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I have recently come home (to Buenos Aires, Argentina) from Panama. During my stay there I had the opportunity of living among the Kunas for a week. The Kuna Shire, or kuna yala (Land of the Kuna people) is an independent region, comprised of over 370 islands. Some were as small as five meters wide. Others were as big as to hold seventy huts (seventy families). It is paradise on earth. I have never seen anything like it.
The smaller islands are also inhabited by some members of the family that owns that particular island, who rotates during three month periods. When they are not on the small island they go back to their tribe’s island.
After years of isolation, the Kuna people are opening themselves to the world, offering cheap and rudimentary (and this is the special thing about visiting them. You actually merge for some time with their culture) accommodations to anyone who wants to visit them.
You live in one of their huts, sleep in a hammock or, if you are unlucky, a bed (don’t expect luxury mattresses). The "bathrooms" have a "direct connection with the sea" (if you know what I mean). While men dress in a "western way" and the great majority speaks Spanish and sometimes English, women dress the Kuna way and seldom speak fluent Spanish. Women spend their days knitting and sewing "molas", decorative fabrics that they also use in their clothes. Men, spend their days fishing until the sun sets. These differences are due to the fact that men often go outside Kuna Yala for business (and more now, because of tourism).
One of the things that most dazzled me was the fact that Kunas start person to person relationships in the exact opposite way that Westerners (like me) do.
Imagine when you first approach a person. What are the first questions you would ask?
What do you do for a living? Family? The weather?
The first thing a Kuna will talk to you about will be either sex or food... if you get more intimate with them, then they would start talking about their families, etc.
The bottom line is that they have an amazing and almost virgin culture.
The problem is that very strong foreign capitals want to get their resorts to Kuna Yala. I was there during one of the council meetings regarding this issue. The answer was “NO” to the corporations, but regrettably this “NO” is not permanent.
In the last few years the Kuna youngsters have been absorbing more and more western culture, thus leaving their own culture behind, and sometimes feeling ashamed of it.
Today they say “NO” for two reasons: First, the elders are still alive and they stick to their traditions. No money in the world would make them change their minds. Secondly, the adults have great respect for the elders and abide by their decisions.
But what will happen when the elders are gone? The new adults don’t have those deep tight roots. It will only take one Kuna to get bedazzled with millions on a table, for not only their "shy tourism economy" but their whole culture will be lost.
It is not what I think, it is what all of them know will happen, it is what they have told me.
Only one question remains: Is there anything we could do?
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Writer Profile
Fernando Tarnogol
Fernando Tarnogol is an argentinean Psychologist residing in the USA. He is 29 years old. Worked in corporate Human Resources, and as a counselor and psychological evaluator, of children and adolescents. He is currently employed by the Devereux Foundation as a Program Coordinator.
He has visited 36 countries in the five continents.
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Comments
Agree! Yaiguili Alvarado | Feb 26th, 2008
Great article! I am half kuna half spanish, and everything you say is true. I have seen many changes in the kuna society, there are some communities that still maintain the culture, but there are some others that even have banks! I also wrote an article about this in TUNZA Magazine, here's the link: http://tigurl.org/d0ryxz
Regards,
Yaiguili Alvarado
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