Anne and Rich finally skip town!

November 5, 2008

The U.S. election safely (and triumphantly!) concluded the night before, we threw a few clothes into a bag, loaded Rich’s bicycle into our Nissan, and set off on Wednesday morning for a three-day adventure into the Azuero Peninsula of Panama. We were high from Obama’s victory, and felt like we were on a celebratory pilgrimage. Our goal was to reach the town of Chitré the first night, Pedasí the second, and drive back home on the third. And in between Chitré and Pedasí, to stop in the little town of La Palma where Rich served in the Peace Corps in 1970.

Driving west through Panama City (we live on the eastern edge) we said a fond farewell to the polluted, chaotic cityscape that is the main east-west road through town. It is aptly called Tomba Muerto… (Tomb of the Dead). The traffic is always nuts, ignoring traffic lights and stop signs, and entering and exiting the roadway at illegal points, but Rich has really learned how to flow with it. He jokes about making money hawking bumper stickers for Panamanians asking How’s My Driving?

In half an hour we reached the new (northern) bridge over the Panama Canal, built to lighten traffic congestion over the original Bridge of the Americas going out of the city to western Panama. (Note to my mom, who was with me in Panama in 2004 and remembers the Centenario bridge when it was under construction: Mama, it looks a LOT like your new bridge in Bucksport! Suspended by two elegant sail-like triangles of cables – very pretty – but without the classy lights and lookout post that your bridge has.)

The land mass of Panama is most closely equivalent in area to the U.S. state of South Carolina, but it is shaped like a long, east-west tilde with the Azuero Peninsula jutting southward from the middle-western part of the country. The Azuero peninsula is famous for its sandy beaches, which don’t exist in the eastern half of the country. All the other foreign teachers at Rich’s school have been making weekend trips to the beaches since August, but we hadn’t trusted our car to make it there until recent repairs, so this was our first foray.

The first half of our trip was on the Pan-American Highway, which extends through the Americas all the way from Alaska to Argentina with only a brief gap in the Darien jungle of eastern Panama, but don’t let the fancy name fool you! In Panama, at least, it is NOT a smooth, highly engineered road. In many places it is two-lanes, and it slows WAY down to go through busy little towns, kind of like old US route 40. Very picturesque, though – not sterile, like our interstates. Our total 3-day round trip was about 500 miles, which is nothing on US interstates, but Panamanian potholes and periodic torrential rains make efficient travel impossible.

Our first stop was at a roadside open-air bakery/restaurant for breakfast, where we ordered omelets, resisting the sweet pastries and fried corn tortillas that Panamanians love. The place was hopping on a Wednesday morning, with workers, couples, and families pulling in for a 10:00 am meal.

After a two hour drive through countryside and small towns we stopped at the beach in Santa Clara. The public beach charges $2 per person for parking, but the beach, itself, is free, as are bathrooms and changing rooms. A little restaurant/bar has a captive audience. We strolled up the beach to a quiet spot and spread our towels. Hot sand, warm breezes, blue and green surf, and families playing. Rich put on some sunscreen to mollify me, and baked on his towel while I walked along the edge of the surf under my umbrella. (White Girl does the Tropics...)

We next stopped in the town of Penonomé, capital of Coclé Province (like a county seat) and walked around the town center. Rich had been yearning for a “pueblo típico” (typical small town) with a central plaza and bustling commerce, and Penonomé satisfies. Panamanian flags flew everywhere, celebrating the November holidays of Independence Day (November 3, for independence from Colombia in 1903), Flag Day (November 4), and Independence from Spain (November 28 , achieved in 1821).

From Penonomé, it’s another hour to the turn-off southward onto the "Carretera Nacional" (National Highway) from the Pan-American Highway. The countryside grows more and more lovely and agrarian. It looks somewhat like the American south. Contented cows and horses graze in hayfields interspersed with corn and sugar cane fields, tree-lined country roads, coconut palms, and flowering plants. Little shrines appear along the highway at odd intervals. Angela, my Spanish teacher, says they are actual graves, usually for someone who died at or near that place, buried there rather than in a distant cemetery so their soul will rest.

Chitre is a town of about 48,000 people and the capital of Herrerra Province. It has the prettiest town square of anyplace we’ve seen in Panama! A central, elevated gazebo looks out upon lush plantings and the walkways are designed to entice people through this little oasis of greenery on their way to the cathedral at one edge or the candy kiosk at the other. Around the edges of the square are restaurants, hotels, and shops. We stayed at the Hotel Rex, an old and simple, but comfortable, hotel which sits right on the town square. A beautiful 2nd floor terrace lets you sit and watch the world go by below in dry comfort (in rainy season). You don’t have to be a church-goer to enjoy the lovely old cathedral (La Catédral de San Juan Bautista). I liked most that its huge doors are wide open all day, and late into the evening. There is no preoccupation in Panama with keeping the homeless out. As we walked back to the hotel after our $12 (for both) dinner, Rich spotted a street vendor selling strips of tender, marinated grilled meat on skewers, the taste of which brought him back vivid memories of 1970 Panama.

Thursday morning we set out from Chitré for the town of Las Tablas, a bustling commercial center of 25,000 people. It was HOT by 11 am, and we were happy to duck into a shop that sells the handmade leather chairs Rich had been looking for. We talked with the shopkeepers and said we would come back the next day, on our way home, to buy two rocking chairs and 4 straight chairs for our still-sparse house. Then we stopped for lunch in a local restaurante for the traditional Panamanian "sopa" (soup) called Sancocho; a hearty chicken soup with tropical root vegetables (yucca, taro, and yam). It's an acquired taste, but it certainly has grown on me! I am now trying to make it at home.

By 1 pm we reached La Palma, the village where Rich had lived for 8 months as a Peace Corps member. He exclaimed in nostalgic recognition when we reached the turn-off, a soccer field at the edge of town. We turned northwestward and drove through a picturesque little town, built into rolling hillsides. "Why didn't you tell me it was this pretty?!" I asked. He had always portrayed La Palma as extremely poor and simple, but it looked lovely to me. Houses were painted in pastels, flowers were everywhere, and there was no trash to be seen (in stark contrast to Panama City).

We parked in front of the hut where Rich had lived - a simple, adobe house, on one edge of the town square, now turned into a hardware store. No one was around as we got out of the car and started walking around the town. Rich wanted to look for a man who had been his assigned contact in his Peace Corps days. Benigno had been designated because he had considerable education (to the 8th grade level or so). When we reached a street Rich thought was close to Benigno's house, he asked a friendly, elderly passerby, who directed us to a nearby store. We went in. It was simple and stark beyond all recognition in the States - lots of bare shelves, a few cans of sardines and tomato paste, but mostly empty shelves and jars that perhaps held wares in better days. A middle-aged woman and a young woman were in the shop, and they politely answered Rich's queries. The young woman then made ready to leave her post and take us to where we could find Benigno. It turns out she was his 31-year old daughter, Rosalina! She was friendly and companionable on the walk through town, but shy until later in our visit.

When we reached Benigno's home, he was sitting on the front porch with an elderly neighbor woman, and a young woman and her little girl. Rosalina preceded us, and gestured to Rich as she greeted her father. Benigno, 65, with impaired eyesight and a lame leg, peered at Rich. Rich said, (in Spanish), "I don't know if you recognize me? It's Ricardo." Benigno said, "Of course! Don Ricardo! Please sit down!" Rosalina had told us that her father had spoken often of Rich, and we proceeded to have a lively hour of conversation with the family and neighbor about Benigno's health, local happenings (including a bizarre story about a local wild-but-beloved monkey that had been mysteriously poisoned), and family news. We were treated to photos on Rosalina/s cell phone of recent local events, and the elderly neighbor hobbled into the house to fetch a framed photo to show us of her beloved daughter, who lives and works in Panama City. Rich was charming and entertaining, and I blundered along in my elementary Spanish; it was a delightful hour. Finally, we took our leave, promising to come back in the spring to witness sugar cane processing.

Rich was transported for the rest of the day. Peace Corps had been such an important chapter in his life, and this visit brought it all back. We arrived in the little seaside town of Pedasí in late afternoon. We checked into Dim's Hostal, a lovely, funky big old inn with five guest rooms and a large garden. The focal point of the yard was a huge mango tree with a roof built into its branches covering a patio filled with inviting chairs and tables and hammocks. We spent quite a few hours on that patio in the next 24 hours, and despite the heat there was always a breeze. Breakfast, included in the room price, was served there, made to order. Rosa, the assistant to the owner, and the one who did everything, was a charming Panamanian woman who chatted with us amiably whenever we crossed paths. We could have stayed there happily for a week.

On Friday morning after breakfast we set off for one of the town's two beaches. The sand was so hot we couldn't go barefoot except at the water's edge! Rich sunbathed and I walked. It is a beautiful setting, with a dark-colored sandy beach, wooded shores, and huge rocks sticking out of the water. Did I mention that it was HOT? After an hour we surrendered and went back to the hostel, showered, packed our bags, said good-bye to Rosa, and started home. We stopped in La Tablas to arrange for delivery to Panama City of the leather chairs. Our only other stop on the 6 hour drive home was in the little town of La Arena, famous for its pottery. There we bought lovely - and cheap - pots for our fledgling tropical garden and had lunch. It rained a bit on the way home, but that is Panama. The only thing that marred our great adventure was that we reached Panama City in rush hour, and spent a frustrating 80 minutes crawling the last 15 miles! We''re hoping that among Panama's concessions to development and modernity it will recruit a few good traffic engineers.

For photos from our trip, go to http://picasaweb.google.com/anneew

On Being An American in Panama During the 2008 Presidential Election

November 1, 2008

I am so nervous, I can hardly sit still. Yesterday I made 15 super-extra-long distance phone calls from our house in Panama City to voters in Ohio and Pennsylvania to encourage them to vote next Tuesday or before. Between each call, I got up and paced around the room, adjusting the fan and the curtains to minimize the breathtaking humidity in the house. When I got back to Panama a week ago from my two-week trip to the cool, temperate U.S. Mid-Atlantic, I walked from the air-conditioned plane into the air-conditioned airport, and from there, outdoors, into a blanket of warm, wet wool. I could have swept some of the air into a jar, put it in the fridge,. and had a full drink of water from the condensation. My skin, which had resumed its normal fine-pored, dry texture in the US, was back to sticky within minutes. The climate here is like a big, panting dog that follows on your heels, even into the bathroom.

We want Obama to win so badly that we can't concentrate on anything. Even that. I have abandoned my usual Spanish language TV channels in favor of madly flipping from CNN to the BBC and back again to parse the news from the commercials and gain reassurance that Obama is still the favorite to win. CNN plays his (and McCain's) campaign speeches wherever they go, and I could recite both mens' by now, but I can't stop watching. I can't imagine a greater contrast between two men, and two visions of America. That's a good thing, I hope. The more stark the contrast, the more accurate a referendum this election is on Americans' view of the world and our place in it.

I have asked a number of Panamanians about their views of our election. They range from the predictable to the bizarre, but all the neighbors and teachers at Rich's school with whom I have spoken favor Obama. Panamanians know firsthand what it's like to have America boss them around, and they take a dim view of our war in (on) Iraq. They also have long experience of American racism, both the overtly hostile kind, and the subtly condescending kind. My Spanish teacher favors Obama because he seems like a reasonable man who might have a clue how the world's brown-skinned peoples experience the world. Our next-door neighbor, a truck driver for his wife's home-based customs business, believes that George Bush coordinated the 9/11 attack with Bin Laden... Needless to say, he doesn't trust McCain.

On the other side are some of the students at Rich's school (and presumably, their parents). Most of the kids are indifferent or uninformed about the U.S election, having no connection with North America, but the more sophisticated and older students have taken an interest. The International School of Panama (ISP) draws from a broad community of educated Panamanian and foreign families. Most of the students have Latin American parents; and about half of them have lived in Panama most of their lives. Many of the parents are businesspeople or professionals in law, medicine, or politics. The Mayor of Panama City sends his children to ISP.

In Rich's economics class an argument erupted this week between the Obama supporters and two McCain supporters. Rich said it was fascinating to watch, and watch-only he did, to stifle his impusle to flatten the McCain advocates. "They were my two weakest students in that class, and their peers made short work of dismantling their arguments in support of McCain." I guess if introductory econ students can see that our emperors have no clothes and that Obama has done his homework (a concept they understand) it bodes well for the upcoming generation.

This coming week is Rich's first week off since starting the school year on August 11th. Most teachers immediately leave town, to go to the beach or to other countries for a vacation. We will travel a bit in western Panama... after the election. Until next Tuesday night, we are glued to the news from the country it turns out we really do love.