Panama

  • Panama

    San Blas Islands

    This story can only go one of two ways. I could tell you I took a beautiful sailboat trip through the San Blas Islands of Panama and over to Colombia. Everything was perfect! The captain was lovely, the beaches were pristine, and it could not have possibly been better. I could tell you that…but I would be a big-fat-liar. Paradise in pictures is not always as it appears. So rather than a picture postcard, here is the truth as I experienced it. Paul, our captain, had a certain aura about him from the minute I met him. He came across as jaded and lackadaisical. Early on he made a comment…

  • Panama

    Por Orto Lado

    I had never walked across a border before. In the past it had always been in some form of vehicle: bus, train, car, cruise ship. After receiving my exit stamp from Costa Rica I walked through no man’s land, the space between border. The void that should be empty, but was bustling with traffic, horns, stench. Was this where people came when they had nowhere else to go? That’s what it felt like, the slum that filled the space between identities. Neither Panama or Costa Rica…nothing. Perhaps it looked different during the day, but at night it felt like walking through a world where daylight was a myth. Panama City…