some notes I wrote linking one woman's complicated beliefs, experiences, and hearsay about US soldiers as desirable partners, sexual predators, and idolized blue eyed mates.
(these themes also run throughout
Luna Verde)
During the invasion she was advised to wear two pairs of panties and walk around with pants on at all times- no skirts or dresses. [I always assumed this to be for protection against American soldiers, but in fact she was concerned about Panamanians. She believes that the looting and destruction of Panama city was done almost entirely by Noreiga’s dignity battalions and people from the
PRD. Reasons explained in interview notes]
It was said (according to her) of US soldiers (which unless specified she means white Americans) to be careful if you had sex with them because they wanted to put it anywhere and everywhere there might be an opening. They were thought of as some kind of insatiable sexual creatures. Paradoxically, they were the most desirable of partners, especially those who had blue eyes. Panamanian women who married gringos were “lucky” she said. “well, most of them.”
Another day she recounted a story when she was working with the Peace Corps here in Panama. One of the workers, a young blue eyed white boy, confided to her that he was approached by multiple families in the hopes that he would have sex with their daughters so that their children would come out with blue eyes. They didn’t want anything from him monetarily or support wise, but they wanted their kids to have blue eyes (reminds me of El Ramo Azul, a story by
Octavio Paz- about a man who is collecting un ramo de ojos azules for his girlfriend
HERE is the story. it is in Spanish, sorry.).
On the day of the 20th anniversary of the invasion, she wore her US Peace Corp t-shirt. Laughing, she recounted that her sister was sure they were going to get hit with flying objects.
Despite thinking that US soldiers were sex craved, her eyes teared in disbelief when I told her that someone told me at the 20th anniversary March that the stories of people being sexually violated by US soldiers were removed from the documentary. “estadounidense?? No. no puede ser. Estadounidense? De los panameños si, pero los americanos? No puede ser.” [American? It can’t be. Americans? Panamanains yes, but the Americans? That can’t be] I was pretty shocked at her disbelief, not only given the stories she has told me about insatiable American sexual appetite, but also because of the Abu Ghraib scandals in Iraq which made international news. She said she always knew Panamanians abused each other but never that Americans did the same thing. I did not ask, but wondered why the thought of American soldiers’ abuse of other men and women was incomprehensible to a woman who weeks earlier described these same Americans as voracious sexual predators.
She lamented this point also for her friend, ****, who I interviewed. He was detained for 16 days after the invasion because he was part of the Panamanian military, albeit the band. She said “I hope to God nothing like that happened to ****. Many people were taken and the invasion affected many. But everyone comments that he is different. He was affected differently. Please god do not let anything like this have happened to ****”
She has a female friend who married a US soldier, not sure what part of the military, but the sex became abusive and her husband expected her to have sex with his friends as well. She came home one day and a few of his friends were in the house and her husband told her she had to have sex with them as well. She did not say whether or not the friend agreed to have sex with the man’s friends, but the woman, who was considered so lucky at the time to have married an American and moved to the US, divorced and returned to Panama.
Another friend married a Black US solider, moved to the US and has lived happily "as far as we know. When she returns she always looks happy. Maybe Blacks are different,” she told me.
