Balloon Day with the kiddies

I recently taught my English class how to say their colors in English by using some balloons. I can't say they really learned much, but the balloons were a bit hit.

It turns out, most of the kids had never seen balloons before - the elders in the community don't bring them in. Man, they don't know what they're missing...

Parque Nacional Coiba

This past weekend I ended up in jail. Please send bail money, cigarettes and a large raft. What used to Panama's own version of Alcatraz, Parque Nacional Coiba is now the third largest marine park in the world behind the Great Barrier Reef and Galapagos Islands, and I was real fortunate to make its acquaintance.



It's a great chain of Pacific islands that has only recently been given protected park status. Up until 2004, it was a Devil's Island-style penal colony built at the beginning of the 20th century, where the convicts, who were all serious thugs - rapists, murderers, and lawyers (just kiddin) - were allowed to roam free on the giant island. It was the guards who locked themselves in with guns at night.

I asked the guard what happened if a convict escaped. He smirked, and said they did nothing but sit and wait. The remote location and shark-infested waters ensured they wouldn't go far.

In addition to run-away prisoners, I was on the look-out for the rumored "mud man," who according to legend, conducted "mercy killings" on other prisoners on the island by sneaking up, strangling them and whispering apologies. It's ok as long as he says he's sorry.

The only lodgings on the main island are the inviting old jail and cabins set up by the government for scientists and the occasional adventure group. While the jail aspect caused a bit of apprehension when we were visiting for the weekend, what really captured our attention was the incredible wildlife. Of the park's over 430,000 hectares, 85% is virgin forest that's been left untouched by the recent spate of development.

Because of it, we were surrounded by very cool and curious critters. If you didn't catch Tito the crocodile keeping vigilant watch, the giant rodents neques, the lizards, parakeets or hawks, it was Sarah the domesticated deer that'd steal your attention, while he was stealing your sandals - she was a brazen thief. All this was just on land - the real excitement took place in the water.

Our main goal was to see some whales - that was knocked off our list right away. The whale gods were very kind to us, as we bumped into humpback whales on our way out to Panama's largest island and on our way back to civilization. We also saw a loggerhead turtles popping their heads up.

That's me on the second row on the right taking pictures...


The park is renowned for its marine diversity - diving and snorkeling can be intense as we found out. I went with a Panamanian friend of mine who had never really learned to swim past the doggie paddle and had never snorkeled before. It's crazy - Panama is surrounded by water on all ends, but the majority of Panamanians can't swim. Normally I blame rap music for all of society's ills, but I can't find a blameworthy culprit for this astonishing revelation.

I convinced my friend to snorkel the reef around this tiny deserted island. At the end of the white sandy beach was a peninsula of giant rocks that led deep into the ocean, making a cool place for tons of fish to congregate. As we doggie-paddled our way around the first turn, I caught something snooping out of the corner of my eye - it was a 6-foot long white tipped shark checking us out. Imagine snorkeling for the first time and having a hungry shark size you up for dinner. I've heard Panamanians are tastier than gringos, so I wasn't too afraid.

Yeah, that's a blatant lie...after I soiled my shorts, I took a deep breath and let the shark pass about 10 feet in front of us. Rules of the ocean - anything with sharper teeth than me gets the right of way.

We kept on swimming and ran into another shark. It was incredible. Thank God we're not part of their food chain.

Here are some other pictures from the weekend:

We ran into a pod of about 40 dolphins who took turns swimming in the boat's wake.






This deer kept on stealing sandals and snorkeling gear. I caught her just as she was about to grab a mask.


She was cool with me because I kept feeding her Cheeze-its.




Tito the crocodile






A neque - one of the largest rodents in the world

Folsom Prison Blues...Entrance to the prison


Not quite paradise...

An untimely end...

You might remember my first blog entry where I talked about my utter fear and dread of my shower. I don't think I was so scared of the actual shower as much I was terrified over the naked wires that fed it electricity.

Well, last week the shower suffered an ill-fated demise...um...while I was using it.

I was sudsing up when I thought I smelled some smoke. It was kind of like a tire burning. It couldn't have been Cesar's cooking because we had just eaten. Finally, I looked up, and too my horror, saw smoke billowing up from the shower head.

My knee-jerk reaction was to jump out of the shower, naked, sudsy and wet - all the while screaming like a little girl. I reached in avoiding the drips and killed the water before I too, met the same fate as my shower.

Two days later, in walks Groundskeeper Willie with the new unit (seriously, he takes care of everything within the apartment building and refuses to talk to me in Spanish. So, I refuse to talk to him in English. Believe me, with our poor grasp of both languages, it's painful all around. I feel sorry for anybody caught in the crossfire).

The new head is much prettier than the old one, but my loyalties lie with the previous shower, mainly because it didn't electrocute me. I think it really liked me.

Take a look at this crazy thing:



Seriously, I have no idea what that demented octopus-like tentacle thing is intended to be use for, and if by chance you do, I'd appreciate if you'd keep it to yourself.

Seafood market

Panama City has a great seafood market, where fisherman will fillet a sea bass or grouper right in front of you for next to nothing. The ceviche from this place is potent, delicious stuff - it's a form of citrus marinated seafood salad that's "cooked" without heat by the citric acids mainly in lemon juice.

I love this guy's expression - it completely sums up the market's inviting aroma.

Pearl Islands

If there's one thing I like more than showing off this country to friends, it's having somebody else do it for me.

I love having visitors come down to enjoy the natural beauty that Panama has in its own backyard. It gives me a chance to do some new exploring of my own, and since there's so much to do here, I try to tailor it to my friend's preferences. Although my good friend Melinda's first choice of following the dog-fighting circuit didn't materialize (she only likes to watch the Dobermans fight - she's such a breedist), we went for the next best thing - sailing to the Pearl Islands.

Our original trip had us sailing from the canal on the Atlantic side to the San Blas islands, but as fate would have it, the sailboat we had chartered lost its generator the day before Melinda, her boyfriend Chris and friend Karl flew down. I argued that a sailboat doesn't need juice, it only needs wind. Unfortunately, that reasoning just didn't carry any weight.

So through my buddy Stu who owns a hostel in town, I tracked down Juan at the very last minute. Juan rebuilt an abandoned sailboat he bought in the States and brought it to Panama a little while ago. For $50 per person per night, he offered his services and his boat to us for the week. Among captaining the boat, his services also included great company and all meals cooked to Panamanian perfection. He was a real stand-up guy.



We sailed at night under an impressive blanket of heat lightening to Taboga Island, where we stayed until morning. After waking up to the sway of the ocean, we made the long trek out to the idylic Pearl Islands, an archipelago of about 90 islands - one of which is home to a sunken submarine and was also the site of Survivor Panama.

The islands got their name from the abundance of pearls found in its waters. Not surprisingly, the oysters than made the pearls were wiped out by Balboa and the conquistadors for the king of Spain years ago.

Five days sleeping on a cramped boat without a shower could have been pretty uncomfortable if it weren't for our covert nightly missions to the Hotel Punta Galeon's poolside showers - that, and the nightly beer run. My favorite part was snorkeling off the ship at night. When I'd wave my hands around under water, the bio-luminescence made it look as if there were bright constellations exploding in the Pacific.



The week's many highlights included all the snorkeling, sailing, spear-gun fishing, exploring and cussing - well, Karl provided the last one, and that way by way copious amounts of rum Abuelo.

Overall, the trip was incredible, except for getting a sunburn on my bald spot.




I learned how to fish with a spear gun - I didn't actually catch any fish, but I maimed a few of them.


A sea snake I followed as he was on his daily hunt for breakfast.


Juan speared us some fish, filleted it right on the shore, then made us some sushi and amazing baked fish on the boat.


This was the sunset I caught with my disposable underwater camera right after snorkeling.

Our comfy living quarters


Coconut milk straight from the source






This was crazy - after a night that seemed like the sky was falling from all violent storm, we woke up to this water spout about a mile or so away from the boat, which is basically a tornado over water. It swirled around for a bit, then retreated quietly into the clouds.

Conrad's visit

The internationally acclaimed Justin Conrad made a trek down to Panama for a trade mission last month, but I think the only thing he traded was his pasty white skin for a solid red burn. Way to apply that sunblock...

Regardless, we attended a few mission events and ended up at the Ambassador's mansion for a little cocktail party. We even got our smug mugs in the paper:

http://www.mundosocial.net/templates/empresarial.php?idn=968


We also hit one of Panama's best all-inclusive resorts - Decameron, which I highly recommend. When I set up the whole weekend, I had to argue with the travel agent. Supposedly, they had given me the Panamanian rate by mistake when I made the reservation and then tried to reverse it and charge me double. I'd like to think they were fooled into believing I was Panamanian by my superb command of the Spanish language, but I really doubt it...




Easy livin'

By the end of the weekend, I definitely needed to get "Life is a Highway" out of my head...

Road-trippin'

A group of us did a road trip through the more rustic parts of Panama - the Azuero Peninsula. It somewhat felt like a land that time forgot, where cows rules the road and breakfast of rice, beans and patio chicken were 75 cents.

Here are some of my favorite pics from the week:




Nice curlers...


We had to wade through all this mud to get Fernando's boat to take us to Isla Canas.