Panama Scouting - Day 9 - Panama Hats and Panama Cats
Hello from Panama City! We spent the day around the hotel and the mall, so rather than send you photos of the Mall of the Americas again, I thought I would tell you tidbits from our trip so far.
Panama Hats: Miguel bought a snazzy Panama hat when we were in Casco Viejo (the old town), and it comes with a funny story. Panama hats are made in Ecuador - this is not a local style or locally made. They are made by hand, tightly woven, and you can roll them up to store them in a box - all swell things, but the Panama hat is not made in Panama. How did they get that name? The hat is made from the carludovica palmate plant, which grows in the coastal lowlands of western South America, but not in Panama. Ecuador began producing the hat as early as 1630! During the California Gold Rush, individuals traveling through Panama to California purchased the hats and told others that they had purchased the hats in Panama, never mentioning (or perhaps, never knowing) that the hats were produced by Ecuador - and the "Panama Hat" was born. When Teddy Roosevelt visited the Canal in 1906, he met the Ecuadorian President who gifted him a hat in which he was photographed many times, which cemented the popularity of the hat, and reinforced the Panama name.
The REAL hat made in Panama is now called the Painted Hat, and below is a photo of the Pope, who visited Panama in 2019, and was photographed in the real Panama hat.
Kids on Vacation: School summer vacation in Panama runs from Christmas through February, with the return to school around February 1. I already noted that the parks had few families, or anyone else, during the heat of the day (today was a cooler 89 degrees). The mall, however, is cooler and has a playground, and the complex has a covered skateboard park. Kids and moms, kids and nannies, kids and dads, hang out at the mall during the heat, but these are people with money. It was fun to watch a dad teach his young son, say 5, how to jump on his skateboard. What we haven't seen is daycare classes out and about, or families in taxis. We took a taxi last night and the driver said that he had expected more fares because the kids are out of school, but that hasn't materialized. Because small kids cannot yet be immunized, he speculated that families with kids under the age of 5 are staying in rather than risking outings during the pandemic.
Cats around town, but no stray dogs: Dogs are definitely pets in Panama City, and you see them out being walked early in the morning and after dark - rather a social event of walking dogs. Not all dogs are on leashes, but they are all well-tended by owners. We expected more stray dogs, especially with the park across from our hotel, and lots of restaurants with food waste, but not so. There are cars and vans that drive around with recordings telling people to buy this, or "bring your electronics for recycling"; I expected a dog-pound style truck to roam the streets with a recording calling "Here doggy! Good dog! Come here, come on! Good doggy!" That hasn't happened, but no stray dogs! Kitties crawl, sprawl, and sprint in and out of everywhere - no fat cats, but they seem well cared for and Miguel has not been able to entice them to be petted; no cats on leashes, and no cats in laps, but kitties, kitties, everywhere!
Black doves are around town - just like our white dove, Paloma, but black and beautiful, and some are shimmerily iridescent! Miguel says they like churches as they have the best high perches, and in Antigua, Guatemala, sometimes there are hundreds on the square who nest in the church roofs. They seem happy to mate with street pigeons, who are just like Seattle's street pigeons and built a bit differently than the black doves, but no black dove stood still for me to route a photo to Paloma for her to admire. I had never seen (or noticed) a black dove before, but they are striking!
Four-Way or Emergency Flashers: Panamanians use their four-way flashers to communicate lots of things besides emergency stops. They turn them on to signal that they are going to parallel park. If you are a pedestrian, they will signal you with the four-way flashers that it is OK to walk across the street (a promise not to hit you). If they are going to pass a car that is riding on the lane marker, or a big truck or bus, they will turn on their four-way flashers, and often toot their horn to announce their intentions and then make their move boldly. If they are going to be going slowly, like a taxi cruising for fares, they use the four-way flashers to indicate that they will not be hurried, the slow go is intentional. Drivers, especially taxi and Uber drivers, love to communicate with their horns, also. You notice it most on high-traffic roads, but there are a thousand ways to announce intentions or display your displeasure - all of them loud, and to me, obnoxious. Three little toots for "wake up". Seventeen little toots for "I am passing you and you better stay out of my way", which continue until the passing is complete. The long, obnoxious blasts (often many of them) display displeasure at having to wait. Patterns of toots particular to a driver that announce, "Hey, Frieda, I know you!" or "You're cute, just letting you know!". A toot to tell the driver in front that the light has changed, even if that driver is already underway. Whew! I wish I could turn my hearing aids off and be oblivious!
Tomorrow morning we depart on our Panama Relocation Tour, and I look forward to telling you new and interesting stuff that we learn along the way. This evening I have to pack a week's worth of our stuff into a single suitcase and prepare the other suitcase to ship and meet us in Boquete - quite an endeavor!
Have a great night!
MaryBea y Miguel