MarkoBoquete

Once again, the parade season is upon us in Boquete. Today was a fabulous day and a good time was had by all. As usual, I have posted some pics from the parade here for your enjoyment. And as I always say, the real stars of these parades are the young women. This is their moment to shine and do they ever! I am always knocked out by the attention to detail and variety in their uniforms and their obvious pride in their presence and beauty. They are truly the future of Panama. For those of you new to Panama, the parades and the Pollera tradition, are a unique cultural heritage of Panama. There are no commercial sponsors or TV news coverage. The people participating in the parades do so for their own gratification and the appreciation of the people lining the route. Their faces tell the story. Enjoy, Mark Heyer

I appreciate the respect and consideration shown by Don Ray and the admins of this site in this discussion. Posting links to another site is I think, perfectly acceptable if a description is provided, which is also enlightened self interest by the poster, who wants to draw readers. I seldom respond to bare links in emails or forums. As a poster, it is very time consuming and difficult to present a quality, well formatted posting across multiple platforms. Every site has an idiosyncratic editor which treats your text and pictures differently. We have seen some disastrous attempts by well meaning people to copy and paste from one forum to another. Much better to just provide a link. Personally, I like to read Don's articles in their "native environment" with all the care and attention he puts into his site. So I hope he will continue to post links with descriptions here at least for important stories. None of the Boquete forums are in fact competitive with each other. Each brings a unique and valuable angle to our discussions. Cross-promoting benefits everyone and widens the audience - or as I recall from a semi-famous former POTUS, a rising tide lifts all boats.

We seem to be in a paroxysm of banning and cross-banning. You can be banned from one site for what you said on another. It's getting really hard to know who is participating and who is banned. Maybe we need a weekly matrix report showing who is in and who is out for each forum.

With all the talk these days of folks getting re-married in Panama, this is a wonderful and beautiful testimony to the fact that you can be married, MANY times in MANY countries without bringing down the international Interpol marriage police. Full story and more great pictures here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3002309/This-couple-travelling-world-MARRIED-places-just-83-days.html

Hilary, I understand and appreciate your comments. T. Rob is never one to mince words. Let me add a little flesh to his comments from working with him over the last five years. You could replace his first paragraph with the statement "Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result." I have been to several of the police/community meetings he organized in and around Coronado. They are well attended on both sides, the officials are ernest and want to be helpful, cards are exchanged - and nothing happens. Rob has pushed the case up the line to the Attorney General and Minister of Tourism in Panama City. I sat in on some of those meetings. Again, lots of happy talk and no action. The problem isn't the individuals involved and nobody should denigrate them or how they do their jobs. The problem is structural and in our opinion does not admit of an easy answer based on lobbying or "pressure" from citizens. What they do respond to, though, is media coverage. That is a direction that needs to be enhanced, although we are out here in the woods. The Chinese would say "The mountains are high and the emperor is far away." In short, our safety is in our own hands and is our own responsibility - Panamanians and expats, as communities and individuals. It is up to each one of us to make sure that we are not vulnerable to the next tragic home invasion and to make sure that our friends are not also. We need to organize to take back our towns. This is the entire message, philosophy and reason for existence of Dr. Sleepwell.

Congratulations to Bud for once again adding to the richness of our Chiriqui information environment. Like any newborn, Chiriqui Life will grow, learn and become a contributor to our community. I can't wait to see how it turns out!