School Presentation: Make Way for the Kids!

I love this picture of who I think are 8th grade boys.  Many of the different grades gave mini presentations.  The 8th graders (I think) gave a mock interview with three well-known experts in the infotech field.  the interviewer was a girl, suitably dignified and solemn.  these boys were--well, their age!  I happen to get a big kick out of this age group of boys (so long as I don't have to deal with them on a daily basis).  The look on the face of the middle one is sheer mischief.  Of the relatively few stills I shot  (I spent most of my time filming), this is my favorite.

The children's presentation started off with the Jardin Infantil--kindergarten.  They are singing along to music--the voices you hear are not theirs.  They are utterly darling.  the song they're singing talks about wanting a world where children can live in peace.  At two points in the song, the lyrics say that they are singing for those children who are in pain, and for those who have no bread.  At that point, I started to cry.  There is absolutely nothing worse in the world than hearing a child cry from hunger while knowing that it will not get anything to eat.

But here they are, the Jardin Infantil of Escuela Felix A. Lara in Potrerillos Arriba!

I didn't catch the poetry reading by the first-grade girl, but here's a recitation by a 4th grade girl. The poem is about when the school bell sounds--"tin, tin", everyone goes to class, and  they discover the world in books. ( Sorry about the pole in the way).

The School Presentation, Part 1

I thought I'd devote this post to still pictures, to prepare the way for the kids.

The presentation was held outside in front of the school.  The pavilion was for special guests, which meant retired teachers.  We were with Maritza Espinosa, who is a retired teacher, and she invited us into the pavilion with her.  It's the reason why I shot the videos as best as I could around flagpoles, umbrellas and other objects; our angle of viewing underneath the pavilion was worse than the chairs set out under the sun.  However, it was nice to be in the shade.

The woman to the extreme right with her hair pulled back and wearing a red blouse is our friend, Maritza Espinosa.  To her right is her daughter, Marisin.  As with any of these images, if you click on them, you'll get a larger one.

Here we have the Minister of Education, all the way from Panama City to lend his august presence in order to open the proceedings.  Forgive me if I wasn't impressed.  The picture flatters him because it doesn't show the phony politician's smile pasted on his face for most of the proceedings.  It was especially prominent, the smile, when he announced that the Escuela Felix A. Lara right here in Potrerillos was going to become THE model school for all of Chiriquí once the government was through upgrading it.

Yeah, sure.  

Panamanians are polite.  Under similar circumstances, given the realities of where the money really goes and the history, an American audience would at best have been stone silent; realistically you'd have heard jeering laughter.  Here, people pretended to believe it.

What offended me even more than his phony smile was the fact that he was unshaven.  Mustaches are very common among the men here; beards are not.  Last I saw, razors were readily available in all the stores.  I personally thought it was insulting, but then I'm American and I don't know how Panamanians view it.  I didn't ask.

He left after his thankfully brief remarks, trailing an entourage of about 6 to 8 women.

This is the director of the school which is known formally as the Centro Básico.  It's more than just a primary school since it includes Grades 7 through 9.  after that, the kids go to the colegio or high school in Dolega.

She's young to have such an important position.  Maritza told me that she's been in the position 4 years, and that she's worked extremely hard.  I can believe it.  Getting three new classrooms in any kind of reasonable time must have taken Herculean effort, given the way things go here in Panamá.

The dates you see on the lectern are first, the date the school was inaugurated and the second, when it was named after Dr. Lara.  Maritza told me that there used to be, in the earlier days of the pueblo, a lot of two story houses; she grew up in one.  She said that before there was a school, classes were held in the private houses, on the bottom floors.  This was true of her house as well; the family lived on the upper floor.

In the museo, there are some very old photographs, especially of the first "educators", as they're called here.  One was taken in 1905 of a woman who was the first in Potrerillos.  there are a lot of old photographs there; I want to go back and take more pictures, learn more.

A Day of Celebration: The Memorial Mass

Chapel of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Potrerillos Arriba

Yesterday (June 13) was a special day in Potrerillos Arriba, because the school (which contains grades K through 9) put on what turned out to be an extraordinarily impressive program celebrating the completion of three new classrooms, one of which will be a computer classroom.

Because this is Latin America and even though Panamá is a very secular country, religion is a vital part of the community life.  So, for the Catholic parents and children, the celebration started off with a special Mass at the church at 9 am.

Dr. Felix Antonio Lara as a young man.

 This was a memorial Mass for Dr. Felix Antonio Lara, a distinguished educator in Chiriquí and for whom the Potrerillos school is named.  June 3rd this year was the 100th anniversary of his birth.

I just took a few clips from the Mass itself, more to show what the community looks like than anything else.  Our priest is a young Franciscan.  The Franciscans are very prominent in Chiriquí, which suits me just fine, since I'm quite Franciscan in my attitudes.

Just some things to look for:  the first clip is before the Mass started, just to show the community adn the inside of the church.  The school children are all wearing uniforms.  White shirts are for grades K through 6, while the blue shirts are worn by grades 7 through 9.  Pants and skirts are dark blue.  Uniforms like this are universal in the province; every school kid wears one.

I panned the front of the church to give you an idea of what it looks like.

The older woman reading the first Scriptural reading is Maritza Espinosa's aunt.  She and her husband are very active in the congregation, as is Maritza herself.  

The priest is reading the Gospel.

Finally, just showing the communion line, for more visuals of the congregation.  You'll see a Ngobe Buglé woman in traditional dress.  She's wearing one which is aquamarine with brown and white decorative "bands"; she's sitting towards the front of the congregation.  

I got the biggest kick out of watching one of the 8th graders, I think, telling off either a sibling or a school chum towards the end of the last clip.  Her facial expression is just classic.

Enjoy.

Something that the priest said during his homily, which emphasized the value of education, intrigued me. He remarked that at least teachers in Panamá were more or less well-paid, but that was not true in most of Central America. He specifically mentioned Guatemala and Honduras where, he said, many classes were held outdoors in the forested area due to lack of schools. He also said--and given the currency units, he had to be talking about Guatemala, not Honduras--that teachers were paid the equivalent of $20/month.

Sobering.

I'm still processing and editing stills and videos, but I should have at least one video up tomorrow.

News Briefs, 27/5//2008

La Prensa:  "English: A Stone in the Shoe."  The article reports on the failure of colegio students to demonstrate proficiency in English as evidenced by poor performance on exams.  According to the article, a 60% grade is passing; average grade was 53%  for 12th grade students.  The test has been mandatory since 2007.  It's bad news for the universities, too, because, since 2007,  proficiency in English is required to get a diploma.

La Prensa:  Panamanian economy, while growing, is slowing in rate, down 4% from this time last year.  Those sectors that have slowed: pretty much all the agricultural sectors, which is very bad news at this time of higher food prices, tonnage passing through the Canal, manufacturing in the food and textile industries, among others.  Officials are blaming the slowdown on high fuel prices.

La Estrella: Hydroelectric production at the plant in Bayano stopped this weekend due to low water levels.  However, the situation at Fortuna, here in Chiriquí, is getting back to normal with the steady--and at times--heavy rains we've been experiencing over the past week.  Heaven knows it's beginning to feel like August around here.

Interestingly enough, there have been demonstrations (reported in La Prensa in the past week) over Volcán way, protests by farmers and residents against a proposed hydroelectric project that would reduce if not outright eliminate water that has traditionally gone to small farmers there.

There have been accounts in La Prensa recently of demonstrations by parents and students at different primary schools that fiberglass removal has been inadequate and badly done. Today in Panamá Américana, there's an article quoting the Vice Minister of Education as admitting that many companies don't have experience in that work. Always leads me to wonder if there's a money trail there.

La Estrella: Torrijo's plan for assisting the agricultural sector with high costs consists of reducing the interest rates on loans to that sector to 2% and broadening the insurance coverage in case of natural disasters, accidents, etc affecting crops and harvests.  The president of ONAGRO (Organización Nacional Agropecuario) congratulated Torrijos on this measure, but also requested steps to reduce the number of middlemen between the producer and the market, saying that this is a major cause of the increase in costs to the consumer.

There's a much longer article in Dia a Dia on steps being taken to give consumer relief over high prices of basic foods.  It doesn't say when, but a program was started in the Azuero Peninsula that introduced measure to help producers and guarantee lower prices to the consumer.  One of those measure is that the government would buy 100% of the rice crop, which has at its base the rise of oil to $135/barrel last week.  this also would help eliminate speculation.  Urea, which is a prime chemical fertilizer used, would be sold at half the going rate.  The hope, of course, is that these measures benefitting producers will lower costs that will be passed directly to the consumer.

But meantime?   At the beginning, the article does mention some steps taken in other countries, such as the issue of food vouchers.  That certainly would help the poor in the short term.

Yesterday, I went to our local mercadito to buy a bag of cement, since our favorite construciton worker is coming here today to do a small project for us.  I shelled out $7.35 for the bag, remarking as I did so that the price had risen $0.06 since I last bought one.  The young woman at the cash register, someone I'm not familiar with, shyly started talking about the rise in food prices.  Then we got to talking about the increase in fuel prices.  

Panamá regulates the price of fuel, adjusting every two weeks; the next price adjustment is on the 28th.  Right now, we're paying $4.10 for a gallon of diesel, which about as cheap as you can get it locally.  Boquete is traditionally $0.10-$0.15 higher.  We were surprised last weekend to see stations in David $0.15 higher than our local bomba.  

For dead certain, the price is not going to drop, not with oil reaching ever higher records.  All we can do is wait and see, and continue to implement our plan to do even less driving than we are now.

So much for a brief post.