Mundo never sent any additional information about the Norwood drinks thing- no revised guest list, no agenda items he wanted me to hit. Just radio silence.
Oh well.
Hopeton and I arrived at the Norwood Club half an hour early, on the night of the get-together. The room we’d reserved was ready to receive guests. Trays of cold hors d’oeuvres and pitchers of gin and tonic and whiskey sours were arranged on a cherrywood sideboard (I learned all about fine furniture watching re-runs of Antiques Roadshow during my time in Fort Dix. My white-collar colleagues loved that shit).
I did a slow turn and surveyed the scene. Hopeton was wearing some of his Madison Avenue swag- a pair of slim fit tropical wool trousers in a light khaki color, a perfectly tailored light pink Tattersall button down and those bad-ass oxblood wingtips. Without a doubt, the man looked like he owned the room.
Mundo’s people started trickling in at around 7:30. And these were definitely Mundo’s people- a little late, a little loud and very friendly. Thankfully, Filo was the first to arrive- he was the only person I knew on the invite list. And he seemed to know everyone else, so I left it to him to make introductions. Easy-going Filo was happy to oblige, and didn’t make it awkward at all. By the time the last man rolled in, we were a party of twelve. As Hopeton and I had surmised during our google research session, it was a bunch of regional banking managers, international development leads and political fixers. Mid-level money people- all of them in New York to have a good time, do a little networking and maybe get some work done. They all knew each other from the Central American social circuit. I introduced myself as a VP of Management at Mundo’s company and Hopeton as my partner in a Jamaican real estate venture.
As soon as introductions were wrapped, everyone automatically floated towards the drinks table- this was definitely a party crowd, no doubt about it. I handed Hopeton a gin and tonic and gave him a quick thumbs up. Then I shut my mind off, channeled my inner Doe and dived into the social scene swirling around me.
And you know what? It was easy. And I didn’t hate it.
Hopeton wound up chatting with Bernard Searle, a fortyish British/German man who ran infrastructure improvement projects throughout Panama, for various entities like the World Bank. Bernard’s father was a British civil servant who’d been posted to Cuba for several years in the mid 80s, apparently not too far from where Hopeton had spent a lot of time when he was a kid. They had a very long, very animated conversation about Tarpon fishing at Playa Larga and watching semi-pro baseball games in Havana.
The hors d’oeuvres and cocktails were devoured within the first half hour, so I called for a ton of food from the restaurant- crab cakes, roasted vegetables, mini pizzas, meat and cheese platters and assorted desserts. Hopeton asked the bar to replenish the cocktail pitchers and send them over along with a bottle of port.
During the lull, Filo, Bernard and one or two of the others stepped out to smoke a joint. I stayed inside, keeping up steady conversation with various folks, and gleaning just enough info to realize that Mundo was seen as an awesome party boy but not much of a businessman.
By the time Filo and crew returned, the second wave of food and drink had arrived.
At ten o’clock I glanced down at my watch then looked around the room. It finally seemed like things were winding down.
Filo looked pretty loose and open, so I decided it was a good time to catch up with him.
“¿Qué lo qué, hermano? ¿La noche bien?”
“Pierre,” Filo greeted me. “I was just telling everyone how awesome this get-together has been. Super fun, man! ” He leaned forward and said in a lower tone, “You never know how these things are going to turn out. It’s always such a mixed bag.”
I saw my moment.
“Oh, you know Mundo. He asked me to host in his absence but didn’t tell me much, aside from you’d be here and, well… that was it, really.”
Filo laughed and said, “That fucking guy.”
“So, was there anything we were all supposed to discuss tonight?” I asked. “Or was it just a free-flow get together?”
“No, not really,” Filo said. “Mundo just likes to get certain groups of people in a room together and see where it goes. He’ll get several calls tomorrow saying that the evening was a success and that future business will come out of it for all involved. And that’s all he wanted to happen.”
He clasped me on the shoulder and said on last thing before he hit the bottle of port for a final drink.
“Look at these series of events as a way for you to get to know the people you’ll be socializing with in Panama. That’s all this really is.”
