The Global Village strikes again

The Spanish school I attend, takes half of the first floor of a building. The classrooms that face the outside have big wide windows from ceiling to floor, which is really very cool, because we can see the trendy "Via Argentina" (it could well be "the trendy Via Brasil", but they had to choose to establish themselves on "Via Argentina" rather than in Via Brazil, hey?) passing by and students can use many things in the view as examples for learning.

Anyway, the other day I was having my class in one of these classrooms with an excellent teacher they have. She not only is a great teacher from the technical point of view, as well as speaks 5 other languages, therefore understands much better what is going on in the student's mind. Also, she is a pocket full of culture. Classes with her are great. So, there we were, "hablando hablando", when I pointed to something out on the street as an example and she turned to see what I was talking about. When she turned to see it, she also saw this man crossing the street and she says to me in Spanish:"there goes Demetrius, my Greek friend. He is Head of a Department at Bristol University in England" to what I replied: "Wow, Bristol University? My older daughter is a Dr from there and works there too". She heard my reply and walks towards the window, opens it and in Greek calls him and invites him up and we had a wonderful friendly chat about it and about his research here in Panama. Of course, from ALL the universities in the world, he had to be from Bristol University in the UK, of course!

If you have been following my thoughts here in this blog for the last two months, you might remember that our lawyer here in Panama, did his master at Cardiff University, where our younger daughter did her studies... it gets even more interesting when you stop to think that because of its history and geography, Panama's connections with the US are much closer than with the UK. So once again I say, of all the universities in the world, he had to have gone to Cardiff University!!

And last but not least for my global village week... a couple of days ago, I woke up with no internet service in my phone, so off I went to my service provider shop to check what was going on. I got there only to find out that some other people must have had similar problems, so had to wait for some 20 minutes to be called. When the number before me was called, I decided to stand up and be extra alert for my number, you know how it goes... foreigners tend to be a bit a stupid when they are not in their cozy comfort zones, so to avoid any whatever, I decided to stand up and get closer to where I would be called.

Then, out of nowhere, comes this man who was also waiting and starts talking to me. Why me I have no idea!! He goes on talking about nails. He was saying how nails have to be soft and smooth with no lines and he continues to say how he had learned that from the Chinese doctor he had consulted with at the "Emperor's clinic" in Beijing. "Great doctors they are", he says and goes on to say: "You know, just looking at my nails, they were able to see that my pancreas and liver were not functioning well, so they gave me this awful tea to drink on a daily basis and now my nails, pancreas and liver are all good. If you ever go to Beijing, you should visit this clinic, really good"... and before I knew, he was called by the person he was with who had finished his enquire and off they went.

And there I stood just thinking, should I had told him that until I get my permanent visa in Panama, my home address is in China? Do I tell him that I have already been to Beijing? Do I tell him that my family and I have also been to that clinic (probably that is where they take all stupid tourists, he he he), do I tell him that my husband has taken those awful teas for many months and has indeed enjoyed the result? Do I tell him that I'm landing on this side of the planet after 9 years living in a Chinese city? No no no, none of that... he was so excited and happy telling me of his travels experiences that stealing his thunder would have been mean and that morning I was not in a mean mood...