The morning I met Dalys, she presented herself like a solider reporting for duty.
Arms at her side, head high, eyes wide, she smiled at me brightly through a mass of dark curly hair.
“I can carry a bag of cemento and use a machete as good as any man,” the young woman blurted out unprompted.
Dalys appeared that morning unannounced. She’d come to Los Islotes, the oceanfront community Lief and I are developing on Panama’s Veraguas coast, because her cousin had mentioned the evening before we were hiring.
“I am a woman, but I am abnormally strong,” Dalys continued that morning. “I can show you,” she said. I thought she might drop to the floor and do push-ups.
Dalys imagined we needed work crew, but we also needed someone to manage things. Dalys spoke English. She’d taught herself watching MTV music videos. She also knew how to use a computer. Those are uncommon skills in this remote region.
Lief and I saw something else in Dalys. I’ve hired hundreds of people. Experience helps, but a can-do spirit outweighs everything in my book.
We offered Dalys a position on the spot. I consider that decision one of the smartest I’ve made.
Dalys is our right hand when Lief and I are at Los Islotes and the one in charge when we’re not. It’s no small thing, a woman in charge of dozens of men, most her senior, but Dalys was smart and strong enough not to turn down a chance she’d likely never get again.
Dalys and the world at Los Islotes that she manages for us when we’re away are much on my mind as Lief and I count down to our return to Panama.
When we’re elsewhere, Dalys updates us weekly.
“We’re at the height of the rainy season,” she wrote in this week’s report, “but our Veraguas coast has been enjoying many blue sky days…”
Meantime, the regular rains keep the landscape lush…
The current priority project is our stables. We have eight horses at Los Islotes, six born on the property…
We’re building them a comfortable home, which should be completed by the time we’re back in residence at the end of the month…
Our woodshop is a beehive of activity as our crew works to make that happen…
Lief and I can’t wait to get back and see their beautiful handiwork for ourselves.
Until next time,
Kathleen Peddicord
Founding Publisher, Overseas Opportunity Letter
