notyoubob takes on Panama

[doc holliday]

More please!

[notyoubob]

Panama Red Beer col. 9


Moving back to Saigon

It seems living in a tropical land does more than trigger some long-buried Vietnam memories. I’m now living in the hood of Bocas called Saigon.
Did I hear that right? Saigon? Si.
I can’t get a good explanation, but I think the one story that makes the most sense is that it’s a Gringoization of the original name that Americans, especially vets, kept mispronouncing as “Saigon.” And, some of the houses are built on stilts over the water, just like in the real Saigon. Sorry, I refuse to call it Ho Chi Minh City. Some things do matter, despite that Nam mantra, it don’t mean nothing.
So after a month of living in the downtown hotel, The Ambassador, I made the move to a one-room cold water flat in Saigon, leaving Panama Annie alone to fulfill her fantasies. The lack of hot water is no biggie for me; I just take a shower in the middle of the afternoon, when the sun is its most intense. My room is about a 15-minute walk to downtown and a 30-minute crawl back. Most of the time my walk to and from the room is interrupted by stopping to watch the neighborhood monkey, named Toto, do his shines. The first time Panama Annie saw the tied up la mona, she squealed like a child and ran to get a hug from the monkey. He repaid her kindness by pooping on her shoulder. I tossed an empty plastic water bottle to Toto once and laughed when he tried to bang it against the tree trunk and it bounced back and smacked him in the face.
My room is one of 10 owned by, get this, karma believers, Elvis and his wife, Aida. It’s call Hospedaje Wini. Aida works in one of the local farmacias, Blanca Rosa, and Elvis oversees the construction of another apartment behind his. Work starts at 7 a.m. (wages are $10 a day), seven days a week and I have to turn the TV volume up really loud to drown out the construction noise, coupled by a pair of screeching parrots and a bleating goat kid. The goat sounds like a child crying out for help and during the night has caused some pretty weird dreams.
Some of the local kids — this is their summer vacation, which ended the first week of March — have a homemade ping pong table set up on the sidewalk and kids stand in line to take on the winner. Losers go the back of the line.
Costa Rica Joe, New Jim, Hardware Rick and Butcher Carl all live there, too. Or did, as New Jim and Hardware Rick have returned to the States, for now.
Next to the Wini, in another building owned by the entrepreneur Elvis is a small tienda, owned and run by the Chinese descendants of those brought to Panama to help build the Canal almost 100 years ago. In fact, in Bocas, all of the grocery stores are owned and run by a Chinese family. It’s the only place that will not cry crocodile tears when you have a C-note to change.
By the way, never, ever travel with traveler’s checks down here. I still have mine because no bank or store will cash them. I don’t know why, but when I visited David, Panama’s second largest city, I went to seven or eight banks, to stand in line only to be told, no way. Did American Express stiff Panama or what, I don’t know.
Anyway, Saigon is a neighborhood of mostly poor, honest folks, Indios, mixed races, old hippies with a few turistas and ex-pats living in mostly substandard housing. The hood even has its own drag queen, a young man with pursed lips who wears a training bra under his tight shirt and bats his eyes at all the men when he rides by on his cruiser bike.
There are a handful of bars and restaurants for the locals, so I go there to listen and try to learn and yes, drink cheap beer. I like Atlas and Balboa with an occasional Cerveza Panama. But with the high price of oil cascading down to affect everything in the world, the bars have recently raised prices from 60-cents to 65. As always, there seems to be at least one local in each bar who wants to practice his English, but the hidden agenda is “Would you buy me another beer?”
Elvis also owns a bar, Bar Yuly, which has an interesting eye-opener: The video jukebox shows pornos if the song being played doesn’t have an accompanying video. There are also four video slot machines that I watch locals shovel fistfuls of dollars into. One time this young man’s wife threw daggers out of her eyes at her husband who was putting in a few five-dollar bills. He left with his tail between her legs, followed by hoots of derision from the local patrons. Things that make you go, hmmmmm.
There are small shops, a laundry, metal shop, and even a small jail for miscreants, although I have never seen anyone in there, not even Otis, the town drunk.
There’s a nearby beach a minute’s walk from my room, but the currents, or lack thereof, mean the beach and water are filled with rotting seaweed, so I usually hop on a bus for an hour’s ride to Playa del Drago. A few minutes of walking brings you to secluded beaches under coconut palms, laden with nuts. Plus the water is clear and chest-deep only a few feet from shore.
In Saigon, it seems most houses have a few chickens and the roosters start their crowing around 3:30 a.m. with a repeat performance a couple of hours later. I have even seen a rooster with a small leash on its foot tied to a porch and one man amuses himself by tossing his rooster into the air, spinning it repeatedly. The rooster doesn’t seem to mind. A community horse is staked out on different empty lots to “mow” the grass and fertilize the land.
Dogs are not as numerous as in Telluride, and they are mostly placid canines, approaching people submissively, looking for a handout. I’ve never seen one chase a chicken, which puzzles me.
Because Panama is the center of the globe, the days and nights do not change much over the seasons. Neither does the temperature, highs in the low to mid-80s and lows in the 70s year-round. There are also no hurricanes here, just a few blowhards in the bars.

[jeezeweeze]

This is great !

[notyoubob]

The Longest Walk, a memorable march


(Editor’s note: Panama Red Beer takes a break from reporting from Bocas to write about The Longest Walk, which he covered for his college newspaper 30 years ago.)


The Longest Walk 2 stayed in Montrose last week in celebration of The Longest Walk 30 year anniversary.
So let’s return to the exciting days of yesteryear.
It was spring break of 1978 and I was a student at the William Allen White School of Journalism at Kansas University. I had previously collaborated with photography student Randy Olson, who now works for National Geographic, last I heard.
We had followed the newswire about a group of Native Americans who were walking from Alcatraz Prison (well, not walking that part) to Washington DC to protest the possible abrogation of Native American treaties suggested by a North or South Dakota legislator. The American Indian Movement was also making the news.
As other students set off for warmer climes in search of the Lost Weekend Rites of Passage, Randy and I decided to track down The Longest Walk story.
Last we had heard The Longest Walk was in Grand Junction. We had never been to this part of the state before and wrongly assumed the travel time involved from Lawrence, KS to Grand Junction. So, packing our instruments of construction and naivety, we hit the rode in Randy’s old car.
After many, many hours we found ourselves slipping and sliding up Monarch Pass in the middle of the night. A spring blizzard swirled outside and when the car began losing traction, Randy got out to push and I got behind the wheel, with one foot on the road trying to help. We were the only ones on the road; the state trucks were nowhere in sight.
Just as we were giving out, we started our descent. Then after more driving, we found ourselves in Grand Junction. A quick check revealed we had overshot and The Longest Walk members, who were now growing rapidly in numbers as more and more tribal members joined up along the way, were staying in a place called Montrose.
It was late afternoon when we found the group, staying if memory serves, in a school gymnasium. Sleeping bags were all over the hardwood floor with various tables serving sandwiches and beverages along the walls. We soon started introducing ourselves and Randy began taking photos as I tried to jot down details. The next thing we knew, some of the organizers had us up on stage for all to see. “These people say they are journalists, but since we don’t know them, I ask you to look into their hearts like our grandfather taught us to see if they are telling the truth or are here on other business,” this one older man said over the microphone. “We know who they could be.”
Suddenly countless pairs of eyes were studying us intently. I began to sweat a bit, staring at my boots but realized if they can really “see” us, they will know we may be a bit scared, but our hearts were pure as far as our mission was concerned.
After gaining a reluctant acceptance, we fanned out to do the story.
As the sun set, we drove to a nearby park and tried to get some rest. We had by then been without sleep for about 48 hours.
Bright and early the next morning, after a restless night tossing and turning in the car, we returned to the gym only to find the walk had begun an hour or so earlier. We raced east on Highway 50 and caught up with The Longest Walk. Two ranks of Native Americans were trudging along the highway. The Colorado State Patrol and county Mounties were providing an escort. I jumped out of the car and took my place at the end of the long line, slowly making my way forward to talk to as many people as I could. Randy started getting some photos, traveling up and back of the line in his car, looking for The Shot.
I began to notice some outright anger from some of the teens and early 20s crowd for The White Man. Whenever I began to talk to any of the women, the man behind me would kick the bottom of my boots when I would pick them up. “Getting tired, White Man,” several said in undisguised mockery. I sure as heck was getting tired as I had walked with the group for several hours by then. I also noticed there was a bus carrying walkers and every few miles a new group would take up the walk. Each fresh group would find their way behind me, smirking. “Getting tired, White Man,” seemed to be their mantra. I bit my tongue because I seemed to be the only one who was walking without a break. Discretion indeed is the better part of valor.
The day was Colorado springtime at its best. Freshly fallen snow lay on the ground but with brilliant sunshine warming Mother Earth.
As the sun approached high noon, we looked up at the beginning of what I now know was Cerro Summit, but in my story for the University Daily Kansan, I described it incorrectly as Monarch Pass. A fresh group of young walkers from the bus took their place in line, chanting and stamping their feet, eager to take on the challenge of that steep walk.
At the top of Cerro Pass, we stopped for lunch. My dogs had been barking for the past couple of hours, but pride took over and I refused to let the disrespectful talk get the better of me.
Then Randy came with good news. “I got it,” he said excitedly. “I got the cover shot.” That shot was of a lone walker, a stern-faced man as I recall named St. Claire from one of the Dakota tribes standing, standing on a boulder by the side of the road, a streamer from his walking stick floating in the breeze. The black and white photograph, which I have hanging on my living room wall, looked for all the world save his modern boots, to be at least a century old.
“Let’s get the hell out of here and hit the road,” Randy said which was music to my ears.
Later that summer when The Longest Walk came through Lawrence, things got ugly. Randy and I tried to do a follow-up story, but young, angry men from AIM had taken over from the grandfathers and the harsh confrontational approach was their MO. When we brought copies of the picture page we did for the Daily Kansan, those now in charge demanded we give them the negatives.
But we were now on our turf and told them to stick it where the sun doesn’t shine.

[notyoubob]

Panama Red Beer col. 11

Hed: Trying to balance acts like bowling balls

A couple of weeks ago, the good folks at Bohmfalks bar hosted Talent Night.
Sharon Bohmfalk had asked me earlier to be the Emcee and I readily agreed. That way, I figured, I could be part of the action but wouldn’t have to risk being “gonged” and forced offstage.
Before opening night, we had at least a dozen people signed up.
I opened with a couple of songs to “warm up” the audience and unlike when I’ve played before, people actually stuck around, knowing things would get better.
I had a sheet, handwritten by Sharon, of the acts but there were only five only the list. “I only wrote down those who are here and will definitely go on,” she said. I stared at the watered down list and wondered how I was gonna fill all the spaces between acts to keep the audience entertained. The place was packed to the rafters in anticipation. Four long-time gringos agreed to be the judges. We had trophies for Best Act, Worst Act, Most Impressive Act and Any Unnamed Category.
“Let’s get the show rolling,” Bill Bohmfalks said and off we went.
Of course, the first act, Doreen and Richard, who were to do a dance number, shied away and said they could not be first. A couple more acts had this request: I don’t want to be first — or last.
Finally Mark and Abby the Dog agreed to kick things off. It was the usual dog act we’ve all taught our pets: sit, stay, dog cookie on the nose, etc.
I asked around for the next act, but after running through the list with no takers, Costa Rica Joe said he’d do a song he’d written for his mother.
I told a couple of jokes while the next act set up.
Then the fun really began.
A local Panamanian woman sang a song accompanied by a CD and she got some good reaction.
A couple of songwriters performed, then we took a break.
After the break Diver Jeff, a friend of Randy Sublette who also knows Judy Kiernan, took the Stage for his “You Might Be From Bocas If routine.
It was a hoot. See his list below.
A few more guitar players, including Gordo, whose mother-in-law is Patricia Hardy, who grew up in Telluride and graduated from Telluride High School.
As Bill and his band performed, Bobby Love, aka Bobby Brylcreem, walked in the band pleaded for him to sing a song. For the past week, we had been trying to get Bobby Love to enter but he was indignant, saying he was a pro and couldn’t lower himself to a “talent” contest. He even went to far as to tell me I could fall flat on my face as an Emcee and he might stick his head in the door to laugh. He’s a piece of work, he is.
Then the audience, which by then was well into their cups, began chanting, “Bobby, Bobby, Bobby.” He finally relented and got the audience to join him in singing Mustang Sally. It was very good and the judges awarded him first prize. That was all well and good, until the Panamanian woman walked up to me and huffed that the judging was rigged and she would never come back. A few other people complained that Bobby was a pro, but then so was Ray Jason, a professional juggler who performed for years at halftime for the San Francisco 49ers and at four Super Bowls.
But all in all it was a great night and almost all, audience and talent members had a great time and the bar is looking forward to doing it again. Paul made a video of the event and the editor of the Bocas Breeze was there snapping pictures. Unfortunately, the story won’t come out until after I’ve left Bocas but it was memorable, to say the least.

And now, with Diver Jeff’s permission, here’s his list.
You Might Be From Bocas If…
1.Your best ashtray is a conch shell.
2.Your bumper sticker says, “My other car is a Ponga.”
3.You've ever fought someone over a dock space
4.You play connect the dots with your bug bites.
5.Jampan Taxi knows the sound of your voice.
6.You get off the airplane at JFK at Xmas in shorts, tank top and flip-flops.
7.It’s easier to buy land than vegetables.
8.Your shopping list starts with: Mosquito coils, beer, two-stroke oil.
9.Everyone at your wedding wore flip-flops
10. You've ever washed down Imodium with Abuelo rum.
11.Your geckos have names.
12.The money is named after a beer (Balboa).
13.The country is named after a beer (Panama).
14.You plumb forgot how to drive a car.
15.You stood in a bank line for an hour to be told, "No, this is not your signature."
16.Your sexiest lingerie is a sarong and stiletto flip-flops.
17.You think Dengue Fever is a better high than LSD.
18.You can field strip a Weed Eater in under two minutes.
19.You are turned on by a woman that can field strip a Weed Eater in two minutes.
20.You can see fish swimming by looking down the toilet drainpipe.
21.You never have to wash the window. What windows?
22.You've ever had a custody battle over an outboard engine.
23.You're best Cabernet Sauvignon comes in a box.
24.You burn candles in 100-year-old bottles.
25.You hide the kids’ Easter Eggs under coconut shells.
26.You think Seco and Orange Crush is a date rape drug.
27.You buy yourself a Seco and Orange Crush in hopes of getting lucky.
28.You see the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean on the way to Price Smart.
29.You don't have to check your machete at the door of your favorite bar.
30.A hooker will also get you fresh fish.
31.You've drunk at the bar with someone from “Americas 10 Most Wanted.”
32.You've lost a puppy to a boa constrictor.
33.You've needed GPS to get home from a party.
34.You've had two bicycle seats stolen.
35.Your kids think rice comes from saltshakers.
36.You've actually heard “Yes, we have no bananas.”
37.Fun on Saturday is volunteering at the Spay Clinic,
38.You measure humidity in inches per day.
39.You think: Chicken, rum, rice, plantains are the four major food groups.
40.You go to the airport to visit with friends.
41.You have had an airplane’s prop wash blow your beer off the table.
42.The most popular item at the Big Auction was a composting toilet.
43.Your kids think: Pargo Rojo, Casa Verde, Yogurt, Naranja and Panama Red are Crayola colors.
44.You cried at Bill and Sharon Bohmfalk’s wedding.
45. When your family asks, where are you, you tell them to Google “Licheminisis.”