Thursday, January 27, 2011

A Gringo but a Poor Gringo

Currently I sit in Changinola awaiting my regional meeting with the other 30 volunteers within the Bocas Del Toro area. Sadly today we will hear from the Peace Corps Panama director about how we will not be able to continue with our desired growth plan for Peace Corps Panama given that the budget has not passed yet. Peace Corps Washington has asked all agencies to scale back their growth plans in fear that we will not get the budget increase we were hoping for. In effect, our Community Economic Development program is getting slashed and the intended implementation of a Youth Development program is not going forward.

Yesterday we did agency visits to get acquainted with potential stakeholders that we could work with throughout our projects with our communities. I continually questioned different agencies about whether they worked in the area of my site location. Playa Balsa sits in a difficult location. Geographically considered in Bocas Del Toro, but politically apart of the Comarca Ngabe-Bugle. It would seem that we should work more with the Comarca Ngabe-Bugle whose headquarters are in San Felix on the Chirique side, but given our distance, they most likely don't even know my community exists. Which is part of my role as a volunteer, trying to get my community more agency recognition.

I have now been in my site for three months and have come to the end of the reserved period of Proyecto Amistad (Project Friendship). I have visited every house multiple times, hauled lots of heavy vegetable bags, thatch roofing, and firewood (engaging in back breaking labor seems to have earned me the most respect among the community), and had three interactive community meetings (consisting of a community map, seasonal caledar, and daily activity schedules). I will present all that I have learned about the community on February 1st with my APCD (Associate Peace Corps Director aka Boss) present and engage my community in activities intended to prioritize their desires for the community. It seems clear that they will express wanting a better water system as the first project. But while the communities we work with consistently see the actual infrastructure as our biggest contribution to their communities, we consistently try to promote our lead role as capacity development and education. Pushing the health side of our assignment while recognizing that the infrastructure will ultimately be my legacy.

Most of time over these last weeks have been dedicated toward working on my home. Its been a struggle to understand and feel comfortable with the workparty culture in my community. I have struggled with the sense of entitlement my community members have in relation to workparties. Nobody will work unless they know there will be food, and everybody is always asking what kind of meat will be bought for the occasion. Looking back on my first month in site I remeber now that one work party never happend because nobody had bought meat for the occasion.

My supposed counterpart has been less than helpful in planning work parties at times. He always just asks me "You bring the money" in the wari-wari english that I barely understand. When I asked him what kind of meat I should buy for the work party he told me I should slaughter a cow. He was being slightly sarcastic, but I think he was hoping I would jump on the idea. So, I continue to struggle with trying to convey that I am not a rich American. I gave a very successful speech the other day about this. I explained that I am a Peace Corps VOLUNTEER, that I have left all options of making money behind in the United States and have chosen to serve this community for the next two years with only enough money to get by. I told them that unlike the government projects they are used to, the Peace Corps comes with no money. That I am not a financial resource but rather a human resource. I come educated and capacitated to look for funds for future projects from potentially all around the world, but that we will seek this together. And amazingly I think this speech really worked. Two nights later my counterpart started talking about how I am a gringo, but a poor gringo. Which really just reinforces my understanding that they have equated gringo with rich. So I hope that this struggle will lessen as I continue to articulate what my role as a volunteer is and bust their misconceptions of Americans.

My home is coming along nicely and I´m working hard to have it ready for Helen´s visit on February 12th. I have the panka roof almost entirely done and am hoping that my woodcutter has finished cutting the wood for the walls, so that "all we need to do" is haul it out of the forest and nail it up. Of course I will still need to hold multiple juntas (workparties) that require making food as the incentive for the men to come. Which I´ve become much more comfortable with after another volunteer and I discussed that helping out with manual labor like this is a day lost to look for food for the family and themselves, and thus, they need food in compensation.

I look so forward to having my own space after 6 months of host families. Being able to cook for myself and have some privacy. When I stand on my new floor and look out at the ocean I feel so content and excited, and I believe this private space will be a wonderful contribution to my effectiveness with the rest of my service. Once my house is done, its all forces ahead to work with the community on what I´m really here to do (improve and educate about water and sanitation).

On an exciting note I helped haul a boat out of the jungle the other day. Incredible! These boats they make here are just hollowed out tree trunks. They weigh a ton and we hauled this one up a huge hill and back down with about 10 people. Enjoying lots of chicha along the way and a dinner at the end (the junta incentive). I can´t believe how much that puppy weighed and it was just a little boat. Sometimes they haul out huge one´s with 40 people.

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