Chris Anderson - Earth Train Panama
Week 1

            As with all great beginnings, the first week here in Panama has been quite hectic.  Free time in the first couple of days has been a precious commodity and, in all honesty, it’s quite refreshing coming from the beginnings of the summer doldrums at home.  So much has happened in the last few days that I’m finding it hard, here writing with the rain pounding down, to even know where to begin telling the story.  I suppose I’ll start with the beginning, as good as place as any to start.  Our group of four, Jake Sullivan, Grayson Zulauf, Caitlin Bush, and myself,  have all decided we would like to spend the next six months deep in the rainforests of Panama. He we will be learning as much as possible under the masterful tutelage of Nathan Gray, a man who has accomplished more in his lifetime than most people could in several lifetimes.  We prepared ourselves and our bags thoroughly and it was not long before we found ourselves at Denver International Airport (DIA) on the 19th of June 2007 at 4:30 a.m.

            After leaving DIA, we arrived at Houston for a six-hour layover.  The layover was good for letting us get to know each other. I also bought a couple of books at the airport bookstore: Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond and On the Road by Jack Kerouac.  I started reading On the Road first because it seemed most appropriate.  Reading about Sal’s experiences with those crazy beatniks on the back roads of America seems like a most proper way to start an adventure.

            We finally arrived in Panama City at about seven in the evening.  We got through customs and immigration without a problem and after a little scare where we couldn’t find Nathan, we soon found ourselves driving through the massive city to our temporary place of residence: Casa Arias.  Casa Arias is an 88 year-old house in the historic Casca Vieja district of Panama City.  It is a house full of character in which through the dust and paint of the restoration you could see its former grandeur. 

            On our first full day in Panama, we were given a brief orientation and were introduced to Nicole McFarland, the coordinator of interns for Earth Train, and Enrique Arias, the son of the former secretary general of the Kuna Congress who will be joining us for the next six months.  Enrique and I will be helping to coordinate the GIS based mapping that will be going on here on the 10,000 acre Centro Modrono Campus.  GIS stands for geographic information system and is basically a wonderful hybrid of data and maps.  It allows you to display data geospatially, or where it would be in location to the earth.  GIS mapping is a very important tool in science and specifically in biodiversity studies.  For example, one could use a GIS map to mark the locations of several stands of trees on a map, with each point you put on the map you can also add information about the dot.  So you could mark the location of the trees along with any pertinent information about those trees, like species, number, health and so on. GIS also makes it easy to measure the distance between all points on the map.  The usefulness and applications of GIS is nigh endless in both commercial and scientific work. 

            After the brief orientation with Nicole we were taken to a local mall and given a contest.  We were assigned partners and told the find the cheapest food processor, dish rags, and pot rack.  The team that won would get free tickets to the movie theater.  My partner was Enrique and it is important to note at this point that Enrique speaks almost no English and I speak very little Spanish.  This made everything far more difficult.  We wandered from store to, the embarrassed Kuna-Panamanian and the clueless Gringo on our quest during which time I tried to avoid the oldest and most sacred of all American traditions while traveling abroad, that is, speaking English to everyone and when they don’t understand start talking louder and slower as if that would allow them to magically understand me.  I will admit though, that it happened without my realizing it at least once.  Eventually however, we managed to navigate the massive stores and fight our way through the mall workers that surely thought that I was mentally deficient to find a large food processor for 50$.  Satisfied with our discovery we returned to Nicole and the rest and learned that each team managed to find the least expensive of at least one item, so one member of each team was given two dollars for a free movie ticket.  And no, dear reader, your eyes have not deceived you, two dollars for a movie ticket.  Something that is equally surprising is that popcorn and a drink was three dollars.  I spent a total of five dollars at the movie theater, something I have never before done.  Such are the wonders of traveling, I suppose.  Travel the world and no longer will you be forced to mortgage your house when you go to the movies.  The movie that we watched was Pirates of the Carribean 3 in English with Spanish subtitles, so that Enrique could enjoy it as well.  When the movie was over we all returned to Casa Arias for a good night’s sleep.  It was needed for the next day.

            On Thursday we began our trek to Centro Modrono.  All of our gear had to be put into large plastic trash bagged and double bagged, as we were to be driving through the Mamuni River.  The trip itself took several hours over roads that would scare the most hardcore of road enthusiast.  When we finally arrived at the Centro Modrono campus I was promptly bitten by an insect I can best describe as a horsefly on steroids, a Barry Bonds of horseflies, if you will.  After such a warm welcome I was very happy to get to sleep in the mosquito netted cots, especially after such a hard day’s travel.

            The next morning we began the true orientation and were introduced to our surroundings.  On Friday and Saturday we traveled to three local villages to introduce ourselves and to go swimming in the local rivers.  Simply traveling around the countryside was always interesting.  It was amazing to see the sheer diversity of trees and plants in the forested areas.  As the truck roared and rumbled along the path, it was relatively easy to reach up and pick mangos.  We even managed to spot a few monkeys swinging in the trees above us. The forested areas were in sharp contrast, however, to the areas that had been burned and clear-cut for farming, but even in these places it was nice to see the forest start to recover and reclaim the land.  Perhaps one of the most frightening moments from these first two days at Centro Modrono, was when we were traveling back from a particularly good swimming hole.  It was after a tremendously fierce downpour and the roads were a gooey, muddy mess.  One of the trucks lost control and we almost went rolling the side of the mountain, never to be heard from again.  The truck stopped just before it went completely over the precipice, although it still had to be towed back onto the road by the other truck.  It was definitely a wake up call to remind us just how dangerous these roads could really be.

            After all of this traveling I was completely ready for a day of rest.  It was not to be, however, as we still had some exploring to do on the Centro Modrono campus.  We all went on a two and a half hour hike to the headwaters of the Modrono River to swim and get more of a bearing on our surroundings.  There was no real trail, and it was quite amazing to travel through primary rainforest.  Everything around you is alive trying its best to survive in the competitive environment.  I saw more trees and plants than I have ever seen before in my life, the variety was mind-boggling.  You always hear about how incredibly biodiverse the rainforests are, but it isn’t something you can truly appreciate until you spend time in them.  I’ve only spent a few days in the rainforest and it has already astounded me and I’m sure that true appreciation is still far beyond me.  We were given the rest of the afternoon off and it is in this downtime that I’m typing madly away while there’s a torrential downpour (it’s always raining here).  It has only been the beginning of a six month adventure and if the first few days are any indication, I’m in for quite the ride.