The Panama (Chocolate) Crisis of 2022

Having not felt its presence the last few days, I welcomed the familiar feeling of my sweet tooth lobbying for an evening dessert excursion through the streets of Panama City’s Marbella neighborhood. I wasn’t too surprised - any sane person would kill for something sweet after my sub-par dinner that night. What had begun at the grocery store as a gourmet pipe dream, this deconstructed-burger recipe had rapidly devolved into a sickening mass of an overtly dry, toasted baguette, ají peppers sauteed in PAM spray, and a 20% seasoned ground beef patty. As what tends to happen in a hostel kitchen, I also forgot any form of sauce to choke down this kitchen nightmare; I had resorted to dousing this dish in an expired bottle of Frank’s Red Hot Sauce found high up in the community cupboard. I pitied my sweet tooth.

That meal was far off from the rest I’d had over the last few days in Panama City (or “Panamá” for the local panameños). In fact, this was the first time I cooked at the Maquina Hostel since arriving three days prior. Upon arrival at Tocumen Airport, bright and starry-eyed after my short flight from Houston, I was eager to try the cuisine of the transcontinental nation. My stint began to unfold as it probably would for most visiting Panamá for their first time: walking around the well-preserved, colonial Casco Viejo, ascending the sloth-riddled Cerro Ancón hill for a panoramic view of the entire city, and, of course, patiently witnessing a cargo ship squeeze through the narrow locks of the Panama Canal at the same rate that paint dries. Yet, as I went between touristy spaces to more nuanced, grittier neighborhoods of the massive coastal city, my thoughts all converged on one observation: Panama was expensive.

For a Latin American country, Panama proved itself to hold quite a high cost of living (or visiting more like) compared to its Spanish-speaking neighbors. Whether it be a lunch or a tourist attraction, I found myself paying significantly more than I was anticipating. To rub salt into the wound, after trips to Ecuador, Mexico, and Colombia in the past, I felt cheated by paying prices at some restaurants that would even exceed standards in the States.

There are probably several reasons this was the case. At first, I thought it was the ever-so ritzy neighborhood my hostel was located in. Although, when I ventured out on a random city bus to rustle up some more wallet-conscious grub one night, I still couldn’t escape the Marbella or Casco Viejo prices. It seemed more likely that the long history of American influence in this narrow isthmus had more to do with the unnatural price trends of the area rather than the particular neighborhood. What began around 1885 as light naval support during the Panamanian people’s rebellion for independence from Colombia (an effort primarily to protect its interests in eventual control over the Canal Zone, a rebellion later labeled the “Panama Crisis of 1885”) quickly ballooned into an immense American presence during the construction of the Canal and eventually became so intertwined with the States that around 30,000 American expatriates live across the small nation now. It started to make sense why the local population here spoke more-than-passable English, why the abundance of American products outnumbered Panamanian ones on store shelves, and why prices in most areas had swelled to accommodate the pockets of Panama’s new, English-speaking, retiree community.

Now, money is never a fun topic to broach for a budget traveler no matter if you’re five days or five months into your sojourn. On the traditional backpacker circuits, you’ll meet a wide array of nomads with differing opinions of what to spend money on and how much is fair. On one end of the scale, you have the traveler that is often content spending money on pricier meals, any attraction and museum that catches their eye, and Ubers from door to door as long as it provides them with assurances of consistent rich-tasting meals, anticipated sights, and timeliness. On the other end of the scale, you have the traveler that is so cash-conscious that they will go to the ends of the Earth to save a dime on dinner, forgo traditionally paid sight-seeing stops, and choose the closest-to-free means of transportation (which most of the time tends to be via foot). Regretfully, I find myself leaning towards this end of the scale more often.

Truthfully, as is the case with most travel ideologies, I don’t believe there’s a “correct” answer here. If good eats and deep history are the values you instill in your trip, then who am I to say that it’s wrong to spend hard-earned cash on a nice meal and a tour guide? Conversely, if scraping by via grocery store hauls and the local bus system is the most effective means to extend your travels, then go for it. For me, the only danger lies in being so cheap on the road that you inadvertently cheapen your own experience. I didn’t stop in Panamá on my way to South America to turn my nose up at an entry fee to see the famed Panama Canal, nor will I ever pinch pennies so hard that I opt to buy a Nathan's hot dog for dinner rather than a fresh-caught snapper at the local fish market. Indeed, it’s entirely up to the reason for your travels.

With that being said, after three days of sufficient coconut fish, arepas, and empanadas, I was finally ready to put a plug in my swirling budget and hit the grocery store for my last few meals before departure. I wish I could say my grocery shopping was well-organized and swift, but my travel-glazed brain hardly managed to put together a decent basketful of goods after 30 minutes behind the humidified glass doors of the Bella Vista Supermercado. Somehow, I managed to depart satisfied with my assortment of peppers, ground beef, eggs, and baguette amongst other items which only cost me the equivalent of 1.5 meals out. As the cooking began later that evening, I realized that I was still wholly unprepared for the actual task of dinner. Gordon Ramsey would have been disgusted. It only made sense that my sweet tooth took up its pitchforks and torches in an outright uprising after my plated disaster.

There I was, back out in the streets, which had become rather comfortable over the span of a few days. I figured I could quickly quell the revolt with a treat I find synonymous with the region: a bar of dark chocolate made with some local cacao. Not feeling the most adventurous at this point in the night, I opted to stop by the neighboring mini-market to use my choppy Spanish and ask the friendly, young shop owner Luís if he could sell me any Panamanian chocolate.

“Estoy buscando chocolate panameño,” I said. ¿Lo vendes?”

Luís chuckled and responded to me in English with a wry grin, “What do you mean?”

“I mean I’m looking for chocolate made with cacao from Panama. Does that exist?”

Luís only laughed again. “Panama does not make chocolate. The only thing Panama makes is drugs and bananas!”

Deeming drugs and bananas hardly strong enough standalone exports to support an economy of 4.3 million people, I decided to test his thesis. “I thought I had some Panamanian coffee the other day though.”

“Oh! Yes! Drugs, bananas, y café. No chocolate.” Luís motioned to a white-wrapped candy bar on his dusty store shelf. “This is the only one from Panama.”

I took the peanut-covered candy bar and examined it for a moment before politely, but disappointedly, returning it to Luís. This Panamanian PayDay was going to do little in the face of my sweet tooth rebellion. Thanking Luís for his help, I bid him a good night. As I emerged from the tiendita, I couldn’t help but mull over the viability of an economy built exclusively on a triarchy of drug trade, bananas, and coffee.

Willing to trust Luís, but equally unwilling to accept defeat, I decided to verify my source by asking a few more folks in the area if there was such a thing as Panamanian chocolate. On my way to the next group of stores down the street, I passed a woman smoking a cigarette out on her front porch and asked her if she knew where I could find my dessert. To that question, a slightly amused expression flashed across her face before she returned to the scowl she donned when I approached. She couldn’t have been more uninterested and simply turned away without saying a word. I took little offense to it. A gringo in sandals and gym shorts asking where to buy chocolate around 9 P.M. on a Saturday night hardly warrants an interruption to what I observed to be her sacred quiet time. That didn’t mean my inner-insurgency for sweets had grown any quieter though.

I had to try one more source. Out of options on my quiet hostel street, I walked into a pharmacy. Perhaps eager to close, the pharmacist at the counter quickly jumped on the opportunity to help me. I posed the same question to her as I had done my last two sources, and, to my genuine surprise at that point, she nodded and scurried towards the back of the store out of sight. Weary that she was going to return with the peanut bar yet again, I idled hesitantly at the front.

Sure enough, a good minute later, the pharmacist rounded the corner of a shelf with my prize to be: three different types of dark chocolate bars. All made in Panama. All fit for my consumption. Not only had I secured a peace offering for my sweet tooth rebellion, but I had also finally proved my baseless hunch that there was indeed such thing as a Panamanian chocolate bar. Once paid, the pharmacist, sensing my enthusiasm for the whole affair, asked me if the chocolate was a gift for someone special back home. With one foot out the door, I shamelessly pointed to my right canine, smiled, and said, “Sólo para mí.”

On my way home, thinking about the pharmacist’s question, I did feel obliged to share my triumph with someone. The candidate seemed obvious.

I marched back into the mini-market and held the chocolate bar up to Luís. With a look of amazement, he shook my hand and apologized for misleading me. Not intending to evoke an apology in the first place, I laughed and told him that wasn’t why I was there. I wanted him to try it with me. Of course, the answer was yes. We each took a square from my scores of victory and chewed silently while we formed our opinions on the chocolate panameño. And, after all my search and after all my anticipation for the after-dinner treat, we both simply concurred:

Panama would probably do well sticking to bananas.