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While the east coast of the Azuero Peninsula may be dotted with fancy developments and new airports, characterized by excitement and chaos, the western coast offers this brilliant sense of calm and homey feeling. The feeling of exploring this coast is that of taking life full-on: I might as well have snacked on freshly-killed polar bear or rented a back room from a native Indian. I was really living.
Siamese Trees: One of the weirdest trees I've ever seen. It looked like someone had bred it specifically so that they could show their friends. Someone religious or someone who just read the Da Vinci Code might say it is nature's representation of the blade and chalice, but I just think it's cool.
This old man was a hoot. He sat there admiring the beach in these old wound-up sandals holding some sort of potato sack. The funny part is that he was so concentrated on something else, that he never even looked at me taking this photo. Hell, I doubt he even knew what a camera was. He was a really pleasant old man, happy as can be, and when asked how old he was, he smirked and said “243”.
One of the cooler panga fishing boats I've seen. It reeked of newly-caught sea bass and showed its age, having traveled out to Cebaco Island (in the background) more than it's fair share. It's owners had rigged up a lighting system on board so, I'm assuming, they could play Scrabble or scale fish in the dark. Pretty close to my dream job.
A horse had encroached into this little pup's space. After numerous barking attempts to get rid of the old steed, the dog decided just to sit there and make sure nothing crazy happened.
Living by the sea is so peaceful. This family would work, play, and sleep by the lapping waves of the Pacific, hardly aware of the congestion and commotion going on in the city just an hour and a half away. They smoked meats using the salty ocean breeze, played soccer with random sticks as goals, and slept in hammocks with mountains and jungle behind, and an endless horizon of sea ahead.
This little boy was struggling mightily to push his bike slash wheelbarrow up the hill. He looked at me several times as if to ask, hey gringo, how about some help here? In the large buckets in the back was cement, used to create what some day would be a house for his family.
This man was making cinder blocks to build a house. He would shovel up a large heap of gravel-looking cement, then slap it into a steel mold. After tapping it firmly, then packing in more, he would slam it onto the ground. What would be left behind was a cement block that'd need water and sun to solidify and be ready for sale: $0.10 each. He could make about 240 per day. “That's great” I told him. “I usually do about 260-265”.
A typical coastline on the Azuero Peninsula. This jagged coast is in Malena on the Western coast of the peninsula, and is about as pristine as it gets. I love how, at the time, there was this faint mist rising above the tide forming this mysterious and calming steam that would then rise up into the mountains.
Wandering into some hidden jungle canopy, I came upon this gravesite. It was in the family's backyard and the unfortunate person was their young baby daughter Ilalia. The flowers appeared to be picked fresh, an honor they would practice every day. Just beyond the memorial was the ocean waves rushing up and then fading back down. Ilalia lay beneath the canopy of a mango tree and her body was marked by a small mound of smooth sea stones and two large wooden sticks in the shape of a “V”.
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