I have a bunch of random tidbits that I’ve been saving up, so I think I’m just going to dump them all out here for your enjoyment…or at least for your consumption.

• When my dear friend Katie visited, she took the same tour that my parents took with Eric to Lake Gatún which is the lake in the middle of the Canal.  I just found out that both Katie and Eric wrestled the same ginormous crocodile and both lived to tell the tale.  I’m very proud of both of them for their incredible courage.  Look at the size of this thing!  And it’s only 2 years old!

Steady, Katie!

Conquered!

Apparently someone asked if they could put their finger in the croc’s mouth. The tour guide said sure! Eric said he knew the lawyer in me would be dying had I been there…

• Next up, I have a few more photos from my parents’ visit that my mom didn’t share in her post:

This is a common thing on the Cinta Costera. Mango with vinegar, salt, pepper, hot sauce if you want it. Sounds gross, but it’s actually really good and refreshing.

Mom never stops, but I insisted on a daily siesta. It’s too hot to go go go all day long.

Mom and her raspado

At the top of a hill at the Parque Nacional Metropolitano…after seeing sloths, before seeing monkeys.

Watching a chemical ship go through the Canal with only 2 feet leeway on either side of it.

This is me. I’m at the Canal. I’m smiling.

What Dad and Eric did while Mom and I went to Gucci, Dolce, Carolina Herrera, etc.

This is a really popular treat down here. It’s a snow cone, but with condensed milk added! Even MORE sugar!

Beautiful (Carolina blue!) dress from Carolina Herrera. Only $1370.

• This one is completely out of nowhere.  Have y’all heard that the BRONTOSAURUS IS BACK!?!?!?!  I remember being (semi-) crushed when scientists decided that the brontosaurus wasn’t a thing but that there was something sorta like it and it was a brachiosaurus.  I hated, and still hate, the brachiosaurus.  But now, and I don’t know the details, nor am I going to take the time to Google it now b/c no one’s going to click on a link to any article that I may link to, there’s something that they’re going to call a brontosaurus!  And I feel like 1) an old friend is back, and 2) there’s hope that Pluto is a planet after all.  8 year old Julie is super happy.
• Eric told me the other day that public restroom cleaning ladies just hang out in the men’s rooms regardless of whether men are in there.  He said it was odd.  I can understand that.
• LOTS of people rollerblade here.  Like, they still sell them in seemingly normal stores, and you’ll see multiple people rollerblading on any given walk down the Cinta Costera.  I feel like they should be wearing scrunched down socks with them, but sadly, they’re not.  Ooh, and maybe Hypercolor shirts.  Isn’t that what they were called?  Anyone?
• Last Tuesday, April 7, a couple of things happened at capoeira training.  First of all, I got a round of applause for doing something well!  It’s not common for us to do this for each other during training, so I was really excited.  The funny thing (to me at least) was that I was doing cartwheels.  They’re supposed to be really controlled and slow, so there is a bit more skill than you’d think would be involved, but still, it made me giggle that that was what they complimented me on.  When I finished up, a girl whose nickname is Ninja (the girl from DC who’s amazing) asked me “so you’ve really never done capoeira before?”  I told her no, but in my head I was thinking…”but I was 9 once…I mean, it’s cartwheels!”  Then we switched to the other side and I showed them that, like everyone else in the non-capoeira/gymnastics world, I can only cartwheel to one side.  🙂  Whomp-whomp.
• Later in that same practice, I was learning a new type of kick called a media lua.  The guy who teaches the classes, nicknamed Mono (monkey), came over to demonstrate how to do them one after another with a partner.  I went first, but I messed up and made the mistake of standing up in hopes of trying again.  Wrong move.  Mono kicked me square in the eye with his heel…hard.  You may remember him from earlier posts…he’s not a small guy:

He has hard heels. He’s not small.

The next day my eyelid was bruised a bit – which I didn’t know was a thing – but no real blackeye.  Definitely disappointing after being knocked upside the head.  You want battle scars after that.  At least my Spanish teacher noticed something and didn’t let me read anything the next day b/c she didn’t want me to hurt myself.  🙂  Love her.

The real pain from that workout, however, was from the move we practiced which involved a sorta almost roll/cartwheel thing on your head.  I don’t know about you, but I do not believe that heads were made to have weight put on them.  Especially not all of my body weight on concrete.  No, sir.  Not this gringa.  I did it though.  Or rather, I tried it.  I did not succeed in any sense of the word, but I tried.

• On Wednesday, the following day, we had our capoeira music practice.  I don’t know if I’ve explained that since capoeira has Brazilian roots, all of the songs played while it is played are in Brazilian Portuguese.  Also, the teachers often speak Portuguese during training and classes.  Really pretty difficult when you’re just trying to understand and follow the Spanish and learn the moves and all.  I feel like an idiot ALL the time.  Anyway, we learned two new songs on Wednesday, and to my horror, Lourdes, who leads the music practices and is engaged to Mono, started going around the circle asking each of us to sing each song solo to make sure we had it down.

In case you’re wondering, I did not have it down.  I do not know how to pronounce Portuguese words.  I do not have a strong singing voice or any desire to sing solos in public for newly discovered friends who I think are super cool and want to like me.  Yes, I’m a 7th grader down here…I just want friends.  Anyway, Lourdes helped me out a bit, but the seconds one was easier to follow and I was able to make it through the long chorus on my own.  I even did the “call,” the part where you call the rest of the group to join you, on my own, and maybe not in a beautiful voice, but it was strong.  A couple of the guys complimented me and seemed satisfied.  I was happy with that.  Just trying to keep from being a complete idiot…that’s the goal.  🙂

• We finally sorted out our electricity bill and somehow managed to have the bill from our first month and a half in this apartment kicked back to the former renter who has disappeared and has been avoiding my calls.  The electric company would not let us put the bill in our name until she paid her bill, so that’s been a problem.  Finally…and I won’t bore you with the whole story…the owner of our apartment bribed the security guys in our building to keep out the electric company guys so they couldn’t get to the meter to read it and send us a bill, then we went to the company with us and she somehow worked it out.  In the process, the company insisted on knowing how many lights we had in the house (have you ever heard of such a thing?!), whether we had an iron (um, no…it’s called a dryer), and everything else that uses electricity.  Oh, and how many watts each thing uses.  Really?!  Who knows that stuff, and didn’t you just have this info from keeping up with the apartment 2 seconds ago with the last tenant?!

Anyway, here’s a photo of Isabel, our landlady, who is so sweet and wonderful, but ruthless and sneaky when she needs to be.  We love her, even when she’s a little ridiculous.  Doesn’t she look like she could be straight out of…I can’t decide between Florida and Savannah.  Probably Florida.

Our landlady

• During the Summit of the Americas, we had a great time watching out for motorcades from our apartment.  It overlooks a big road, so whenever we saw that it was being blocked off, we knew that some world leader was coming through soon.  The best part?  We saw Obama’s motorcade twice!  The first time it was about 11:30 pm and we were taking Addie out for a walk.  Lo and behold, the President of the United States just goes driving by with two limos, lots of black SUVs, cops, and an ambulance.  Amazing!  The second time, we saw him from above, from our balcony.

It was interesting to compare the motorcades to one another.  Smaller countries (think Trinidad and Tobago) probably just rented 4Runners when they got here.  Not everyone can fly over tons of cars, at least one if not two helicopters, etc.  All the folks in my capoeira group commented on it.  The funny thing is, Obama didn’t do that to show off.  It’s what he uses for everyday stuff in the US too.  It’s just amazing the differences among all the countries in this continent (or these continents, depending on what your 5th grade teacher told you about North and South America v. the American continent).

One of these days I’ll have to get into Lourdes’s reaction to hearing the Apache helicopters this past weekend.  It reminded her of when the US invaded Panamá in 1989, when she was 5 years old.  She got really scared remembering it and told us all about it via WhatsApp.  I was ashamed that I knew absolutely nothing about us invading, and yet this was a hugely impactful event in my friend’s life.  Amazing how little we learn in the States about these things sometimes…

• Coming up:  planning our first border run!  Although Eric took a trip to Boston a few weeks ago, I’ve been here for more than 90 days, meaning that I can no longer drive legally.  I’m not the type for taking chances with this kind of thing, so we’re leaving next Tuesday for Costa Rica.  We’re hoping to stop through Boquete (a major Expat retirement site b/c it’s cooler and beautiful) and Santa Catalina (a great surfing area where a friend owns a hotel) on our way back.  Exciting!