The first thing I noticed were the contrasts between modernity and tradition, from the airport and the billboards advertising every new, high tech thing you could think of and then some to the views along the roadside.
On our drive from the airport, I caught glimpses, through fencing, signs and plant life, of faded, pastel, shacklike dwellings with corrogated tin roofs crowded together. The image was reminiscent of the housing I remember seeing near Old San Juan in Puerto Rico when I first visited my son in the aftermath of Hurricane Hugo. It brought on recollections of buildings that were indicative of poverty
At the highway overpasses, there were long lines of people waiting for buses painted with coats of brilliant colors. I wanted to get a good photo of one of these buses, but we passed them at a speed that didn't allow for the split second needed to focus my camera. Later I found the back panels of two of these buses being used as decoration in the restaurant of my hotel.
We passed a grass fire on the side of the road. We passed all the usual American imports, McDonald's, Subway, a Domino's Pizza delivery driver.
There was the extreme contrast between the new, ultra modern Panama and the other Panama. It could be seen in the contemporary architecture layered against the older buildings that looked like those I had seen in Mexico and Puerto Rico, but there was so much more.
Near our hotel we stopped at an intersection. A man selling avocados approached the window of the bus. He made eye contact, grabbed at his chest in a way that implied grabbing a breast, and then puckered his lips and made as though he was throwing kisses.
The streets in the area where we are staying felt very confining, claustrophobic and chaotic to me. My unfamiliarity with Panama City was likely to be a factor in this.
Once we made it to the hotel and were booked into our rooms I enjoyed the contemporary artwork near the elevators. I found myself thinking that something similar would make an incredible mural for the front of our high school building.
At the window in my room I watched several large birds (Could they be buzzards? If this was Texas that's all they could be, but I don't know about the birds here.) that soared and spiraled, riding the thermal up drafts over the cityscape across from my hotel. I tried, and failed, several times in my attempts to catch a still image of them. They appeared to be roosting on the buildings across the way.
From above I could see a patchwork of contrasts: modern, gleaming, glass architecture and older stucco buildings with wrought iron over the windows, high rise buildings almost concealing distant hills, congested traffic in narrow streets and small swatches of open space, pavement amid palm trees and lush plant life.
All in all, it made me very curious about the past, present and future of Panama. I found myself wanting to know more about the relationship of my homeland and this place.
I was left with the thought that all that is day-to-day and humdrum to me would appear far different to anyone experiencing it for the first time. It left me wanting to see my hometown through the eyes of a stranger. What would it look like to me?
