Hello again. It is Monday morning. Luis is sleeping, but I can't sleep. We woke up early to go walking/running at the baseball stadium with Luis' father. Here in Panama it is so hot when the sun is up that it can actually be dangerous to run during the day. Most weekday mornings Luis' father starts his day with a walk at the stadium. Some times he gets up at 5 am. I have to admit he looked very cute in his excercise outfit. He had on sneakers, shorts, and a red jersey with a little baseball cap. ¨Luis, Luis! Vamos a caminar!¨ he said knocking on the door to wake us up. Some people get up at 4 in the morning to avoid the heat! We got up this morning at 5:45. It was still dark out and the moon was still out. When we arrived this morning around 6 there were already several people walking around the track. I ran around a few times while Luis and his father walked. We watched the sun rise and listened to the birds begin to get louder and louder. The birds really sing here! I really like the call and answer of one very noisy bird. Sort of a black medium sized bird with a rainbow sheen and a rounded tail. ¨Screech!!!! chi chi chi chi!¨ and the same thing in response. I have to say that there is another animal that sings here which is surprising. Geckos! Geckos are everywhere. They are Luis' least favorite animal because they are everywhere and many of them are translucent, so if you see one in the light you can see whatever insects it has just eaten in its belly. I've been hearing this funny noise since I've been here. Like ¨Kuk kuk kuk kuk kuk kuk kuk!¨ I thought it must be a bird, but Luis told me it was the geckos. These geckos aren't very big. They can really project! As an opera singer would say, They know how to ¨send the breath.¨ Apparently they came to the Panama canal on Chinese ships, and crowded out the native red and black species.
Because this entry seems to be mostly about animals let me tell you about some other animals I have seen! There is this great ice cream place called Jackelita here in David. I think it is my favorite place here so far! Can you believe you can get a delicious ice cream cone for just 35 cents? The ice cream is all natural in all kinds of fruit flavours. The cones are small, but you really don't need a lot. They also have coffee, chocolate, little cheese sandwiches, fresh juices, and fruit salads. I saw my first iguana here at Jackelita! It was quite a surprise! He was sitting peacefuly without expression just under the roof of the restaurant. I approached him and thought he would stay still. I didn't realise how fast they can move. He scrambled quickly and noisily into a crack between the roof and the ceiling of the restaurant, his tail and legs crashing and thrashing! So I didn't get a picture. Next time I will be very slow.
In the town of Boquete, Luis and I visited a very beautiful garden. The garden is open to the public during the day. There is a beautiful pool full of fish and lots of bridges and pathways. There is a view of the beautiful surrounding mountains. There are flowers in all different colors. This is an animal story as well! Luis and I were walking down a pathway and talking when all the sudden we came across a greenish/brown snake. Luis laughs about this story now because when I saw the snake I didn't freak out. I just said ¨Oh, look a snake!¨ Luis just about jumped out of his skin! I don't know why but I wasn't that scared. I thought that it would be smart to move slowly away from the snake, but he seemed peaceful and harmless, like the poor garden snakes that the cats kill once in a while in Maine. Luis jumped and started running in the opposite direction from the snake. I wanted to keep going down the path. Luis was like ¨Run, Run, It's gone! Where is it? Where is it?¨ I guess while we were making a fuss the snake slithered away to a quieter resting spot. We told Luis' father about the snake and he doesn't think it was a dangerous one. But, he says that on his farm there are some dangerous snakes. The snakes have killed some cows and horses there before. No wonder Luis was afraid. I wonder if my heritage somehow removed some of my instinctual fear of snakes over time and Luis background would have kept it as a very useful fear. Or maybe it is because I haven't really grown up in places where there are dangerous snakes? Don't get me wrong, I am not going to start hanging around with snakes!! I am scared too, but wonder why I didn't react as quickly as Luis.
Here is another topic I have been meaning to write about! Fashion! People do dress and look differently here. The sexuality around here is quite overt. Women have curves spilling out all over. Of course part of it is the fact that it is hot, so people don't want to wear a lot of fabric. Flashy clothing with stretch, sparkle and color is the norm for every day here. Kind of like birds. Maybe we would be happier up north if we wore brighter colors more often. Luis' mother took me shopping in the fanciest clothing shop in David. She bought me a lovely sleeveless blue top with a black layer of lace on top as a present. I am glad I brought that black skirt with beaded embroidery on it that I never wear. It looks great with the top and makes a very nice Panamanian Christmas outfit. In the fancy shop I also tried on a cute dress with a halter neck. It was very bright and covered in flowers in yellow, brown, red, and lavender. The only reason I didn't choose it is that I wasn't comfortable with the color combination. This was one of the first days that we were here, and I guess I was still stuck in Montreal mode which is more conservative this time of year. The truth is that people like and wear different colors here.
I also had a lovely time shopping with Angela! Angela is such a nice lady and so funny and kind! I have a real life example now for how to play the character of Despina from Mozart's ¨Cosi fan tutte.¨ Angela is very intelligent and she dreams a lot. She has a lot of spirit and she says ¨Good Morning¨ to me every day in English. She likes to learn new words. She is not afraid or irritated when I talk to Luis in English. She just listens and tries to figure out what I am saying. I liked Angela right away when I met her and I was delighted one day when she wanted to take a break and go for a walk around the down town shops and she invited me. We met a street vendor and she introduced me as her friend and that made me very happy. She treated me to a snow cone with pineapple and an agua de pipa (young coconut water straight from the coconut.) I felt very spoiled and happy as a little kid would have felt! It was a hot day.
The last couple of days we have attended Christmas parades. On Saturday Luis and I went for pizza with his mother in Boquete. We have eaten pizza here a few times. Going out for pizza is special here. That is a difference. When people go out for pizza in Canada or the states it is much more casual and usually cheap. Here it is a special treat. We ate a delicious vegetarian pizza with fresh vegetables and thin strips of zucchini. As we were finishing the pizza we started to hear firecrackers out in the street. People were building up outside and we felt the excitement start to increase. I don't really ¨get¨ firecrackers. They make me think of guns and they startle me. We ate the last bites of pizza and drank our last drops of hot chocolate quickly and hurried out ino the street. The first truck to come down the street was carrying some kids and a giant snowman with a huge smile. I really get a kick out of all the snowmen. Trucks came with children dressed in different costumes. Most trucks even the ones with kids were blasting throbbing reggaeton music (what Alex and I listened to coming from cars all summer long in Jamaica Plain, MA.) Luis' Mom laughed so hard at a truck carrying a fat Santa Claus, dancing with undulating hips in his hot red and white costume. The truth is that we were all having a blast. The people in the trucks were throwing out candy from giant bags at the people in the streets. Kids were going crazy and I fought tooth and nail for the few pieces of hard candy I was able to get. I drew a line at going for pieces that would be too risky to try for. A piece of hard candy isn't worth having your hand crushed by the foot of an agressive little kid. Luis' Mom was lucky enough to catch a block of caramel corn (actually it hit her right on the nose!) One of the very last trucks carried the mayor of the town of Boquete throwing candy from the biggest bag of all. Teenage boys with bags were trampling people down and following the truck trying to get as much candy as possible. They were like a pack of pirañas and when they came I didn't even try for candy. These boys picked it all up before it even hit the ground.
I am going to end this entry with something funny! Soon we are going to upload more pictures. I took a picture of a really wonderful place, however normal and every day it might seem to someone who lives here. Luis and his family are fruit and vegetable snobs. They only accept the best and his Mom goes to the market every couple of days the procure the best specimens. Luis and I have come along a couple of times. One day his father sent us to the fruit and vegetable market with a list. A papaya was on the list so Luis sent me to pick one out from a heap of different sized, colored, and shaped papayas. I picked a medium sized one with a nice looking shape, fairly green just starting to turn. Luis okayed it so we brought it home, although now I think I remember a brief look of doubt on the face of the fruit and vegetable lady. Nevertheless, she bagged it for us and we took it home. Angela was unimpressed and said that it would be days before it could be eaten. Yesterday we finally ate it. It tasted good to me, although some pieces were hard and inedible. Luis' father looked at it with a look of superiority. ¨Esta papaya no es tan catolica.¨ I asked Luis what he meant. The papaya was not a good catholic! Can you imagine the papaya enjoying it's sunday skipping mass with a look of glee on its green face?
Ok that's all for now! Take care.
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