Peace Corps Panama Friends

"One View of the Kosovo Conundrum"
by Jason R. Marshall

When asked for opinions on current US foreign policy in the Balkans, people usually respond in two fashions: (1) they are utterly confused by the happenings there and cannot reason for or against NATO military action, or (2) they are full of opinions and insight and are more than ready to share them with others. The author falls into the latter description and will attempt to prove that the goal of the NATO military action in Yugoslavia is laudable, yet the manner in which this moralistic goal is being pursued is atrociously flawed.
       Pundits and scholars seem to agree that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's bombing of the Yugoslav provinces of Kosovo and Serbia is illegal in an international sense. NATO countries have received no permission from the Yugoslav government to operate militarily within its sovereign borders. Neither has Yugoslavia committed an act of aggression against the US or other NATO countries. True, NATO and US interests and security might be indirectly damaged someday by the horrible events unfolding within Yugoslavia, but this is not enough to legally qualify the current massive air campaign. If NATO's bombing is illegal, yet the region direly needs a resolution or counter to the atrocities being carried out by Belgrade, then where does the legal recourse lie, the action that initially should have been taken?
       In the United Nations, specifically in the form of a multinational Protection Force, is where the response should have initiated. Putting the UN at the forefront of international crises like the one in Kosovo has many advantages. Ground troops are more effective instruments than airpower in preventing massacres, controlling masses of people, and obtaining and relaying information on Yugoslav military bodies and targets. Since a UN Protection Force would be truly multinational, including participating parties from developing countries, the US would not be labelled as the world's hegemon or "policeman," and the attempt at a resolution would have an international hue. The costs of a UN operation would also be better distributed and more proportionally shared than those of a NATO operation. An international consensus against Serb attrocities toward ethnic Albanians would be more convincingly forged. Plus, Yugoslavia's neighbors (i.e., Croatia, Albania, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Bosnia-Herzegovina) would have a much greater say in the fate of the region. I believe that Yugoslavia is a member of the United Nations; therefore, UN actions would hold more legitimacy in the eyes of the Yugoslav government. The US has contributed much toward the UN and it is time that the UN be allowed to perform its designed function. Although it is highly likely that Russia and China would veto any insertion of a UN Protection Force within Yugoslavia, an attempt at a UN resolution must be made. It is the most legal, moral, reasonable, and practical response available.
       NATO is an unnecessary institution than needs to be dismantled. It was created in the mid-1940s in order to contain communism to central Eurasia. The threat of communist expansion in Europe is close to non-existent. NATO has turned into an expensive, expanding dinosaur with newly invented intentions, both explicit and implicit: (1) protect members from unlikely attacks, (2) keep the former monster, the old USSR, from growing a new head, and (3) have the US play a definitive role in European security and, ergo, partially decide Europe's historical destiny. NATO is an organization with a singular, North American-Western European outlook that deals with security issues only within the scope of that outlook. If the US wants to be viewed as promoting internationalism, spurring democracy worldwide, defending human rights, and dealing with global crises and issues, then money would be best invested in the United Nations instead of in NATO.
       The conflictive history of the Balkans is no excuse for non-intervention, of course. The clash between the Catholic Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Muslim Ottoman Empire, along with an injection of Orthodox Slavic peoples from the north, has always made for a boiling cauldron of hostilities. People just do not get along--period. What NATO (read: US) is trying to accomplish in enforcing acceptance and tolerance of ethnic groups is praiseworthy. Yet if this objective cannot be achieved legalistically, then it should not even be attempted. The US should have respect for international law not only for simple moral reasons, but also because of the risk of anarchy in the future world system due to its present improprieties of not respecting international law and consensus. It could come around full circle in the future to slap the US in the face. The horrors being committed within Yugoslavia are abominable, but Yugoslavia is a sovereign nation, just as other countries in which unspeakable atrocities were carried out--and no international responses were taken (e.g., Cambodia, Indonesia, Argentina, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Republic of Congo, Algeria, Iran, and Iraq, to name a few).
       Despite huge military efforts with already stressed and scaled-back armed forces and the best of NATO efforts, Slobodan Milosevic has likely already achieved his goal: that of ethnically cleansing Kosovo of ethnic Albanians. The bombing seems to be doing nothing but ruin Yugoslav infrastructure, kill civilians, and displace terrorized residents--the same people that we are trying the help and protect! It has been shown how important morality is in international actions. The United States has always had a strong moral sense of right and wrong in world affairs, and I strongly agree with the moral reasoning of President Clinton in intervening in Yugoslavia. Yet the US must choose correctly in which vehicle to place its morality and efforts in order to achieve a desired outcome. That vehicle should have been the UN, not NATO. Lofty goals are nothing without proper planning and vision, and the current course of action of the Clinton Administration in Yugoslavia demonstrates perfectly what fiascos unharnessed, blind idealism can bring in events such as the Kosovo crisis.

JUST MAP IT

Is the rainy season not as busy as you thought it would be? Worried about what to do in your site when the dry season rolls back around? Leaving soon and feeling like you are not leaving behind as much as you would have liked? Well I have the solution for you!

The World Map Project is a wonderful, fun, and educational project to do. Basically it consists of drawing and painting a large world map by grid method on a wall. You can paint the map on the outside a school building, inside a classroom, or any place you want.

I did my world map on an outside wall at the school. My grandma donated $20.00 for the project. This amount almost covered all of the expenses for paint, brushes, pencils, rulers, and permanent markers. You can ask for donations from home, hit up the representante for materials, or do a fund raising project with the school. If I had to do it all over again, I would try do the school funding route. This might have generated more interest from the community as a whole, instead of just the students.

Another idea is to share paint costs with other volunteers who are interested in doing the project too. All you need to buy are the four primary colors. Then you mix the primary colors to make the other colors you will need. Four quarts of each color are more than bastante to paint one map. I am selling my left over paint to a fellow vol.

This project is rather time consuming, but it simply depends how organized you are about it. I had a good amount of help from the jovenes in my community with the drawing and esp. the painting. If I would have worked straight through on it, I could have completed the map within three weeks or less. However, I drew it out (no pun intended!) and it took me about a total of four months (where did the time go!?).

The only disappointment I had while doing this projcect was with the teachers. They showed little interest. Each afternoon, I would be drawing away and they would say a simple "buena, como esta" as they walked pass me, en route to go watch the afternoon novelas. This was a bit frustrating and why I would try to do a fund raising project with the school next time.

So, how can you get started? Ask Virginia in the office for the World Map Project Manual. This manual has ALL the information you will need; various size diminsions to make the grid, directions and how to draw the map, color scheme for painting the map, various ideas for funding, and even ideas of how to complete the map during a weekend "seminar".

I am so glad I did this project. At first I thought, "I can't do this, I cannot draw worth anything." However, I learned that I can draw Asia, Africa, and Austalia by a grid method! Also, there are a lot of jovenes who are talented artists in the campo. I was amazed at how well the kids who helped me could draw and paint.

It is a good feeling to accomplish something that at first you did not think you could do and be very proud of it. The kids had a lot of fun helping me. I had a lot of fun with the kids. I will leave in three short months, but the map will always be at the school for many years to come. Hopefully, the teachers will use it as a teaching tool, to at least show the kids where Panamá is located in the world.

I STRONGLY recomend doing this project at your sight. PCVs in Costa Rica and Dominican Republic have been gung-ho on this project and have made hundreds of maps all over these two countries. I think it would be great to strive for that here in Panamá as well. It is a lot of fun and educational. I am very proud of my map and the kids who helped me. ¡MAPA BIEN PUES!

"I just wanna dance!"

-One of the two Dorky Guys in Dazed and Confused

Prologue- Why do human beings dance? The answer is probably as old as mankind itself. As a mating ritual; almost certainly: the anthropomorphic equivalent of the courtship rites of countless other species. Also, as a communal, ritualized manner of celebrating life’s rich bounty and the joy of simply being alive. On the other hand, dancing has been a means to attempt to drive out evil forces, exorcise demons, perhaps cheat Death Himself (or at least keep Him at bay for a little while longer...) and to respect and protect the spirit of the departed.

But these timeless motives still do not explain the atavistic, cathartic nature of the act of dancing itself. In order to dance, there must be rhythm, someone banging two rocks together. And rhythm is life. As the natural world moves in its seasons and cycles- the 11 year ebb and flow of sunspots is mirrored in similar fluctuations of arctic hare populations- the rhythm of the dance reflects and syncopates the steady tattoo of the heartbeat within us- literally, our personal pulse of life- in a kind of organic resonance frequency, effectively unifying Man as part of a larger whole; what Wordsworth and his Romantic/Transcendentalist disciples referred to as "the Oversoul." As George Harrison put it : "... life goes on within you and without you."

All this goes to suggest why dancing has been with us for the hundreds of thousands of years that the fossil record suggests that we have been walking upright. For these reasons, there is also the possibility that dancing, precisely because of this ancient role in the development of humankind, serves as a means to tap into our Jungian "collective unconscious," the communal, ancestral memories that we perhaps carry in an almost forgotten zone of our brain, part of the 90% that is not actually "used." By subliminally accessing these memories through the medium of dance, we individually affirm our identities as a member of a viable species with untold years of cultural history, and thus feel a renewed sense of relevance and self-worth; an umbilical cord to the past within the constant uncertainty of the rapidly-evolving present.

At any rate, dancing is primal, man. And as the above epigram suggests, dancing is very important to some people. Maybe to you. That’s why, if you’re a North American guy here in Panama who wants to dance with the locals (or anyone else who just wants to laugh at how pathetic we North American guys are at getting the locals to dance with us), you should read...

How to get Panamanian Women
to Dance with You:
A Gringo’s Guide
(part 1) By Will Woodfield

Introduction-While visiting a fellow PCV, I had the good fortune to attend a Samy y Sandra dance, always a treat. I had a good time that night, dancing with two women, the second one repeatedly , and not getting rejected once. My friend, the other PCV, who shall remain nameless, got shot down several times and was starting to get depressed. "What’s your secret?" he asked me morosely during a break, as the announcer guy droned on and on...

What’s my secret? I don’t really have one. But I do have an advantage: I live in Agua Buena. Maybe you’ve heard of it? Agua Buena is situated smack-dab in the middle of Los Santos, which, as everyone knows (although not everyone will admit, especially those intractable Herreranos/Herreranas), is the Party Capital of Panama. So I get to go to discotecas and bailes almost every weekend. Through long, at times bitter, experience, I’ve amassed enough pearls of wisdom, perhaps, to share with you, you PCVs who haven’t logged as many hours on the pista. You Santeños out there probably know all this already, and I admit I haven’t consulted such authorities as Matteo Cross or Ted Lanzano in the research of this guide. Maybe you guys can write in with some extra stuff.

I still get shot down all the time. But, slowly and surely, I’m beginning to stack the odds in my favor...

Sheer Physical Looks Aren’t Everything...- We are gringos, and as we know (although many Panamanians don’t), gringos come in many different flavors. However, for most of the time, for one reason or the other, we do look different from the locals. This is both an advantage and disadvantage when asking Panamanians to dance, as will be explained later.

One thing is for sure: sheer handsomeness is not critical. I’ve seen guys that look like Ricky Martin (some people have told me he’s handsome...I can’t say personally that I agree, but he’ll serve here as a Latin benchmark of beauty) get rejected by beautiful panameñas who seconds later are dancing with a guy who’s a head shorter, chubby, and has a plethora of moles, each one sprouting a profusion of coarse black hairs, adorning his face. So sheer physical beauty isn’t as important as other qualities. Which of course is good news for some of us more "handsome-impaired" guys...

However, the Accoutrements Are...- The short, fat little ugly dude with the hairy moles all over his face was wearing a nice striped shirt and had a cellular phone. While your face and body may not be so important, how you clothe that body is. At dances, I have learned to wear a $5 striped shirt from Super Impacto with black jeans and black shoes (I draw the line at the cell phone however- maybe with Janice’s beeper...)

Talcum powder: your best friend at a baile. The talc’s a must, as it somewhat reduces the copious amounts of sweat that will spew forth from your pores during the course of the evening. Plus, it smells nice. Plus, every Panamanian, male or female, uses it. Plus, seeing that telltale trace of white powder on your chest where your shirt collar is unbuttoned (unless your natural skin hue is dead-fishbelly white, like mine is, thereby minimizing the effect) will cause a panameña to think to herself: "Hey! He’s not going to sweat all over me! And maybe he’ll smell nice. He’s a gringo, but he uses talcum powder, just like me! I hope he asks me to dance..." Maybe she’ll think that. Sprinkle it liberally all over your upper body, and anywhere else you think you might need it.

Basically, try to dress as Panamanian as possible. This will still allow your Gringoness to shine through- indeed, will accentuate it by the contrast- while still muting its rough and frightening edges. It’s also a nice concession to the culture.

Oh Yeah: Know How To Dance- A key point in dancing with Panamanian women is knowing how to dance. It may sound like a minor quibble, but it’s actually really important. Whether tipico, merengue or salsa is your game, be sure you know how to dance it before you approach unknown females with an invitation to do just that.

This is probably the most common reason why panameñas shoot down gringos: they’re afraid we don’t know how to dance (which, sadly, is often true). This leads to a vicious cycle in which you, the gringo, get rejected because she saw the women before her reject you, because she saw the women before her reject you, because she saw the women before her reject you, because she was afraid you don’t know how to dance, and doesn’t want to make a fool of herself in front of the entire community on the dancefloor with you.

How do we break this downward spiral? Step one: learn to dance. Ask your Panamanian "family" to teach you. Friends. Tell one of the language instructors that you need help with your Spanish, get ‘em to visit your site for a week, and spend that week dancing típico continuously. (Sonia, Vicky, Maritza, Juanita, and Brígida are great; Rolando, and especially Gil: not recommended). Dorian Stone, the late, great boss of the SBD program, used to practice with a broom and watch his shadow on his bedroom wall to evaluate his form. Whatever floats your boat.

Step Two: Get one of the aforementioned friends, neighbors or language instructors to actually dance with you at abaile where all the other women can see you. They’ll say: "Wow! She actually let him dance with her. And it appears that he actually knows how to dance somewhat! And he uses talcum powder! I hope he asks me to dance..." Maybe they’ll say that. Note: this is probably the most helpful hint in the entire article: (the rest is just icing, baby). After you’ve sufficiently demonstrated your dancing prowess to all viewers, you can now take the bold plunge and invite a new, unknown female to dance. But first you gotta survey the scene...

Survey the Scene- In wilderness medicine the critical first rule before attempting any treatment on the patient is to survey the scene, to make sure that there aren’t any more dangerous cliffs or errant Grizzlies around to cause further harm to anyone else in the vicinity.

Surveying the scene at a club, baile or discoteca is also essential, although for somewhat different reasons. After all, you gotta know, or have a general idea, of who or what is out there, and whether conditions merit your investment of time and money (at $6 to hit the pista, a cost-benefit analysis is especially important).

Surveying the scene is an art, and the crowds of people and general lack of sufficient illumination in these scenarios require at times a master’s touch. Remember, it’s the first thing you should do, upon arrival. Here’s some tips:

Visit the bathroom, and /or the bar, if you’re a drinking man. Multiple times. Circumnavigating the club, jardin, etc. by a different route every time. Keep your eyes upon. Divide the area into quadrants for mnemonic user-friendliness. Once, walk right across the middle of the still-vacant dancefloor. Remember, one of your purposes in doing this is to be scoped out too, so show some attitude. Walk like "Yo, I just flew in from the U.S. of friggin’ A., and I’m ready to do some friggin’ dancing!", but don’t overdo it. Remember, just like the guys in Swingers, you’re so money.

Then, when you’re dancing your first few "safety dances" (remember? with your friend, language instructor, etc.) keep your eyes open too. This is a unique position to scope things out because of your improved tactical location and thus improved LOS (Line Of Sight). Because you’re dancing, your scoping is also less obvious. Move around the dancefloor and do lots of twirls, to maximize possible LOSs.

The Invitation- OK. You’ve surveyed the scene. You know who’s out there, they know you’re out there. You’ve got that special someone in your sights. Now you’ve gotta ask her.

Like I’ve said, it’s more than just who you are or how you look that’s important. It’s how you ask. Here’s some tips:

There are two recommended possible vectors of approach. One is from straight in front of her. Let her see you coming from far away, walk up to her, not too fast or too slow, and offer your hand. If this approach doesn’t have the desired effect (read: she shoots you down) maybe in the future you should try the second approach: the sneak attack. Come up from behind her and suddenly extend your hand (palm up, always) into her direct LOS. She’ll have to trace your hand to your arm to you. Sometimes in this way, it is possible to surprise a woman into dancing with you, through the sheer reflex of acceptance on her part, before she really realizes who you are.

In any event, don’t say anything. Don’t let your silly gringo accent ruin everything you’ve achieved up to this point. Just offer your hand. Also, keep your face serious, or with possibly a slight cocky smirk tilting up one corner of your mouth. Don’t smile a big goofy grin, or look imploring or desperate. Look confident and in control.

Omygod! This article is mushrooming out of control! As they say in the Vaina, " May we do justice to the trees that died for theses pages." I feel like I’ve done them a big enough disservice already this issue without further deforesting an area the size of the Azuero to finish up this little guide. So I guess it’ll be continued in the next issue (give ‘em two months to grow back), where the 6 different Responses to The Invitation are reviewed and analyzed (with suggested countertactics), as well as what to do when actually on the dancefloor and possible long-term follow-up. I hope you can hold out till then. Keep dancing!

[To be placed somewhere else in the Vaina]

THERE WILL BE NO "FAST TIMES IN AGUA BUENA" ARTICLE IN THIS ISSUE!

Will knows that this will be a huge disappointment to the legions of fans who, like Pavlov’s Dogs, salivate in anticipation of the latest FTiAB piece, and wait with baited breath outside their local little Correo for the latest Vaina to arrive. It’s not for lack of material: next ish should feature the maurading packs of feral dogs that prowl the streets of Agua Buena when the sun goes down, the excitement of a trip to Dairy Queen, and more of the general Agua Buena zaniness that the fans have come to expect and love. Also, be aware of, pending on the distant horizon, the final, gotterdamerung of a conclusion to the epic Bäri Kuane Trilogy, whose existence and ultimate impact was predicted by Nostradamus and described in the Book of Revelations. Apologies all, but be sure to read in the meantime the article about how not to get negged on the dancefloor by a fickle panameña: sure to entertain gringos and locals, guys and gals alike...

La Vaina - July 1999 page 1	La Vaina - July 1999 page 3
Announcements	Maureen's poems
Editor's page	News from the medical desk
Stuff from Matteo	The Mejorana in Guarare
"Desert Island" Disks	The July VAC
La Vaina - July 1999 page 2
Kosovo Conundrum
Just Map It
I just wanna Dance