Bocas Baseball

Last night I went to my first Panamanian Baseball game. The national league has started up. Each province has a team, my host brothers and several people in my town are obsessed and listen to the games till midnight, on their radios. Bocas was undefeated with 4 wins to some formidable opponents. On Tuesday they played Veraguas, who is also undefeated. The car from the Junta Comunal ( town committee) charged a dollar for round trip. (This is an incredible bargain because usually one way to Changuinola is about $3. We packed about 17 people into this covered pick up and headed for the stadium. I had big expectations as the stadium is the first thing visible when you come into town as well as its bleachers behind home plate. However when we arrived the announced the bleachers were not done being constructed. This is classic Panamanian style, they have had a year to finish the bleachers, and they aren't ready so they probably are losing half of their seating (or standing) capacity.
Sorry these pictures came out bad it was hard shooting with the lights. The game was like a little league game, but with wild fans. At one point after an inning a Bocas player right ran over to where I was standing, whipped out his change pouch from his back pocket and gave a friend or family money to buy food. There was so much more fan-player interaction it was pretty cool.
The fans were wild. It reminded me of being at a typical Latin American soccer game. Maestro Ramòn and I were right next to the guy with the megaphone. He would either blast the siren for an entire at-bat or just shout ¨¡Ponchelo! ¡Curvalo! ¡Si puedehombe!¨(Bocas spanish has alot of Caribbean island influence from Jamaica, so lots of sortof english is spoken) Air horns where the norm as well as whistles. There was also a drum band that sounded great and they would blast reggaeton, meringue and other music between innings. The games also have 50 cent beers and $1 meat on a stick and 25 cent banana chips, and entrance is only $2. Bocas ended up getting blown out but it was still a great time. I just felt like putting in a picture of the main street in Changuinola. Today was a rare rainy today in the dry season. The street is lined mostly with Almacenes which are department stores.

Since I´ve been living in Valle, my thatch (Penca) roof has been leaking. This is especially a problem because I live in the rainiest province in Panama, that can get downpours everyday for a month. My family helped with this situation by putting peaces of sheet metal roofing over my bedroom. This worked quite well, and also kept out bats, rats (to a certain extent although I still see them in my room at night sometimes) and any basura falling from the the roof. So my host family has been saving up my $20 monthly rent to buy new Penca and have it replaced.

So for the next 2 to three weeks all of my belongings are in bags or just piled on to one side of my house, while the other side is being worked on. This also means I can´t live there because there is constantly stuff falling from the ceiling. To make a roof, they find this tree that has massive leaves, that look like palm fronds. Each frond is about a meter long. They split the leave in two, so there and then stack them to dry. Once they are dry they are placed, and tied on almost horizontally. So on the inside all you can see are the main stalks.

The other day we went to go clean the toma de agua for my part of town. Toma de agua literally means take of water, so its wherever you channel water from a natural source into a pipe. The one we just built is with is from an underground spring. This is from a creek. That means that all sorts of junk can fall into the the pipe and ultimately the tank. Also it means the water can be contaminated much easier from surface water runoff.

You can see the dam and the 3 inch pip coming out of it here. In this picture is my counterpart Vicente (President of the aqueduct) and Maestro Ramòn, who is a teacher and President of the Health Committee.
On the dam you can see a wire cage used to filter out the largest leaves and other trash.
They are essentially just stirring the water up and pushing the settled mud into the tube. They had disconnected the pipe just after the dam so all this muddy water didn´t flow into the tank.

Some random pics

We had our in service training a few weeks ago. One night we went to this bar that had MASSIVE SOMBREROS. This picture stands to tell the size of these. Needless to say I kinda cut up my forehead because it was like having a wicker basket rubbing up against your face.

The NGO that is funding the majority of our aqueduct came to visit about a month ago. I just got these pics from a friend. You can see in the backround what the toma looked like before we put the final cement cap on.

Here is a picture of Greg, the director of the Environmental Health sector in Panama (my boss) on the right. Next is Father Roberto ¨Niggity Kree¨and his niece Ashton. They all hiked up to the toma, to check it out. Roberto lives in Mexico and follows up on the work that a NGO called Waterlines. They provide funding for many water projects that PC Panama does. I was lucky to have they previous volunteer in my site solicit money from them, so I didn´t have to do any of the fundraising leg work.

Talking about the toma design.

Dimly lit picture of the whole group that came including Byron from Rotary Club international who is also provided much of the funding for the project.

In other news I had a great weekend. On Saturday I helped clean out the two aqueduct tanks that give water to my house. The amount of sludge and leaves and crap that was in the tanks was pretty gross considering I drink that water directly. I even found tadpoles in one of the tanks! We cleaned them out with dish soap and chlorine, and I explained to them how they can use the older higher tank as a primitive sedimentation tank to clean most of the basura from the water.

After that I played in a soccer tournament in my town. I played for the Valle team, they are really good ball handlers but don´t spread the ball around the field or pass much. It kind of reminded me of litter kids soccer when they all bunch around the ball. Anyways my team ended up winning, I also got a free meal out of it. Later that day I signed on to play in the soccer league that is going to start in March. The league has about 8 teams from around my county and most games are played in my town because it has a field with nets. It is mostly teenagers but some older guys play too.

In the night we all went to the corregiadoria, which is the equivalent of a town hall. Since my town is the center of the county this is where are business goes down such as registering to vote or registering births and settling disputes. They have a solar panel and a battery hooked up to a tv there. At night 20 people from town crammed into this wood building to watch Panama vs Costa Rica in the Central American soccer tournament. Panama ended up losing in penalty kicks.

Party in Casco Viejo

This weekend we went to a fellow volunteer Victoria's, house in Casco Viejo of Panama city. Her parents just moved down here to renovate an old house. This part of the city was the first founded but was burned down whenCaptain Morgan attacked. As a UN world heritage site it is full of old stone churches and interesting buildings. However it is also dangerous to go out at night because it is for the most part very poor. There was a bunch of volunteers at the party as well as the habitants of the building. Most of them were retired people from the states, but all very interested in Peace Corps.

Rob, Jacob and Michelle rocking out.

Some of the best food that I will have all month. The sangria was excellent too.

Kevin, myself and Ryu rocking out to the Talking Heads. Its a tradition!

There was an illuminated fountain in the middle of the courtyard. And a sweet bar too.

We switched shirts so I could be wearing all red. I had on my bright red Santa Claus shorts.
Stacey, Melissa, Mo, Justin and Brandon.

Finishing the toma de agua

Before I left for in service training we finished the toma. The basic idea of the toma is to channel the water from a natural spring into a pipe. You design them so the water never is out in open air. This prevents rainwater runoff and animals from getting into the water system. They are challenging to make because no too are alike.

This is the sort of jungle frog I see usually once or twice when I´m hiking up to the toma.
Here you can see the toma, you can tell how steep the area immediately above the toma is. I am nervous that a landslide could harm the toma but don´t want to disturb it any more because it has a good rock base. We are planning on planting an anti erosion plant called sote caballo. That is a two in pipe coming out, we used this to keep the construction area relatively dry.
Here is a real pretty picture of the toma. You can see the actual spring box. Two times a year the top (not present) will be taken off and it will be cleaned of any silt they may have accumulated. You can also see the two overflow pipes. Normally this spring puts out about 30 gallons a minute which is a very high flow for one spring. However after a large rainstorm or series of rainy days the flow can get as high as 60 gpm! and that is only when I have been measuring! For this reason I put two overflow pipes because you can cause permanent damage if the water backs up into the actual spring, because water will travel underground and find a new exit.
These are the three major players that show up to work every day. Emilio, Jose and Ramon. Emilio carried up a 100 pound cement, and then went to go get more sand, that day.

Special shout out to the Rotary Club International who provided the funds for the project.
Here is a view from the toma looking at the jungle. You can see the rancho where we would eat lunch and ladies would make coffee. This is also where we all gathered when it started pouring rain.

They are laying the form work and rebar for the spring box lid.

Cows and Cacao

Hey, right now I'm in Panama City. I just finished a week long in service training outside the city. Volunteers with experience, PC trainers, and Panamanians all helped train people from my group in the specific sections that they needed help in. I went to sessions on aqueducts, latrine maintenance, grant proposals. I found it very interesting and it was also good to just see the other people from our group. Panama City is really hoppin and reminds me of Miami. It is definitely strange seeing very hip people, posh stores and restaurants like the Hard Rock Cafe, and knowing they are in the same country that we serve.

This guy actually is currently representing my district in Panama City. How can you trust a politician that you can't see his eyes. I think they are using his campaign banner as a shower curtain.

Chanda, one of the many dogs that belongs to my host family had 4 puppies under my house.

My host sister Juanita preparing 'pita'. This is the plant that the fibers for the traditional purses come from. First you scrape the leaves so it is just the strands then you wash it, dry it and roll it into thread.

My host brother Justin and friend Gerardo went up to some cow pastures. Justin is a cow tecnico and used to work with milk cows. He is certified in all sorts of things about cows and tells great stories about charging bulls, horse back riding and milk. We went up to this pasture to 3 cows that our family owns. In this photo we were putting salt on our hands for the cows to lick. They love that stuff!
The baby calf, maybe 1 month old.

Justin, is probably my best friend in town. He has some knowledge of the outside world because he went to high school, and technical school, and has traveled around Panama. He is a huge WWF fan.

My host family purchased 50 pollitos from the Ministry of Agriculture. It is like an investment, all you have to do is feed them, and they grow fat. You buy them for about 50 cents a bird and can sell them for about $5. They lantern is there so they eat at night as well as day and it provides them with a little warmth is the cool nights here.
I ran into these guys on the way to working on the aqueduct. This baby looked so cute and so tough at the same time. You can't see but they were actually on their way to the health center because the baby has leshminieasis on its face. Lesh, as its more commonly known is a flesh eating virus that basically causes an un healing scab. It comes from sand flies that have been snacking on sloths. The treatment is very harsh shots. 3 times a day for 3 weeks straight. Basically its no fun to get.

My neighboring volunteer Sara is an agricultural volunteer and put together this cacao workshop. She organized for 2 tecnicos (experts or anyone with training) on cacao to come visit and explain how to properly prune a tree and keep it disease free. The tecnicos were trained in an early program by PC. So this class was a practice for them too. To me it sounded like they really knew what they were talking about.

Here he is up in the tree pruning cacao. You want to cut some of the leaves down to let more light through, as well as giving more energy to the blooming cacao mallorcas.


This is a view of the river nearby. I have yet to go swimming in it. It looks deep but not all that clean.

The man standing is the head of ANAM which is like the forest service or EPA. Because my town is the largest in Palo Seco national forest reserve ANAM visits quite frequently. This guy was born in my site and has much family here. It is interesting that he has so much power coming from such a humble backround. He is a great example and roll model for people that want to succeed in Valle.

This meeting was held by the NGO that is in my site called ASAFRI that works with reforestation, cacao, and protecting Palo Seco. Currently there is much heated discussion because a major hydroelectric dam is going to be constructed. It will not directly affect any one in my town but some people have farms of family in the affected area. The people of my town feel as if they are being left out of the loop in discussions with the national government, ANAM and the dam company AES.

This ladies and another guy Lorenzo are trying to start a bread making company in town. Currently all the bread at the stores is brought in every few days from a bakery afuera. Their bread was good and they are also planning on making sweets but it definitely has a long way to go before they can beat out the real bakery. They also sell it out of their house and lack a real schedule. I try to buy it as frequently as I can to support the local economy.

When I was talking to them they invited a community member named Ortencio, that is one of the few to actually leave the town and go to college. He is living in Panama City now working with a large cement company. When he came they people in town new he had money, and was part of a 'development' organization. These bread bakers solicited his help. They are very good at appearing organized and professional, even though I am almost positive they had no future business plan or anything. They reminded Ortencio that they are family and explained how they just needed a little money to get their business off the ground. They even presented a letter that was formally asking for money. This appeared to be very organized, whoever I knew that they had just jotted the letter down moments before his arrival and had hurried to put their aprons on and look busy before he showed up.

I assumed that the money they needed was to purchase flour and other ingredients and tools in bulk. Instead they asked for a new oven. They already have a regular cooking oven (kinda of extravagant for my town where most people cook with fire) but said they needed a new one exclusively for the business. Sure enough Ortencio reached in his pocked and gave this guy Lorenzo $200 for a new oven, explaining that it was a from his organization and they need to pay him back. I am very interested to see if they will pay any of it back, but I suppose it is possible if their panaderia takes off. This is a great example of the type of development that has existed in my site, and many others. When people just give things away it makes the people believe that they don't need to work to get things just beg. It also causes them to expect gifts from development workers. 'Joe what are you going to build for us? What are you going to bring us?'

This is the so called 'inter-americana' highway connecting my house and my host families house. For almost the whole month of January it was raining almost every other day, so it was constantly muddy. I had a miniature 'junta' where I bought pig (freshly slaughtered in town for 70 cents a pound) for my host family and all the kids helped me cut down the trees and haul gravel and sand from the river. This has been great as i no longer need to where rubber boots to go to the bathroom. It is still missing a little more gravel though.