Panama City, PANAMA
Feb.25, 2015
Sometimes you take a sip of a cup of coffee, and it's just SO good...
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Cafe Sucre - on the left |
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A most scrumptious 'tomale' at my cafe 'desk' - yucca, sweet potato, chicken, raisins, seasoning, wrapped and baked in banana leaves |
How on earth does a Panamanian baseball player end up in Lethbridge, Alberta!?! "Come and have a drink with me and I can tell you," he said.
Whoop whoop whoop go the alarm bells, fight or flight, fight or flight!? I'm a slow twitch thinker, don't ever hire me into the secret service or something that requires quick action! (He was retired from baseball, and now served in the presidential army - the presidential palace was just around the corner).
The solo female traveler connundrum: what to do when a nice man talks to you?? Part of the joy of traveling is talking with the interesting people you meet, because, (hit replay button) everyone has a story, and we all like stories. A layer of complexity is added though, when the person is of the opposite sex, or same sex depending on your persuasion. I really enjoy - and can get quite into - good conversation, but I have to be careful not to let that insinuate "I really like conversation with you in particular because I am attracted to you"... Because that can lead to the eventual "come tell me about yourself" invitation, and the inevitable reciprocal "no thanks - I blah blah blah <insert reason>". Awkward. The "I have a boyfriend" response is lame, unbelieved, and often just elicits a response of "So?".
I had already told him I was on my way to meet my friends. So after minutes of thought (in my head), which was actually only microseconds, I explained my friends and I had lots going on over our last couple days in Panama City, but were thinking of going to the Whiskey Bar around the corner later on this evening - he could come find us there as I was sure my friends would be interested in his stories about a non-English-speaking Panamanian playing baseball in Canada, and enjoy his company too. I really meant that, but I often fail to recall that subtlety is an art form typically best understood within the female species. But I really wanted to know the story!
The ladies and I never did make it out - Rasheedah joined Jeannie and I at the table in the hotel lounge where we were logisticizing (travel is regularly interspersed with bouts of logisticizing), and a box of wine was suddenly there too. We got deep into conversation about the core of our existence: being a woman in a western civilization predominantly created by men. The three of us were a group representing (not necessarily at the same time): Chinese, Black, and White; Baptist, Buddism, Catholicism, Muslim, and Spiritualism; corporate employee, self-employed, and retired; single, partnered, married, and divorced; left-brained, right-brained and combination-brained. So you can imagine, there was lots to say.
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Rasheedah, Jeannie, and a mighty fine box of wine |
Anyway, today, I did not feel I could go back to the Cafe Sucre. So, I wandered the streets
to another place where bonus: I found one of those coffees where you take a sip, and it's just SO good... And I guess I will never know from the fellow at Cafe Sucre, as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story.
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SO good... (that I bought some of the shade-grown beans - from Panama - for my mom's birthday) |
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