Starfish are Cool

(Kevin uploaded the pictures, but this is April's story you are reading.)

Well, if you are going to be jealous of our time in Panamá, now is a good moment to do so...we just spent a week snorkeling in one of the most beautiful places in Pamaná, an area called Comarca Kuna Yala.



The word comarca signifies that the area is a semi-autonomous region of Panamá that is populated by one of the several indiginous peoples of Panama, in this case the Kuna Indians. Kuna Yala is also known as the San Blas Islands...this being the name it was given in Spanish colonial times. But the Kuna who live there prefer and use the name Kuna Yala for the region.



In many ways the Kuna are very protective (rightfully so) and controlling of what a tourist can do and where they can go and how...but it is the picture of paradise (literally some of the tropical paradise photos you have seen are from Kuna Yala.) Kuna Yala is an area of beautiful coasts, white sand, coconut trees and water so clear that I could see my toes clearly when I was in water shoulder deep. It is said to be home to some of the world´s best snorkeling...I don´t have enough experience to know if it was the world´s best...but it was fun enough to keep me swimming for hours each day for 6 days.





In our snorkeling search for colorful coral and lots of fish, we also found some white sand dollars the size of dinner plates and big starfish. We saw lots of starfish, many different kinds and colors. The above photo is of some starfish that we found in about 12 feet of water. They tend to crawl along the bottom slowly looking for food. They were numerous and easy to borrow for a photo prop. Or to just play with for about half an hour, as April did in shallow water near one island.

When you first pick up a star fish it pulls in all of its tenticles and goes all rigid in your hand. It seems as if it is not capable of moving. But if you have a bit of patience eventually the animal will start to put out its tenticles and feel around. On their underside they have a line of tenticles that run along the middle of each leg, going from the tip to the center of the star. Their mouth is located at the center where the 5 lines of tenticles meet. Each tenticle has a suction cup type tip for grabbing things, and aiding movement.


When the starfish is not holding itself stiff for protection, it is suprisingly soft and yielding to the touch...kind of like incredably thick velvet, but with armory bumps sprinked in the pattern. It is easy to see the bumps, but if you are patient and have a keen eye for observation you can also see little velvety sensors on the upper surface of the starfish that help them perceive and respond to touch stimuli.

For those who are interested enough to wait (it is a bit like watching turtles move...takes a real interest and lack of hurry), starfish are quite flexible. They are capable of folding almost in half to turn themselves over or to go over the edge of a surface (like the edge of my hand). They conform their shape to the surface that they are on and move with undulations of the hundreds of sucker tipped tenticles.

In the below video you can see the tenticals moving pretty clearly.



(Watch the starfish suckers move him along Kevin's hand)

We also saw lots of types of corals including fan corals, vase corals, brain corals and many others that I don’t know. We saw itty bitty colorful fish in all the nature video colors, and big fish with all sorts of colors too. We saw big schools of blue fish and others of yellow fish and grey fish. One fish, two fish, red fish blue fish....

We saw many schools of minnow sized fish where the school had to number in the hundreds of thousands of fish...you could be in the middle of the school and have a hard time seeing out of the school for all the fish and flashes of sun from their bodies. We also saw anemones, sea cucumbers, lobsters, conch (brought a big one back to the hotel and had it for lunch the next day), crabs, sea grass and pelicans.

One thing I don’t mind not ever seeing again was a small school of Barracuda. They were making me nervous, so I popped up to the boat where our guide was following us through an off shore reef and had the following conversation:

me- Are barracuda dangerous?


him- How big is it? (spreading his hands shoulder wide as an example)

me- (thinking...this conversation is not going the way I had hoped) This big. (spreading my hands to about 4 feet wide)

him-Oh...how many are there?

me- (thinking...I really am not being reassured at all by these questions) 4 or 5 of them.

him- Oh. (what felt to me like a long pause for thought here) They will just go away.

me- I am not seeing very many fish here.


him-They are probably hiding from the barracuda. Barracuda are brava. (brava is a word most often used with animals, and can have many context driven tones or connotations...but usually means mad or aggressive)

me-(thinking....If I see them again I think I will be ready to hide like the other fish!)

Of course, we did fine...we didn’t snorkel in that area for long. I am glad to have seen barracuda, but don’t feel a particular need to see them again. We had a great time snorkeling...can’t wait to go again.

Can you see the two starfish that are in the above photo?

Tenth Anniversary Trip to Kuna Yala

Before and after our Anniversary trip we were extremely busy working on the 2009 Peace Corps Panama Calendar. The calendar is the main fund raiser for the Volunteer Action Committee, VAC, who uses it to fund Super Small Project Assistance, SSPA, grants (up to $60) for volunteers who need a source of funds to help get community members to events, jump start projects, etc. We were working until nearly 1am the night before we left, on the computer at our embassy host family's house (thank goodness for their hospitality and flexibility!), and then had to get up at 4:30 to head to the airport for a 6am flight. So we were well prepped to enjoy a relaxing week when we finally did leave. (We will post info on how to buy a copy of our wonderous PC Panamá calendar just as soon as they are available so you too can enjoy it!)

For our anniversary we went to the Kuna Yala Comarca (sort of like a semi-autonomous indigenous reservation within Panama; Kuna Yala was previously known as the San Blas islands, the name given by Spanish invaders) on the northeastern side of Panama (sort of on the Caribbean and Columbian borders).

We flew to Kuna Yala in a plane small enough that Kevin´s hat touched the ceiling. We landed on a small island that wasn't much more than the runway, a small hotel, an administrative office where everyone had to pay the $2 "tax" to be in the comarca, and a boat dock. The process of getting your baggage from baggage check was a little less organized than some I have experienced.

(Our plane, just off the runway, unloading luggage from the nose compartment. The plane unloads and then immediately loads back up and leaves. It was on the ground for less than 20 minutes. When we left, we noticed that everyone who had just arrived was snapping pictures of their small plane and the small runway, just like we did.)

We were able to sit on the white sand beach and look at the clear water, but what we really wanted was to sit in a hammock, read a book, and take a nap. Or go snorkeling. We waited and waited for the boat from the cabañas we'd made a reservation with to come pick us up. But the boat didn't come, despite several calls from the payphone (the cell phone service there is the other company from our type of cell phone :). Finally around noon, one of the helpful folks from the admin office made a call for us on his cell phone to "a guy he knew" on a nearby island, and we had a place to stay, and they came to get us.

(A picture from the plane of our island. The white dot in the front was our bathroom. The red roof just to its left was our "cabaña".)

It wasn't on a deserted island (there were probably 40 bamboo-sided/thatch-roofed houses, a school, and a basket/volleyball court, all in an area about equal to three football fields).

(The view from our bathroom dock, toward some of the houses and other bathrooms.)

There weren't white sand beaches, and we wouldn't have gone snorkeling from them anyway.

(The view from our bathroom, toward the water. Yup. That's right.

While talking with the family during the week, we explained a composting toilet and its benefits. We seem to always be working.)

And at $40 per person per night (including all meals and boat trips to other sites), it cost twice what the place with our reservation was supposed to cost. But in the end, they were very accomodating and although it involved a 30-45 minute boat ride to other islands, we were able to do a lot of snorkeling in clear waters with coral, white sands, and fish.

(Laying in clear water on the white sands of Isla de los Perros, with palm trees on another island in the background. Coconuts are a big source of revenue for the Kuna, who cultivate and protect the trees and sell the coconuts for 20 cents each to Columbian ships who pass through the islands to trade.)

We were in a six room cabaña. It was over the water between the main part of the island and a small spot of sand.

(The view from our bathroom dock, toward our cabaña. April is on the steps.)

Other than one night when two Australian couples (who are spending about a year and a half traveling, volunteering, and working their way through central and South America) were there, we had the cabaña to ourselves, and we did our best to make it our own, in celebration of our anniversary.

(The bamboo door to our room. At April's secret request, our parents sent along digital copies of some of our wedding photos, which we printed and posted to celebrate the day.)

But even with no one else staying in the cabaña, it was only so private feeling, considering how close everyone else was.

(The view from our bathroom dock, looking onto that spot of sand beyond the cabaña. There was another family living out on that spot of sand. In the foreground you can see their cayucas, or canoes. Most are cut from a single tree, and then augmented to have higher, more wave-protecting, sides.)

As you can imagine on an island that small, with space at a premium, soccer and baseball are not the preferred sports. While we were there, it was volleyball season, and daily afternoon practices in the beginning of the week led to a tournament on a nearby island Friday and Saturday.

(The view from our bedroom window early Saturday morning as the volleyball team loads into a cayuca for the ride to the tournament. Note the traditionally-outfitted Kuna women in the boat with the uniformed youth.)

We would travel by cayuca as well, but it was generally less crowded.

(The volleyball cayuca headed to their tournament. Our cayuca was slightly smaller, but typically had just the two of us and a capitan.)

As we boated along, in a fashion earily similar to our normal life in Peace Corps, we did dream a bit. Our original plan for this trip had been a bit longer, and it was supposed to include a few days on a sailboat going through the islands, learning to sail, and getting to snorkel where ever we were.

(View from an island out to modern catamaran sailboats contrasted with the sail on a cayuca. Cayuca sailboats form a primary method of transport for the Kuna amongst their islands and for fishing. Gas costs $5.50 a gallon in Kuna Yala.)

But we were able to spend all but our first day snorkeling on a variety of islands, and based upon how red we turned in spots like the backs of our legs, despite using a lot of sunblock, we probably didn't need any more snorkelling time in the sun. And we were lucky enough that on several of the days, we had a small island to ourselves, or very nearly so.

(View from Isla de los Perros, where we did a lot of snorkelling and some sitting in a hammock on a white sand beach.)

On our actual anniversary, we paid a bit extra for the gasoline and went all the way out to the Cayos Holandeses (Dutchman's Keys). Because it is further from most of the islands (and closer to the open waters), it had more fish to see, as well as some pretty good corals. Afterward, April asked about bigger fish and our capitan took us out closer to where the open waters break on the coral's edge. But all we saw right there were about four four-foot barracuda, which was not the type of "bigger fish" we were looking for. So we started back in and spotted some clear waters with starfish (look for another post about them scheduled for the next week) and sand dollars, and did one last swim. That's when we found the next day's lunch.

(April brought up this large conch, which we brought back with us. The family cooked it out that night, and we had coconut rice and conch in tomato sauce for lunch the next day. We brought the shell home too. I think the family enjoyed the fact that they didn't have to buy fish or conch to feed us for that meal.)

On our final day, we went snorkelling mid-day, then went mola shopping in the afternoon. We picked up a couple of not-so-bad ones, but before we found the really good molas, we found our first really good sunset.

(Sunset our last night, from Carti Supu, an island just off the shore from Carti, the terminus of the only road that connects the Kuna Yala Comarca to the rest of Panama.)

Check through some older posts from April if you need more info on molas, but in general, they are a layered fabric stitching technique that the Kuna women use to create blouses. They stitch a front and a back piece, then attach a lighter fabric for a neck and arms and below. Previously in our searches for molas in Panamá City and other parts of the country, we had only encountered the molas, but here where the Kuna live, most of the molas were in use, still attached to blouses.

In Kuna Yala, women would bring hangers, obviously from their closet, of blouses with the skirt that matched them, to sell. Several women were willing to separate the stitching on their blouses to sell us one of the molas that made them, but some weren't and insisted we take the entire blouse, with both molas.

In the dark after that sunset, we visited a small island near Carti Supu and, surrounded by fifteen people speaking rapid fire Kuna, under the light of a flashlight, we found several molas we liked, but the woman didn't want to separate the blouses. She insisted on selling the entire blouse, for only slightly more than we'd been willing to pay for just one side.

But that wasn't the craziest mola purchase we made. We had seen several molas we liked a lot at our cabaña, from the women in the family there. So we had set aside money for those molas, so we could purchase them at the end. But negotiations bogged down, and we thought we had lost the chance to buy them, some of the most impressive ones we'd seen, when she walked away.

But she came back. With several other blouses! And they were even more amazing.

(One of the late coming blouses, that forced us to reconsider what we wanted to purchase.)

(Closer look at the mola on the back side of the same blouse. Normally, the front and back are very closely related in pattern, but on this one, the patterns are not only different from each other, but dramatically different from most other molas we've seen.)

In the end, after looking closely at several and debating how much we could spend (being low on cash after paying twice what we'd planned for our housing, and now feeling like we wished we still had the money we spent buying the other molas on Carti Supu), they offered to have their son meet us at the airport in Panamá the next morning and we could use the ATM there to withdraw more money and finish paying for the ones we wanted. Which is what we did. What an amazing amount of trust. And what amazing workmanship.

(The sisters who crafted the molas. Initially we were interested in three molas from these two sisters, but we ended up with six. What shrewd barginers they are! The young girl is the daughter of the owner of our cabaña and on the volleyball team.)

We returned on a beautiful sunny morning in Kuna Yala, landing in pouring rain in Panama City. Our trip was a bit different from what we'd expected, but we enjoyed it, and we will have great memories, and momentos, for the next ten, and more, years!

10 años casados

September 19, 1998 - September 19, 2008

It has been 10 years since the moment we kissed to seal the deal....

amoungst family and friends (and some bubbles).

Of course, Kevin has more wrinkels now...but they mostly seem to be from smiling.

We both have more grey hair...but I will refrain from laying blame there.

In the time since these photos, we have tryed so much, gone so far, and lived such full years.

Thanks to all the family and friends who have been so loving and supportive these 10 years.

We just wanted you to know,

that there are still many moments that feel just like the photo below.

Cultural Contrasts

Sometimes I find that I learn about myself from the way I respond to others. I feel like I have learned a lot about our culture in the USA from being here...from the contrasts that I see and from how I respond to those differences.

Kevin will attest that sometimes I ask his opinion and then do whatever I was thinking originally. He says that he doesn’t understand why I bother to ask if it is not going to change what I do. I ask because my emotional response (relief at his agreement or lack of) is very revealing...it helps me to know what I truly want and how strongly that desire is. I don’t just ignore his desires, they become part of the mix too.

Being in Panama has been like a national version of my interactions with Kevin, very revealing of my personal understanding of the world and how it is the same and different elsewhere. I have come to realize some of the cultural norms that I was following in the USA without giving them thought.

For example, think about the last time you were standing in a store waiting for help...say at the bakery counter or meat counter in the grocery. You know, one of those places were more than one person is waiting but there is nothing to tell you to form a line so everyone just lingers with a little bit of personal space. Usually the person waiting the longest is closest to the counter. When the worker is ready for the next person they either know in their head the order of arrivals or they ask "who was next?"...and every one in line also has the general order of who arrived before and after them in line in their mind. Can you imagine it?

People tend to wait patiently (with exceptions for slow service and troublesome customers) in these cluster lines. If someone tries to skip the "line" someone generally points out "They were here first". The self reinforcement of line waiting becomes even more pronounced and direct in those cases were the structure of the line is introduced by the establishment with signs or stanchions.

We even seem to have an unspoken understanding that if you waited in line properly and finished and then found that something wasn’t quite right (thinks like "you didn’t give me a spoon" or "you charged me too much") you don’t have to wait again to get more help on the same transaction...only for new transactions. You have probably had a similar experience.

I don’t think that (without a LOT of thought) I could have clearly described those cultural norms before living abroad. I realized them through realizing the actions here that I found annoying...but no one else seemed to notice. Why were they annoying? Because the rules of the road that I live by are different.

In the above example, I could be waiting patiently for the help of the worker who was with someone else and a new person would walk up to the counter and say "Joven" (young in Spanish and a term similar to "Miss" in it’s use to command attention). The worker would then interrupt what they were doing to help the new person. This usually seems to be related to short transactions...but even so I find it annoying. I was waiting so I should be next, right? Not necessarily by Panama norms.

In the above case I could say something like "I was waiting here first"...and it would get results, but it would be considered forceful of me. Not that they would serve me differently at all, just maybe look at me as not as patient at most people...maybe even not as nice because I am a foreigner.

Other examples:

• In Panama when you get on a bus you say a general "buenas dias" greeting to all and get a reply from those closest to you. In the USA it seems that buses and public transport are anonymous spaces. There doesn’t seem to be a requirement to do anything more than respect the private space of others.

• In Panama when a person visits another it is normal to offer a chair and a drink or food. This is similar to the States. However, in Panama it is much more common to be sent on your way with food. This can be food that is prepared or raw ingredients.
  In Panama, when visiting someone’s house there isn’t the same requirement to maintain conversation the whole time. Silences happen and are normal and comfortable to them. In the States long silences can be uncomfortable and indicate that the visit should end. We tend to only have comfortable silences with those that we know really well and can relax with.

• In Panama everyone is supportive of children. It is common to see a mother of 3 children on a bus put two of them on her lap and accept an offer from a stranger to hold one of her children. If the children are on a lap they don’t have to pay for the ride for them, if they take a seat they pay for a seat. It is normal to see strangers - both men and women- playing with children on the bus. In the States it seems that we are a bit afraid to have someone accuse us of doing something wrong with their children, so we refrain from interactions (or curtail those interactions some what) unless invited.

• In the USA we have the belief that we are all created equal and thus we refrain from using physical descriptors when possible. When we refer to race and skin tone most of us are careful to do so with respect. Yes, there are derogatory terms used to refer to race and skin tone, but they are derogatory and their use reflects poorly on the person who uses them. In Panama calling a person who looks Asian "chino" is normal accepted practice. Calling me "gringa" is normal as well. They don’t to see a lack of respect in this practice. In this ways it feels like I imagine the States must have felt like just before the civil rights movement.
  

I have noticed these things because they initially felt strange. I would often feel surprised or uncomfortable or even annoyed depending on the case. It took me a while to realize that these differences were telling me something about who I am, and who we are in the USA. I still feel those things...but I try to match my actions to those around me so that I am the only one uncomfortable.

Next time you are in public take a moment to watch those around you and see if you can see our social norms at work....it took living in Panama for me to see some of them. Have a good time people watching!

On the front lines of a quiet culture war (sea turtles)

This past week I had a very turtlely week and learned of a quiet battle that is being faught every night on the dark beaches of this lovely country. Please excuse the lack of photos...a sore point as I lost some great shots with the theft of my camera from my hotel room.

I spent my week traveling to learn more about sea turtles in order to teach about them in my community of fishermen. Sea turtles are an important part of the ocean ecology, and not all that well understood because of the range of thier travels, the lenght of their life span, and the difficulty in following an aquatic animal in the world´s oceans (especially when they are too small/young to tag). All 7 species of sea turtles in the world are in danger of extintion, and about 5 of the species are known to lay eggs on the coasts of Panama. These include the Olive Ridgley, Hawksbill, Green, and Leatherback, which is the largest of the turtles who´s shell alone can reach 6 feet long.

I started the trip with a visit to San San Pond Sak...which is a wetland park located in Bocas del Toro, very close (3km away) to the Costa Rica border. It is a wildlife preserve focusing on protecting both sea turtles and manatees. While in Bocas del Toro, I got to see and hold my first baby turtle, a leatherback who emerged from his nest a day or two before his siblings....so we only got to see the one baby. Oh boy, was he cute. He had his own paparazzi of people accompanying him to the sea.

(imagine a couple of photos of a turtle baby here)

The egg laying season was finished on the Caribean side...so I went home with my friend and fellow PCV Cassie to her site in Veraguas, on the Pacific side. Together we did some work, some teaching, and went walking the beach in the middle of the night looking for turtle eggs. Sea turtles in Panama face many risks here in addition to the natural risks found in the wild, including:

• human consumtion of eggs (also collected to sell at $1 for 3 eggs for eating)


• dogs eating eggs


• removal of sand from beaches for making cement for construction


• eating turtles for thier meat


• getting accidentaly caught in gill fishing or lobster nets
  

In Cassie´s community there is a small group of people who walk the beaches to collect turtle eggs and protect them in a fenced area of sand. Your typical turtle nest has 100-120 eggs and is burried 12-20 inches deep. They are at the greatest danger from humans the 1st 24 hours after they are laid when the tracks made by the mother still are visible. Each night there were more footprints in the sand in the middle of the night than at any other time of day.

In my three nights of walking the beach I saw about 8 sets of turtle tracks who´s nests had already been robbed. One night I got up at 12:40am and walked with Cassie. We saw 4 nests that I don´t think were robbed but we did not manage to locate the nests to collect eggs. The rising tide was limiting our time...it was raising a river between us and bed. The river went from knee to belly botton hieght in the time we were out there.

While walking back to the river we encountered a turtle who had arrived while we were down the beach a ways. She was just finished laying and in the process of covering the nest up when we arrived. She was not a very large turtle...we couldn´t measure her as she was not in her egg laying state any more when we appoached. It was awsome to sit in the weak moonlight and watch her finish shuffeling and packing sand to cover and hide her nest. We then walked behind her as she went to sea.

(imagine a photo of a green turtle and me here)

After she departed we used a stick to poke the sand and figure out were the nest was...it took 4 trys to find it as she had already filled it in when we arrived. We then collected her eggs (suffering 40ish bug bites along that tender strip of back that shows when your shirt rides up as a reward for my efforts leaning over the nest). We carried them back to the protected area (including wading the now waist high river) and reburied them at the same depth in the same within the fence.

(Imagine a photo of a dirty happy bugbitten April with a while pingpong ball sized egg in her gloved hand here)

All in all, three nests were collected for protecting in my three days of walking the beach. The turtle volunteer group estimated that 15 nests were lost to poachers or dogs while I was visiting. Add those losses to the following facts and you start to see why this is an important issue for the species:

• 1 turtle hatchling in every 1000 lives long enough to reproduce. This is one egg for every 10 nests. For Leatherbacks the number is closer to 1 in 10,000.
• Turtles don´t lay eggs every year....they sometimes skip 1-2 years between laying.
• A turtle must live 9-40 years before it can reproduce...most species averaging 23-25 years before they reach sexual maturity.

Add all the above together and a turtle must survive to reproductive age and lay 10 nests over the course of years in order to beat the odds so that one of her offspring survives.

We saw and talked to a couple of people who were walking the beach to illegally collect eggs. In some cases they responded with exactly what I expected...denigal that they were out to collect eggs (as if walking the beach with a stick in hand...used to poke and feel for the nest... at 2am is normal Panamanian behavior and had nothing to do with turtles). We also got told that the eggs collected were for personal consumtion and not for sale. There are Panamanians out there who don´t have enough food and turtle eggs can be an addition to the diet...but I think that they are the exception, not the majority.

It is a quiet and secrative war being faught over turtles and thier eggs...but yet there are nightly manuvers on both sides. There are very few confrontations in the night. The local volunteers lack the authority to do anything other than talk and it is hard to do when it is your nieghbor you are addressing. The authorities lack the resouces to be out observing and enforcing with frequency. Thus, at the moment the poachers are winning and the world´s turtles are losing.

Stay tuned...this is surely not my last visit to the turtle beaches of Panama...and I am deturmined to get sea turtle pictures!