The Magic School Bus

7.1.10

This morning I awoke at 6:10 to a torrential downpour. Of course this is not an unusual occurrence in the tropics during the rainy season, but it was alarming because we needed to be on an 8:00 flight from Bocas del Toro to Panama City, then take a taxi to the international airport in Panama City in time for Sierra’s 11:54 am flight. My flight to Miami would take off an hour later. We had plenty of time scheduled to get between airports, but the rain, thunder and lightning made it unlikely that we would take off on time from the Caribbean island we were on. When we left the Smithsonian station to go the airport, it took a few minutes to find a cab; this was enough time for our luggage to get soaked. From previous visits, I found it ineffective to call a cab early in the morning, especially because there are usually more cabs than any other type of car in Bocas del Toro. When we finally did get inside a taxi pickup truck, it also picked up 2 children in school uniforms. Then it stopped again and picked up 2 more. We were riding in a school bus taxi! In Bocas del Toro, taxis only cost 25 cents for the locals, so it makes sense that children would ride taxis to school. But what didn’t make sense was why, every few minutes, our taxi driver felt the need to bark like a dog. It was a pretty good dog impression and had I not seen his mouth moving I would have thought a dog was trying to go to school too.

The fact that students take taxis to school is not because there are no school buses. In fact, there are tons of American school buses driving around Panama. They are not yellow, but usually painted with a multitude of brilliant colors and portraits of famous boxers, Jesus, or family members of the driver. They often have bright flashing lights and plastic fins on top, which might make them look like some sort of strange sea monster if they were submerged in water. These are the local city buses. They are referred to as the Diablo Rojo, possibly because of the way they drive with no regard for other people on the road, lane lines, or the copious diesel exhaust pouring out of them. I have never been on one, but I have narrowly escaped being hit by one in my rental car multiple times. After years of riding a school bus in the US, I have no desire to be crammed onto a sticky bus designed for small children. I think the key lies in the fact that most Panamanians are rather short and thus are appropriately sized for the buses. It seems to function enough so that in Panama, taxis serve as school buses and school buses take adults to work.