Bienvenido A Panama

Welcome to Panama!
At the moment I am playing a lovely game of "Mo-naw-polia" con una chiquita.

But lets start from the beginning. I'm already struggling. No one in customs spoke English, and somehow they let me into the country. I proceeded to the exterior of the airport and to my surprise found NO ONE waiting for me. I looked everywhere and none of the signs had my name on it. So like the lost little white girl that I am, I wandered around, tried to buy a SM card, almost got hustled, and then continued to wander brainstorming what I was supposed to do if no one showed up. And then, to my relief, a friendly man came up to me and said, "Hediyeh?" and I said, "Si?" and he said, "Allah-u-Apha!" (phew!) And so my adventure began! To my advantage he spoke broken English and we were able to talk during our ride up to the Temple. Let me paint you picture, its about 83 degrees and its very humid. However not as bad as everyone made it seem. Its definitely bearable. So we hop in the car and start driving, about 10 miles...took 2 hrs! Literally. There are only two main highways in the province of Panama, Panama Norte y Panama Sur. With two lanes each...which makes traffic unbelievable. Basically no one adheres to any rules. Its survival of the craziest driver and for me it was pretty entertaining because its simply the culture and everyone knows how to deal with it. They also have public transportation...the infamous Diablo Rojos! They're simply school buses that have been made into a club on the inside and out. At night they have flashing lights and music blasting out of them, and the passengers cram into the bus and often hang on for dear life because its so crowded the doors to the buses don't close.
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But alas we arrived at El Templo Bahai, and my was it a beautiful site. I was dropped off at the home of a young women I had been in correspondence with, she also lives on the Temple grounds with her little Moosh of a daughter. But when I arrived she was no where to be seen and I was left with her daughter and her daughters babysitter. Neither of which spoke any English. Yet the culture of Panamanians became clear at this moment, the little girl was so eager to play with me, and although I didn't understand a word she was saying she slowed down her speech and kept me busy until her mother arrived.When her mother arrived, she showed me to my room.
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I closed the door to hang up a jacket and saw a lizard on the door, it was soooo tiny though I didn't even stop to think it was real. But when I came back later it was gone. Hah! Anyways, you were all in my thoughts and prayers this morning at the Temple. I had it all to myself :)
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Although I'm still not sure what I'm doing here, I'm trying to make the most of being in this gorgeous country!