Someone messed up the dress box and I ended up with a dress from “Chiriqui” that was clearly just visiting from its Little House on the Prairie. :) Normally the dresses from Chiriqui look just like mine, but the top is made of white. I don’t blame them though. They probably had 2 extra yards of material which means they were 8 yards short of making another one of those skirts!
My Spanish class was definitely the prettiest in the group (aka no boys – gross!). From left to right: Erica is adorned in the traditional dress of the Kuna Yala, an indigenous group on the northeast shore. The design on the front of her shirt is called a mola and always come as a set of two semi-identical pieces. The other is on her back. Kenia, our teacher, is wearing the white top of a Chiriqui outfit. I’m wearing a dress from Chiriqui in the west. Kristen has on a super fun dress from the Conga region of Colon in the north central part of the country.
We also learned some pretty sweet dances. My favorite is from the Conga region in the province of Colon. It is pretty hilarious. The woman dances with a platter hypothetically with baked goods – we’ll say Sandy Siegel’s brownies with chocolate frosting and a scoop of ice cream! The man chases after her trying to get a hold of some deliciousness, but she’s too quick, her hips too suave, and she always gets away with all of the chocolaty goodness for herself and her more awesome girlfriends. Erik King and I won the dance contest among the volunteers. He attributed it to my skirt flip at the end. I think it had more to do with his enthusiasm and the crazed look in his eye as he jumped along behind me.
Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eql_FKc5Bew
On top of that, as if it could get better, we cooked up some traditional Panamanian party food. The go-to is fried rice with chicken and potato salad. We also had tamales, some sort of milk pudding, orange juice, and pineapple.
Bri, you look elegant in that fully expanded/spread pink dress!
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