Queen of Carnaval

On Sunday we went to the nearby town where the environmental trainees are staying to see the Carnaval celebration.  It is a town of only 300 people or so, but they all turned out for the crowning of the Queen and Princess of Carnaval.

First, however, was the traditional spraying of water over the crowd.  This is a part of Carnaval celebrations in every town.   It was a really hot day, so everyone enjoyed cooling off. They had to fill the truck up twice with water.  The picture below was taken as we arrived, when most people had gone home.

The water truck hoses down anyone inside the fence

There was a break of a few hours, and then night fell and the girls showed up for the competition.  There were four contestants for each spot, and Peace Corps trainees were chosen to be the judges because they were thought to be more impartial than the townspeople, who are all related to each other in some way.

The girl on the left won the Princess competition.  She will compete again on Tuesday

These two were the youngest contestants

This girl won the Queen competition

Proud parents with the Princess

The crowning of the queen was followed by dancing.  They played traditional Panamanian music, to which many couples danced around the floor.  The PC trainees gamely tried the dances, but were clearly no match for the natives.  Then one of the trainees asked them to put on some reggaeton music, which was definitely more in line with our dancing skills.  Out strutted Nico, a trainee who is an amazing dancer, and he put on a solo exhibition which had the crowd screaming in approval.  He was shortly thereafter joined by Lindsey, and the two of them continued to wow the natives.  Soon the dance floor was filled with Peace Corps people gyrating to the music.  They invited their host family brothers and sisters to dance, and Panamanians and Americans all danced together until our bus came to take us home.