Panama, the Center of the Americas

We had never met anyone in the United States from Panama and that piqued our interest to go there. We’d be assured of hot weather when everyone in Chicago was suffering in the Polar Vortex. We’d heard about Coronado Beach and besides, the Panama Canal is a wonder of the world, an engineering feat fascinating to see.

We arrived in Panama on February 4^th in time to avoid a lot of horrendous Chicago weather and to enjoy Panama’s dry season. Cruising the Canal is a must. Standing in the middle of the Americas, the Canal has changed the history of our hemisphere connecting us all in many ways. It’s advisable to book a boat cruise on the Panama Canal on-line before you go there. You won’t want to miss it.

The histories of Panama and the United States and the rest of the Americas are intertwined because of the Canal. The day before going on the Panama Canal cruise, we visited the Museum of the Panama Canal in Casco Viejo. This museum rolls out the history of the Canal from the beginnings of its construction to the United States’ handing control of it to Panama. Captions are in both Spanish and English. 

The Canal was built by the United States and until 1999, was controlled by it. Because the area around the Canal - the Canal Zone - was also controlled by the United States, our influence is felt there even now in much larger proportion than in other parts of Central America. For a long time, the Panamanians, viewing U.S. control of the Canal Zone as colonialism, had demanded that the Canal and the Canal Zone be handed back to them. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter and Omar Torrijos, then President of Panama, negotiated the return of the Canal to Panama to be final in 1999.

Since the return of the Canal to Panama, Panama City has boomed, growing exponentially into one of over a million people with no apparent thought to urban planning. The income inequality is blatant. Yet,this city’s mushrooming in just over twenty years’ time is fascinating to see. The car traffic is impossible. Many high rises loom leaving little room for green space. 

Many North Americans go there because it has modern conveniences and infrastructure. Their WIFI connections are great. You can drink the water. And violent crime is at a minimum. Their subway system is new and immaculate. I have to add that the people who ride it are extremely courteous offering both of us seats every time they saw us standing.

American chain stores and megamalls that put the Mall of America in Minneapolis to shame abound there. At the Albrook Mall, one can see every American chain store and fast food restaurant imaginable. While it’s debatable whether or not this is the aspect of our culture we want to export, it’s there for better or worse. Since it’s so hot in Panama City – usually in the 90’s Fahrenheit with high humidity, we went there a few times to be in air-conditioning, to walk, and to meet friends for lunch or to get buses to other parts of Panama. While the influence of America is there, you can still see many women dressed in traditional indigenous garb going there to shop. I found these contradictions fascinating.

Try Panama. It stands at the center of the Americas and as such has always been a crossroads. It’s a great place to start any exploration of the our hemisphere.

Montgomery, Alabama - The Last Stop of Our Trip and the First Step on our Way Home

The first Civil Rights protest that I was aware of was the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1956. I was eight years old when this event took place. It would be surprising except that it was extremely powerful seeing an entire community walking, carpooling, and taking cabs demanding that Jim Crow bus laws be ended. That the community sustained that effort for a year is something I’ll remember forever.  Thus when we were invited by Pat Thornton at the Southern Poverty Law Center to tour their offices in Montgomery, I got the goose pimples. It’s hard to believe that 63 years have gone by since Rosa Parks’ arrest for refusing to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. It’s even more surprising how few people remember or are aware of that pivotal moment that galvanized the Civil Rights Movement.

the view from the windows of the SPLC offices

We arrived in Montgomery in early March at the end of a long trip to points south. The Southern Poverty Law Center, founded by Morris Dees, Julian Bond, Joe Levin, and Joseph J Levin Jr in 1971, was our first stop there. Its mission is to provide legal services and advocacy to insure the rights of all vulnerable groups in the United States. Their legal division takes mostly class action - ones that will the protect rights of people in vulnerable groups. Defending the rights of racial minorities, religious minorities, immigrants, the disabled, the LGBTQ community, they stand as a buffer between all of us and those forces that seek to eradicate all the progress that has been made since the 1950’s.

We toured their floor where diligent people monitor the proliferation of on-line hate groups that have mushroomed since November, 2016. We also saw their program Teaching Tolerance which provides educational resources and materials for educators. Most of the material is free to teachers. Their resources that teach tolerance for every grade level can be used to teach core curriculum. Every teacher would be wise to request this information. They can inquire about it at the SPLC’s website https://www.splcenter.org.

After touring the SPLC offices, we went across the street to the new civil rights memorial. This powerful memorial pays tribute to all the people who lost their lives advocating for equal rights. At the beginning of the exhibit, is a short video talking about all the sacrifices. A class of fourth grade students was there watching this video with us and we were glad to know that this history is taught to all fourth graders in Alabama.

posters seen at the Civil Rights Memorial

On our way out of the museum, we talked to people working in the gift shop and asked if things were still better than before. One woman assured us that it is. “It’s much better than the way it was for my parents,” she said. “We have a black police chief, sheriff, and fire chief.”

I only hope that they can hold on to progress made. To give ourselves inspiration, we went around the corner to The Dexter Avenue Memorial Baptist Church where Martin Luther King led much of the Civil Rights Movement.

Dexter Avenue Memorial Baptist Church

There is still so much work left to do and this stop was a great one to make on our way home to Chicago from South Florida. Ready to resume taking part in efforts to create a just society, this was the perfect last stop on our way home.

The work of the SPLC is more urgent now than ever. If you would like to donate money to them, you can check out their website https://www.splcenter.org.