The
Adventures of Kat Maria, Perla Haiti, in Panama
By Kelsey “Kat” Black
’13
“Uh, funny story,” I said to my friend when she pointed in horror to the masses
of welts and bruises that disfigured my leg from shin to kneecap.
“What happened to you?” she wanted to know. It was two days since I returned
to the United States from a month-long study program in Panama. I’m sure she
wasn’t expecting anything close to the story I told: about how I injured my leg
after falling through a hole in a latrine over the ocean on an indigenous Panamanian
island—thankfully, not into raw sewage.
Kelsey Black ’13 by the biggest tree on Barro Colorado
Island, Panama. |
It was during SIT (School for
International Training) Panama: Biodiversity in the Tropics,
with which I spent most my summer as a Praxis intern, participating
in field excursions, interviewing locals, living with my
home-stay families and even exploring Panamanian night-life—and receiving
my real education about Panamanian culture, environmental policy and other lessons.
For example, I learned from
talking to local Kuna lobster fishermen that the indigenous
Kuna people, who live in the self-governed island province
of Kuna Yala, do not in fact consume the lobster themselves.
Their catch is usually transported to Panama City and/or
served to tourists on the island. I learned how difficult
the life of a laborer in the produce capital of Panama is
by climbing to the top of one of the steepest hills in the
region; by the time I had descended, I was exhausted, covered
from head to toe in mud and painfully aware of the physically
demanding nature of farm work in the highlands of Panama.
In addition to discussing the
potential of GMOs for the future of Latin American agriculture
and the pitfalls of organic farming in the tropics, I also
learned, through a chance conversation with a local hotel
manager, that the indigenous communities—which comprise most
of the agricultural work force—have statistically suffered the worst health consequences
of prevalent pesticide use. I learned about the decimation of marine ecosystems
due to overfishing by snorkeling around coral reefs and sunken ships (often through
swarms of poisonous jellyfish—think Finding
Nemo).
By interviewing representatives
from various NGOs and Panama’s National Authority for the Environment (ANAM)
for an independent research project, I learned that the role of NGOs in the management
of Panama’s national conservation parks is significant, but considerably limited
due to government interference. And I was given the opportunity to observe the
scope of “biodiversity in the tropics” by seeing it in full-color brilliance
in the tropical rainforests of El Parque Internacional La Amistad and Barro Colorado
Island.
My education took place on a
cultural level as well. I learned about the state of public
transportation in Panama by taking countless taxis, the drivers
of which drove on the curb, shouted at pedestrians in crosswalks
to move out of the way, fell asleep at the wheel and considered
seat-belts an extraneous nuisance. I came to understand the
extent to which Panamanian women treasure their public appearance
when my home-stay mother refused to let me attend class in
shorts or a mildly wrinkled skirt. “Ay,
no puedes irte asi!” she exclaimed
(“You’re not going out like that, are you?”)
I learned about the ubiquity
of machismo in Panama when one of my little home-stay brothers
naturally assumed that, because I was a woman, it was part
of my job description to take care of babies, and, to my
infinite surprise, dumped his infant brother on my bed. The
assumption was confirmed when, not wanting to abandon a helpless
baby, I brought him to his father. “Te
ves bien,” he quipped, adding in English, “The baby looks
good on you.”
I was rudely awakened to the
standard treatment of animals in rural Panama when I lived
with a family that kept a monkey in cramped quarters and
saw a horse tied to the doorknob on the front steps of a
house. I learned about the emphasis placed on family and
community by attending an extravagant birthday party for
the ex-mayor’s son, which seemed to have the entire city in attendance (a cow
was slaughtered for the occasion).
Above all, I was introduced
to the warmth of the Panamanian culture through the love
and care lavished upon me by my home-stay families, including
receiving a new nickname from my first home-stay sister: “Kat
Maria Perla Haiti” (“Kat Maria, the Pearl of Haiti”), the meaning of which evades
me. Still, the nickname made me genuinely feel like a part of the family.
In
Panama, I also learned—after some seven years of theoretical study— that I could
speak Spanish fluently, though I encountered many challenges along the way. It
was one thing to discuss postmodern Cuban literature in Spanish in a Smith classroom,
and quite another to buy produce at a supermarket, make small talk at the discoteca,
talk to a hairdresser, or chismear (gossip) with my home-stay sister and her
cousins.
By the time I touched ground
back in the United States, I was sunburned, covered in stings
from every marine organism in the Caribbean, and bespattered
with bruises and cuts. But as a fellow gringa at my last
home-stay put it, gesturing to my impressive collection of
injuries: “Well, at least you can prove that you
weren’t just doing ‘tourist’ things. It means you got to know the country.” |
