The past 6 months have been a challenge for all of us. Jen and I have been in virtual lockdown since returning from our abbreviated adventure in Israel last March. I have been reluctant to make many blog posts as it seems everything appearing in others posts and on social media has been largely negative. I have never been a fan of spreading negativity here or in any other medias. I never want the unvarnished perspective that I present in my posts and in my book to be mistaken for negativity. Often when we have a negative experience, we prefer to refuse to return for a repeat experience rather than spread hatred of a business or vendor. People often contact us to inquire about something of which we have been vague. The fact that we have been vague about an experience does not necessarily mean the experience was bad. We have been offering endorsements sparingly, because we want to keep our blog honest and raw, allowing our readers to create their own experience. Hopefully, all the readers are sharing our experiences from afar or learning enough to help pave their own path. Today I am going to share with all of you a bit about how we have spent the past 6 months and where the country of Panama is heading as they attempt to reopen the economy here. The next few paragraphs are rooted in my research and come from various sources that I will attempt to give credit as I share.
In a previous post I detailed our experience upon returning from Israel. I will give a brief recap to bring our new readers up to date. While traveling to the Middle East we found no concern for the COVID in the airports other than in our own departure from Panama City where they were doing health checks of all passengers arriving. Our departure was early in March and we did not see any widespread concern until about half way through the first week on the ground in Israel. Nothing about our time in Israel was as we expected. After being told that the tourism industry was closing and that we should plan to leave the country as soon as possible, we began having concerns that we would not be able to return to our home in Panama. As it turned out, we just barely got home before the airport in Panama closed. Other than the numerous cancelled and rescheduled flights, and difficulty finding a restaurant opened in Miami where we had an unplanned overnight layover, the only real appearance of a world-wide pandemic was upon landing in Panama City. We were carefully screened in the airport and sent home for a 14 day quarantine. We were only allowed to leave quarantine to go for groceries or the pharmacy (only 1 of us was allowed to go). Within a few days of our return the entire country was placed under strict quarantine. Gender specific days out of the house with people only allowed out for 2 hours at a time. The time for going out was based on the last number of a persons cedula with foreign residents allowed out based on their passport number. Only people meeting the proper criteria were allowed into a grocery store or pharmacy. All other businesses were closed and any person with a special need to be out during a different time were required to have a special permission from the government which is called a salvo conducto. While none of this was particularly comfortable, we agreed that the restrictions were there to keep us safe from the pandemic. After a few weeks, some restaurants were allowed to open for take-out and delivery. I think the number one income of people in Panama for most of the past 6 months is delivery drivers. The streets have been deserted and traffic concerns dropped to nearly zero.
Fast forward to today…things are starting to re-open. The 2-hour time restrictions ended at the beginning of September. The gender-specific quarantine ended this past Monday with all people being allowed out Monday through Saturday from 5am to 11pm. Only those with a salvo conducto are allowed out on Sunday and from 11pm to 5am. For the past several months we have waited patiently every evening for an update on one of our Facebook groups like the one below. Our friend Karyn Saunders gets the update in Spanish from the Minister of Health, translates it, and posts it to the group. A careful look at the post from yesterday will show just how successful all this lockdown has been for Panama.
September 17th, 2020 UPDATE
104,138 total cases +672 new, 2213 deaths +15 new, 152 ICU, 731 hospitalized, 24,044 active, 77,881 recovered +1094 new, 2.1% death rate,
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- 417,620 total tests, +5355 new, 12.5% positive rate, 9761/100,000
- There are over 218 tracking and tracing teams throughout the country.
- Vice Minister Ivette Berrio and her team paid a visit to the new mask manufacturing company in the Panaparkfree Zone. She is pleased to report the masks follow all the requirements needed for the medical industry (KN95 and surgical). The company is also making other equipment that will be used as PPE.
We are still on course and our numbers are going down. A great sign 4 days into our new found freedom.
Our church has been involved in a very comprehensive process to open back up. Approval has been granted, however we still have a total lockdown on Sundays. We had a service today to test the system for allowing us to reopen. Every person was required to walk across a shoe cleaner, have their temperature taken and recorded along with their cedula number and name (for tracing purposes). Attendees were required to use hand sanitizer every 30 minutes, wear masks, and exercise social distancing. 13 people were in attendance which is a long way from the average of 100 pre virus. Thank you Pastor Jon for the video of the Doxology and the picture of our small gathering.
We will continue to have Sunday service via You Tube and Facebook until things open up a little better. I am still not sure about having services on Friday to conform to the government requirements. People here are starting to feel a little rebellious with the restrictions and I am not sure why it has taken this long. Jen and I are putting it all in God’s hands and accepting that we are guests in this country. The Constitution of Panama guarantees health care to all. They have to keep us all healthy or prepare to take care of us.
Car washes were allowed to open on September 7. That is nice, but I fail to see the importance of this being put above many other things. They allowed the beauty parlors and barber shops to re-open, due to public outrage, a few weeks ago. This was done with huge limitations. Jen got her hair done the other day and her salon has enacted significant price increases.
On September 28th retail stores, restaurants, and portions of the service industry will be allowed to open. National Aviation will resume and National Parks, rivers and beaches will open. Earlier this week my friend Roberto posted a tour of the beaches near our home here on the seco arc. Roberto Hernandez writes a popular blog called The Spartacus Papers on WordPress. Jen and I have had the privileges’ of enjoying most of these beaches and I am sharing the link to his post for your enjoyment Roberto’s beach tour. After you check out the link, please use your back browser to return to the remainder of my post.
International Aviation will resume along with hotels, motels, rural hostels, other accommodations, and tourist activities. Tourism, tours, cultural industries, music and art academies, libraries and swimming pools.
NO date has yet been announced for the remaining which includes schools, colleges, universities, cinemas, theaters, museums, galleries, and closed structure tourist sites. Also remaining closed without an opening date are gyms, casinos, bars, canteens, discotheques, and carnival parades.
At our house we are anxiously awaiting the reopening of the beaches, pools, restaurants and gym. Even in our closed private community, gyms, the country club, and pools have remained closed.
We have had friends who returned to the States to wait out the restrictions. It has been hard to remain in virtual solitary confinement and that is taking a toll on the mental stability of many people. Many parts of the world have far less restrictions but the mental suffering is still a huge concern. For several weeks now we have been having a weekly lunch with 2 other couples. We have rotated the location and cooking responsibilities with an afternoon of dominos following lunch. This has given us a wonderful thing for which to look forward. Our condos have not told us we cannot do it and our friends are all happy to escape solitary confinement once a week as well. In the past, this was possibly against the rules, so I will not disclose the locations, day, or time.
Today our ballots arrived. Pursuant to the Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment Act (MOVE) we requested our ballot be sent to us by e-mail. The email ballot includes instructions for completing and returning the ballot for the upcoming election. We will be required to print and sign the ballot. It must be returned in the pre-addressed, postage paid envelope which was included with the e-mail with instructions for assembly. Our ballot must be delivered to the US Embassy no later than September 24th. They will return it to the States in a diplomatic pouch. From there it will go by mail to our jurisdiction. I learned from a friend in Michigan today that she has received 6 applications for an absentee ballot in her mailbox which she never requested. I hope that this does not cause voter fraud. Every legitimate vote counts; once you move to a foreign country, make sure you continue to vote.
When I started writing this blog post I was unsure if I had enough content. There are actually several other points that I wanted to make. I will save these for another time. Thank you for the overwhelming support of my book. If you are among those who have read it, please go Amazon or Good Reads to leave a review. That helps others find it on search engines. If you have not yet picked up the book please go to Kindle or Amazon to get a copy today. Kindle Unlimited readers get it free. As always, like and share my blog to help me build the reader base. I am considering publishing a newsletter once we have the readers to support it.
Marc Vargas
Blessings from Panama,
Greg and Jen
