"Do not go where the path may lead..."

I made it. As of right now the Volunteer that I have been sharing my community with, Moiz, is a RPCV. He's done. He's gone. As of now I no longer live with a host family, I am in charge of this project on my own, and I have my own hut. I am -finally- an independent adult once again. The first three months I knew were going to be hard. But they were harder in ways I didn't expect, and I think it all boils down to lack of control over my own life. Not that Moiz and I ever had any problems. I feel like we did an excellent job of creating a smooth transition between Volunteers for the community and I am incredibly indebted to him for a tremendous amount of knowledge and insight that only 2 years living with our people can bring. But I am so ready to kick my service into gear. Over the last few weeks, I have filled my days with lots of reading, lots of journaling, and lots of counting down for this point. I still visited with other people in my community and such, but I was re...

There's a 'jungle legend' out here in the Darien that a PCV once went crazy. After several days of not being able to get in touch with this Volunteer, the PC office sent someone out to their site to check on them. The missing PCV was found in site, cool as a cucumber, busy nailing pancakes to trees because it needed to be done. So now it is not uncommon to hear one West side PCV warn us Darienitas, 'don't nail pancakes to trees!' I am coming close to nailing pancakes to trees. I have been living with host families for the last 5 months and on Monday, I get to move into my own hut. And not a moment too soon. I love my host family. I love my community. I love Panama. But I REALLY need to have my own space. To choose when I eat and how much I eat and whether I eat rice or platano. To choose when I go to sleep and when I get up and to not have to tell my mom where I am going every time I have to use the latrine. It will be amazing. 72 hours and counting. I wonde...