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Published: April 4th 2010
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I'm still volunteering at Lost and Found, still in Panama. What can I say living on a mountain in a cloud forest, making enough money to cover my costs is great. I will probably be leaving in the next 2 weeks, but who knows. I've been cooking a lot, it's pretty much all I do there. I think it annoys the owners that I never pay them, they always pay me. I like it. Ok, I check people in and out and carry things up the mountain once in a while, what a terrible life.
One day while I was hiking I literally stumbled upon some bones. I was positive it was a raptor... but supposedly dinosaurs are extinct. Ends up it was a dog. I kept some of the bones and boiled the head, it will be the mascot of the Lost and Found's new Jungle Bar. If the rest of the bones are still there when I get back I will boil them an recreate a new animal (it kind of goes with a lost and found theme, plus it's just fun). I freaked out one of the cleaning women. She asked me what I was cooking. I told her (in my very broken Spanish) a dog head. She quickly responded, "is it for dinner?"
There was a coral snake right near the house the other day.
There is a whole new set of volunteers now, only 1 other person has been there longer than me and he isn't just a volunteer. He runs tours, is developing his own tour and wants to live in Panama permanently. which brings me to two days ago... He used to be in the Peace Corps and still has friends volunteering. When I decided to tag along with two volunteers who were leaving and going to Bocas he suggested, semi in jest, that his friend was in this amazing place we should all go to. We decided it was a wonderful idea and he should take us there, so he did.
Kusapin is a town on the tip of a peninsula in the Ngobe Indian reserve. We started by taking a bus to Chiriqui Grande a little port town that tourists generally have no reason to visit. It has very active docks, and lots of bustling people. (I would have pictures but my camera died about a week ago.) We stopped to have lunch, and I tried my first piece of chicken in 12 years. By piece, I mean tiny sliver but it was tasty. From Chiriqui Grande we caught a 45 minute motor boat to a town I can't remember the name of. The views on this boat ride were amazing. Everything from the gigantic boat owner whose nose was crooked and smashed in, to the ngobe kids playing in the water still care free of the craziness of life. Several people knew the volunteer we were with because not that many white men come through, especially ones who can speak ngobe. After talking to a few people we walked to the other side of the peninsula on a sidewalk built by the government. They are supposed to charge people to use it, but someone was keeping the money and it was not getting back in to the community. Of course the community stopped charging. Without this sidewalk it would have just been a mud trail, and I mean knee high mud. (I guess I forgot to mention that this is in Bocas Provence, which is the rainiest area of Panama. It is the northern section of Panamas Caribbean coast. So far I like the landscapes in Bocas more than anywhere else, probably even the mountain... it might be because it reminds me of where I was in Ecuador.)
We walked to a brautiful beach where children were playing, men were playing baseball, women were talking (one while holing a chicken upside down) and cows are wandering in the mud and on the beach. Here they don't view nature like we do, it's not a big deal. The only people who swim are the little kids, they also poop in the rivers that lead to the ocean. Men fish in hand carved wooden canoes and go skin diving 60 feet for lobsters...
I have to checkout of the hostel now I'll have to write more later.
Info I've learned:
If you have a thatched roof you must keep a fire going to stop animals and termites from invading your roof. The fire only keeps them out of that part. Zinc panels are the only other roof option and those are expensive, and a pain to get to rural poor places. I hear the best option is to have thatched roof over the kitchen area and zinc over the bed area, that way the bedroom doesn't have to have a fire thus is less hot, and the kitchen is easy to repair.
See volcano surfing on youtube.
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mmom
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this is what u went there for!
Sounds like a grand adventure. So Ngobe sounds African. Were they slaves? Cool that you are not spending any money! All is well here. Finally we have beautiful weather. Love to read your adventures. mom