Pete Ostrower's Journey to Panama

On Wednesday night, September 9, Peter Ostrower gave a presentation on his two-year experience as a Peace Corps volunteer. Ostrower talked about his time in Panama, where he built latrines and aqueducts for an impoverished community.

Ostrower trained for ten weeks before being placed in his Panamanian village. He learned basic construction skills and developed his technical knowledge, as well as learning Spanish.

Once Ostrower completed his training, he built his temporary home in the Herrera Province on the Azuero Peninsula, right next to an Evangelical church, with the help of many villagers. Ostrower later worked for each of the 20 local men who helped him build his home of bamboo and palm leaves, as is customary repayment in Panama.

The design of the house was very sturdy, but Ostrower soon discovered that the palm leaves made a great home for all types of creatures. He described his many encounters with boa constrictors, scorpions, poisonous spiders and deadly frogs.

His community had no electricity and had never seen a white man before. However, they welcomed him to their village with a gasoline tank of homemade rum. Ostrower learned how to harvest kidney beans (the village’s main source of income) and how to grow and cut the rice crop. He assisted the community by building latrines to reduce the amount of waste being pumped into the local water sources. He also built aqueducts out of PVC tubing, which transported fresh water from the mountain springs into the communities. Due to Panama's eight month rainy season and the poor condition of roads, Ostrower had to walk between ten and fifteen miles every day.

All of Ostrower’s hard work paid off through the amazing relationships he cultivated with the locals. He played with the children and formed close friendships with the adults. He developed a deep appreciation for the hardships that the people of Panama have endured, and offered his new community a positive outlook on living in a sustainable way. His presentation was insightful and inspiring; we are very privileged and grateful to have had him speak at Alfred University.