Back to the drawing board

So after much deliberation I decided to cancel my English Club after the 2nd class of absolutely no one showing up, the forth of three people or less showing. It wasn't even raining! I felt a little insulted because this was the class after our big movie night, where I showed Watchmen and gave everybody popcorn and soda and we all had a good time. We were supposed to talk about the movie and what it can tell us about American culture but no one showed. I'm trying to learn from my mistakes but I can't think for the life of me what kept people from the class besides shear laziness. They aprovechar of the fun stuff we do but they don't want to do the work and think about anything. I think this is illustrated perfectly by the fact that people don't say "Estoy preocupado" which is the dictionary Spanish way to say "I'm worried". Instead they say "Estoy pensado" here, which is dictionary for "I am thinking". Thinking is bad. Thinking is worrying. So let's just eat all the damn popcorn and never do our assignments.

So instead, and I want to run this by El Jefe first so the kids will have to wait until the end of the month, I want to start a turtoring program. I want to go house to house at assigned times. I'm hoping this will reduce abscences and distractions. Truth be told, at the movie night it became apparent to me that the kids use my class to meet up with their little girlfriends safe far from parental or bochinchoso eyes. This explains why they were always leaving the room randomly without permission. They wanted to flirt in privacy.

I think going house to house will be a great step in the right direction, it will get me pasearing more, it will allow me to vary the classes according to English skills. The club had nine through seventeen year olds which was problematic in this regard.

The other news is that someone stole the propane tank and a garden tool from the school. Who does that? Jeez. The police are actually involved now which is a big deal considering that the nearest station is 30 to 45 minutes away. I hope they find the dude that did it but I highly doubt anything will come of the investigation.

What else... I've started mingling more with the extranjeros. Met a Spaniard and his French wife. Met an American/Canadian who is really interested in helping the community. We'll see what happens. I'm tired of taking baby steps but look at what happened when I just jumped into teaching English. It was a waste of two months of my time and now I'm back where I started. I know I sound like I'm ranting but I'm actually in a good mood. I'm just poking a little fun at myself really. I spent all day at the beach with my best buddies in town and then I introduced them to the glory that is Goodfellas. So I have no complaints. I'm even proud of being so quick to dust myself off and plan out this tutoring thing, which I'm sure will have it's own challenges. Also, there is a new ANAM guy I need to introduce myself to so I hope he will be able to help with the vivero thing. I'm not going to let myself get choked out. I am human too and want some dignity. I think you can agree with that, right?

Caroline demands a post and I say "How long?"

So I do feel like I should say something on this blog but I don't know what. (Haven't I started the last three posts like that now?) I'm just gonna ramble. There has been a long going on is some ways and absolutely nothing going on in others. I went to Panama for a long weekend to chill with my Peace Corps buddies. It's always amazing to me how PC lets you spend time such a wide range of personalites and that always leads to good time. I spent too much money but it was all worth it. I spent a day's pay on a book. WOOT! I saw Inglorious Basterds and it was great. Killing Nazis for 2hrs plus? YES PLEASE! Also, I ATE A BAGEL!!! AND INDIAN FOOD!!! It was really overwhelming to be around that much light and sound after being in the campo so long. I felt shell shocked but in a good way. There were a few funny stories that came out of it but I don't want to waste your time here. I'm sure it'll all come out eventually. Ask me.

So I was glad to be back in site and rock out a good English Club class even though I was super tired. The numbers for the English Club have plummited but I think that's a good thing. The kids that just come to play with the furniture or flirt with the girls don't show up as often now.

Saturday we had a big party and it was pretty cool. Though, I did lose my cool with this one old dude who would not leave me alone and I started cursing at him in English. I know that it's just a cultural difference but it gets under my skin when a man is that much of a pest and don't take "leave me alone" for an answer. I like almost everyone in my community but when there is a fiesta and the guys are all drunk and clingy it creates an illusion of danger and I get super testy. BUT! on the bright side this one woman started talking to the viejo for me saying "You have to respect her" and such. The whole time she was acting like I were her child (in a good way) and it was really comforting to know that someone has my back. The early hours of the fiesta were really great. There was a parade and singing. It was to celebrate campesino culture so there was dancing, polleras, tamborito and all that stuff I am fond of. And hojaldres. God I love hojaldres.

Honestly, today I'm a little down because I really need to have work to do. I have way too much time to sit and think about all the choices I've made in my life and the choices of humanity in general and if we have HAVE choices and so on that it's making me a little nuts. Plus, I've been taking a crack at reading the Bible again and that always puts me on edge. Divine justice does not look kindly on idle hands. And what does it mean that I favor justice over compassion these days?

TANGENT ABOUT JUSTICE: So I bought a copy of Che, the Benicio Del Toro flick, and while I haven't decided whether or not it's a good movie yet (leaning toward no), I give them mad props for showing El Comandante actually ordering an execution! He's always held up as such a martyr of struggle (Don't you know the man had crippling asthma!), justice and enlightened revolution that people forget that he was a soldier who went around Latin America killing people. Those were his actions. He gave people hope, gave good speeches, and wrote heart wrenchingly about the plight of the landless but really, in the end, he popped caps in people. So when does murder become justice? When it is defended with a myth, or something bigger? When you can say that it's for God? Or for the People? Or for the State? Being here in Central America is rekindling my interest in Che but definitely changing the questions I ask about his life and work.

Anyway... I've been three days with no water either so that's also bumming me out. Not the end of the world but irritating nonetheless. They always say that your service is what you make it and maybe I haven't been trying hard enough. Or maybe that's just the protestant culture that I carry.

Screw it, BAILAMOS!

Panama Firsts

WALT, THIS IS FOR YOU!!!


Things I Had Never Done Before Peace Corps (besides the normal speak Spanish/ meet Panamanians type stuff)

Eaten a turtle egg
Made hojaldres! YUUUUUUUUUUUM!!!
Been so excited to eat fresh black pepper. This actually goes for a lot of foods. MUSTARD!!! HONEY!!! BREAD!!!
Been so hungry that I didn't mind fake yellow cheese
Had someone offer to buy Maria cookies off of me
Seen that my cereal was crawling with ants but eating it anyway, after trying to sift them out, of course
Seen a cock fight
Seen a rodeo
Showered in a sink
Showered outside with a bucket in the dark but still in plain view of the Ngobe community
Desperately pooped behind a tree on the beach then wiped with my Spanish workbook
(In a related first) almost od'ed on antibiotics because the doc didn't say I should take each course separately
Been pooped on by a lizard
Been bitten by an iguana
Enjoyed being at a dance club
Had to wait by the side of the road for a good long minute because a herd of cows were passing
Played hand drums while we all jammed some tamborito tunes
Waded through calf deep swamp muck just because I was curious about where the path went to
Had so many 8 to 13 year old male friends... well... really they just like the SNES games on my computer
Swam in the Caribbean and the Pacific within the same month or so
Had bug bites on my privates

Moving Day!

We lost another good one but at least there is a nice picture of her eating some dreds.



TREE OF LIFE!



So I'm slowing moving my way into my new house/ office. Almost everything was set from the beginning which was great but I have to buy kitchen stuff and things like that. I need to buy gas for the stove because it was supposedly jacked by the people who administered the building last. Hmm... I'm really excited to have a place to sort of call my own.

I'm teaching a lot of classes and running an "English Club" at nights. It's essentially another class because people are too pena-ed to participate but we do more fun stuff like translate "A Change is Gonna Come" by Sam Cooke. Awww yeah. I used it to talk a little about American history and racism and stuff but nobody looked too interested. I need to get the hang of making stuff seem important. I'd like to blame my students and say they don't care but a good teacher can make anyone care about anything. ANYhow, I'm looking forward to putting a more cultural aspect on the English Club. As far as my classes at the school go, I'm hanging on. About half the kids seem to have attention/discipline problems so it means that the others can't learn even if they wanted to. If I hear the phrase, "Mire que el me pego!" one more time I might flip. At first I thought it was a cultural thing... in Peace Corps you try to develop different (sometimes lower, sometimes higher) standards for host country behavior... but then I did a guest teach in a neighboring town and the kids were so GOOD! Nobody even talked over me. I got through my hour long pronunciation lesson without ONE hitch, without anyone grabbing my stomach telling me to give a drawing assignment, without anyone just walking out of the room, without anyone hitting anyone else! My mind was blown. I'd like to sit down and figure out why my students are having so much difficulty paying mind but I think it's beyond little old me. They're great kids, I just don't have the chops yet to maintain a positive learning environment.

Well... That's about all that's on my mind. I'll leave you with some Spanish phrases I really like now.

Echar cuenta - to toss stories - to chat
Echar arroz - to toss rice - to serve food
necio - means bratty as far as I can tell
Acha? la vida, or my favorite, Acha la - Oh drat!
Estamos refrescando - we are refreshing - we are drinking beer

My favorite of all time: WAH! This versitile interjection is used to express joy, displeasure, anguish, surprise, anger EVERYTHING. It's wonderfully useful.

and one that gets on my nerves:
Mire que - kinda like lookit! It only is annoying because my studest always use it to preface telling me that someone is being necio.

I run on ritz crackers and nasal decongestant!

Im not really sure what to say here but I want to say something because a lot is going on here, but not all of it is good so part of me wants to just keep my mouth shut. Its not like you want to listen to me whine anyway right, internet? Too bad for you because Im at an internet joint with time to kill.

I started teaching in the school. Thats going ok. Im a horrible teacher but, hey, no one is Joe Dimagio when they first pick up the ball. To my credit, Ive discovered I can change a lesson plan mid class and not miss a beat. This is really important because most of the kids I teach would sadly be labeled ADD back home. Theyre just being kids. The English teacher Im supposed to be supporting stares daggers at me everytime I ask to look at her lesson plans so I know what to teach the Thursday and Friday, the days she teaches elswhere. I really dont know what to do to break the ice really. She doesnt live in the community most of the time so I cant really pasear and get to know her. Im kind of at a loss. I started teaching night classes for the high school kids and adults. I had one adult show who can only attend once a week because hes in the finca. Two very bright kids from the high school and of course, tons of kids from the elementary school. DONT SEND ME YOUR KIDS WHEN IM ALREADY TEACHING THEM IN THE DAY! That was the whole point. It was lost. We are supposed to do more advance stuff here so if that means working intensely with the two high schoolers then so be it. I got the free time for it. Im at a loss here too. I dont want to have to tell those young kids that they arent ready for the material I want to cover but on the other hand its not fair to hold back the rockstars. Conjugate some verbs and then get back to me.

The tree selling project is at a stall. I want to make a work calendar to keep us on track. I hope that occurs.

On the personal front I did a very stupid thing and hung out with my hosts boyfriend when she wasnt there. In my defense she left me alone in the house, I was bored, and he was offering a showing of Slumdog Millionaire in English. I couldnt really refuse. Furthermore, we went to find her and invite her, and we did find her at her daughters boyfriends place, but she ran into the back room. Her daughter lied and said she wasnt there. We all saw her run so it was really awkward and we collectively said "screw it" and went to watch the movie. So for the past half of this week Ive been dealing with fall out of this situation, crying and feeling guilty about absolutely nothing, feeling paranoid... all that good stuff. My host and I talked it out and came to the conclusion that all parties share some guilt. She was CONSTANTLY finding excuse to leave me and the boyfriend alone and then being pissed about it later. For my part, I should have broke off the friendship and hidden at home alone because people dont believe men and women can just be friends here. (Ill admit that the situation wouldnt look very good on the surface in the states either). So, after talking and even HUGGING IT OUT!!! (my first Panamanian hug! Weve had problems, but I love my host) now things are getting back on the up and up. Im living with a new family anyway just because I switch every month. Its a pretty nice pad even though my student slash roomate cant stop rolling around on the top of the bunkbed. Hes a kicker!

The other issue thats come up is drugs. I was told that drug runners use my beach as a stop off point and then go on their merry way. This is not the whole truth. Some of the famers in the surrounding communities actually produce drugs and are affiliated with international shippers. I was really annoyed about this. Last weekend some folks nearby (not IN my community mind you) found about a pound of cocaine packed in those giant pixie stick wrappers on the beach. People say that Panamanians are anti drug in general. I have found this to be true for most. But not the guys that found the package. The friend who told me the story about all this was offered a pixie stick while disfrutaring in a cantina. Cantinas are bad enough I dont want to imagine one fueled by coke. This, coupled with the misunderstanding about the movie night, has made me really paranoid. Im terrified of people all jacked up, swinging machetes. Im terrified of bochinche being spread to get back at me for something I would never do. Im scared. High school level paranoia for those that new me back then. I dont know who to trust here. Somedays it feels like no one. Itll pass. Itll have to. Right now, Im just throwing myself into work for the classes, reading a lot, and not talking to anyone. I have Twin Peaks to watch on my computer but I just found out that its broken. Need the windows disk. Otherwise Id be watching that too. I need to keep a low profile for a while which is very much impossible here.

I really feel like Im this fount of negativity on this blog but at the same time I dont want to lie about the Peace Corps experience. We all have it rough. Today I found out another friend is leaving. She had stuff line up nicely back home so thats where shes going.

Ill end with this. I really like working with kids. They are hilarious. Even when they are laughing at me. ESPECIALLY when they are laughing at me. Now if the adults gave a rats patoot about the work wed be on our way.

And she said Ooh I'd do anything for you 'cause you're a ROCKER!

I´ve noticed recently that now that I don´t get to listen to my music all the time like I do back home, I appreciate it more. Nobody really listens to good ole rock and roll here. It´s almost always tipico with some salsa or club jams thrown in every once in a while. It´s good stuff for sure, but definitely not what I´m used to, coming from a blues tradition. Now that I´m starting to make sense of the Panamanian beats and getting into that, my own tunes seem urgent again, like good rock or hip-hop or blues should. Electric guitar sounds dangerous when compared to the tipico accordion!

There is a desperation to rock that tipico doesn´t have. Even when the lyrics are about desperation itself, losing a mujer usually, the songs just sound sad, not impassioned. I´m not saying that tipico is emotionless, in fact, the gritar can be very emotive. I think the bottom line is that, in the songs I´ve heard, tipico is afraid to be ugly. Apart from gritaring there is very rarely anything dissonant or uneasy about the rhythms or melody, which makes sense considering it´s dance music. You can´t change up the rhythm too much when people are trying to dance to it. I had a bunch of Radiohead songs come on my music player and they serve as a perfect example. What makes most of their songs so interesting is that they give you something really pretty to hook your ear but then the rhythms and melody always sound like they are about to fall apart but they never do. I´ve missed that tension.

On the other end of the spectrum, I´ve missed the swagger of old school rock. T-Rex, Thin Lizzy, and Immortal Technique all drove that home for me. They make themselves sound dangerous not so much because of tension but because of pure attitude. Tipico definitely has a difference attitude, a different worldview. Tipico is about keeping tradition and the past alive and strong while rock is about punching it in the face. Both very important projects.

Well, thanks for putting up with that. Let´s talk about work. I had a general "so what do you want Peace Corps to do for you" meeting since I last wrote. Way more people showed that I thought they would. 21. Wah! Nothing too surprise came up, people are scared (with good reason) that investors are going to steal all their land. People say they REALLY want English classes. Looks like I´ll be actually IN a classroom about 16 hours a week. With the time I need for planning lessons I´m not sure if that´s asking too much or not. Doesn´t sound like it but on the other hand I´m not here to teach full time. We´ll see how it plays out. I´m very excited to have something to keep me busy.

I thought I had killed all the trees we want to sell for the vivero but they are recovering from being transplanted. The worm compost idea went over well so that´s another thing to wark towards. The last thing that came up was and artisan´s group. I´m not really sure who all wants to do that yet. We´ll see.

When do I get to go home?

Let me preface by saying that I have hit one of the natural low points of Peace Corps service. This post is going to be on the negative side but I think it´s only fair to take the downs with the ups. Besides, today, I´m pretty upset so I could be a lot more negative.

This week has been nuts. First off, I think my community guide thinks I´m trying to steal her boyfriend. I´m big enough to admit that this is my fault because I went to a cock fight with him and probably shouldn´t have, knowing how jealous she is. I should have respected that. I really wanted to speak some English though and see what cock fights are all about. (They are pretty horrible by the way but it was a good cultural experience. At least if the loser dies it gets eaten... more human than KFC.) We talked a while the next day and at first I got vibes that she was upset but as we talked I think she was more upset about things not going well with him in general and her daughter got hurt on a horse so she was worried about that.

Then yesterday I woke up with a 103 fever and the worst diarrhea of my life. When I get fevers I can´t really think straight so I just kept tossing in bed thinking I was going to die in Panama, a 7 hour flight and 7 hour bus ride from my friends and family. I went to the doctor which meant an almost three hour chiva ride with a fever trying not to poop myself. It was pretty brutal. Turns out it was just a bacterial infection and I will be fine.

NOW the icing on the mierda cake that has been these last few days is that I get a text message from one of my best friends in the region. Turns out he fell off a 50 foot cliff Sunday, doesn´t remember two days, and now is heading to the same hospital I just left. I really wish I were still there to offer support. I really wish it were easier to communicate so I could see how he´s doing. I really wish that these things weren´t happening all at once. Gracias a Dios he´s still alive. I just don´t know whether or not he´ll medically separated. I don´t know if he´s had any permanant damage. It would be heartbreaking to see him have to leave after all this. The most frustrating thing is that there is nothing anyone can do. It´s all up to luck now.