As a medium to heavy rain had just started to fall, and Chango, his wife, and I boarded his piragua with what we would need for the night and next day. The rains had come for almost half the day the day before, and the current on the Rio Chucunaque was that much stronger thatn the day before. With the rains come the roaring of howler monkeys. In groups of 7 to 10, they are perched on trees beside the river bank. As our piragua passed underneath them, their roaring would begin as a claim to their position above us. Further up the river, the canyon of trees beside the river grew taller and taller. Exotic birds sweep from brush to brush, skimming the river for prey. About an hour into the ride, we turned east onto the Rio Membrillo which is much narrower than the Chucunaque. Dramatic bends around the river reveal even more natural wonders, a toucan flies by, and the howler monkeys roar louder as the rain falls harder.
We reach Chango's encampamento with the pleasant surprise of his wife's parents already there. They had come to the encampamento about 15 days ago and will continue to stay for another week or so. My hands were instantly met with a warm cup of coffee. Dinner was served - rice, platano, and fresh fish. The question and peculiarity of me being there barely seemed to cross anyone's mind. A smile, friendly hand shake, and my curiousity about who they are was all I could offer. I slept that night under my mosquito net listening to the orchestra of insects that make up the Darien jungle.
The next morning over a breakfast of platano, fish, and gato solo (smoked and fried wild cat that they hunted), we talked a bit more about Embera culture. Chango told me about a marriage ritual where a man would have to challenge a father to a wrestling match to win his daughter's hand. They begin by grasping each other's hair and whoever falls, loses. Chango had it easy we joked, especially because his wife is nothing short of inspirational. The three of us hopped back into the piragua and went upstream to their platano farm.
We disembarked with a machete and an 'em' (pronounced eh) which means basket in Embera. The word Embera is made of up three words put together: em (basket), be (corn), ra (god). Most of Chango's farm is bien sucio (too much overgrown brush covering the area). He's not really in any position to pay for any help. To harvest platano, you simply find the good ones that are ripe, and chop the tree down. Having forgotten my machete, I kicked the trees down and used my hands. Chango's wife was laughing histerically at my method, but after I got a few I eventually got her approval, "Tu sabes Moises, tu sabes." We would then pick up the platano and stage them at various points in the river. She could easily carry about 100 platano on her back without breaking a sweat. "I like to work in the monte", she says, "the women in the village just wash clothes all day." It was great when she would chide at Chango too, "Ayyy Changito, sus ojos tan viejos, no puede ver el platano! And why are you always running over the logs in the river? Hoo, I've been driving piraguas since I was 10!"
About 4 hours later, with 4 points staged with platano, we returned to the piragua and claimed our goods at each point, collecting 400 in total. On a good day with a big boat, they can do 5000. As she is half in the water, and I'm sitting in the boat she says, with complete complacency, "This is our life Moises. It's hard work but we have to eat and send our kids to school. We're here because our parents didn't send us to school." We pulled up onto the shore of Alto Playon, and Chango gave me my generous share of 50 platano to take back to my host family, some were platano maduro - the very sweet kind! They tried to sell the rest, but with not a lot of income in the village, most of it sells on credit. Looks like Chango and his wife weren't just feeding their kids, but they were feeding most of Alto Playon as well.
More pictures to come, it's very hard to upload with this connection!
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