Panama's Carnaval 2010 and the Morning After

Living a block away from Panama's Carnaval has given me a new insight into this annual ritual of coronation of queens combined with music, dancing, and drinking. To be sure I attended Carnaval and had a good time. Also, every day during Carnaval, I walked down to the closest cyclone fence and police checkpoint, showed my ID, got patted down, and walked down the confetti littered street to El Rey for veggies, bread, arepa (we are really a Colombian household), meat, and milk. Each morning the confetti covering Via España reminded me of a dry Midwestern winter with wisps of snow tracing moving patterns along the asphalt of a small town main street. Then I would notice the palm tree next to Panafoto and the spell would be broken.      

This is the sort of image of Carnaval we see on television, folks having a great time in the sun in one of Panama's towns in the interior. The only thing missing in my old photo is a fire truck and the firemen spraying everyone crowed into the town square. Of course the beer stand is in a prominent location.

The nice part about going somewhere else for Carnaval is that you can leave after you have had your fill of treats, seen all that you want to see, or are, frankly a little tipsy and concerned about falling down next to the two drunks whom someone has throughtfully pulled to the side and propped against the wall. It has been a year since I avoided demasiado ceveza and escaped the embarassment of sleeping it off next to two gentlemen propped up along the wall so I decided to chance another visit to Carnaval this year in the city.

The nice part of having Carnaval in your back yard, so to speak, as that it is a short walk down the street to get into the fenced enclosure on the old Spanish Way where the crowd is shouting ARRIBA as they fling their hands in the air to the sound of accordion music, an energetic male singer and a very pretty girl whose main job appears to be to look pretty while she jiggles, her tambourine

When we walked down to Carnaval the first night I was under the impression that there were just too many beer stands extending from the bank parking lot across from Iglesia del Carmen all the way down to where Via España meets Via Brazil. Boy, was I wrong! Each night the crowds got progressively more dense - concentrated because of great numbers in a small space, and perhaps a little stupified by the sheer amount of beer available and consumed. What I did not see were any guys propped up against a wall. On the other hand we did not ever stay past midnight or 1 am and I know that the party didn't stop each night until at least 3 am to 5 am depending upon the night.

 How would I know the party didn't stop if I went home? I live a block off Via España and our back balcony faces the street. To hear ARRIBA! and dance to the accordian music we never really had to leave the privacy of our own home. Considering that cerveza is readily available at the tienda on our block we were pretty well set to enjoy Carnaval without going out our front door. But then we would have missed the people watching.

 Anyway, Carnaval was fun. It is over, at last. And, now I see why there were all those nature trips listed in the events sections of the various local papers and why they all coincided with Carnaval.

 Maybe next year we will invest in binoculars and go bird watching