A couple Projects Photos

The two sets of photos are from a project in my site and another one where I assisted my fellow volunteer Derek Bloor. The world Map was a project that we painted at the School in Milla 10. Many people don't know what a map of the world looks like, let alone can show you where Panama is located. Therefore Derek decided to paint a map on a school wall in order to help with the education in the schools.

The second set of photos is of the aqueduct that I am putting together in my community. Derek is assisting my aqueduct group and myself with the digging of trenches in order to bury the tubes for protection. Secondly the old tubes that were left are being used to connect tubes to more houses. A lot of manual labor but the project is coming along and I am proud of the community involvement in the project.

Life after Peace Corps

As my time comes to an end, I am starting to think about what I would like to do once I am home. When I say that I am thinking about what I want to do, in this instance I am not referring to my future, although I have thought of that, but rather the activities I would like to do for enjoyment. Being in the Peace Corps for two years has seen my life revolve around simplicity.

The other day I was sitting in my town on a hot day and all I wanted was a pool. I dream of a hot summer day in California. No work and a bunch of friends and family surrounding the pool in my backyard. I dream of a barbecue cooking burgers and hot dogs with a bag of chips surrounding fresh guacamole, a cooler full of corona and music playing in the background. As the day moves on it gets too hot to handle and I am forced to do a front flip into the deep end of the pool to cool off. Although it rains a lot here in Panama I was unfortunate enough to be placed in a community that doesn’t have a large river. There are several creeks that flow throughout the town but not one of them deeper than two feet. For this reason I dream of a pool. I grew up around the water and there is nothing more refreshing to me than to submerge myself completely in cool water on a hot summer day.

I want to go on a bike ride. In the middle of my service the government came and gave all of the children in the school new bikes. They obviously ruined them within a couple months but still I was jealous. I am allowed to ride a bike here but never thought it to be a reasonable purchase. Likewise I want to drive a car. I have gotten into going on long walks because it is the only form of transportation I have in which I don’t have to wait on slow, lazy, Panamanians. I dream of the ability to go where I want to go when I want to go there. The hours of my day could be so much more usefully if I had my own car.

SURF. I WANT TO SURF! It has been hard being here because I can’t surf when the waves are good. I missed a great El nino right when I got down here and was forced to hear about all of the great waves I was missing. Secondly, I was placed within an hour of an island that does have some good waves, only to be able to visit this island once every three months. Don’t get me wrong, I have surfed a few times and I did get lucky with some good waves but compared to the amount I used to surf I am hurting on water time. I want to surf. I can’t wait to get home in June and go straight to the beach. I don’t care how small the waves are, if there are waves I am going to surf.

I also look forward to the ocean in general. I am going to spend all of the time I can at the ocean. If there is no surf I am going to go fishing, diving, or swimming, whatever I want to do. I am going to enjoy the ocean and all of its glory. Being here has made me realize that when I finally settle down I am going to have to live near the ocean.

Those are a couple of the things that I want to do. I want to enjoy the things that I miss the most in Panama. I want to return to the life I had before I came to Panama. I know that I have changed as a person and will return to the United States stronger and smarter but my desires and the activities I enjoy haven’t changed. Being without the ocean and water for two years has been a strain on me. It was one of the things that I never thought would get to me the way it has. I was raised in the water and I will always be around some sort of water.

Sick Days

I was trying to determine whether or not I was going to write about my recent visit in the hospital. You see, my Mom is one of those that can't help but worry about everything. Seeing that I am in another country that has all sort of venomous animals, mosquito spread diseases and gastrointestinal track illnesses you can imagine that she is constantly worried about the state of my health. I had stayed on the side of no, to save her a few early grey hairs until my younger brother Duncan let it slip and she called me the other day.

So now that she knows, I can explain the reason for my recent 4 day stay at Hospital Cattan in David.

To start, a few weeks ago I had a full body reaction to something... still don't know, food, bugs, or plant. Anyway, I had a full body rash that started at night and lasted throughout the following day until I reached the clinic that conveniently opened at 3 in the afternoon. The doctor agreed that I had an allergic reaction and gave me enough medication to get the itchy red rash to go away. The following two mornings the rash returned in the morning, although to a lesser extent, only to go away by noon. At the end of the third day I had worked on the aqueduct for 5 hours and had a pretty normal rest of my day. Ate some food, nothing new, brushed my teeth and laid down to read a book and go to bed. While reading my book I slowly developed a headache and decided to stop reading and just try and sleep. I immediately got freezing cold. It was not cold out either, I put on a sweatshirt, pants, socks, and was under my covers. I was violently shaking and unable to raise my temperature, I even was having trouble just using the toilet. This was then followed by a complete reverse in temperature. I stripped all of my clothes and could not cool down. I was in and out of sleep all night and when the morning finally arrived I had no motivation to get up and my entire body was sore. I couldn't open my eyes for more than a minute and had no energy to get out of bed.

That morning I called Lordes our wonderful medical officer and she informed me that I might have Dengue and if I could get to David, a 5 hour bus, it would be best for me. I built up the guts and lived through the long bus ride with the help of a friend and made it to the Hosptital in David. On my arrival I had no fever but my lower back, head, and cheeks were still giving me pain. The doctor had no idea what had happened and decided to hospitalize me just to be safe. That night I had a recurrence of the chills followed by a high fever. The fever the second night was considerably worse than the first night and after the worst of it had broken the nurse measured my temp at 39C or 103F. I know that it had gotten higher than that because during the worst I was lying as spread out as I could on my bed pouring sweat. Definitely the worst I have ever felt in my life. During the second fit I also had one bout of vomiting and started to have diarrhea.

From then on the doctor referred me to an internal digestion specialist because one of my blood tests reported that my white blood cell count was 13,000 when a high normal level is 10,000. His determination was that I had an intestinal infection and my body was fighting very hard to try and fight that infection. Once this was the determination I had an IV of saline and antibiotics in me 24 hours a day. It turned out to be what was needed because the following two nights I didn't have a recurrence of the chills or fever. I still am not pooping well but my fever is under control. Also a final blood test showed that my white blood cell count had leveled off to 6,700.

In the end it turned out to be an infection... I guess. I was given three types of medication to take for varying amounts of time and told not to eat anything exiting and to keep resting. I am glad the whole thing is over. I am definitely thankful that I came to David the night I did and that Lordes was so caring and on top of it the entire time. All and all I guess it is just another day in the Peace Corps, but it is a day in the Peace Corps that I could go without.