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