The class took place on the rooftop of an old apartment building, where a gentle breeze tickled the shirts drying on a clothing line. A field of rooftops surrounded us, with the Pacific Ocean peeking out in the distance. As soon as the music began blaring from a small speaker, our disheveled instructor gave us little time to overthink what came next. Before I knew it, I had a hand on my lower back and was face to face and holding hands with the tall French guy. We began to dance.
We weren’t great, moving in an awkward synchronicity that caused us to laugh between steps. But after that day, our bi-weekly class grew from just three students to a larger collection of a dozen dancers. The lesson was relocated from the rooftop to a more spacious, open-air recreation space along the bay, known as the Cinta Costera. I felt self-conscious about dancing in such a public setting. Were passersby judging me? Did I look out of place? I was confronted these distinctly American thoughts—the idea that I had to be a skillful dancer with perfect technique to be on display—and took a cue from the people around me. I chose to shake and groove my inhibitions away.
As I got used to stumbling through each lesson, my classmates became my good friends. After salsa, we’d go out for ceviche at the seafood market or cheap pizza at a hole-in-the-wall, and we began to invite each other on weekend hikes and beach trips.
After a year of living in Panama City, a teaching job led me to a remote beach town called Playa Venao on the coast. This meant saying goodbye to my dance group, but I knew that if I had found my community in Panama City, it could do it again in a new town. I arrived just in time for carnival, with its colorful costumes and elaborate masks, and parades and live music beating through the streets.
Hopping between celebrations, I ended up in a grocery store parking lot, where a group of locals had gathered. The sounds of drums vibrated off the cement walls and floor. Every other hand had a clear bottle of gold-colored beer, and people formed interlocking lines as they danced by moving back and forth in unison. Before I knew it, I was unapologetically shaking my shoulders alongside them.
Suddenly, a 60-year-old Panamanian man in jeans and a flannel shirt faced me. As the improvised drum beats grew faster, I entered an unexpected collaboration: I began to mimic his dance moves, and he began to mimic mine.
Caught in the serendipity of it all, I allowed my body to move in absolute freedom. A circle formed around us, and everyone was cheering—a sense of freedom swept over me, and I felt excitement like electricity running through my veins. At that moment, I experienced dance in a whole new way. Once a strategy to meet people and make friends, it was now a tool to connect to anyone in almost any setting. There’s a reason dancing is intrinsic to Panama and its people—and that night, I understood why.
