The one about new years resolutions

Happy Holidays!

Christmas time (especially Christmas week) is basically the only time I’ve ever feel homesick in the past three years of living abroad. I knew what I was getting into when I signed up for this crazy Panama gig, but I knew it’d be hard. And it has been. I think of being home with my family, cutting down the tree, working with my ladies at the Elephant’s Perch, being in the refreshing and energetic presence of my amazing brother, and skiing of course! That said, I’m doing okay this year. We had a Christmas miracle arrive in the form of Shannon, Katie’s girlfriend and she brought with her Christmas joy and American chocolate and coffee! And tomorrow, I head to fly to Colombia on vacation! I will be exploring/hiking to coffee country with college buddies and my partner in crime, Krissy! 

Since it’s the end of the year and I’ve been binging on “Best of” podcasts and news articles, I’ve been reflecting back on my Peace Corps journey and how it’s now the third time I get to ring in the New Year abroad and as a volunteer. The years have brought much change – personally, professionally and spiritually and it’s been a pretty powerful thing to look back on. I dedicated 2014 to working on myself. In this very blog I wrote, “In 2014, I turned alone time into a coping mechanism for that discomfort. And at first it was awkward and the hardest thing I ever had to do was spend four, five or six hours alone. But, I’ve really taken control of it. I’m better at setting goals, holding myself accountable, being patient (still working on it). I have become the ruler of my own mind, which sounds maybe like a lame thing to work on for an entire year, but it wasn’t. It took 17 months of Peace Corps service to get here and yes, I’m still working on it, but my alone time is no longer uncomfortable and awkward, it’s a shiny new tool for my life toolbox.”

My goal for 2015 as I wrote was “This year is the year of expansion, pushing myself to the limits, growing from others, and truly giving host-country nationals the energy they deserve.” I believe that I did a good job on this one. I finished my service strong and I really invested in the people I lived with. I learned to rely on others, to trust my project partners, to speak up for my community. The year 2015 has been an amazing one – one that I am very proud of. The growth and accomplishments we achieved in my community were pretty remarkable. And now I’m in a totally new community and developing a new project.

For 2016, I’d like to focus on professional development. I have a wonderful set of personal strengths that I’ve honed over the past 30 months of Peace Corps. I’m more creative, resourceful, and comfortable with myself, self-aware. I’m a better leader, friend and listener. I’ve spent so much time becoming who I am and I know that I can create a strong program here in Panama. I want to develop a curriculum that I am proud of, but that also serves Ngobe communities in the best ways. I hope to make this year much less about me and more about dedicating my skill set to pursuing a noble goal – of bringing health education to indigenous communities!

And now the moment you've all been waiting for....my own personal “Best of 2015” lists!

Best Songs:

1) Hello by Adele

2) American Oxygen by Rihanna

3) Travesuras by Nicky Jam

4) Tokyo Sunrise by LP

5) Dearly Departed by Shakey Graves

6) Me Voy Enamorando by Chino y Nacho

7) Ginza by J Balvin

8) Yo Te Amo Tu Me Ama by El Alfa

9) Rechazame by Prince Royce

10) Lean On by Major Lazer

Best Books:

1) All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doer

2) Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

3) Room by Emma Donahue

4) The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah

5) Not That Kind of Girl by Lena Dunham

Best TV:

1) Transparent (Amazon)

2) The Mindy Project (Hulu)

3) Scandal (ABC)

4) How to Get Away with Murder (ABC/I love Shonda Rhimes)

5) (And the obligatory) House of Cards (Netflix)

Best Podcasts:

1) Serial

2) Slate Political Gabfest

3) Global News Podcast by the BBC

4) Radio Ambulante (Spanish language)

5) Huff Post Live Audio by Huffington Post

6) Ted Radio Hour

Top life events of 2015:

1) Climbing the 76^th tallest mountain in the world (February)

2) Graduating our first group of paramedics in Manzanillo (March)

3) Convincing all seven of my Commune ladies to come visit me, it was very special that I got to see them all during my service!!! (March)

4) Luis and Enriquito’s wedding (September)

5) Closing my service in the Dominican Republic with surprise guest appearance by the one and only Grayson Caldwell (October)

6) Watching Henry win Idaho State Mountain Bike Championships (October)

Goals for 2016:

1) Finish developing our Community Health Worker curriculum and implement it in 20 Ngobe sites

2) Read every night before bed

3) Journal/yoga/write more

4) Listen to more podcasts (double points for Spanish ones), read more of The Economist

5) Work on a political campaign (or get a really cool big girl job)

That’s all for now folks! I’ll write you next year!

Paz, 

Bea

The one about my arranged marriage

HEYO!

I finally finally feel settled in and things are going well (for the most part). We wrapped up our last follow-up clinics (to bring medications to chronic patients with diabetes, epilepsy, asthma, high-blood pressure, etc) and then all the Floating Doctors staff was gone, just gone. They all go home for two months over the holidays and regular clinics stop, holidays are celebrated, the weather doesn’t get any cooler (womp womp) and Katie and I keep chugging along.

Our work is computer based and we might turn into zombies soon, so instead of becoming the crazy anti-social losers that many of you American office workers/software developers/aspiring writer types end up becoming, we take breaks. We’ve found ourselves in a pretty great routine these days. I would describe it to you in painful detail, but then I remembered one time reading a friends’ friend’s blog about being married and each month for the first seven months of marriage, she did a recap of that month of marriage – explaining in vivid detail what it was like to be married. I could not relate, but I passively enjoyed and digested her observations of living on top of another human and the routine they ended up finding together. Well, week 6 into my “arranged marriage” with Katie and I now totally understand what the purpose of those blog posts were – do you even realize how crazy it is to be sharing a life with someone who literally knows everythingabout you and is there for every second of every day and not even two months ago was a total stranger to me? It's insane. 

The Raffalongs (Bronwen Raff + Katie Long = The Raffalongs) Month 1 Update:

It’s us – the Raffalongs, sending an update after Month 1 in our arranged marriage! Phew! I know many of you have been holding your breath for our first update and we report with good news is that our arranged marriage has thus far worked out perfectly. We haven’t even fought yet, we haven't even gotten in little tiffs about who does more dishes (me), who fixes more things (Katie) and who hogs more covers (Katie) but shhh, don’t jinx it.

Our daily schedule

7:15*: Alarm goes off, snooze til 7:33, wake Katie up by turning over, go for a run on the beach

8:45: Breakfast – Katie makes the toast, I poach the eggs and make the coffee, we listen to the BBC Global News podcast

9:30 – 12:30: Work on the computer and just when we start to lose our minds, we alternate making lunch (typical options include: leftovers, vegetable/bean wraps, something with peanut butter)

12:30 – 3: More work or errands around town

3:30 – 5: Movement/afternoon activity – typically beach volleyball, sometimes substituted by swimming or paddling on the surfboard we borrowed from a friend

5:30 – 6: Decide what we want for dinner and bike to get ingredients

6 – 7: Make dinner - Katie specials include: omelets, sushi (!!), stir-fry; Bea specials include coconut Thai curry, papaya sticky rice and tuna mac n’cheese.

7 – 10:30: Play the ukelele, play brain-expanding trivia and/or invent mind-stretching games, spend hours picking out a movie and watch half of it before falling asleep

10:30: Lights out!

*If it’s a Tuesday or a Thursday, we exclusively speak to each other in Spanish.

Favorite meals:

5) Tuna mac n’cheese

4) Papaya sticky rice

3) Stir-fry

2) Anything with peanut butter

1) Coconut Thai curry

Favorite snacks: Papaya, popcorn, ginger cookies with peanut butter, shortbread cookies with peanut butter, oatmeal cookies with peanut butter, chocolate

Favorite games this month:

5) Trivial Pursuit

4) Sporcle

3) Use an iPhone to record ourselves making music with the ukulele and sending them to friends

2) Beach volleyball

1) Improv games

Popcorn flick picks:

4) Frozen (Katie’s first time!)

3) We Need to Talk About Kevin (highly recommended by Katie, in her words “The most visceral viewing experience I’ve had in a while”)

2) The Place Beyond the Pines (highly recommended by Bea, in my words, “Ryan Gosling, what else do you need?”)

1) Serena (not recommended by either of us, from the mouth of very own film critic Katie, it was “Pretty people, pretty country, pretty bad”).

Books on the proverbial coffee table this month:

5) Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shtenygart (pretty decent read about a love story set in the near future, not on my top ten list though)

4) La Ceguera by José Saramago (Katie enjoys, didn’t seem too enthusiastic when I just asked her...she seems lost in her work)

3) Serena by Ron Rash  (Good book, fatal movie)

2) Donde No Hay Doctor by David Werner (I can’t tell if looking up weird medical conditions at the one flat surface we have that serves as our kitchen table/work desk/coffee table counts as business or pleasure)

1) Room by Emma Donahue (comes highly recommended by both Bea and Katie, beautifully written from the perspective of a five year old boy trapped with his mother in an 11’ x 11’ room – that said, we do not suggested reading this book if you literally live in an 11’ x 11’ house with one other person)

Favorite questions:

5) ¿Que es eso?

4) What’s that sound?

3) Should we go to the beach?

2) What game should we play?

1) Do you want to build a snowman?

Favorite Words: Astronaut, Clinic, Game, Popcorn, Coffee, Trivia, Improv, Leishmaniasis, Sloth, Ukulele, Run, Room, Tiny House, Clos 

What we’re learning this month: Patience and acceptance

Other interesting facts:

- Longest time spent apart: 4 hours

- Spines Katie picked out of Bea’s foot: 3

- Back and forths on the volleyball: 29 hits in a row

Characteristics we realize we share: Disinterest in small children, love of running, taste in food, critical lens for analyzing international development, always thought the Disney “D” was actually a backwards “G,” musical talent (I'm getting there)!

Characteristics we don’t share: Love of dogs, sense of direction, pop culture/movie references, improv expertise

Gallivants: This month we’ve been to eight Ngobe-Bugle communities as super star interpreters for Floating Doctors clinics/follow up, we’ve also explored two nearby beaches and hope to add a few more to that list this week!

In summary - month one of arranged marriage is working out great and it’s all been happening so fast! I guess we really know now what people are talking about when they say time flies when you’re in love! Wish us luck in Month 2 :) 

The one with pictures of our clinics

Floating Doctors clinic in pictures:

Group of girls we met while conducting a public health survey, they are 3 of 12

Intake Bea taking vitals and history

Line for clinic is already out the door at 8am

Norteño, a Ngobe village

Peace Corps interpreter superheros!

Promted to Intaker #3

Next you'll be calling me Dr. Bea

The one with photographic evidence that I'm in paradise

My new site in Pictures: 

Kabob man on a Bocas street

Bocas is an eclectic mix of abandoned buildings and new flashy tourist places which makes for an interesting vibe.

The one about my job

Good morning from rainy Bocas del Toro!

This is a long update with logistical information about my work and job soooo read on if interested, if not, look at the pictures and have a very Happy Thanksgiving!!!!! I am thankful for all of you and sending turkey stuffed hugs to all of you. Insider tip from someone who’s already celebrated Thanksgiving this year – try making your mashed potatoes with skinned purple potatoes for a nice lavender color and richer/more vibrant flavor (or maybe that’s the whipping cream we added?). Happy cooking :)

It’s been a wild ride of three weeks and I’m finally sitting down to send y’all an update. These past few weeks have been a crazy mix of interpreting at multi-day roving health clinics in indigenous communities during for doctors working for my partner organization (Floating Doctors), trying to find permanent housing, getting the lay of the land in my new territory, moving every few days from one place to another (between dirty warehouse studio apartments, a half-constructed compound on a deserted island, a nice hotel called the Cosmic Crab, and hammocks hung underneath stiled houses in rural villages I haven’t spent more than four days in any one place since the end of October) and deciphering what my job here will be. I’ll cut to the chase, here is what you need to know about where I am and what I’m doing!

This is the partner organization I work with: Floating Doctors.

Floating Doctors’ mission is to reduce the short-term burden of disease and poor health in resource-limited populations through a network of ongoing health care mobile teams, and create long-term reductions through community development projects, education, and local capacity building. This means that they bring a roving medical clinic staffed by doctors, interpreters, nurses and clinic managers to 22 indigenous communities in the Bocas area (think small tiny communities with houses on stilts over the water in various mangrove islands). My job the past month has been to join them on these clinics to see what they do and how they operate, however, my job will be to create a sustainability approach to the work they conduct.

These are my responsibilities: Developing a curriculum for a Community Health Worker (CHW) Training (months 1-3) to be implemented in Ngobe-Bugle communities (months 4-10).

I first need to coordinate with Floating Doctors (hence attending all the clinics) to create specific project design, then draw up project timeline with deliverables for review by Floating Doctors utilizing existing educational resources, and then create detailed curriculum of the training course with take-home documents for trainees, and then create assessment tools, assessment plan and reinforcement plan. In addition to all that, I’ll recruit participants from target communities, coordinate the implementation of the training sessions and assess the effectiveness of the training strategy and I’ve got a year to do it with the help of 2 other Peace Corps Response volunteers, Katie (who lives with me) and Evan (who lives in the communities we will work in).  

This is the indigenous community we work with: Ngobe-Bugle.

Basically Panama is one of the only countries left respecting indigenous populations and granting them full autonomy over their regions. There are four main groups in Panama and the one in Bocas area is known as Ngobe-Bugle. They mostly live in stilted huts near the river and have their own area/land protected in a similar fashion to Native American reservations in the States. Personality wise, they start having children young and have many of them, women wear long gowns called naguas decorated with sewn-on geometric designs, carry their stuff in bright handmade shoulder bags made of natural fibers and known as kra, are generally reserved and timid people who are generally short and stocky. It’s a fascinating culture that deserves a post of its own so I’ll save that for another day, stay tuned.

This is where I currently sleep: A half-constructed compound in Isla San Cristobal

However, there is currently not many amenities and no reliable transportation on/off this particular island and the entire Floating Doctors staff will be gone for the months of December and January while five Panamanian men do construction on the compound sooooo Katie and I are currently looking for permanent housing situation on the main island Isla Colón.

This is where I hope to sleep by Thanksgiving: A cute tiny green house on Isla Colón

There are various islands here in the Bocas region, the main operations of Floating Doctors were on Isla Colón before they bought the land on Isla San Cristobal and it’s where most of the action happens. Katie and I have found a wonderful family who are renting a little green house in a cute neighborhood. Their family lives on basically ¼ of the entire block, so we’ll be taken care of both socially and for security purposes. They’ve been great to us so far, more to come on them too!

This is what I do for fun:

Go to the numerous beaches in the Bocas area and swim! I have also been reading plenty and would gladly take book recommendations. I have been playing lots of trivia with Katie who is my personal encyclopedia.

This is who I spent most (read: all) of my time with: Katie

Katie Long – The one and only, the world’s best Returned Peace Corps Volunteer who served from 2005-07 in Honduras (which closed as a Peace Corps Post in 2013). She is from and lives in Baltimore and works in an urban park as the programs coordinator and Latino outreach. She is a homeowner, improv specialist, laugh expert, dog-owner to a cute lil thing called Louie, and game/trivia fanatic. We get along great and she is definitely my support throughout this weird and crazy transition. Katie plays the ukulele and we’ve already performed at the senior citizen home Floating Doctors works at once and are currently preparing our next concert series.

This is what I’m doing for Thanksgiving: Mixed culture Thanksgiving!

Katie and I are spending it at the compound and the Ngobe kitchen workers led by the British dentist kitchen boss will be making the FD crew a Thanksgiving feast (yes, we see the irony). Soooo Katie and I will be hosting a talent show and performing a parody song to Under the Sea explaining Thanksgiving history for the European doctors who make a majority of the Floating Doctors crew right now (will send recording) and our contribution will be a pumpkin pie dessert dip with ginger cookies (a Long family recipe) then thank our lucky stars that we’re moved and settled in – a beautiful thing to be thankful for!

In other being thankful updates, it’s yet another Thanksgiving away from home and I must say how truly thankful I am that we were able to celebrate Thanksgiving in October with my family before I left, love you guys, thanks for being weird. Wishing you all amazing Thanksgivings full of family, love, turkey and wine! Get (cranberry) saucy!

Xoxox,

Bea

The one about going to Panama!

Greetings from sunny Panama! In case you were concerned, let it be known that I made it!

After three and a half wonderful weeks of vacation at home with the family, I made it to Panama! A lot of people have asked me how “re-integration” was, but I don’t have a good answer, because for me it was never really re-entry, I knew I was just touching down for a brief visit with the family and then off on a new project, job, place, adventure. I loved being home and I was nervous that I would get there and say, “WTF am I doing, I don’t want to go abroad again.” I got to see Henry as a real teenage driving (with a permit), winning races left and right, and doing big kid homework I couldn't even help with. I had wine nights with my momma and bike rides with pops. I spent time with friends (mostly over good food) and time alone in the outdoors. It was perfect. I got to "re-set." So now, as I sit here on the porch of a beautiful hostel in my new home of Bocas del Toro, I am exactly where I am meant to be!

I am on this crazy ride with the other three response volunteers who are wonderful: 1) Evan is a Panama Peace Corps veteran who has been our cultural guide. 2) Then there’s Shannon, a returned volunteer from Paraguay who is a HIV/AIDS specialist living in the nearest big town. 3) And I live with Katie (who's been my savior/guiding light/buddy/pal/roommate/friend/confidant/trivia master), a returned volunteer from Honduras (before it was shut down in 2012) whom I’ll be working with directly to develop modules for a community health worker training for a medical organization called Floating Doctors. We’re a motley crew, but we’ll work together in the best of ways!

So spark notes of my last few weeks: I landed in Panama City. If you all want to travel to a safe/beautiful/nice Latin American capital city – this is the one for you. I love it! It’s just a vibe thing because of course I can’t know every corner of the city in the four days I’ve been here, but it is such a fun and beautiful place to be. There’s a remarkable bike/running path along the coast of the sea where we’ve walked to get fresh ceviche, see Casco Viejo (the colonial part of the city that used to be a World Heritage site until the president built a highway around it), stroll and people watch. And we’ve been eating delicious food that I definitely don’t appreciate enough because I’m still on America mode. I’ve met a handful of wonderful regular two-year Peace Corps Volunteers who all stay at one hostel in the city and shared a beer or two over stories from the "comarca" or indigenous autonomous territories (more to come on that). And then, I swore in as a Peace Corps Response Volunteer and now I’m in my site in the northeast. Whirlwind!

Now that I’m here in my new site on the main island of Bocas del Toro (Isla Colón), it’s all sinking in. I currently live in a warehouse where the organization I work with, Floating Doctors (a roving medical clinic providing services to hard-to-reach indigenous communities), has studio apartments and a bunch of long-term volunteers living in them. However, they’ve been building a compound on another island (Isla San Cristobál) for the past year and it’ll be done this week. Soooo move in day is supposedly this Friday. We’ll see, but apparently the boss is hopeful. ¡A ver! Regardless, we move off this touristy island soon and then I’ll live on a remote isolated island (with internet, whaaa) and a bunch of other staff members. But then, all the staff (not me) get six weeks off for December-January so Katie and I will be living on the remote island compound alone – how cool is that? We’re looking into buying a kayak or two and then of course we’ll need to stock up on board/card games. 

Once we get the hang of the islands and how clinics are run and the organization functions, we will get started on developing a community health worker training for these local indigenous communities. More work updates to come as they happen, but for now, we’re just soaking it all up and enjoying the island life. So much more to tell you, but my internet spot for the day is closing! I’ll send another update soon, along with more information about Panama in general (Panama celebrates 4 independence days and one of those days was today so most things are closed all week) but until then, know that I’m alive, well and happy! 

XO,

Bea

It's time for PANAMA!

It's time to head to Panama. I'll no longer be a PCV in the DR, now I'm an PCRV in Panama! How do you like them acronyms? Stay along for the ride - I'd love to have you follow my Peace Corps Response work in Panama until September 2016. UEPA!

Things I'm nervous about: 
1) My Dominican accent, will anyone understand me?
2) Not having the right clothes. Last time when I touched down in the DR, I had enough clothes to last me on a 2 year camping trip, and quickly realized, it's tight and bright and fashionable, not camping.
3) Starting over and mentally being prepared to live abroad again for another year.

Things I'm excited about: 
1) Working with a medical organization to develop a community health worker training.
2) Seeing how Peace Corps works in another country and putting another piece of my international development puzzle together - how does the world and its complexities fit together?
3) Living on a chain of islands in Panama, cuz DUH!