Antics in the City

Sometimes simple things end up being really complicated in other countries. Ashley and I were sitting around the hostel wasting some time before taking the bus by reading and watching movies. We didn’t have to get on the bus heading to Bocas Del Toro until 830 that night so we had the entire day to do whatever we wanted, and what we wanted to do that day was just hang around. It started to rain around noon that day so we thought we would wait and leave once the rain passed. It did not however, and at 5pm we packed up our gear, put on some rain proof clothing, and hit the road to catch a taxi… not the smartest thing to do because if you think U.S rush hour is bad, try the capital city of Panama….which doesn’t have a single streetlight or stop sign! We should have known that something was wrong when every empty taxi gave us a crazy look and a head shaking ‘noooooo’ when we would tell them we needed to get to ‘Terminal Albrook’ ,which I would yell out to them with a smile because it was the only think I knew how to say in Spanish. My smile quickly diminished after the 4^th taxi turned us down and we had been standing in the rain for about 15min. In fact, the only person interested in helping us was some homeless man thinking we needed to cross the street and kept coming up to me and saying I needed to be more aggressive to get to the other side; I would reply ‘taxi’ but I don’t think he understood. Maybe we just smelled bad and he wanted us to get away from his corner. Finally, we found a taxi who would take us to the bus terminal after some consideration, and a few dollars more than the going rate.  He was in a big rush so he yelled “Vamanos!”, so Ashley, pack still on her back, jumped into the back seat. There was a problem though, the bag was too big to fit into the door! So there is Ashley, half in the door, trying to pull her bag into the taxi… Im pushing, the taxi driver is yelling “vamanos”, rain is going everywhere, cars honking and splashing as they zoom past the not so patient taxi driver.  And to add insult to injury, the taxi starts rolling! Ashley is still trying to get in, I’m yelling, “take the pack off”, The taxi driver is care free because he is moving, with at least some of his passengers in the taxi (I guess he thought that he would get paid even in only half the people made it to the bus terminal)! Finally, Ashley is able to wrestle the pack off and pull it in as I throw my pack in and jump in after the bag.  Another problem: the seats are not big enough to hold two people and two large bags, so I was unable to close the door (don’t ask why we didn’t put them in the trunk..there is no way he would have waited for that!) At this point the taxi is already going and I’m holding on for dear life thinking I’ll just roll out of the taxi. Finally, I am able to scramble on top of my soaking wet bag, slam the door shut, and squeeze into the 3 inches of extra space between the door and my bag. We did make it to the bus station, however, and once we thought about what had just occurred, we did nothing but laugh.  It is true, sometimes simple things end up being really complicated in other countries.

A&D...Venturing Out.