Kolcha Deh

Culture Day, Saturday, March 26. We were both so impressed and so overwhelmed with HOW MUCH we saw, heard, and experienced and how interesting everything was. I was going to write TONS about it, but then couldn't gather the energy. Maybe sometime at a later date. Things are happening so fast that I can barely keep up with the basics. SO glad that Steve mustered up this good paragraph.

Yesterday was cultural day, and we all went to the southern part of the country and learned about the Garifuna people. They are a mixture indigenous Arawacs and Carribs who blended with two shiploads of shipwrecked African slaves. They were deported from St. Vincent and came here. We started at a cultural museum and had a guided tour. We went to a native bakery and watched how women dug up the cassava roots, stripped the bark, ground up the pulp, squeezed the water out and baked the dry pulp into thin bread. Next we were treated to a tour of the gallery of Pen Cayetano who is a musician and a painter. He was very interesting to talk to. After lunch we went to watch two women make drums. They took log sections and cut out the inside with chain saws. Our last demo was native dancing with singing and drums; afterwards we were invited to dance the Punta with them. Almost all of us joined in. Cathy and I asked one of the drum makers to pose with us for a picture. She is a beautiful woman with features that suggest that she got the best from a diverse genetic heritage.

Our hostess, Mrs. Cayetano

Baker making cassava bread

Garifuna Dancers

With Datha, the drum maker