I recently found out that I have made 500 dollars from my garden. My Peace Corps neighbor, Will, lives about an hour hike down a muddy trail in a town called Alta Ortiga; he told me that while he was sitting on his porch, talking with a neighbor, he was informed that I have made over 500 dollars selling the harvest from my garden.
This is an awesome rumor for a few reasons, made better for the way in which in was shared. (To clarify, I have not made a penny on my garden – I have grown enough to harvest something daily and share with a lucky few friends in the community, but not nearly enough to sell).
First off, people are talking about my garden. Score one for me.
Second, people think the garden is managed well enough to produce a surplus to sell (we will ignore the fact that only a handful of people have actually seen the garden). Flattering, although totally untrue.
Third, people are talking about my garden in neighboring communities. Awesome. This game of telephone has bastardized any semblance of truth that originated with the game, but that is beside the point.
Finally, Will’s neighbor supposedly ended his anecdote by saying, “but he doesn’t grow onions,” as if to make my imaginary market garden somehow a little less spectacular. To put this comment in context, let me describe what is available in the cooperative store in my town: two sizes of processed meat similar to SPAM (yes, I eat it regularly), rice, lentils, two types of beans, four types of sardines, tomato paste, spaghetti, oil, cookies, soda, chicken feet on a good day, fish on a great day, MSG packets, top ramen, garlic, and without fail, onions. They are always there. We may run out of beans or tomato paste, but there are always onions. I find it endlessly entertaining that Will’s neighbor seemingly decided that I am inadequate because I have chosen not to compete with industrially grown onions that sell for 40 cents a pound.
Will supposedly finished this conversation by reminding the neighbor that he (the neighbor) does not grow anything, while neglecting to correct the neighbor’s misconceptions about my profit margin. I would have loved to listen to the conversation.
Although my garden has yet to make me any money, it has greatly added to the diversity of my diet. Tonight’s main course consists of fried rice with eggs from my chickens along with cabbage, spinach, bell peppers, green onions, celery, and culantro (a local herb like cilantro) all from my garden. My first course consists of a cucumber, tomato, and basil salad, all from the garden as well. Other volunteers reading this, are you jealous?
A meal like this is pretty normal but the treat is the pork I am throwing in – the host family decided it was time to slaughter the pig to celebrate my host brother’s graduation. I have eaten lots of pork but this was the first time I have taken a pig from neighbor to plate. Allow me memorialize Cena the pig (her name means dinner in Spanish. I named her).
Around two months ago, my host mom and two brothers came back to the house, dragging this pig by three ropes. Cena the pig was relatively small (I would guess about 100 pounds), but she was a fighter. Three of us held her while my host dad tied her to a tree. Within 30 minutes the pig was free, squealing and sprinting away from the house with my host brothers, host cousins, host parents, and myself (about 12 people) chasing after her. She worked her way through the school, into the middle of a soccer game, around the community center and finally back towards the family property, with us looking like a bunch of buffoons running after her. After about an hour, she ran herself into a patch of mud a little too deep for her to deal with. Omar managed to grab a leg long enough for me to jump on her back and get her in a head-lock any fan of UFC would have been proud of.
After her escape, Cena was placed in a newly made pen and fed the scrapes from the house, usually consisting of green banana skins. Although the family is pretty big, pigs eat quite a lot and the scraps where not enough to appease her appetite; I did not have a scale, but if I had to guess I would say Cena lost 5 to 10 pounds before she met her maker.
The process we went through today was a sort of organized chaos – slaughtering and processing a pig takes a lot of space and makes a big mess. We started by hanging Cena… I was told by my host brother to throw Cena’s rope over a strong tree branch and pull. I thought we were going to lift it and cut an artery but we did not. We pulled it just high enough to take the weight off the back legs. I asked him if maybe we should cut it’s throat to kill it faster, but he just made his mouth go sideways and shook his head like he often does when he thinks I am asking a dumb question. I just had to scrath my head and roll with it. When in Rome… (As a disclaimer, I would have done this part differently had I been in charge).
After Cena became Cena’s carcass, we brought her onto the house patio and began the processing. We poured boiling water over the body to loosen the hair and began scrapping the hair off with machetes. We then went through the process you would probably guess for cleaning a pig: stringing it up, collecting the blood in a bucket, taking out the insides, cutting off the head and then slowly cutting it into a collection of pieces appropriately sized to stew, fry, roast or smoke. This whole process took about 4 hours and the most entertaining part was the haphazard teamwork and “backseat driving” that went on during the process. At one point the uncle was splitting the carcass while the 8 year old instructed him to hit the machete harder with the hammer and told his older brother to hold the legs further apart.
After the whole process, the pig was divvied up between the family and the eating began. I ate a few delicious spare ribs that my host mom made for lunch and was given a huge bowl of other tasty bits for later. Those tasty bits grace my plate right now. Although I am now without a neighbor, this is the best meal I have had in a while. Cena, you will be missed.
This is an awesome rumor for a few reasons, made better for the way in which in was shared. (To clarify, I have not made a penny on my garden – I have grown enough to harvest something daily and share with a lucky few friends in the community, but not nearly enough to sell).
First off, people are talking about my garden. Score one for me.
Second, people think the garden is managed well enough to produce a surplus to sell (we will ignore the fact that only a handful of people have actually seen the garden). Flattering, although totally untrue.
Third, people are talking about my garden in neighboring communities. Awesome. This game of telephone has bastardized any semblance of truth that originated with the game, but that is beside the point.
Finally, Will’s neighbor supposedly ended his anecdote by saying, “but he doesn’t grow onions,” as if to make my imaginary market garden somehow a little less spectacular. To put this comment in context, let me describe what is available in the cooperative store in my town: two sizes of processed meat similar to SPAM (yes, I eat it regularly), rice, lentils, two types of beans, four types of sardines, tomato paste, spaghetti, oil, cookies, soda, chicken feet on a good day, fish on a great day, MSG packets, top ramen, garlic, and without fail, onions. They are always there. We may run out of beans or tomato paste, but there are always onions. I find it endlessly entertaining that Will’s neighbor seemingly decided that I am inadequate because I have chosen not to compete with industrially grown onions that sell for 40 cents a pound.
Will supposedly finished this conversation by reminding the neighbor that he (the neighbor) does not grow anything, while neglecting to correct the neighbor’s misconceptions about my profit margin. I would have loved to listen to the conversation.
Although my garden has yet to make me any money, it has greatly added to the diversity of my diet. Tonight’s main course consists of fried rice with eggs from my chickens along with cabbage, spinach, bell peppers, green onions, celery, and culantro (a local herb like cilantro) all from my garden. My first course consists of a cucumber, tomato, and basil salad, all from the garden as well. Other volunteers reading this, are you jealous?
A meal like this is pretty normal but the treat is the pork I am throwing in – the host family decided it was time to slaughter the pig to celebrate my host brother’s graduation. I have eaten lots of pork but this was the first time I have taken a pig from neighbor to plate. Allow me memorialize Cena the pig (her name means dinner in Spanish. I named her).
Around two months ago, my host mom and two brothers came back to the house, dragging this pig by three ropes. Cena the pig was relatively small (I would guess about 100 pounds), but she was a fighter. Three of us held her while my host dad tied her to a tree. Within 30 minutes the pig was free, squealing and sprinting away from the house with my host brothers, host cousins, host parents, and myself (about 12 people) chasing after her. She worked her way through the school, into the middle of a soccer game, around the community center and finally back towards the family property, with us looking like a bunch of buffoons running after her. After about an hour, she ran herself into a patch of mud a little too deep for her to deal with. Omar managed to grab a leg long enough for me to jump on her back and get her in a head-lock any fan of UFC would have been proud of.
After her escape, Cena was placed in a newly made pen and fed the scrapes from the house, usually consisting of green banana skins. Although the family is pretty big, pigs eat quite a lot and the scraps where not enough to appease her appetite; I did not have a scale, but if I had to guess I would say Cena lost 5 to 10 pounds before she met her maker.
The process we went through today was a sort of organized chaos – slaughtering and processing a pig takes a lot of space and makes a big mess. We started by hanging Cena… I was told by my host brother to throw Cena’s rope over a strong tree branch and pull. I thought we were going to lift it and cut an artery but we did not. We pulled it just high enough to take the weight off the back legs. I asked him if maybe we should cut it’s throat to kill it faster, but he just made his mouth go sideways and shook his head like he often does when he thinks I am asking a dumb question. I just had to scrath my head and roll with it. When in Rome… (As a disclaimer, I would have done this part differently had I been in charge).
After Cena became Cena’s carcass, we brought her onto the house patio and began the processing. We poured boiling water over the body to loosen the hair and began scrapping the hair off with machetes. We then went through the process you would probably guess for cleaning a pig: stringing it up, collecting the blood in a bucket, taking out the insides, cutting off the head and then slowly cutting it into a collection of pieces appropriately sized to stew, fry, roast or smoke. This whole process took about 4 hours and the most entertaining part was the haphazard teamwork and “backseat driving” that went on during the process. At one point the uncle was splitting the carcass while the 8 year old instructed him to hit the machete harder with the hammer and told his older brother to hold the legs further apart.
After the whole process, the pig was divvied up between the family and the eating began. I ate a few delicious spare ribs that my host mom made for lunch and was given a huge bowl of other tasty bits for later. Those tasty bits grace my plate right now. Although I am now without a neighbor, this is the best meal I have had in a while. Cena, you will be missed.
Now, for a little about the stove project!
While my host mom was cooking the pig, I was able to pick her brain about her method for cooking on a fogon (as I have mentioned in other posts, people use three rocks over an open fire, or fogon, to cook). After a few community meetings, we have decided to start with an “improved stove” project. To begin, I will need to find a model that suits the needs and wants of this community, which is why I was grilling my host mom. All models of improved stoves are based on the same principle: enclose the cooking space so that the heat is transferred directly and efficiently to the pot. To be honest, I am surprised there is a demand for these stoves. Part of me is worried that people want these because it is something they can get for free in their houses – they have seen completed stove projects in other communities and know we can get a grant for the materials. Although there are plenty of benefits from using improved stoves – less firewood being used, less smoke in the face of the person cooking – these stove projects are infamously ineffective.
It is easy for a development worker to get an engineer to design something more effective then an open fire using cheap materials, but there is often something that makes people not want to use the stoves. For example, in Guabal the wood that most people cook with is a mixture of dry and wet wood (we are in the rainforest after all). There are three “improved stoves” already in the community and the consensus seems to be that these stoves do not work with wet wood. On a fogon, people put the wet wood in on one side of the fire and the dry wood in on the other, which somehow works better. The improved stoves only have one opening for firewood, which makes this impossible and therefore the stoves are rarely used.
The most blatant example of improved stove projects’ ineffectiveness is the Loraina Stove project (I think I am using the correct name). The Panamanian government essentially went to every school in the country and built beautiful Loraina stoves with three big cooking holes and one hole for firewood. From an engineering standpoint, the stoves are perfect; they are safer and incredibly more efficient than an open fire, they funnel the smoke away from the person cooking, and they have a large enough cooking area to feed a few hundred students. Not to mention, the schools all have enclosed areas to dry firewood, so the previously mentioned obstacle is not a problem. But for some reason, these stoves are just used as glorified counter-tops. In the picture I took, you can see the Loraina Stove from the Guabal School in the foreground and the area built to house three fogons in the background. During a big soccer game a few days ago, people were using the fogons to cook and putting finished food in big pots on the otherwise ignored Loraina Stove because they fit so nicely into the holes.
All this is a long way to say I am a little nervous about this project. I am currently on the hunt to find a model that can consciously accommodates for both wet and dry firewood, but have yet to find anything. The exciting part of the project is that there are a lot of families (at least 20) that want to be a part of the project and Marco has pretty much taken charge of organizing people. More than anything, I am excited that the community has spoken up about what they want to work on together, which is often a big problem.
Wish me luck finding an appropriate stove and if you have any thoughts or suggestions, please comment below!
While my host mom was cooking the pig, I was able to pick her brain about her method for cooking on a fogon (as I have mentioned in other posts, people use three rocks over an open fire, or fogon, to cook). After a few community meetings, we have decided to start with an “improved stove” project. To begin, I will need to find a model that suits the needs and wants of this community, which is why I was grilling my host mom. All models of improved stoves are based on the same principle: enclose the cooking space so that the heat is transferred directly and efficiently to the pot. To be honest, I am surprised there is a demand for these stoves. Part of me is worried that people want these because it is something they can get for free in their houses – they have seen completed stove projects in other communities and know we can get a grant for the materials. Although there are plenty of benefits from using improved stoves – less firewood being used, less smoke in the face of the person cooking – these stove projects are infamously ineffective.
It is easy for a development worker to get an engineer to design something more effective then an open fire using cheap materials, but there is often something that makes people not want to use the stoves. For example, in Guabal the wood that most people cook with is a mixture of dry and wet wood (we are in the rainforest after all). There are three “improved stoves” already in the community and the consensus seems to be that these stoves do not work with wet wood. On a fogon, people put the wet wood in on one side of the fire and the dry wood in on the other, which somehow works better. The improved stoves only have one opening for firewood, which makes this impossible and therefore the stoves are rarely used.
The most blatant example of improved stove projects’ ineffectiveness is the Loraina Stove project (I think I am using the correct name). The Panamanian government essentially went to every school in the country and built beautiful Loraina stoves with three big cooking holes and one hole for firewood. From an engineering standpoint, the stoves are perfect; they are safer and incredibly more efficient than an open fire, they funnel the smoke away from the person cooking, and they have a large enough cooking area to feed a few hundred students. Not to mention, the schools all have enclosed areas to dry firewood, so the previously mentioned obstacle is not a problem. But for some reason, these stoves are just used as glorified counter-tops. In the picture I took, you can see the Loraina Stove from the Guabal School in the foreground and the area built to house three fogons in the background. During a big soccer game a few days ago, people were using the fogons to cook and putting finished food in big pots on the otherwise ignored Loraina Stove because they fit so nicely into the holes.
All this is a long way to say I am a little nervous about this project. I am currently on the hunt to find a model that can consciously accommodates for both wet and dry firewood, but have yet to find anything. The exciting part of the project is that there are a lot of families (at least 20) that want to be a part of the project and Marco has pretty much taken charge of organizing people. More than anything, I am excited that the community has spoken up about what they want to work on together, which is often a big problem.
Wish me luck finding an appropriate stove and if you have any thoughts or suggestions, please comment below!