Panama: Day 7

Thursday, April 4: Today was our day to visit another of the seven indigenous tribes of Panama--this time an Embera village. Archie picked us up at the hostel in a van and drove about 50 minutes to the interior. There we were met by a dugout canoe with two Embera men in colorful loin cloths and beaded skirts who motored us to Embera Quera, which means Embera perfume. The tour company we used was started by an American woman who was working on a documentary about the Embera when she fell in love with and married a native. She usually uses his village, which is more authentic because it is farther up river and therefore less adapted to modern civilization. The men there wear only loincloths and the women are topless. But now, during the dry season, the river is too low to get there so instead they're using Quera. It is one of the few where the tribe is buying the land and acting independently rather than living on National Park land, where they are limited by government rules. The people came originally from near Columbia but guerilla fighters and paramilitary have made it so dangerous that they have moved away. This village exists as a Cultural Center and is making it work as a tourism spot. The village is very nice, with lots of green area and flowering plants and high platform bungalows with thatched roofs. The people look healthy and beautiful. They mainly marry by age 14 and have children right away so even the grandmas looked pretty young to us. The men were playing instruments and the women clapping along as we approached the dock and got off the boat. Another dugout arrived about the same time with three young British women and an older American woman who seemed to be sponsoring them or something. We were greeted warmly and told we could wander up the hill to look around but not to enter any of the homes. Each of the twelve families has its own bungalow and there are many other buildings as well, including a 1-8 grade school for the 8 school aged children of the village, an Evangelical church, and three buildings where visitors can stay to study and live with the people. If the kids want further schooling they have to travel downriver to catch a bus to attend high school. We made our way back down to the main meeting area, under a thatched roof where a large group of older Americans had arrived and gathered for a presentation. The eight of us with our guides went up into a Community kitchen area where a second chief told us about their culture and background  showed us how the women were cooking, and generally answered all the questions we could ask. Then a medicine man took us for a hike and showed us some of the plants he uses for healing. When we returned the women served us lunch. First they brought us a giant wooden platter covered with a big banana leaf which was full of pineapple and papaya slices and covered with another big banana leaf. We ate our fill and then they brought another platter that had clever banana leaf pockets with a large fried tilapia fillet and fried plantains. It was filling and delicious. After lunch the men and women played more music and danced and invited us to dance with them. We had time to look at their crafts, mostly carvings and weavings, and Marv bought a beautiful frog from a young man named Marco who had excellent English because he had been an exchange student in Kansas!  I got a temporary tattoo on my right wrist to go with my Kuna bead bracelet on my left. Then it was time to leave Embare. We had seen many new birds for our list, a couple of iguanas, a red and a black spider monkey, and enjoyed our time immensely. It was a bit more commercial than the Kuna Villages had been but we understood the need in order to maintain some semblance of their traditions. We were happy to know that Marco had chosen to return to his village despite his time in the US, and was now married and had 2 beautiful little boys. I tried not to be sorry that a cell phone rang and was quickly answered nor that the young guys were over to the side drinking cold cans of pop from somewhere out of sight. I wondered if the people would all remove their beautiful, colorful clothing as soon as we left and get back into shorts and t-shirts. But considered as a living museum it was a very nice place to visit.

Going down the river

Arriving at Embera Quera

School kids in their classroom

Second Chief talking to us as women cook behind him

Medicine Man

Golden Hooded Tanager 

Banana Leaf lunch pockets

Our server

Marcos with his youngest son

Embera tattoo and Kuna Yala beaded bracelet

Back at the hostel we all enjoyed a dip in the little pool and some icy beers. A couple from Arizona, a deaf man from South Carolina and an older woman from Canada joined us and we had a nice time getting to know their interesting and unique life stories. We gave the horrible traffic (partly due to the construction of a new Metro system set to open next year) time to die back a bit before we headed to the Albrook Mall area to have dinner at an authentic Panamanian restaurant called El Trapiche, which was recommended to us by Archie. Finding our way around here with all the Metro construction disruptions is always a comedy of errors, even with an app Marv downloaded. But find it we did and the food was very good and quite reasonable. Marv and I shared a sampler plate of Panamanian dishes and then we each had a Caribbean sundae. Our return trip to the Hostel was much less stressful and far quicker. We did a bit of writing and a bit of packing before going to bed.