Ngobe FAQ

As people get more used to having me around, they´ve started to ask me more questions. Most of them generally cycle through the same 10-12 inquiries, and I´ve formulated many automatic responses.

On the one hand, I love answering questions, and enjoy the opportunity to teach them something new. I feel like I am tearing a small hole in the dark curtain that has, because of poverty, circumstance, and lack of access, limited their world view. I have to hide an incredulous grin sometimes when I hear Roberto, my host dad, unprompted, explanining earthquakes to someone in Ngobere, a topic I explained at great length last week over dinner. He is eager to spread the word. I even love how, after trying to navigate a long-winded scientific explanation, armed with my illuminated-by-kerosene-lamp Spanish dictionary, Roberto´s only response is ¨A mystery... the work of God.¨

And you know? Instead of talking myself blue in the face, this might become my fall-back answer.

But on the other hand, sometimes answering the exact same questions over and over has its frustrations. Even though I live in absurdly close quarters with these people, and spend virtually all day with community members, sometimes I feel the wide expanse of the whole world between us. It brings on the strangest feeling of loneliness-- this idea that I am here, in their country, speaking their language, living and learning their lives, and that my own existence in the U.S. is so far beyond their own understanding. I continually forget this until I hear the questions they ask. Then I am reminded that my life is impossibly distant from everything they know, and that they will never, ever really ¨get¨where I am coming from. It´s an odd feeling. I try not to wonder too much about what they really think about me. It´s better to live only in the moment of our interactions, which are usually rich and fulfilling. If I think too much about the barriers between us, some of my work here starts to seem even more difficult, bordering on impossible.

This is the first time in my life when I have truly felt that I am the only kind of person in one place. I am having an experience so foreign and unique that I can never fully explain it to someone else, American or Panamanian.

I think I know what you´re thinking. That is a lot of emotion coming from a simple Q and A. But during each, I am confronted with the privelage of my education, of where I grew up, and everything in the world I have learned. We know so much, and we don´t even realize. It´s something to think about, and something to be grateful for.

But please do remember as you read these questions the differences between being uneducated and being stupid. The people here are not stupid. I am impressed daily by how quickly the grasp the things I talk about, how they remember everything I´ve ever told them, and continue to bravely ask intelligent, thoughtful questions that they´ve never had the resources to answer themselves. They are not stupid, but they are uneducated.

Until 2001, there was no school in town past sixth grade, and those who wanted to continue would have to pay a daily bus fare to Almirante, the nearby port town, to finish 7th through 12th grade. Few families can afford that. Consequently, most of the adults stopped formal learning in sixth grade, and took to the family finca. They know impossible amounts about farming, their products, and every plant that grows s around them. They can identify every animal, including all of the venemous snakes that Cati could get killed by. They have the sharpest eyes, spotting sloths in trees that are imperceptible to me, or noticing and fretting over every new bug bite that dots my ¨blanquita¨skin. They know alot; it´s just a completely different kind of knowledge.

Here is some of what they ask me most frequently, and in some cases, how I answer.

Q: Will you marry an indio? If so, when and who?
A: These conversations are always long. They really, really, really want me to marry a Ngobe and live forever among them (also a good option: taking him to the states so he can send money!). I always say that I am not looking for a boyfriend, American or indigenous and, ¨also, my mother would be really mad at me if I got married in Panama.¨Which is true, right Mom?!

Q: Why do you have blue eyes/Why do we have brown or black eyes/Are you sure you don´t want to marry an indio so we can have blue eyes too?
A: They call me ¨Ojos de muñeca,¨ meaning ¨doll eyes¨and are endless fascinated by the gringo baby blues. I have been asked by many if all gringos have blue eyes like me. Sometimes I go into the fair-skinned people with European heritage explanation about why more gringos have them, but most of the time, I try to turn their compliments back to them, and tell them how I´m jealous of their brown eyes and jet-black shiny hair. I point out that the sun hurts my eyes and I get sunburns, and they sort of smile proudly like they had it figured out all along. Silly gringita!

Q: What are the stars, and where are they? If the world is round (many people are still not convinced of this... Sorry Columbus), why don´t the people on the bottom fall out?
A: These explanations never go so well. I try to start at the beginning, but for many, the idea of space is a new one, and as I fumble in my dictionary for words like ¨axis¨or ¨lightyears¨, I know I´ve said too much. And gravity? Forget it.

Q: Does your mother remember you?
A: The first few times I was asked this, I thought I understood them wrong. Alas, no. For people who never leave each other for more than a day at a time, the thought of having been away from my family for four months and counting is unimaginable. If we haven´t seen each other, maybe she forgot me? But my dearest mummy still answers my phone calls and emails, so I think so far we´re good.

Q: Is there pobreza, poverty, in the United States?
A: Many can´t believe me when I say yes. Admittedly, I get a little tired of their ¨everything in hunkey-dory in the U.S.¨assumptions, but I have trouble likening the two kinds of poverty in the two countries. Here in Panama there is a program called Red de Opportunidades that is similar to the American welfare system. I often just say that we have a Red de Opportunidades too, and that people need help like they do in Panama, and that seems to be enough.

Q: How much did _____ cost?
A: They ask this about literally everything. For more information on this, read the Ngobe Culture Points post. Depending on what it is, sometimes I tell them the truth, sometimes I reduce the price by half, and if it´s something costly (like my mp3 player or camera), I say it was a gift. It´s just easier.

Q: What do you eat por alla?
A: I always begin my answer with a big grin and say, ¨First of all, we never eat green bananas or plantains, only ripe, yellow ones, and we eat them as snacks, not as meals.¨ Their brows furrow. They scan my face, pause, and say, ¨Then...what do you eat?¨ I usually talk about fresh vegetables, and emphasize that we eat rice sometimes but not every day and not in heaping portions. I leave out the frequency with which I eat chicken because here, it is a rarity and only for a special occasion. I don´t talk about dairy, because I am pretty sure no one has ever eaten yogurt or cheese, and even though they have cows, I have never seen the milk used for anything? Anyway, some things are sacred, and I like yogurt to be my special little secret.

Q: Can you read?
A: I am not sure why they ask me this. Could the answer really be no?
Q: Can you read in Spanish?
A: Yes. (This is always very impressive to them.)
Q: In English?
A: Again, could the answer really be no? Sometimes people even ask me if I know how to speak English. Whenever I ask them what else they think I would speak, I don´t get an answer. And no, my Spanish isn´t anywhere near that good, so they can´t think I´m a native speaker.

So there you have it. I have my hands full here some days.