The biggest jacuzzi on the American continent

When I found out I would be spending three weeks in Panama, visiting the Canal was probably the least of my priorities. This big money-maker has been the center of attraction for Panama since its inaguration in 1914, and honestly, I could think of 1000 better ways to spend my afternoon than watching a cargo ship slowly go from bathtub to bathtub. To clarify: learning about the canal's history was not at all a problem, it's just that I have high expectations for human-designed infrastructure.

Alas, after three weeks of being let loose in the tropical forests, islands, and cities of Panama, we were scheduled to visit the locks. By this point, my apathy toward the canal had diminished, but my skepticism about the entertainment of the locks was still running high. In the afternoon, we were finally driven to the infamous Miraflores locks where we began our tour with an informational video (in English) about the canal's history and engineering. I thought the end of the video meant a ship would be patiently waiting for us to step outside so it could begin 'the show'. Instead, we waited, and waited, and waited enough that we had more than enough time to make our way through the three story museum and to entertain ourselves with a miriad of pictures.

Well over an hour after we initially expected the ship, it slowly (and I mean SLOWLY) made its way through the first lock. And, not at all to my surprise, if I know Latin American culture, a gentleman began to MC as if on a TV show. If you had been a fly on the wall, you might have heard him make comments alluding to: retirement, selling houses to come to the canal, taking photographs, not dangling children over the ledge, the terrible winters that are coming (ehem, climate change), and the canal being the show of a lifetime.

Hard as he tried, 30 minutes after the ship started going in, and water had filled from one tub to the other, I was still unimpressed. Okay, I lie -- I was a little impressed, but mainly because the locks (or gates) are the EXACT parts that were there in 1914. Roosevelt did well with carrying out the 1500 'dream'.

1914

2010

After an entire afternoon out, and a quick visit to the Smithsonian Tupper Center (yes, as in Tupper from TupperWare), we crashed in our guesthouse to think about our next and last days in Panama.

Week 2: Wounaan, Panama TV, and laughter

To capture the entire past week into a blog is akin to "catching a wave upon the sand" (thank you Sound of Music). Thought somewhat exaggerated, the experiences from this week measure up to what one might do throughout a much longer period of time in Panama.

The following blog will in no particular order explain some of this week's favorites:

1. Academically, or things relating to our tropical biology course, included several visits from biologists who explained their current feld of research and had us join them in the field. Marc, who studies Atta ants (leaf-cutter ants), had us dig up several colonies to remove the queen and the fungus the ants feed on. The excitement for, as well for the others, peaked at seeing  an inch long queen feeding on leaf fungus. Little did we know that we would spend much more time with the Attas throughout the week.

Regardless, the highlight of the research visits was Justin and his research on the hourglass frog's oviposition sites. Thrilling as oviposition sites are...doing the frogging at night made me reconsider my major for a millisecond. Frogging consisted of wading to the middle of a pond and escavating the area for any frogs. Things found: a parrot snake, two random baby snakes, many hourglass frogs, red-eyed tree frogs (posterchild of tropical biology), and a horned frog.

2. Wednesday, we spent the morning with the alleged Wounaan tribe that originated in the Darien region but now resides on an island close to an ecotourist resort in Gamboa. They sustain themselves in great part through ecotourism, meaning that their income depends on the tourists (like us) who visit their community. I immediately felt overcome by a mixture of guilt and curiosity. Guilty that their lifestyle has been so changed, that they must depend on individuals like me to come/invade their personal space in order to sustain themseves. At the same time, I've always craved experiences like this. I've wanted to visit and see for myself the living conditions, the traditions, the people. During our visit we took a hike through part of their forest to learn about the different uses the Wounaan have for trees, we heard about their celebrations, and joined in on traditional dances.

3. Friday: The day started at Parque Metropolitano de Panama, we took turns riding up 30 m / 100 feet into the air inside a small box to look over the top of the rainforest canopy and the city. Unfortunately, the rain made it difficult for us to see any animals above the canopy, but the view was gorgeous. On our way back, we decided to stop by the Anthropological Museum, but as luck would have it, the exhibit we wanted to see was not open to the public. As we walked in, however, we noticed several groups of performers practicing and waiting. After asking around, we found out that it was a taping of the Panamanian TV Show "Mi Gran Talento" (the equivalent of America's Got Talent). No sooner had we figured this out, we found ourselves inside the studio and cheering on the most random performances. Both the canopy and the show combined made for a great day.

4. Panama City: Our sore feet at the end of the day didn't get in the way of enjoying our last day in the nation's capital. This implies that we walked endlessly up through the commercial Avenica Central to the Casco Viejo, the colonial area of town, down to the Mercado de Mariscos (fish market), back down av. central to the Canal Museum, where we learned that Woodrow Wilson pushed the button (all the way from D.C.) that exploded a certain area in Gamboa (my current loation), and then back up av. central to the bus stop. The day was a success, but it made it very clear that our third and final week in Panama would soon begin.

5. We rounded up the week by taking a trip to the Caribbean/Atlantic Coast of Panama. Our first stop? Punta Galeta, another Smithsonian research site. This one, however, is on the Caribbean coast and focuses on marine biology, so instead of rainforest, we had the privelege of looking out into the calming water and playing with the starfish. We then headed into Colon and later to Portobello where we saw a different lifestyle than that of the capital. Poverty