At the beginning of October I had the opportunity to visit
the Comarca Ngobe-Bugle for the first time.
The term “Comarca” refers to an indigenous reservation. People who live inside comarcas are citizens
of Panama, but also follow a separate set of rules established by their
tribe. About five tribes have such
status throughout Panama, and the Ngobe (pronounced no-bay) are one of the
biggest groups.
A good friend said that the group of farmers turned
gardeners he is working with could use some help with agribusiness, so he
invited me out to give an informal talk to his group. After getting off a six hour bus ride in a
city called Tole, Reid met me and together we hopped on a chiva which took us
across the line into the Comarca. After
that, we began what Reid warned me would be a two hour hike. “The good news is that the hike is half
downhill,” Reid said cheerfully, “but that means the other half is
uphill.” He was not kidding. Down one mountainside, across a bridge over a
river, and up the other mountainside was quite a trek that my asthma was not so
happy about. Luckily it was gorgeous the
whole way.
Shortly after making it to the community La Tijera, the
daily afternoon downpour began. We hid
inside and Reid taught me how he makes chocolate from the cacao found around
the area. Yum!
The next day, five of the seven members of Reid’s group
turned up for the charla (pretty
decent turn out!). The talk went well
and the group seemed interested and caught on pretty quick. I had heard the stereotype that many Ngobe
are stone-faced and reserved. While the
people I encountered throughout this trip did seem a little more reserved than
the louder Latinos I live with, and I did notice I was getting openly stared at
by serious-looking eyes everywhere I went, Reid’s group had no problem
participating in the session and even laughed at our jokes. Whenever the conversation slipped into the
local Ngobere language, I said the one phrase Reid taught me, meaning: “I don’t
understand what’s going on at all,” and that seemed to go over well.
I really enjoyed this visit.
While I fully believe I would have been happy wherever I ended up and
that each site has advantages and disadvantages (physical, cultural, etc.), I
was struck by how different my life would have been for these two years if I
had as intense of a hike in as Reid does.
Leaving for appointments, bringing home groceries, having friends visit
… These things are complicated enough for me as it is. A two hour sweaty, wheezy climb would add a
whole new level of challenges. Additionally,
it was hard to imagine how this community functions so far off the path. People must haul in heavy materials like zinc
sheets for roofs and food for the small stores.
If someone gets sick, they are carried all the way out in a
hammock. One advantage of the higher
altitude community of La Tijera is cell phone signal everywhere. Overall I feel lucky to live where I do, and
lucky to have the chance to travel and experience sites like Reid’s.
Reid and I talked a bit about what the future holds. We still have eight months here, and
sometimes that seems like a lot, but time does fly. Reid says he has really enjoyed this
experience, but he thinks it may have satisfied his wanderlust and that he will
now be ready to settle down in the U.S. permanently. I have to say that I do not feel the same
way. It is true that I am looking
forward to spending time stateside and plan to attend business school somewhere
in my native country. However, for me
this experience has confirmed that I want to continue working in international
development and has strengthened the connection I feel to Latin America. Right now I cannot imagine myself in a
long-term lifestyle that does not involve traveling abroad. So we’ll see what the future holds, but
something tells me, my wanderlust may not be curable.
Fútbol-Mania
I made it to the Panama vs. U.S. soccer game and it was a
pretty awesome experience. I had
carefully planned my schedule so that I would be in the city at just the right
time. Several things almost went very
wrong that could have led to minor disasters, but somehow it all worked out
great.
I came out of site on a Monday to go to a city called
Penonome in order to give an agribusiness training session to the government
agriculture organization MIDA. My
volunteer team powered through the all-day training session on Tuesday, cutting
off Panamanian tangential rants left and right, and somehow wrapped things up
by 2pm. From there we hopped on a bus
and after just over four hours we’d made it through rush hour traffic to get to
the hostel in Panama City. A quick
change and a few beers later we were en route to the stadium, again with much
traffic and the added pleasure of a totally sexist cab driver transporting four
independent female volunteers. Ayayay.
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| MIDA employees taking the stage |
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| Explaining how to calculate production costs with small scale farmers |
Finally made it to the stadium before 8pm for an 8:30
kick-off (although the tickets said 9:00) .
For some reason, they split the entering line male/female and only
females were required to get an invasive pat-down (by female officers), so as
always, the girls line was insanely slow while the boys walked straight
in. The women started getting
pushy. I am usually a wait-in-line kind
of person, but by this point, I was in dire need of finding a restroom, so I
pushed my way in and made a run for it.
 |
| Girls line to enter the premises |
Disaster! They seemed
to have oversold my section and had closed the doors. I waited with angry Panamanians who tried to
bully the security guards into opening the door. I let it be known that I was just trying to
get in so I could pee, and the Panamanians instantly supported my claim and
called the security guards out for their shameful treatment of foreigners in
their country saying things like, "I bet the U.S. wouldn't do this to people at their stadium!" (a little extreme, but then again, seriously, put some bathrooms
on the outside!). A door squeaked open
and all rushed in. I saw security guards
pulling out the pepper spray. AHH! I approached one and calmly asked where the
bathroom was. She looked sympathetic and
pointed where to go. Finally!
Relief! And then … Uh oh, where are all
my friends? I had bolted and left my
large gringo group somewhere behind.
I made some phone calls, but no one was answering / signal
was not so good (of course). I started
watching the game. I got a few weird
looks since I was a white girl by myself in a sea of Panamanians. A couple people nearby started making
conversation and once I told them I was rooting for Panama, all were instantly
friendlier and invited me up to get a better viewing spot. And then Panama scored. GOOOOOOOAAALLLL. Beer rained down and the energy was
contagious.
I spotted a few volunteers walking by. I latched on and we explored a different
section (supposedly you were only allowed the sit in your assigned section, but
I found this was not totally the case, especially considering they’d oversold
mine), and we were thrown free Panama jerseys along the way. Eventually we made our way to where a large
group of volunteers had congregated.
Many were decked out in vibrant U.S. apparel and were very loud in
supporting the stars and stripes. I
personally kept rooting for Panama just because I think a win would have meant
more to Panamanian citizens than to Americans who generally barely care about
soccer. After a few more goals and beer
rains, the game was approaching its end and Panama was up 2 to 1. So exciting!
Then the U.S. scored. Woah! It’s tied.
The score board had not even caught up and then BAM the U.S. scored
again! It was done. Just like that the U.S. came through 3 to 2
and Panama’s hopes were destroyed. I
felt bad, but the excitement of the other volunteers was hard to resist. U-S-A! U-S-A!
Overall, the soccer game was an extremely disorganized
adventure that could have gone terribly wrong at a few different points, but
ended up being one of the coolest activities I have experienced in Panama City.
Agribusiness Grant
Update
I again wanted to thank everyone who contributed or
considered contributing to my Agribusiness Seminar Project. My grant has been completely funded! Over the next months I will begin planning
these three seminars to take place within the December to May time frame. These seminars will present all kinds of new
logistical challenges for me to conquer and will certainly keep me busy working
on something I really care about. I will
keep you posted as the project moves along!
