Monthly Archives: August 2015

A Borojo, Addie, and a Stripper

We invited Dan and Sarah to join us in our produce-sampling game, and they drew the short straw.  This week’s pick was a borojo.  Borojos are brown, about 12 cms in diameter, and unsettlingly squishy.  Kinda like those balls filled with some kind of goo that were popular about the same time as Koosh balls were.  They are high in protein, ascorbic acid, calcium, and iron, and are often referred to as superfoods.  They are used in the preparation of jams, wines, and desserts and are said to have aphrodisiac effects.

Raw and plain, however, they are quite disgusting.  Extremely flavorful, bitter, squishy, almost sour at points…quite hard to describe.  I tasted it first and used the words sour, pungent, bitter, lemon, and sharp cheddar cheese.  I believe Sarah likened it to spoiled lemon Pledge, even after adding sugar to it, as recommended.  Dan said it wasn’t bad (with a 1:6 borojo:brown sugar ratio), but did not go back for seconds.  Eric wasn’t a big fan, but couldn’t quite find the words to describe it.

It was disturbing how easily a dull knife went through it.  Here are a few pictures…

It came packaged in seran wrap and nylon netting…otherwise it would squish out all over the place.
Notice the cracks in the surface of it. Gross.
Wiki says each one has between 90-640 seeds. Weird.
Not in love.
Meh.

In other mundane news, our dog has produced what appears to be the makings of another dog, or at least a sweater.  This is the fur Eric took off of her in only about 20 minutes of brushing her.

Then we did it again the next day.  On the upside, she’s looking awfully trim recently.

I also realized I forgot to fill y’all in on the bachelorette party I attended a week ago.  It was a surprise for our friend Lourdes, so we were playing it like it was just going to be a girls’ night.  Two nights before the party, Lourdes mentioned on our group chat on Whatsapp that we should go ahead and get a stripper for her that weekend at our “girls’ night.”  Shoot!  Was she kidding or did she really want one?  Did she know our plan for the party?  Did anyone know where to find a stripper?

First, I’ll say that this is a pretty naive and innocent group of ladies.  No one had any experience with strippers.  We did, however, have a prolific salsa dancer in the group, and she just happened to know a friend of a friend who had, ahem, entertained before.  Uncomfortable as we all were, we wanted Lourdes to be happy, so the hostess hired this guy:

Three comments I have to add here.  1) I already discussed this with Mom and I’m pretty sure she thought it was hilarious, so I don’t have to do my usual shoutout and apology to her.  2) I don’t know what the laws are regarding age in Panamá, but for the record, he IS over 18.  Not by much though.  EEK!  3) Yep, he’s serious with those poses and that face.  Haha.

So let me also add that none of the other ladies had ever been to a bachelorette party before.  I, however, have been to more than my fair share of them (not that they haven’t been lovely, if you’re reading this and I went to yours!!!).  I’m just saying that all the traditional themes and silly games were not old to them, so they wanted to do it all.  There was even talk of costumes by some, but luckily we got that shut down.  Whew.

The thing that was not shut down, however, was the cake in the shape of, well…you can guess.  And the woman who chose to make the cake…had never made a cake before.  In her almost 40 years of life!  So she came to my house to make it.  And Eric, precious sweet husband that he is, helped us with it since we were also preparing most of the other food for the party and getting ourselves ready too.  My friend was shocked, I think, that he was so comfortable with the idea of holding a cake in that particular shape.  No silly machismo keeps this one from helping out his wife in her hour of need.  🙂

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While we were preparing the food, we got a call that Lourdes would have to bring her two daughters, ages 7 and 10ish, to the party with her.  Now remember, she has no idea that there will be an inappropriate cake and a stripper there…so what’s the problem?  The girls hang out with us all the time!  Uhh…we scrambled for a solution…and finally decided that they would just watch movies upstairs and we would delay the entertainment a bit and hope they were asleep.  Oh jeez.  Brilliant.

Luckily, all went according to plan.  Lourdes was surprised.  Blown away even.  None of her surprise guests (friends from her Portuguese class) ended up coming (punks!), but our capoeira group had a great time.  And although we were all nervous about it, the stripper was as tasteful as I imagine something like that could be, and stayed comfortably decent through the whole show.  I think we could safely call him a dancer instead.  Phew!  Also, since he was a friend of a friend, he just had a beer and chatted (fully clothed) with us for a few minutes afterwards, which alleviated any weirdness from the previous few minutes.

Mostly, it just ended up being a fun night with a group of close girlfriends!

Lucero (our 18 year old friend – she keeps us young)
Lucero, Jessie, Me, and Auri
Paola and Me
Lourdes, Jessie, Paola, and Mahalia
Auri

Dan and Sarah’s Visit and Trip to Playa Blanca

Our friends Dan and Sarah came to visit us from Raleigh this week!  They flew in on Sunday around noon, and after a couple hours of settling in to our place, we carted them off to Casco Viejo for…you guessed it…a capoeira presentation.  It was raining for a decent portion of the afternoon – not just our usual afternoon downpour.  Luckily the roda was in a large covered gazebo in one of the plazas.  I was so excited to have them there!  And Eric was very sweet to take photos throughout the whole thing.  He got some great shots.  I also had the honor of starting the roda with Mono, which was a nice surprise.

Group photo for Mahalia’s bday.
Dario playing the berimbau.
Paola. 23 years old and 5 years of capoeira under her belt. She’s incredible.
Mono
Mahalia showed up in the rain in style.
I told him I’d take it easy on him since he was coming off a neck injury. Ha!
Jessie and Mono
Meia lua de compaso
Esquiva-ing a benção from Irvin. This guy is good…lots of fun to go up against. A huge challenge…but so much fun.
Jessie with one of the girls from her program – she does a capoeira/self-esteem building type class for middle schoolers every saturday morning. Incredible.
Mahalia and me. I love going up against her. We think similarly in the roda and always have a good time trying to trick each other.
Mono and Lourdes (engaged…will be married in late November)
Singing with Lourdes
Juan Pablo and Jessie – they always put on a show.

Although he had planned to take the whole week off, Eric ended up having to work all day on Monday, which was frustrating for him.  He had just returned the day before Dan and Sarah arrived from a conference in Seattle, so he had to catch up with what was going on in the office.  That meant that he was unable to join us on our trip to the Canal.  Boo.  But the three of us enjoyed the museum, the viewing platform, the empeñadas from the little coffee shop, and the 15 min 3D movie about the Canal.

Watching a ship head towards the Pacific.
Sarah and Dan at the Miraflores locks.

We then went out to the Amador Causeway – long skinny road out to three small islands just past Casco Viejo – for lunch.  We had to settle for the Italian place since my favorite seafood place was closed for lunch, but it ended up being very good.

Then we were off to Panamá Viejo, the ruins of the former capital of Panamá (think 1500s-1600s), which was attacked and destroyed by Captain Morgan (yes, like the rum) in 1671.  Unfortunately, Monday is the one day of the week when they close for maintenance, so we had to try that again on Tuesday.  We returned home, then went out to Maito for dinner.  Maito is a fabulous restaurant with this amazing ceviche in passion fruit sauce.  Sarah took my advice and got the salmon with a honey mustard crust over polenta…just amazing.  The guys tried the kimchi tuna, and while it was good and well-cooked, it was pretty obvious that the ladies won the ordering game.

Tuesday was…well…Panamanian.  The country really brought out its A-game for our visitors.  Our first stop was Panamá Viejo.  It looked cloudy when we left, but it’s the rainy season, so we don’t get any completely cloudless days.  We figured that if it rained for the usual 20 minutes, we’d be okay.  We armed ourselves with raincoats and set out…Eric in tow this time.

We gone about halfway through the first floor of the museum when we realized that the noise all around us wasn’t the poor fans trying desperately to circulate a little air in the stuffy building, but rather a massive rainstorm.  Tons of water.  Nothing that my Tom’s were going to handle well.  We waited it out for maybe 30 minutes.  In the end, we gave Eric all our phones to take back to the car to stay dry, pulled up our hoods, and set off walking down the long muddy road towards the ruins in the rain.

As it turns out, the rain wasn’t the worst of our worries.  The mosquitos were HORRIBLE!  I had about 6 on my legs at one point.  I have never had bug trouble here before, aside from at capoeira practice, and this was the WORST!  Everyone besides Sarah got viciously attacked, but we were on a mission, so we ventured on.  We saw each of the 6 or so former convent buildings on the grounds.  We climbed the 115 steps to the top of the bell tower of the cathedral – a major symbol of Panamá.  We read the plaques and saw the sights.  Then we shuffled back down the mud road with wet shoes, slapping our legs as we went…and passing a maintenance guy wearing a shirt that said “The scent of sex.”  Good showing, Panamá.  You look awesome for our guests.

The good news?  We were heading to the Playa Blanca that night!  We rented a gorgeous house with a private pool, and after our rainy excursion we were ready to get on our way.  Panamá, however, had other plans for us.  After grabbing lunch at a fondo (small local restaurant) down the road that we lovingly refer to as “Mullet Man’s Place” because of the owner’s amazing hairstyle (yes, he’s an American…’murica!), we went home to find that the elevators were out in our tower of the building.

Can I remind you that we live on the 44th floor?  Oh, and ps, Dan is recovering from hip surgery!  All we wanted was to eat a quick lunch, pack, and get on the road before traffic…but that didn’t happen.

We went up to the social area since the two towers share that space and we could ride the other elevators to the 9th floor, and that’s where we ate lunch.  Maybe 10 minutes later, Eric and I decided we were going to make the hike up 35 flights of stairs to get packed.  I’m not going to say it was fun, but I was very proud of both of us for not being all that horribly winded after our climb!  My knees, however, complained the whole way and made us take a few rests.  Sarah kept Dan company for a while, but she later made the climb as well.  Eric went back down to be with Dan while Sarah packed, then she hauled two backpacks and a bag all the way down.

Not 15 minutes after Sarah left to go back down, all three of them showed up at the door ready to hit the road!  Were the elevators working again?!  Nope.  But the building staff was getting creative about how to get people back upstairs.  Turns out, they had ridden the elevator in the other tower to our floor with one of the maintenance guys.  He had then led them through Apartment C on our floor, in the other tower.  Luckily it was empty.  Apartment B (in our tower) was also empty, and the wall between the balconies of B & C had been removed.  So they walked through C, out onto the balcony, crossed to the balcony of B, then exited B to the hall in front of our apartment.  Jeez.

All we had to do to get back out, Eric thought, was use a credit card to pick the lock of B again, then reverse their trip up with all of our stuff to go to the beach.  Problem was…the maintenance guy locked the deadbolt after he led them upstairs.  So we were stuck again.

By some miracle, the elevators started working maybe 30 minutes later, and we got on the road.  In a big city.  At 6 pm.  When everyone else was leaving the city.  It took about an hour to get from our place to the Bridge of the Americas, which I can nearly see from our house (only buildings block it – it’s not far away at all).  Not a fun way to start a trip.

We made it to the beach house a couple of hours later after battling traffic, hitting up the grocery store, talking our way through two guard gates, and finding house #1008 on a dirt road in a country that doesn’t have addresses.  But behold!  The house was BEAUTIFUL!

Barn-type doors led from the open dining room/living room/kitchen out to the patio and private pool.
Two balconies off the huge master suite, three hammocks, lounge chairs, and a private pool.

We didn’t see exactly how beautiful until the following morning, but we were just thrilled to be there.  And I was excited to take a shower…until we realized that there wasn’t any water.  No problem, I would just talk to the live-in housekeeper/groundskeeper Sergio, a 20 year old kid who had a pretty good gig living on the beach, and let him know what was going on.  He assured me he would fix it.  It didn’t come on.  I asked him again.  He said he’d try something else.  It still didn’t come on.  By 10:30 I was exhausted and ready for bed.  I texted him one more time to let him know that we still didn’t have water, and heard from the American homeowner a few minutes later via text.  She, however, was in a chatty mood and wanted to relate to me as an American in Panamá and trash talk Panamanians, while I just wanted to sleep…and for my guests to have water.  Somewhere around midnight, everyone heard the water come on and we sleepily rejoiced for a brief moment before falling back asleep.

Wednesday, luckily, was heavenly!  Dan and Sarah spent some time on the beach while Eric and I ran out to the store.  We sat in our private pool so we didn’t have to walk the 75 yards to the community pool and share it with….no one.  The sun was out, there were barely any clouds, and we had plenty of sunscreen.

In the afternoon, we took a walk to the beach, picked up shells, and Eric took a few pics of me practicing some capoeira moves.

On Thursday, we enjoyed a late checkout, then headed up to El Valle de Antón, the same little mountain town where Eric and I took my Aunt Angela and cousin Ashley and where I had my capoeira retreat a few weeks ago.  We had an incredible lunch at La Casa de Lourdes, then headed back home without any traffic problems.  Amazing!

Sadly, we had to put Dan and Sarah back on a plane on Friday afternoon.  Great visit with them though!  Thanks for visiting, guys!

Now we’re looking forward to Matty’s visit on Thursday!

New Empleada Day! (yes, again)…and Gymnastics

We were doing pretty well for awhile there.  I really thought Elena was working out.  She was a great cook.  She wasn’t the most stellar cleaner, but she did a good enough job without me having to be mean and picky that Eric and I were satisfied.  She didn’t seem like she hated me too much or resented me all that much for asking her to do certain things.  But, fortunately for her and unfortunately for us, she got a full time job at a factory.  She offered to come on Saturdays, but that’s no fun because we would have to stay home all day while she was here.  Boo.

So after a couple of weeks of searching, I found Paola.  Paola is Colombian, which I love because she speaks a beautiful brand of Spanish.  Clear, pure, intelligible….just lovely.  She has also been in Panamá for 16 years which means she is legal.  A rare find.  I’m betting she won’t be around for long, but I’ll enjoy her while she’s here.  Oh, and did I mention that her resumé said she has worked as a supermodel?  Eric’s in Seattle this week for work and yesterday I happened to need to send him 4 emails throughout the course of the morning, including one announcing that Paola was going to come today for the first time.  Guess which email he responded to within ONE MINUTE?!  Yep, the one about the supermodelo housekeeper.  Shocker.

Paola showed up perfectly on time this morning – that in and off itself may have been a first.  However, when I opened the door and she saw Addie, she looked HORRIFIED.  Pure terror on her face.  Apparently she was not the one I warned about the dog.  Oops.  I’m usually pretty good about that.  Not this time.  So poor Addie went out to the porch for a bit.  I know that all Addie wants to do is sniff the woman once and then leave her alone, but Paola is so scared.  Poor thing.  We’ll work through this, but I’ll give her a minute to get used to the idea before I force them into the same room together.

Anyway, Paola is not a woman that I would look at and say “WOW!  Supermodel!”  First of all, I don’t know what distinguishes a model from a supermodel.  Secondly, I’m not trying to knock her at all.  I’m thinking in a “we surveyed 100 people and they said…” kind of way.  She might be a couple of inches taller than I am.  Maybe 5’5″ tops.  She’s 36, so perhaps she’s changed over the years.  But as a veteran America’s Next Top Model aficionado, I can say with authority that she does not have any particularly striking features.  Maybe she’s really good at smizing (or however you spell it…for those of you who don’t watch the best show ever made by Tyra Banks, that’s smiling with your eyes).  Of course I’m being harsh, but come on, when you say “supermodel” on your resumé, you create expectations.  I just want to know more!  Now she’s gonna think I’m weird when I stare at her and try to figure out what the deal is.  Google to the rescue!  I’ll keep you updated…

So last night, I went to my first gymnastics class since I was four years old.  Mono invited me while I was working again on my front walkover type move and explained that the idea is to help us to train in the acrobatics side of capoeira.  So I went.  And Mono didn’t.  Apparently he had some pain in his neck or something.  I went even with my jammed and swollen finger and aching wrist.  (Again, Eric, I’m sorry I can’t get my wedding rings on my finger.  And Mom, yes, I still kinda blame you for the Taylor Swift concert related wrist injury that is flaring back up.  Why are you so freakishly young and athletic?)

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One other capoeirista went, thank goodness.  His name, and I feel I have to explain it, is Kike.  It’s pronounced KEY-KAY.  It’s not a racial slur.  It means robocop in Portuguese…or at least that’s the idea.  Anyway, he’s super in shape b/c he trains like mad and runs a bazillion kilometers every day, plus he’s at least a foot taller than me.  Let’s just say he has a slight advantage when we train together.

So this gym was PACKED with 5-12 year old little people on all the apparati that you think of when you think of gymnastics.  We were upstairs in this warehouse type gym…you know, where the proverbial heat rises.  The warm-up lasted for, as far as I can figure, 7 hours.  I can’t remember the last time my skin felt so hot.  I was seriously worried about my body temperature…and also about the possibility of vomiting on the super cool springy floor.  At several points, I just had to sit down on the floor and put my frozen water bottle (ice bottle, i suppose) under my knees, on my arms, behind my neck, etc.  I thought I was going to quit several times, and I was pretty shameless about it, as I thought I was going to die, but then I would get back to just moderately overheated and Kike would convince me to return to the “warm-up.”  I did get it all done…just not quite as quickly as some of the others.

Some goofuses came in about an hour after us, warmed up, and ended up doing the class just like we did.  That’s the way to do it.  Good thing to know for next time.

I met a nice Canadian girl who must’ve been all of 20 who reassured me that, yes, it’s hard, and yes, it gets easier.  Mostly she was just really nice about saying that it wasn’t weird that I was dying.  I liked her.

So we finally got to the class part and got to play on some super big mats.  We ran and did front rolls, then front handsprings (with help).  Then we jumped and landed backwards on big stacks of mats.  Being the second to shortest and the newby, I had some trouble with this one.  Plus, apparently I jump like a high-jumper (leftover from my two weeks of fame during middle school…not that I like to brag) and arch my back, so I pretty much just ran straight into the side of the mat.  Awesome.

We ended the class doing back flips (back tucks?  What do you kids call them?), which was actually pretty cool.  Again, I had the coach on one side and a guy from the class on the other side, but still, it was cool.

Will I go back?  Hard to say.  I really really really hated the first part.  It was awful.  Really awful.  But the rest of it was fun.  And probably pretty helpful for capoeira.  I’ll probably say that I don’t want to take yet another night away from my husband and leave it at that.  We’ll see.  Or maybe I’ll try to talk him into going with me.  He called last night and told me how awesome he thought the videos of my back flips were….not the one I put on facebook, but the next two when I improved a lot.  That made me feel pretty awesome.

Okay, back to my day of writing to prisoners, icing my finger, tending to my random gymnastics bruises, and hanging out with a supermodel.  You know, the usual.