So what exactly is it that you are doing?

Up until now, I have written mostly about the relationships I´ve formed and the cultural adjustments I´ve made since arriving in site. Our first three months are dedicated to an in-depth community analysis and building trust and friendships within the community. This is an essential part of Peace Corps service and sustainable development. Communities must be able to think critically about the resources they have, what they need, and how they can acheive it for themselves. Decades of paternalism and the delivery of ¨projects¨ for which they neither had to work nor plan end only in more dependence on government agencies and NGOs to bring villages what they need. When people participate and work for something, success rates are much higher.

The cornerstone of Peace Corps and sustainable development revolves around the idea that I teach as I go along, and that the community participates, plans, and manages its own project with my help. If they do this, when I leave, the knowledge and skills they have gained will stay, and the can continue forward in the future.

It´s a great idea, but it´s harder than it sounds. There are plenty of people in my village who believe all gringos are bad guys, who still don´t invite me in when I come to pasear. Many children and adults alike thought I came to take their kids back to the United States to be sold. Some think gringos eat people. A fellow volunteer lives in a community where everyone thought she was a spy and didn´t want to share anything with her for fear of where the information was going.

I´ve come a long way in my community since I arrived at the end of October, but you can see why the first step of building relationships is so important. We are up against a lot of ugly history, cultural boundaries, and foundationless fear and rumors. The first step of our Environmental Health project framework is to motivate and organize community members. To help them form committees, understand how to run meetings effectively, and to get people to actively participate in their own development. People in my community rarely attend meetings, and those who do are the same people over and over. Most of these people view ¨the community¨as only the 30-ish houses nearest the road, and ignore the remaining 65 that are spread out over hills, across rivers, and as far as two hours or more from the street. To advise every house of a meeting requires at least four days of walking. The disperese nature of the community, and the overall lack or motivation and organization will be one of my biggest challenges.

Such work is the first goal of the Environmental Health framework. The other two revolve around water and sanitation. Depending on the needs of a community, EH volunteers may educate existing water committees about the maintenence of an aqueduct, basic aqueduct theory, trouble shooting, waterborne diseases and better managing of time, funds, and meetings. This is a huge felt need in QP, where broken pipes go unfixed for weeks, some houses connected to the aqueduct have been without water for months, and for the fun of the ick factor, our water reserve tanks have crabs and sometimes worms inside of them.

I attended my first water committee meeting this past week, and while it was an experience that was at times frustrating, and I still battle with Getting People to Listen To Me, it is also heartening because I know I have the ability and resources to help them in many important and sustainable ways. EH volunteers also help to plan for and design other water systems, be it aqueduct lines or rain-water catchment. About 70 percent of my community is without running water in their homes, and use springs, creeks or wells (many of which are extermely dubious) for drinking, cooking and wash water. I am still thinking about what can be done for these homes. They are all so spread out, it is impossible that one water system could serve them all, and they also lack organization of any kind. They tell me they want water, but they haven´t come to meetings, or done anything other than voice their need. Beginning to work with some leaders in small committees and planning for a future project, or at the least, rain-water catchment systems is something I hope to do as well, though as I see it now, it cannot be my first priority.

Santitation is the other element. EH volunteers educate about fecal-oral transmission pathways, and essentially, promoting the construction, proper use and maintenence latrines. In Bocas, living in an indigenous community, this is another element where cultural understanding is key. Most of our technical sanitation training revolved around building and promoting compositng latrines. In my community, only about 10 percent of houses (generous estimations) use latrines, and those are full or poorly maintained. All of them are pit latrines, and most of them have buckets of wash water to clean with after use. Toilet paper is used by only a few families, and the others have no interest in it becasue they feel cleaner using water.

Which is a problem for composting latrines, which must be kept dry. It is also a problem because so few houses have a nearby water source, so they are extremely unlikely to use composting latrines if they could just go to the creek, or in the woods, and wash afterwards. I am realistic about the fact that, right now, I know of only about five families who would properly use and maintain a composting latrine. For most, pit latrines are a better option. In time, many will be ¨ready¨ for composting latrines, but as of right now, few people have identified them as a priority.

I am running into a small problem because my counter part solicitied PC for the specific purpose of a compositing latrine project. He knows they are better for the environment, last longer, and of course produce a fabulous compost for the finca. I think he is unrealistic about the scope of a project we could undertake in QP, as he is comparing our situation to one in a nearby community where 35 latrines were built by a PC volunteer. But this is my job: assessment, and then education and promotion. I have plenty of time to gauge genuine interest (and not just what he claims when he went around and told everyone I was coming to work on composting latrines) and feasibile success rates. Many volunteers have built latrines in Bocas that went unused or were unfinished. I would hate to do that.

So that, in short, is what EH volunteers will do, and as I wrap up my community analysis, what I am imagining for my time here in Panama. As always, leave me questions in the comments.