30 November 2009
By Silvio Sirias Duarte, Photography by Flor Marenco
For the Costeños of Nicaragua’s Caribbean community, living in the pacific is a radical change. Boats are exchanged for buses and the connection between the body and the water is lost. Living in communities is almost impossible due to distances. Sun, sand, sea, rivers, palm trees, Miskitos, Creoles, maypole, hurricanes… this is what the Nicaraguan’s Caribbean Coast is for many from the Pacific side of the country. The Coast is much more than that say many of the Caribbean people currently living in Managua. They feel that the Pacific Mestizo community has many prejudices, racist attitudes and an ignorance of the history of the Caribbean Coast, their cosmology, and the substantive contribution to the national economy and inclusive form of their politics.
The Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua rejoined the National State in 1894, after which there were several uprisings of its residents. The “reincorporation of the Moskitito” resulted in a traumatic process where force was used to impose the Spanish language and the establishment of a politico-administrative system led and directed from the central government in Managua.
However, according to Reverend Normal Bent, the coordinator of the Ecumenical Advice from the Caribbean Coast of the Morava Church, “A juridical, political, economical, religious and cultural reincorporation at the Caribbean Coast from the rest of Nicaragua has not happened yet. It’s an imaginary vision that the national political leaders sustain.”
Marisa Olivares, a sociologist and scholar of the Central American University, believes that the history of Caribbean Coast has very little to do with what the rest of the Nicaraguan population has been taught about the national identity: Ruben Dario, Rafaela Herrera, the Spanish, gallo pinto, Catholicism, the nacatamal, etc. She affirms that all of these things are outside the culture of the Caribbean people. “Their Anglicism, their Protestantism, the sea, their relationship with nature, their language is not taken in consideration.”
Being Nica or being Costeño
Sitting in front her desk in her small office in Ducualí neighborhood in Managua, Alta Hooker, director of URACCAN, one of the two universities that exist in the Caribbean coast, says that to be Caribbean, for her, is first. “To be Costeña comes before being Nicaraguan. It means living and learning to behave in that environment, to build and manage to be part of that identity.”
And what is that cultural identity? It’s the group of values, traditions, symbols, beliefs and behavior manners that work as a uniting element within a social group and act as a support for individuals who use it as a base for their sense of belonging.
Shakira Simons, a young lady proud to be Creole, arrived in Managua in 2001 to study Social Work. Two weeks after arriving she wanted to return to Bluefields. “Of course I wanted to make friends, but I accept that I brought, and still have, a bit of resentment and anger for the treatment that Caribbean people have received.”
Feeling more at home, without being at home
Judith Plazaola Cunningham, a coastal Bilwi who arrived in Managua in the nineties, says that the hardest part of not being on the Atlantic Coast is that the places cannot be brought to Managua, however, she says “there are things that you can bring: the feelings.”
These are precisely the feelings that help maintain the strength and identity of a people who feel they have been historically excluded. Everyone from the Coast has at one time or another felt persecution in some form in Managua: whether it is being stared at for speaking their language, harassed for their physical features, being compared to drug dealers or addicts, being objects of “admiration” for the color of their skin or for the way they dance, being victims of mocking in the media or even not being allowed in certain places.
In Managua, the world of Caribbean people is growing every day. Now it is becoming more common to enjoy Caribbean culture in the Pacific. Eating a rondon, nibbling on some scrumptious coconut bread, and dancing to Caribbean music at black and Miskito clubs have become new pleasures in Managua. Capital neighborhoods like Bello Horizonte, North Waspam, Primero de Mayo, Jardines de Veracruz, Ciudad Jardin, Las Mercedes, Casa Real or Monseñor Lezcano are home to an entire hidden culture.
Shakira Simons maintains that the Caribbean people are a people who can adapt to every kind of environment. “We look for places where we can find other Caribbean people: a disco, a bar, an afternoon at a friend’s house to speak in our language, to eat our food, to talk about everyday stuff.”
It all can be solved with education
Richard Belide, Sandra Cattuse and others originally from the coast, have lived in Managua’s Monseñor Lezcano neighborhood for many years. Several weeks ago, the group defied the midday sun to stand in the street and discuss the importance of educating people about differences and similarities between the two sides of the country. The theme most expressed was that Pacific people need to leave behind prejudices and realize that everyone is equal.
Cattuse, who does hair and cooks for a living, speaks up as she braids a neighbor’s hair, “It’s a problem of how you are raised. My son has a friend that is not a racist because that’s how her parents taught her, that we are all equal. It has to do with what parents teach their children.”
Neighbor Shirlene Green proposes that Caribbean people should keep their identity when they live in Managua, but that it is necessary to share it with the friends from the pacific coast to break commonly held negative beliefs.
Aira Bracket, a professional model and tourism student feels that interaction is the key, and with it would come understanding. “People from the Pacific should talk to us; get to know us how we are,” she says.
But Cattuse is less optimistic, saying, “I do believe that the people from the pacific will die feeling this way, they won’t change. There are some who understand, some don’t.”
Looking for a solution
“The government has a huge responsibility of creating a sense of identity, nationality and multiculturalism,” says writer Andira Watson, the winner of the 2009 Mariana Sanson National Poetry award. “It’s in the constitution, so it must be given value. We have to create those opportunities and mechanisms for integration or dialogue to move the country’s culture forward.”
Education is fundamental to find the cultural, ethnical, political, and economical parity between the Pacific and Caribbean coast. The idea is to defeat the actual and perceived division between the different parts of Nicaragua, so that Nicaraguan people like Reverend Bent, Alta, Shakira, Shirlene and the many others from the Caribbean can feel like Nicaraguan people.
Que buena nota profe…
“So, my people were called different!
Interestingly different,
In a beautiful way, different,
So , so different, yet so, so human!”< C.hodgson
Gracias Silvio por tu trabajo, saludos
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