To my long lost fans that haven't heard from me in several weeks (or is it months now?)...I have returned! I have spent the last month being coddled by my dear friends in Denver (namely my fabulous caretakers Kristen and Matt!), spoiled in Florida by my wonderful family while spotting manatees and dolphins in the intercostal areas, and cuddled in Ohio while lounging in Nicaraguan hammocks and exploring beautiful Appalachian caves with Cody. So whats on the itinerary next for this avid traveler and lover of adventure? Well, I have just arrived in San Francisco where I will begin my course of study in nursing/midwifery in two weeks. I have started setting my roots in the Haight where I am living on the third floor of a classic California Victorian, in a room whose floor to ceiling bay window looks out into the sky and close by bald cypress trees. Just a stones throw from golden gate park and the UCSF campus I am able to explore the little nooks and crannies of the city, the way I would enjoy a new frontier in Latin America. So, now that I am back in the U.S.ofA. i can say that life should be a journey for all of us...that each turn in the road should be savored, whether the other side presents us with a steep hill or a lush flat pasture...its the discovery and steps that move us onward that give us life!
Now back in my mother country I am able to look back over the last several months of my life and comment upon it. If I were to sum up my experiences in a quick sentence explaining what I gained/learned/felt I can easily say that this trip taught me what it was like to be a woman in the world. So what does that mean, you ask, knowing that I am already a woman and have spent thirty years as one? From midwifery clinic, to woman's center, to impoverished nicaraguan women, miskito ladies, quechua mothers, young women on buses, my own interactions within the latin american medical realm...all of them acted as my teachers. I have a deeper understanding of how the majority of women in the world subsistence live, i understand how they are demeaned in healthcare settings, I have seen them empowered by midwives, I have seen them subjugated by men, I have seen them in their daily roles achieving domestic feats that I could not hope to realize myself! I feel a deeper empathy and understanding for what a woman truly experiences in varied environments. To come full circle, it has always been my clients that have served as my most potent teachers, and the women that I worked closely with in Latin America, as patients and friends, that have again taught me. With this refreshed view on a woman's world and appreciation for my many teachers, who transcend the role of classic student-teacher, I feel ready to delve deeper into the medical community and realize my own role as a competent provider for the many faces of woman and their families. This is the end of my big sabbatical trip...but the journey never stops, the wheels keep rolling forward. Next stop: University of San Francisco...mexico...burma...??
Lastly...I want to here from all of you. Please feel free to keep connected with email, but if in San Francisco, let me know! My new information is: 707 Shrader St, San Francisco, CA, 94117, and my new phone number is 415-350-8832 (beginning 6/15).
May your journeys surprise you!
xoxo, kari
Monday, June 11, 2007
Sunday, April 22, 2007
A World without Lawn Mowers
Here in Cochabamba, Bolivia the weather is hot, the mountains dry, and many a medicinal plant flowering. I originally had decided to visit Cochabamba way back in the day when I was writing for my Fulbright grant. I had discovered a man named Carlos Prado, a fifth generation herbalist, who runs a small school for traditional Andean medicine with an herbal medicine clinic named Kuska Incari which translates to ¨together to live better¨in Quechua. Since my arrival in Cochabamba my days have been steeped in herbal medicines and mates (that´s south american for tea!). In the morning I usually walk to the enormous market covering many city blocks in search of my morning tea. Here you can find men and women who have set up carts with various glass jars filled with fresh herbs such as chamomile, uña de gato, cornsilk, cedar, or anis infusing in water...you can walk up and say Ï need something for my kidneys or my liver¨and they will mix up a concoction for you, tossing in a bit of fresh honey. From there I usually catch the ¨U¨ a colorfully decorated bluebird short-bus that roares through the cities streets, cutting lanes of traffic, blaring its horn at any opportunity to arrive at the Cochabamba Botanic Gardens. With Carlos I have been assisting in mounting a new garden of Foreign medicinal plants and clearing the original medicinal plant section to contain only Bolivian Natives. From there we usually go to Carlos´s home/clinic/school to see a patient, prepare medicines, or eat lunch with the family. His home is exactly how I imagened it to be: caving in ceiling, clinic room designated by a hanging sheet that sections of the ¨healing space¨from the living area, two rooms full of hundreds of jars of dried plants, five gallon buckets brimming with tinctures, and a patio cluttered with mismatched jars/pots full of medicinal plants. It is in this home that Carlos reads coca leaves to diagnose the origin of a person´s illness, where he burns copal to induce healing, and where he ladels out his medicines into platic bottles to pass on to his patients.
When working with healers in traditional cultures the most magical moments are when their philosophies are shared with you, teachings that often butt up against the western paradigm in which we have been bred. These moments challenge us, giving us the opportunity to completely disregard the information, or more interestingly instigate us to chip away at the boundries that close in our minds. When we choose to ¨chip¨we open the door to a diffent world that appears magical because it often defies our normal beleifs and perceptions.
Two examples:
1)We went out into the mountains seeking native medicinal plants to transplant into the Botanic Gardens. We stopped on the way to eat whole fried fish from the Lagoon, soft-salty cheese, and boiled beans. Knowing my interest in plants used in gynecological matters Carlos was discussing a large native grass species that we were going to dig up. He says to me that according to some women the plant is useful as a contraceptive. My interest peaked, I asked him if its a plant that´s used for short term effects or longterm/complete infertility, as many plants used in this fashion are catagorized this way. He looks at me and says, thats such a westernized thing to say! First, in Andean beleif system the concept of time is very different, so to use the term absolute doesnt fit into his description of the plant or how it would function. Second, the plant is medicine, so it can be used in various ways depending on how the plant synergizes with the person and the plants specific state of growth. A large plant may have a longer effect than a short plant; if its growing at higher altitude versus lower this can influence its effects; if the woman is young vs. old, fat vs. thin, never had a child or already has a litter, etc.
2)I hear Carlos speak about almost every plant with the reference ¨its the famous avocado seed, the famous andean sage, the famous passiflora...¨ Each plant is revered and honored as medicine. When sitting in on a class of university students one of them dared to asked: what is that plant used for, and his response was almost open jawed as he said, obviosly its medicine, its all medicine! the catagorization of uses often constricts the plants abilities, confining it so that it cant do its work.
And now to bid you all adeu, I wanted to share the famous anti-diarrhea formula that we prepared yesterday:
1.5 cups peeled, washed, shredded avocado seed
1.5 cups burnt to a crisp, dry, white rice
1 peel of a pomegranit chopped
1 handful cinnamon bark broken into small pieces
Add all ingredients into 3 liters of boiling water. Steep 15-30 minutes, strain. Dosage is 1-2 Tbsp. To make a tincture add 1.5 liters water and 1.5 liters grain alcohol. Dosage is 15-30 drops.
When working with healers in traditional cultures the most magical moments are when their philosophies are shared with you, teachings that often butt up against the western paradigm in which we have been bred. These moments challenge us, giving us the opportunity to completely disregard the information, or more interestingly instigate us to chip away at the boundries that close in our minds. When we choose to ¨chip¨we open the door to a diffent world that appears magical because it often defies our normal beleifs and perceptions.
Two examples:
1)We went out into the mountains seeking native medicinal plants to transplant into the Botanic Gardens. We stopped on the way to eat whole fried fish from the Lagoon, soft-salty cheese, and boiled beans. Knowing my interest in plants used in gynecological matters Carlos was discussing a large native grass species that we were going to dig up. He says to me that according to some women the plant is useful as a contraceptive. My interest peaked, I asked him if its a plant that´s used for short term effects or longterm/complete infertility, as many plants used in this fashion are catagorized this way. He looks at me and says, thats such a westernized thing to say! First, in Andean beleif system the concept of time is very different, so to use the term absolute doesnt fit into his description of the plant or how it would function. Second, the plant is medicine, so it can be used in various ways depending on how the plant synergizes with the person and the plants specific state of growth. A large plant may have a longer effect than a short plant; if its growing at higher altitude versus lower this can influence its effects; if the woman is young vs. old, fat vs. thin, never had a child or already has a litter, etc.
2)I hear Carlos speak about almost every plant with the reference ¨its the famous avocado seed, the famous andean sage, the famous passiflora...¨ Each plant is revered and honored as medicine. When sitting in on a class of university students one of them dared to asked: what is that plant used for, and his response was almost open jawed as he said, obviosly its medicine, its all medicine! the catagorization of uses often constricts the plants abilities, confining it so that it cant do its work.
And now to bid you all adeu, I wanted to share the famous anti-diarrhea formula that we prepared yesterday:
1.5 cups peeled, washed, shredded avocado seed
1.5 cups burnt to a crisp, dry, white rice
1 peel of a pomegranit chopped
1 handful cinnamon bark broken into small pieces
Add all ingredients into 3 liters of boiling water. Steep 15-30 minutes, strain. Dosage is 1-2 Tbsp. To make a tincture add 1.5 liters water and 1.5 liters grain alcohol. Dosage is 15-30 drops.
Friday, April 13, 2007
This one´s for my mama!
Coming to this area of the world it is hard to deny the power of the earth. It is evident in the snowcapped peaks seen in the distance, the evergreen hills towering at 12,000 ft, and the roaring waters flowing through Andean valleys. When I sent my mother a message letting her know that I was heading down to the Inka empire of Machu Picchu she told me that I was living her dream. So, as a tribute to her and all the Mamas out there including the Pachamama I dedicate this edition of my blog once again from a land where women carry their babies tightly wrapped to their bodies in brilliantly woven tapestries.
The Pachamama is considered the feminine power of the mother earth as ascribed by the Inkas. It is a force so grand that the people populating the Quechua regions of Peru live an existence that is inseperable from her. They follow various practices that honor her, and on a day-to-day level it is obvious how she is appreciated.
1) Living Buildings
On the large scale Machu Picchu is impressive due to its complicated location deep in the Andes atop a leveled green mountaintop. One asks over and over how people lived up there, and how on earth they carried goods so far. But what is almost more impressive, in my eyes, are the architectural details that incorporate the earth into the citys dwellings. Unlike many cities where the earth has been cleared, lifted, and destroyed to accomodate its settlers, Macchu Picchu is a work of natural art. Throughout the ruins you can behold rocks that have been so delicately carved that they may have six or three sides and yet fit togehter in a linked pattern to produce walls. The most stunning buildings are built from enormous boulders that were jutting up from the earth then and exist still. Many boulders form the base of temples which are topped with smoothed stones to produce a vision that is unmatched. Not only had the Inkas chosen ares of great natural beauty to live, but their habitations are alive with the place, not seperate; an honoring of the Pachamama. The Inka decendants today still live in homes cast from mud bricks, surrounded by immense gardens and terraced agricultural plots.
2) Agricultural Advancements
The Inkas also show their appreciation for the Pachamama in their agricultural processes that are mostly based in terraced plots. In areas that appear harsh the Inkan decendants have been able to manipulate the earth to produce a wide array of agricultural successes. The potato, which origantes from the Andean mountains, boasts more than 300 differing varieties from sweet, starchy, small, large, colorful, to a dried variety that is produced by freezing and then expressing water by stomping. Having traveled a variety of times to Mexico, I thought I knew corn...I had NO idea of the diversity of corn until walking into a market in Cuzco, Peru; at least 50 countable forms and colors...the Peruvians have done a virtual evolutionary miracle with corn hybridization! The markets in Peru are unlike anything I have ever seen and I owe this fact to the honoring of the earth and manipulation of her soils and fruits to produce the rainbow available in the market place: corn, potato, camote, peppers, aji, garlic, greens, mushrooms, algeas, membrillos, pomegranits, and a majority of produce that I can only dream of remebering the names!
3)Herbal Medicine
Alongside the ventas full of fruits and vegetables in a Peruvian market you will also see the largest variety of fresh herbal medicines that I have EVER seen in a market in Latin America. I spend hours talking to women like Justicia in the markets that share their remedies and herbs with me. The beauty of this environment is that many plants that are common in the herbal pharmacopea can be located here alongside the Andean plants that are new to me: Marshmallow, valerian, horsetail, nettles; Muña, coca leaf, hierba de cancer, etc. Herbal medcine is alive here, and I attribute that to the reverance for the earth/Pachamama.
Next stop La Paz, Bolivia!
The Pachamama is considered the feminine power of the mother earth as ascribed by the Inkas. It is a force so grand that the people populating the Quechua regions of Peru live an existence that is inseperable from her. They follow various practices that honor her, and on a day-to-day level it is obvious how she is appreciated.
1) Living Buildings
On the large scale Machu Picchu is impressive due to its complicated location deep in the Andes atop a leveled green mountaintop. One asks over and over how people lived up there, and how on earth they carried goods so far. But what is almost more impressive, in my eyes, are the architectural details that incorporate the earth into the citys dwellings. Unlike many cities where the earth has been cleared, lifted, and destroyed to accomodate its settlers, Macchu Picchu is a work of natural art. Throughout the ruins you can behold rocks that have been so delicately carved that they may have six or three sides and yet fit togehter in a linked pattern to produce walls. The most stunning buildings are built from enormous boulders that were jutting up from the earth then and exist still. Many boulders form the base of temples which are topped with smoothed stones to produce a vision that is unmatched. Not only had the Inkas chosen ares of great natural beauty to live, but their habitations are alive with the place, not seperate; an honoring of the Pachamama. The Inka decendants today still live in homes cast from mud bricks, surrounded by immense gardens and terraced agricultural plots.
2) Agricultural Advancements
The Inkas also show their appreciation for the Pachamama in their agricultural processes that are mostly based in terraced plots. In areas that appear harsh the Inkan decendants have been able to manipulate the earth to produce a wide array of agricultural successes. The potato, which origantes from the Andean mountains, boasts more than 300 differing varieties from sweet, starchy, small, large, colorful, to a dried variety that is produced by freezing and then expressing water by stomping. Having traveled a variety of times to Mexico, I thought I knew corn...I had NO idea of the diversity of corn until walking into a market in Cuzco, Peru; at least 50 countable forms and colors...the Peruvians have done a virtual evolutionary miracle with corn hybridization! The markets in Peru are unlike anything I have ever seen and I owe this fact to the honoring of the earth and manipulation of her soils and fruits to produce the rainbow available in the market place: corn, potato, camote, peppers, aji, garlic, greens, mushrooms, algeas, membrillos, pomegranits, and a majority of produce that I can only dream of remebering the names!
3)Herbal Medicine
Alongside the ventas full of fruits and vegetables in a Peruvian market you will also see the largest variety of fresh herbal medicines that I have EVER seen in a market in Latin America. I spend hours talking to women like Justicia in the markets that share their remedies and herbs with me. The beauty of this environment is that many plants that are common in the herbal pharmacopea can be located here alongside the Andean plants that are new to me: Marshmallow, valerian, horsetail, nettles; Muña, coca leaf, hierba de cancer, etc. Herbal medcine is alive here, and I attribute that to the reverance for the earth/Pachamama.
Next stop La Paz, Bolivia!
Saturday, April 07, 2007
thoughts on nicaragua from lima
once again in a cosmopolitan city such as Lima, peru i am able to reflect back on the experience and learning that nicaragua has provided me with. I can think fondly of the simplicity of life there as I gently clack away at the key board, listening to cars drive by on a street lined with brightly lit casinos and designer clothing shops. On my last days in Nicaragua Cody and I discussed all of the new skills I had aquired and foods that I had savored. When I turn these events over in my mind I recognize that I learned skills that are basic to the life of a woman living in a rural area of the world, skills that may appear quite different from those of the high heeled city woman. So in honor of all the rural women the world over, particularly those in Nicaragua that laguhed as I attempted to master the most mundane skills I dedicate this list of newly aquired knowledge:
-to pull water up from a well with a plastic bucket...easier said than done, its all in the wrist!
-to grate a coconut on a tool derived from a punched metal can and then make coconut milk...various scars on my hand to prove the sharpness of this tool!
-to light a fire with pine wood and charcoals for grilling food...this is without the traditional addition of fast lighting plastic
-to effeciently bath and wash dishes without running water
-to carry buckets of water without spilling too much
-to hand wash cloths on a grated cement block, hang them to dry, and remember to bring them in at night so they wont get stolen (ill admit that i only did it a couple of times and paid to have someone do it the rest of the time...its hard work!)
-to fish with a line and hook
-to descale, gut, and grill a fish (thanx to cody for that one!)
-to peel and cook bread fruit in a variety of ways
-to make cake out of quiquisque
-to make miskito tortilla both fried and baked (kind of!)
And to cody and his gastronomical passion a list of new foods that have touched my palate: quiquisque, jocote, bittensweet, naranjarilla, bread fruit, malanga, icate, chile congo & cabro, encultidos, rose apple, roscetes, rosquillos, rondon, wiya/ibhina wina/gibbnet, turtle meat, iguana eggs, bunnyhuevos, fresco de grama y avena, cuajada...just to name a few!
occassionaly as a modern woman traveling in the developing world you realize the delicate and difficult skills that we have lost as life has become paradoxically simplified and more complex at the same time! heres off to the Inka empire and other unknown skills....
-to pull water up from a well with a plastic bucket...easier said than done, its all in the wrist!
-to grate a coconut on a tool derived from a punched metal can and then make coconut milk...various scars on my hand to prove the sharpness of this tool!
-to light a fire with pine wood and charcoals for grilling food...this is without the traditional addition of fast lighting plastic
-to effeciently bath and wash dishes without running water
-to carry buckets of water without spilling too much
-to hand wash cloths on a grated cement block, hang them to dry, and remember to bring them in at night so they wont get stolen (ill admit that i only did it a couple of times and paid to have someone do it the rest of the time...its hard work!)
-to fish with a line and hook
-to descale, gut, and grill a fish (thanx to cody for that one!)
-to peel and cook bread fruit in a variety of ways
-to make cake out of quiquisque
-to make miskito tortilla both fried and baked (kind of!)
And to cody and his gastronomical passion a list of new foods that have touched my palate: quiquisque, jocote, bittensweet, naranjarilla, bread fruit, malanga, icate, chile congo & cabro, encultidos, rose apple, roscetes, rosquillos, rondon, wiya/ibhina wina/gibbnet, turtle meat, iguana eggs, bunnyhuevos, fresco de grama y avena, cuajada...just to name a few!
occassionaly as a modern woman traveling in the developing world you realize the delicate and difficult skills that we have lost as life has become paradoxically simplified and more complex at the same time! heres off to the Inka empire and other unknown skills....
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
A Brief History of the Miskito
Greetings still from the Miskito Coast of the Region Atlantica Autonima of Nicaragua! First a quick apology for leaving my fans waiting for so long, but between being completely off the grid for weeks (read further for an exciting overview) and the power in Puerta Cabezas vacillating between on and off every couple of hours, I just havent had the opportunity to write. but now here´s the story....
The miskito people are so called due to a set of kings that lived through out the region referred to as Reyes Moscas, or Fly Kings. They are a people that for me at first glance do not have the outward cultural brilliance of people such as the Mayans or Embera, as they no longer have traditional clothing, traditional handicrafts or overt daily customs. What fascinates one as you become immersed with the miskito people is the thick threads of history that are woven into every aspect of their being. The miskito people are not a uniform people...they are a color wheel of black, brown, chocolate, cafe, light skinned, to white; hair that is kinky, braided, straight as an asian; eyes that are deep brown, blue, green or gato as they say here. To identify a miskito person requires that you are actually in the miskitia, as the varied features of a miskito person could easily be confused with chinese, thai, balinese, japanese, latino, african, or occasionally german. The history of the miskito is one of fighting to maintain their land as different cultural groups aimed to conquer it, and as one friend said over drinks last night, they have never lost a battle. One of the main peoples were the english that have left their mark in language and food, as evidenced by the Worcestershire sauce sold at corner stores and the baking bread found at night in the markets. The african slave trade and spanish conquest also played large roles in the development of modern miskito people. The language of the miskito is probably the most culturally rich melting pot of words and expression that describes the richness of this people. It is common that miskito speak the three languages of miskito, english, and/or spanish. The indigenous language itself is as far from any language that you could possibly think. To say good afternoon you would say tetam yamni. But in this same language you have words that are distinctly english, and generally of a variety of english that has long passed. Words to describe items that were not present in the past such as spoon, door, plastic, are often heard sprinkled into a miskito conversation. Words such as dear for expensive or basin for a bowl harken to old school english. Counting is simply done in english. How much is it is Dia price, which may be answered by 5 dollar! Spanish words are also interspersed in the language. This amalgamation of words and speech color the miskito people as deeply as the variety of shades their skin take on.
Today the miskito people maintain a living that is from the sea and the land. Harvesting and using coconuts and breadfruit, diving for lobster and fishing in the deep carribean atlantic sea. They live in stilted homes, many now made of concrete, painted brightly, bringing up images of old sugar shack towns in the southern US. The one thing that still remains about the miskito people, is that they are off the grid, extremely rural. Once you have made contact they are kind, open hearted people that are thrilled to share their turtle meat with you...its just getting there thats the complication! So here is where I interject about my fabulous travel partner Cody. For those of you who are not familiar with the story he is my best friends brother and has been traveling to the miskito coast for the last five years making contacts and winning both respect and opened armed welcomes into the communities. He has been building and installing solar panel systems in the most remote areas to power lights in a world of darkness after 6 pm. It was with him that I had the wonderful opportunity to know the infrequently visited miskito communities of the north as well as the even more rural miskito keyes.
Entonces...we set out early in the morning to find a panga to take us up the coast. After securing our ride we waited as he went to get gas. We boarded the panga several hours later. Upon leaving the driver quickly began to sip from his bottle of flor de cana rum, only to become ridiculously drunk within a short period of time. When attempting to change the gas tanks he was so cross eyed that a wave hit us filling the panga with water. Quick thinking form my man told him to cut the top off our only water bottle to start bailing the water out of the boat, as there was nothing in the boat to do this with. In the meantime I am thinking, the coast isnt that far, i can swim if I have to. By the time we make it just a few miles from our destination the driver is so drunk that he is falling off the back of the boat when i say to cody, we are either getting off here or i am swimming! we disembark at a small beach in a community called Dakura, home of the most beautiful crystalline blue lagoon, to be greated by children shouting "cody, cody!" We spent the night in a home of friends only to be transported to our true final destination by sailboat across the lagoon, a 1km walk across land and then a canoe ride to the end. Just the first of many adventures to be had! To make a long story short we spent many days in a community called Sandy Bay as Cody installed a solar system and I buddied up to the local midwife Dona Esmeralda and prepared herbal solutions to put on a crazy jungle fungus growing on my back.
Later we returned to Dakura to prepare for a one week sailing trip to the Keyes. During this time was probably the largest and most important cultural event in the miskito coast: the campesion baseball series. We opted to go to Awastara to see the festivities by horse. Now most people know my history and can say, kari is a person that likes to ride horses. Ive had to rethink that opinion after sitting atop a horse that is virtually no more than a bone digging into your pelvis as you kick with all your might to get it to move. needless to say, we arrived dragging the horses and returned walking the 2 and a half hour trail.
So many stories, but by far the best and most amazing was the sailing trip that Cody organized. We set sailing in the morning of a clear day, he and I and our crew of three cien por ciento pirates. We sailed the open sea by land marks, gently pushing through the waves of the caribbean, sails high. When you imagine sailboat, I hope that you are seeing a hand built wooden hull that is painted bright blue with masts made from large widdled tree trunks and handsewn sails waving. BY the early afternoon we reached the first key called whipling, a set of 14 wooden fishing shacks set upon a sandbar in the middle of the ocean, no land to be seen. All of the keys are of this fashion, wooden houses that are stilted to withstand the hightide that reaches up to six feet, and low tide averaging around two feet. Many of the other keys are surrounded by establishments of mangroves, but still no land. So we spent the next several days, evenings, and nights watching the sunrise over one side of the ocean to set on the opposite, eating a culinary feast of lobster, conches, crabs, and fish caught earlier in the day. We eventually made it back to land with our crew of well versed pirates to arrive in time for the ripe mangos.
hope that all of you are well up there in gringolandia as spring starts to show her face!
The miskito people are so called due to a set of kings that lived through out the region referred to as Reyes Moscas, or Fly Kings. They are a people that for me at first glance do not have the outward cultural brilliance of people such as the Mayans or Embera, as they no longer have traditional clothing, traditional handicrafts or overt daily customs. What fascinates one as you become immersed with the miskito people is the thick threads of history that are woven into every aspect of their being. The miskito people are not a uniform people...they are a color wheel of black, brown, chocolate, cafe, light skinned, to white; hair that is kinky, braided, straight as an asian; eyes that are deep brown, blue, green or gato as they say here. To identify a miskito person requires that you are actually in the miskitia, as the varied features of a miskito person could easily be confused with chinese, thai, balinese, japanese, latino, african, or occasionally german. The history of the miskito is one of fighting to maintain their land as different cultural groups aimed to conquer it, and as one friend said over drinks last night, they have never lost a battle. One of the main peoples were the english that have left their mark in language and food, as evidenced by the Worcestershire sauce sold at corner stores and the baking bread found at night in the markets. The african slave trade and spanish conquest also played large roles in the development of modern miskito people. The language of the miskito is probably the most culturally rich melting pot of words and expression that describes the richness of this people. It is common that miskito speak the three languages of miskito, english, and/or spanish. The indigenous language itself is as far from any language that you could possibly think. To say good afternoon you would say tetam yamni. But in this same language you have words that are distinctly english, and generally of a variety of english that has long passed. Words to describe items that were not present in the past such as spoon, door, plastic, are often heard sprinkled into a miskito conversation. Words such as dear for expensive or basin for a bowl harken to old school english. Counting is simply done in english. How much is it is Dia price, which may be answered by 5 dollar! Spanish words are also interspersed in the language. This amalgamation of words and speech color the miskito people as deeply as the variety of shades their skin take on.
Today the miskito people maintain a living that is from the sea and the land. Harvesting and using coconuts and breadfruit, diving for lobster and fishing in the deep carribean atlantic sea. They live in stilted homes, many now made of concrete, painted brightly, bringing up images of old sugar shack towns in the southern US. The one thing that still remains about the miskito people, is that they are off the grid, extremely rural. Once you have made contact they are kind, open hearted people that are thrilled to share their turtle meat with you...its just getting there thats the complication! So here is where I interject about my fabulous travel partner Cody. For those of you who are not familiar with the story he is my best friends brother and has been traveling to the miskito coast for the last five years making contacts and winning both respect and opened armed welcomes into the communities. He has been building and installing solar panel systems in the most remote areas to power lights in a world of darkness after 6 pm. It was with him that I had the wonderful opportunity to know the infrequently visited miskito communities of the north as well as the even more rural miskito keyes.
Entonces...we set out early in the morning to find a panga to take us up the coast. After securing our ride we waited as he went to get gas. We boarded the panga several hours later. Upon leaving the driver quickly began to sip from his bottle of flor de cana rum, only to become ridiculously drunk within a short period of time. When attempting to change the gas tanks he was so cross eyed that a wave hit us filling the panga with water. Quick thinking form my man told him to cut the top off our only water bottle to start bailing the water out of the boat, as there was nothing in the boat to do this with. In the meantime I am thinking, the coast isnt that far, i can swim if I have to. By the time we make it just a few miles from our destination the driver is so drunk that he is falling off the back of the boat when i say to cody, we are either getting off here or i am swimming! we disembark at a small beach in a community called Dakura, home of the most beautiful crystalline blue lagoon, to be greated by children shouting "cody, cody!" We spent the night in a home of friends only to be transported to our true final destination by sailboat across the lagoon, a 1km walk across land and then a canoe ride to the end. Just the first of many adventures to be had! To make a long story short we spent many days in a community called Sandy Bay as Cody installed a solar system and I buddied up to the local midwife Dona Esmeralda and prepared herbal solutions to put on a crazy jungle fungus growing on my back.
Later we returned to Dakura to prepare for a one week sailing trip to the Keyes. During this time was probably the largest and most important cultural event in the miskito coast: the campesion baseball series. We opted to go to Awastara to see the festivities by horse. Now most people know my history and can say, kari is a person that likes to ride horses. Ive had to rethink that opinion after sitting atop a horse that is virtually no more than a bone digging into your pelvis as you kick with all your might to get it to move. needless to say, we arrived dragging the horses and returned walking the 2 and a half hour trail.
So many stories, but by far the best and most amazing was the sailing trip that Cody organized. We set sailing in the morning of a clear day, he and I and our crew of three cien por ciento pirates. We sailed the open sea by land marks, gently pushing through the waves of the caribbean, sails high. When you imagine sailboat, I hope that you are seeing a hand built wooden hull that is painted bright blue with masts made from large widdled tree trunks and handsewn sails waving. BY the early afternoon we reached the first key called whipling, a set of 14 wooden fishing shacks set upon a sandbar in the middle of the ocean, no land to be seen. All of the keys are of this fashion, wooden houses that are stilted to withstand the hightide that reaches up to six feet, and low tide averaging around two feet. Many of the other keys are surrounded by establishments of mangroves, but still no land. So we spent the next several days, evenings, and nights watching the sunrise over one side of the ocean to set on the opposite, eating a culinary feast of lobster, conches, crabs, and fish caught earlier in the day. We eventually made it back to land with our crew of well versed pirates to arrive in time for the ripe mangos.
hope that all of you are well up there in gringolandia as spring starts to show her face!
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
A Tale of Strong Women
Greetings from Puerta Cabezas, in the north atlantic miskito coast!
I spent the previous week in Nicaragua volunteering at a clinic call Maria Luisa Ortiz Cooperativa in a small town of the state of Matagalpa called Mulukuku. Mulukuku today is a town that lays beside the one highway headed northtowards Puerta Cabezas, about 8 hours north of Managua. It is a little visited area, as there is not much to offer aside from a pretty view over a red steel bridge and some mandarins that you can purchase from venders on the side of the road. What is fascinating about this place is its history, or for those feminists out there, it´s herstory, as the past is mostly told through the traditon of hard working women in this community. Mulukuku was originally know for due to the large military outpost that resided on one of the hills above the river. As the military set its roots down, so did a small community on the banks of the river. The location was prime for a military station, as Mulukuku is located between Managua and the most northern points of Nicaragua. The communities around Mulukuku were small, unorganized groups of farmers, campesinos. During the sandanista revloution and ensuing contra war instigated by US influence, Mulukuku was hit hard. THe military post was damaged and the communities sacqued. Many of the people in the region were sympathizers with the sandanista revolution which was a socialist movement in the 1980s, and as such, this region was hit hard by warfare. Not to be completely destroyed by the war, it was Hurrican Juana that leveled the community. As rain poured down on the mountainous region and winds blew hard, the river flooded, taking all houses on the river banks with it. This is when the story gets interesting. There was nothing left, and there certainly wasnt going to be any government aid, and the military was gone, so what was there to do? Having been supporters of the socialist movement, the women in the region knew something of working together as a community, or cooperative. The Mulukukuan women decided to found a cooperative, the Maria Louisa Ortiz Cooperative, to build cement blocks. With these cement blocks they rebuilt homes. As the community expanded, they used blocks to build a women{s health center. Then they started a cooperative to build furniture that they could sell to support them and their community. To this day the clinic serves Mulukuku, and the recently founded Municipio de Mulukuku which includes over 24 surrounding communities. As part of the coop, a stipulation that was written into how the clinic is to be run is that any new patient arriving must have a PAP smear, regardless of why they have come to the clinic. In this way they are fighting to redue the rates of Cervical-uterine cancer in Nicaragua, which is the second highest in Latin AMerica after Haiti. THey have also recently constructed a Casa Materna birth center to address issues of maternal mortality. I was chatting one evening with a man about the women of Mulukuku and he said to me, "las mujeres aca son bravas" which translates to the women here are tough/difficult. They are a breed of women that is uncommonly seen within the third world. To give you an example here are a couple of vingettes:
Lucia: original founder of the coop, mother of seven, built and owns her own home. She continues to work cooking and cleaning, from 530 in the morning until 7ish at night. She says her work is much easier now. The volunteer house that she works at has running water.
Natali: 28 years old, daughter of original founders studies and practices natural medicine at the clinic. She has twin daughters that are 9 years old. She is empowered to give women a voice and an alternative solution.
Doña: traditional midwife whose first birth that she attended alone was her own. She has been attending her community ever since which is probably 50 years. She says that women began to seek her out because she knew more than them. She is now part of a training for community health providers.
While at Mulukuku I had the opportunity to be involved with a group of community leaders, individuals from distant communities that provide medical, legal, and community building services. Many arrive after days of travel that include 5 hour boat rides, hour long bus rides, and several hours of walking through mountainous terrain. Some can write, some can read, some have never lifted a pencil. What can be said for this grou0p of individuals is that they are dedicated to providing services to their community, they are well organized, and they are fighting to bring their communities together. They often intigrate traditonal healing practices with modern ones that they learn at these trainings. It was a very special experience for me to share with these exceptional people. After a week I was kidnapped away up to Puerta Cabezas after a surprise visit from Cody...
hope you all are well! besos, kari
p.s. to read more about the clinic and happenings in Mulukuku search on google for Dorothy Granada.
I spent the previous week in Nicaragua volunteering at a clinic call Maria Luisa Ortiz Cooperativa in a small town of the state of Matagalpa called Mulukuku. Mulukuku today is a town that lays beside the one highway headed northtowards Puerta Cabezas, about 8 hours north of Managua. It is a little visited area, as there is not much to offer aside from a pretty view over a red steel bridge and some mandarins that you can purchase from venders on the side of the road. What is fascinating about this place is its history, or for those feminists out there, it´s herstory, as the past is mostly told through the traditon of hard working women in this community. Mulukuku was originally know for due to the large military outpost that resided on one of the hills above the river. As the military set its roots down, so did a small community on the banks of the river. The location was prime for a military station, as Mulukuku is located between Managua and the most northern points of Nicaragua. The communities around Mulukuku were small, unorganized groups of farmers, campesinos. During the sandanista revloution and ensuing contra war instigated by US influence, Mulukuku was hit hard. THe military post was damaged and the communities sacqued. Many of the people in the region were sympathizers with the sandanista revolution which was a socialist movement in the 1980s, and as such, this region was hit hard by warfare. Not to be completely destroyed by the war, it was Hurrican Juana that leveled the community. As rain poured down on the mountainous region and winds blew hard, the river flooded, taking all houses on the river banks with it. This is when the story gets interesting. There was nothing left, and there certainly wasnt going to be any government aid, and the military was gone, so what was there to do? Having been supporters of the socialist movement, the women in the region knew something of working together as a community, or cooperative. The Mulukukuan women decided to found a cooperative, the Maria Louisa Ortiz Cooperative, to build cement blocks. With these cement blocks they rebuilt homes. As the community expanded, they used blocks to build a women{s health center. Then they started a cooperative to build furniture that they could sell to support them and their community. To this day the clinic serves Mulukuku, and the recently founded Municipio de Mulukuku which includes over 24 surrounding communities. As part of the coop, a stipulation that was written into how the clinic is to be run is that any new patient arriving must have a PAP smear, regardless of why they have come to the clinic. In this way they are fighting to redue the rates of Cervical-uterine cancer in Nicaragua, which is the second highest in Latin AMerica after Haiti. THey have also recently constructed a Casa Materna birth center to address issues of maternal mortality. I was chatting one evening with a man about the women of Mulukuku and he said to me, "las mujeres aca son bravas" which translates to the women here are tough/difficult. They are a breed of women that is uncommonly seen within the third world. To give you an example here are a couple of vingettes:
Lucia: original founder of the coop, mother of seven, built and owns her own home. She continues to work cooking and cleaning, from 530 in the morning until 7ish at night. She says her work is much easier now. The volunteer house that she works at has running water.
Natali: 28 years old, daughter of original founders studies and practices natural medicine at the clinic. She has twin daughters that are 9 years old. She is empowered to give women a voice and an alternative solution.
Doña: traditional midwife whose first birth that she attended alone was her own. She has been attending her community ever since which is probably 50 years. She says that women began to seek her out because she knew more than them. She is now part of a training for community health providers.
While at Mulukuku I had the opportunity to be involved with a group of community leaders, individuals from distant communities that provide medical, legal, and community building services. Many arrive after days of travel that include 5 hour boat rides, hour long bus rides, and several hours of walking through mountainous terrain. Some can write, some can read, some have never lifted a pencil. What can be said for this grou0p of individuals is that they are dedicated to providing services to their community, they are well organized, and they are fighting to bring their communities together. They often intigrate traditonal healing practices with modern ones that they learn at these trainings. It was a very special experience for me to share with these exceptional people. After a week I was kidnapped away up to Puerta Cabezas after a surprise visit from Cody...
hope you all are well! besos, kari
p.s. to read more about the clinic and happenings in Mulukuku search on google for Dorothy Granada.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
I am NOT dead!!
To all of my fans and confidants, I apologize for my lack of contact over the last month...it has been a whorlwind that has taken me all over the map of nicaragua. I write to you all today from the cozy abode of my dear friend Jana in Oakland, California, which answers a pending question that many of you have probably had. Tomorrow morning I will be interviewing at the University of San Francisco's midwifery program. It feels odd to be back in the states, so normal, and yet so far from home. So now for a quick recap of my last month.
I have had the distinct pleasure to have shared my last month with my personal tour guide and companero Cody. With him we have covered various terrains, often far from the reaches of modern society such as computers and cell phones and tourists(read: this is one excuse for why I haven't written in so long!). Traveling with a man, particularly in a very third world area, has allowed gender issues that exist in Latin American to turn to a palpable level. The idea of women's liberation and rights is far behind what a woman would experience in Mexico, and even further from a first world nation like the US. Most women's first sexual experiences in Nicaragua are violations, and as a friend told me recently, their frequency can be determined by the radial distance that a young woman lives form her local well. For myself as a white woman, I find myself embedded in a world of men, one in which few women have the opportunity to engage. Good women in Nicaragua are wives that are at home with their babies, not out socializing...a Nicaraguan proverb is that a woman is married or looking for a husband, there is no in-between. Women may also be classified as "amigas" women who are promiscuous and have sex with many men, "novias" or girlfriends which means that they may be involved in a relationship with a man for 24hours or a couple of weeks, or "esposa", a wife who only has sexual relations with one man (understand that these do not define a man's role). So in this world men are often overly polite, not truly themselves, or they completely ignore me as I don't easily fall into their catagorizations. When I walk the street with my companero or am within a circle of friends I am treated with respect and curisotiy. When I walk the street alone I fall back into the world of fresh meat...cat calls and attempted gropings!
So to leave the social realm of what it is like to be a woman in Nicaragua, what is it like for ME in Nicargua...a quick review of my parts of my itinerary:
Day one: spend the night on a private island in the isletas by Grenada, flor de cana rum in hand, with a group of fabulously gay men, who wear knee high white go-go boots and blue thong swimsuits as tour boats weave in and out of the isletas for a nicaraguan experience.
Day two: catch a ride in a new toyota corolla from Managua to Puerta Cabeza. The road is one hours worth paved, 11-20 hours (depending on your velocity) worth dirt with pot holes. Get caught in a log bridge to be fished out by passengers of the "express bus" from Managua. Arrive 5 am.
Day three: take high speed panga (boat) on wild carribean sea for two hours with Miskito family. This is truly communing with the sea when you jump several feet into the air after riding a wave only to crash down hard so that your teeth grind together as you hit the water once again. HOld onto greasy bike and little girl to avoid being thrown overboard.
Days four through six: be treated like kings in Sandy Bay, a little visited area on the northern atlantic coast of nicaragua, where you are served bread fruit, chicken feet soup, quisquisque cake, rice, and plantains. Visit local midwive refered to as a "grande" who is at least 90 years old living in a brightly painted stilted home that lookslike it could have been plucked out of early century jamaica.
Day seven: take boat trip up to Laguna de Bismuna. Buy crabs and fish directly from the boats of fishermen. Arrive at small stilted community where you are welcomed into a traditional miskito home. Learn to make miskito tortilla, have miskito language intensive class at night in the dark (no electricity except at the church) in the hammock. Sleep under pinklace mosquito net in a room with 6 other beds. Eat like kings three meals per day: fish, bread fruit, yucca, rice, miskito tortilla. Bath in the river.
Day ten: return to Puerta Cabeza via fish transport boat. SPend half of the ride like the queen of the nile, and other half been attacked by a one ton tire as you ride over deep ruts in the road, envolped by a tarp to keep out the rain and keep in the carbon dioxide and cigarette smoke. After fifteen hours ass is numb and you know that now you could take ANY ride in the world, no problem. Arrive 1 am. 1 pm board the "express" bus to Managua. Arrive 9 am the following day. Bus breaks down just frequently enough to take pee breaks!
The stories could go on and on...just imagine amazing rides, beautiful scenery, stilted homes, deep black people speaking a language that is a blend of a native tongue, colonized english and spanish, where turtle meat is a major food source, where teal and pink are common colors for wooden homes, where horses are a normal mode of transportation, where people are disabled from the sandanista and contra wars, where only young women are seen selling tortillas and homemade chees on buses coyly batting their eyes, where we eat 5 pounds of lobster tails in one sitting, drink 6 bags of home made fresco/liquad juices per day, eat raw oysters floating in their black blood in the park in Masaya...basically where anything goes and our days are filled with enjoyment! Not only am I not dead, but I am fabulously alive and sucking the marrow out of life in Nicaragua!
more soon...volunteering with doroty grenada in Mulukuku. Hope everyone is well and making it through winter. The magnolias are blooming in California!
I have had the distinct pleasure to have shared my last month with my personal tour guide and companero Cody. With him we have covered various terrains, often far from the reaches of modern society such as computers and cell phones and tourists(read: this is one excuse for why I haven't written in so long!). Traveling with a man, particularly in a very third world area, has allowed gender issues that exist in Latin American to turn to a palpable level. The idea of women's liberation and rights is far behind what a woman would experience in Mexico, and even further from a first world nation like the US. Most women's first sexual experiences in Nicaragua are violations, and as a friend told me recently, their frequency can be determined by the radial distance that a young woman lives form her local well. For myself as a white woman, I find myself embedded in a world of men, one in which few women have the opportunity to engage. Good women in Nicaragua are wives that are at home with their babies, not out socializing...a Nicaraguan proverb is that a woman is married or looking for a husband, there is no in-between. Women may also be classified as "amigas" women who are promiscuous and have sex with many men, "novias" or girlfriends which means that they may be involved in a relationship with a man for 24hours or a couple of weeks, or "esposa", a wife who only has sexual relations with one man (understand that these do not define a man's role). So in this world men are often overly polite, not truly themselves, or they completely ignore me as I don't easily fall into their catagorizations. When I walk the street with my companero or am within a circle of friends I am treated with respect and curisotiy. When I walk the street alone I fall back into the world of fresh meat...cat calls and attempted gropings!
So to leave the social realm of what it is like to be a woman in Nicaragua, what is it like for ME in Nicargua...a quick review of my parts of my itinerary:
Day one: spend the night on a private island in the isletas by Grenada, flor de cana rum in hand, with a group of fabulously gay men, who wear knee high white go-go boots and blue thong swimsuits as tour boats weave in and out of the isletas for a nicaraguan experience.
Day two: catch a ride in a new toyota corolla from Managua to Puerta Cabeza. The road is one hours worth paved, 11-20 hours (depending on your velocity) worth dirt with pot holes. Get caught in a log bridge to be fished out by passengers of the "express bus" from Managua. Arrive 5 am.
Day three: take high speed panga (boat) on wild carribean sea for two hours with Miskito family. This is truly communing with the sea when you jump several feet into the air after riding a wave only to crash down hard so that your teeth grind together as you hit the water once again. HOld onto greasy bike and little girl to avoid being thrown overboard.
Days four through six: be treated like kings in Sandy Bay, a little visited area on the northern atlantic coast of nicaragua, where you are served bread fruit, chicken feet soup, quisquisque cake, rice, and plantains. Visit local midwive refered to as a "grande" who is at least 90 years old living in a brightly painted stilted home that lookslike it could have been plucked out of early century jamaica.
Day seven: take boat trip up to Laguna de Bismuna. Buy crabs and fish directly from the boats of fishermen. Arrive at small stilted community where you are welcomed into a traditional miskito home. Learn to make miskito tortilla, have miskito language intensive class at night in the dark (no electricity except at the church) in the hammock. Sleep under pinklace mosquito net in a room with 6 other beds. Eat like kings three meals per day: fish, bread fruit, yucca, rice, miskito tortilla. Bath in the river.
Day ten: return to Puerta Cabeza via fish transport boat. SPend half of the ride like the queen of the nile, and other half been attacked by a one ton tire as you ride over deep ruts in the road, envolped by a tarp to keep out the rain and keep in the carbon dioxide and cigarette smoke. After fifteen hours ass is numb and you know that now you could take ANY ride in the world, no problem. Arrive 1 am. 1 pm board the "express" bus to Managua. Arrive 9 am the following day. Bus breaks down just frequently enough to take pee breaks!
The stories could go on and on...just imagine amazing rides, beautiful scenery, stilted homes, deep black people speaking a language that is a blend of a native tongue, colonized english and spanish, where turtle meat is a major food source, where teal and pink are common colors for wooden homes, where horses are a normal mode of transportation, where people are disabled from the sandanista and contra wars, where only young women are seen selling tortillas and homemade chees on buses coyly batting their eyes, where we eat 5 pounds of lobster tails in one sitting, drink 6 bags of home made fresco/liquad juices per day, eat raw oysters floating in their black blood in the park in Masaya...basically where anything goes and our days are filled with enjoyment! Not only am I not dead, but I am fabulously alive and sucking the marrow out of life in Nicaragua!
more soon...volunteering with doroty grenada in Mulukuku. Hope everyone is well and making it through winter. The magnolias are blooming in California!
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