so we got robbed. the boys who did it are going to prison for 4 years. I think its harsh, but its the law here, and its not up to me to judge the system they use. I had a hard time with it because I was already having a pretty intense week. I was tired from not sleeping and emotionally exhausted for other more personal reasons. So there I stood already heartbroken, fatigued and sore, but now with the new reality of having nothing of importance left in our posession. there was a moment that I was sure I would lose it and have a breakdown, but what good would that do? I watched caleb run down the alley, and it was as though i was deaf, I new the people behind me were shouting something but it was all white noise to me. I wanted to see him catch the guy and tackle him, get our things and come back with a smile. I heard one word clearly: gun. It was loud again, I could hear everything, they wanted him to stop, the guy was carrying a gun and in Colon they WILL shoot you. there was 53 murders in Colon last year. once a week someone is killed here. He must of finally heard the crowd because Caleb stopped and slowly walked back, looking like he was more frustrated that he had to stop the chase than happy to still be alive. the next 2 days are all sorta blurred. we where in and out of 3 different police stations and spent all of our time with a millitary entouage. I have never been escorted by fully armed millitary officers to the bathroom. It makes you feel important when you send them for toillet papper. When they started comming back with handfulls of our things we got so excited. it was amazing to see that they actually found anything. Colon has alot of alleys and really great places to hide things. The locals where certain that we would get nothing back. I guess the methods of interrogation here are more effective. When the officer I spent most of my time with came out of the interrogation room to wash the pepper spray off his hands, I realizaed how serious they are here. So after filling reports we finally got to go to bed that night, only to have them show up the next morning and bring us back in. This day was alot less thrilling, mostly just sitting and waiting. we still had our entourage, but it was hard to sit and wait for 3 or 4 hours at a time. Anyways, that was pretty much it, now we keep waiting until they can give us back our things and we can be on our way.
thanks for reading, hope we are doing ok with keeping you updated.

Liz