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Thurston
Get Blog Posts As EmailsMy long burning desire to learn Spanish is finally on the top list of things to do in the next year, hopefully enrolling in some night classes will provide for a good start! But what is this? “Wapin”? According to Panama 980 magazine, this is a Panamanian slang for “WHAT’S HAPPENING” or “wapin mi fren”? [...]
Panamanian Slang
August 19th, 2010 by ManyaPanama = Happy
July 21st, 2010 by FrancesWhen we chose Isla Palenque for the site of our island resort community, one of the many reasons was that Panama’s laid back lifestyle creates an ideal atmosphere in which to live, retire or vacation. Now that experience has been quantified by Gallup. Gallup polled thousands of people in 155 countries from 2005 to 2009. [...]
Chacara Bags from the Ngobe-Bugle of Panama
July 20th, 2010 by ManyaChacara bags are woven from the fiber of the wild pineapple plant (Aechmea magdalenae). The Ngobe-Bugle use these bags for transporting everything from babies to market goods on the mountainous trails of their tribal homeland in western Panama. Residents of Isla Palenque can visit a Ngobe Bugle village less than an hour’s drive from our [...]
The Red Devils
July 13th, 2010 by ManyaSurely the “academia” version of art education provides students with a good base of art appreciation. But what I really missed was a “real life” art appreciation class on graffiti. At a number of occasions I have heard about the graffiti buses in Panama City, but never took a closer look until today. AMAZING! In [...]
Palenque CD
June 30th, 2010 by BenActually, it’s better than that: the CD is actually entitled “Palenque Palenque!” Released earlier this month by Soundway Records, that English label which has also released three CDs of obscure Panamanian music from the 60s and 70s (blogged about here and here), “Palenque Palenque: Champeta Criolla & Afro Roots in Colombia 1975-91″ continues Soundway’s exploration [...]
Kiplinger’s Two Cents on Retiring to Panama
June 29th, 2010 by FrancesPosted on yesterday’s Washington Post website, and written by associate editor of Kiplinger’s personal finance section Laura Cohn, is yet another article extolling the financial benefits of retiring to Panama. That puts the Post and Kiplinger’s in good company with Business Week, The New York Times, SmartMoney, TheStreet, Forbes, and many others. Why all the [...]
The Ngobe Language
June 21st, 2010 by ManyaThe Ngobe people maintain their own language, though the majority of the time they speak Spanish. Here are a few examples of it: (Please note that these are only phoenetic spellings). yantera dego – good morning coing – gracias gwa – fish bron huve – let’s go nukuro -dog nu – water atwai dederre – [...]
Recipe: A Savory Panamanian Salsa
May 19th, 2010 by FrancesWhenever I have great tomatoes from the garden I make a simple salsa. You know the kind: tomatoes, onion, peppers, cilantro…it’s ubiquitous. But it’s too early for good tomatoes this chilly May, and in my search for a salsa substitute I learned about Panamanian refrito. Refrito (or “rehash” or “refried” in English) is a Panamanian [...]
Isla Palenque Music, Part 2
May 13th, 2010 by Ben(For background, find Part 1 here.) Despite my words in the previous post about a globalized world and ersatz simulacra, there is definitely some Panamanian music that should be included in our mix. And while Panama has a healthy reggaeton scene (in fact, it was arguably invented in Panama), it’s not quite our vibe and [...]
Isla Palenque Music, Part 1
May 12th, 2010 by BenWith the gradual opening of the sales office over the last few months, we needed to address the issue of background music. Since I’m a music nerd (over 2000 albums on my ipod, and a few hundred more I’ve listened to through Rhapsody – I’m not bragging so much as admitting an addiction ), I [...]