Seaduced's Web Diary - Embera Indian Village Tour

Embera Indian Village Tour

Seaduced

John & Jane Craven

Tue 28 Jan 2014 14:21

This was billed as a unique opportunity to visit a genuine Embera Indian Village and gain an understanding of their traditional way of life. I was a bit reticent about this trip at first. We have been on trips such as this in other countries and you almost feel as though you are looking at people in a cage and it can be almost embarrassing to be the gawking tourist. However, it seemed like a once in a lifetime opportunity, so off we went.
The first part of the journey was by road, to a small settlement about halfway along the canal. From there we were taken by motorised dugout canoe up the Chargres River. This took about half an hour. The river was surrounded, and in some places full, of trees and dense vegetation. The pilot had to steer a careful course to avoid all the obstacles!

Team Seaduced in matching life jackets ready to board the canoe

The river banks were teaming with bird life, including lots of the black vultures that are so common here, as well as other birds of prey and smaller birds as well.

Speeding along the river

We were met on arrival at the landing area by some of the village residents and taken up the hill to the village meeting place. All the villagers wear traditional clothing. They paint their bodies with henna tattoos as decoration, but also to protect against bugs and sunburn. Some of them seem to paint on their clothes almost using the shapes of shorts and t-shorts as a pattern. Others have more intricate, designed, tattoos.

The shore party

The local band played for us as we landed

When we arrived, the village meeting place was full of locally made arts and crafts. We had seen similar items for sale in Panama City, but these were all the genuine article. Each family had a stall, and each item was labelled with the name of the person it was made by. When a tour goes to the village, the money paid by the participants is shared by the whole village, but any money made by the sale of handicrafts etc goes to the individual family, so there was a fair amount of competition between the stall holders!

The stall where we bought our bowl

The stall owner - his wife makes the bowls

Having browsed and purchased a hand woven basket, priced at $75, the price of which was explained to us as being calculated by the amount of time taken to weave it, at a rate of $1 per day, for 3 hours weaving per day, it was time for the formal greeting by the village chief. He explained about the life there and there were demonstrations of how the wood carvings and baskets were made. The baskets are made from palm and are hand dyed using natural dyes to produce the colourful end product.
The community here came about in 1984 or so. The land is now part of the National Trust equivalent in Panama. This means that they now have to earn a living to stay there and they do that by inviting people like us into their village. The community is well supported by the Panamanian government. They provide a school and a teacher for children up to grade 6 age in the village, they can choose to continue their education further to secondary level, but to do this they have to go to school in Panama City. This would be a complete culture shock for them, for a start they would have to wear clothes! In order to lessen the effect on the children going to school there, they live with friends of the tribe so they can continue to follow their traditional way of life as well as attending school. The government also facilitates visits twice a year to the village of a doctor an dentist to ensure that all the children get their vaccinations and that all the residents are generally healthy. I am not sure what the life expectancy is there as it seemed a young village with hardly anyone older than about 50.
After the greeting it was time for lunch. This had been cooked in the main village cooking area. They served us fried tilapia (fish), and fried plantain served in a banana leaf bowl. The oil they use is palm oil. This is a fairly common meal and looking at the kitchen facilities, I would guess that a lot of the food is prepared this way. I am not sure what effect all that fried food has on the life expectancy, but it must detract a bit from what would otherwise be a fairly healthy diet of fish and vegetables.

Lunch.....

Cooked in the communal cooking area - they were cooking all the fish heads for their dinner that night

When we had arrived, the local band had been playing on the landing area, they were now going to play for us again and the women and children would show us some traditional dancing. The band was made up of a bamboo flute, two drums, maracas made of gourds, and a hollowed out turtle shell - I have never seen anyone pay a turtle before! After the demonstration, we all had to have a go, but they did make it easy for us, the children took our hands and led us in what could only be described as a shuffle round the floor - easy enough for anyone to manage, even the male members of the party!