Saturday, July 08, 2006

Cool Boquete and hot coffee







Hey yáll, greetings from the land of rash covered extremities! Also the land of Old Milwaukee beer, huge sections of store refrig space devoted to awful hotdogs, and soon, the land of a dispersed Group 57. Yup, we will be heading out to our sites for a visit tomorrow, and in a couple weeks, moving to them for good.

Until then, more spanish classes, more charlas on personal safety, and maybe even more shots. Well, I shouldn´t complain. There are plenty of sublime moments or even afternoons, filled with mermaids on rocks in cool rivers, seas of coffee beans to swim in, and when we are lucky, holdras. These are like beignets, but without the sugar and a little tougher. They are often just served plain, owing to the panamanian aversion to all spices and most condiments. Uh oh, I´m complaining about the food, a slippery journey that often gets a little too beligerent for a sober guy. So I will move on. I will say that after our trip to Boquete for coffee training, I have a big bag of some of the best coffee I´ve had, and I think I have gotten our host mom addicted to it. She will have a hard time going back to nescafe when we leave. Or maybe she hates it, but is just trying to be polite, since she can see how much it means to me.
I miss fire season, but as you know, mysterious rashes on both arms and legs is nearly as rewarding. Maybe next time I´ll include pics. I still get to cut down trees, but they are more often banana trees with my machete. Speaking of machetes, I´ve finally scored some points with our host mother with my machete skills. Actually, I think she is happy to have something for me to do, and enjoys watching me flail skillessly. Plus, I´m a tall gringo with a big machete, so I can reach those tall branches that are dying to be cut off.
Tonight we are in the Albrook Mall, the most bizarre place in the world after you have been out in the countryside. Take any big mall from suburban america, drop in intact on the outskirts of Panama City, and there you go. And I do mean intact- it has Wendy´s, Burger King, even a friggin´Quiznos. When you consider that many volunteers live without electricity or running water in shacks that you have to hike to, and the fact that the mall is also the main bus station, it is one heck of a cold culture shower.
Ok, getting delirious for an Orange Julius or similar mall rations. Oh, the prices here are the same as the U.S., too, so when you go from the countryside making $10-day as a volunteer, it is scary. Plus, you start pricing everything else in duros, which are delicious frozen juice bags that cost ten cents. Crap, back on the food topic.
Anyway, I hope to make this blog better in the future, by adding links to other PC peoples sites, ones who have better pics and are less likely to digress to food philosophy. In the meantime, salud from Panama!

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