Road Warriors in Panama

I was in Panama City, Panama, it was Monday morning and the journey to Colon, not colon but Colón had begun. We knew that the Corridor Norte was to lead us to the Free Trade Zone and we could begin work on the reason for our journey. Driving: in many areas throughout the world we know of it as transportation, a point “A” to point “B” kind of thing. Well, in Panama that’s true but it’s also the most awesome video game ever!

Seeing the green army men, two to a motorcycle with machine gun in hand mixed with a hint of slightly paved roads meandering through the tropical rainforest with wandering children and animals dotting the view, the settings were all on Advanced. There were no Beginner or Intermediate levels in this game.

Each car in Panama must have seen over a million accidents that week as they all looked like small versions of the demolition derby cars I would go watch every summer at our county fair. There were no lanes painted onto the road on about 80% of the streets and I guess in Spanish that translates into 6-8 cars wide per 2 lane sized road. Every driver in Panama is instructed that if they don’t get ahead of you while driving they are sentenced to life in prison. Nobody wants to rot in jail so protocol was to pass you by any means necessary. The cars were also reconfigured to only have two speeds: fast and stop. Any kind of order by signal or Alto sign was not treated as law. I’m not really sure after my visit that there are any driving rules other than pay the toll as the guy collecting your money is sitting next to one of the green army men complete with machined styled gun.

Now, you’re not going to believe the words which you are about to read but I profess they are true: there is no road rage in Panama!!! I know you don’t believe me, I wouldn’t believe me, and it’s true at least from my 3 days of observance. The people in Panama understand a certain way of operating, in this case driving their death portals.

We’re all conditioned to become a certain way or react to situations from the experiences we’ve had. The residents in Panama drive differently as a whole and understand that aggressive driving is business and not personal, thus they don’t become afflicted or tormented by getting cut off or even getting bumped by a Toyota Prada. This is a great example of the reality that we control our actions; no one else has that power. Getting offended or getting upset and losing our composure is a choice borne only by self. If the folks down in Panama can endure a daily commute including but not limited to getting cut off a minimum of a thousand times, getting hit or nudged several thousand more and finally being asked to buy a cell phone carrying case or charger every 5 minutes from the local car to car salesmen then we too have the power to not let outside influence affect our outward reaction.