Just to start

Well I have started this blog as a way to share my experience here in Panama with all of you. Hopefully this will make it easier for me to update you all on my life, and share my pictures with you. To start I should probably explain what I am up to for those of you who dont know, just a brief summary...

I am in the PeaceCorps. I live in the mountains of Panama with an indigenous group called the Ngobe, who live in thatched huts and wear a traditional dress called a Nagwa, with the beautiful dientes of different colors. I work in sustainable agriculture, helping them move away from slash-and-burn or the worse option of over abundant chemical use...and toward a future of organic agriculture. I work in soil conservation, organic fertilizers, fish/rice tanks and lots of other fun ag. tecniques that might not be so easily explained. I spend most of my days hiking to fincas and working with farmers while explaining what I mean by organic...a term most of them have never heard of.

I live the life that they live...for three months now I have been living with a family. My family is huge, and I like it that way. I have like 9 brothers and sisters, too many cousins to count and we all live happily in a one room house. This will be changing soon due to the fact that my little hut is now complete. No more than 10ft by 10ft, but all of it mine and that is what counts! It is really cute, or quaint is probably a better word. A thatched roof with tabla (wood) walls it cost me all of $100 to build and worth every penny for the increase in privacy. Due this soon to come change in residency my diet will soon be making a much needed change in direction. Up until now I have been eating what the family eats...which isn't much. We eat plain yucca and plain rice....and not much else. I am excited and at the same time feeling a little guilty that I will be eating better than them. I am hoping to produce much of my own vegetables from my little huerto I have growing in front of my new house. So far I have beans, corn, squash, tomato, pepper, basil, lemongrass, cucumber and hopefully lots more to come.

Every two weeks or so I take a much needed trip into the nearest city, my regional capital...David. In order to do this I have to hike out 2 hours and hop a bus for another two hours, but all this travel is so worth it to be able to check my email, eat real food, drink a beer, sleep in a bed, take a hot shower and enjoy air conditioning. This is my time to spend with my fellow volunteers, we meet up for some much needed conversation in English and just plain fun. The people I have met here in PeaceCorps are some of the coolest people I have ever met (could I expect any different from PeaceCorps?), and without them I don't know if I could ever survive this experience. There are a few that I know will be friends for life...and if nothing else, that has made this experience well worth the struggles.

Well that is my life in short. I hope that fills you all in and I will try to keep you posted on a semi-regular basis! I hope to have some pictures up here soon to share with you all the beauty of Panama!

Un abrazo, (A hug)
Wakan