I wasn’t feeling terribly inspired to write recently; I’ve been busy! I did a lot of traveling in the last week specifically, on top of spending every day I wasn’t traveling in my school. At some point, my third month of living in Panamá ticked by; half of me is like, “WOAH THREE MONTHS YOU GO GIRL! KILLIN’ IT!” and the other half is like, “What do you mean it’s only been three months? I have two more years of this? Are you kidding me?”
To re-cap my last two-ish weeks since my last blog:
Wednesday May 16: School, lunch with a family, and tutoring
Thursday May 17: School, tutoring, power outage all evening (crazy darkness)
Friday May 18: School, tutoring, playing with neighbors, tutoring again
Saturday May 19: My sister got married in Baltimore, I went to Boquete and explored the highlands, the library, and downtown including a great Italian restaurant and the brewing company
Sunday May 20: Went to La Caldera and sat in thermal springs all morning, grocery shopped, then traveled back to my community and went to basketball league
Monday May 21: School, tutoring, worked on school report for my teachers
Tuesday May 22: Visited my neighbor-volunteer’s site to help with a compost lesson in the school and assist with a recycling/trash fair for her community
Wednesday May 23: Regional meeting in David with all of the volunteers from Chiriquí, received my very first care package in site at the post office (!!!!!), traveled to Cerro Punta for a volunteer retreat, commenced retreat
Thursday May 24: Left Cerro Punta and explored Volcán for the afternoon, traveled back to David, and then back to site
Friday May 25: School, Padres de Familia meeting, worked out, tutoring
Saturday May 26: In David all day using the Laundromat, buying flea/bed bug spray and a mattress cover, and visiting with other volunteers who I ran into while there
Sunday May 27: Lunch with another family, basketball league, relax before another busy week
Out of all of those little adventures, I’d have to say my time in Boquete was absolutely the most lovely. It was the most human I’d felt in a long while, being able to relax all the way and not hold up a front for anyone. I stayed with a couple that I met at a pet clinic a few weeks ago that my host family went to; they’re currently 8 months pregnant and still invited me into their home, took me on a tour of the area, spent their Saturday night getting dinner and beers with me, and then invited me along to La Caldera on Sunday with a friend of theirs. The kindness they extended to me, a literal stranger, was amazing. I’ve experienced that a lot in Panamá, but this particular instance was really impeccable (although this couple isn’t Panamanian, they’re Mexican and Argentinian). I found myself in their guest bedroom on Saturday night with three of their dogs, sleeping more soundly than I had since arriving here (part of that might have been the craft beer, if we’re being honest).
Additionally, the husband is one of the directors of Salvadores de Animales in Boquete (an animal rescue) and we talked a bit about collaborating on some education and outreach in communities in my area (look at me, getting work-related things done during my little vacation).
I definitely found myself still in bed at 8:00 am today (way later than I usually am, I wake up automatically around 6:30 here most days), recovering from the insane amount of traveling I’ve done recently. I love the long bus rides and watching the mountains in Chiriquí roll by, but it’s exhausting nonetheless. Especially on top of the busy schedule I’ve created for myself being in the school so often, and agreeing to tutor lots of kids in math and English while I’m getting to know everyone.
I’m not supposed to be traveling right now, honestly. I’m not supposed to leave site for the first three months, other than running errands to David or visiting neighboring communities with my host family for the day. However, some great opportunities have presented themselves and I haven’t wanted to pass them up; I’m really happy I didn’t.
Leaving site and being away so much last week was a huge motivator for me to kick some serious ass this week. Firstly, I kind of missed being in my community after being away so much; that was a good feeling to realize I had. Secondly, I now have a week of time to “make up for” as far as integration strategies go. I’m feeling super motivated to spend a lot of time out pasear-ing this week, visiting my tienda owners to start working on my PACA tools (different activities that the Peace Corps uses to help volunteers integrate in their communities, such as a community map, an annual calendar, daily schedules of different demographics in the community, and some other stuff I can’t remember at this very moment), solidifying my housing option so I can move in July, and presenting my observational report to my teachers at the school (I didn’t have to do this, I decided to since I’m the first volunteer in my community).
It feels good to be doing some real work, and I’m really excited to be putting together some reports and maps and such this week; having a physical product of my work will be extremely satisfying.
I also have some other work-related events coming up in June that I’m excited about, including a reforestation event, learning to build an eco-stove with another volunteer in her site, and more meetings with my Padres de Familia group at my school (like a PTA) to talk about starting our school garden! I was also made aware of a watershed initiative of some sort that wants to work in my community, and a fellow volunteer invited me to participate in that group as well (I’m extremely excited about this one, give me alllllllll the watershed work).
As far as non-work life goes here…
I’m falling in love with Chiriquí. After getting out to see some more of my province and watching mountains, waterfalls, rivers, giant coffee farms, and lush emerald forests roll by while I traveled, I can confidently say I’m enchanted with this land. I’m not sure that watching the sunrise over fields covered in volcanic rocks while morning fog rolls off of Volcán Barú will ever get old. While I still don’t feel quite at home here, I’m finding lots of things that I absolutely love about where I’m living, and they help me feel much more at ease when things here don’t feel so great.
Despite having a really busy couple of weeks, I still felt homesick for lots of people and places in Michigan and encountered a lot of personally difficult situations, like dealing with racism toward indigenous people and having a lot of misunderstandings with my host family. Not to mention the emotional stress of missing my sister’s wedding last weekend, and the insane excitement when I found out I’m having my first visitor from the States come in October. I’ve had some insanely large roller coasters to ride: the ups and downs have been extreme, to say the least.
The hardest part of the emotional bumps of Peace Corps service is that I chose to be here, so technically I chose to experience all of this. I chose to spend two years abroad away from all of the people I love, therefore choosing to miss two years of their lives, including weddings and graduations and birthdays and promotions, and all of the beautiful little moments that happen in between. What’s even harder is that I can decide to stop and just go home whenever I want, and stop missing everything. But I’m choosing to stay, and that blows my mind.
I’m not sure what it says about a person, to miss everything you love so much but to continue to choose doing exactly that, willingly. It would be so easy to call my program manager and tell him I want to go home, and show back up in Grand Rapids to lots of open arms and opportunities and have everything be easy as can be again. I would get to fill the hole that’s opened up in my heart for my home. I would have hot showers and sweet Michigan wine and homemade biscuits on the weekends and most importantly all of the support in the world from my community. But I’m not going to do that. I’m staying here, even though I don’t exactly know why right now.
During PST, every volunteer had to write a “why,” a statement for why we were serving in Peace Corps. I remember mine pretty well, and I still believe every word of it. When I wrote it, it ended up representing a lot of my ideals and being more of a personal credo for my life. But I’ve now realized that I can accomplish and live that “why” here, or in Michigan, or just about anywhere in the world. The way I live my life and feel strongly about service, community building, and environmentalism has nothing to do with where I am; it has everything to do with who I am. So lately, I'm caught in this place of wanting to be here but not really needing to, and trying to reflect back on what motivated me to pack my bags in the first place.
While I'm figuring that out, I know that who I am finishes what I start. So, I’m accepting that I’m in love with Michigan while I’m falling in love with Panamá, maintaining an entire life at home while building a new one here, living my truths unapologetically in different ways all over the Americas, and missing all of you like hell.
I’m waiting for the day someone makes a Lifetime or Hallmark movie about the emotional disaster of being a Peace Corps Volunteer; it would be some amazing content and I’m sure the drinking game to go along with it could kill someone.
Honestly,
Hanamá
P.S. No new flea/bug bites after the insanity I went through yesterday in David, and I didn’t even sleep in socks!
P.P.S. I have a lot of pics from the last two weeks also, but they won't upload! So just use your imagination.