Carnaval: Proof that Americans are Wimps

There is a certain hand gesture used in Latin American countries, when someone finds something funny.   If you held out two fingers, diagonally and then made a motion like you were trying to whip something off your hand, you´d have it.  Well, almost, no one does it quite like they do.

So I´m laughing, doing the hand snap, surrounded by a dozen kids from Panama and they are teaching me every bad word they can think of in Spanish.  Someone whispers a word in my ear and points at their friend.  I repeat the word, and ask, ¨Him?  Is he one?¨  Finger snapping ensues.  I have no idea what I just said, there is only one person in the group who speaks passable English, but that´s okay, it´s Carnaval.

If you´ve never been to Las Tablas, here is a brief run down of the itinerary.

Wake at 8 AM, shower, pop some advil, eat breakfast, slather on sunblock.

At 10 AM take your cooler down to the park, to stand on the street with 100,000 of your closest friends.  There will be the coleco, a water truck that sprays the crowd all day.  There will be floats that pass through the crowd.  There will be constant loud music.  You´ll start to learn the songs and sing along.  Da da, da da, Carnaval (ok maybe you don´t learn all the words).  There will be live bands.  For the next 5 hours you will get soaking wet, dance, jump around, scream at the floats, drink and get massively burned.

At 3 PM wander down to the local bar, where they play music and pass around the microphone.   Since you´re the only American, they will make a big production out of calling you out and making you dance with a drag queen.  This will happen everyday, get used to it, you´re a celebrity now.  That mostly means that you are never allowed to stop dancing, even to adjust your sunglasses.  Move chica, move!

At 7 PM go back to the house, for a quick shower (there are 19 other people waiting, literally) and a quicker nap.

At 10 PM donning your best evening wear (for me, black pants and a tank top), you head back out for the night.  It´s back to the park to meet up with everyone, either on the Calle Arriba or Calle Abajo side.  Now, this is important.  You can´t be both.  You have to pick.  For me it´s Calle Abajo, por siempre.  Everything is a competition between these groups, from games to beauty pageants.  It´s best to get your loyalties straight early on.

At midnight head to the PH.  Live music, huge stage, dancing all night.   The weaker ones will go to a bar instead, but this is Carnaval, there is no room for slowing down.

At 5AM head home and collapse.

At 8:30 AM wake up to 5 people standing outside your tent, looking at you like you´re an exhibit in a zoo.  Como estas?  They are very curious about this strange gringa who likes to sleep more than 3 hours.  How odd.

Now, got that?  Do that for 5 days in a row.  Don´t worry, I couldn´t either.  I faded every night, like the soft American that I am, and got curious looks when I announced at 2 AM that I was planning on going to bed.  Some days, I slept in until 9 AM and people would literally climb into my tent with me and talk to me until I got up.  Even then, I was running on fumes.

The energy of the event keeps you going.  There are people pressing into you on all sides, and you´re all jumping up and down in unison and singing.  The music is so loud that your chest plate vibrates with the bass.  I made friends with this group of locals so quickly, I´ve never done anything like that before.  Julio would sling his arm over me and put his head on my shoulder and sigh.  Carlos would borrow beers from me and repay me with sandwiches he picked up in town.  Mani and Chewie would pull me physically away if a man they didn´t like tried to talk to me.  Jose and Arturo would come looking for me every morning to make sure I came to breakfast with them.  Alexis would sit in my tent with me and ask me about all the books I was reading.  We would all be in the coleco, dancing and smiling.  Everyone was so happy, it was infectious.  It was such an expression of joy, you couldn´t help but want more.

If only if the body was willing.

Here are some photos from the event: