Maybe we fiind what we are looking for after all

Today was a day of encounters. At the bus stop this morning two young women showed up, both Americans. One of them is here doing an internehip with the Smithsonian, which has a facility in this town and seemingly every area of Panama. She told me she is working on a bat study. I had always thought all bats were blind, or nearly so. However, the type of bat they are studying goes after larger prey-namely a type of frog, and with the larger prey they need sight in addition to the sonar and other sensory devises they have, and these bats can see. They also monitor the mating sounds of the particular frog they hunt, and can use their powerful and finely tuned sonar to pinpoint the frog’s location. Meanwhile, the man waiting on my other side looked at me and smiled after we watched a mango drop from a tree and roll down the street toward us. Another chicken bus but this time the local science population clearly changed the composition of the riders, nearly all either somehow involved in science, or headed to the locks. Funny how that changed the experience. I'm in shorts and flip flops, body greased with sunscreen and bug spray, the wind blowing through all the windows of the bus, and I find myself at peace in this moment and this place. I know it is transitory, but it's sweet nevertheless. I arrived at the locks in time to see two large ships pass through, which was fascinating, amazing- and then nothing to see at all. So I decided to head for the Causeway. I had planned to walk out to the street and catch a bus but as I headed that way a van taxi pulled up beside me and we negotiated a fare. Through the next half hour ride, I karate chopped my way through words, phrases and even whole sentences in Spanish with the driver. He suggested we rent a bicycle for two once he knew where I was going-ha! I’m fairly certain he was just entertaining himself. At any rate, we had a pleasant conversation and I was delighted to have even a stunted conversation in Spanish that went beyond destinations, prices and food and he was very patient. And by that point in the day, the air conditioned ride was welcome. We did reach an impasse a time or two when I could not figure out what he was asking me, or how to say what I wanted to say. I met Louise at the bus station later in the afternoon. She is a retired school teacher, 83 years old and spoke very good English, having grown up in the Canal District with her dad working in the tunnels of the Miraflores Locks. She said that when she was in school, the US provided free education to the children of the canal workers, in English. More conversation with a young couple waiting for the same bus, and then this evening a Canadian family group was at dinner. We talked about everything from best places to dive (I contributed absolutely nothing to this topic), to treatment of cow manure to make potable water, to our travels in Panama. I can’t really do them justice. They are clearly more worldly and sophisticated than I would have expected, which is an indictment of my thought processes more than anything. It was a husband and wife, one of their five children who is mid-university, the wife’s dad and an uncle. An odd configuration for a traveling group but it seemed to work. In the end, I am reminded that regardless of who they are, or how they are, I bring myself to each encounter too.