Coco Solo
Coco Solo – sounds like a fun place to be, doesn’t it? The name makes me think of piña coladas by the beach, crazy pool parties…
The reality is far from this, however. The place where Senator John McCain was born, once a US Army base, has been abandoned, and is now a hovel where children play in water contaminated with raw sewage.
Here, Pastor Mikey, a resident of Coco Solo who has adopted six boys and set up a kitchen to feed the children, explains life on the edge, and imagines a youth using a .38 to hold people up – if he doesn’t hold people up, his family get no money, his children get no food. He asks ‘Would you put down your .38?’. Easy to say you would, I suppose, but I would do anything to feed my children…. He also explains how many of the girls are pregnant and having their own babies as young as twelve, creating a vicious cycle.
It is very hard to see any way of escape for these people living in their rubbish strewn plywood houses, so near, yet so far, from the Manhattan-by-the-sea skyscrapers of Panama City, where people (including myself and my family) attend frequent pool parties overlooking the Pacific.
An inspirational Coco Solo photography project, Cambio Creativo (Creative Change), encourages children and young people to explore their creative side by photographing the areas in and around their home. Here is a link to a Global Voices article about this project if you would like to find out more, and possibly buy a photo or two to help support this ravaged community.
Quite a Conflagration
An area just beyond the City Of Knowledge, North of Panama City is aflame as I write. The area behind our house, across a narrow river, is ablaze.
The noise of the fire has been a crackling phenomenon. Large chunks of ash are landing all around as we walk round our village.
Hoses are sending out 100ft jets of water. Helicopters circle overhead.
And, by the time this video taken from our bedroom has finally uploaded to Vimeo, all is dying down, thankfully. We can still smell smoke everywhere, can still hear crackling flames, and there is ash all over our back patio. But it seems as if we have been spared….
Panama Taxi Ride
The taxis of Panama City have recently been regulated and painted yellow, New York style. The one we got into on Saturday night was dark green. It was at the taxi rank beside all the shiny yellow taxis and the driver was very persuasive, so, like the fools we are, we got in.
Left passenger door didn’t work – no problem, we’ll get in the right hand side door. No real covers on rear seat. Oh well, things aren’t perfect here, we know that! Smashed crackle-effect side rear passenger window… open front passenger window – well, maybe the driver just likes the fresh air!
We were going to a party – our first night out as a ‘grown-up’ couple for over 5 months – there was a lot riding on this, so we stayed in the taxi. For once I was out with no danger of children’s sticky hands getting on my clothes – it felt good. Until the driver ran through a gigantic puddle, and the water splashed through the open passenger window onto my top. Dirty puddle water – just my luck!!
On the bright side we gave him completely the wrong directions but somehow he managed to get us to our destination, so maybe getting into this dodgy taxi was our destiny.
A couple of days later I called a taxi to take me to the mall… you know what’s coming next, don’t you? I got to see this delightful cab in the daylight! So, to add to the non-functioning rear door, the smashed side window, the non-functioning front window (by this time I had realized that the driver was not trying to get some extra fresh air!), I could see the full horror of this taxi.
Large horizontal (1 ½ foot long) crack on right hand side of windscreen. Vertical crack up left hand side of windscreen extending from dashboard to roof. No side mirror. No rear seat covering – some kind of blanket over the seat. No seatbelts (this seems to be a standard feature of Panama taxis).
Now most taxis here are not up to the standard of those in the UK, but this one really took it to extremes. I didn’t take any pictures – I felt it would have been rude of me – but if I ever take this cab again, rest assured I won’t hold back.
Differences between Panama and Scotland
Panama has some of the newest mountains in the world. Scotland has the oldest mountains on Earth, part of a granite chain linking Norway, Scotland and the Appalachian mountains in the US.
In Panamanian hardware store Do It Center, they sell MACHETES, unsheathed, on the bottom shelf. That’s the bottom shelf, where kiddies can reach them! In Scotland selling of any knife sharper than one from a cutlery set is banned to under 16s. Guess which country has the higher incidence of knife crime?
Panama has bright green parrots, toucans, spoonbills, ibises, pelicans. Scotland has great crested grebes, goldfinches, pheasants and golden eagles. Hang on, when I have ever seen a golden eagle? Perhaps once in my whole life. The birds are not shy of people in Panama, so even most of the spectacular ones are sighted frequently. The notable exception being the rare Harpy Eagle.
Panama has tropical palm trees, rainforests and trees with buttressed trunks. Scotland has pine forests and deciduous woodland. Both Panama and Scotland are equally beautiful, but in very different ways.
Tree with buttressed trunk, Panama
Crocodiles, agoutis and coati mundis are common sightings in Panama. Foxes are common sightings in urban Scotland, red deer in rural Scotland. Wild cats are there as well, but practically never seen, similarly the ocelot of Panama. A panther was reported outside a friend’s house a couple of weeks ago – what I would give to see one of them!
Panamanian bin men collect your rubbish if you pay them enough money. Scottish bin men collect your rubbish when they feel like it – but only if you take your bin to the bottom of the lane, mind!
Panama is hot every single day. Scotland is hot occasionally.
Panama keeps law and order with armed police (I think they have Kalashnikovs – something serious like that, anyway) and spot passport checks. Not much fun, but the place does feel safe. Scotland keeps law and order by sending police out for nice little drives, either in cars with the word ‘Community’ plastered all over them, or in trucks with riot windshields. The police are almost never spotted on foot in Scotland whereas in Panama they make regular foot patrols.
In Panama we are plagued by ants. In Scotland midges are notorious – but at least they don’t invade your house like the ants do! I have just eliminated every last ant from our house using copious amounts of washing up liquid. Just this morning I was fighting off flying ants from the roof of our patio. (With a large broom and more washing up liquid, just to give you the full picture!).
That’s enough from me for now. There are ants to be annihilated….
The Gathering Storm
As I write this, yet another tropical storm is brewing here in Panama. The sky is darkening although it is still daytime and there is an eerie yellowish hue to the clouds. Thunderstorms are an extremely common occurence here – we have frequently experienced storms which consist of lightning flashes every few seconds but no thunder or rain. There are also plenty of the more traditional kind with thunder, lightning and torrential rain. It´s never boring here, that´s for sure!
I should mention as a P.S. that this photo was taken during the build-up to another storm last weekend – that is why the sky does not appear yellowish!
Spectacular Panama Sunset
There was a pretty nice sunset here the other day. With Panama being so near the equator, the sunsets are normally nothing like as spectacular or as long-lasting as they are back in the West of Scotland. This one gave Scotland a good run for its money though!
Whilst looking at this picture you should try to imagine the deafening sound of birds, crickets and frogs that we hear every night around this time. After nightfall the crickets are so loud, I often think I am developing tinnitus, until I remember where I am, and that this sound is completely normal, humdrum even, here in the outskirts of Panama City.
Pictures from our move
At last, I am back with full internet access so I can post some pictures of our move. Here is the trailer arriving at our new home, 7 weeks after leaving Glasgow, after a voyage across the Atlantic Ocean and through the Panama Canal.
And these are some of the removal men, from a great company called Panama Packing. They flew through the unpacking – it was quite a sight to see their lorry roll up, the back doors swing open and all these men jump out ready for action like a swat team!
The next day we received this stunning flower arrangement from this company which provided us with such an impressive service. I would definitely recommend them to anyone thinking of moving out here.
Moving In
We were reunited with all our stuff today, just over seven weeks after leaving Scotland. It took a team of a staggering twelve Panamanians a mere four hours to unload everything and reassemble all of our beds. Very impressed indeed with the delivery men who worked so hard to get us settled in! What a relief to get everything back after the four to five days required in customs mysteriously stretched to three weeks. We finally got our container rubber stamped by the required official after days and weeks of phone calls and emails to our relocation company. They say moving is one of the most stressful things you can do – well we have moved three times in the space of two months! Time for a breather now methinks. No time for that unfortunately as I’m test driving a car first thing tomorrow morning so I have to keep on rolling!
PS This was written on my kindle as we dont have broadband set up yet in our new pad – hence no pictures.
Spectacular Storm
There was the longest storm ever here last night. It started about 7pm and was still going when we went to bed after midnight. We could see lightning illuminate the skyscrapers and the Pacific Ocean, with the effect being very similar to the Northern Lights. I saw types of lightning that I’ve never seen before – wavy horizontal lines travelling from one cloud to another, high up in the sky. Very like being inside a giant Plasma Sphere! Unfortunately my camera was not up to capturing the impressive light show, but I’ve included a couple of snaps – one before a lightning strike, the other during, which is so bright it looks like daylight, but I think you can see there is a slightly otherworldly glow about it.
Belated first impressions
From the moment we touched down and I saw the wild, 20 foot tall, pampas grass and the red earth, I knew we had arrived somewhere special.
We have been here for just over 5 weeks now, in the 15th floor of a 40 storey apartment overlooking the Pacific Ocean and the skyscrapers of Panama City. I am writing down some of my first impressions before we move to our house in the outskirts and I forget them.
It is amazing how quickly you get used to seeing frigate birds, pelicans, vultures and egrets everywhere on a daily basis. I am used to seeing these creatures with some kind of soundtrack and a David Attenborough voice-over, so it is very nice to see them in their natural environment. It is lovely to see how abundant they are here, not rare, not ‘special’, just part of the scenery.
Each morning the little single person fishing boats go out to sea from the small houses beside our apartment. They are very quickly surrounded by all the birds mentioned above – slightly more exotic than the seagulls I am used to! In fact, I get quite excited now when I see a seagull instead of a frigate bird.
