Whirlwind

Whirlwind:

It’s always embarrassing how much time passes between my blogs. For the 5 people that actually read this ;) sorry for being such a slacker. Here is my attempt to explain the last several months. 

First, my trip to the beautiful country of Ecuador. A note for the wise: when traveling to Ecuador you have to remember Quito’s altitude and pack shoes. I only packed sandals, which was a huge mistake. Quito is cold, 68 degrees cold which because of Panama’s influence, I was Freeeeeeeeezing. Quito, although cold is really nice. I walked into a Public market and was in heaven (silver jewelry, beautiful scarves, and beautiful canvases). Quito is surrounded by beautiful mountains. The city center is incredible. If you feel the urge to visit a church and then wish to visit another and another, Quito is the place to go. You can go catholic church-hopping. The down town area alone has over 200 churches.  I went with Dad to visit Ana Grijalva and Rachel, two amazing woman that we met because of Pitzer’s International host family’s program. Rachel went last semester to Quito to study ecology/environmental rights (she actually made a really great documentary called “ “ that you can all watch on youtube). My dad and I flew into Quito and the next day had an opportunity to meet all of Ana’s extended family and see her mom’s absolutely beautiful home. The next day we went with Rachel and her mom to the cloud forest just north of Octavalo known as Intag. We actually stayed in a very small hotel in Nangulvi. The next day we went to visit a group of women that work with bolsas, we also went to see a coffee cooperative, and finally visited a group of women that form a aloe vera soap group in a small community called Rosal. This group of women was so inspiring to see. They formed their group as a reaction to a cement mine close by that is really the only form of an economy in the region. Several deaths have occurred at the mine and these women are prepared to fight for safer working conditions. They are a group of very strong feminists in the middle of rural Panama, I absolutely loved talking to them. One great experience in Rosal that evening was the cultural night. The group of women and our tour guide Franklin played music and we danced along to songs about their community and Ecuador. The guitarist also played a couple songs by Vicente Fernandez! It was so much fun. I would really love to visit them when I travel after I finish Peace Corps next June. Rachel, her mom, my dad and I also went on a grueling hike the following day. At some points we were so close to the edge of a cliff, it was a little too close for me. Once we made it to the waterfall and back to our tour guides house he admitted to us that the week before a gringa had slipped and had to spend a week in his parents home to recover. We all made it back to the car after 19 kilometers and drove back to Quito. The next days were spent on the coast close to Canoa at a small organic farm known as Rio Muchacho. The farm doesn’t create any waste, everything is composted (including compost latrines). We stayed in very cute cabins and played catch phrase in English and Spanish. We rode horses, and I have officially decided that horse riding is not the thing for me. We made coffee and chocolate. We ate delicious vegetarian food. And before I knew it, we were heading back to Quito. 

Back in Panama,  during the month of June we hosted two recycling days. The kids really, really want to attend the field-trip I have planned for the end of the year. They are all fighting to be “recycling stars.” The parents have also become super involved. We have over 16 people helping count the recycling every recycling day. In Panama, I have learned that if you need help, you really really have to ask for it and then people help. We just opened a bank account with the recycling committee’s president because we have made over 445 dollars recycling.  The project is going so well. Sometimes I cannot believe how well it is going. I actually have to share a presentation next week with the Community environmental conservation volunteers next monday about recycling projects in volunteers communities. I have become the recycling expert, who knew? We have hosted two recycling days this month and the next recycling day is August 6th and August 20th. 

A couple weeks ago, (After escaping my site after seeing a 23 year old slitting his wrists in my site) I attended a women’s artisans seminar that was hosted by Peace Corps Panama’s Gender and Development group. I took two women from my community, Yadira and Senora Sebastiana. We traveled to San Felix, Chiriqui on Monday and stayed until Friday morning. The peace corps had allotted for 10 facilitators, but at the last minute gave me permission to attend the seminar. The seminar was incredible. The volunteers were such great facilitators, they are all very talented speakers. The seminar included talks on price, cost, quality, competition, budget, calculators, nutrition, child development, HIV/AIDS, and domestic violence. 44 women from peace corps communities attended the seminar. These women were all from different areas of panama, including Darien, Colon, Panama, Cocle, Veraguas, Herrera, and Bocas del Toro. A number of the women were also from the indigenous regions (comarcas) known at the Embera and the Ngobe-Bugle. The indigenous women actually made up the majority of the women at the seminar. I am sure its not often that this happens at seminars so it was a really great experience especially for my community members to have a chance to interact with indigenous women. I actually had a wonderful time working with two women, Celina and Josefina both of which are unable to read or write.  As the addition to the seminar, my job was to help these two women during the charlas that were heavily oriented in reading and writing. These women were so sweet. Apparently they told their volunteer (Matt T) before they left for the seminar that even though they couldn’t read or write that they were going to “listen really hard.” The women also during the seminar had many hours to teach the others their craft. I actually sat in during these workshops as well and managed to make a beautiful necklace out of plant fibers and recycled earrings (under Lauren Lynch’s guidance) made out of magazines. The seminar was such a great experience, to laugh and learn with these women. I love outspoken women and many that attended are very outspoken. Others that aren’t super outspoken had an opportunity to share their personalities during cultural performances or their craft work. I really want to begin giving similar charlas in my site...

I got back to site and thankfully the 23 year old that I saw attempting suicide had entered a program and his family said he was doing well. I actually intervened and called the ambulance and police when I saw him the week before, which the family wasn’t too happy about--and Peace Corps wasn’t too happy either. That week in site was super rough, my host dad had been beaten up and robbed on his way back from El Valle de Anton. Luckily my host dad and my neighbor and his family appear to be doing alright. (I normally try to keep this blog happy and upbeat but that week in site was anything but..that week in site was efffed up)

Last week was super busy. I have a economic development charla hosted by INADEH everyday in the health center with 18 women for the next 5 weeks. We have been learning how to “re-utilize” and reuse recycled materials. So far, we have made vases, mirrors, picture frames, lamps, baskets, various wall decorations, flowers, and small purses. I cannot articulate how cool it is to hang out with these women Monday-Friday from 3-6. The president of the recycling committee, vice-president, and I have been participating in the charla together. I have also made dinner for a number of the participants on friday evenings after the charla. 

I have also been playing soccer in site. A couple of weeks ago, my team won first place! I have been in the chiva and randomly people have pointed at me and said, “la gringa juega muy bien.” alright! We have another tournament on Sunday. I would really love to host a tournament and invite peace corps volunteers to form a team to play.

Last week, I also had some friends visit my community. One of their complaints has been that they know Membrillo, but I have yet to visit their communities. So friday, bright and early, Bri and I made our way into the real Cocle countryside to two friends, Sergio and Sean. The real campo, as opposed to where I live (in the fake campo--fake because its easily accessible and has electricity and running water) takes two hours to get to and then an hour hike. All three of the volunteers that I went to visit are Environmental Health volunteers, “the bad-asses.”  Badasses because they work with aqueducts, compost latrines, and other bad ass projects. Over the weekend we jumped into a raging current (I only did it once because I was terrified), we ate fresh beef (the community members killed a cow at 1 am and made over 300 dollars selling the meat the following day--and Sean and Bri proceeded to take epic pictures of themselves with the cow head), we hiked in a sea of mud, we measured homes for the aqueduct---in terms of distance and altitude, played catch phrase (I have yet to win a game), and we made brownies out of discarded tuna cans in a pot full of water and rocks. It was such a great weekend in the “campo campo.” 

This week, Monday we hosted our 9th recycling day at the school. We made a whopping 113 dollars. My next big event to plan is the field trip for the first week of December. We will be taking 48 students to hopefully 3 science museums in Panama City. I was asking about transportation today in Penonome and am hoping a local politician will provide it for us, if not I have to start looking for donations....:)

Tomorrow, I am headed to a beach resort with group 68 volunteers to celebrate our 1 year in Panama. Everything is included, drinks and food. I can barely contain my excitement. Then I am off to visit an Embera site and have my body painted in jagua de nuevo (a paint thats lasts for about 2 weeks)

Hasta Pronto, Sonia