I made it back out of site again after a solid two weeks in, it is really nice to come out some times. Get my hot shower, air conditioning and a good dose of news from home. As you can see i got my camera back on line and went a little overboard with the photos, but it seems that sometimes pictures speak a thousand words. I can say that i have been enjoying myself the past two weeks, i have been staying very busy. The weather has been absolutely amazing, sunny and warm every single day without exception, and at night it rains so the land doesnt dry out. I have been doing a lot of diving and spear fishing, although the other day i came across a four anda half foot barracuda in my favorite spearfishing place so i kind of laidoff the past few days. It is really fun to spearfish though because it is so primitive, i use a real spear connected to a rubberband that is tied off to my hand. Believe me it takes a skill that i have yet to perfect, but it is fun, it is like going to the buffet and choosing what you want. What you see on my kitchen table is a productof a rediculous ammount of swimming and spearing. Some of the other pictures that you see are of my house and the spectacular view that i have from my hammock, all the sunset views are from my hammock. I finally got some pictures of my house so that you all can see, the house turned out good in the end, at least it doesnt let rain in for the most part which is a good thing.
There are several pictures of some of the work that i have been doing. One is of the bridge that we built over the creek that floods when it rains, we had to wait for the dry season to build it, then another is of the rainwater catchment system that i built for my family they are the only ones with water now, another of the work that we are doing on the aqueduct system. The toma de agua was blocked by a landslide that damaged the entire system, so we are cleaning it out and rebuilding it which is requiring me to learn about engineering stuff that i hadno idea about. It is really interesting though because it is like the ultimate test in
college. You get the literature on the subject and then you study it intensively and then you are literally tested on it. But the difference is that human lives are affected by your results, so there is more pressure, but unlike college there are actual results that are tangible which makes you care more, hence your performance is better. I am really enjoying this aspectof the job because i feel like i am really learning now, not that i wasnt learning in college but now it seems like i care a lot more. I guess i will see how it turns out, my unofficial test is on the second of march when i get home, wish me luck. But in reality anyting works because it is always better than what they had before. As you can see with the bridge it is not a big project (actually more like a sidewalk that crosses a creek) butwe used all local resouces and local know how (me). I cant say i know much about bridge building but we did it and it works really well and they are happy, which is what counts.

I always have a lot of visitor in my house, they come from all over the area (Bahia Azul, Kusapin, Punta Allegre) to hear the gringo speak their language, that is not their primary reason but they all seem to have heard that i speak their dialect. I am not fluent but i can hold my own for the most part, which took a lot of work and they seem to respect that. Like this guy, he is a mama tata religious man, he has long hair and wears a dress. One of the big things is that they are tryingto preserve their language which is disappearing quickly. So he came to my house to see if it was true that i could speak with him, i did okay, it seems like these guys speak much faster
and without mercy as far as vocabulary is concerned. But oh well, he was entertained and he gothis photo taken (for the first time).

Here is a good story. I was walking in the jungle with my brother and we came across a fairlylarge venomous snake in the path. Normally i would have walked around the snake avoiding all together, but my manhood was called into question at the expense of the snake. So with my extremely sharp machete i lopped off its head and not knowing what to do i continued down the path. My brother did not move an inch, he yelled from behind "where do you think you are going, you may be a man for killing the snake but you mustgive it the proper burial." So he showed me the ritual for killing snakes, you bury the head and plant a stick on top and then tie a leaf around the top so the snake cant see you next time on the trail. I thought that it was a neat tradition, but most importantly from the whole thing came a renaming of Tuchi (myself), i now have a new name for when i am in the jungle..... Itchi &#&#& (i cant pronouce it) "snake slayer."
For all you enviromentalist out there dont worry i am not going to deplete the snake population, but keep in mind that i have to maintain my reputation.

Man this sunset was unbelievable!

Some times the water turns such a beautiful color, this photo was taken outside my house when these two girls came to visit me.

Here comes the sun.

I will be out in my site for the next month or so, i am going in for a long hual, i will be out in the middle of april again. So if there are no updates for a while that is why, but please stay tuned I should have some good stories to come back with because i have a lot of work to do.

Take care until then

Tuchi

Snake Slayer

Panama Jack

I am going to title this blog "My People"
Because that is exactly what it is, these are the people that i wake up in the morning and see everyday. These are the people of my village, they are my friends and most importantly they are my family, every single one of them. I see it like that and they do too. It may seem a little matter of fact but it is the truth, it is exactly like having one big family, you dont always get along with them but they are always there and eventually you get over your differences and work together.
I know that it has been a long time since i have posted anything but it is for a good reason, i have been holed up in my site for the better part of a month now. i have been working and slipping deeper and deeper into the indigenous life, it has brought many tough days but it has also brought about some of the most rewarding days of my life.
In that time i have finished my house, which was a huge relief, it was a lot of work but it was well worth it. it was a big symbol for them to see me build my house by my self, in their culture it is a sign of a man to build a house. if you cannot build one then your worth as a man is lessened, you could almost say that it is a rite of passage. man it was a tough passage but now i have gained alot of respect in the community.
As far as projects are concerned i am working quite a bit, i am limited to the things that are existing in the community as well as using what resources i can that come srom the outside. Recently a group of tourist showed up at my site and wanted a tour of the village, it was a rather comical situation because they were rich doctors and lawyers trying to mingle with extremely poor indians. My guys (villagers) did really well, they are a very proud people so they didnt let it phase them that the people that were walking among them make a thousand times a week than they do. it was strange, having outsiders come in made me feel much more like one of the villagers than the foriegner that i am. now the village kind of sees me differently now that outsiders arrive several times a month, they treat me much more like one of thier own, which believe in this line of work is a very good feeling. it is one that is not alwas achieved.

The money that is being generated by the new tourism is alowing for me to work in the community, although it is very little we have been fairly resourceful with what we have. it is not enough to do a major project (latrines, aqueduct, etc.) but we make do. so far we built a bridge over the creek, which was a major test of my engineering knowledge (none). But you use what you have and you keep on going. We actually made two bridges, one was of concrete and the other was a massive log that we carried and layed it into place. both of which were a lot of work but the outcome was very much worth the effort. the tourist (the guy that brings them) requested that we clean up the trail up the old world war two military base, he gave use some money (twenty bucks) to buy food for the workers. the whole thing turned out pretty funny. we had a meeting and decided on a time to clean it up, all the men over the age of fifteen volunteered along with myself so there were about twenty to twenty five of us. we set the date for friday in the morning. so all of us met on the beach and had coffee together and began sharpening out machetes for the work. we had chop this out of the dense jungle so a sharp machete goes along way. so anyways there we were on the beach, twentyfive indians and a white man sharpening three and a half foot machetes (small swords and let me tell some of these guys are pretty muscular and wild looking sometimes) when a two tourist groups pulled up onto our beach with tlooks of horror on their faces. at the time i didnt think about because it was normal for me, but we must have looked like a was party getting ready to slaughter the neighboring village. in retrospect it is hilarious to me, but i think it really freaked out some of the tourist. the tour guide assured them that it was safe and that the women were not gonna be

harmed in any way. i couldnt help but fall down laughing, so much that i almost impaled myself on my machete, which in turn all the men thought was even funnier so they all started whooping and yelling (a cultural thing that is fun but can be rather disturbing at times), which furthered the idea that the tourist might have made their last boat ride. anyways the people got off the boat and only stayed for a while while we continued to drink coffee and joke in the dialect, which for all the tourist knew we were plotting their demise. But as you can see from the pictures that i am posting these are really gentle and nice people, it is amazing the misunderstanding that arise sometimes.

other work that i have been doing is fixing the aqueduct which is a real head ache sometimes,
but it is coming along okay. something that i am really excited about is that there is a group coming out in march to do a project with us. i am in charge of organizing a project for sixteen high school students from Lawrence Acedemy in Boston, a really high end academy. they are coming down for two days and are bringing materials and everything. it is a really good oppotunity for us, one that is quite unusual. it looks as though it is going to be a long term thing as well, they are talking about bring more students for extended periods in june as well. apparently word is getting around that i am on the pennesula organizing the indians there and the resorts are interesting in coming with tourist as well as doing projects. so that is exciting. So it looks as though i have my work cut out for me over the next couple months, if anyone is interested in coming down or getting involve in some form or another you can contact me at jacksonjtaylor@yahoo.com

any help is welcome and will be put to good use, things are happening in Punta Valiente and i am really happy to be

a part of it.

i will leave you with this picture of Rogelio one of my good friendsm this is a classic picture of the men of punta valiente (pictured in the back ground). "we dont sit in ourr boats out here we stand, it doesnt matter how rough the sea is."
I cant exactly do that but i am trying, i have twenty months to figure it out.

Panama Jack