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Published: February 12th 2013
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Well we have been in our "not so little condo" by the sea since January 29th when we rolled down the highway from David. It is a far cry from the other places we've been staying in as it has a full kitchen with hot and cold water, 2 full bathrooms, 3 bedrooms and 2 balconies over looking the Pacific Ocean and a peek-a-boo view of the pool. We are on the forth floor. It even has a washer and dryer! We pay about $33.00 per night which is cheaper than the hostels we were staying at.
The area we live has a mix of apartment towers, estates, middle class residential homes and private clubs. A dirt road below our window heads directly to the beach with a private club between us and the beach. When we first arrived here the beach was completely ours to enjoy with few others wondering along it. This beach club had an abandond look to it as well. Looking to the right (south west) is a small bay where the local fishing fleet lands their boats on the beach and where you can buy fresh fish before it heads out to the stores and
restaurants. We bought a tuna and another local fish for $11.00 which we later learned was too much. Gringos! Well the peace and quiet didn't last long as we've discovered that the Panama City, city dwellers arrive enmasse every weekend. They roll in Friday night with their boom boxes and fireworks and the parties begin. As a matter of fact, this week has been "Carnaval" and the boozing and fireworks has been going on all night since February 8th. Tomorrow is the last day and then we hit "Lent". It has been so noisy that we have been running the A/C at night to give us some "white noise" to drown it out. Some local joker likes to fire off fireworks at about 6am every morning. A change from the roosters, anyways. Not really complaining, as I said earlier it is very quiet here during the week and "Lent" is only a day away!
As I said, we are in a "mixed use" area (zoning does not exist in Central America!) and the places further back from the ocean are good sized properties. A typical property is about 100' by 100' fenced lot with a house. There are many
vacant lots in the area as the neighbourhood starts its development. There is even a gated sub-division not far from us which we walk by on our daily morning walk. Well, these vacant lots and over grown yards are "groomed" by torch and the smoke from these fires makes its way into our apartment on occasion. This is the windy-dry season and there is no need for A/C when the wind whips through the apartment but it also whips up these brush fires. It's a good thing people live in concrete block homes and not wood! Garbage is a big problem in Panama as a whole and this town is no exception. People dump there garbage on the vacant lots and the clean up solution is fire. It may be a decade or two before Panama buys into being "green".
We were planning on renting a car but changed our minds when we discovered that it was Carnaval week. No need to be out on the roads with the crowds and drunks. Our routine lately is to study the spanish we learned back in Boquete. Our walls are crawling with verbs, adjectives and phrases which we posted with love.
Ian's stir fry
He makes the best stir fry's north of the equator :) We do at least 2 hours of work a day learning. Our neighbour and his Columbian girl friend live across from us up one floor. He was our property manager until he quit a few days ago. He has had it with his boss and plans to head back to Columbia with his girl friend in a month. Our new friend was a school teacher back in the States and before that in the Navy, stationed at Whitby Island. Anyways, he also teaches Spanish to the Coast Guard and goes to sea every three or four months. We were at dinner with them the other night and Dennis offered to teach us Spanish! For free! He says he is doing it because he likes too and because it keeps him fresh when he gets called up. We meet every morning at 9 for an hour. Our road trips have been put on hold for a while as we learn some more. Look out Central America, Karen and I may be able to communicate with you soon!
That's all I have to report for now.
Ian
PS The beer is $2.75 for a six pack! What's a man
Grande
Watermelons as big as your head! ( and bigger too) to do?
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rose
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Those papayas look good!
Thanks for the interesting and insightful Blog. I gobble up every word.