The Portuguese language is a very formal language, but like everything else in the world today it’s becoming more and more relaxed.
There is a generation of Portuguese who are “old school” who would stand up when elder people come in to a room, and that, in Portuguese would never refer to their mother or father using the informal of “you”, “tu.” Today, in general, young children today will be less formal but in certain levels in Portugal there are still very strict rules of who you are, where you are, where you’ve been, and how you live.
On average now it’s a lot easier going than it used to be. I was talking to a friend of mine today about the time when girls would go out there would always have to be chaperone because the parents wouldn’t let it be any other way. These days if you told a 12 year old they needed to have a chaperone, they would say, “Are you crazy?”
In America, even if you’re the president of the company, people would say to you, “Hi, Bob,” whereas here in Portugal it would always be “senior doctor” or “senior professor” or “mister engineer.” You would never use the more informal way of speaking; until you became friendly with them, there’s always that formality. So you would never say, for example, “Senior Bob” you would say “Senior Johnson,” you wouldn’t say the first name. So there are small things like that that would be a faux pas.
The Portuguese are really, really impatient when they get behind the wheel of a car. They drive like lunatics on the motorways and you wouldn’t think it was the same race of people that gets behind the wheels of their cars and they sit on your bumper or don’t let you in. For them, it’s “me first, me first,” which is odd, because they’re not like that we’re they’re chatting to you, but behind the wheels of their cars, you do have to be careful, or, alternatively, you just do what they do.
(1836 sketches of women of Portugal, pictured.)
Here in Mexico, if you see a newly constructed, expensive, and contemporary house it will look just it would have in Southern California.
I used to have a health insurance program out of London called IMG, but I have since moved to an insurance program out of Florida called Claria that has a very high deductible. For my entire family, our premiums are about $3,000 a year. .jpg)
There are spots to rent canoes, like the Chaa Creek Lodge. Our guests go there, rent a canoe, and go downstream on the river for 2 hours. They end up in San Ignacio. The lodge picks them up and brings them back to their car. You can also rent a canoe there and go upstream if you like. 
In Panama, women and girls are placed on a pedestal; up to a degree. It's good to take into account the country's Spanish - and therefore Catholic - heritage. In Spain, it's common to encounter ladies with names such as "Purisima" (the purest) and "Inmaculada" (immaculate). Even names such as Mercedes (as in Benz) or Dolores (usually turned into Lolita, like in Nabokov's novel) come straight from the Virgin Mary: María de las Mercedes (our Lady of Mercy) and...
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Our move to Panama happened after the economic downturn of the Obama administration took its toll on our quality of life. Yes, it was more than that, too. The cost of medical care skyrocketing, the cost of everything going up never down. Increased taxes, poor air quality, too many sick days and frankly after two...
