By Simon Lee
The drive from Roseau was one of the most exhilarating and
uncomfortable I've ever experienced in the Caribbean. The small maxi
taxi lurching round hairpin bends as the Transinsular Road climbed
above Canefield airport and the village of Massacre beyond, past
coconut and cocoa groves. With more rivers than roads, Dominica lives
up to its reputation as the nature island of the Caribbean and the
lack of traffic and habitation seemed to goad the driver into a
transport of speed as we flew on through the rainforest.
At Pont Casse we veered east, past the Emerald Pool and Castle Bruce
into the Carib Territory. This 3,700 acre reservation granted to the
Caribs in 1903 by colonial administrator Henry Hesketh Bell, is home
for the Kalinago (as they call themselves), some 3,600 descendants of
the Island Caribs who first settled the Windward Islands at the
beginning of the fifteenth century, supplanting the Arawaks.
Ownership of the land was vested in the Carib Council by the Carib
Reserve Act of 1978, one of the conditions for Dominica's
independence.
Due to its densely forested and mountainous terrain,
Waitukubuli (the Kalinago name for Dominica, which
means 'tall' or 'old is her body') was one of the last islands to be
colonised in the Caribbean. Early attempts by the Spanish and then
the French and British were repulsed by the Kalinago and in 1660 the
two European powers even agreed to leave the island to the
Indians.
This agreement was shortlived and the Kalinago increasingly found
themselves caught between the warring French and English. They
withdrew to the inaccessible northeast, their numbers dwindling from
5,000 in 1647 to a mere 400 in 1730. Today the Caribs of Dominica
along with the Karifuna communities of Belize, Guyana and St Vincent
and to a lesser extent Trinidad, are the only surviving indigenous
peoples of the Caribbean.
After Castle Bruce the road follows the rugged Atlantic coastline,
with steep hills dropping into the sea. We continued now at a
thankfully more leisurely pace through L'Escalier Tete Chien
(stairway of the dog-headed Boa) at Sineku, where the guardian spirit
of the Kalinago resides and on through the hamlets of St Cyr and
Salybia to Marigot.
I was so engrossed in the hurricane swept slopes with their battered
coconut trees I forgot to ask for a drop in Salybia, hardly believing
the small wooden building we'd passed was the Carib Council office.
When I got back, the office was deserted and I was directed up a
track to the Carib Chief, Hilary Frederick.
I climbed the track leading up a steep hillside crowded with
crotons, cocoa and battered coconut trees. Passing a small wooden
shack I enquired from a teenage girl where the Chief was and had to
retrace my steps. A short man in early middle age, his jet black hair
cut short above fine Mongolian like features, was tending a small
garden, dressed in short pants and a tattered T shirt.
Chief Hilary Frederick welcomed me into his brother's two room shack,
apologising that Hurricane Marilyn had removed the roof of his own
three bedroom concrete house across the track. We sit in the tiny
front room where Hilary tells me this is his second term of office as
chief. He had first been elected in 1979, serving until 1984 when he
was defeated by Irvince Auguiste, who served through till
1994, when Hilary won re election.
Elected for five years the chief's main responsibilities are
organising land distribution and the preservation of Carib culture.
He is elected separately from the six man council. Government funding
pays for small salaries for the councillors, the Council Clerk and
the chief who receives EC$650 a month, although Hilary admits "I
supplement my income by farming."
Now 37 years old, Hilary was prompted to lead his people as a young
man of 21, returning from studying anthropology in the States. When
he was 16, his parents' house had burnt down and family friend
Arthur Einhorn, an American anthropologist from Syracuse
University, wanting to help offered to take Hilary to the States with
him.
"It was a strange and fascinating experience. I was exposed to
Einhorn and his collection of North American Indian culture. Learning
about their struggle for survival prompted me to study for a broader
understanding of myself and my people."
With his new appreciation of his people, Hilary entered the elections
on a platform offering youth employment, education and an increased
awareness of the Caribs' unique and endangered culture.
Now16 years later Hilary has seen some changes, many of which he
finds regressive. "The previous generation were much more together,
sharing and loving. There was more respect for God and on Sundays
you'd find everyone in church. Before the people used to provide
their own food, processing manioc for cassava bread; the men fished
and we lived together as a nation."
Most of the Caribs in the territory are subsistence farmers, growing
coconuts, bananas, citrus, avocadoes, dasheen, tania and ginger.
Bananas are sold to the Dominica Marketing company while small
amounts of other produce are sold in Roseau market, a ninety minute
ride away.
Marilyn severely damaged last year's banana and coconut crop and this
setback is compounded by the inaccessibility of much of the
uncultivated land and the lack of access roads.
There is an increasing trend among the young to leave the territory,
especially among the girls who often go to Canada, the States or
Belize. Hilary is perturbed at the numbers of girls who return to the
territory as unmarried mothers: "After a couple of babies they come
back and look for a Carib man to support their babies."
He is well aware of the negative impact of unemployment and lack of
opportunity on young people: "The youths now have a carefree
attitude. In my time there were no drugs. Now you find most young
people are into drugs, they're no different from other young
Dominicans. The road was built in 1965 and people have found a route
to come up here."
Youth training is one of the major issues Hilary is now seeking to
address, the others are education, social and cultural, economic,
health and the building of access roads.
With no organised transport, secondary school students have to rely
on private maxis, cars or pickups to travel the 10 miles to Marigot,
or 12 miles to St Andrews High School "Unlike students in other parts
of the island who can walk to school." The cost of transport is
another burden on the hard pressed farmers in addition to the cost of
books, uniforms and other school supplies.
Hilary's vision, given the economic and unemployment situation, is
"the model Carib Village project which will depict the lifestyle of
the Caribs 500 years ago and create employment for craftspeople,
youths, fishermen and farmers." Government funding has already been
approved for a five acre site at the Crayfish River Falls and
construction is due to begin this year.
The model village will showcase traditional crafts like canoe
building and weaving, the making of cassava from manioc as well as
cultural displays. The complex, complete with traditional A frame
'mouinas' housing a museum, souvenir shop, bar and guesthouse will
employ at least 40 and there will be spin off benefits for the whole
community.
The preservation and development of Carib culture has become all the
more crucial in the face of fast developing communications, which
bring foreign values and the expectation of different lifestyles.
"Carib society is becoming much more like Dominican society, with
telephones and TV and people watching Batman. People buy bread,
canned food and meat imported from the USA," Hilary shakes his head.
A small percentage of Territory Caribs work in Roseau, in the civil
service, offices or hotels and as ethnologist Lennox
Honychurch notes many Carib descendants live outside the
Territory on the east and south coasts, where they have entered the
mainstream of Dominican life.
The Waitukubuli Karifuna Development Agency (Waikada) was
formed in 1993 to preserve and develop Carib culture and tradition
and to improve the quality of life in the Territory. The Kalinago
Centre in Roseau functions as an economic enterprise promoting
the product development and marketing of arts and crafts and
agro-forest products (including excellent coffee) as well as
providing archival sources and an information centre. Funds raised by
sales go towards preserving cultural heritage and essential services
in the Territory.
For Hilary a cultural programme is essential if young Caribs are to
discover and feel pride in their identity. "I'm about to propose that
the Territory school system starts teaching Carib history. At the
moment it's very limited. I want to make students feel wanted and to
be proud of their heritage." Sadly the Carib language has not been
spoken fluently since the middle of the nineteenth century.
He also feels that for young Caribs to be able to deal with the world
of the twenty first century "We need scholarships and not just at
elementary and secondary level but at tertiary level overseas."
The most immediate concern is to repair the damage done by Marilyn
and although Hilary admits the Red Cross assisted with food and the
government supplied building materials "It's not enough. We would
like people to respond to our plea to bring our community back to
normalcy." 12 houses were totally destroyed while many others lost
their roofs. Hilary still needs lumber to repair the damage to his
own home.
By now it's too late to get back to Roseau and Hilary arranges for me
to spend the night with his father Elvin Frederick whose
rebuilt rambling house cum bar and parlour is on the road below.
In the bar Elvin and I drink Kubuli, the new Dominican beer. Elvin is
a spry old man with laughing eyes set in his deeply weatherbeaten
face. He takes me to see his copra house across the road and then
points out the 'mamou' or 'ma Wina' plants in his hedge which "are
good for washing clothes when there's no soap."
At dusk I wait for John Valmond, a master canoe builder, who
is up in the forest preparing a gommier tree, using the same process
that his ancestors did centuries ago. With darkness descending and no
sign of him, I set out along the road for St Cyr to meet weaver and
craftsman Willard Bruney. Two years ago I had interviewed him
over the phone, now I was eager to meet him in the flesh.
On the road I meet shy children who hide from my camera, despite
their mothers' encouragement. Half way to St Cyr, Carib Angel,
the same maxi I'd met earlier in the day, squeals to a halt offering
me a lift.
Minutes later I'm dropping out, having arranged an early morning pick
up to get me back to Roseau in time for the express ferry. Willard, a
heavy set 35 year old, is surrounded by friends in the temporary
structure he's erected next to his house after his craftshop was
destroyed by Marilyn.
Hanging from the carat roof are baskets, woven from the
Larouma reed; waterproof black and red double baskets or
suitcases, woven with larouma and lined with Balisier leaves;
finger traps or cache doudou (which resemble a woven
riding crops with an open neck which fastens over a finger or thumb
when pulled and were used to lead women and children through the
forest with) along with carved white cedar walking sticks and
calabash purses.
Willard and his wife are both weavers, their craft shop acting as
a retail outlet selling to visitors. He services a loose co-operative
of weavers and craftsmen, buying their products wholesale and
retailing "for a small profit." Besides destroying the shop, Marilyn
also hit sales and Willard says "sales have only picked up in the
last month."
Now it's dark and I set out under the full moon after promising to
return early morning to see how Willard treats the larouma before
weaving. Moonlight shines through the smashed coconut trees,
reflecting off the sea beyond; the lights of Marie Galante
twinkle on the horizon.
I hear the patter of feet behind me, is this a Kalinago spirit? But
it's only a curious Carib woman on her way home. Am I married, she
enquires before suddenly disappearing when she hears my
affirmative.
I take a traveller's rest in Roy Valmond's rum grocery, where
he offers me a shot of cask rum. Hm very potent! For serious drinkers
there's an even stronger potion 'Step Up': a bottle of cask rum mixed
with a bottle of ginger wine because "some people real like to
drink." Although business can be slow, at the end of the month "when
fellas have money" or on an occasion like Christmas or Carnival, Roy
stays open all night. Carnival is "biggest occasion round here with
people making up their own calypsos." I remind myself to return for
an occasion.
Next morning I'm back at Willard's where he's already splicing a
length of larouma reed in four. The reed which grows up to 15 ft long
in cold, well watered locations like the mountains or near rivers, is
now becoming scarce and the Carib Council has initiated a scheme
encouraging farmers to grow it, with the object of expanding the
craft industry to generate more revenue from tourism. After reaching
maturity within three years, the reed is cut and dried in the sun for
four or five days, acquiring its characteristic reddish brown colour
and becoming pliable. Black larouma is made by burying the reed in a
mudhole for three to four days and then washing it.
Willard has been weaving since his father taught him when he was
eight. His wife "taught me some things I didn't know and I taught how
to make double baskets." Now they are passing on the painstaking art
to their own boys and others in the Territory, giving lessons in the
oval shaped 'Carbet', another traditional Kalinago building, which
served as a community centre before Marilyn.
After breakfast Willard's wife sits down to work on a basket, behind
her the trees and the Atlantic. The talk turns to cricket with the
arrival of one of Willard's friends, who gives a stroke by stroke
account of his trial for the Dominica team back in his halcyon days
when he was captain of the Territory team. There are still as many as
six teams in the Territory, including Carib United, the Battlers,
Courageous, Tacklers and Self Stars and the Territory team won the
Dominica Cricket league in 95.
The old captain inspired by memories wants to start up an over 35
team. Will I join? What could be more pleasant than coming back to
Jolly John Memorial Park, named for one of their great chiefs, to
play cricket for the Caribs, especially since it seems the WIBC is
intent on ignoring my skills!
When the Carib Angel rounds the bend, Willard thrusts a finger trap
into my hand with a broad grin "Don't lose yuh woman!" The maxi is
packed with three passengers crammed next to the driver. But it's the
last transport going down to Roseau for the morning and somehow I'm
wedged into position for the helter skelter journey.
CARIB CHIEF HILARY FREDERICK CAN BE CONTACTED AT:
SALYBIA POST OFFICE,
CARIB TERRITORY,
COMMONWEALTH OF DOMINICA,
WEST INDIES
TEL: 809-445-7777.
THE WAITUKUBULI KARIFUNA DEVELOPMENT AGENCY (WAIKADA) CAN BE
CONTACTED AT:
THE KALINAGO CENTRE,
PO BOX 1683,
54 KING GEORGE V STREET,
ROSEAU,
COMMONWEALTH OF DOMINICA.
TEL: 809-448-1753
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