Bonnie Raechal Beres ’23 cooking on the fogón (wood fire) in the Ngäbe-Buglé Comarca in Panama.

Living the Call: Bringing Actio to Life in Panama

The Norbertine pillar of actio calls for a life of meaningful action — serving others and working for the common good. Bonnie Raechal Beres ’23 may be a perfect example of what it means to live out that call.

For the past year, Beres has lived in an Indigenous community in Panama, serving as a Peace Corps volunteer.

Called to Serve
Beres always knew she was called to a life of service. Her interest in the Peace Corps first sparked in high school.

“There was a Peace Corps volunteer who came in, and she spoke about her service in Tanzania,” Beres says. “I remember listening to that talk and thinking, that sounds really interesting. I feel like I want that to be a part of my narrative and my story someday, too.”

Though she explored other options over the years, the Peace Corps remained in the back of her mind.

At St. Norbert College, Beres fully embraced study abroad opportunities. A driven biology major with an organismal concentration, she had a deep desire for field research. Her studies took her to Panama during her junior year — and the rest, as they say, is history.

After returning to the U.S., Beres found it difficult to stay in a traditional classroom.

“I wanted to be back out in the field,” she says. “So that took me, then, for a semester in the Galápagos Islands in Ecuador. I did that for my very last semester of college. They actually had a graduation ceremony for me in the Galápagos, and then I also got to walk at St. Norbert — so I kind of had two graduations, which was fun.”

Answering the Call
Peace Corps volunteers can be placed where the need is highest, or they can apply for a specific program, sector or country.

Right after graduation, Beres was placed in Peru — but she deferred the assignment.

“I wanted to make sure I had my feet on the ground back home before venturing overseas again,” she says.

A few months later, her heart was still in Panama. This time, she applied directly to serve there.

“When I was abroad in Panama in college, I had formed a lot of love for this country and care about the issues here,” she says. “Then the semester ended and I left, and there was kind of this sadness because I was no longer part of all the stuff I had come to care about.”

Serving in Panama
Since February 2024, Beres has served as a sustainable agriculture systems volunteer in the Ngäbe-Buglé Comarca — one of Panama’s Indigenous regions. Before her placement, she completed 10 weeks of intensive pre-service training, learning soil conservation techniques and strategies to increase crop yields in tropical environments.

Because of her previous time in Panama and Ecuador, she was already familiar with the climate and eager to serve in a rural setting.

“I was told they needed someone who could do agriculture and would be willing to live in an Indigenous community speaking an Indigenous language,” she says. “That really appealed to me. I was kind of fascinated by what that would look like.”

Raised in Pewaukee, Wis., Beres attended a Waldorf school where learning happened mostly outside the classroom.

“I feel like that kind of learning environment from my early years set me up to be able to do an experience like this,” she says.

She also credits St. Norbert College with helping prepare her for this path.

“I really loved field biology and field research,” she says. “I did a summer research experience in El Paso, Texas, and then David Hunnicutt (Biology) helped me find my research experience doing viticulture and enology in Pennsylvania with grapes. I think that kind of gave me more of an agriculture background.”

Her goal in Panama has been to deepen her knowledge of agriculture and help connect outside resources with community needs.

“I kind of see my role a lot of times as a bridge between their hopes and dreams and needs, and then agencies outside who can provide that assistance,” she says.

She spends much of her week working alongside farmers.

“A lot of times it feels like being free hired help,” she says, laughing. “But there’s always hope that you’ll find something — some pest you can identify — so you can reach out to agencies, send photos and ask what they’d recommend.”

She also teaches basic English once a week to help community members interact with tourists.

“It’s not to create fluent speakers,” she says, “but to give them enough English to interact in a market setting.”

Building a New Life
Adjusting to life without technology, transportation or even running water proved challenging.

The Ngäbe-Buglé people speak Ngäbere, an Indigenous language that can’t be found in books. Spanish is spoken, but less frequently.

“I was confident with my Spanish, but it wasn’t enough,” Beres says.

Reaching her community isn’t easy, either. After a long bus ride and a truck ride off the highway, visitors must hike up and down mountainous terrain.

“It was definitely a big adjustment,” she says. “Especially because I arrived during the rainy season — and walking that path in the rain from the get-go was a stark transition.”

Beres quickly learned to live off the land. Homes are built from local materials. Her first structure was made from fallen wood and measured eight feet by eight feet.

“We used some wood we got from a fallen tree and constructed my eight-foot-by-eight-foot castle,” she says, smiling.

She slept in a hammock for more than a month until she finally decided to buy a mattress.

“I told my host dad I couldn’t sleep in the hammock anymore,” she says. The two built a frame, but a mattress was still missing.

She walked 30 minutes, took a pickup truck another 30, and finally reached a town with stores.

“I was so excited to get the mattress,” she says. “But that day it poured rain, and I had to carry it back on my head, down this mountain terrain.”

As if that weren’t enough, when she returned, she found a stray dog had dug into her home and eaten her clothes.

“That was probably my most miserable day,” she says. “But even though there are very miserable days, the beauty always seems to win out. It’s equal parts misery and beauty — and that makes for a very meaningful, transformative and spiritual experience.”

Finding Purpose — and Family
Over the past year, Beres has found a new sense of purpose — and a new family.

“They told me I’m family. They told me they never want me to leave,” she says. “I’m always clear that at some point I will leave, but I hope I’ll always be connected to them.”

Beres often speaks of community, a value that closely aligns with the Norbertine tradition of radical hospitality.

“The Ngäbe-Buglé people have a huge cultural value of spending time with one another,” she says. “When I first got there, they were always like, ‘Why haven’t you come to my house yet?’”

Despite living with food insecurity, they insist on offering guests full meals — or at the very least, fresh fruit.

“They are incredibly generous,” she says. “That’s how they communicate love and hospitality. So I think radical hospitality is definitely present.”

As her experience continues, Beres says she’s embraced the idea of cathedral thinking — the belief that meaningful impact often spans generations.

“Sometimes you feel like you’re not making a big impact because things are small scale,” she says. “But I think I can lay a great foundation for whoever comes next. I think the biggest takeaway is seeing myself as part of a relay — not a sprinter.”

Beres plans to complete her two-year placement with the Ngäbe-Buglé people and is open to wherever life calls her next. One thing is certain: she will always be part of their story — and they will always be part of hers.

June 5, 2025