Whirlwind Heroine

My Heroine

Sharp readers of Frail Deeds will realize I haven’t been on the blog for a few days now. My daughter was worried enough at my silence that she sent me a text questioning my whereabouts. I will try to summarize what has been an absolute tornado of activity over the intervening days since I was last on Frail Deeds but the overwhelming theme will be the emergence of my Favorite Panamanian as a Valkyrie like heroine in my ongoing battle with the Panamanian bureaucracy. Her gab really was a gift, heaven sent.

Family Gathering Second Night in Panama City

I last left you with the news that I’d be traveling back to David from our beach condo in the hopes we’d get some sort of message on the impending interview with the immigration ministry – a key, almost final, step in the whole godawful process of obtaining residency status. We’d thought the interview would be in a couple months and require another trip to Panama to complete but our lawyer made some calls last week and said there was a chance we could get the call this week. Falling back on my heretofore experience with the process I thought there was a better chance of a snowstorm in Las Lajas (never below 80 degrees) than that happening.

Dinner First Night
The Unfortunately Named Place Next to Hooters is the Panamanian Equivalent of Home Depot
For Those of You Who Immediately Leapt to Conclusions

At any rate we abandoned our paradisiacal basecamp and returned to my mother in law’s house in David. On our way back I got to meet one of the Panamanian national police officers in charge of traffic enforcement. The Inter-American Highway is a now a beautiful four lane superhighway but the speed limit is 80 kilometers per hour which roughly translates to about 50 miles per hour – in other words – exceedingly slow. I was cruising along at 90KPH and had dozens of energetic Panamanian drivers pass me like I was standing still. I came around a bend in the road and was signaled over by my newest friend. He was in the process of writing me a ticket when my wife got out of the car and walked back to talk with him. A little while later he called me back, handed me my license and told me to take it easy. My wife’s patter had been successful, that or he just wanted to get rid of us. I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth and took off at a stately 80KPH. First instance of my wife’s “gift” saving us.

Boarding the Plane at Albrook

My wife disappeared shortly after we arrived in David and I labored on my big family tree project which my daughter has been an immense help with by translating PDFs into copy and pastable text documents for me. My wife returned about three in the afternoon and we went car shopping. We need a car for our extended times in Panamá since the rental car costs are skyrocketing. We will use the money we got from the sale of our land to buy the car. We were sitting down with a dealer just having reached consensus on the RAV4 we’ll pick up in January when my sister in law rushed into the dealership.

Cerro Ancon - A well Remembered Panama City Landmark

Our lawyer had called the house to tell us the needed immigration interview was on for the next morning. In Panama City. In other words, at the other end of the country from where we were. We rushed out of the dealership and my sister in law careened through the streets of David to the Air Panama office where we got two seats on the flight to Panama City that was leaving in 45 minutes. Another few careening turns through traffic had us on the plane and in Panama City about 45 minutes alter.

Wife's Visit to Aunt - A Fortuitous Delay

In the ensuing time the Panama City Branch of the family was alerted and mobilized to help out. My other sister in law was waiting for us at the Albrook Airport. This was the first time I’d ever flown Air Panama and it provides great, very easy service to the Albrook Airport which is right in the middle of the city in the old air force base where I first met my Favorite Panamanian. There is also a huge shopping mall there which is where we headed next since my wife’s overzealous washing of my lone pair of dress pants had resulted in some debilitating damage to said trousers. We found a suitable replacement pair and then cast about for a place to eat.

Flying Over Pacific End of Panama Canal

Being the hyper-vigilant person that I am I noticed that a well-known American landmark was right next to where we parked. When I suggested we eat at Hooters I didn’t receive the expected bash about the head and shoulders. I buttressed my opinion by extolling the virtues of Hooters chicken wings. I’ve written before, somewhat eloquently, about the pervasive, abundant beauty of Panamanian women. Combining that aspect with Hooters is almost unfair. I was stunned and had to be extremely vigilant in keeping my eyes at eye level contact only. The wings were every bit as good as hoped for but I had two extremely vigilant Panamanian women monitoring my eye level for the entire meal.

The Booths Outside the Ministry

We spent the night at my sister in law’s place and my wife’s uncle picked us up for breakfast and then the whole reason for our trip when he dropped us off at the nearby Immigration Ministry. Walking into that building brought back some less than fond memories of my first trip there a couple years ago when we started the whole residency process. The place was jam packed with seemingly endless lines of people (mostly Venezuelan) waiting for their turn at literally dozens of windows. We figured out where we needed to be and found our 9am appointment was only a manner of speech. We were finally ushered in around 1100am. The interview was pretty straight forward but the young Panamanian I was speaking with was virtually incoherent. Even my wife had a very hard time understanding him through his fast patter and tendency to mumble. Spanish is hard enough for this gringo without this added challenge.

This Guy Really Wanted his Picture Taken So I Obliged 

I finally had to ask him to speak slowly since I was completely baffled at some of his statements and I needed to pass this interview. I think the guy has a rep around the office because a couple of the ladies our lawyer had spoken to stopped by a couple times to help out. We finally finished both sides of the interview and after two years and four separate interviews I think have finally convinced the Panamanian Immigration Ministry that my wife and I are in fact, married. Our next task was to obtain a “visa multiple” which I need since I’m not supposed to leave the country while this whole process is underway. Obviously that is impossible so I needed to get this visa, once I completed the interview, at least that’s what our lawyer promised. If I didn’t get it I would be liable for a $2000 fine every time I left the country.

Meanwhile - Back Home

We waited in a few more lines in the same building and finally met up with visa multiple guy who’s first question was, “Where’s your lawyer?”. That turned out to be a very good question because she was about 400 nautical miles as the crow flies from our location. She didn’t realize her presence was required. The tired bureaucrat said we needed to fill out some new forms, print out a copy of our tramite (whatever the hell that is), and a copy of our lawyer’s credentials.

A helpful fellow sufferer of the process directed us outside to a series of makeshift booths set up outside the ministry that sold fast food and had a series of copy machines and computer access points. Capitalism at its absolute finest as they were doing brisk business with my fellow process sufferers. We walked up and asked about the tramite and were shortly in possession of one. Our lawyer tried to email us a copy of her credentials to the same location but she’s either completely computer illiterate (my guess) or didn’t possess sufficient bandwidth to make the transaction. We were waiting under the corrugated tin roof of the booth for the email during the usual afternoon monsoon rain poured down while the clock ticked down to the closing of the immigration office. My wife finally told the lawyer over the phone to cease work and that she was going to handle it.

My Favorite Panamanian charged through the rain and down the stairs to the unsuspecting bureaucrat who in short order had no idea what hit him. I will say, with no fear of contradiction from anybody who knows her, that my wife is singularly blessed with ability to talk. She is never at a loss for words as I know better than anyone on God’s green earth. She thrust the paperwork we did have and then went into a litany of all the hoops we’d been forced to jump through to get to this point only to be thwarted by a change in the process no one seemed to know about. She pleaded for his understanding and in a move that I’m sure will keep him out of the cold hearted bureaucrats’ hall of fame he acquiesced and agreed to process my visa. I was stunned. Second instance of my wife’s “gift” saving us.

BRS Discovering A Pinata

We were told it would take 24-48 hours to get the needed visa stamped on my passport and we should return Thursday afternoon on the off chance it might be ready. Remember I had to fly back to the United States from David on Saturday. Still we counted this as a win although I was a little concerned seeing my passport disappear into the nether regions of the ministry. We decided to celebrate by taking the Panama City branch of the family out to  a sports bar for dinner and beer. We walked in to find the Red Sox – Yankees game playing on several large screens and a huge section of well garbed Red Sox fans dominating one whole side of the restaurant. They only had one cause to cheer all night as the Sox got their collective butts handed to them and that was when this group’s picture flashed up on the screen on the Latin American broadcast of the game. It was kind of surreal but also very cool. The family did their usual thing of non-stop laughter and it was a great way to end what had been an extremely trying day.

Daddy Daughter Day Scooter Time for FBR

Thursday morning my wife’s uncle took us out to breakfast and then all the way across town to visit my wife’s 95 year old aunt. My wife had promised her a visit the next time we were in Panama City and couldn’t be talked out of it. The delay turned out to be a godsend since this delayed our trip back to the immigration ministry, more on that in a bit. After wading through the immense traffic snarl that is modern day Panama City we skulked back to the waiting area for our number to be called. An hour later our number was up and the lady that attended us said the passport wasn’t ready yet. This was when my very talkative better half once again distinguished herself with outstanding gallantry on the field of bureaucratic strife.

She engaged with this lady for about five minutes explaining our plight and asked if there was anything she could do. The lady admitting to hearing my wife’s diatribe a day earlier and was sympathetic. My wife noticed a freshly delivered stack of paperwork behind the lady and asked her to look there in a forlorn hope. Since she was already close friends with my wife (her secret super-power) she agreed and excitedly turned up my passport (which wouldn’t have been there if we hadn’t been delayed). My wife squealed in delight and they would have hugged each other if there hadn’t been a glass partition separating them. We walked out of the ministry with my visa stamped passport in enough time to catch the last flight back to David (Air Panama again). Third instance of my wife’s “gift” saving us.

This Looks Edible

I cannot begin to extol my wife’s contributions enough over the past few days. Motorcycle cops and cold hearted bureaucrats were no match for her impassioned defense of me. When I tell her how proud I am of her she demurs and says I should be thanking God because it was His doing not hers. You’ll forgive me if I disagree. My wife is that rare combination of spirit and passion that is impossible to ignore and makes people want to help her because they automatically like her. I am so proud of her.

Shortly after we returned to David we were driving through a mesmerizing thunder storm back to the condo to shut it down until the next time we take up residence. We’ll head back to David in the morning and I’m going to have to find some way to properly recognize my wife’s heroism over the past couple days, shopping will probably be involved. This will be my last post from Panama as we catch an early Saturday morning flight back home to find out what’s happened in our lives during the past few weeks back there.

If I hadn’t been shanghaied to Panama City for past few days I would have written about the astounding BRS. We were talking with her on Tuesday night and our son showed how quickly she’s taken up crawling. She immediately started crawling towards her collection of books, a family trait. She astounded both her father and her distant grandparents when she crawled up to her father and then used him to rise to her feet, standing as if it was no big thing. She’s probably taking from her overachieving parents and is going to skip the whole crawling phase and move directly to walking. My son sent the accompanying picture from Day Care where they had photo day. He joked that the BRS apparently thought she was being arrested and this was her mug shot.

Mug Shot

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RECURRING CHARACTERS

BRS - Blog Reader the Sequel - second granddaughter; FBR - First Blog Reader - first granddaughter, ABFA – Amazing Best Family Athlete = my daughter in law, formerly known both as MEF – Most Excellent Fiancé & MEG – Most Excellent Girlfriend; Wingman – my son in law; Keene Friends 1 & 2 – friends since high school from my home town of Keene, NH; Soxfather - my brother in law; Great Aunt = my elder sister; Cantankerous Friend – friend since grade school who likes to argue about everything, poses as radical leftist to attract women; Pittsburgh College Roommate – high school friend, also a “minor Celebrity” in Pittsburgh; Deckzilla – our backyard deck which grew to monstrous dimensions once my wife got invole din planning; Maine and Virginia Musqueteras – two close friends of my wife – her US sisters, my wife is the 3^rdmusquetera (musketeer); Buddy – AKA the Wonder Pooch – family dog, a black lab – hates squirrels, died in 2017; Riggins - also known as the Grandpuppy, son's dog, surrogate grandchild while awaiting arrival of the BRS; PanaGals – female relatives/friends of my wife from Panama; Panamanian/Latin Mafia – inevitable group of Latin friends my wife accumulates wherever we have lived & their spouses; Neighborhood Mafioso - wife's close friend and Panamanian mafia member, Favorite Panamanian - the wife (of course); First Friday – celebrations to mark the First Friday of the Week; Excellent Boss – my former direct boss at work; Voices of Inappropriate Worth - members of public who come to every Worcester public meeting to complain, all are on public assistance along with demeanor issues