Thickair Blog

Here in Panama, the litter and trash problem is unreal. Rivers, mountainsides and any roadside ditch is filled with plastic bottles, juice boxes and millions of these colored plastic bags. Every time you buy anything at a store they double bag your item in these very inexpensive, blue, red or yellow baggies. I have been thinking of different ways to re-use these bags, and create a piece of art with them. My original idea was to attach millions of them together and make a Christo-esque installation piece. Instead I thought it would be a fun idea to make a kite with it. Here they don’t sell wooden dowels (except for in Panama City), so I thought I could use bamboo instead. I drove up the mountain looking for a good grove that had some slender bamboos. I found a dilapidated turqouise house with huge bamboo groves behind it. I stood outside for a long time, and an old man yelled down ‘buenas’ as he looked to find himself a shirt to wear. After dressing, he walked down to meet me and I explained to him that I was looking for bamboo. He had the boy get him a machete and we went hiking into the groves, asking me to tell him exactly what size I wanted. I showed him the slender 1/2″ dia reeds. He told me to wait in the shade and he went through and cut me several bamboos. He talked and talked to me telling me all about his life living there and working the chicken farm. As I sat there, I realized that I would never go up to anyone in the US and ask them if I could have some of their bamboo. People are incredibly inviting and welcoming here. I took my bamboo home and started making the material for the kite. I ironed together plastic bags to make the sails. In all it took about 5 hours to complete, looking fairly sad. The bamboo supports are not perfectly straight, so it gives the structure a little curve, and the sails look like garbage, because that’s what they are. In my first flight attempt, the sail tore down the side. I guess maybe I should go back to the christo idea.

This entry was posted Wednesday, April 29th, 2009 at 1:07 pm and is filed under 'Slow' Living, Panama. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.