Costa Rica has a complex and inconsistent attitude towards its borders. In the border town of Sixaola no one minded Stephen and me walking across the rickety wooden bridge into Panama: people came and went from both sides, to school and to work. Very different was the attitude to Nicaraguans, large numbers of whom who are driven by poverty to try to find a better life in Costa Rica – many of the banana workers, for instance, are illegal immigrants.
A banana packing factory
But it’s the Colombians who cause the most anxiety, as a dramatic event on our doorstep demonstrated. Early one morning there were alarums and excursions as the police discovered a large boat on the beach near the house. It wasn’t clear whether it had carried immigrants or drug smugglers, though we later discovered that our guard/caretaker had appropriated two barrels from the site of we knew not what. We went out to watch police photographing clothes and a mobile phone recovered from the boat, but only on return to San Jose did we hear that the TV news had reported a seizure of cocaine.
In Sixaola we were welcomed by the Baptist pastor and local human rights activist, Enrique de la O, who showed us round his parish. On our last day, we met Erlinda, a women’s rights worker, active in the banana business and trying to find local women alternative employment. She was interested in the flexibility that self-employment offers to women with children, and we discussed the possibility of setting up a microcredit project. On our way back to town we were held up for two hours by campesinos demonstrating for higher prices for their goods. Some had been there all night. We were alarmed to see police with riot shields and tear gas, but after some lively negotiation all passed peacefully.
Costa Rica is at the forefront of ecological awareness in Central America. There was considerable anger and anxiety about plans for oil rigs being set up yards off the beautiful Carribbean shore. A committee of Accion de Lucha Anti-petrolera (ADELA) had been set up to represent the interests of local people and forty local NGOs. Informed by previous experience, particularly in Mexico, they were worried about oil spillage, and the effect of drills on the beaches, and of detonation on the fish. There had been little local consultation before an agreement had been signed giving a 20-year lease with complete rights and no protective measures to combat possible environmental effects. There were no guarantees about possibly disastrous effects on the air, the water or the health of local residents. The government, which had signed joint ventures, was proposing the drilling as a solution to the considerable economic problems of the area – producing jobs and an oil-rich economy. The reality was that the project would only result in about 60 jobs, of which 60% would be given to outside specialists and the remainder would be “dirty” jobs. Previous experience showed that the project would also result in drink and prostitution. ADELA felt that their most powerful argument was that the proposed drilling would adversely affect the ecological tourism for which Costa Rica is increasingly known and which economically is as important for the country as coffee and bananas. They wanted to keep the country free of oil exploration, and for Costa Rica to become the leader in a new era of exploration of alternative energy.
With each group of campaigners Diego was able to offer use of the Peace Centre as a resource, usefully near government offices and courts in the capital. It was, as Stephen later wrote, “truly inspiring to witness the influence that a few people, allowing themselves to be led by the Spirit, and willing to speak truth to power, can have on the politics and economy of their country.” I found Diego a kindred spirit, with whom I could discuss the problems of discernment and ways forward on our spiritual paths. He was at a crossroads: feeling a call but tied by personal commitments.
On our return to San Jose, we accepted Diego’s invitation to stay with him and his family. He shares his house with Ileana, her parents and her sister’s three children. A large horizontal building in a rural setting outside the city, it is divided in two parts with a covered courtyard in the middle. He was concerned that we might find their haphazard lifestyle difficult. We reassured him that nothing would please us more, but I confess that we were not prepared for the six dogs of varying shapes and sizes that met us with frenzied barks of welcome.
It was a warm rumbustious household, generous and loving. Another example of the ministry of hospitality that we encountered all over the world. On the day we left, having decided to forgo our flight to Honduras, taking the overland bus through Nicaragua instead, Diego saw us off, at 4.30 a.m.! A ministering angel, he had facilitated nearly everything that we had done in Costa Rica.
In the tradition of Arias, as we saw in the lives of both Napoleon and Diego, the job of peacemaking goes on.
Chapter 4
Doing the Splits
We have a variety of strategies for passing by on the other side: we manage not to know about such things, by living elsewhere and averting our eyes and hearts from information which might trouble us.
Jonathan Dale, 1987
After Costa Rica, the poverty of Nicaragua and Honduras was shocking. We had not intended to go to Nicaragua – I had what turned out to be an outdated concern about safety – but, hearing from fellow travellers of how much they had enjoyed it, we cancelled our flight to Honduras, and decided to travel overland instead.
For once Stephen was in agreement about not spending much time in the capital. Managua is a sad and sprawling city that has been decimated by earthquake, fire, revolution and the flooding that resulted from Hurricane Mitch in 1998. Not generally nervous in city streets, Stephen felt quite unsafe as he went on a long expedition on foot the evening we were there to try to find a bank that would take Mastercard. We stayed overnight at the Quaker hostel, in order to attend Meeting for Worship at the small worship group of unprogrammed Friends that meets in the peace centre. Sadly, the clerk was absent, no one knew how to contact the others, and there was no Meeting. After a plastic pastry breakfast in a mostly shut shopping precinct, we held a Meeting for Worship on our own in the lobby of the hostel. It was the rainy season, and we were soaked as we left our hotel to seek out lunch in the empty streets. Nothing local to be found.
Throughout South and Central America we had been warned that bus stations were dens of iniquity. By hanging on to our possessions and not wandering about at night, we had not had any problems, but at the bus station in Managua we witnessed an ugly punch up between one of the officials and a rather pathetic homeless man who had simply got in the way. The same aggressive official touched up one of the young women vendors as she passed – no doubt part of the trials of her daily life.
Granada, our next stop, was a charming colonial town with a lovely main square. On this steamy Sunday it was full of local people, relaxing in the cafes, and on benches among the trees. We sat with cold drinks, taking in the sights. The strange sight of a self-conscious young tourist, a very tall man wearing a quite outlandish stetson, walking back and forth across the square. The unbelievable sight across the square of a young boy on crutches arguing with his father who took off his belt, and there, in public, in front of us all, whipped him. No one said or did a thing, but the boy, now cowed and crying, followed his parents out of the square.
The hotel we were staying in was pretty basic: a square of buildings round a garden festooned with washing. One night we arrived back from supper after 9.30 p.m. to find it shut up. We had to wake up the thin little girl – a drudge of not more than 16 – to let us in. In the garden the next morning a middle-aged woman was sitting on a chair, listless and alone. She was a German tourist, and she was very ill. The reason for her permanent diarrhoea was being investigated the by the rather basic local hospital, but she had been unable to eat for days, and was now far too weak to travel to the capital where the medical facilities might be better. I talked to her for a while, offered to shop for her if necessary. Why did we not stay to take care of her, take her to Managua? Too much in a hurry, as usual; against all our intentions, we were on a schedule.
Finca Magdalena is a co-operative farm on Omatepe, the large
st island on a freshwater lake in the world (our journey was peppered with these Guinness Book of Records entries). We had reached the island by a four-hour boat journey, sitting on the deck among a pleasant group of young tourists and local people. When we arrived at a small pier, with no town in sight, we confidently sat on, having been told it would be another hour. By the time we realised that this was our stop, most people had left, and oncomers were flowing in with their sacks and cases over the single plank to the land. We struggled ashore to find the bus gone, and only a truck taxi available. It was the first time I had travelled standing up in the back of a truck, and I found the two- kilometre ride exhilarating, sweeping through the luxuriant foliage, we ducking to miss low branches in the cool night air.
The following day we caught a rickety bus along a potholed dirt track to Balgue, from where a 1300-metre track up hill led to us the farm. It was the first time we had actually had to carry our rucksacks, and in the heat the effort was shattering.
The finca was a ranch, and for the first time we saw horses used as a matter of course, ridden with aplomb and without a saddle. It was a lovely place, with howling monkeys and long-tailed white-breasted birds in the trees, an extinct volcano rising up behind us. Groups of fit young people would go up in the early morning with a guide and reappear in mid-afternoon, muddy and exhausted. The farm also provided a hostel, in a large subdivided barn, with simple showers at one end. There was no light in the loos; torches were as usual a necessity. A large toad near the entrance watched us come and go.
The finca was a restful place with hammocks, tables and chairs on a large open veranda on which we and the many young visitors sat, conversed, slept and read, gazing out over the large lake at the bottom of the hill. People were working in the fields around, chopping weeds with a machete – all the men and many of the small boys carried them – building a home, planting sunflower seeds and, in the house, cooking for us all. We had hoped to do some voluntary work, but it didn’t materialise, though Stephen did help a bit with carrying stones. We heard that Westerners were pretty useless at cutting cane or picking coffee, so presumably it wasn’t worth asking us.
The finca was one of the few remaining co-operative farms in the country, flourishing because they had found a Canadian market for their coffee. The owners were Sandanistas, supporters of the governing party brought down by the Contras and an American blockade in the 1980s. Workers on the farm during the civil war, they had been granted the farm by the communists who had wrested it from an absentee landlord. While we were there, we joined them to watch some of the party political broadcasts for the Sandanista candidate in the forthcoming elections. Generally the TV was only on for the daily soap, to which the staff were addicted – with melodramatic stock villains, heroes and heroines. The farm had no manager, but was run collectively, each member taking a role. Stephen questioned them at some length, with me attempting to interpret, because it turned out that they had solved the question of inheritance, which a similar Quaker-run farm we had come across in Costa Rica was finding it hard to deal with. Stephen passed the information on, hoping that in acting as a conduit for such information, we were serving a useful purpose.
We climbed for an hour up the volcano, but we were neither young nor with a guide, so it was not surprising that we got lost in the jungle. The path petered out in the dense foliage, and we were content to come down, stopping half-way to sit and look at the butterflies – twelve different varieties within minutes. On our way down we encountered a man with a machete who had been working in the fields. I engaged him in conversation, Stephen not feeling his Spanish was up to it, and since I was doing all the talking, the man started to make false assumptions, and asked me more personal questions. Noting Stephen’s bald head and the fact he was older than me, the man asked if he was rich. I cottoned on at last, and made my excuses.
The village at the bottom of the hill was small and straggling with a few shops and houses with porches serving as cafes, both stocking little other than the ubiquitous Coca-Cola. We occasionally bought some to be sociable, but in general I preferred to drink bottled water. Little home industries were visible from the road, including a machine we passed in an open yard. Stephen felt it looked familiar and discovered that, yes, it was a Petter engine, made many years before by his father’s family, shipped out here, and now used for milling rice
The magnificent crested birds I had seen earlier turned out to be local magpies – why should I have felt disappointed? Their beauty was unchanged. In the pre-dawn, I was woken by a cacophony of howling monkeys, parrots and the alarm calls of various birds.
It was hard to leave, but the time had come to move on to Honduras and Guatemala, where my mother and daughter, Juliet, were waiting for us.
We were getting used to the complexities of crossing the borders in Central America, though we still succumbed to swindling on occasions. The tricycle taxi that we had hired to take us over the border between Nicaragua and Honduras, waiting with our luggage as we fulfilled the bureaucratic procedures in leaving one country and entering another, was driven by a past master. Despite a tip for his patience given before we were through, the young man still tried to assert that the price he had quoted was in dollars, not pesos. We stood firm, but as always the attempt left a sour taste.
Because of our decision to travel through Nicaragua, we now only had a week in Honduras, and no plans except to visit Tela, on the Caribbean coast, which Stephen had visited some years before for an international Quaker conference.
Our first stop, which proved not to be on the way to our destination, was a characterless little town called San Marcos en Colon, but it was at least higher up, and cooler. It took four bus journeys in one day to get there, all quite smoothly connected, apart from the tussle at the border. Although as we were well under budget at this point, we were chronically short of ready cash, scrabbling around for meals, as it was so difficult to find places to draw it.
One of the four journeys was a classic: vastly overcrowded, often four to a seat that comfortably seated two in one of those long yellow ex-US school buses that are so prevalent in Central America. The number and variety of vendors on board were prodigious – one man pronouncing for about ten minutes on the virtues of a protein food. There were sellers of sweets, bags of water, plantain crisps, toys and various other foods, the women vendors unable to squeeze past all the standing passengers.
Our stay in San Marcos was in an unfriendly place which made us pay in advance. Despite treating us with complete indifference, the owners were obviously “religious”, as there were Biblical quotations all over the walls. There was also one saying, “Do not spit on the walls” and Stephen, a child at heart, climbed up and wrote in pencil, “Only on the floor”. An odd noise came and went throughout the night, like a bird – three whistled notes. It turned out to be a watchman patrolling with a big stick and blowing a whistle. And when we arrived in Tela we met the local equivalent: a nice elderly man carrying a sword! Yes, he said, he was a watchman, a vigilante.
We had telephoned a few days earlier to “book” a Servas host in Tela, and we arrived by bus at night. In the dark it was hard for the taxi to find the way but we finally realised that her address was not near “Boardinghouse Sara” but actually in it.
Our hostess, Alma, had inherited the three-storeyed rickety edifice from her parents who had run it as a boarding house for some thirty years. The attractive wooden construction was thoroughly dilapidated, and impossible to operate as a commercial concern. To our embarrassment we learnt that Alma had resigned from Servas as she could not afford to keep people there for free, but she would not hear of any payment from us. She lived there with an extended family that we never quite got the hang of, and was looking to sell. We promised to help her advertise, perhaps in the States – for the place had potential – but she never followed up with the details.
The house was almost on the beach, with just a row of down at heel little shacks between us and the sea. From our room we
could see the inhabitants at their daily chores, filling buckets with water, washing in the yard. The beach itself was grubby and unappealing and the whole area demonstrated the poverty of a country where there is nearly 50% unemployment. Along the road passed horses and carts, one carrying a motor bike, and even at 7 a.m. drunken men were zigzagging from the drinking den on the beach, round the corner. It was an unattractive place, with broken glass all around and stray dogs wandering the streets.
Dogs were quite a feature of our journey. To begin with, rabies in mind, I was terrified of all the stray dogs; after a while they seemed a commonplace; always several wandering around. Some were pets, but two of the most unpleasant things we saw centred round dogs. One was the abandonment of dogs in Bolivia; the other an incident here in Honduras, when we saw a wraith-like dog in the street, obviously near death, being stoned by a little girl to keep it away from her pet. How could a child be taught to be so kind to one dog and so cruel to another?
From our end of town – the old part – Tela was a sad place. Further up, the town was bustling, with cafes and restaurants aimed at the tourists. In fact it was hard to find a local place open, though we frequented a café that did very good fruit juice, except when the power failed. We wandered up the beach one day to see the conference complex at which Stephen had stayed some 15 years before: very smart, and in a different world from Boardinghouse Sara. The great divide again.
On the way to Tela, Stephen divulged another reason for wanting to go to that part of Honduras. It was rather a romantic story. While at the conference, the delegates had been taken to a nearby village called Triunfo de la Cruz, a Garifuna village. The Garifunas are black, quite unlike the rest of the inhabitants of Central America, and are the descendants of escaped slaves who had been deported from St Vincent in the eighteenth century and dumped by the British on the coast of Central America. They retain their own culture and language and have, naturally enough, a reserve towards white people.
Call of the Bell Bird Page 5
