I was sitting poolside at Villa Michelle, killing time and Walter called to tell me that he was out front. I've known the guy for two years and I didn't know he had a personal car that he kept in Panama City. Walter's mother was riding shotgun and I took the back seat. The first order of business was for him to go to the National Maritime Authority and meet with his attorney. We arrived at the designated time but his attorney hadn't shown yet so we started the boat search. First we headed off to Diablo, a part of town near the canal formerly serving as housing for the U.S. Army. On the way we passed near Albrook Airport, now an international airport, formerly a U.S. Air Base. After escaping stop an go traffic we entered a road which bisected a huge urban park of raw jungle giving way to well kept, three story houses, with one residence per floor situated on fair sized lots. Office buildings in the neighborhood that at one time housed military administrative personnel were being used for a variety of purposes including university school rooms.
Walter was surprised that there were so few boats for sale near the residences. Presently we entered a large lot beside the canal and saw a lot of junk and a few boats of which one could be proud. At one location a man manufactured pangas, a type of boat extremely common in the entirety of Central America. He was in a 40' x 40' enclosure laying fiberglass in a mold, in the process of manufacturing a 23' panga, a boat frequently used to transport 21 to 30 people between the islands on bench seats. A canopy was $800, he read my raised eyebrows and said, "the canvas is $16 a yard" I looked at the boat and said to Walter, "6 yards, that's 96 bucks, 14 poles, there's another $140 dollars, I guess it costs a hell of a lot to sew." The man kindly explained that 16' to 23' boats are all made using the same mold. A false transom is slid in the mold at the appropriate spot to vary the length of the boat. Foam filled bench seats could be added at a cost of $400. The benefit of these seats is that they take up room, displacing water. in the event of a hull breach, heavy rain or a rogue wave the boat ostensibly won't sink. The physics of this is something any reasonably intelligent grade schooler could handle. Compute the (volume of the seats * the density of water) - (weight of boat + engine + accessories). Any positive number indicates positive bouyancy. Somehow I feel in the ad hoc configuration of these boats this is never computed and many a boat has been dispatched with an erroneously confidant boat captain.
Having killed enough time we returned to the Maritime Authority and took a seat in a pizzeria. After we all ordered Walter received a phone call indicating that his attorney had shown up and disappeared for about 10 minutes to sign the document. He was as clueless as I as to why this couldn't have been handled by power of attorney. For this he flew halfway across the country, granted it's only 300 km or so, but it takes time and money. While he was gone I tried to engage his mother in small talk but we encountered fatal communication problems that made it more trouble than it was worth. We finished lunch and I bought a couple of coffees from the cafe next door. I really just wanted to use their WiFi. I had almost guess their wifi password, I just had the capitalization wrong.
Next we headed off to Centro Marino a place highly recommended by my landlord. I was told this was the most dangerous neighborhood in Panama. It looked like a good part of Detroit. The store looked like a typical boat supply store, disheveled and crammed with sundry, but lacking variety both in types and choices. At the back counter a man proudly offered his business card. Matias Alvarado Asesor de Ventes, a friggin' sales consultant. Excellent, I was told these guys could really help configure a boat. "Can I see where the boats are made?" We went into the back room. I have a feeling that the boat manufacturing shops in Japan were in far better shape immediately following the hurricane. Outboard motors in every stage of disassembly were stacked up to ten feet high. A sullen man sat on the gunwhale of a mold in which he was manufacturing a panga. Other molds were buried under piles of rubble. It is difficult to imagine how much debris must be shuffled every time a different mold is used. I inquired about an 18' panga. My consultant glanced at the sullen man who was inhaling massive quantities of petroleum distillates the man replied with a "No." No, what? I looked at Walter, Walter looked at me, we both looked at our consultant and I said, "Ok, well, I guess there's nothing here then." Now Senior Sullen gave a curt statement in Spanish and it appeared as though the third item on their standard offerings was again available. The prices for accessories and options was far less here than the previous location but questions of engine power and prop pitch were beyond the ken of this consultant. Having started in the job a mere seven years earlier I guess it's not his fault that he didn't know if the boat was provided with anti-fouling paint standard, or if running and anchor lights were provided. Actually he didn't know his ass from a hole in the ground.
I digress...
LITTLE GIRL ON A PLANE
An atheist was seated next to a little girl on an airplane and he turned to her and said, "Do you want to talk? Flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger."
The little girl, who had just started to read her book, replied to the total stranger, "What would you want to talk about?"
"Oh, I don't know," said the atheist, "How about why there is no God, or no Heaven or Hell, or no life after death?" as he smiled smugly.
"OK," she said. "Those could be interesting topics but let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow and a deer all eat the same stuff - grass. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, but a horse produces clumps. Why do you suppose that is?"
The atheist, visibly surprised by the little girl's intelligence, thinks about it and says, "Hmmm, I have no idea."
To which the little girl replies, "Do you really feel qualified to discuss why there is no God, or no Heaven or Hell, or no life after death, when you don't know shit?"
And then she went back to reading her book
This guy didn't know shit either. Does it come with a gas tank? A battery? A battery holder? Cleats?
Next I wanted pictures of boats in different configurations. I was shown a picture of the wallpaper on a clerks computer screen. That's a boat, not anything to do with what I'm looking for but it's a boat. Then the girl flicked through photo album after another at extreme speed, never heading my requests to stop. She started deleting pictures I wanted to see. A hot woman in a bikini on a beach. "Mi gusta, que su vende?" Nope, not an accessory. Once again, you can say stuff like that in Latino land and no one takes offence, hell they'd wonder about your masculinity if you didn't.
So she emailed me a few random pictures
Can I have a captain's chair instead of a bench? Oh, you don't carry chairs? How about a different brand than Mercury? WOW he knew the answer to that one, I could buy another brand elsewhere and they would install it. How much would that cost? Well, the cup of knowledge was empty. We left, I had to go meet with my attorney about my property acquisition anyway.
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