Panama & Work

My days were spent hiking and exploring Panama, because the nights were taken over by a trade show my company was taking part in.


We had no idea the show hours were at night, but I was really grateful for it. it gave me daylight to explore. They do the shows at night because they want people to be able to attend after their work shift.


We arrived Tuesday. A co-worker had already been there since Sunday setting the booth up mainly by himself. He's the man.



Wednesday he and I walked from the hotel in the a.m. to meet a customer down the road from the hotel who had just decided to buy equipment from us. Yay. We then cabbed it over to the convention center, where I helped put the finishing touches (hanging things up, moving catalogs, arranging a table). We were there from around 11 a.m. until 11 p.m. Very tired.

Day 1

Day 2: The show's hours were 3:00 - 9:30 p.m.

David and I pose in front of a ginormous wheel of some truck being displayed by another company.

Scene from the show.

On Day 1, I wore nice shoes. Day 2? Sneakers. 12 hours standing up the previous day had done a number on my feet.

The show was PACKED. We were in a separate hall from the main one, and I think the AC was broken. It was HOT. At one point, I did a spazzy freak-out dance because something slid down my shirt front and down my chest. What was it? Sweat. LOL

On our way in to the convention center on Day 1, we noticed this above. This is our equipment being used by one of our customers whom we sold the equipment to, on the building directly in front of the convention center. Hello? What LUCK!! My co-worker called up the customer and Boom....

...they let us hang a banner. What GREAT advertising! We actually had customers find our booth and say "We saw your stage outside and decided to drop by." Very cool!

Our nights were usually long and we got into the (bad) habit of eating late. Here we are eating dinner around 10:30 p.m. in an outdoor cafe. We stopped the late eating on day 3 and 4, choosing to grab quick meals inside the convention center itself.

We had Wi-Fi inside and I was able to create quotes for customers as they stood there asking for them. I can imagine their surprise when the got into their e-mails the following mornings to see quotes already in their in-boxes. :) All in all, for being our first time there, the show was a success.