Love hate relationship with my life

So I just wanted to lay out in a very organized way what I love and hate about my life here in Panama...lets start with hate: 1)Bugs...any and all of them. Cockroaches crawling up my pants in in my food box, scorpions on my clothes and in the walls, spiders in the roof and in my boots, ants (see last blog), chiggers, ticks, mosquitos...I could go on forever. 2) Kids...always asking me for something, peeking through my walls, always talking in Ngobe so I don´t understand, never giving me privacy, making me feel guilty for all I have even though I have very little. 3) Lack of education and understanding of anything...they think water is bad for you, they prefer spending money on coffee even though they are poor, they don´t pay the water fee of 50 cents, they call women sick when they are pregnant and still make them work until they have the baby, they never participate in anything community oriented, they have become totally dependent on outside resources so they think I am only here to give them things, their main pastime is drinking chicha fuerte and beating the shit out of eachother and their wives and children. 4) Their sense of time...meeting at 8am....starts at noon 5) The food...chicken feet should not be eaten and plain white rice and yucca with salt does not constitute a stable diet. Well enough with hate...even though I could go on forever...love 1) I lived in a thatched hut in a little village in the beautiful mountains of Panama...what´s not to love? 2) I actually feel (even though sometimes I have to hold a knife to their neck to get anything done) that I am making a difference, that I am actually teaching them something that will help them. 3) I get to work outside...I love sharing daily work with the people -sembraring y cosecharing: yucca, rice, beans, otoe...learning to pilar, tostar and all the other things you gotta do to prepare the harvest. -tumbaring monte: I love to cut shit with my machete 4) I am learning to speak Ngobe and I have made a chakara...the looks that the old women get in their eyes when they see this...awesome! 5) Hiking (can be on hate list also...depends on how much I am carrying) it is such an amazing feeling to have to hike everywhere...and it is all beautiful. The majority of my work is about 1 hour hike away. I especially love hiking out because I know a cold beer and a piece of chicken are at the end of it. The simple pleasures of life in the campo! 5) I love teaching them about the world, showing them my national geographics, explaining maps and things that happen outside their world. Even if that means explaining for the upteenth time that yes man did land on the moon. 6) Last but not least...partying with all my PCP buddies. Some of the coolest people I have ever met or will ever meet. Well that is it folks...my life put into some lists!


Ants
OK...so I have a couple frustrations and I felt that I needed to get them out. First off...I have developed a rampant fear of ants. I know that sounds silly because they are so small and I have scorpions and other fun insects, but when I see an ant on me my heart rate automatically goes up...alot. I woke up the other night to the feel of something biting my legs. I look down with a flashlight and my bed and legs are covered with thousands of little red fuckers. I freak out, and rightfully so if you ask me...the ants have taken over my floor, stove, bed and much more. I finally kill the majority of them and go back to bed. Unfortunately my adventure does not end there...I had the worst dream about those damn things. So the dream was that ants were eating my entire house...my clothes, my dishes, my camera...everything. I could do nothing to stop them. My brother Nicasio tells me that the only way to get rid of them is to blow up the house. So I escape the slow death of being eaten by ants, and light my house on fire with lots of gasoline. Then I wake up...and think once again I am covered by ants. Anyway...I might sound like a wuss but I am deathly afraid of ants now. So if anyone is looking for a way to scare the shit out of me...there it is. Thanks for listening.