Yel Kaye - Travel Blog, Writing and Photography » Panama

Kuna Yala

Caitlin — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 19:22:17 +0000

Kuna Yala, otherwise known as San Blas, must be one of the world’s most intensely relaxing places. The moment I stepped off the plane, my shoulders lost their typical hunch, my legs relaxed, and I breathed more deeply. Lying in a hammock on the deck of the Hotel San Blas, there was nothing to think about but the sound of the waves. Walking through the maze-like village of Nalunega, only to reach the other side after three minutes, I wondered how any place could be so calm.

I realized that I had not felt so peaceful since being in Sapone, since the nights I’d spend lying on a bench, staring at the stars, and marveling at the quiet. I started to think that I needed to be “away” to find calm. After all, the only similarities between Nalunega and Sapone (asides from the slow pace of village life) is that in both places I was entirely out of my element, almost as if I was totally far away from myself. Maybe this is why I’ve become a bit of a “travel junkie” – I only seem to have any inner peace when I am separated from everything familiar.

I was only on Nalunega for two nights, so I don’t really know about the social fabric of the Kuna, so I don’t want to make any grand, sweeping generalizations. The only real sense that I got was that the people felt intrinsically connected to the islands, and were content and proud of who they were. This is not to say that I didn’t notice hints of problems, especially of gender imbalances and alcohol problems, but I don’t want to comment on something I have no real knowledge of. All I know is that the people on the islands contributed greatly to the peace that I felt.

From Panama, to Toronto, to Ottawa

Caitlin — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 01:47:33 +0000

I finished traveling, returned to Toronto, packed up my life, moved to Ottawa, and started grad school. I think that I’m now starting to settle in, which will hopefully mean a return to consistent blogging. What is grad school for, but to come up with projects to distract from reading, writing, and marking first-year papers?

Panama was lovely, though as predicted it could never capture my heart in the same way as Burkina Faso. However, I was pleasantly surprised at how mellow and easy it can be to travel in Central America. I was not exactly in the “photography mood” that usually characterizes my travels, so I don’t have oodles of pictures that excite and inspire me.

Upon a few occasions, though, I was so caught up in my aesthetic surroundings that I took some lovely shots. The biggest of these occasions was my short stay on the Nalunega in the San Blas islands, part of the semi-autonomous territory of the Kuna people. The beauty of the islands was so overwhelming, so sharp and so surreal that I actually found myself giggling hysterically or wanting to cry at different moments.

To start off, here are a few photographs that show the landscape. I need to actually write about the people which I’ll leave for a later time, but I think that these images speak for themselves.

A man, a plan, a canal

Caitlin — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 20:08:46 +0000

I am in Boquete, in the Chiquiri province of Panama. I´m not too keen on spending much time on the internet while I´m here, but it pours every afternoon and an internet cafe is a good place to hide from the rain. The weather here is not actually as bad as I was expecting. It does rain in the afternoon, but only for an hour or two, and the mornings are sunny. (Well, I am generalizing based on two days in Panama, but whatever.)

My plane was delayed for 5 hours in San Jose, so I spent 11 hours in the airport. The only dining options there are Poppa John´s pizza and burger king, and when our place was late, the airline brought us some delicious Costa Rican food from… Denny´s. From what I saw in the airport, I am happy that I decided to come to Panama and not to Costa Rica. I got into Panama City at 3AM, went straight to my hotel, and passed out. Yesterday I spent the day on the bus (8 hours) to David city, where I checked into the Purple House Hostel and went out for dinner with a nice Canadian guy from Ottawa.

Already I´m being pretty careless about eating and drinking. The water is (according to all guidebooks) treated and safe to drink outside of Bocas del Toro, so I´ve been drinking straight from the tap. But I´ve been eating street food and last night I had a blended strawberry slushie. In other words, a rousing game of ¨how long till I get diarrhea. I´ve convinced myself that I have bowels of steel since going to Africa, but hopefully I don´t wake up tomorrow realizing otherwise.

So far Panama has been beautiful and a nice place to travel. But it´s hard for me to say for sure yet, since I spent most of yesterday sleeping on the bus to recover from the long trip from Canada. I am now in Boquete, which is a town in the highlands above David. The trip up here was awesome – it was in a schoolbus, music was blaring and we were going SO FAST. Boquete is a little too developed for my taste (it reminds me of Jasper in Alberta) but the climate is cool, the scenery is gorgeous, and accommodation is cheap. There´s also a lot of nice hiking and other activities to do in the area. I´m meeting my friend John from Queen´s in about an hour (hopefully) and I am excited to have someone to go on adventures with.

Hasta Luego.