Some house udpates!

We are officially in our house now, with a week under our belts of fighting back the termites, scorpions, and water leaks, and defining for folks that it is now our house, not the neighborhood public porch for everyone to wander in and sit down (or inspect all of our stuff!). As April said, we have two rooms and a large porch. Here is what it looks like from the field (since the last pictures were taken, there was a junta, or communal work effort, and the grass was cut by a bunch of guys with machetes):

Here is all of our stuff, out in the porch, while we were cleaning and spraying the rooms.

Compare this huge pile of how much we have now with the picture from when we came down here (http://ak-panama.blogspot.com/2007/05/training-week-one.html) with just the blue suitcase, blue backpack, grey suitcase, red backpack, and yellow backpack, most of which are actually visible in this image.

We have two neighbors within shouting distance. This is taken from where April was standing in the first picture and you can just barely see part of the closest house in the trees straight back.

We have a path to the water, but not quite a waterfront view. It is down this path that the neighbors (and various other folks) walk to their boats, in a cove about 100 meters away. Again, the picture was taken from where April stood in the first photo, so folks do pass rather close to our house, and since this front room is our bedroom, quite close to our windows and bedroom door. It is a bit different dynamic in Panamá than in the states, as we've taken many other paths as close to houses. We hope to build a wall of bamboo or something between the door and the first column, to define our space and give some privacy to our door.

But for now, we are hoping that the termites don´t return (we knocked down those nests, swept a lot, and sprayed), while we are gone for training and Thanksgiving (most of the volunteers here in Panamá gather in a mountain resort for a taste of chill air - they say we need a sweatshirt - and cook a huge Thanksgiving meal together) over the next two weeks. We'll post more about the house and construction projects in the future.