Carnival

So we had 4 days off for Carnival, Feb 19th-22.  Carnival in Panama last's 4 days and 5 nights.  It is celebrated with culecos.  Basically people throw buckets of water on eachother, squirt eachother with water guns, or in some form get eachother wet. 

In our training community, the town celebrated Carnival on Sunday.  In the afternoon there was a dance with culecos.  There was a dj and a big truck with a tank on it filled with water.  People sat on the tank and used a fire hose to spray water on everyone while they danced.  It was quite the event.  People of every age were participating, dancing and getting soaked. 

After the culecos wrapped up everyone went home to eat dinner, then returned for the crowning of the rena (queen).  Basically girls of pretty much any age, compete to be the queen.  They were elaborate dresses/costumes and dance there way out one by one.  Each princess has another girl that dances out with her, acting as her court or something of the sort.  As each girl dances out the girl's family members set off fireworks, shoot confetti, throws candy, blows horns etc to show their spirit.  In some towns the rena competitions involve elaborate floats that go around town the night and day before the competition.  Our competitors ranged in age from about 6 to 17 (kind of awkward to have to judge between a 6 year old and a 17 year old).  3 fellow Peace Corps trainees were actually asked to judge the event, I am quite glad I was not one of them haha. 

After the crowning of the queen there was a dance/party that lasted most of the night.  Being lame I left pretty early with my host family, but seeing as my normal bedtime these days is 8:30pm, staying up until even 10 is pushing it for me haha. 

Here are some pictures of Carnival, unfortunately I have none of the culecos (water and cameras did not seem to be a good idea)

Adventures in Los Mortales

In our free time in our training community, my friend Chelsea and I would go on hiking and running adventures.  There are tons of dirt roads that lead to rivers, farms and other roads.  Sometimes we would drag other trainees to join us.  Here are some pictures from those adventures, they capture some of the beauty of our training community! and Panama in general!

Playing Catch-up

Yes, I am mega behind in my blogging, I know.  I've been exceptionally busy and don't often have internet access.  Also my blogger app that lets me save posts and then publish when I have internet was not working, and the one internet cafe that i frequent when we go to the Peace Corps Office refuses to publish my blogs and simply freezes them so I have to re-write them lol.  So all in all I have been a semi failure at blogging.  However, with my app working and using this as a test post (as to not lose ny good solid picture and info filled posts) I am going to attempt to play catch-up and get everyone caught up on the past few weeks of my life here in Panama.

Also, I apologize if the font is hard to read (it doesn't seem I can change that fact from my app) and that sometimes pics are in the wrong order (again I don't know how to fix that on my app).  SORRY! 

Alright well here goes the attempt to catch everyone up!!

FOOD

So I have creepily been taking pictures of my food for the last week or so so that I can show everyone what I have been eating, and why, I, along with all the other Panama trainees, am going to gain weight haha. . .

pic 1 (breafast)- platanos (or maybe platanos), they are plantains that are fried, smashed, then fried again. . .eggs and coffee. . .also take note of the malaria pills haha

pic 2 (breakfast)- liver and onions and tortillas. . .sooo this was the third time that my host mom fed me liver, and I just couldn't eat it, those that know me well know that I haven't eatin any meat other than chicken and fish for years.  The first time she fed me liver I ate it, the second time as well. . .but this third time, at 6am, I just couldn't do it.  Sooo I put it in a baggie, and when I left for class I fed it to the dogs hahaha.  Tortillas are pretty good, they are made of mashed corn and fried.  Last night my host mom and dad taught me how to mash them. 

pic 3- my host mom and dad grinding the corn
pic 4- me grinding the corn

pic 5 (breakfast)- hot dogs and toast. . .breakfast of champions lol

pic 6 (breakfast)- the purple stuff is some type of root vegetable, tastes like a potato,  and chicken

pic 7- (lunch/dinner, they are generally similar)- LOTS of rice and some chicken

it seems I only have the one pic of a lunch/dinner. . .but generally it's rice, with chicken or beef. . .sometimes rice and guandu (kind of like lentils) with meat, sometimes rice and soup. . .OCASIONALLY I get some tomato salad or salad. . .generaly there are no vegetables though.  I miss veggies!! lol

Running in Panama

So this post is dedicated to all my running friends :-) and my father of course!  The first week I was in Panama I was not able to run at all, but as soon as we got to our training community that changed.  A fellow trainee and I run every morning (at 6:15 am when it is just barely light enough to see the roads).  Our training community is INSANELY hilly, and most of the roads are unpaved, but it makes for GORGEOUS runs and excellent workouts.  The one morning we deided to bring along our cameras, so here are some pictures of what our daily runs look like!

Also, let's just say that running in the near dark, down steep rocky hills can end badly.  One morning, I tripped on a rock and did a beautiful super man style fall/slide down the hill.  Upon hitting the ground I began to whimper, then curse, then laugh histerically and of course finished the run.  I didn't realize until the run was ending that my knees where both dripping blood, if the Panamanians didn't already think we were crazy for running, they def thought we were crazy after they saw the bloody white girl running. . .oh well lol. 

Host Family

Last Sunday, the 15th I believe, we moved in with our host families in a town just outside of Panama City.  My host family consists of a middle aged man and women.  My mother (Thelma) met my father (Moran) five years ago.  Thelma had come to this town to meet her daugher's (Jessica) fiancee and went pasearing (pasearing is when Panamanians walk to other people's houses, stop in, say hello, have a chat, etc.  It is customery of the person who's house it is to give the visiting person food, or a drink).  While pasearing Thelma met Moran and they fell in love and got married 5 days later.  Thelma has 3 grown children, 2 boys and one girl.  The girls, Jessica, is studying to be an english teacher, and has an adorale 4 year old daughter, Irene.  Irene is here on the weekends, she and I color together, and play soccer.  I try to interpret her fast passed spanish but sometimes I am throroughly lost lol. 

I am very lucky, I have my own room in their house and a relatively nice bed.  There is a electricity and even an indoor flush toilet!  There is a shower as well, not a nice one, and it's only cold water, but still. . .this is living the high life around here.  Some other trainees have latrines, some have toilets like me, but everyone has electricity. 

Here are some pictures of my house and the road it's on! The first is my road, the second is the front of my hosue, the third is my room, the fourth is the bathroom in my host family house, it is very yay yay (aka quite nice compared to most other peoples bathrooms in the area, many are latrines), fifth is the kitchen and sixth the dining room. 

So hopefully I will get to post this on sunday (it is now already feb 3rd, i have yet to have internet to post nything!)  But I woud love to add a host family story to this post. 

So last Thursday, my host mom was going to the city for the day.  She often leaves for the day and will put my breakfast and lunch in the microwave for me to heat up.  She gave me my own set of keys to the house, so I go on my normal morning run, come back, heat up my breakfast to eat, go to my 4 hour language class, come back heat up my lunch, go to 4 hours of tech class and when I get home she has returned.  Well on this particular day she told me she was going to be gone for the day, I left for my run, not thinking anything of it.  I return from my run to find the door locked and I (being stupid, and misunderstanding exactly when she was leaving) did not have my keys.  At 7:15 in the morning, sweaty and gross, I was stranded.  So I walked back out to the main road, wondering which fellow trainee would be awake and able to help me, when the host mother of a fellow trainee saw me dressed in running clothes and assumed I was looking for her trainee who was about to run.  With my new found knowledge I went sprinting up the street to find said trainee, who in turn became my hero, letting me shower and giving me clothes (including a bra and underwear) and even sharing her breakfast with me.  She also spoke with her family who agreed to take me in for lunch as well.  Unfortunately my host family did not return until after 6pm that night, and it was extremely awkward to have to explain why I was sitting outside the house (very sunburnt since I'd been outside for about 10 hours total that day and my sunscreen was locked in my house) and why I had not eatin my meals that where waiting in the microwave.  However, they were very nice about it, and it has become quite the joke. . .and needless to say I NEVER leave the house without my keys. 

First Site Visit

So i don't have internet access, post offices are nearly impossible to find and my phone only has service if i climb a hill, said hill is now referred to as colina de gringos (white person hill) since we all cover the hill afrer our tech class ends.  I am however getting ahead of myself, and truly wanted to write about the site visit my fellow cec pcts and I did sometime last week (I'm writing this on sat jan 21 and will post it whenever I have internet access.) My plan is to start writing some posts and save them, then I can post multiple when I have internet access. 

We took dug out canoes across a river to visit a cec volunteer currently serving! The community is actually located in a National Park.  The park was created after the people where already living in the community, and the creation of the park forced the people to completely change their way of life, because they were once farmers and had cleared the land to do their farming.  First, we went on a hike through the jungle with the volunteer and her Panamanian counterpart.  It was a gorgeous hike, really a gorgeous site overall.  However, it is currently the beginning of the dry season, one of the prettiest times of the year because everything is still green, but it isn't raining all the time.  Apparently the river we crossed is often just a small steam, the community actually uses the steam bed to crow corn and other crops. 

After our hike some women in the town made us a spectacular lunch of rice with chicken, fried fish, and salad.  We then learned a little bit about the volunteers projects and saw her house that the community had built for her.  Here are some pictures from the day!