La Semana de los
Muertos
On Sunday, November 3rd, a man in my community
drowned in a river. The Rio Indio
divides the province of Panama Oeste from Coclé, and the community El Harino
from Vallecito (where my close friend and neighbor volunteer Siobhan lives). November 3rd is Panama’s
Independence Day, which means a lot of parties go on. Teodoro was partying during the day in
Vallecito, but planned to come back to El Harino in time for the big baile at our cantina that night. Crossing the river (whose depth varies from
knee-high to neck-high depending on the rains) drunk and in the dark is an
obviously bad idea, but many do it regularly.
Teodoro’s family began to worry on Monday that he hadn’t come home. Frantically organized search parties found
his body downstream on Tuesday morning.
The loss to his family and to the community is
tremendous. While I personally did not
know him well (he’d attended a few of my charlas
but never invited me to work with him), his family has always been very kind to
me, and I know they are a family that has already suffered many hardships. One of his daughters is only 16 and has
already had two babies, the most recent of which died as a 1-month-old in
August. The husband of one of his older
daughters (who is a good friend of mine) died years ago in a mudslide. She is one of the strongest women I know.
Leave it to Panama’s bureaucracy to make death all the more
painful to deal with. When the body was
found Tuesday, the law is such that he had to be taken into the city for an
autopsy. The ensuing paperwork lasted
longer than 24 hours and the body was not returned to the community until late
Thursday. By that time, I had helped a
large group of men dig his grave (definitely a first for me, and hopefully a
last), but his family preferred that he spend one last night at home. Friday morning the coffin was carried to the
church (about a 20 minute hike) for a short prayer session and then to the
cemetery (another 15). His family
retained composure throughout the morning, but as soon as the coffin was
lowered into the grave they lost it, and so did I. Panamanians very rarely show strong emotion,
which made their grief all the more powerful and saddening (the word “wailing”
came to mind). A few relatives spoke,
mostly saying thank you to all the community for showing support. On behalf of the immediate family they asked
that support continue to be given either in the form of money, food, or work
(fields of the family’s rice need to be harvested as soon as possible). I heard people talking about how even the
cheapest of coffins cost more than $100.
This amount of money is extremely hard to come by.
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| On November 2nd, much of Latin America celebrated El Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). We had celebrated that day with a service at the cemetery. These are Teodoro’s daughters paying respects to their recently lost baby. Less than a week later, they buried their father here as well. |
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| Procession from the church to the cemetery. The coffin is being carried up front |
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Every evening for nine days following the death of Teodoro,
a prayer session is held at his family’s home.
This altar was made for this occasion.
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Siobhan, who crosses this same river regularly, has been
working with Engineers Without Borders groups on a bridge project so that
people and horses will be able to cross safely at any time. We are hopeful that construction of the
bridge will begin as early as April.
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| Surveying a possible bridge location |
During this same week I received news from home that the
father of two close friends from high school passed away. These friends have stayed in my thoughts and
heart and I wish them all the strength and love in the world as they get
through this hard time.
On a Happier Note
Aside from such significant challenges, life and work have
continued to go well for me in El Harino.
Here are some highlights:
- I helped facilitate a workshop called “Choose your life”
for school kids in Siobhan’s community.
The workshop focused on helping teenagers develop goals and identify
resources and steps to help them achieve their goals. A session on sex-ed is also included.
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| Explaining different types of resources they might have available and that money isn’t everything. |
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| They did an activity where they had to guess if HIV could be transmitted or not transmitted. Alex went through and explained that actually no, you can’t get HIV from somebody coughing, sneezing, sharing a cup, etc. |
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| Practicing how to put a condom on. |
- During Panama’s Independence Day, I accompanied the school
kids on their annual parade down the main road.
That night some neighbor volunteers came over to hang out and we made a
brief appearance to dance some típico
at the baile.
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| School parade |
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| Baile at the cantina |
- I hiked the long way out (through Siobhan’s community on
the Coclé side of the river) to make it to a Peace Corps Halloween house party
in Coclé’s capital city Penenomé. The
hike took close to three and a half hours.
The party featured costumes, dancing to American music and playing the
American game of beer pong.
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| Pretty hike |
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| Halloween sheriffs. Don't worry, my gun was 2-D |
- I collaborated with Panama’s Center for Environmental
Development to host a talk on reforestation and tree-nursery management with
our 7th grade.
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| Filling seed bags with a good soil mix |
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| Watering in a small tomato plant |
