Latin America

Bye bye dream island and hello Panama. Before I went to Panama I had a short stay over near the airport in Bogotá. The apartment was convenient, calm and the landlady had a cute big dog in her living room. It was perfect to charge all my batteries electronic and biological ones. At 3.30 in the morning I then took a taxi to the airport. To board the flight I had to show a PCR test. Luckily a girl I met in Ecuador emailed me her test which was issued in Bogotá.

At the time I arrived in Panama I really needed to go to the toilet. I walked 5 minutes passed a covid laboratory continued for another 5 minutes and found myself at a dead end. They erected some temporary walls at certain areas at this tremendously bigTerminal. I couldn’t continue to the baggage claim area so I went to the toilet and then back all the way to the very gate I disembarked. From there I could go to another direction where I spotted two airport employees who let pass certain people down a cordoned off staircase. Those guys told me I have to do the Covid test at the lab station to pass this area and continue to immigration and further to customs.

I was the last person of my flight cueing for this silly on arrival test. 2.5 hours waiting in line after I could finally do the test. They charged me $85 for it and told me I have to wait 40 minutes for a rapid test result. Within 3 days I will also receive an email with the final test result.
With the rapid test in my hand I finally could go down the stairs towards immigration. On the way there I had to stop at another checkpoint where they asked me where I will stay the next 3 days to wait out the final result. I showed them my reservation in the City and explained I will extend my stay there for 2 more days. I then had to show my Bogotá PCR test and my rapid test result and another paper which I filled out earlier at the airport with tones of information.
Finally I could continue to immigration. I was already tired and I just handed in my passport and my Salvoconducto paper. The young boy inside the booth was totally perplex. He had no idea why I gave him my Salvoconducto since he saw that I have a Colombian exit stamp in my passport. He run to his supervisor with my documents and a moment later the supervisor came to me just as confused as his young fellow. He told me to wait in a waiting zone until further notice. 6 Colombians who were on the same flight were in this waiting room, everyone was pulling a sad face and seemed to be tired and annoyed.
I waited 2 and a half hours until the migration officers came back from lunch and started to analyze our passports and my Salvoconducto. We all had to sign a paper and I specifically had to explain the Salvoconducto. Without any explanation from the officers side, we were forced to go straight back to the gate with him. We realized at this point that we were rejected to enter the courtney and sent back to Bogotá. A woman was almost crying, she told me that she paid a lot for this test on arrival and she has her family waiting her outside the airport. I felt sad for all the 6 Colombians some with Venezuelan double citizenship who just like me had to go back to Colombia without knowing why.
I asked one last time a migration officer if he could give me an explanation, he told me, he will not explain me anything, I should ask migration in Colombia if I want to know more.

Two hours later we were back in Colombia. Passports were always with flight attendants and then with Colombian migration officers. Finally I was in a waiting room with a water dispenser. I was hungry and thirsty since we couldn’t have any water through the whole time in Panama.
All of us had to fill out a Colombian online migration form and answer some questions. Once we were done with that we received our passports and I specifically got an entry stamp from an angry immigration officer who told me I have 15 days in Colombia whereas today is day one. I smiled took my Passpoet and left the airport at 7pm.Read more