El Panamá

Ahhh my last international trip of the winter/spring recruitment season and it was likely the most enjoyable... save for the actual travel. The closest trip I've ever taken for work and it took me the longest travel time... and I went to friggin Myanmar!

So, first stop was El Salvador. Yeah, I was a little nervous because it's overall apparently not very safe, a high violent crime rate, and even the US Department of State lists it at a level 3: reconsider travel. But, I loved it! And it was really beautiful and the people I met were absolutely wonderful. Also, apparently California governor Gavin Newsom was at the hotel I was in San Salvador like a few weeks before. Reminds me of staying in the Hanoi hotel right after Kim Jong Un LOL.

Anyway, I love Central America. I should really be learning Spanish. But I love the culture and the colors and the jungles and the flora and fauna and the humidity. So I was happy to be there. Sadly, I was in El Salvador probably a total of 48 hours, and spent most of the time either in my hotel room or at the agency office, but I still had a nice jungle view and a wonderful outdoor lunch overlooking the volcano and the ocean.

I also had some delicious meals at a restaurant next to my hotel on a patio during some evening thunderstorms. It was hard there without Spanish, but I survived.

Ceviche! ...on Ritz crackers LOL

I flew from El Salvador to Panama and the best part was that my friend Jessica was able to visit for two days and help show me Panama. She has been there several times previously and I was extremely grateful for her as I was able to relax and be led rather than forge my own way a little, and she spoke Spanish so thank you Jeebus for that!

Actually, it was a pretty hilarious/embarrassing start to our time together. Checking into the hotel, we were lounging around, catching up, Skyping our friend Iris who just got the sex results of her baby (found out it's a boy!) and then getting ready to go explore for the evening when we spotted the biggest, fugliest, scariest cockroach of our lives on Jessica's suitcase. There was a lottttt of screaming, a lot of barely kicking her suitcase and trying our best to get him out of her suitcase and capture him... somehow, but neither of us were brave enough. We finally decide to call the front desk and I hand the phone to Jessica and say "tell them about la cucaracha". She goes on the phone and I'm laughing because I understand "una cucaracha enorme" lololol. She gets off the phone and tells me she told them there was a huge cockroach in our room and we were a little scared hahahaha I still laugh when I think about it. And then of course we were humiliated when 3 men came up and were laughing at us as they took care of it. Oh well.

Together we visited the Panama Canal, explored the Casco Viejo and my personal favorite, Cerro Ancon, a bit of a jungley hilltop with a huge Panama flag at the top and 360 views of the city.

It's a long story. Svetlana can explain.

My only goal really on our Cerro Ancon hike was to spot a toucan. I've seen a few in Central America on previous trips and they were just so delightful. On my 2014 trip to Nicaragua I met a family who had one as a pet and I came more face to face with one and I just loveeeee them! They are so adorable. Their colors are so beautiful and really don't translate in pictures! And I just think their beaks are so funny! They are huge and just don't seem to fit them at all, it looks like they put a Halloween mask on.

So that whole trip we kept stopping and hoping we would spot a toucan. We saw tons of these huge giant tail-less rat hamster things that were quite cute, lots of beautiful tropical birds and huge butterflies, but sadly no toucan.

Giant hamsters on the walk

At the top of the hill we visited the flag and admired the views and sat down for a bit. We were sweaty and exhausted.

Right before we were ready to head out, I saw a bird in the distance and I went to investigate. It was a toucan! We huddled in the distance trying to make out the details and then we were straight up #BLESSED when this toucan, who we later named Bayana, flew straight up to us in the tree right above our heads and hung around for a solid 10 minutes! The gift of her presence at the summit of the hill made our entire weekend!

Bayana the Toucan eating

That evening, Jessica took me out for "my birthday" to one of the coolest restaurant experiences of anywhere ever! Donde Jose is a strict reservation-only restaurant with a specially curated meal each night that "tells a story" and is all Panamanian food. It was something like 10 amazing courses and each of the servers explained the background, interpretation and ingredients of each dish upon serving us. It was amazing!

After Jessica left I was quite lonely, but I did have work to do. Interestingly, Sunday May 5 was their election (which I had been totally unaware of) and I had travel alerts that Panama was deploying 12,000 extra police troops to help facilitate it and banned the sale of alcohol from late Saturday to early Monday. That part really sucked, and I was really nervous what that would look like, but it was fine. It was quiet in the Casco Viejo, but it was fine. Saw a few campaign cars around, but nothing got out of hand.

Panama City was fine. The Casco Viejo had a real Pirates of the Caribbean feel and it was pretty neat, but otherwise it was just kinda whatever. There's a lot more to see than the city of course and it would have been neat if I was able to explore more, like the islands or jungles or coffee plantations, but that's what happens when I'm on work trips! It was way more productive than I was anticipating though, so that's promising!

Now I just have two conferences in DC to finish out this season and we'll see where fall travel takes me next...!