Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Roughing It

During my 5 day site visit to El Harino, Panamá Oeste, I went through about as many ups and downs as there are minutes in a day.  I will return to the family I just stayed with after Peace Corps Swear-In in July and be with them until mid-August.  This is real poverty.  A latrine filled with flies, a wood-platform bed with no mattress (luckily I brought a small, air-filled one), no cell phone service, and long hikes over mountainous, muddy terrain for basic services are some of the low points.  But there are high points too and more than anything, there sure are interesting points.  Believe it or not, I like bucket baths.  There is something beautiful about pouring cool water on my head while I look up at the jungle all around me (never mind the little fish swimming around my feet).  And my long hike home is absolutely gorgeous.

Bucket Bath!  I also get my drinking water here, but filter it first of course.
Walking home = breathtaking
 This family would surely be considered unusual by US standards.  The man of the house (age 43) is taking care of his ex-wife´s children plus has 4 kids with his newer, 24-year-old wife.  He has a son his wife´s age and grandkids older than his own.  They are all incredibly sweet, caring people.  I am a kid magnet and I love playing with all 5 of the youngest ones that range in age from a few months to 11 (I even still love the baby that peed on me ... diapers do not exist here).  My young host-mom told me that I am part of the family and they will help me in any way possible.  She said she knows what it is like to be alone and told me a story of how she spent a month alone in a hospital when she lost 4 fingers on her right hand in a mill accident while processing rice.  Her struggles are certainly harder than mine.

Yeni, Anayanci, Joel, Diana, Rebeca
The religion talks are getting a bit awkward.  Everyone asks what I am, and very few have ever heard of Judaism (I am not even going to try to explain that I am a cultural Jew, not a religious one).  They ask what my church is like and I try to explain that it is a Jewish temple, not a church.  They ask what the difference is between my religion and theirs.  I try to change the topic since I feel like telling them I don´t think Jesus was God´s son nor my savior will go over very well.  So far I default to saying that in the US we have a lot of religions and they are all very different.  There is a pretty strong divide here between Catholics and Evangelists (my host-family is the latter), so at least I am not picking sides on that one.

Had some awesome talks with my host-dad about campo (a better word for countryside) living.  He has lived in a city before (Panamá) and agrees with me that money does not necessarily make people happy.  He came back to the campo so he can live tranquilo.  We also talked about the importance of taking care of the environment.  One day he showed me around his coffee farm and he taught me a lot about local crops and methods.  He grows so many things: coffee, sugar cane, yuca and other roots, banana, plantain, oranges, etc.  He is a conscientious farmer who is always looking for ways to improve and my brain is spinning with project ideas: compost, pruning, harvesting and processing methods, seed selection and nurseries ... Can´t wait to get started!

Backyard farm full of coffee, yuca, plaintain, etc.
It is hard to limit my conversation topics to exclude technology.  People ask how I communicate with my family, but they really do not know what email is.  I have busted out the camera (which the kids love) but had a hard time explaining that I am not going to print them all, but rather leave them in digital form.  Basically I find myself feeling ashamed every time we talk about things that in the states are completely ordinary, but here are unimaginable and excessive.  I think my kindle might stay packed away for the first few months until I get my own place and privacy ... Juegos de Hambre will just have to wait.

I had some good first pasear-ing experiences.  Met some nice neighbors and many gave me gifts of food.  I know giving things like this to visitors is a common part of the culture here, but I can´t help but feel guilty for taking gifts from people who don´t have much, but it is rude to say no.  At least food is something most don´t have to worry about here since they grow it themselves.

Pineapple and Yuca!
Trash-burning is a big thing in all of Panama and I hate it.  The smoke burns my eyes and makes me cough.  But it is what they have to do.  My host-dad said his cows kept getting sick eating plastic bottles, so he has to burn them to get rid of them.  I explain that in the US we have landfills, but that doesn´t come off as sounding much better for the environment than burning.  We agree that the best solution is to have less trash.

Pig rummaging through trash that will be burned later
I saw a lot of boob this week.  Women are surprisingly open when it comes to breast-feeding.  It seems a little strange that they talk about how scandalous the indigenous people are that wear little clothing, while they are so free with their own bodies.  This will take some getting used to for me.

Culprit of boob sightings
Being a follow-up volunteer will be interesting.  It sounds like the last volunteer did some awesome things and I will have some pretty big shoes to fill.  One perk is after living with my first family until mid-August and then a different family for another month and a half, I will get to move into her old house, which looks wonderful.  And by the time I get there I´m sure it will seem all the more luxurious to me.  That house is also closer to the community and right next to the school (right now I live 30-40 minutes from the school ... Woo exercise!).  In the meantime, if this family can be happy living here always, I can certainly handle roughing it for a few short months.
Future house -- Can`t wait for you to come visit!

Friday, June 15, 2012

El Español, el Baile Típico, el Café Robusta, y SITE ANNOUNCEMENT


El Español

As you may already know, I love speaking in Spanish, something I haven’t had the chance to do much in the last few years.  Being back in a Spanish speaking country feels great.  It’s like a constant mind-quiz and I get really excited when random words come back to me that I haven’t used or thought of in years.  We had a language evaluation a couple weeks ago and mine went really well – I tested at Advanced-Medium.  I have now been switched into the language and culture class that includes two native Spanish speakers from Guatemala and El Salvador.  In this class I can get some extra help on more complicated grammar/vocab, work on Panama-specific phrases, and hopefully learn more about Panamanian culture and history.  We are also working on a project where we walk around the community and gather info on local plants, their uses, and how to grow them.  I’m really excited about this switch since my last class was too easy for me and felt limiting.  I’m looking forward to going deeper into more interesting topics.

El Baile Típico

A few weeks ago I finally got to experience Panama’s typical dance.  Panama has your usual latin dances – salsa, merengue, bachata, reggaetón – but it also has its own “típico.”  The rhythm of típico reminds me a bit of a latino-sounding polka mixed with the Texas-two-step, if you can imagine that.  Like the two-step, típico is danced with a partner and you follow the current of people in a circle around the dance floor, going at your own pace but staying with the general flow (although I’ve heard that this circle pattern might vary regionally).  Overall we had a lot of fun with it and as usual, I’m just happy to be doing any form of dancing at all.  I stuck to dancing with other gringos … the older Panamanian borrachos were just a little too creepy for me.

El Café Robusta

Last week was “Tech Week.”  My sustainable agriculture group was split into three depending on the focus of our assignments, and I hit the jackpot – coffee!!  My group of 8 spent one day at a coffee farm in Colón and the rest of the week visiting and working on various coffee farms around Boquete.  As a coffee-lover and a frequent caffeine-addict, I found learning about the whole production process to be fascinating.  We worked on pruning techniques, shade management, organic pest controls, soil improvement strategies, and processing options. 

From the tree to the cup!

Drying process

I also learned a lot about different coffee varieties.  All of the coffee in the world is classified as either “robusta” or “arábica.”  Robusta grows well in lower altitudes (which is what most of Panama has), tastes more bitter, has a higher caffeine content, is used in things like espresso or blends where taste doesn’t matter so much, and is not exported out of Panama because nobody wants it.  Arábica, on the other hand, is valued for its high quality taste, and is sold at high prices globally, but only grows in select areas of Panama like Boquete that are high enough up in altitude.  The taste of Arábica coffee varies depending on the environment in which the trees are grown and cared for, in addition to how the beans are dried, cleaned, and roasted.

Light, Medium, and Dark Roasts
Since I have never been a coffee snob, the taste-testing we did was a little lost on me.  To me, all coffee tastes good and I would rather drink the robusta that has more caffeine, but apparently the rest of the world disagrees with me and does not want to buy Panama robusta.  As such, communities growing robusta coffee focus mainly on maximizing their production and have no incentive to improve the quality of their product, since the extra effort doesn’t result in more income, and selling is limited to local communities or domestic coffee shops.  Pretty small scale stuff, but hey, every little bit of added income helps.  And if grown using the organic, low-input methods we are learning, coffee production can actually benefit natural environments without depleting resources.


“Cupping” (smell & taste testing)
I was really happy to split into a smaller group for the week.  I feel like I got to know the 7 other coffee volunteers really well and we had a lot of fun together.  Very positive energy all week.  Boquete is a beautiful little tourist town with less humidity than in the rest of the country and a beautiful view of Volcán Barú (it’s dormant, don’t worry).  Some of the farms we visited were pretty far out there.  We got to experience our program director’s badass, off-roading skills – river-crossing included!

Adventure time


Fancy Coffee Farm
At the end of the trip Peace Corps gave us our first completely free day since we’ve been here.  My coffee group headed to a beach called Las Lajas where we met up with the Environmental Health group of 24 volunteers.  We took over the beach and it was awesome.  It was a pleasant surprise to discover that the Pacific Ocean down here is actually warm!  We did a lot of swimming, tanning, drinking, and general relaxing.  It was a much needed break and the perfect way to end such an incredible week.  During a night swim we also got to see some bioluminescence going on (I’ve seen it better in Cali, but it was still cool).  Basically my life is amazing and I am feeling very lucky to be doing what I’m doing here.


California girls reunited with the Pacific
Where the jungle meets the Beach


Site Announcement
  
This morning our sites were announced!  I am going to a small, latino community of 200 people called el Harino en the province Panama Oeste (Western Panama).  My site is relatively accessible by road and I have a few other volunteers within a 45 minute hike.  I won't have electricity but will have a relatively stable source of water.  My work will include coffee production but also home gardens, fish tanks, etc.  Woo!  Next week we will visit our communities and find out more info...  !!!