Cayos Cochinos - Continued

This narrative picks up where I left off in the first post about the Cayos Cochinos; in a small boat on the way out to the islands...

The boat captain suddenly killed the engine and the bow of the boat dove as we abruptly came to a stop in the middle of the Caribbean. The captain was pulling in a fish on the line that had been draped across his knee and trailing in the boats wake. It was a beautiful Tuna about 14 inches long. I sat there feeling sorry for the fish as the motor roared back to life and sent the boat hopping over the swells. It flopped around less and less after each passing swell. But I knew this tuna would nourish a hungry family and come as a real treat compared to the flatter - less tasty fish that are usually caught near the shore. Alas, such is life, and this was certainly easier to watch than the iguana I saw mercilessly tormented and killed by a pack of wild kids a few weeks before (the iguana was also going to be eaten).

As the islands came into view, I felt myself getting really excited. I saw two large humps in the distance beckoning me like sirens. This is what its all about. Since I can remember I have been drawn to islands. There is something about being surrounded by water that both comforts and excites me. When I started to become disillusioned with geopolitics and mass consumption, I often dreamed of making a life for myself and a few select friends/family on a private island somewhere in the south pacific. I enjoyed reading tales like Huckleberry Finn, Lord of the Flies, and my favorite: Blueprint for Paradise: How to Live on a Tropic Island. Subsequently, I was moved by movies like The Beach, Mosquito Coast, Cast Away, and the Lost series. The list goes on with stories like Blue Lagoon, Treasure Island, Robinson Crusoe, and an all-time favorite, Joe Versus the Volcano. 

Anyway, the islands were getting closer and soon I saw a little dome of sand rising from the sea with a lone palm tree. We beached at this cay and spent some time snorkeling and poking around. It was a sweet little island, with volunteer coconut palms trying to gain their footing in the shifting sands, and a network of intricate coral reefs surrounding it and stretching across vast inter-island expanses. At the edge of the reef, the sea floor dropped out of sight into an abyss; hovering out there on the edge of the reef, you could feel the cold water rising up from the deep blue depths. The sea life was fantastic! Looking west, you could sense the remoteness of the archipelago as the towering mountains on the mainland now blended into the horizon.

Soon we departed for the Marine Park's Headquarters on the smaller of the archipelago's two main islands, Cayo Menor. Other than the headquarters and research station, this island is uninhabited and covered by a dense layer of tropical forest. This island is highly protected and one can't even step foot on the island without permission... except to pay the marine park entry fee. Still, our contact with the island was limited to the pier. After paying our fees, we circled the island in the boat and I could hardly contain my jubilation while passing secret coves, volcanic cliffs, and hidden beaches.

Our final destination in this boat was the tiny cay known as Chachahuate, home to about 15 families and 1 dog (known as Niñito). When we beached, we were greeted by about a dozen children all holding necklaces and bracelets made from fishing line and shells. We assured them that we would buy something but that we first would like to make sure we had a place to stay tonight. Apparently someone had radioed ahead and told the village that we would be coming. They offered us a nice little loft above a family's home with meals included for about $25 US each. The owner assured us that we could leave our things in the loft and that she would make sure nobody went up there. Since there were four of us, and only two small beds, I was finally glad that I had been carrying around a ~5 lb hammock that I purchased in La Ceiba. 

The owner's husband offered to take us to Cayo Grande - the largest island in the archipelago, to look for the endemic and elusive Culebra Rosada (Pink Boa Constrictor). Our hike up the ridge line of Cayo Grande was a true jungle trek. We saw one Pink Boa down at the resort where we landed, it was stuffed in the rafters of one of the buildings... then on the trail, we were stopped and alerted to the presence of a poisonous green tree snake, which we clearly avoided. Eventually, my companion and the guide had no more motivation to climb the mountain, so I went on alone... toward the lighthouse at the top. On the way, I finally encountered una Culebra Rosada curled up inside a hollowed-out log. It wasn't all that pink actually, but it was so cool to discover it on my own! I didn't mess with it, just opened the log a bit to get a better look. The Boa was sleepy but slowly came around and slinked away up a tree.

Once I reached the top, I could see beautiful 360 degree views of the Caribbean filtering through the foliage and spent a little time looking around the locked lighthouse. I thought I could barely make out the village on the eastern side of the island that few foreigners have seen. This village - called East End - is apparently not as inviting as Chachahuate. I think I had seen a few too many movies because I started getting freaked out being alone in the jungle. I would hear something in the woods and think it was a Jaguar or a jungle mugger or something. I actually sprinted down the mountainside to catch up with my companions, but didn't reach them until I made it all the way back down to the beach. Everything was cool though. No jaguars, no guerrillas, no more encounters with poisonous snakes, just a brisk run down a mountainside to emerge from the jungle on a beautiful tranquil Caribbean beach.

We slowly made our way back to Chachahuate in our wooden canoe. There we hung out with the local kids, played with El Niñito, swam in the warm sheltered waters of the bay, and I bought a necklace. Later we had dinner (fresh caught fish, with fried plantains and rice) under a small light bulb illuminated by a car battery, and passed the Garifuna version of the peace pipe with our Cayo Grande guide and the owner of our room. It was an incredibly beautiful evening made even better by a night swim with the phosphorescent plankton before climbing into my hammock. There was no electricity, so the stars, the trade winds, and the sound of the ocean were our sleeping companions. It was almost like sleeping on a sailboat with the breeze blowing across the loft's two open windows and gently rocking me to sleep. I could live like this...

The next morning, we caught a ride on a small boat headed for the mainland with bottles to be recycled. Between the four of us, the boat's captain, our gear, and the bottles, this 8-foot boat was loaded to the brim and riding low in the water. It took about 2 hours to get to the mainland and by the time we got there, we were pretty wet from the swells splashing over the sides of the boat. We were dropped in a medium-sized Garifuna town called Nuevo Armenia, where we waited for a bus and planned the next leg of our journey... 

The Deluge

In Charlotte, we just had a fantastic couple of thunder storms! I missed thunderstorms when I was in California. It was incredible; the force of the rain was vibrating the whole house and it lasted for hours, both times. The (clean) gutters on the house couldn't even keep up and the water was pouring over their edges. The yard became a really wide flowing creek a couple of inches deep. The usually dry creekbed in the back yard became a serious torrent. I took some videos and thought I would post some screenshots. The interesting thing is that in the above picture there are three big streams converging in the forest and underground water tunnels that are undoubtedly being widened into small caverns. It's hard to get a sense of scale here... the skinniest point in the torrent in the above picture is about 8 feet across, 4 feet deep, and must be flowing at 25 mph... One would definitely be swept away in the blink of an eye.

Downstream it filled the forest floor. The only other times I have seen sustained rain this intense was during hurricanes. These shots were about 15 minutes after the most intense rains subsided.

Sustainable Globalization?

In a historical sense, globalization is nothing new. What is relatively new, is the much more penetrating form of globalization today, characterized by free-market capitalism, international investment, and nearly instant exchange of information via television and the internet; we can be anywhere around the world within a day. Globalization has hundreds, if not thousands, of implications for unique cultures all across the world. Many times, the implications may generally be understood as good, such as the sharing of technological advancements, dramatic economic improvement, or international movements for human rights. Other times, globalization's implications are generally considered bad, like when cultural tradition is drastically threatened or degraded. I picture Islamic fundamentalists with rocket launchers and McDonald's in Tibet.

It would be difficult to argue that the world economy on the whole has suffered as a result of this globalization; on the contrary, international trade has increased, and nations that had previously been economically quiet are now waking giants. South Asia is probably the most recognized example of this with countries like South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Malaysia manufacturing a huge portion of the world's goods. These countries' Gross National Products have certainly increased, but have living conditions for the majority of the populations?

What we are discovering is that millions of rural people move to manufacturing centers in these nations. The throngs of workers live in subhuman conditions and flood the pool of available workers, thus perpetuating low wages, and poor working conditions, not to mention destroying the effectiveness of unionization. In the most extreme cases, we are approaching something like corporate feudalism. What we are seeing is an actual increase in the separation between the rich and the poor, the haves and the have-nots, the Northern Hemisphere and the Southern. Many developing nations have been able to find a niche, a specialization within the global market that brings them international income. However, many have not. In addition, the flight of manufacturing centers from domestic soil to countries with lower wages and regulations leaves the cities that the companies left with no jobs, like in Flint, Michigan, where living conditions begin to mirror those developing nations that the vehicle manufacturing plants left for.

Globalization's implications for the world's poor are both promising and worthy of concern. The Garifuna are a group of Afro-Caribbean people that inhabit the Caribbean coast of Central America, from Belize to Nicaragua. Their way of life still relies heavily on fishing and subsistence farming, yet tourism and globalization is descending upon them whether they are ready or not. My undergraduate research on the complexities of tourism development in Honduras brought me into regular contact with Garifuna communities. Globalization promises them improvements in the realms of economy, health, and sanitation.

However, several older generation Garifuna people I talked to expressed concern over the trend in Garifuna youth to be more materialistic, desiring commodities represented in media images from the US. Most of the English spoken by the Garifuna teens that I interacted with were song lyrics. They expressed incredible fascination with American culture. Many “thug” mannerisms depicted in American pop-culture were portrayed by these young Garifuna.

One of my key informants was called “Homie” and his choice of an American pop-cultural "street name" was not unique; most of his friends used similar names. (Image courtesy of Jessica Dunlap, 2006)

What the Garifuna elders consider to be a threat to the perpetuation of their culture, is also a threat to their environment. With few jobs to be had, the kind of money required to buy the things that we so often take for granted does not come easily for most Garifuna. As a result, there is much support for environmentally destructive large-scale tourism projects and foreign-owned factories (Maquilas), whether these are sustainable or not, for these endeavors promise the most jobs. Tax-free zones, minimal environmental regulations and nearly non-existent labor laws are only some of the incentives promised to international investors by developing nations.

What it boils down to is that the poorest people of the world see western ideals of affluence, individualism, and materialism without having the means to achieve the objects of these ideals. In other words, the images precede the societal and economic changes. This seems to lead to development focused on immediate income rather than sustainable or responsible economies.

In a speech given to the U.S. Congress on February 21, 1990, Vaclav Havel (then the president of Czechoslovakia) said: “Interests of all kinds: personal, selfish, state, national, group and, if you like, company interests still considerably outweigh genuinely common and global interests. We are still under the sway of the destructive and vain belief that man is the pinnacle of creation, and not just part of it, and therefore everything is permitted… In other words, we still don‟t know how to put morality ahead of politics, science and economics.”

I believe globalization, in its present form, is a result, a side effect, of the actions taken by economically driven powers seeking their own financial success. We are seeing that Laissez-Faire capitalism is not the all-equalizing force it has been touted as. That said, the ball is rolling, and as much damage as it may cause, it will not be stopped. Therefore, we should not focus on ending globalization, for that decision is not ours to make, too many have seen its fruits. Instead we must change globalization from being a side effect, to an intentional process guided by the principles of fairness and justice. We may not be able to solve all of the world‟s problems, but we can, and should, begin to assess our own contributions to these problems and correct our actions wherever possible.

Havel, Vaclav 1990 “Address to Congress” in Grace Cambell, Michael Gillum, Dorothy Sulock and Mark West (Editors) 2002 The Asheville Reader: The Individual in the Contemporary World Acton, Mass. : Copley Custom Publishing Group