My Own House!!

The long awaited day has finally arrived- I now have my own house! I think I've mentioned before that we are required by the Peace Corps to spend our first 6 months with host families and, yes, I have just reached the 6 month mark! For the past few weeks my friends and I have been leaving our host families en masse, moving into our own places. Living with a host family is a really great experience (so much so that some volunteers choose to stay with one their entire 2 years) but it can be, well, obnoxious, always having to explain where you're going, when you'll be back, why you didn't eat your entire 3 cup serving of white rice (no, I'm not sick and I love your cooking, it's just that I'm not used to eating so much rice!). I was really fortunate to have such an amazing host family whom I sincerely adore but I'm thrilled to be living on my own. And, I'm only 4 blocks from my host mom if a craving for white rice strikes.

So this is my house. Isn't it cute? Can you see my hammock up on my porch? The most wonderful thing about it is that it is up on a little hill and gets a great breeze. It's a little too big for me and way too expensive, but it was all there was available in my town. I pay $80 per month, which is double what most Peace Corps volunteers pay. Before you laugh at my rent, keep in mind that I only make $10 per day (a dollar an hour after taxes) so $80 is a small fortune to me. I do, however, have some luxuries that many volunteers don't, like electricity and running water. I also have, like most people in Panama, many many cockroaches. They are gigantic. And they fly. It's almost enough to make me quit this whole Peace Corps thing...


When you walk through the front door you are standing in the living room, looking at the dining room, with the little table, chair, and stool that my host mom gave me. As you can see, I don't have a whole lot of furniture. The door against the back wall leads to the kitchen and there are two doors on the right wall that lead to the bedrooms. The picture on the right is of the front door and living room. Someday I would like to have a couch or a chair or something but it won't be in the budget for awhile. Hopefully people in the community will take pity on their poor volunteer and donate some old furniture.


This is the kitchen, with a back door out to a small cement slab/patio. I don't have a refrigerator, a stove, an oven, or a microwave. I'm saving up for a propane camping stove (a propane tank is $50!) and (in the distant future) a refrigerator. It's too hot here to not have cold water to drink. I do have a little electric burner (on the pink table) which is obnoxiously useless. It doesn't boil water. What's the point of a stove that can't boil water? Drives me crazy...

There are two bedrooms. This one is the "guest" room. My host mom is lending me the bed, a short twin size bunk bed. I'm sleeping in the guest room until I can get a mattress for my bed in the other room. It's a pretty cute little room anyway.

This is the master bedroom. A volunteer who completes her service this week gave me the bed and a mattress is at the top of my priorities. I'm hoping to be able to afford one in about a month and a half. I cannot wait!! I'm just so thrilled to have my own space. I really love my host family but I love not feeling like a guest and being able to let my hair down, so to speak. Also, this is excellent news for anyone who wants to come visit because now you've got a place to stay (and I might even have another chair by the time you get here!) :)


I forgot to take a picture of the bathroom.. It's the least wonderful part of my house because it's pretty small and cramped. Also, I have a pet bat named Murci (short for murcielago, the Spanish word for bat) that lives in the roof and uses the shower for his bathroom. I guess it's nice that he goes somewhere that's easy to clean. I've never actually seen Murci because there's a thin ceiling between us, with a little hole that he poops in. Apparently he is potty-trained. He is also very irritable. Whenever I use the bathroom I turn the light on, which wakes him up during the day and he chews me out for it. He sounds like a very angry squirrel. I try to calm him down, I've even tried explaining that of the two of us I'm the only one that pays rent. But he insists the bathroom is his territory so I've conceded the point. Honestly, it's kind of nice to have someone to talk to.

So now you know where I live. I really love it. I especially love the hammock. Sitting in the hammock on the front porch with a good book is one of the simplest and most wonderful things. You'll have to come visit me and see what I mean.