The Community Action Project (CAP) for this delegation is assisting our community partner, Pro Eco Azuero, with reforesting the Azuero Peninsula. The next few days of blogs will consist of how we discussed, designed, and now delivered on this project. You can read more about the importance of this work in the earlier blog post from LDDs Gael and Miguel.

Our first day of our Community Action Project (CAP) started with an early wake-up call at 5:00 A.M., a first for this delegation. We had some help from Tim Regalado, our GGL leadership coach, with the wake-up calls in the other building some of us are staying in. A lot of us felt tired getting up and some just went back to bed, but we still managed to make the breakfast call at 5:45 A.M. Breakfast was a light ham and cheese sandwich topped with ketchup and mayo made to-go. The bus ride was supposed to be at 6:00 A.M. but we ended up boarding at about 6:15 A.M.; a bit behind on time for work on the Community Action Project. The bus ride was entertaining because we did a majority vote to play music in the morning which helped wake us up and kept our spirits high. We arrived at Playa Venao around 7:50 A.M. where we started a hike up the mountain, approaching the rendezvous point with our coordinators from Pro Eco Azuero.

After our hike up we began picking up baskets filled with saplings two-by-two with muddy hills. With mud comes slipping and falling where the first person down was Nathaniel Hill (completely unharmed) who taught us the dangers of hiking on muddy hills. Once we got to the next checkpoint we put down the baskets to allow the “Maginificos” to plant the next day. The ‘Magnificos’ are a group that came before us to assist in making the day easier by digging and readying the saplings for us to plant. This is where the real work began- we split off into groups, and each team had a guide to show us where to start. For each sapling, we had to remove its covering to expose the soil and roots followed by planting it in the ground. There was a bit of a struggle with removing saplings from their containers, something we plan to improve during the coming days. We walked around planting more saplings, a total of 1,020 finishing our work early around 11:30 A.M. Due to the intensive labor, we all were drenched in sweat with varying quantities of mud. Due to being ill-prepared, a majority of us lacked proper clothing for lunch. We now know how the workload will leave us so we will prepare accordingly for the following day. Lunch was near the beach around 1:00 P.M. where we had rice, beans, and a choice of pork or chicken.

After lunch, we got back to our bus and we began to make our way back to our accommodations. After our eventful morning, we were all tired and ready to take a shower. Luckily, during our free time today, we were able to make calls home to make our families and friends aware of our well-being. After that, we worked on our Appreciation Letters to the Global Glimpse supporters who made this trip possible. Shortly after we ate our dinner consisting of Barbecue Ribs with mashed potatoes and salad.  We then continued with our nightly meeting, reflecting with comments from our peers to improve as leaders paving the way for our next leaders, Jalen and Joel.

Gerardo Recinos

For me, this day was slightly stressful as I wanted to try and embody the role of leader as best as I could for everyone and thanks to positive feedback I am glad to be satisfied with how the day turned out. But I would’ve wanted to be more prepared for the day, as well as preparing everyone for the first day of our Community Action Project.

Edwin Ochoa

It was a wonderful experience being a leader of the day, especially with someone I feel pretty close to and I believe that was reflected in the energy we were able to emit to the rest of the group. Although it wasn’t fully due to our work, I tried my best to address and concerns people had. Additionally, I’m so excited we were able to kick off the Community Action Project in which we’re planting trees to save a critically endangered species of monkey. This trip has been so fun and I’m glad I’ve been able to interact with the others well while enjoying my stay here in Las Tablas, Panama. I only wish I could’ve brought more energy to such an early day but I’m glad that I’m aware of what I can improve on to be a better leader in the future.

Arriving at the mountainside to begin our reforestation!

Glimpsers Judith, Yanai, and Ronaldo with saplings ready to plant!

LDD Gerardo leading the way!

LDD Edwin showing off his talent of bench pressing co-LDD Gerardo (no Glimpsers were harmed in the making of this talent!)

A beautiful landscape photo to show the need of reforestation in the Azuero Peninsula