On the banks of the Canal
Fri, 7 Jul 2000 17:41
From Panama City, Panama
Once again I bumped into a cybercafe. It costs me as much to check my
e-mail as it does for a hotel room in Guatamala, but getting on a computer
again does feel great.
Today I am in Panama City. Yesterday, I booked a flight to Quito Ecuador on
the 9th. The ticket cost me as much as my whole trip has cost so far. That
fact alone should give you an idea of the wonderful places I have been
staying lately. Letīs just say that I have only stayed in one place with
hot water this whole trip. The first place I stayed in Panama City had no
running water. I arrived at 4:00 am and per force I took the first hotel I
could find. Since I have several days to kill, I have been exploring
Panama City. Surprisingly, Panama City has a lot more to offer than your
ordinary busy port town.
I am staying in the Casco Viejo (old part of the city). It is a wonderful
example of grandeur falling to ruin. At the turn of the century, the Casco
Viejo was classiest act in Central America. Today, it houses crumbling
cathedrals, bars, and ramshackle corrugated tin apartments. The streets are
brick and cobble, but the adobe and stone buildings are crumbling above. It
reminds me of pictures of Havana, but the cars are slightly newer. All the
business has moved farther east, which makes hotels in Casco Viejo very
cheap. (Which is why I am able to stay here). Most of Panama is very modern
with strip malls and highrises. Its people are a very ecletic mixture of
races. Every color of skin is represented on its streets. What is very
fascinating is how casually blacks and mestizos (Indian-European blood) mix
in Panama. You see a great number of black-mestizo couples holding hands
and chinese, black, and Indian kids playing in the parks. The contrast
between poor and rich is very striking as in all of Central America, but
Panama City does seem richer than any other capital except San Jose.
The most fascinating people, I have encountered so far are the Kuna Indians.
What is so interesting is how urbanized they appear, yet the women still
wear a distinctive dress (with seeming pride). As with most Indians of
Central America, the Kuna men are indistinguishable from normal mestizo
(ladino) men. They wear western clothes and almost always speak Spanish in
public. The women, however, have continued to wear traditional clothing
(certainly not pre-columbian, but still very distinctively indigenous).
Kuna women cut their hair short, wear thick gold nose rings. They often
cover their heads in red hankerchiefs. Their blouses have very puffed
shoulders with a short sleeve terminating above the elbow. Around the
chest, the blouses are stitched with the most bueatiful patterns. Their
knee length skirts are wrap around fabric with a horizontal lined pattern.
The skirts are usually blue, and the blouses are generally a lighter color.
Their calves are covered with the most intricate bead work. Once it was
probably red and white clam shells ground into beads, but to day the beads
are glass or plastic. Their shoes are leather sandels. What really
fascinated me about the Kuna, was seeing the mothers with their kids in the
main shopping drag (Central Avenue). The women are carry plastic shopping
bags and their kids are prancing about in school uniforms. The kids look
disconcertingly like any other Panamanian kids buying ice cream and yelling.
Unfortunately, the children will probably not continue wearing the
traditional clothes (at least not the ones growing up in Panama City). I
have seen only a very of the younger girls wearing the traditional dress.
The other fascinating feature of Panama City are its public buses. The
Panamians outdo all other Central Americans in their gaudy attempts to
disguise our old yellow school buses. It appears that their bus painters
took inspiration from Dungeons and Dragons illustrators with a slight tinge
of Heavy Metal(the cartoon) thrown in for good measure. The buses bear
names like Public Enemy or some other macho apellation. They bear pictures
of women in skimpy body armor fighting panthers. Alternatively, they might
sport cartoons of Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse. In some ways it is a
microcosm of the new global economic order-the worst of American
illustration and commercialism admixed in a sprawling port city of many
races.
Panama is very modern city, but it has a lot of interesting history. I
spent the last 2 days going to see the canal (and its museum) and the
national museum of history. I saw a ship pass through the MiraFlores locks
which had over 4200 cargo boxes on it. One of those cargo boxes fits on a
railroad car, so you get an idea of how big this ship was. It had exactly 2
feet to spare on either side of the lock. It was an absolutely incredible
feat of engineering. Of course, the political manipulation involved in
constructing the Panama Canal was an even more amazing feat (in
skulldoggery).
Well I will bid farewell. Hope all is going well you all.
Amos B.