Holidays in Hell: Travels to the World's Worst Places and Asks What's Funny About This?

by P. J. O'Rourke

  There are other, juicier allegations. Noriega and ilk probably pulled the 1985 torture murder of a government critic named Dr. Hugo Spadafora. Panama is a country more greedy than evil. Snuffing your bad-mouthers is not considered the small social gaffe it is in most of Latin America. You're supposed to send them off in exile to "the Valley of the Fallen"-Miami Beach. The U. S. Justice Department is also investigating Noriega's use of Panama as a huge drug money Laundromat. Furthermore, defected Cuban intelligence big-shot Major Florentino Aspillaga says Noriega has been raking in dough selling U.S. high-tech items to Castro.

  The opposition has a point. They would prefer nice, stable democratic corruption like we have in the United States. But, unfortunately for the cause of kick-out-the-wheel-chocks partisan journalism, the pro-government people also have a point. Panama used to be run by the normal south-of-the-Rio-Grande kitty litter box of brain-dead hacienda owners and United Fruit business squad. Then, in 1968, General Omar Torrijos led an army-backed coup.

  Torrijos was a half-baked socialist and a blow-hard, but he was lovable and good-looking. He took a predictable, feisty underdog stance toward the U.S. and the local rich shitepokes, swearing he would fight all of them in a guerrilla war if he had to, which he knew he didn't. Panamanians, who have absolutely no immunity to theatrics, went nuts over Omar. Actually, he was sort of an all-right guy. He had genuine feeling for the poor, started some only moderately useless social programs and maintained a modest style of life, keeping no more than two or three mistresses on the side. Torrijos also managed, after decades of negotiations, to wrest a new canal treaty from the United States. Admittedly, he wrested it from Jimmy Carter, so it isn't like he played against the varsity, but it gave the Panamanians a patriotic thrill to get the middle of their country back. And under Torrijos (though, to a certain extent, despite him) Panama prospered. It became a middle-class country with one of the highest per capita incomes in Latin America. Thousands of jobs were added to the government payroll. People came up in the world.

  "Even the men who killed Torrijos loved him," a taxi driver told me. (Taxi drivers all over the world, by the way, are under Newspaper Guild contract to give easy quotes to foreign correspondents.) In fact, nobody killed Torrijos. He died of his macho penchant for flying in bad weather. But such is the romance in the Panamanian soul that nothing will do except he be a martyr.

  When Torrijos bought the rancho, Noriega, his chief of staff, was the natural heir. Watching him try to act like Omar is like watching Ted Kennedy try to act like Jack. Members of Noriega's own government admit he's a pig. But a lot of people are scared the rabe blancos will bring back the bad old days of venal oligarchy. (This is unlikely because most of the opposition belongs to the new middle class, but that's politics for you.) Also, what's the big deal about corruption? This is Panama, for godsake. The whole country is a put-up job, sleazed into existence by Teddy Roosevelt so he'd have someplace to put the Big Ditch. One pro-Noriega legislator told me, in a fit of candor about peculation, "We are just doing the same thing the others were from 1903."

  The Panamanian government types are also mad about the U. S. Senate resolution of June 26, 1987, in which the Panamanians were advised their democracy had B.O. and they'd better send Noriega to the showers with a family-size bar of Dial. Part of the resolution was in language identical to an opposition manifesto. And how would we like it if the French Chamber of Deputies voted for a Democratic Party policy statement telling everybody in America to listen up when Mario Cuomo speaks? Then the United States trotted out the State Department's human-rights bureau, that feeble Carter Administration leftover, and sent one of its goody-two-shoes "human-rights investigators' to pester the natives. How about a Saudi Arabian human-rights investigator arriving uninvited in D.C.? "By Muhammad, you are not cutting off enough hands of thieves! You are not throwing off of minarets enough adultresses! You are not branding your slaves on their bottoms!" We'd appreciate that.

  So, although the opposition has a point, the government has a point, too, and the college students. . . . Well, the college students don't have a point. They're just mouthing the standard Third World college student take-out order: two anti-colonialisms, an anti-capitalism with cheese and a small Che on the side. The students are full of shit. That, however, puts them in perfect harmony with the nation of Panama. The whole country is full of shit. Or-since they're very nice people-let's say "the Panamanians have a poetic conception of the truth."

  The opposition movement was set off by anti-Noriega accusations from Colonel Roberto Diaz Herrera, who was forced to resign as the Defense Forces second in command-not exactly an unbiased source. Diaz claimed, among other things, that Noriega and the ex-chief of the U. S. Southern Command, the hopelessly respectable General Wallace Nutting, planted a bomb on Torrijoss plane after-get this-luring it off-course by changing satellite navigational signals. Diaz Herrera also underwent some kind of religious conversion, then barricaded himself in his walled suburban mansion with the teachings of his spiritual guru and a gang of armed supporters. He was all but receiving Radio Venus on his bridgework when the government finally stormed his house and hauled him off.

  Various "eyewitnesses' to the attack on Diaz's house told me there were five dead bodies on the lawn, told me there were eight dead bodies on the lawn, told me Diaz's only son was killed, told me Diaz himself was killed, etc. Diaz has several sons, none of whom were killed; nor was Diaz. Indeed, the ninety-minute fire fight at the Diaz home didn't kill or seriously injure anyone, a very Panamanian touch. Another witness told me Sandinista troops participated in the battle dressed as Dobermans.

  Assorted tales from the government camp were just as silly. The government press office circulated subliterate books and pamphlets claiming that the pre-coup president, Arnulfo Arias, murdered Jews and that the Jewish Eisenmann family, which owns the principal opposition newspaper, is running an international cocaine ring.

  This is radio bemba, "lip radio," and it is-after money, cars and Japanese stereo equipment-the ruling passion of Panama. During one hour in a discotheque, I heard the following nonsense:

  1. Noriega has picked every Miss Panama since he took over and deflowers each of them.

  2. The last Miss Panama had to be married off to one of Noriega's colonels at the insistence of Noriega's jealous wife.

  3. Mrs. Noriega killed her husband's mistress when the mistress was six months pregnant.

  4. A pregnant woman was shot by the Dobermans when they mistook the diaper she was hanging on a clothesline for a white opposition flag.

  5. Werewolves are loose in the Panamanian countryside.

  Of course, an important part of radio bemba is blaming absolutely everything on the United States. The opposition tells you the U. S. isn't supporting them because Noriega is a tool of the CIA (usually right after they've told you Noriega is in the pay of Danny Ortega). The government tells you the opposition is controlled by the U.S. embassy DCM, John F. Maistro, because he used to be in Manila where he overthrew Marcos. And the college students tell you all sorts of things very loudly in Spanish while shaking empty pepper-gas cannisters under your nose. In this case the students do have a point. TRIPLE CHASER GRENADE/FEDERAL LABORATORIES/ SALTSBURG, PENN. read the cannister labels. I don't know about you, but it makes me sleep better at night knowing the U. S. Defense Department keeps our allies supplied with these. Why, if Panama should ever have to come to our aid in a war against Russia, the Panamanians could just fill the air with pepper gas and make the Soviet air force pilots sneeze like the dickens.

  Three thousand words here and it seems I still haven't answered the question, "What's happening in Panama?" Darn these Apple Its anyway. Where's the BRIEF INSIGHTFUL SUMMARY key on this thing?

  The rabe blancos are acting like wimps. When the government moved on Diaz Herrera and simultaneously closed all the opposi tion newspapers, opposition leaders responded by hiding. ProNoriega salsa bands took over the streets. On July 26, after nearly two months of agit
a, somebody finally got killed-a quiet, well- bahaved business-administration student named Eduardo Enrique Carrera. Eduardo and some friends apparently yelled, "Down with the Pineapple," at a police cruiser, and the police shot him. Not a single major opposition leader showed at the funeral.

  As for the rabe blanco demonstrations, I was talking to a senior official in the Panamanian Foreign Ministry, a black guy whose grandparents came from Jamaica. He just laughed. "Man, I went to the toughest high school in Panama City," he said. "We knew how to riot. Oh, these people should check the confetti in Beirut."

  On the other side, the government hacks are acting like morons. They're swamped with debt but spending millions on pep rallies and early bonuses for public employees. Reuters correspondent Tom Brown, the only U.S. reporter based full-time in Panama, was expelled for reporting a Civilian Crusade general strike as 85 percent effective. "You have twenty-four hours to leave the country voluntarily," Brown was told. And on June 30 the government launched what might be the lamest ever "spontaneous' attack on an American embassy. Five thousand government workers were required to participate in the demonstration in order to receive their paychecks. These not-very-enthusiastic anti-imperialists were bused to the embassy compound where cheerleaders led them in dispirited chants while thirty hoodlums threw rocks at the building. Washington presented a bill for $106,000 in damages to the Panamanian government, which promptly apologized and paid up.

  Meanwhile, the economy of Panama goes to hell. It's not like they make or grow anything. The whole country is based on international banking and a canal the United States can take back any time it wants with one troop of Boy Scouts. Right now the contents of Panama's banks are on a greenback-salmon run to Luxembourg, the Bahamas and the Cayman Islands.

  Noriega's getting to be more trouble than he's worth to the other corrupt military officers. He'll probably "retire" in favor of some more acceptable general. Or maybe he'll hang on. The opposition might even win, and its hundred factions will squabble merrily until the next coup. People knowledgeable in Panamanian political affairs ask themselves, "Who gives a shit?"

  The night before I left, I watched an NBC producer who'd been in the country for two months sit on the floor of his hotel room drunk, swaying and keening to himself over and over again, ". . the rumors, the honking, the confetti, the tear gas, the rumors, the honking, the confetti, the tear gas . . ." Panama can drive you around the bend. Believe me, I know. I went back to my room and put on my best Central Intelligence Agency seersucker jacket and rep tie. Then I went down to the hotel bar to leave the Panamanians with a little of their own radio bemba, a sort of going-away present. "Buenos noches, Ramon," I said, speaking to the unctuous bartender in a stentorian American voice. "Looks like those rich rabe blancos are too scared to get their own hands dirty."

  "Si, comb no," Ramon agreed.

  "You know, I was up at Southern Command today," I said, looking around as though we might be overheard. "I hear the rabes are hiring some out-of-work death-squad guys from Argentina." I leaned over and whispered loudly to Ramon, "And they're getting help from the Mossad, M15 and the KGB." Then I downed my drink and smiled, knowing the news would be all over Panama by morning.

  Third World Driving Hunts

  and Tips

  During the past couple years I've had to do my share of driving in the Third World-in Mexico, Lebanon, the Philippines, Cyprus, El Salvador, Africa and Italy. (Italy is not technically part of the Third World, but no one has told the Italians.) I don't pretend to be an expert, but I have been making notes. Maybe these notes will be useful to readers who are planning to do something really stupid with their Hertz #1 Club cards.

  ROAD HAZARDS

  What would be a road hazard anyplace else, in the Third World is probably the road. There are two techniques for coping with this. One is to drive very fast so your wheels "get on top" of the ruts and your car sails over the ditches and gullies. Predictably, this will result in disaster. The other technique is to drive very slow. This will also result in disaster. No matter how slowly you drive into a ten-foot hole, you're still going to get hurt. You'll find the locals themselves can't make up their minds. Either they drive at 2 mph-which they do every time there's absolutely no way to get around them. Or else they drive at 100 mph-which they do coming right at you when you finally get a chance to pass the guy going 2 mph.

  BASIC INFORMATION

  It's important to have your facts straight before you begin piloting a car around an underdeveloped country. For instance, which side of the road do they drive on? This is easy. They drive on your side. That is, you can depend on it, any oncoming traffic will be on your side of the road. Also, how do you translate kilometers into miles? Most people don't know this, but one kilometer = ten miles, exactly. True, a kilometer is only 62 percent of a mile, but, if something is one hundred kilometers away, read that as one thousand miles because the roads are 620 percent worse than anything you've ever seen. And when you see a 50-kph speed limit, you might as well figure that means 500 mph because nobody cares. The Third World does not have Broderick Crawford and the Highway Patrol. Outside the cities, it doesn't have many police at all. Law enforcement is in the hands of the army. And soldiers, if they feel like it, will shoot you no matter what speed you're going.

  TRAFFIC SIGNS AND SIGNALS

  Most developing nations use international traffic symbols. Americans may find themselves perplexed by road signs that look like Boy Scout merit badges and by such things as an iguana silhouette with a red diagonal bar across it. Don't worry, the natives don't know what they mean, either. The natives do, however, have an elaborate set of signals used to convey information to the traffic around them. For example, if you're trying to pass someone and he blinks his left turn signal, it means go ahead. Either that or it means a large truck is coming around the bend, and you'll get killed if you try. You'll find out in a moment.

  Signaling is further complicated by festive decorations found on many vehicles. It can be hard to tell a hazard flasher from a string of Christmas-tree lights wrapped around the bumper, and brake lights can easily be confused with the dozen red Jesus statuettes and the ten stuffed animals with blinking eyes on the package shelf.

  DANGEROUS CURVES

  Dangerous curves are marked, at least in Christian lands, by white wooden crosses positioned to make the curves even more dangerous. These crosses are memorials to people who've died in traffic accidents, and they give a rough statistical indication of how much trouble you're likely to have at that spot in the road. Thus, when you come through a curve in a full-power slide and are suddenly confronted with a veritable forest of crucifixes, you know you're dead.

  LEARNING TO DRIVE LIKE A NATIVE

  It's important to understand that in the Third World most driving is done with the horn, or "Egyptian Brake Pedal," as it is known. There is a precise and complicated etiquette of horn use. Honk your horn only under the following circumstances:

  1. When anything blocks the road.

  2. When anything doesn't.

  3. When anything might.

  4. At red lights.

  5. At green lights.

  6. At all other times.

  ROADBLOCKS

  One thing you can count on in Third World countries is trouble. There's always some uprising, coup or Marxist insurrection going on, and this means military roadblocks. There are two kinds of military roadblocks, the kind where you slow down so they can look you over, and the kind where you come to a full stop so they can steal your luggage. The important thing is that you must never stop at the slow-down kind of roadblock. If you stop, they'll think you're a terrorist about to attack them, and they'll shoot you. And you must always stop at the full-stop kind of roadblock. If you just slow down, they'll think you're a terrorist about to attack them, and they'll shoot you. How do you tell the difference between the two kinds of roadblocks? Here's the fun part: You can't!

  (The terrorists, of course, have roadblocks of their own. They alway
s make you stop. Sometimes with land mines.)

  ANIMALS IN THE RIGHT OF WAY

  As a rule of thumb, you should slow down for donkeys, speed up for goats and stop for cows. Donkeys will get out of your way eventually, and so will pedestrians. But never actually stop for either of them or they'll take advantage, especially the pedestrians. If you stop in the middle of a crowd of Third World pedestrians, you'll be there buying Chiclets and bogus antiquities for days.

  Drive like hell through the goats. It's almost impossible to hit a goat. On the other hand, it's almost impossible not to hit a cow. Cows are immune to horn-honking, shouting, swats with sticks and taps on the hind quarters with the bumper. The only thing you can do to make a cow move is swerve to avoid it, which will make the cow move in front of you with lightning speed.