Panama Travel and Tourism

The Embera

The majority of the Embera continue to live a traditional lifestyle, but they also welcome visitors. They are not as well known as some Native american groups in Panama as they have traditionally lived in the dee[p rain forest of the eastern Darien province, but that is beginning to change. Parara Puru is a small village of Embera on the Chagres River ab out an hour from Panama City that welcomes tours from the outside.

Depending on which village you choose to visit you will meet Anne, a US citizen with a 20 year career as an animal trainer in film and TV. She met her husband while working on a films in the jungles of Panama, and is now married to a member of the village.

The Embera is one of seven recognized tribes in Panama. They first migrated from Colombia to Panama's Darien region. Then over the last quarter-century some of these families established villages on the Chagres River.
Normally you will arrive in the village by canoe and are greeted by music and kids. Embera Puru has about 100 inhabitants, 15 or so thatched roof huts, a gigantic "town hall" and a small "guest houe" for visitors. You are allowed to wander around on your own during your visit, you will also hear about their history and culture. Then lunch over an open pit fire which is served in banana leaf "plates." You also enjoy a trip into the jungle to hear about medicinal plants, just the Shaman and what nature provides. Ladies attend basket weaving which they are so famous for.
They explain that crafts are priced at $1 for each day it took to make the item. They also dance and play music.

If you want to visit the Darien province itself, it is for the cautions adventurer. There are no hospitals, clinics or pharmacies. You need to make arrangements to go with a guide as danger ebbs and flows in the Darien. These people made their way from Colombia in 1830 and are proficient hunters using poison dart blowguns. They are renown for making canoes so stable that the Panama Canal Authoirty buys them for transportation to up-river areas. Women are considered among the world's best basket makers.

The Darien National Park is one of Panama's jewels with 576,000 hectares of rain forest rich in wildlife.

The Embra People of Panama

Panama's Kuna People

Kuna Yala

Kuna Yala means in the Kuna language "Kuna territory." It is also known as San Blas, a name given to this territory by the Spanish conquistadors and which remains to this day. The region borders on the west with the Province of colon and on the east with Colombia, to the south you find the provinces of Panama and Darien and the 365 islands that make up the archipelago that extends out into the Caribbean Sea.

Most of its population is concentrated in these islands. By the mid 19th century they started populating the islands of the archipelago. The continental part of the "comarca" (territory) is mostly uninhabited. They have been able to preserve the biologic diversity of the region and their culture.

For the Kunas the land is the mother of all things. She is the guardian of all that exists and represents the spirit, the strength and the vigor of the Kuna culture. The elders have taught the Kuna people that there are 8 spiritual levels in which they can find themselves: gold, silver, iron and other minerals that maintain Mother Earth. If they allow these minerals to be exploited, their trees will dry up and production will decrease. That it is why it is so important for them to take care of the environment and not abuse it.

The Kuna culture is one of the most studied and their traditions amaze and surprise tourists. One of the most striking practices is the fact that their young do not receive their names until they reach puberty. Until they reach puberty, the Kuna women are called by a nickname. The women wear the beautiful "molas." Molas are considered one of the most sophisticated handicrafts in Latin America. They are made from brilliantly colored cotton textiles. Cuts are made in the clothe making layers which are later sewn. To complement the molas, the women wear brightly colored cloths tied around their waist, in a manner of skirt and a red handkerchief with yellow designs on their heads. They also adorn themselves with necklaces, rings, and bracelets of gold with thich they complete their daily attire. The Kunas wrap their ankles and wrists in bracelets made from bright colored "chaquiras" (beads called winis in the Kuna language).

Their economy centers around the harvest of coconuts which they sell mainly to Colombian ships that sail in the region. Coconuts are traded for clothes, food or accessories such as sunglasses.

Another aspect that catches the attention of tourists is the high incidence of albinism in the Kuna territory. Experts attribute this to the fact that they rearely marry outside their community. Children of the moon, as the albinos are called, are revered and treated as special people.

Border crossing into Costa Rica from Panama

Guabito, Panama (and Sixaola, Costa Rica) is one of the few border crossings with Costa Rica, this one located on the Caribbean side, in the Bocas del Toro province. Guabito is a town in the Changuinola district of the Bocas del Toro Province of Panama. Guabito is a small town located directly across the Rio Sixaola from Sixaola, Costa Rica. An elevated former railroad grade and bridge connect Guabito to Sixaola. The border crossing is popular with tourists going between Costa Rica and Bocas del Toro. The Costa Rica-Panama border is also a time zone boundary so Guabito is one hour ahead of Sixaola. Few tourists stop in guabito longer than necessary to clear Panamanian customs.

The bridge across the Sixaola River is for both pedestrian and vehicular traffic and was built in 1908! A new bridge is very badly needed but Costa Rica and Panama are having discussions on its construction.

Panamanian amphibians victims of deadly fungus

Workers at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore have spent the past decade creating a frog-breeding program that now makes the facility the largest U.S. breeder and shipper of the Panamanian golden frog. The program is part of a larger effort by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums to propagate the endangered species in captivity with an eye on one day rebuilding the wild population in its natural habitat.

The "waving" is a language of "hand" motions the frogs evolved to communicate amid the din of falling water in Panama that drowns out their chirps. Maryland Zoo veterinarian said the Panamanian golden frogs once were abundant in Panama. A national icon and a symbol of good luck, their image appears on the country's lottery tickets, in hotels and gift shops. But today they're absent in the wild, reduced by habitat loss, toxins and over-collection, then wiped out by the deadly chytrid fungus that has affected 30% of the world's amphibian species. They also discovered the frogs like running water in their tanks. So the adult tanks have a steady trickle of water falling through the lid. Temperatures are kept near 70 degrees, like Panama's mountain forests.