I spent four days at the stunning Hard Rock Hotel, a 62-floor monstrosity, in Panama City with all our international staff, and felt like a queen. During out adventures we traveled out of Venezuela at one in the morning after the power in the Barcelona airport going out (full black-out inside a terminal obviously leads to confident travelers), and arrived in Panama City at four am. We visited the Panama Canal, the old city, enjoyed spoiling ourselves to dinners out and buying local crafts. We enjoyed roaming around one of the largest malls I've ever been in (not as big as MOA) during the monsoon-like rain. I spent our last afternoon camping out at El Rana Dorada (or the golden frog) cerveceria, or brewery, nestled into a cobble-stone street in the old city. Having micro-brewed beer was a treat, but even more so were the other people that I met during my three hours there. First I met the brewer, a late 20-something guy named Marshall from California who used to work in Colombia; he shared with me a lot about the business and his experiences of biking to and from work in Panama. He then informed me that there was a brewery tour on Mondays at 5pm, which was quite a treat. Listening to him talk intelligently about the brewing process and then turn around and say it all in fluent Spanish was very impressive to me. During my time I also met a former Venezuelan baseball player who had played in MLB apparently in the states for a few years, and a US navy vet hanging out (it happened to be Colombus Day). Furthermore, I met two guys who are former PCV, and now work for Peace Corps in Panama, they had some great stories to tell, despite spending the majority of their time at the bar hitting on the other two American ladies who were present.
I have also enjoyed friendship, or maybe simple group-bonding, with the group of guys that have a bike club that I join about once a week or so. I am one of two women that goes, and the other lady is an extremely fast and fit road biker, while the guys are not all super fit but ride fairly quickly down the streets of Anaco. We ride after dark, because otherwise you will melt into a puddle on the road, and we must be quite a site with everyone lit up like a Christmas tree. This week I went for a ride well knowing that the impending thunderheads would likely catch up with this, and boy did they ever. We rode hard for about 15 minutes, found my friend Homero who came flying out of nowhere with a rather amusing "helllllo"; note that I am in the process of teaching Homero English in return for bike help, beer, and friendship. Oh, and learning Spanish. I am learning Spanish quickly from all of these guys, but they certainly are teaching some of the groserias, and they regularly call me "teacha", mostly because they know I work at the school and a few of them have students that are in my classes.
My latest sentiment of friendship was brought to me this weekend, when Homero invited me over to his friend's house to meet a few of their panas, or friends. I had a great time just messing around and watching music videos on what I'm pretty sure is the oldest TV in Venezuela, and I enjoyed our conversations in Spanglish. I was invited back for the next night, Mexican food. Sometimes I forget that when the word fiesta is uttered, this usually details staying up most of the night, copious amounts of food and beverages, and a great time. It was all of that and more. I sat around a kitchen table and was serenaded by gorgeous voices of love songs new and old, and met many new faces that made me feel so much more at home here. I was immediately added onto Facebook by most of them, and was told that we are going to the beach in one of the upcoming weekends. It was so calming to have a group of people simply allow me to walk in to their group of friends, and to be charmed, as my friend Nathalie so eloquently phrased it.
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