This isn't possible! March 4, 2010

Has it been that long since we've talked!? WOW! Well, life is busy and in a routine, so maybe we haven't felt inspired to write. But wanted to tell you about an exciting happening, which is building on previous efforts.

For the last several years a small group of gringo ladies has had summer art programs for the local kids in El Valle; each program has been about 8 weeks long. Last year, all the art projects were made with recycled materials, including the kids' carnaval masks and costumes.

This year we had sponsorship from the Fundacion Parroquia de San Jose (i.e., we didn't have to have bake sales to raise the money for the program...what a treat!), and we were fortunate to have two teachers from the Museo de Arte Contemporano (MAC) in Panama City. The kids learned basic painting and color mixing, and employed those skills to make and paint their carnaval masks. It was such a delight to see the kids' creativity grow, and see their joy in achieving some really interesting work with novel approaches. In about a week, we will put up an exhibition of the kids' best work (as chosen by them) in the El Valle Library.

Also, during this summer's program we employed four young teenagers as aides to the MAC teachers. These teenagers were chosen from the previous year's program when they had demonstrated their own creativity. It was so gratifying to see these teenagers grow in responsibility and initiative, and share their artistic ability with the younger kids.

The Fundacion has asked us to organize additional cultural classes for the kids; these new classes will be conducted during the school year. In April we will re-start the weekly painting classes with the MAC teachers, and we hope to add other classes, such as: acoustic guitar, ballet, singing, theater, music reading and appreciation, choir, creative writing and any others which fit into the general category of "culture".

Now, if this isn't a motivation to learn Spanish....

October 24th, 2008

We are having gardener woes. Our original gardener (liked by Barbara, despised by Tommy) decided to stop gardening and take up construction (more money). Found another gardener straight away, agreed on terms and duties, and waited for him to show up on the appointed day....nada. Found a second gardener, agreed on terms and duties, and waited for him to show up on the appointed day...nada. Now I'm getting paranoid; what's going on? A cousin of friends' gardener said he had an extra day, and would send in a crew of four to do a big tidy-up; agreed on terms and duties...well, you know what happened...nada. He did show up a week later, apologizing that he was too busy and would have his friend Sebastian come the next day; I emphasized I only wanted one guy for one day a week. Four guys showed up the next day.....My Spanish is NOT that bad! I am going to hire an interpreter to find out why this is happening, or, more accurately, not happening! Groan...

October 14, 2008

I think that you know that I have been involved with a local Panamanian group which is trying to do something about the roadside trash and to start a recycling program. We had our first "fair" on Saturday, which included lots of exhibits, introduction of the first "eco brigade" (kids who are going to keep streets around the school clean), and a bake sale to raise money. I had contacted "Playacommunity" (an English-speaking website, centered mainly on the coast, about 40 minutes from here) for publicity. They wrote an article before the event, and then wrote an article after the event, which included photos. Check it out here: http://www.playacommunity.com/the-news/community-events/el-valle-first-ecological-fair/
You will notice the "NO BASURA" sign, which I designed and starting creating. When my mother came to visit, she helped me and then later I had the elementary school kids help. The sign is made mainly out of little juice boxes, which we cut into strips, folded and then threaded onto wire in the shape of the letters.
Anyway, the ecofair was a grand event for this little town. In two of the photos you can see the kids of the first eco brigade, getting ready to take their pledge. Oh, they were so cute!

And today Tommy and I went to Panama City to pick up my new car....a little baby red car. It is very similar to my Nissan Micra in Portugal. I drove it home and I love it!

September 13th, 2008

Saturday was our anniversary (26 married and 30 together)..yikes! As we were passing Mario's, we saw him talking to the fish truck guys. We knew that the fish truck had lobster, so we stopped and asked Mario to buy two and fix them for us for dinner. He as delighted, so we went there with our bottle of champagne, and he put flowers on our table and served us a sort of lobster thermidor. We were sitting outside, and the temperature was perfect with no wind. We could hear the live music at the beer hall "Imperial" in the distance so it wasn't too intrusive. Off in the distance we could also hear fireworks (what in the world was happening in El Valle with all this activity?)

The last time we had lobster was in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua on our trip from California to Panama. Mario's lobster was every bit as good! What a special evening!

Cement Workshop, September 2008

Franco is an artist who works in many media. He is currently using cement to make sculptures, which are magnificent and too expensive (rightly so)for my pocketbook. He was very receptive to teaching his techniques, so I organized a two-day workshop. In order to get us started quickly, Franco had cut and bent the initial armatures so that we all started off with the same shape. And then we went to work, each of the six of us creating something original and completely different from all the others. We mixed and applied cement for hours, with Franco helping each of us as needed. We were so thrilled with our creations; mine is a bust of (perhaps) a lady but it could be an American Indian. And it is heavier than shit!
Because of the success of the first workshop, others wanted to learn so I organized a second workshop. I just went to look at their creations: all of theirs are different from each other and from ours! This medium is incredible!
I need to finish my big stained glass commission (hopefully by the end of September) and then I want to try a larger, more delicate piece. Cross your fingers!

Organic Coffee, El Valle

We have a special treat here in El Valle: a small tostaderia (coffee roaster) which specializes in organic coffee. The tostaderia is owned and run by Francoise and Jose, a Canadian/Panamanian couple. They make excursions throughout the country to source their coffee beans. Each batch of beans has an interesting journey; for example, the last bag I bought made this trek: Jose called someone in a small village in the Ngobe Bugle comarca (way west and north from here...towards Costa Rica), where they had previously visited and approved the coffee. The phone answerer took a message and a couple of days later, the "chefe" called Jose, who ordered four five-hundred pound sacks of coffee. Once the coffee beans had been picked and bagged, the sacks were loaded onto donkeys who make the trek through the jungle until reaching a road where there was a 4-wheel drive jeep. The sacks were taken, by the jeep, down to the Pan American Highway, where they were transferred to one of the buses which run up and down the highway. The bus got the coffee beans as far as the turn up to El Valle (28 km down the mountain), where Jose was waiting with his car to transport the beans up the mountain to El Valle.
It is not often you get to hear about your food origins! And it is yummy coffee, too!

Travis and Morgan, August 2008

Most of you know that Travis (11) and Morgan (8) are my beloved grandchildren. I was fortunate to have five days with them when we were in the States in August. These kids have so much, and there is no way that I can compete with that so I prefer to spend time with them, creating memories and events with which they can identify me. And we usually have a lot of fun, too.

The day I arrived, we walked downtown and had sushi for lunch. On the way back, we stopped into a make-your-own-art and the two of them created art pieces. Then we stopped for decaf mocha frappachinos for the kids; Travis was amazed that there are no Starbucks in Panama. This kid needs to get out of California!

Later that week, Travis decided to have a lemonade stand. San Carlos has a farmers market every Thursday in August; he reckoned that lots of people going to the market would have to walk by the house. We ran around, collecting supplies and decorations; Travis and Morgan made signs which were pasted on the street corners and the big sign on the front of the shop window. We opened promptly at 4, and had customers right away. People in cars stopped when they saw the big sign, parked and came over to buy the lemonade. The kids worked straight through til 8, when the market ended. They made over $25!, all at 50 cents a glass! And no fighting at all...another wonder!

On Friday, we went up to the Tahoe house, primarily because Chris and Kerry wanted to continue re-roofing the house. The kids and I were sent to the creek with a picnic lunch, but before we got to eating, Travis decided we needed to building a raft. So, with Travis as engineer and project director, we build the raft, and re-built the raft, and re-built the raft...five times worth. We used materials we found in the creek: old planks, a log, and weeds which we tied together to make string. Five re-builds and five hours later, we had a raft which floated with a kid on it! What a riot! We had so much fun, we didn't realize that it had gotten so late until Kerry came to fetch us. It was great!