Dillierama

Post "vacation" delirium

We got back from our annual trip to San Diego this morning and all three of us are understandably cranky and exhausted.  We drove the entire trip over night, leaving Tuesday night around 11:00pm and leaving to come home last night about the same time.  While this made for a easy stress-free trip toddler wise (Alex slept the entire trip both ways), John and I both stayed up all night.  John did the bulk of the driving, and I am unable to sleep in cars.  The trip home made it even harder for me to sleep as the floor in front of me was occupied by the cooler, requiring me to fold up my legs and ride the entire trip Indian style.  Amazingly uncomfortable, I can assure you.

The trip itself was mostly exhausting for me.  We stayed at my grandmother's house in Fallbrook which does not have air conditioning.  Her house is also filled with shiny breakable knick-knacks that were irresistible to Alex.  When I wasn't prying breakables out of my son's hands, I was in San Diego with John at ComicCon trying to navigate a giant stroller through an ocean of geeks.  Our time at ComicCon was spent standing in lines, standing in more lines, and, just for fun, we'd stand in a few lines.  Geeks love them some lines, let me tell you. In fact, on two separate occasions, I retreated to a far wall of the exhibition hall to take a break and people actually lined up behind me.  The first time it happened, within 20 minutes, I had four groups of people standing along the wall with me when someone walked by and asked me what the line was for.  "Line?  What line?  I'm not in line, I'm just standing here." I replied.  Everyone groaned and walked away.  I thought it was pretty funny until it happened again later in the day.

It wasn't all bad though, I got to meet Chief Tyrol (aka Aaron Douglas) from Battlestar Galactica and had his new action figure autographed.  He was really nice and willing to talk to fans.  Too bad all I could think to say to him was "Der, I bet it's cool to have your own action figure huh?  Snort".  Unfortunately, that was the day I'd forgotten to bring my camera, so this is the only proof I have of the encounter:

We also were lucky enough to get into the Heroes panel line just in time to get seats for the event.  We showed up at about 9:00, the panel started at 11:00, only to discover that apparently, Heroes is the new Beatles.  People had actually camped out the night before in line.  It was a good thing we'd left Alex with my family for the day as we spent the entire day glued to our seats in Ballroom 20 of the convention center for not only the Heroes panel (which was great), but the one panel I was excited about, "the women of Battlestar Gallactica".

We spent a couple of hours at the beach in La Jolla and we saw a baseball game...  All in all, it was a great trip, but I gotta tell ya, I'm wiped out.  I'm going to go take a nap.

Welcome to Boston

Alex and I just arrived in Boston after a whole day of air travel. I feel like I've just run a marathon and hiked to the summit of Everest. My left arm (the one I hold Alex on) is pretty much dead and lifeless,the muscles are so shot from carrying Alex around all day.  Thank goodness he's skinny!  I don't know what I'd have done if he was a normal kid.

As pooped as I feel, it couldn't have gone better.  We got to the airport at 6:30AM (after a night of no sleep, Alex fell out of his big boy bed around 1AM and got stuck between the bed and the dresser and wouldn't calm down about it all night long, poor guy). We flew through the check-in and security process and waited for an hour and a half at our assigned gate.  Alex, un characteristically, wanted to be held the entire time.  Probably still traumatized from the night before.  A half hour before boarding they announced that the flight was overbooked and they needed volunteers to go on different flights.  Not being in a hurry, I volunteered and scored a non-stop flight to Boston (the original flight layovered in NY) AND a seat for Alex AND two meal vouchers AND a $200 coupon towards future travel.  The only downside was we had to wait around the airport for another hour, which wasn't too big a deal.

Alex behaved himself most of the flight, there was about 30 minutes or so that he threw a major tantrum complete with screaming, scratching, crying and raisin throwing.  It was just a tired tantrum and soon he passed out and stayed out for about an hour and a half.

We arrived without incident and caught a cab to John's hotel that was swarming with eBay people (John's here for eBay Live) and now we're eating a $30 room service meal of a cheese quesadilla and a hot dog waiting for John to get done at the party (which will likely be late tonight).

Home again, home again jiggity jag

Up at 5:00 AM to head to Tocumen Airport

Obligatory security check and carry on baggage search - twice

3.5 hour flight from Panama City to Atlanta Georgia

• Alex sleeps for 45 minutes at the beginning of the flight, then bounces around on our laps for the duration of the flight
• Trying to eat breakfast on a flight with a toddler in your lap is impossible.
• Airplane bathroom has no baby changing shelf.  I am very close to praising Jesus that Alex did not poop during our entire flight

1.5 hours to go through border control and customs in Atlanta

6 hour layover in ATL (we've clocked 10 hours at ATL's T concourse between going and returning from Panama)

3.5 hour flight from Atlanta to Salt Lake City

• Alex slept THE ENTIRE FLIGHT!!! 
• After waiting for 30 minutes at the baggage claim, I happen to come across all of our suitcases sitting in a corner at the back of the claim area when walking to the bathroom.  Thank goodness for my bladder or we'd never have found them.

Little Jen and Baby Lily Mei were waiting at our house for us when we came home.  It was awesome to meet our brand new niece.

Alex was thrilled to see all of his old toys and stayed up well past midnight playing.

We're glad to be home.

La Isla Bonita

Well, it was Isla Grande actually.

Yesterday morning we all (Me, John, Alex, John's co-worker Jen and our driver Ricardo) got up early and headed on a cross-country trip to the Caribbean side of Panama.  Now a cross-country trip in Panama is only a three hour drive across the skinniest part of the country.  But once we got past the free zone in Colon, it was all twisty, pot-hole riddled roads that made me car sick.  It was totally worth it though because going from Panama City to the small little village on Isla Grande may as well have been going to another planet it was so different. 

Isla Grande has a population of about 300, there are no cars and when walking through town, it's just sandy paths between small cinder block houses painted in vibrant pinks, yellows and blues.  The whole island is covered with plants and trees right up to the shoreline.  The water is clear and warm and the views are stunning.  None of us could resist taking a dip in the water.

We were told that they had a swimming area netted off so that sharks and sting rays couldn't come in and attack us.  John actually swam out to the "net" to find it wasn't a net at all, just a rope.  we kept swimming anyway, but I kept an eye out for any menacing looking shapes coming toward us.  Turns out the only ocean critter we saw was one lone fish swimming around our feet.

We bought agua de pipa, which is coconut water.  We've had it before at the Canal and it came bottled and chilled, but when our agua de pipa arrived, it was just a coconut with the top hacked off and a straw stuck inside.  It was perfectly refreshing and I thought it appropriate to be sipping the water out of a fresh coconut on a tropical beach.

Around 1:30, we went to Restaurante de Pupy, a little beach side seafood hut which doesn't have an actual menu, they just tell you what they caught that morning.  They don't have anything made ahead of time, they make it once you order it so everything is fresh, and we sat around listening to Bob Marley, drinking beer and talking for the forty five minutes or so it took to make our meals.  Once they came, I had the pleasure of looking into the eyes of yet another dinner. What do these people have against cutting the heads off their fish?   I had ordered "langostino" which we thought were crayfish, but turned out to be jumbo shrimp, which was fine with me.  It was absolutely delicious and came with a mound of rice and plantains fried up with butter and garlic.  Easily the best meal I've had here to date.

After lunch we caught another water taxi to the mainland and drove out to Portobello to check out the ruins of Fort Santiago.  We were all tired so we didn't stay there nearly as long as I'd have liked to.  But we did walk around the old fort and admired the views.

On the drive back to the hotel, everyone but me and Ricardo fell asleep.  It's a shame too, because I got to watch the sunset over the ocean and saw scenery that took my breath away.  I've never been awestruck by a cow pasture before, but even that was gorgeous. 

Back at the hotel, I was dismayed that not a one of us escaped a sunburn.  John's face and legs got burned, I was burned from head to toe and Alex, despite the fact that I smeared sunblock on him on the hour every hour, got burned on his arms.  Despite us looking like a family of lobsters, it was one of the most amazing days I've ever had. 

Singin' in the rain...forest

Saturday afternoon we went out to the Parque Natural Metropolitano. It is the only rain forest within the city limits of a modern metropolis. I really wanted to see the rainforest. This place is so jungly. But it seemed that just wandering out into some random woodsy area wouldn't be a very good idea. Besides, I left my machete at home. The Park had very nice hiking trails to follow and it was suitably jungly for my purposes.

I was especially hopeful to see some wild rainforest critters, and the park did not disappoint. We immediately saw several lizards and turtles and several scary looking bugs. About halfway into our hike, once we got far enough from the road, we began to hear rustling above our heads. We looked up to see a little monkey. He chattered at us as we took some pictures of him. A couple more monkeys joined him and for some reason that sparked fear in me. "They're going to attack us!" I yelled at John, which made him laugh (I mean, these things weighed maybe 2 or 3 pounds). Although I think I was right because I was soon pelted with something from above. probably a nut or a berry of some type. I was just glad it wasn't poop.

The hike was amazing, lots of vines and palms. The sounds of insects buzzing and exotic bird calls, and monkeys chattering at us from the trees made me feel like I was in another world.

The only downside was Alex fell asleep only halfway into our hike. He missed out on the monkeys entirely. John had him up on his shoulders and Alex started to slump over his head. It was actually quite funny, but I didn't think to take a picture because I was worried he'd passed out from the heat or something. Turns out he was just tired and the motion of John walking just lulled him to sleep.

Toward the end of our hike we met another little monkey and I stopped to take a picture of him when John said to me "You know, monkeys view standing still as a sign of weakness". I immediately turned on my heel and walked briskly away to the sound of John laughing at me. God, I am so gullible.

More fireworks

Fireworks again tonight.  Oh MAN, I'm dying to get out there and party like a Catholic four days before Lent!  I have these brief moments where I look at my sleeping baby boy and think "Oh, he'll never notice I'm gone, I'll just go down there and check things out.  I'll only be gone for twenty minutes."  Of course I won't so much as go down the hall to the ice machine and leave him alone in the room.  So, I'm stuck watching the party from afar.

Tonight I grabbed my camera and tried to take some photos of the fireworks from the window in our room.  It's hard to take pictures of fireworks!  Particularly while trying to look sideways out the window.

They're really close and I can feel the windows shake when they go off.  I LOVE fireworks, so I'm really glad I can see them from our room.  I'd be hating it if I could hear them but couldn't see them.

Do as the Panamanians do

Last night at midnight I was awakened by the sound of explosions.  Terrified, I ran to the window to see what was blowing up.  Turns out it was fireworks, at or near the casino down the street.  Apparently last night was the crowning of the Carnival Queen. 

Carnival here is supposed to be one of the biggest holidays / festivals of the year.  It's the Panamanian equivalent of Mardi Gras.  From what I gather, it begins with the selection of the queen and her attendants (apparently happening last night), then  they commence with the partying until Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent.  From what I'm hearing, it's all about parades, music, dancing, booze and for some reason getting sprayed by fire hoses. 

John is not too keen on the idea of going out to celebrate Carnival this weekend.  Ugh.  He has no sense of adventure!  He has a point though.  I mean, it doesn't sound like the most child-friendly of activities.  But I say, "When in Panama..."  I think it would be a real shame if we don't at least go out to Via Espana (the main street, which is only a block from our hotel) this weekend to see what's going on and maybe get hit with a water balloon or two.

I heart Panama (so far anyway)

I find it interesting that of the two of us, I'm the one who feels more comfortable in our new environment.  After all, John lived in Costa Rica for two years.  He's familiar with the culture, he speaks the language fluently.  You'd think I would be the one with culture shock.

Nope.

I love it here.  The weather hasn't bothered me one bit.  When we go out, John is complaining that the sun is too hot, the air is too humid.  Alex is slumped in his stroller sweating sucking down bottle after bottle of apple juice and water.  Me?  I'm happily walking around town checking out shops barely noticing the heat.  I'm not normally a fan of heat, particularly humidity, but I find the weather to be not just tolerable, but downright enjoyable.

I also love the food.  I find myself ordering things that I don't even know what they are (probably because I can't read the menus).  Rice with bits of mystery fish?  Bring it on!  Is that an oyster? octopus? I don't know.  I'm eying the street vendors, trying to figure out what they're selling, tempted to try whatever they've got to offer.  I'm normally a picky eater, but not here.  I'd bet I'll be eating pickles and tomatoes before we leave.

I have to give John credit though, he's probably the main reason I'm so comfortable.  I completely rely on him to communicate with the natives.  Aside from an occasional "gracias", "si" and "No habla espanol" I haven't even tried to talk to anyone outside the hotel.  I did venture to the grocery store the other afternoon by myself and found that smiling, pointing and nodding are surprisingly effective. I'm going to make more of an effort to make use of my High School Spanish from now on though.  Most people here speak English but seem to appreciate it when people at least try to speak Spanish.

I'm excited that we get to be here for another 3 1/2 weeks!  John's already itching to come home to his comfort zone and routine, but I'm finding that I am craving more of this place.  We've walked around the same block every day this week, and every time we go out I want to venture further away from the hotel.  I want to explore more of the city.  It's just different enough here to be exciting and I want to experience more of it. 

The only complaint I have is getting around town with a stroller is difficult.  Coming from Utah, quite possibly the most baby / kid friendly place on earth, there are wheelchair/stroller ramps on the flat sidewalks.  There's almost always a baby changing station in the bathroom everywhere you go.  Here,it appears the sidewalk is just an extention of the business you happen to be walking by, and many are in bad repair.  Some sidewalks are cement, some are tiled, some asphalt, some are dirt, most have stairs of some sort.  The only ramps are driveways which aren't as common as you'd think they'd be.  I have seen exactly two traffic lights during the week we've been here (including all the driving around we did on Saturday), and the traffic is terrible.  Lots of horn honking and little cars wizzing around on the narrow streets.  Crossing the street is an exercise in faith.  You just go hoping you don't get hit.

I haven't seen a single baby changing station, not that I'm surprised, I didn't really expect to see them outside of the US anyway.  In public restrooms I've just been trying to change Alex on the counter by the sinks, something he doesn't appear to appreciate.  When we were at the shops at the Amador Causeway on Saturday, Alex had soaked through his diaper and shorts and I had no choice but to change him.  The second I removed his diaper, he began peeing all over the counter.  I put him on the floor, naked from the waist down and attempted to clean up the mess.  Of course, even though the restroom had been empty up until this point, when Alex was running wild in nothing but a t-shirt and shoes, and I'm sopping up toddler pee off the counters, several women came in.  Alex immediately began to jabber excitedly at them and started doing his hip-swinging dance for them.  Naked.  Luckily, the women thought he was cute and laughed.  But I'm sure they weren't expecting a strip show on a saturday afternoon in the ladies restroom.

Tourists

We hired the guy that drives John to and from work, Ricardo, to take us on a tour yesterday.  I thought maybe he'd take us to the canal, maybe Panama Viejo.  We ended up going to six different sights:

• Panama Viejo and the Panama History museum
• The Baha'i Temple
• Panama Canal
• The Golden Altar at the San Jose Church
• Casco Viejo
• Amador Causeway

By the end of the evening, we were practically begging Ricardo to take us back to the hotel.  All three of us were hungry and tired.  I saw more of Panama yesterday than I thought I'd see the entire month we're here!

Ricardo clearly loves his country and was very excited to show us all of the sights that were beautiful or meaningful to him.  The highlights of the tour for me were Panama Viejo and the Baha'i temple. 

Panama Viejo is what I really wanted to see.  Panama Viejo was the first city founded on the Pacific Coast of the Americas.  It was the gateway for the Spanish conquest of Latin America.  Ricardo told us that it was destroyed by pirates three times, the final time by English pirate Henry Morgan in 1671.  The ruins are spectacular, and I could have spent the entire day taking pictures of old bricks.

From there we went to the Baha'i temple.  The House of Worship is situated on Cerro Sonsonate (a tall hill, elevation 730 feet) and I understand the location is known as Ojo de Agua.  Of course John thought it looked like a big white boob and made reference to the boobie shape many, many times while we were there.  The building is actually in the shape of a nine pointed star crowned by a white parabolic dome covered with Japanese tiles.  The interior is simple and elegant.  Rows of benches face a small podium.  There are nine entrances (the number nine is the highest digit that includes all the others, it is used as a symbol of unity and the culmination of an era) that allow a nice breeze to flow through the entire structure.  It was quiet and serene, the only sound was the breeze blowing through the palms.  I could have stayed there all day long. I've never felt so peaceful.

We were soon on to the Panama Canal and we got there just in time to see two ships go through the Miraflores locks.  I felt like I'd walked right into a history video I saw in Junior High School.  I walked out onto the terrace and suddenly remembered the entire history and workings of the canal.  We bought some agua de pipa (coconut water) and watched one of the big cargo ships go through the locks. 

After we got bored with the canal (there's really only so much entertainment a big cargo ship can offer), we drove through one of the poorest looking slum areas I've ever seen.  The buildings were horribly run down.  In fact for a while I thought that they must have been abandoned they were in such poor shape, until I realized that people were indeed living in these apartments and shops.  We drove through the more "modern" slums (big square apartment buildings) into what looked more like French slums.  In only got to snap one photo from the cab we were in and it really isn't a good representation of what it looked like.  Despite it's dilapidated appearance, the architecture was beautiful and I felt like all this place needed was a good cleaning and some exterior paint and it would have been just lovely. 

What I found particularly interesting was that even though the buildings and shops these people lived in were rather shabby the people themselves were not what I expected.  They were all dressed nicely.  So nicely in fact, that is why I thought the buildings must have been abandoned because I couldn't imagine these well dressed people living in these places.

Eventually we stopped at "El Altar de Oro de la Iglesia de San Jose", The Golden Altar of the San Jose Church.  It was heavily guarded by police and the entrances were covered in bullet proof glass.  We went in and sat down in a pew in the back.  The church was very dark, lit mostly by candles so the pictures I got were terrible quality.  (I was afraid to use my flash.)  The altar was breathtaking.  The booklet we were given is mostly in Spanish, so from what I could gather, the altar itself has been in Panama since 1612 and in 1671 Fray Juan succeeded in saving the golden altar from the pirate Henry Morgan by painting the gold to look like wood so it wouldn't be stolen.  There were many effigies and altars along the walls of the church of various saints etc.  We paid our respects and gave a donation to the church and left. 

As I understand it, the golden altar is actually in Casco Viejo.  If we have another opportunity to go out there, I'd like to take a proper tour and learn more about the history of Panama.  There is much more to see than just the altar and the views from the boardwalk.  We basically just took in the sights and had snow cones.

From Casco Viejo we went out to the Amador Causeway which is mostly just shops, restaurants and views.  By the time we got there, Alex had blown out a diaper and soaked through his shorts.  We were all hungry and tired, so we just looked around and then went back to the hotel. 

All in all it was an amazing day.  There were many places I could have easily spent the entire evening exploring. 

Gotta work out a better schedule

   

John's working the night shift, 3pm to 2am, so he sleeps until about 10 or until I can't get Alex to stop jumping on him in bed.  John's a slow morning person, so it takes him maybe an hour and a half to two hours to read the paper, check ESPN online, go to the bathroom and eat a muffin.  This means we're not leaving our hotel room until after noon. 

Alex and I are generally getting up at 8am and go down to the pool first thing to give John an opportunity to sleep a little longer in peace.  We get back, take a shower, I brew some coffee, Alex drinks a bottle and we watch one of his readinig DVD's or play with his toys.  By noon, Alex and I are REALLY ready to get out of the room.

Here's the problem.  By 1:00 Alex is ready for his nap which means he's either falling asleep in his stroller or throwing an "I'm tired" fit the entire time we're out.  We've got to be back to the room by 2 so John can get ready for work.  As you can tell, we're not really getting much sight seeing in during the week. 

I'm hopeful I can get John to do some touristy things this weekend.  I'd settle for one touristy thing really.  John is probably the least fun traveling companion one can have on any given trip.  No matter where you are or what you're doing there, all he wants to do is lay around in the hotel room and watch TV.  Even more so on this trip because he's here to work, so the weekend means he wants to relax.  But with Alex and I basically trapped in the hotel room all week, I'm aching to get out and do something.