“Like all great travelers, I have seen more than I remember, and remember more than I have seen.” – Benjamin Disraeli

After almost seven years of Spanish classes, I have learned one very important lesson: YOU have to be the one to make it fun.  If I hadn’t figured this out pretty quickly, I think I would have dropped out before I had to learn the dreadful subjunctive tense (which doesn’t really exist in English…making it all the more weird and complicated sometimes).  So throughout the many made-up dialogues, practice sentences, and long essays required from various courses, I learned that there’s nothing more fun than adding in a little surprise humor for your compañeros or unexpecting teacher.  Which brings me to tonight: another regular, ol’ boring night stuck in Spanish class.  Our profesora was teaching us how to write a memorandum using the proper technique and proceeded to explain that we would each be writing one to read out loud within the class period.  My mind started buzzing right away for creative topics, and I finally decided on taunting my fellow Panamanians a little…(as written and translated by yours truly)

*Note – for all of you non-soccer fans (myself included), there’s another game between Panama and the USA tomorrow…and to give you an idea of how important it is to people here, a boy in my class told me he skipped the geology test I had yesterday to have a beer and watch Panama defeat El Salvador.

“Date: June 21, 2011

To: The faculty and students of USMA

Subject: Free day tomorrow

The president of USMA wishes to communicate to the students of USMA that tomorrow, the 22 of June, there will be no night classes due to the fact that La Villa will be celebrating the victory of the United States over Panama.

Every United States citizen that lives here will receive a golden crown, and it is expected that all Panamanians will celebrate them eagerly until the early hours of the morning.”

The teacher laughed out loud when she proofread it for me (brownie point for me), and I got some more laughs and playful boos from the other students.  It made the two and a half hours go by a lot faster tonight.

This past Saturday marked the beginning of one of the biggest celebrations here in La Villa: Corpus Christi.  My experience was a whirlwind of loud drumming music, men dancing in strange devil costumes, fireworks going off starting at two in the morning, and one giant question bubble in my head reading “what the heck is going on???” Thanks to my first round of tests, presentations, and preparing to be a tour guide for mom and Coleen, I had very little time to do my homework on the weeklong celebration.  So take this as an “IOU” note and enjoy the pictures in the meantime. 

All I know is that this thing is called a "Diablo Sucio"...or "Dirty Devil." Good potential Halloween costume.

A few quick anecdotes I want to share:

I like to go to the Mass they offer in the village church during the week in the evening when I can, which is usually said by the more soft-spoken priest of the parish.  Last week when it was my turn to receive Communion, he looked at me and smiling bashfully said: “um, dee Body of Christ?” in English.  It came out as more of a question but I appreciated it all the same. 

Last Thursday while working at the clinic once again, a man who always waves to me on the street when I pass by came in (I think he works there) and gave all of us students and nurses a small piece of candy…or so I thought.  Turns out it was a cough drop which they sell here for 5cents as pieces of candy.

One of my favorite things about Panama is seeing the old men in the streets wearing their traditional Panamanian hats: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4088/5090595329_9b6f6c4897.jpg.  And trust me, they LOVE their hats.  Rain or shine, they’re wearin’ em’.  All they do is put a plastic trash bag over it when it’s drizzling and they go on about their day.  At first I thought they wore the rims of their hats flipped up just because, but a friend from school later on explained the old tradition to me - if a guy has the front and back end of his hat flipped up it means he has a girlfriend or wife. But if he walks around with only the front up, he’s soltero and looking. Watch out ladies.  Unfortunately the tradition died out over the years, and the men just wear their hats however they please…which I guess is a good thing, otherwise there would be a lot of old, single Panamanian hombres I’d have to be avoiding.

Countdown until mom and Coleen get here: less than 24 hours! Forgive my absence and lack of blogging while I entertain them.  Hopefully I’ll have some good stories from their visit (I warned them that if they’re not nice to me I won’t translate anything…muahahaha). Ciao!

The crowded plaza square watching the diablos sucios dance...which will be even more crowded this week when the celebration is in full swing