Volume No. 2 Issue No. 41 - Monday June 2, 2008
Dominica: the Caribbean's lost world
 Gavin Bell - Telegraph News (http://telegraph.co.uk)
Dominica possesses a wide array of flora and fauna
|
They came in canoes carved from single tree trunks a century before Columbus, and for generations they resisted European attempts to take their lands.
But the tide of history was against them, and gradually they retreated deeper into the mountainous rainforests of their island until barely 500 remained.
It was an enlightened British administrator, Sir Henry Hesketh Bell, who secured a reservation for the last Carib Indians in a remote part of Dominica in 1903, and it has been a remarkable success story for a community that has increased six-fold.
They call themselves the Kalinago People, and they live in one of the most naturally bountiful places on Earth. This rumpled quilt of live volcanoes swathed in primary rainforest is so fertile they say if you plant an umbrella it will bear fruit.
Perhaps not, but the island is a riotous assembly of vegetation in which avocados, apples and limes jostle for space with giant chatagnier trees, cocoa, mangoes, enough root vegetables to feed an army and a chef's cornucopia of spices and herbs.
Throw in jungle hikes to spectacular waterfalls and hot sulphur springs, world-class scuba diving and laid-back people unspoilt by mass tourism, and you have the essence of a natural adventure park far from the Caribbean stereotype of glitzy hotels on palm-fringed beaches.
They will be dancing in the streets of Roseau, the bustling little capital, and in the villages with more gusto than ever this year, as the island celebrates the 30th anniversary of its independence from Britain.
At the same time it is taking a step closer to the old mother country this month with the introduction of daily flights from St Lucia, timed to coincide with arriving flights from London. The British tour operators Ramblers Worldwide and MotMot Travel have just begun offering walking and scuba-diving tours, and Thomson has added Dominica to its Caribbean cruise itinerary.
"We have always been a very happy people," says Irvince Auguiste, former Carib Chief of Dominica and now a member of the tribal council. "We may not have a fancy house, or a car or a pick-up truck, but we have no mortgage to pay, and no gasoline or food to buy. And most of us have no television or telephone, because we really don't need them."
We are sitting in a thatched shelter in Touna, one of eight small settlements in the so-called Carib Territory, watching a man called Steve splicing bamboo for weaving into baskets.
Irvince admits there may be no full-blooded Kalinago left, but he reckons there are about 150 who are pretty close, including himself.
His complexion is lighter than that of his Dominican compatriots, he has the Asiatic features of his Amerindian ancestors, and his long, straight hair is plaited in a pony tail. Small-scale farming, fishing and craft making are the main economic activities, and the only employee on Irvince's farm is a pig that clears the land.
A few years ago the Kalinago realised they were losing their culture and traditions, so they set about reviving them. Two cultural groups have salvaged some of the language and recreated songs and dances, which they perform as much for their own amusement as for visitors, and there are plans for "full-moon barbecues" with drumming and dancing. "This is for us, but tourists will be invited," Irvince says.
Meanwhile, small groups of visitors are welcome to wander through his village (pop. 70) with a guide and observe an age-old system of organic farming, basket weaving and the method of obtaining the sweet juice of sugar cane.
A single track winds past shacks of wood and corrugated iron, and a few simple houses of concrete, enveloped in a lush green landscape and a deep sense of peace.
The Kalinago appear gentle, soft-spoken people, and Irvince challenges the historic perception of Caribs as war-like: "I think this was propagated by colonialists to explain their own atrocities."
Continue to next page
 E-mail to a friend
|
|
