You know some days you wake up and think what the hell happened last night. Well that was me this morning.
When I arrived at the hostel on Friday evening, they told me about the Halloween party they were having the next evening, tickets were $3 and there were drink specials. Cool, that sounds like a good deal.
I spent the day in the mall shopping, which was also slightly bizarre as I haven't done anything so cosmopolitan in months. Anyway, when I got back to the hostel people were getting dressed up and putting makeup on. I wasn't planning to go to any effort and was rather pleased to be wearing some new clothes. Lainie who was putting some zombie makeup on asked if I wanted any. What the hell. (Lainie incidentally, belonged to a Zombie performance group at home in LA.) So we made ourselves up like zombies. When I was finished she asked if I was going on the Zombie Walk. What Zombie Walk? Apparently there was a bunch of people getting dressed up like zombies and were going to walk through the streets of Casco Viejo, our neighbourhood. Since I had the face ready, I thought sure. We walked a couple of blocks down to a bar where zombies and other scary people were starting to gather. There were some great costumes and they were playing music like Thriller and the theme from The Godfather to get us in the mood.
It turns out that the Zombie Walk had been written up in the papers for the past week or so and that the police were not happy about the "protest" so we were being watched very closely. As the crowd swelled with all manner of scary people, we were unsure of exactly when we would be walking and by now there were a couple of dozen police hanging around. The fact that this was being called a protest was hilarious. What do zombies protest about anyway? Apparently for such a religious country a pagan celebration is frowned upon. The only "protest" I've ever been involved with is the Walk For Reconciliation across Sydney Harbour Bridge many years ago. Quite how I got myself involved in a Zombie Protest in Panama City I still can't figure out.
By now it was getting close to 9.30pm and we would be walking soon, but there was a bit of unrest and the police arrested one of the zombies. Not quite sure why because there was no violence or aggression going on. Some people were getting freaked out and left but really, I couldn't see how the police were going to arrest a couple of hundred zombies and other scary people. Then when we finally started walking, the police were all over us and we had to stay on the footpaths, if you walked on the road you would get arrested. So we walked a few blocks to a bar, we were there only about 10-15 minutes, enough time for a quick beer and a sausage on a stick, then we continued. By the time we got to the next bar, we had police blocking either end of the street. They really were not down with the zombies.
At that point it all got a bit boring so I headed back to the hostel with a couple of others, being careful to walk on the footpaths. There we had the party with all sorts of costumes. That part of the night was slightly more normal. Although I did hear the next day that after 9pm the hostel would not let anyone out on the street with any makeup on.
I think if you want to go trick or treating next Halloween, Panama City is probably not the place for you...
***Stop Press***
Here's the article from the Panama daily rag, La Prensa: http://mensual.prensa.com/mensual/contenido/2010/11/01/hoy/panorama/2389431.asp
And the translation (courtesy of Google Translate, sorry about any inaccuracy):
Mayor and Police face 'zombies' marchers
On the eve of Halloween, the mayor of San Felipe, Jairo Morán, had his "witch hunt." Or, rather, of zombies.
By order of Moran, the National Police arrested three people Saturday night, during the preparations for the "Zombie Walk 2010" at Plaza Herrera of San Felipe.
One of the detainees, Mir Rodriguez, was brought before a night court, which fined him $ 365 for "disrespect for authority."
"They are attacking very important constitutional rights such as freedom of movement and free expression," Rodriguez said.
The other two detainees were taken to the substation in the neighborhood, where we applied the Peel Police. Since they had no search warrant, were released.
The mayor tried to stop the march (in the end, he failed), citing Municipal Decree 521 of 1998, which prohibits "any move to disguise or mask the streets of the city district of Panama." The penalty is 10 to 50 dollars.
Moran tried to persuade the zombies do not leave, because in San Felipe three gangs operate.
Rob Rivera, an organizer of the walk, Moran complained that he ignored a note of 29 October, in which the general secretary of the Mayor of Panama, Eliades Serrano, gives its approval to the activity.
The walk focused dozens of people (organizers estimate 200 to 300), attracted to the idea of strolling through historic Old Town as the undead. It is the fifth time that Rivera is organizing the event, the previous four did so in the Urraca Park and Calle Uruguay.
Patrizia Pinzon, resident of San Felipe, lamented that the mayor sent to several police officers (she was 15) and three patrols to suppress a leisure activity, "but every time we've had real problems shooting, always on all fours to see them send officers. "
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