to time, I would just like to incorporate it more into my daily routine. “Just relax”. Saying that in the states can get you punched but here it literally means “lets settle down and have a little coffee or maybe a beer and see if we can't just talk it out”. I don't think that is actually the literal translation, but it seems so and I like to think that's what their saying but in less words.

On another note my room smells terrible and so does my watch. In fact, everything I own that is located in my top drawer of the two drawer dresser that I have smells of mold. I'm worried that this could be a leading reason my allergies have been so terrible lately. I've been taking my medication and it seems to have stopped working all together. I'm almost positive that mold is right next to burning trash on the list of things I should stay away from and I'm pretty sure that I have started a mold farm in my room. I've been slacking on taking care of this problem not because I'm lazy, but because I really don't know how to get rid of it. It is everywhere and I mean everywhere in my top drawer. I'm starting to look like Abraham Lincoln with a green beard on my passport and everything I put in the draw is becoming unusable. The mold bothers me more because the reason it is there in the first place is directly due to my site visit which happens to be the same place I'm going to be spending my 2 years of service and the same place I'm going to visiting next week for 6 days.

Let me tell you something about the site that I will be spending the next two years in. It rains. A shit ton. And I'm not talking about the little “oh look its raining outside let me get my umbrella” rain. I mean “It's raining so hard that I'm wearing a poncho and rain boots and not only am I still soaking wet, but the ground is flooding and I can't tell where I'm going” rain. I would also like to point out that two of the 3 past volunteers E.T.'d from my site before a year was up and that the most recent volunteer had a “difficult” time in my site. I heard the last part through the grapevine and don't really know if it is true so I'm going to just leave it at that. I also think that the most recent volunteer was pretty cool built a pretty nice little hut/house that I will be remodeling and expanding to fit my needs. The fact still remains pure and simple that not this is not going to be easy. Yes, there is a nice little waterfall with a little vine swing, but I'm not sure how much I'm going to enjoy those things by myself. I guess I will have to learn to. And yes, there is a chocolate farming group that is trying to build their business which will be great to work with. And yes, there seems to be really nice people in this Gnobe community that could really use some help because they really are the definition of poor. But, if so many people had problems in the past with this site, and if Bocas is the number place people end up E.T.ing from, how the hell am I going to make sure I keep positive and make sure I don't go off the deep end?

This is a good question and I'm going to have really dig deep for this one. I think is going to really come down to realizing that helping these people is why I am here and it really isn't about me anymore if it ever was. It is not about me being able to handle the harsh conditions of using a latrine every day, having no running water or electricity, or having to wash my clothes in the river. It is about trying to help these people get caught up. Letting them have the same opportunities that us the first world have. I think being a Community Economic Development volunteer has to be the hardest job in the Peace Corps but they will not tell us that. Not only do we have to try to teach these people how to help themselves, but we have to make the choice weather or not doing this would actually help their communities. Does having more money automaticly mean that poverty will be eradicated, everyone in the community will have access to great education, and healthcare will be no problem? Nope. It could actually make things worse. Especially if some group came in and threw a bunch of money one direction and left. It is a fine line we walk and decisions will have to be made in the interest of values, community preservation, and what would be best for the future of these people. I'm sure my views about all this will evolve as my service progresses and this is sure to be a major issue when considering projects. We will see.

On a lighter note, we talked about STDs and different names for sex today. Most of it was pretty funny and made me glad to be STD free. The rest of the presentation was not funny and pretty sad actually and made me glad to be STD free. Some interesting things that I learned; There is a group of indigenous that is part of the group that I will be living with that have been shown to be immune to HIV. Panama also has one of the highest rates of HIV in all of Central America so go figure. It is mostly in the main cities. I definitely do not have anything to worry about considering all of the women that live my village are 5 feet tall and 4 feet wide. The medical officer tried telling us to give it awhile and they will start looking good. I can guarantee you that I will just become celibate instead. Not interested. And for those of you who would like comment on that please remember that my parents are reading this......

Health Report:

Allergies are terrible in Santa Clara. Need to get to my damn site soon.

Gaining most of the weight back that I lost from being sick twice and will need to do some more heavy lifting to get back the muscle. Should be able to do that in site in a couple weeks.

Right foot still hurts with every step and I've developed a blood blister in my heel for some reason. Might be from playing soccer with no shoes on with the kids. One of the other volunteers is having the same pain problem with his foot and they would not do an x ray so I don't feel so bad not mentioning it at this point. It has been hurting for almost 2 months now though. If I get to my site and rest it for some consecutive days and it still hurts with every step then I will have to get it x rayed and probably cast up. I'm really hoping that it will not come down to this. I've also tried to push a needle into my heel to relieve the pressure from my blood blister and could not get through the skin. It is amazing as to how thick your heel is. Really hoping my foot gets better along with the worst allergies I've ever had in my life. It would really make things a lot easier. Other than that I'm fine. Get a little home sick when I see the Giants playing baseball on one of the four channels we get, but that's about it.

One more quick fact, English is the official second language of Panama and almost one speaks it. Go figure....

Mustaches and Music

I woke up this morning with my left eye slightly swollen thanks to my allergies and stumbled to my Clairol neon 70's mirror with optional swivel magnifying glass. I was just trying to asses the allergy damage to my face but when I flicked on the side neon lights I startled myself and almost fell over. I had forgotten that the night before I had decided to chop off most of the facial hair I had been cautiously growing for the last 3 weeks. I say most because I happily left a mustache with mini handlebars for all to enjoy. I'm happy with it just as long as I do not have to look in a mirror often. A mistake I will hopefully not make again after this morning.

I like to think that my mustache makes me look like more a man. I definitely feel more manly. I feel like I could spend hours chopping wood today and not break a sweat. I would only break to sharpen my machete with my teeth and when finished I would build a house in the shape of my mustache thanking it for giving me the power to do so. Well, maybe not, but I do feel more manly. I can understand why my dad had rad mustache in the 70's when he was a cop. It was badass. Especially back then. My mustache definitely doesn't stack up to his though and if they had ever had the chance to meet I can almost guarantee mine would retreat back into my face in embarrassment.

On another note, when I walked out into the common area of the house this morning my host mom started talking to me and I could understand everything she was saying. With this boost of confidence to my Spanish skills I decided to make small talk. That's when I realized that my Spanish is still lacking and I should study more before tomorrow's Spanish interview. I need to reach one more level before I'm able to become a real Peace Corps Volunteer in 4 weeks. I'm just a trainee right now and I feel as if the coming week will be one of the hardest. My Spanish needs to improve, we have technical classes all week again and none of them are in air conditioned buildings so its gonna be hot as hell (which I'm getting used to), and I'm going to be thinking about my future site all day during class. Also, I decided to create a song and play it for our swear in ceremony which I had heard another group had done. I found out yesterday that the President of Panama might be at our ceremony which mean that not only can the song not suck, but it needs be semi good if I'm supposed to be representing our whole group of 40 something people. Thank god I will have some backup guitars and singers up there just in case I do falter. Will definitely have to make sure we record this one.

Until next time....

Tipico, My Site, and Lost Birds

It's Friday night and I'm sitting in the hammock watching what they call Tipico Music on the T.V.

While wearing traditional Panamanian hats, singers or “cantadores” sing/battle against each other. Pointing and rhyming seem to be some of the most important aspects of the show. Singing does not. It definitely takes skill and I know if you were to throw me on stage I would have major difficulties belting out what they are, but I'm pretty sure I can keep a tune a little better than they can. That said, there is also the possibility that the point is to sound like you are screaming and whining at the same time. I would go as far to say the more whining, the better. I might be able to get used to this if I knew what they were saying. I don't mind the music, and the fact that they are battling on stage makes this great to watch.

On to more important matters, I got my site placement today. If that means nothing to you then you haven't read my other blog postings. My site placement is where I'm going to be for the next 2 years of my life in my Peace Corps service. Drum roll please......its the same site I went to go visit in Bocas Del Toro. Well that wasn't very climatic. Even with the advantage of knowing what the site is going to be like because I've been there, I'm excited. The place was nice. They grow and make chocolate, there is a pretty nice river with a vine swing and waterfall, there is already a wooden house on stilts that the volunteer before me built, the people are Gnobe and I will get to learn a language that less than 10k people know, and it is only boat ride away from some really nice beaches.

It's a good place to be and as Brian, the volunteer before me put it “you don't have big shoes to fill”. This is partly true but I give him credit for building a pretty nice house and working with the chocolate group to find outside buyers for their chocolate. Things I'm already planning on changing or accomplishing in the site:

For the House:

1. 
   
   Bigger loft. Its pretty small
2. 
   
   Buy a horse
3. 
   
   Make it so I can jump on my horse from my porch. Its stilted
4. 
   
   Build a shower
5. 
   
   Install solar panels
6. 
   
   Build another catchment system

For the community:

1. 
   
   Work in the school and try to teach
2. 
   
   See if getting a tourism project or group going is possible
3. 
   
   Look into getting a more refined chocolate together for sale
4. 
   
   Packaging for the chocolate
5. 
   
   Get other aid groups in for other types of projects
6. 
   
   Work on trash cleanup

I'm sure there are other things that I will want to do but for now this is a rough draft. I definitely need solar panels because there is no power in the community and a shower would be nice. I don't mind washing my clothes in the river and using the latrine and taking showers in the waterfall isn't that bad. It is a little hike though and sometimes the river is too high to hike up. I also need to figure out the logistics of getting a horse. I know that the community has pastures for them but I would like access to my horse at all times. Will have to think about this.

On another note, someone knocked over the birdcage outside and the parrot that didn't have its wings clipped flew away. My host mom said that the remaining bird was really sad now that his companion flew away. I'm thinking he was alright with it. I don't know about you, but if me and my closest friend are locked up somewhere and he has a chance to get the hell out I'm telling to do it. Don't wait for my dumb ass just because I can't walk. The remaining bird wasn't sad. It was just reveling in all the extra space it had now acquired.

It didn't last long. They bought a new parrot for the for the lonely one. I pretty nice white one. It just sits there looking out at the world and my host mom said that its still stunned from the bus ride. I believe her because I feel the same way every time I get off the bus. Now both parrots stare at each other in disbelief. The white parrot doesn't know where the shit he is and the old parrot that failed to escape is confused as to why his buddy came back a different color. I'm just confused as to why the parrots don't speak Spanish. They don't actually speak anything with makes me think they are not parrots at all, but just small birds that made bad life decisions. If they could talk I think I know what they would say............”Get me the hell out of this cage, I'm a damn bird. I'm supposed to fly”. And thinking about this not only makes me glad that I can talk, but I have the smarts to leave my cage... 

The Comarca

We went to Chorrera again today and it wasn't that bad. I've started to acclimate to the system of learning that we have here in the Peace Corps and Chorrera had been cleaned up of the trash at least by a governmental group. Bright blue bags on the corner of the streets left the evidence I needed to understand why the roads and sidewalks looked cleaner. It also wasn't that hot today and a slight breeze rolled through the streets accompanying the rushing cars as they barreled through town. It was a nice day.

Greg left today or E.T.'d which means Early Termination. To be fair, he was a little older and didn't think he could use his skills in this situation. I understand why he left, I just don't know why he waited so long. He had to have known after the first couple weeks that he wasn't going to be doing any computer programing which apparently was his specialty. He was doing great in Spanish class and often annoyed me due to his rapid comprehension. I seem to be learning Spanish at a slower rate than everyone else. I'm guesstimating that I'm learning approximately 40% slower than everyone else. Most of it is my fault and I need to study more which I'm trying to do and some of it is the structure of the Spanish classes which take place 8 hours a day for one or two days a week. Back to Greg. He was a cool guy and even though he sometimes rubbed me the wrong way (the way a parent does when they are trying to show you how to do something that you should already know kind of way), he was cool and really really smart. The guy was a chemist and wrote firmware for electronics for god's sake.

The Comarca

There are different Comarcas in Panama. A Comarca is just a different word for Indian Reservation, with the only difference being that these are in some of the nicest parts in Panama as apposed to the U.S. Where we pushed our Native Americans into some of the shitiest and inhospitable parts of the country. The government here has even given the people in the 4 different Comarcas almost complete autonomy. They can decide their own leaders and government structure and can even use the resources that the Panamanian government has available which seems to be a lot. All this sounds great but the fact remains that these people remain poor. And when I say poor I mean scraps of metal and plastic bag houses poor. I mean boiled green bananas for breakfast poor. No shower, and maybe a latrine poor. Poor.

So we went. 27 business minded Peace Corps Trainees were sent to the Comarca of the Gnobe Bugle people to live with them for a week, visit another volunteer that was working local groups, learn about real grassroots development, and most of all, test our real desire to do whatever it took to help others in some of the worst conditions. It was a test that some of passed and some of us failed.

Let me give you a little description of where we went. The road to the site is terrible. Mostly washed out mountainside that only a serious 4wheel drive could make. The Chivas or truck-taxis cram as many people as possible into the back of the truck which has a roll cage. The ride is about 1 ½ hours through some bumpy ass terrain and those who didn't take Dramamine wish they had. Our destination in the Comarca, Hato Chami, was once a cloud forest which means that it rains and rains and rains. And its cold. A lot colder than I had ever thought Panama could get. The scenery is beautiful and the views at 3,000 feet into the vast wet green valleys are breathtaking before the clouds have a chance to re-form in the morning. Come mid day, rain. Nothing gets dry. Everything is always wet and this causes problems for keeping clothes dry. Even clothes that I had not taken out of my waterproof bag were wet just from the dampness in the air.

Huts and shanty houses are scattered throughout the now mostly cleared cloud forest and there are kids everywhere. There are pine trees which catches me off guard. At one point and time there was a thought the locals were going to grow pine trees for good wood and sell them. They cleared the cloud forest and planted pine trees. They didn't know at the time of doing this that the pine trees that they planted needed a certain environment to seed and wouldn't reproduce and that the trees would damage the already nutrient lacking soil. So now there are random groves of pine trees and almost no real forest left. I do have to say that this was not their idea and that they have started to realize the importance of keeping the rainforest or cloud forest instead of destroying it for firewood. The Gnobe have all agreed to walk 30 min out of town to get firewood now which is supposed to help. The people I stayed with cut a tree down next to the house.

We were split into different houses and most trainees lived in a single makeshift hut with sometimes 16 people sleeping in one room. The kitchen or as I like to call it, the hut with the smoke billowing out of it, was most times built outside somewhere away from the rest of the hut. This was poverty and life was hard for these people.

I was actually amazed at the smiles and general hospitality I received from my own host family in the Comarca. These were genuinely nice people of the simplest way. Even the kids seemed to wear constant smiles as they wore the same tattered clothes day after day. The English words from the sure to be donated shirts had been faded and soiled to a hardly legible state yet smiles. No clothes? Smiles. And I haven't even talked about Rebecca.

Every family in the Comarca has had at least one child die. I can't imagine if I had lived in this community and that child had been Rebecca. Victor, the other trainee staying with the same host family as I, agreed that this little 3 year old girl could quite possibly be the cutest kid in the world. For that whole week in the Comarca of Hato Chami I slept on a table with no pillow, had diarrhea every day, wore dirty wet clothes, took ice cold bucket baths in a half hut, crapped in a hole, and ate slightly boiled green bananas for breakfast with watered down coffee, but if Rebecca was there she was smiling and if she was smiling the world was a better place. If you told me that the Peace Corps planted this little girl to wake up every morning and give me puppy eyes while she clenched her mothers bright Gnobe dress, I would probably believe you. Her little round face and dark brown eyes hid behind her long straight brown hair. She wore a traditional Gnobe dress that blended in with her mothers and when her name was called. When retreating into the safe crevasses of her mothers dress only Rebecca's tiny head could then be seen until either Victor or I called her name at which time like a turtle retreating into its shell, she retreated in embarrassment.

Rebecca got sick one day and we could hear her coughing in the hut. We were worried and called out for her while her mother Anna served us breakfast. Even in sickness Rebecca peaked out from inside the hut and planted a smile. She was magic and it made the all of the classes about cultural affairs and why were there irrelevant. I knew why we were there. I had now seen it. Rebecca was the reasons name and without the proper education, healthcare, and sustainable development her life could go waste. There are many Rebeccas out there and they are depending on us. Whenever I think about people E.T.ing now I can't help but think that there is one less community with a little boy or girl in it that will now have to wait for the chance to better themselves with the knowledge and skills we posses. 

I hope I make it. I want to help and I know I can. I better study Spanish and hope I don't get sick again or I might not get the chance.             

Oh ya. Just Got my site placement and I´m going to the Chocolate factory in Bocas for my 2 years of service!