Walking in the rain

My pick-up for the BioFit Center had been moved up to 7:30 am on Tuesday for my interview and appointment for nutritional counselling prior to my physical therapy session. John went with me today and Bill Cortright, the founder, greeted us and ushered us into his office. He is also the Green Bay Packer fan that I talk football with occasionally during my PT sessions. We began by going through a form where I answered questions about my medical history and that of my family. Then we talked about my existing diet. I went on the MS Recovery Diet about two months prior to coming to Panama and I felt like I was on the right track in that regard, but as Bill talked and explained the science behind nutrition and how it varies for each individual and even varies within each individual by age, new insight into the world of nutrition opened up to me. The BioFit Center uses bloodwork and a stress test to determine what types of food a person needs to be consuming throughout the day. Bill went through a presentation that showed how the body uses food to create energy and he demonstrated several ways that the wrong diet might lead to disease.


I then met with the nutritionist who took my height and weight and my neck, shoulder, waist, hip and upper thigh measurements. Then she hooked me up to sensors that measured my body mass index which is the percentage of body fat. She had to wait for my bloodwork to be completed from the sample that was taken from me yesterday and then they will then work up my ideal diet plan. This diet is about the quality of food you eat not the quantity and it's about spreading your nutrition out throughout the day.


I then went into the gym area and began my workout with Ivan. John stayed and talked to Bill and one of the other counselors about setting up a program that he could follow. My energy level was up and I enjoyed the therapy session. We worked on balance and coordination. John finished his interviews just as I was doing my final stretches.


On the way home we asked the driver to drop us off at a Mexican food restaurant we had been told about that wasn't too far from the hotel. Even though this is a Spanish speaking country, Mexican food and/or spicey food isn't very popular here. We arrived at the restaurant a few minutes before 11:30 and they were not open yet. We wandered around a few minutes looking at the nearby shops and businesses and waited for the doors to open. The restaurant decore was classic Mexican to the max. The walls and woodwork were painted in classic Mexican colors and everywhere you looked there were Mexican trinkets or paintings or dolls. We ordered and I walked around and looked at all the items that garnished every conceivable space. In the entrance there was an old carved bench with a sunflower backrest and heavy wooden seat. On the bar was a large set of old balance scales and looking down at our table from a shelf high on the wall were skeleton dolls dressed in traditional Mexican garb.

I don't know if it was because we were the first customers of the day or if it is always like this, but it took forty minutes to get our food. Good thing there was plenty to look at.  I asked the waiter if he spoke English and John said, "Of course he does," and as he was walking  away we asked for water and the decorously dressed Spanish man said, "Okey dokey." The food was okay, but not spicey enough for John and it was no less expensive than the Mexican restaurant we frequent in Hawaii.

We left the restaurant on foot and walked over to Rey's supermarket and bought fruit and eggs and then started walking home. The sky was noticably darker as we left the supermarket than when we went in. We crossed the overhead walkway that crossed the busy road, Via Espana, and went into the shopping center and stopped at the Post Office and Radio Shack. When we emerged from the stores it was raining. We managed to walk under the overhang of the storefronts almost all the way back to the hotel and it wasn't until we came to the intersection between the Veneto Casino and the Torres de Alba that our cover ran out. We waited a few minutes for the rain to let up but it only came down harder. We were within fifty meters of the Hotel entrance so we just walked the rest of the way in the rain.