Day 5: January 7, 2014

On Day 5, we set aside the financial literacy workshops in favor of having a free discussion where we could answer any questions the community members might have. Here's the group I talked with on the left.

Then comes one of my absolutely favorite parts of the trip. It started pouring rain, and I immediately ran off into the forest to see what it would look like. It was another one of those moments that I can't describe, and which the camera on my phone couldn't capture at all.


I returned back to my group although I wanted to stay longer, because I didn't want the trip coordinator to freak out (he had already had enough worrying over me, the poor guy). But before long I got antsy waiting under a roof, so I grabbed Joel, one of our interpretors, and headed back into the woods. I was soaked to the skin, but very, very happy.  His phone was taking way better pictures than mine, so I'll put some of those up whenever he gets to sending me the pictures.


Can't really explain why I love the rain so much, but rain was one of the biggest things I missed about home when I moved out to Los Angeles. There was definitely a few times when I was caught out in pelting showers in the North Carolina woods, and being out in the Panama forest with water running reminded me of those days, only ten times cooler.


On the bottom is a photo of a little frog friend I found along the way -->

When I got back from the forest with Joel, the rest of my group was playing cards and waiting out the showers. Before long, it was sunny again. Since I had some time to kill, I stretched out to sun-dry and take a nap. I woke up to the faces on the left staring at me from the wall. Naturally, the only thing to do was to take selfies with all of them.

When the rain showers were over for good, we walked back over to Luis' shop. Luis wasn't there, but we gave his wife some more deliverables, including simple inventory logs, accounting sheets, and templates for recording sales. Some of our other suggestions also included product bundling and creating savings goals. At the end of the day, Luis's wife showed us some of her craft-work, which included the basket pictured below.

 Besides the multitude of chickens running around the village, there were also a good number of pigs. Some were seriously huge, and you can't help but wonder how many people an animal that big could feed.









Before I left that day, I fit in some selfie time with Saul, one of my favorite kids on the trip.

And of course, no trip would be complete without our fearless trip leader falling asleep on the bus ride home and being drawn on. Too bad we found out later that he was faking asleep and completely knew what we were up too. Sorry?