If you want to help support in the festive spirit!

Happy Holidays. Here we are, entering into the season of giving. And we all want to give what we can and help in every way we can. Many people at home ask me how they could help the people that I work with. And now there are a few opportunities to support the people here, giving them opportunities to improve their lives.


In February of 2010, various volunteers and I in the province of Bocas del Toro will be gathering together to put on an Agro-Business Seminar to give small farmers in our region the knowledge and skills to improve their farming and marketing opportunities, in turn helping their families climb out of poverty. In order to fund resources, food and travel to bring farmers from their communities to this seminar, we will need help from friends and family members back home. If you would like to donate, click on
https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=525-130

Another opportunity is to donate to a youth development conference we will be facilitating in february, focusing on self-image, sex ed, and the prevention of STIs and HIV/AIDS. Last year, I participated as a facilitator and brought two teenagers from my community, Placido and Angelica. The kids still talk about their experiences, remembering all the fun games, their friends and the amazing experiences they had. Donations will help pay for the travel, accomodations and food and resources for this amazing conference this year.

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail& projdesc=525-132 (If unable to view hyperlink, visit www.peacecorps.gov click on Donate Now and search by project number 525-132)

Also, if you are feeling excited about giving in a different way and sending a package to my community, we can always use kids books in spanish, or old yarn for my women's knitting group!

Another idea is to purchase a 2010 Panama Calendar

Each year, the Volunteer Action Council (VAC) in Panama creates a Panama Calendar using photos submitted by volunteers. Photos here are from the new 2010 calendar. The proceeds go to small grants awarded to volunteers and their communities for small projects.

Last year, PCPF sold 250 calendars and sent $3,000 to VAC. We want to sell 300 calendars this year.

Price is $17 per calendar, with free shipping to U.S. addresses. (Shipping to overseas addresses

is at cost.)

Please help us meet our goal of selling 300 calendars this year. Order calendars for yourself and for gifts:

1. Order On-line:

Click to Order On-line.

Use "Buy Now" button to pay by credit card

or PayPal. It's fast, free and safe!

2. Order by Mail:

Click for Calendar Order Form.

Mail completed form and check to address

on form.

Questions? Email panamacalendars@panamapcv.net or call Steve Spangler, 703-536-5457, or Jerry Lutes, 301-881-3407.

Hope you are all having festive holidays. I had a fabulous thanksgiving full of turkey, stuffing, pie and good cheer, with all the other volunteers of the country. Here we are in Cerro Punta, a community up in the mountains where we actually felt cold! It was a lovely weekend, staying in cabins, drinking coffee in the place where it was grown, wearing our jackets and pants and using my long underware for the 2nd time ever (1st time when I climbed the volcano). So refreshing. Happy thanksgiving and enjoy the holiday season.

little faces

My friend Elena, hauling bananas back to her house for supper in her chakra on her head. Even the children have strong necks.

Bijen, who always has a smile on her face when I see her
A glamour shots photo, posing with the dog. ( she has a little knit hat on her head that her mother made in my knitting class)
And now the dog is wearing the knitted hat.

Receiving light

And then there was light!
Although you can't see it well, there is a little solar panel in this thatch roof.
My wonderful little helper Rigoberto, hauling solar lights up the hill.
Today, the shipment arrived. I walked down to the main road with a possee of 3 teenage boys to help me carry up 5 boxes of 48 solar lights. The delivery truck arrived an offered to drive us up the road to the school. From there, all the little kids put the boxes into giant chakras, strapped them to their heads and we headed up the very slippery mud hill. My favorite little helper Rigoberto insisted on taking a box up the hill.

Later in the day, after the community finished their cleaning of the cemetery which happens every Day of the Dead on November 2nd, I gave a brief introduction of how solar lights work. Everyone got so excited. I had many women say they were so excited to get light to cook with in the night. They were talking amongst themselves that if their husbands didn’t want the lights, that they themselves would have to find a way to save up their money.
So we are selling them at $11 a piece, $10 for the base cost and $1 to benefit the women's chocolate group helping me sell them.
I have begun helping to install the little solar panels on the thatch roofs. And the first night after the lights charged in the blazing sun, the look of their faces beneath the light was so precious. It was amazing. Although it is not like having full on electricity, it is something, and something sustainable. Through this, the people will not have to buy kerosene which is bad for lungs and the environment or candles which are just expensive, or as many batteries for their flashlights which then get thrown into the streams and the water sources. It is a way of getting the clean development technologies into the hands of the people that need them most.
So thanks to my grandfather and my father who helped in the research and paid for the packaging the families in my community have a little bit more light in their lives.