Peace Corps 50th Reunion

 This past weekend was a special one.  The Peace Corps is celebrating its 50th reunion this year, and each country has a celebration sometime during the year.  This week it was Panama's turn.  Past (Returned) Peace Corps volunteers (in PC lingo - RPCV's) came from all over for various activities in Panama City.  On the weekend they dispersed to the various provinces where they had served. Many of them were here in Panama during the 60's, and hadn't been back to their communities in over 40 years.  They were a fun-loving group, and we had a good time with them at lunch, and then later at a local restaurant for happy hour.

Old timers and current volunteers

One woman brought lots of pictures of her stay in the neighboring province of Los Santos.  It was fascinating to look at pictures from the late 60's and to see how much has changed in Panama and how much still remains the same.  Here are a few:

This woman knows how to carry a heavy load!

This iguana is headed for the dinner table! 

In those days, making houses from mud was a common practice.  They got huge groups of people together to put up the wooden frame, mix the mud, and put it up on the wall.

First, they erected the frame of the house

Then it was time to mix the mud and straw for the bricks

Finally the mud goes up on the house walls.

All those men need to eat a lot of tortillas!

Tortillas on the fire

Nowadays in Chepo, almost all of the construction is with cement blocks (cinderblocks).  To save money, they mix their own cement and form the blocks in a mold here in Chepo.  Some houses are made of wood, and a few mud houses still survive here.  Our neighbor just added on a room to his house, and did so using the same technique illustrated above.  Since it was just a couple of walls, he only needed a few people to help.  Unfortunately we weren't  there to witness the construction, but here is a shot of the finished product.

Also, in Chepo now they don't get together in huge groups to make houses or to help harvest crops like they did in the past.  It's harder to get people to work together towards a common goal.  People are busy with their own affairs.

We had some time to talk to the RPCV's about their experiences both here in Panama and afterwards in the US.  The Peace Corps back then was a lot more loosely organized.  They would often send someone to a town and tell them to do what they thought the town needed.  Sometimes it took quite a while to find someone to work with in the town and to decide on a project that was needed by the community and was within the skill set of the volunteer.  These days the Peace Corps researches each town throughly before they send in a new volunteer.  People in the town need to affirm ahead of time that they want to work with the volunteer on certain projects.

It was interesting to hear the RPCV's talk about their re-entry into the US.  Sometimes it was a bit of a culture shock to go back home.  They had lots of things they wanted to share with people back home, but often people back home didn't want to hear very much about it because it was so far out of their realm of experience.  They asked a few basic questions and then changed the subject.  Several people said that they had changed a lot in the Peace Corps, but that people back home expected them to be the same.  I think this is one reason why most areas in the US have active RPCV organizations.  People who have done Peace Corps like sharing their experiences with each other, and these organizations often promote programs in developing countries, so that their members can continue helping others after coming home.

We are hoping that those of you reading our blog will know enough about what goes on here to have to have some good conversations with us on our return!  We can't believe that we have only 8 months to go.  The time has really flown by.

Will we come back to visit Panama after we leave?  We definitely plan to come back, though I don't think we will wait 40 years to do so!  Since we will be retired, we plan on coming back every few years to see how our friends in the town are doing.

A few days ago, we were in our house and heard a pig squealing and dogs barking.  A pig had fallen off a truck right in front of our house.  Its front legs were tied together so that it couldn't walk.    Our neighbor Andrés grabbed the pig by an ear and the tail and slid it into a mud puddle.  Heather doused the pig with a bucket of water, as it was a hot day.  We untied the front legs, and tied a rope onto the back legs so that Andrés could walk the pig home to his house. It turns out that the best way to walk a pig is with a rope on its hind legs, as you can see in the photo below.

A few days later a boy from a neighboring town came looking for his pig, and he gave Andrés $6 for taking care of the pig.

That's it for this week!

Steve and Heather