Prada Prada...(posting from the road)

It wasn’t until the second day that we realized a box of medications was missing...this box contained the majority of the ibuprofen and antacid medication – two of our ‘best sellers’. Having clinic without these two medications would be akin to a Pollo Campero running out of chicken.
Luckily as this is Central America, they tend to be a little loose with the regulations surrounding any sort of medications, Gary, the world’s best pharmacist and I decided to split from the group while on an excursion to the outskirts of Chiquimoula and rectify this situation. (This was a huge step for me as I swore after my brush with the law in this town that I would never set foot there again...)

So the plan was, we would hop into a taxi and dart over the La Pharacia, pick up the meds and then meet the rest of the group at a local shopping mall. As with the best laid plans, it fell apart early...first off there are now actual taxis in this town. This town has adapted a strict decrepit old minivan with no door transportation system, one that until this point in time I had developed the ability to avoid. But with time a wasting we quickly opted for adventure and tried to ascertain which truck was headed our way – turns out they all were and thus the first fight broke out.

Gary and I seemed to be some sort of prized fare and a fist fight broke out between two drivers while someone else rapidly escorted us to the front of a van and sped off, bumping the van parked ahead of us in a frantic effort to get out. The van operated much like taxis in Montana – everyone states their destination and the van simply drives there – taking everyone else along for the ride.

As we were speeding through the streets of Chiquimoula, randomly dropping off passengers, we saw the most entertaining store ejection. First a giant stream of water got our eye as it shot out of a doorway, dousing an elderly gentleman on the sidewalk causing him to slip in the now newly formed puddle of water. As the old man tried to get up, his cowboy boots kept slipping causing him to slide around as if he was dancing really badly. It took about a minute for him to get fully erect before another dousing of water shot out of the storefront. And the dancing process was repeated.

All traffic in all directions had now stopped to watch this spectacle. The dancing man had now decided to try and enter the shop again while performing a series of high kicks in an attempt to assault the shopowner (it was here that a clearly recognized the signs of the belligerent drunk). The whole scene was briefly out of sight before the man and the shopowner tumbled out into the street, fists flying!

The showowner had at least 100 lbs and 30 years on the drunk ‘dancer’ – it was hardly a fair fight. So, without thinking I started yelling at whole mess to stop while chivalrous Texan Gary was about to hop out of the car and intervene. Our driver could this was on his mind as well, and before the great gringo intervention, he sped away clearly upset that he had ‘won’ the prized fair.

After no less than 5 more stops, we arrived at the pharmacy. Our poor Spanish was apparently inadequate – as was charades (seriously – how to you act out gastric reflux?) as our pharmacy tech handed us a telephone with a semi-English speaker at the other end. This was an improvement but soon the conversation proved frustrating to all and the man on the other end of the phone decided to just join us on site.
This was a fantastic improvement to our communication and in short time we were dashing out of there, with all the PPI’s and nausea meds they stocked. We headed back to the center square – taxi central – and figured that we could secure a ride in seconds.

What greeted our eyes were 50+ minivan taxis, none signed and in no apparent order. Walking around to random vans and showing them a photo of the mall we were supposed to meet at was unsuccessful so , as time ticked away, we decided to just walk the streets and yell the name of our destination. We remembered it started with a P-R-A. So I yelled “Prada” up and down the street and Gary yelled “Pradaxil” – eventually somebody figured it out , picked us up and took us to ‘Pradara’. I am still not sure if it was a taxi or just a guy with a van who was tired of hearing us yell, either way the ride was still a quarter.

Gracious for reading!