Meeting New People and Fighting Bacteria

Having spent just two weeks in my community, I have returned to Panama City sooner than expected.  A long lasting stomach bug was enough to make the Peace Corps doctors decide to bring me in and give me some medication.  After some testing, I'm glad to know I don't have worms or anything too disturbing.  Apparently it's a bacterial infection from food, so I know I need to to more careful what I eat.  Tomorrow I will head back for another long trip.

Other than the sickness things have been going quite well.  Starting to live in a new place with a bunch of people that don't know who you are and don't speak English is always a little tough.  Everyone speaks Spanish but since it's an indigenous community, it's their second language.  Fortunately the teachers at the school speak Spanish very well, so I've found that I get the best practice from talking with them.  Everyone in the community practically has told me that I need to start learning Embara, the indigenous language.  I've gotten a start, but it's going to be a challenge, especially while still trying to work on my Spanish.  The language is pretty basic as far as the structure, but the pronunciation is really different.  There are certain sounds that I think my mouth just cannot do.

My host sister in front of the house

Most of my time so far has been spent walking around the town meeting people and explaining who I am.  The majority of people are pretty curious about why there is a very tall gringo walking around in their back yard.  I must say it is pretty awkward sometimes just going up to somebody's house and asking to talk, but people are very friendly and usually just tell me to climb the ladder and come inside.  All the houses are on stilts about 6-10 feet off the ground, so as I walk around people can look down at me from the shadows of their thatch roofs.  Now I understand even more what they call the fishbowl effect.

It's been interesting hearing all the stereotypes that people have about North Americans, and I've done my best to combat them.  According to the people here, every person from the United States is: a millionaire, white and blonde, lives in a skyscraper, etc.  People have many questions about the US, and some have asked if I will take them there when I go back home.  The curiosity makes for fun conversation.

Community futbol game

Some guys working on a piragua to
make it seaworthy

My goal for these first few months is to work out a community analysis.  In other words I want to figure out what the needs of the people are, what their strengths are, and how to best facilitate positive changes.  I'm expecting things to continue to get better as I get to know people better and feel more comfortable.  As for now I'm headed back to my hostel to hang out with some other Peace Corps Volunteers who are taking a break from their sites.