So, I've spent the past few days running around non-stop. It's been exhausting, but I've gotten a chance to see the city so it's been fun. Mostly, I've been with Vanessa and Christian and the two other people in my program. On Thursday we had orientation. We learned all sorts of things about the program and Panamá itself. There are apparently a ton of cool places to visit. There are also loads of tropical animals which I've not had the fortune/misfortune of seeing yet. Also, there are square watermelons which was something I was pretty sure Farmville made up. We got to see the FSU campus for the first time. We went on a tour of the school and it doesn't seem too big so I'm going to try to do my absolute best not to get lost on the first day of classes.
Look Ma, I'm in the blogs!
The University as well as the ISA (the program that brought me here in case I haven't previously mentioned it) office are located in city called Ciudad del Saber which means City of Knowledge. All of that is located in Clayton, which used to be an Army base. In fact all over Panamá there are cities that used to be military bases. Fortunately for me, my host family also lives in Clayton so I can walk to school instead of having to take the bus.
On Friday we got our first official tour of the city. There are these giant red sight-seeing buses that drive all over. Once you get a 24-hour pass you can sort of "hop on" and "hop off" where ever. The bus went kind of fast for a bus that was supposed to be dedicated to sight-seeing (when we weren't stuck in traffic) so a lot of the pictures I took are of me just missing something.
Though I could just be bad at taking pictures.
First place we went was the Canal obviously. And I managed to get some not terrible pictures of it.
After that there was more driving around. I
think a lot of the fun of driving around the city is spotting the great
road signs. I think one day I'm going to dedicate an entire entry to the
road signs. I didn't get a ton of good shots because the bus thought it
was a Ferrari, but I did manage to get my favorite one.
It's got a donk.
This
one is all over the city. At first I was confused because I thought it
was a little kid and I thought it was weird that they gave it such a
butt, but apparently it's just a normal person. Either way I don't think
I've ever seen a street sign with an ass so every time I see it I think
of this song. And it's stuck in my head forever.
I did manage to get some non-silly pictures of the skyline and the water while we drove too.
At
some point, we drove through what Vanessa called a bad neighborhood.
But I think we would have been able to tell even if she hadn't told us.
I guess ghettos look the same where ever you go. It kind of reminded
me of the worse parts of Brooklyn and the Bronx. It was crowded and
dirty and graffitied to death. There were some intense bars on the
windows. So that's one of the places we're supposed to avoid.
Then if I recall correctly, we got off the bus in Casco Viejo. After the city was destroyed by pirates in the 1600s a new city was built to protect the citizens from those sorts of shenanigans. Today it's mostly a tourist attraction. Restaurants, museums, endless amounts of people selling things. Also some of the structures from back in the day are still around if you're more into the history parts. There is a ton of construction going on right now, so we had to do a lot of maneuvering to get around, which made it feel more like an adventure.
First we went to a cathedral. That was a really weird experience, because it was this tourist attraction but it was still a church, you know and it seemed like some people still treated it as such. So part of me felt like I was in some way being disrespectful by being there.
Having a private moment with your God, sir? Not on my watch!
At that point the group, as they often do, kind of split off into sub-factions. Vanessa was buddies with one student and Christian was buddies with the other. And just when I noticed that I didn't have a buddy, someone sent me this guy.
Who's a precious? You are!
In fact, I had buddies all over Casco. There are cats and dogs all over the place and they are all so adorable. I think most of them are strays, but people put out food for them in all these pockets of the city. I was too worried about getting bitten to mess with any of the dogs, but I got to play with a lot of the cats. They were mostly pretty friendly and would let me pet them even though I didn't have any food. And I got to talk them in a baby voice like I do with all animals, but I did it in Spanish because I wanted to be culturally sensitive. (Hola gato! Venga. Venga. Quien es bonita?)
Then more walking in an open market area this time. I bought a raspado which is a cool little dessert made from shaved ice, juice and milk.
He shaves the ice right there in front of you!
I didn't buy a hat though even though the sun was beating down on me, because it felt like cheating on my real hat, which I hadn't worn yet.
Must... resist... hat temptation.
Then we went to the canal museum, which wasn't too bad even though it broke my rules about never going to a museum in a group bigger than 3. Unfortunately, there were no pictures allowed inside. By the time we'd gotten to the museum, we'd done much more walking than I'd anticipated and I hadn't eaten in quite a while. So I don't think I got the most out of the experience, as I was exhausted and so thirsty I thought I was going to pass out. I got some interesting bits of information here and there, but then I had to sit down and get my bearings. I must have taken a little nap because before I knew it, it was time to leave.
Fortunately right after that we got lunch. Huzzah! The food was really good and I got to order Seco which was really refreshing. After that I was in much better spirits and ready to explore once again. We went to another cathedral and then it started to rain.
It rains everyday here and you'd think that would be really annoying, but I'm starting to find that the rain is the best part of the day. I think that's something that comes with being in a tropical country. It's so hot that the rain is a welcome change. Plus it's kind of fun to run around in the rain like we did, but then again I had an umbrella. Either way, I can't imagine coming here during the dry season.
More walking around, and this time I got some really nice pictures (and met more cats). We got to take this cool picture that I think is going to go on the ISA website, with this little old lady wearing traditional garb and selling these little souvenirs. It was really the quintessential study abroad picture...and she charged us two bucks for it! I was so disillusioned XD. Anyway, I can't put it up here, since we only paid for one and it wasn't taken with my camera, but I did manage to get a shot of her covering up her face at her stand.
Got to protect her merchandise, I suppose.
Then it was time to drive again. The driving in Panamá is insane. It's like a really intense sport. You really don't know crazy driving until you've been in a double-decker tour bus as it makes a very illegal u-turn and then later cuts across three lanes of traffic. But everyone else is just as bad. I'm pretty sure no one here ever uses their turn signal. It's pretty wild, but I think since everyone drives that way it all balances out because you don't see a lot of accidents.
We finished off the tour with a trip to one mall before going back to the mall we started off in. While we were there, these two guys came up to me and one of the other students and asked for directions. I think we were both pretty surprised to be addressed in English even though we had just been speaking English ourselves. I think that says something about how we're adjusting.
There weren't a ton of things to take pictures of on the way back. At one point we saw a cool-looking police truck and I was going to take a picture of that, but it was one of those trucks with and open back so we could see the prisoner and he could see us. It was really creepy. He kept staring and then he smirked. And it doesn't matter what they've actually done, when a man smirks at you from the back of a police truck, you're just going to assume he's some sort of rapist-murder combo platter. It's human nature. So, I was creeped out and decided against the picture.
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