Time

In the Army, punctuality is injected into our blood stream by the NCOs and Officers. One of our many mottos is “If you are not 15 minutes early, you are late.” When you are late, the physical and mental punishment is waiting for you, like thunder waiting for lightening. This lifestyle has led me to practice punctuality in almost anything I do.

In different micro-cultures and cultures, time is valued in very different ways. This makes me and many others believe that time is a social construct. In the United States, our culture has an emphasis on descriptors of time, such as early, late, on-time, or fashionably late. One’s value of time shows who they are in American culture.

As we have learned, time is certainly not valued the same way in other countries. In Spain and Greece, workers receive a three hour lunch break when working. France, China and Brazil give a two hour lunch break, and Italy gives a ninety minute lunch break. In Panama, there is not much emphasis on the descriptors of time mentioned before. Classes here can start early or late, finish early or late, and it doesn’t matter at all. We had also planned to go out with some of the local Panamanians at 10pm, but they showed up at different times over the next hour. Waiting around seems to be common in this country.

I have been already been exposed to the hurry up and wait mindset before coming here. In the time I spent at Ft. Knox last summer, we would wake up at 0400 and go to formation at 0500. We wouldn’t do any movements until at least 0600. Patience was the easiest way to deal with this. Obviously if you have to wake up two hours before actually doing anything significant, you tend to become upset over lost sleeping time, which is a valuable resource in that environment. It is very much the same here in Panama. I have used my developed patience many times. For example, one of our Ubers took 20 minutes to arrive when it had originally said 5 minutes. Another example was when a taxi took 50 minutes to drive me 10 minutes of distance because he kept picking up other people who needed rides.

Many of the Panamanians that I have seen do not wear watches. Those that do seem to only be wearing it as a fashion accessory. I don’t think I have actually seen one Panamanian look at their watch to check the time.

As my time here goes on, I have found myself devaluing my punctuality habits a little bit which is something I need to be aware of when I get back to the United States. It is fascinating to me how quickly I am being accustomed to the culture of Panama.

Nicholas B. Nuccio