So here i am again, after a two week stint in the countryside. It is absolutely beautiful in this country, I feel some times that I live in a national geographic magazine, these past two weeks have been really nice. The picture that you see on the left is Nutivi, it is the first place that we went. It was a four hour boat ride across a bay and then up a river. The baot was a dug out canoe with reinforced siding to make it safe for human transport. As we crossed the crystal clear waters of the bay dolfins surfaced about twenty feet to the left of our boat and began doing jumps along side. We then made our way up hte river, which seemed like to took forever. What you see here on the left is a picture of Nutivi as we got off the boat, this is the village that we built the rainwater collection system and immersed ourselves in Ngobe culture. In the afternoons we went swimming in this river to cool off and relax. I was exempt from going to the ngobere classes because my level pretty high so instead i just hung out with my two younger brothers. We had a great time, they took me fishing which was the most fun. We put on snorkel masks and he grabbed his spear (about five feet in length) and headed to the river about mid day when it was the clearest. I was the designated spotter and he was the "spearer" he caught enough fish and i caught enough crawfish for dinner that night. So we had coconut rice with fried crawfish and grilled riverfish, it was great.

The picture here is another of Nutivi, this the actual village itself, which was pretty small and spread out. As you can see the continental divide in the back ground, we were nestled between the river and the mountians. I really dont think the picture needs much explaining. they really speak for themselves.







The next place we went was another village called Junquito, it was a two hour hike into the mountians along a small trail that dropped down into a small valley. As you can see the houses were very rudimentary, and elevated off the ground. This village was much different than Nutivi, it was a very close knit community that spoke a variation on the dialect of ngobere. But dont get me wrong i liked them both equally. Junquito was much smaller, but thee was less

humidity in the air and the food was different . Here we built three composting latrines , which was quite a bit of work. We did everything from mix the concrete to make toilet seats. It was a really good experience for me. The whole community worked together to make it happen, so everyday we all ate lunch together and worked together. It was reall neat to see everyone come together for a common cause. Everyone did there job well, the women made really good food and the men hauled the sand and concrete blocks.


In both villages i was given a ngobere name, in Nutivi they called me "Nichi," which means "Little One." In the second one i was named "uchu-lu" which i have no idea what it means.
Anyways needless to say i had great time, there is much more to share but my time is up right now, i hope all is well and the razorbacks are winning.
Panama Jack signing off