Kinka-who!?

I’ve got a kinkajou!



Kinka-what?

Some say he’s a monkey of the night, some say he’s a cat of the tree or a honey bear but I say he’s my new roommate and nocturnal companion.

This is what wikipedia says: The kinkajou (Potos flavus), also known as the honey bear (a name it shares with the sun bear), is a rainforest mammal of the family Procyonidae related to olingos, coatis, raccoons, and the ringtail and cacomistle. It is the only member of the genus Potos. Kinkajous may be mistaken for ferrets or monkeys, but are not closely related.

How could a thing like this have happened to a reasonable person like me? I’ve never before been in the habit of adopting monkey like critters.

It started on a simple Wednesday morning. I was in my yard collecting water in buckets and bottles when Carlos comes up to me, and medio sketchy style, asks me if I want to buy a cat, which I can tell is in his backpack. I say, no thank you, as a matter of fact I currently have five kittens. Then Carlos says no, a "tree cat" and opens up his pack to show me this big ball of fuzz that unfurls itself and looks up at me with huge adorable black eyes. My sense of reason tells me that a monkey/bear/tree cat type animal is not a good idea, but reason quickly looses.

Turns out Carlos and crew had cut down some trees to build a house and found him amongst the branches. They took him away and decided to try and sell him ($10, most likely used to keep boozing). I knew pretty much anyone in site would have just kept him tied up below their house, sadly sad and then eaten with coco when he is older. So now he is part of my home, drinking his milk from the bottle, eating papayas and bananas and entertaining me in the evenings. Given his nocturnality, he likes to sleep throughout the day and play throughout the night.

His activity at night can be a little much for people (such as myself) who like to sleep at night. So I had to build him a little ‘addition’ out on the porch. I put my meager yet enthusiastic carpenter skills to work for about three mornings, and after scavenging and tearing apart my compost bin for wood, awkwardly attaching chicken wire to outside posts, dodging falling and hanging wood pieces (sometimes unsuccessfully) tangling myself in mounds of very tangled chicken wire and nailing a door hinge on backwards, I have a new room in my house, complete with a tree jungle gym and porch overhang addition.



I almost feel the need to apologize for being so obsessed with my new little one. Months of no information and this is all you get, monkey news. But I won’t ask forgiveness because he is so adorable he deserves it. All of my love and attention and all of yours too.

Out and About

A great and notable thing that happened in my past few months in site. I have started to go on little mini vacays, or outings with members of my community. It so nice to have friends in town. Here are a few of my moments.

Bocas Island

First, about two months ago, I spent the night in the touristy land of the island of Bocas del Toro with Lucho, Hilda (my counterpart and his wife) and Duncan and Eddi (my other favorite couple in site) and Javier (lucho's 9 year old son, my little bro, cat sitter, and house guard). We went principally to sell chocolate, guandu, and pino lio ( a roasted corn drink) to the locals as well as to scope out some future chocolate selling markets on the island. But what we also went to go do was swim at the beach! Nothing has made me laugh harder in a long time then watching the rolly polly Eddi and Hilda try (and fall) and try again (and fall) and try again to get up on their husbands shoulders in the water. They then proceeded to chicken fight, as I explained the game to them. We also had little swimming competitions and races and I proved to everyone that I would be an excellent person to go diving for fish and lobster as I could hold my breath the longest.

Another man in my community is the caretaker for a swanky gringo summer house (mansion) on a nearby island, which is where we went to sleep. It was a hoot exploring this mansion house with toilets, showers, TVs, stoves and refrigerators with my Ngobes. They could not believe what a gringo kitchen looks like. Our hostess was also explaining to us how to use the shower (tuck in the curtain and what not) and Eddi proudly pointed out that she already knew how, as she had some experience in hotels before. Everyone was pretty impressed.

We still had boiled bananas for dinner

Kusapin

Next, my dear dear friend Edi took me with her to her homelands out on a coastal peninsula in the Caribbean. We took a big dug out canoe to get there, loaded with about 10 people and sacs and sacs of produce. It was about a 7 hour voyage. Then we stayed for 3 nights in her moms house. A two room house on stilts, where 6 of us slept in the same room every night, and ate rice, name and fish every meal. I had kind of forgotten what it was like to live with a Ngobe family. It was nice to be reminded what a luxury having my own house is. Otherwise, it is absolutely gorgeous out there! The first day we walked an hour or so down a palm tree lined sandy beach, through some jungle and to a gorgeous coastal town called Kusapin, where Edi has family. Here is a photo.



I was grumpy on our hike, because Edi said we were going swimming at the beach and instead we ended up hiking barefoot for an hour through muddy rocky jungle paths and I sliced my toe open pretty bad on some glass in a cow pasture. But we crested the hill to Kusapin and it was so amazingly stupidly beautiful that I couldn’t help but sing praises to the sky above.



I hobbled back with a stick and washed my foot compulsively with alcohol for the next day. (I figure cow shit and open wounds are never a favored combination).Here is a photo of me with my great and wonderful friend Edi. You can’t really see it, but I feel it’s worth noting that I have a nice big ringworm, discreetly located in the smack dab center of my forehead. That’s life in Panama.



The Darien

Then I spent some hours and days and weeks and months in site. You probably did not hear from me at that time. And now, I am just returning from another few days away from site. First I took my counterpart to a leadership and management seminar put on by the Peace Corps and then Andy and I visited our friend Molly in the Darien, who's site is about as far from me as you can get in Panama. (She is close to Colombia, I am close to Costa Rica).

The Darien is a great place to visit (as is my friend Molly) and were I not so happy to live in the tropics of Bocas, I just might buy me a horse and move to the Darien and cut down some virgin tropical forest to make way for my new herd of cattle(the principle Darien pastime). Actually I probably wouldn't, seeing that I find cattle raising to be all damaging to the environment and your health and what not, but these Panamanian cowboys sure make it look like a good time! They ride everywhere on horseback and yip and yop and holler at each other and wear fun straw hats. And who does not love a good straw hat?

So, you might wonder, why would I want to visit the Darien Cowboys in the 'wild east' of Panama. Well, to bring them chocolate, of course. We put on a little "cacao/reforestation" presentation for the folks in Molly's community, arguing that they could keep some trees AND raise money using tree crops. Like cacao for instance. We still have to wait and see how the trees grow there, its probably a bit of stretch, but we made everyone hot chocolate and planted some cacao seeds for everyone to take home. They were all pretty excited about it (I think mostly because they got to suck on cacao seeds and drink hot chocolate).

The only thing disappointing about my trip to the Darien is that I had no camera. But just picture some beautiful rolling green hills with a distant jungle mountains in the backdrop. A dirt ( or mud) road with folks riding by on horse, colorful birds flitting about the trees, small wooden houses with grass or tin roofs and lots and lots and lots of cows. Then you can imagine myself with Molly and Andy posing in front of the scene, which is probably what my camera would have captured.

maybe now I should talk about some of the work I have actually been doing? We'll get there.

Water is hard.

We are in the dry season here in Valle Las Perlas, which means we have water once or twice a day ( we turn it on for an hour or two in the morning and an hour or so at night). This means a lot of saving and hauling around buckets of water. It also means that we reeeeeally would like a new aqueduct. Which is why earlier this week three members of our water committee and I embarked on a mission into the mountains, looking for a new source of water. To begin, I will say what I discovered by the end, which is that water sources are hard! I now understand the great popularity of water conflicts around the world. In fact, I myself will probably be pursuing my own water conflict in the near future.

Another thing I learned on my hike for water, which I kind of already knew, is that Gnobes are insane. And by that I mean they exist on some higher plane of existence far superior to us gringos, which I can’t quite understand. And by that I mean that we left at 8am, 2 machetes between the four of us and nada mas. Nary a water bottle. Then we hiked up and up and up in the humid sweaty jungle. Then we hiked down a little, then up a lot more, down and up another few hillside mountainsides or so. By 10 or 11 I was literally wringing the sweat from my shirt and dizzily begging my guides to let me drink from any creek we passed. They were smart and made me wait until we got closer to an uncontaminated source, around 12pm. Fernando folded me up a leaf to make a cup and fed me cup after cup of water, amazed by how much I wanted to drink. They also finally gave in and said, ‘ well I guess its good to drink water, I guess I’ll have a handful’. Those who drank then complained that drinking the water gave them a stomach ache.

They were planning on going the entire day without drinking a drop of water! And not one of them had eaten breakfast! And we hiked from 8am until about 1 or 2pm. And Fernando just skipped through the mountains smiling and laughing like a little jungle sprite the whole way, occasionally taunting me about my sweating. “Already sweating Elsie, this is nothing, we’ve got five more times the distance to go! hahahha” Fernando probably wasn’t going to eat until around 3, if his lady was there and food was ready. If not , who knows he might not eat until 6. And at that time he would probably have one big glass of sweetened coffee and consider his daily hydration done. He is a camel. And he is not that unusual in Gnobe land. What wussies we gringos are (at least me), needing food and water every 4-5 hours. HA.

So, anyhow, about my planned water conflict. We have really got to start getting the troops ready now. During our hike we found 3 water sources. Number 1, very small and no good, Number 2 very nice but runs through someone’s property in the neighboring town and hydrates their cattle, Number 3 ridiculously far, looked promising but all the trees had been cut down by the source making it no good. This leaves us with source number 2 and a field of cattle to battle.

In other water news, Engineers Without Borders recently approved my request to look for a group of EWB volunteers to come to Valle Las Perlas and help construct an aqueduct. wwwaaaahizzzzle!!!! We still have to wait for a local EWB chapter to adopt the project for their very own, fundraise, visit the site and then hopefully (fingers crossed) come down and help us out. Because as I said, water is hard and we need help.

Also a few weeks back I took some members of my towns water committee to a management of rural aqueducts seminar, led by another group of Peace Corps volunteers. We learned all kinds of good stuff. Here are my happy folks with their happy certificates.


Here is a photo of Fernando, jungle sprite, my first host dad and president of our towns water committee. He is shown giving a presentation of our towns aqueduct map, which we made at the seminar.



and that is that.

gardens and things

So, what else have I been up to in my prolonged absence? As you can see, I’ve discovered I have a spectacular knack for not writing in my blog. In fact not writing in my blog has been one of my favorite activities of the past month or so. How delightful to find another hidden skill, though as with all things, it will have to be honed through practice. Other things I have been working on:

Gardens! I have about 5 families I am building home gardens with. In 4 of those families my workmates consist entirely of children. I like the idea that I am passing some skills to the next generation and they are such enthusiastic workers! Here is a photo of some of my kiddies chopping up Platano stalks in one of their garden beds. We’ll mix that will cow poo, saw dust, leaves etc to make some nice compost. The soil around the houses here is pure clay, so growing decent veggies in it would barely be worth your time without it. The main garden crops here will be tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and culantro.

My garden challenge. Scratch that, my life challenge here is that everything I do must cost absolutely nothing. If it costs anything, no one will ever do it. I’ve really noticed this in my garden. Back in the states when gardening season comes around I am used to taking a trip or two to the garden store and buying some seeds, some seedlings, maybe a tomato cage, and if I am feeling luxurious some potting soil or compost to add to the soil. Even if it’s not necessary, I’ll always figure out something to buy with the idea that it will make whatever I am doing extra awesome. That’s life back home. Life here takes a little more creativity and a lot more work and time and absolutely no money. Luckily I have got a lot of time and very little money.

I also went and did 10 grafts on a cacao farm last week. That felt useful.
I’ve also had another batch of kittens. Though as with most second children, both photos and excitement have decreased. They are cute though. And I did wake up to a loud cat yowl at 6am to watch them be born, which was a nice chance viewing into the slimy miracle of life.

And to end, a challenge to you. Something I love, really really love not having is electricity. I like lighting up my little house with candles and a kerosene lamp every night so it sparkles from the inside out like a wooden jack-o-latern. Everything you do by candlelight seems, oh how to say it, more romantic? ( in the joy in the pleasures of living kind of way). You might also start to get nice and sleepy by around 8 or 9. So my dear reader, I beseech you to spend a night pretending electricity does not exist. Cook with a candle, read with a kerosene lamp, knit by the fire, what have you, I promise, it’s fun.

If you wanted to send us some knitting needles, we would not be opposed.

Most things I can get in Panama, but some things I can not. One of these things are knitting needles. This is unfortunate because I have a large group of women in my community begging for knitting classes (a past neighboring volunteer taught her community) and there is nary a needle to be had.

As such, if anyone feels inspired to spread the knitting craft movement down to the tropics, my ladies and I would looooooove any knitting needles, yarns, patterns, materials etc. In exchange, you can feel proud imagining small babies wearing knit hats and slippers in the jungle and I will send you some chocolate. Also, if your envelope is feeling empty, I can also always use crafty items with the kids in town. (I think I might even be starting a Girl Scout troop!)

My address:

Cuerpo de Paz
Elsie McIver
Entrega General
Changuinola, Bocas del Toro
Republica de Panama

A Chocolate Roast

This is one of my favorite (or at least more productive feeling) things I have done here yet. Another volunteer (Oti) and I organized a small grant to take some women from my "Chocolateras" group to his community, to teach his peeps the high quality cacao into chocolate process that my ladies make once a month or so. In the video are two of my closest lady friends in town, Eddi and Hilda explaining in Gnobe to the peeps of the community "Sharkhole" (named as such for the reasons you might think.) I was so proud to watch my ladies play the role of teacher. Also, please notice the natural beauty.

For an even better video, my friend Michelle (who also brought some ladies to the training) made a great video, which you can view here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBsPSg2yPUU

For those of you who wonder, how exactly does one make chocolate from cacao beans, it goes a little something like this.

First you collect all the cacao pods and then take out the seeds. As demonstrated by a group of my friends and neighbors below:



The beans are surrounded by delicious white goo, which is fun to suck on, but for the sake of the next stage of the process, best left on the bean. The next stage is fermentation, where all beans are placed in a fermentation box or bag for a couple of days.

Then the fermented beans are put out in the sun to dry for another few days, which can be difficult as the main harvest also happens during the rainy season. Seeds turning a bit moldy is a big problem in these parts. See some nicely dried beans below.



Once you have your finely fermented and dried beans, the chocolate making process can begin. First all seeds are roasted (as shown in video above). After roasting many peeps just grind the chocolate and roll it into balls and ya! Buuut, my ladies with their higher quality chocolate then peel all the beans (they are covered in a fine shell), chop the beans up and re-roast them, grind them and then throw in a mixture of spices, milk and sugar. Then using homemade "chocolate cutters" made from sliced PVC tubes, they make little discs of chocolate, as seen below.




By spending a day turning their cacao beans into chocolate, my ladies make 4-5 times more money from their beans. Not a bad turnaround.

And that my friends, is the story of chocolate.