Let’s take a look to what exactly means the word “Carnival” for Panama, a country that has gone through a lot of hard and valuable experiences such as its independences from Spain, then from Colombia and most recently from the United State (with the Canal Zone), which have given to Panama the right to celebrate.
Carnival in the Republic of Panama is a huge celebration that takes place in almost every town of the country. This is a yearly party that is always 40 days before Lent, the abstinence dictated by the Christian church (Semana Santa). This festivity has influence from several International carnivals such as Miami Calle 8 Carnival, Mardi Grass in New Orleans and the Rio Carnival in Brazil.
Panama´s Carnival started during the end of the XIXth century when Panama was under the rule of Colombia. Panama became independent in 1903 and by 1910, under a Carnival Board, the first queen, Manuelita Vallarino, was crowned and Panamanian major José Agustín Arango officially established the Carnival.
Each province carries out its own type of carnival and tries to offer the public a new attraction every year. In our days the most famous of all towns to celebrate Carnival is Las Tablas in the province of Los Santos, which is located in the Azuero peninsula. Each town select two queens: the Queen from ‘Calle Arriba” and the Queen from ‘Calle Abajo” and people support one or the other.
Off course San Miguel is also part of this exciting and wonderful celebration. Everybody started getting ready 5 months before Carnival. All the restaurants and small business get an authorization from the Government to sell food and liquor. They have to follow up a process to make sure everything is well set up before the party begins. The Health Center, which is part of the Ministry of Health, is open all day from 7:00 a.m till 4:00 p.m during Carnival.
The Corrigimiento of San Martin this year selected a 17-year-old girl as its queen. For this San Miguelian girl it was the best time of her life: “all my life I dreamed about being the queen of Carnival”. During the main days of Carnival (Saturday till Tuesday) she selects a topic for each day to decorate her float and dress up according to it. The 4 themes for this year were: “pollera’s day” for Saturday to honor the traditional Panamanian culture; Sunday was the Ocean day so the queen dressed up as a mermaid. On Monday the theme was Greek culture and for Tuesday it was Chinese culture. During the afternoon the queen goes around the town in a little float and during nighttime she parades up with her princesses in a big float.
Carnival does not only represent fun and craziness for people in San Miguel, it also represents the highest season of the year, time to make a lot of money and show their culture to their visitors. That’s why San Miguelians try to improve the quality of Carnival every year. Sales have also grown thanks to the increase of tourism; Tima this year sold a 400-pounds-Pork and Nico earned almost $ 5,000 only selling food (without including liquor). Locals made all the decoration and dresses for the queen and the princesses. Michelle, Miriam's daughter, was part of the makeup and costume design team. "This (Carnival) shows that we have high fashion here in San Miguel" Miriam said.
Wherever you go in Panama during Carnival you’ll see people getting sprayed with water through a hose. These are called "culecos" which are a very famous tradition from the interior provinces of Panama. In San Miguel, Catia and Nico’s installed a machine to get water from the river to spray it all over their restaurant, off course just for carnival.
This is a never ending party, every day from two in the afternoon until the sun comes out people are dancing and singing typical music such as salsa, “tipico”, pasa-pasa and reggaeton, drinking, and having a great time. Every morning you see hundreds of people drinking "sancocho", a Panamanian chicken soup that was created to cure those with hangovers from the previous day with a hot plate of soup.
Something magic about this celebration is that all kind of people can be part of it. This year, for example, one of the princesses was a girl with Down Syndrome, her name is Daryelis Milagros Villareal Castillo, a 10-year-old girl who is in fourth grade at School in San Miguel.
On Wednesday, everybody goes back to reality. Approximately at 5:00 a.m. a closing ceremony is held on the beach headed by the queen. It is known as "the burial of the sardine" which symbolizes the end of the feast.
See you next year for Carnival!!
