What´s your ETA, Bei?

Filed teeth, crossed eyes: first impressions. Sharing cultures: Are there indigenous people in the United States? They are afraid of frogs, planes, and being alone at any time, but not chivas without adequate brakes. Plantains are still bland, bland, bland. They can carry 100-lbs loads in grass-woven bags attached to their foreheads, up and down giant mountains on muddy trails for hours. We are going to be living with some interesting people.

My name in Ngabe is Eta (pronounced eh-duh) Lisa´s is Bei (pronounced bay-ee). We were named by our counterparts when we met them, and everyone we meet in town loves to laugh at us upon introduction; look at these funny gringos with Ngabe names!

We went to our site for the first time this week, and we love it. It´s in the Comarca Ngabe-Bugle, high in the mountains in good coffee country. It´s jungle, to be sure, but beautiful and full of mystery. While we were there, it rained nearly every day and the clouds surrounded us so that they were more like mist. We are told that we have a great view, but I only got to see a little of it on the first day.

On the chiva ride up, Lisa got to sit in the front so she saw more of the gorgeous green mountains with a view of the Pacific Ocean. I was late due to an impromptu meeting with our counterpart so I had to hang onto the back of the truck for dear life. It was painful and the rain made me wet, but at least it was only an hour and nine minutes.

When we met our counterparts at the little conference we had, the woman had filed teeth and the man had crossed eyes. As it turns out, these are not strange qualities here. The filed teeth came to three little points on each tooth (so that only two triangles had to be filed out). The other filed teeth I´ve since seen are one or two points per tooth so our lady had something extra special. She´s also an accomplished artisan.

The man is quite intelligent and an excellent public speaker. Despite how he would be received in the States where corrective surgery for this ailment is very common, he has no problem talking in front of anyone and is quite convincing. His Spanish is excellent as well as his Ngobere; he´ll use both to win over anyone to his side. Moreover, he is very intelligent and looks for every opportunity to expand his knowledge. I´ve really enjoyed our conversations in the evening.

It is a large town, with many amnenities such as three restaurants, a large Centro de Salud, a cooperative, a small 5-room hotel, a bunch of little kiosk stores, and a high school. Many people from outlying villages have moved here or hike an hour or more to work here. The chiva goes up to our site and many people take it down to the Interamericana.

We will be having another Volunteer living in the same town as us. She has an agriculture focus and has been working here for two years. She´s extending for a third so we´ll be getting the full benefit of her experiences and she´ll be helping us meet many of the movers and shakers. She asked for a business volunteer to follow up on her agriculture work. Now that many horticulture groups are growing tasty organic food, they and other groups like the artisans, the cooperative, the restaurants, and the stores would like help with accounting, marketing, etc, that she just can´t provide. She was as excited as the townfolk to hear that they were getting two instead of just one, although they are apprehensive because the last one left after just one month many years ago.

Needless to say, we have a lot of opportunities to work. While some people just seem able to envision us finding funds for them, many others want more specific help that we are ready to provide, after an acclimitization period. We will be working closely with people on a hands on basis to learn their work and gain their trust. After we feel comfortable with our understanding of their situations, we can begin to make suggestions for improvements. I think our days will be very full, especially at first, and already there are people arguing about having us work mostly with them.

Our physical conditions are fairly rugged. I´ll just give a few little highlights to let help you feel what we are looking at:
Sleeping on wood planks, it´s cold at night.
Cockroach in my breakfast, just feed it to the cat, the rest is tasty.
Splashback from the latrine is never nice, score: Lisa 3, Ben 0.
Can´t seem to pick the right shoes, Lisa wore nice stuff when they lead us through forest trails and almost lost a sandal in the mud, jeans and tennis shoes for a trek in the rain, and rubber boots for our first agency meeting.
Baby still has a cough for a couple of days after starting meds from the Centro de Salud, after some natural herb meds and a day, parents say they work better.
Lisa´s eyes burn in the smoke, and host explains that it´s from the cold air, not the smoke, of course!

Lisa refers to our site as Heaven in the Comarca or sometimes Alaska in Panama. We absolutely love it and look forward to our two years up there starting next week.