In 2010, a factory in Cochabamba Bolivia will start producing an energy drink made from coca leaves that will go by the name “Coca Colla” (a play on words, as indigenous Bolivians are sometimes known as Collas or Kollas that comes from the pre-Colombian Colla people of the Antiplano region, esp around lake Titicaca). No packshot yet, but apparently it’s going to be dark coloured, sweet and fizzy. Remind you of anything?

There are stories in Spanish about it, here and here and here. We want this stuff imported in Panama. Now.

Finally, the ex-president simply arrived on his own terms, in a cocaine-colored BMW at the prosecutor’s office, chatted for about 20 minutes and left again, without even a medida cautelar. Current president Martinelli has voiced twice already his utter dismay with this mocking of  the authorities by El Toro.

The skull of Islero, now on display in a Madrid café.

Bullfighting aficionados know that every once and a while the bull wins. There is for example the case of the bull Islero, who in 1947 killed famous toreador Manolete and the animal, like our Panamanian El Toro, still has its own Facebook fanpage.

El Toro, defiant as ever, is showing the current rulers that they don’t make the rules. He does. After all, current president Martinelli served as his director of the Social Security and there is no way El Toro will allow a simple supermarket king to have him locked up just because he used his presidency to multiply his fortune. For ten years since he was president, El Toro was allowed to further his business interests and remain an important player in national politics. The tentacles of the Toro network reach into every corner of Panamanian society.

CORRIDA DE OLIGARCHAS

Martinelli has told the Attorney General, Ana Matilde Gomez, directly that he wants El Toro arrested. Similarly, I. Roberto Eisenmann, the voice of the oligarchs, has told Mrs. Gomez the same when the two ran into each other. When Gomez failed to obey immediately, she saw a case unfold against her because her office went after a corrupt prosecutor and ordered phone interceptions.

The PRD, El Toro’s party, maintains that the corrida de toros we’re watching now is “political persecution” and “judicial terrorism”. The Public Ministry maintains that it is investigating and fighting corruption. Both are wrong. The drive to have El Toro arrested and prosecuted now has little to do with political rivalry or any fight against corruption, but must be seen within the framework of oligarchs having a fight about who will control Panama’s business elite.

If the bull goes down, like Islero eventually did, how many people will he take with him? The reluctant AG, who will most likely be thrown out of office next month, will only be his first victim. The corrupt judges in the Supreme Court, a parade of ex-government members and a corral of business associates must be trembling with fear right now for what will happen to them if El Toro receives the final estocada.

The troubled mayor faces two criminal investigations for corruption. One concerns the case of Bosco giving his wife a cheque to go shopping in Taiwan on account of the municipality. The second investigation is about Bosco using his staff for personal matters. Then there are two more investigations against him for electoral crimes.

Meanwhile, his Christmas project appears to be going absolutely nowhere. Several companies have now disassociated themselves from the deal, fearing that they won’t be paid as Bosco doesn’t have any contracts approved by the Comptroller of the State.

Irena Sylya

Wotan, a white toy poodle with a mean bark, accosts me on my way into Irena Sylya’s apartment, which occupies the 13th floor of a Paitilla high-rise. Wotan (pronounced voh-tan), a mythological war god, is a big name for a small dog. But the name fits. The creature circling my ankles is furious about me invading his territory.

Through a scratchy whisper, Sylya grumbles about a bad cold troubling one of her vocal chords. “It’s the right one—I can feel it.” Should we reschedule? “Oh, no—no, no.” It’s now or never: Sylya, general director of Fundación Ópera Panamá, is knee-deep in producing a four-night run of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute.” Three weeks before opening night, Sylya’s to-do list remains scarily long. There’s little time for non-theater activities. So, the cliché beckons, the show (our interview) must go on.

An international opera singer, Sylya is known for commanding performances. Which is why it’s surprising to learn that in college she excelled in science but faltered in music. The science, it seems, underscores her encyclopedic knowledge of music (“Each blood cell has its own vibration, which is like a Viennese Waltz,” she offers at one point.).

Sylya, who grew up in a small Alabama town and has lived in Europe, dreamed of retiring in Italy before she and her husband George bought property in Panama about 10 years ago. They moved here permanently in March 2006, when Sylya started teaching music at the University of Panama. Her visiting professorship ends this year, and through the foundation’s initiatives, Sylya is stirring Panama’s second opera awakening.

The first occurred in the early 1900s, with the country’s emergence as a commerce hub. Opera debuted in Panama in October 1908 with Verdi’s “Aida” by an Italian company at Teatro Nacional. Foreign theater companies staged numerous shows in Panama, and for its part, the National Assembly supported laws creating a national music conservatory and a national symphony orchestra. From 1926 to 1938, the Panamanian government funded a national opera school. But a national company never developed, and after nearly 40 years of ongoing activity, opera disappeared after WWII.

Ópera Panamá added a new chapter to Panama’s opera history with “Madame Butterfly,” staged during last year’s celebrations marking the 100th anniversary of Teatro Nacional. Panama’s second opera awakening comes ahead of the canal’s planned expansion, a fact duly noted on Ópera Panamá’s website. Sylya is determined to nurture theater culture by establishing a national opera company. In reaching this goal, Sylya concentrates on a personal motto, the same one that helped her ignore the odds in becoming an international opera star: “Never face reality.” To face reality is to recognize barriers. It’s much better to visualize opportunities.

Anyone less dogged could’ve been discouraged by red tape alone. Setting up a foundation requires paperwork that takes forever to process. Organizing visas for visiting artists? Major hassle. Putting together—and then actually sticking to—a production schedule? Anyone familiar with Panama’s penchant for the “tranquilo” way of being knows where this goes—nowhere.

“I don’t know how she manages,” says Moisés Guevara. A music history professor at the University of Panama, a viola player for the National Symphony, and Ópera Panamá’s president, Guevara knows a thing or two about multi-tasking. Nevertheless, he’s awed by Sylya’s tireless devotion to every aspect of production, from designing sets to overseeing costumes. She even loads and delivers props to the theater.

In other words, Sylya is no finger-snapping, bring-me-my-latte diva. Which doesn’t mean she doesn’t maintain standards. Ask any “Magic Flute” performer. “Irena demands the best of everyone,” says Diana Durán, a 24-year-old soprano who studied with Sylya at the University of Panama. “She has the gift of seeing the smallest talent in someone and making something great of it.”

Durán’s words summarize a core principle of Sylya’s grassroots approach: empowering young people to fully develop their talents, the seeds of a sprouting national opera company.

These days, Sylya is too busy producing to perform. We get sidetracked on that point—Wotan interrupts us by barking. Sylya scoops him up, patting his head. Her affection won’t placate him, and he growls at her. There’s no pleasing the divo. Pobrecito—he’s not happy unless he’s creating drama.

====

“La Flauta Mágica” (“The Magic Flute”) opens at Teatro Nacional on September 29 and runs through October 2. All performances start at 7:30 p.m., and tickets are available at Blockbuster. For more information about the show or Ópera Panamá, see www.operapanama.com.

Rich man, Poor man, Beggar-man, Thief,
Developer, Warlord, Kuna chief

by OKKE ORNSTEIN

This is how we know Panama's indigenous Kuna tribe from the tourist brochures: Peaceful people who make nice "molas". In reality their leaders are neither peaceful nor nice. See that skull and bones scarf of the old lady? Across the border of Kuna Yala, inside the Colon province, Kunas are committing massive environmental crimes, slashing hundreds of hectares of primary forest on land that is not theirs. And because the government is too afraid to act, local land owners are arming themselves to the teeth....

“I’m a practical man”, says the vice-mayor, Santiago Alarcon. He sits behind his desk, adorned with an engraved plaque with the name of his absent boss, Yira Molinar, the causin of TV personality Lucy Molinar who is the new Minister of Education. A Panamanian flag stands next to it and the vice-mayor’s laptop computer takes center stage on the desk, humming along while the highest local official downloads his favorite tunes from the internet. Plastic flowers decorate a small altar behind him in the only office with air conditioning. A football lies on the floor beneath it. “There are all these laws and regulations”, he says, “but you know how it goes. Nobody enforces them or even knows them. You don’t get much further with laws and rules”.

Santiago Alarcon, the vice-mayor of Santa Isabel, behind his desk in Palenque

I’m in the Alcaldia of Santa Isabel which is located in Palenque, a small, dreamy village on the Caribbean coast, east from Colon and close to the border with Kuna Yala. Not much ever happens here. The biggest event today was the discovery of a captured leatherback turtle, tied to a tree on the beach like a dog. It’s a protected species, but that status doesn’t change the fact that they’re easy to catch when they come ashore to lay eggs and that they taste good. This one gets lucky: The police arrives, someone from the environmental agency ANAM arrives, the animal is released and long after it has disappeared into the Caribbean waters it continues to dominate the conversations ashore.

KUNAS CUTTING FOREST

Yet while ANAM, the police and the citizenry occupy themselves with the life and times of the turtle, a much bigger ecological disaster is taking place next door. Hundreds of hectares of primary forest have been cut for no good reason. Some of the land has been burnt and yucca and plantains planted. The onslaught progresses at a speed that can only be tracked by regular helicopter flights over the area or by having satellite pictures taken frequently. In 2007, an ANAM report stated that 400 hectares of forest had been cut. It’s now close to 600. That’s more than has been destroyed by the controversial Petaquilla mine or the Hydroelectric dam near Changuinola. And nobody talks about it – except for our vice-mayor and a few others.

That’s because it’s the Kunas.

RIDE THE WAVES OF PUBLIC SYMPATHY

An aerial shot of some of the damage done by the Kunas on privately owned land in Colon Province

We are used to scenarios in which the indigenous people of Panama, or indeed throughout Latin America, are the victims: Crooks in Bocas stealing land from them, shady mining companies displacing them, energy giants chasing them out of their villages; that sort of thing. But here, in the province of Colon on the border with semi-independent Kuna Yala, the indigenous Kuna tribesmen are the culprits for a change. It’s these Kunas who are cutting the forest, invading private property, destroying fences and walking around waving machetes and guns – all outside the comarca (reservation) of Kuna Yala. Like an invading army of ants they cross the border, tens or hundreds of them, and graze the forest just behind the beach with axes and machetes. From the sky, the area looks like a war zone. And if no steps are taken to stop them, it will indeed become a war zone. Yet the Kunas are cleverly riding the waves of general sympathy for the cause of the indigenous people throughout Latin America, pretending they are defending their culture and ancient rights to the land.

“The Kunas aren’t fighting for their rights or their culture here”, says the vice-mayor. “They are trying to secure their interests and their wallets. There is a lot of potential for tourism in Kuna Yala/San Blas, and they don’t want competition from others just outside the comarca”.

And then he adds, “I think we will have to kill five or six of them. Then they’ll get scared and go away”. I first think I misheard. But Alarcon repeats the statement about ten minutes later in our conversation, and says, “If we don’t stop them they’ll go on and on until they reach Palenque and even further. They’re breaking the law so they have to be punished”. He is indeed a very practical man.

WARLORDS OF THE CARIBBEAN

French mercenaries employed by Francois Callier carry AK-47s and Uzis. And use them, too.

Some of the land owners whose forests are being destroyed by the Kunas harbor similar feelings towards the indigenous tribe and paramilitary styled solutions are being prepared by some of them. One such land owner, various sources tell me, a French pilot named Francois who has been in Panama for decades, deploys a small militia of trigger-happy Colombians and Foreign Legion veterans who, armed to the teeth with Uzis and grenade launchers, patrol his land to protect it from invading Kunas. The Kunas, unconfirmed reports have it, are carrying light arms and machetes as well. To stave off an armed confrontation there was to be a peace initiative, the local authorities decided. In fact, that peace initiative was set for today in Palenque, but nobody showed up.

LOCAL AUTHORITIES HELPLESS

Thus for now all is quiet on the mesmerizing Caribbean coast. One could stay here for days and watch the waves. Canoes lie helpless on the beach. The local restaurant is decorated with painted fenders and buoys. A dog, the pride of the owner for it is of a special race, is chained to the wall, food lies around it. We sit on turquoise picnic tables eating fried fish. I’m talking with Aldo Cordoba, who works for the environmental protection authority ANAM in the area (but has since been fired when the Martinelli government took over). He agrees with the theory of the vice-mayor about the motives of the Kunas, “They’re afraid of tourism that competes with their own affairs”.

“We’re only with three persons for the whole coast and our vehicles are broken”, he tells me. “Sometimes we get help from the police, but they are understaffed too so we’re basically powerless against hundreds of invading Kunas destroying the forest”.

Frustrated, the ANAM people dedicate their time to the establishment of a new national park, seeing to environmental impact studies, and the occasional captured turtle. A report Cordoba wrote for his superiors in 2007 about the environmental damage done by the Kunas has never been acted upon. Without any significant enforcement in the area, armed militias, local authorities prepared to kill and militant Kunas violating the border of the comarca, invading property and committing environmental crimes, all ingredients are there for the conflict to get rapidly out of hand.

ANOTHER MEETING

So, after more than two years of dragging feet and useless meetings, the Torrijos government finally acknowledged the seriousness of the situation and called…. another meeting on June 4th, in which all parties involved were summoned to participate.

The Torrijos government, by then, was on its last feet and about to be quashed in national elections. Officials were frantically looking for other jobs, safety from prosecution, or both. The meeting was set to start at 10 AM, but the vice-minister was late and eventually didn’t show up at all. And so we were waiting in the beautiful library of the Ministry of Government and Justice, next to the National Theater in Casco Viejo. This library which, oddly enough, has no books, was the first plenary meeting hall of Panama’s National Assembly. A stairway leads to the ceiling. That is, the concierge told me, the secret escape from the minister’s office in case of coups – or Kuna invasions.

But on that day, the minister wasn’t there and the Kunas were not invading but waiting. There was a Kuna lawyer and the Secretary of Communications of the Kuna National Congress, Anelio Merry, the Sub-Secretary of the Kuna Congress Bolivar Lopez and some other hotshots from the tribe.

When the meeting finally commenced, they claimed ancient rights to the land they are invading, even though it is outside the borders of the comarca which the Kunas themselves have recognized. Also, the Kunas haven’t been in Panama forever, but settled in San Blas only a couple of hundred years ago after warring with other indigenous tribes. The Spanish conquistadores would have older claims to the land than the Kuna tribe. Their story was further undermined by the findings of a study by the Agrarian Reform Office (Reforma Agraria). Director Nadia Moreno revealed that in a survey done in 2005 there were no Kunas in the area and that the border of the comarca is clearly defined and really beyond any doubt. She also explained that, by law, land deeds that are dated before the Kuna Yala comarca was created prevail over any claims to that land by the Kunas, even if that land is inside the comarca.

Then Donnie Estrada of the Foundation for the Development of the Caribbean held a presentation. The foundation is an initiative of several land owners who strive for sustainable development of the tourism sector on Panama’s Caribbean coast. One company, Crownland Invest, owns a beach property that borders Kuna Yala. They’re building a small eco-resort there with turtle watching and protection as the main attraction, and manage a foundation that actively protects the turtles when they come ashore to lay eggs. Yet behind the beach, the Kunas are slashing the forest. Estrada showed pictures taken a while ago. Thousands of trees are cut, not even an effort is made to collect at least the wood. Hundreds of hectares are turned into wasteland.

Estrada pointed out that there are several issues in play that should be addressed by different sectors of the government. There is the ecological component, which is the jurisdiction of ANAM. There is land invasion, theft, destruction of private property, which is in the realms of law enforcement. And then there is the guarding of the border, which should be the responsibility of the national government or the state as a whole, claimed Estrada.

He finished his presentation with warning those present that the situation is becoming so explosive that people might get hurt if it’s not resolved soon. The Kuna representatives, already shuffling nervously on their chairs during the presentation, decided to take this as a direct threat. They made a grand show out of it, shouting how insulted they were and then left the meeting, stamping their feet.

Nobody was really impressed, but then the representative of ANAM, a career bureaucrat named Antonio Chang, jumped up and loudly distanced himself from the supposed “threat”. After the show of the Kunas, this was now turning into a very bad theater play. When the meeting had come to its fruitless conclusion, Chang explained that he had to deliver this performance to protect his career, taking into account the coming change of government. I asked him why his office has never acted upon a report about the situation that was filed in 2007 already. He has never heard of such a report, he said.

“How did you get that report?”, he demanded to know.

“I’m not going to tell you”, I replied. “What I want to know is why ANAM hasn’t done anything with it”.

He promised to get back to me. I never heard from him again.

KUNA VIOLENCE

Meanwhile, the Kunas were doing everything in their power to make Estrada’s warning become reality. At exactly the same moment they were making their show of walking out of the meeting, their fellow tribesmen kidnapped three workers from the French land owner and took them to Kuna Yala where they were interrogated and held hostage for several days.

Then they announced on various radio shows that Donnie Estrada was threatening to kill Kunas and pictures of the poor guy were put up in several places.

So a few days later I received a phone call from Estrada. He had made an appointment at the office of the Kuna Congress in Balboa, Panama City, where he would attempt to rectify the situation. Since I had interviewed the vice-mayor of Santa Isabel who stated twice that his preferred solution was to just kill six or seven Kunas to scare them back into the comarca, Estrada was wondering if I would be willing to repeat what I heard to the Kuna officials so that they’d understand that he really was only trying to convey a warning for the sake of a non-violent solution.

KUNAS AND FARC GUERRILLAS

And so on June 6th I met with Bolivar Lopez and Anelio Merry of the Kuna Congress and Donnie Estrada of the Foundation for the Development of the Caribbean. Donnie explained the situation, and I told them what the vice-mayor had repeatedly said when I interviewed him. They looked him up on one of the many pictures they took during the meeting at the Ministry of Government and Justice. Then they backed off somewhat from their hostility towards Estrada.

Bolivar Lopez then said that shots had been heard in the area. Somebody was firing at someone. He confirmed that they kidnapped the three campesinos who were working for Francois-the-pilot. “Unfortunately, they were of our brother Ngobe tribe”, Lopez said. “Our cacique (chief) himself interrogated them and they told him their boss has many weapons”, Lopez added.

Lopez then continued to exclaim how outraged he was by the supposed “death threat” from Estrada, and ranted on about how cabanas could be burned down and other such mayhem in retaliation. I decided to interrupt him. “If this turns violent, are the Kunas prepared for that?” I asked.

Bolivar Lopez answered with a bit of history, “In earlier conflicts when we were attacked, we always formed alliances with others to defend ourselves. When we were attacked by the Spaniards for example, we formed an alliance with the pirates who helped us”.

“And how does that translate into today’s reality?” I wanted to know.

“There are 400 FARC guerrillas from Colombia in San Blas”, he answered, “We could form an alliance with them if we are attacked”.

The FARC – Kuna alliance is, it occurred to me, already a reality. In 2001, while reporting from the Darien border province on the spill-over of the Colombian war into Panama, sources varying from local merchants to policemen told me that the Kunas were supplying the FARC guerrilla camp in the border area with food and other necessities. “You want to visit the FARC camp? Ask the Kunas to bring you”, a hotel owner in Yaviza advised me. That in mind, I decided that Bolivar Lopez was to be believed. They would actually be able to count on the Colombian guerrillas to defend them.

The meeting ended with an invitation for Estrada and myself to visit the upcoming Kuna assembly in Kuna Yala, where Estrada’s foundation would be given time to speak and the issue would, hopefully, be resolved once and for all.

Back home I thought about how these Kunas would be able to drum up support, inside Panama, of Colombian narco-guerrillas the moment they’re attacked – a crazy situation that threatens Panama’s sovereignty and security and that nobody will thus want to talk about. Are the Kunas Panama’s Untouchables? A friend of mine put up one finger in front of me. “Hit the Kuna!”, she said. I looked puzzled at her hand. “Hit it!” So I hit her finger. Immediately she spread her hand, now showing all fingers. “Five Kunas!”

TAKEN HOSTAGE BY THE KUNAS

In the weeks that followed, only fragments of news trickled down from the Caribbean coast. There were some confrontations between the Kunas and the armed men of some of the land owners, but nothing got really out of hand. The country was occupied by the Murcia scandal, the elections, and the victory of Martinelli. But the date of the Kuna assembly got nearer.

“Do you think it’s safe to go?”

I was sitting in the office of Crownland Invest, the day before the Kuna congress. The question came from Max van Rijswijk, the Dutch CEO of the company. They are the owners of Playa Colorada, which borders Kuna Yala and where the eco turtle resort is to be created. Van Rijswijk has been invited to speak at the Kuna assembly as well. For years he has been trying to negotiate a solution with the Kunas. “I would be okay with them using the land they’ve already cut, as long as they don’t come any closer to the beach”, he said. But for the Kunas, there are no practical solutions, because they claim the issue is political. They believe it’s their land, or at least that is the official Kuna spin. And nobody can own land that the Kunas own or face the consequences. Hence the question, “is it safe to go?”

I was not really worried about safety. I’m a journalist, there to report, willing to listen to their side of the story. But van Rijswijk and Estrada were worried indeed. Worried that they would be blamed for actions they have nothing to do with, like those of the Frenchman and his paramilitary force.

“So maybe you should raise the profile of the visit then”, I suggested. “Bring a government official or such, that will make it more difficult for them to do something to harm you if they indeed have such plans”.

That night an earthquake hit Kuna Yala with 6.3 on the Richter scale. I was in a penthouse in Panama City spending the night because we would leave early in a rented plane, and had just turned on the shower when everything started trembling and moving. Was this a sign? And if so, of what? I sat for an hour on the terrace, drinking Costa Rican Cacique, waiting for more shocks and in order not to miss any towers collapsing, and then went to catch some sleep.

From left to right: Donnie Estrada, Jaime Figueroa, the author, Max van Rijswijk

A few hours later I reported at the hangar of the airplane rental company at Albrook airport. Estrada and van Rijswijk had taken my advice and invited Jaime Figueroa along. Figueroa was once presented by Martinelli as the new Minister of Tourism, campaigned, and then saw that position given to a Colombian born music producer. Instead, Martinelli made Figueroa President of the Board of Directors of the Panama Tourism Authority (ATP). We chatted about the earthquake, posed for a picture in front of the plane and then it was off to Porvenir, where we’d have to pick up a colleague of Donnie Estrada.

About ten minutes after takeoff I looked over my shoulder through the front window. We were heading for a thick, black soup. Moments later the plane was shaking violently while plowing through almost massive water. We had planned, on my request, to circle a couple of times around the area where the Kunas had cut the forest so that I could see it for myself and maybe even take some pictures. But after one full circle the pilot said that we had to go to Porvenir now or we’d be forced to return to Panama City. After landing, I understood why. The Porvenir airstrip is longer than the small island it’s on as it starts under water already, and then it’s narrow and a bit bumpy. It stormed, it poured, we had the worst weather of the whole region and that meant that we were stuck for hours. First the earthquake and now this! We were doomed after all. Or maybe it wasn’t that bad and we were really part of on old secret Kuna myth, in which first the earth shook and then white men would come down from the sky and rule forever. The weather improved a bit and our flying machine took off again. I figured we still had a chance.

The Kuna assembly in progress

Forty minutes later we landed somewhere in the jungle on the mainland. A launch came to pick us up and ferry us to a small island called Dad Nakwedupbir, where the Kuna Congress was taking place. We walked around a bit, waited a bit, and then had lunch. I learned that one of the Kuna radio outlets had already been talking shit about “Dutch millionaires” who would be visiting, but some houses were flying the Dutch flag and smiles greeted us everywhere, so I assumed the worries about our safety were exaggerated and ordered more beer. Yet smiles aside, the waiting was getting ridiculous. An endless parade of everything from Kunas complaining about lack of fishing gear to international investment bankers and aid workers had to be heard by those assembled in the giant hut, which was jam packed and very, very hot. Those who couldn’t or weren’t allowed to join were looking in through the voids that walls made of sticks inevitably have.

Bolivar Lopez, sub-secretary of the Kuna Congress

Time was becoming an issue. We had this plane waiting for us and couldn’t fly back in the dark. Sub-secretary Bolivar Lopez assured us that it was “soon now”. And so eventually Max van Rijswijk was asked to speak to the assembled Kuna tribe. He explained what his company was trying to do with the turtle resort and that he wanted an amicable solution to the dispute with the Kunas. He gave it, so to speak, his best shot, but soon protests could be heard. And then the upper-chieftain or sailadummad, Gilberto Arias, stood up and began to yell and scream at van Rijswijk. Others joined the fray, making it impossible for van Rijswijk to even finish his introduction. This was bizarre; why would these people invite van Rijswijk to speak and then not let him speak? The tribe elders were now talking among themselves in Kuna language, and I couldn’t make out from the various comments yelled by others what exactly their point was. Then they announced that their “hospitality” would end here and we should leave the meeting. Somehow they had thrown me on the heap with the Dutch millionaires now. We were led to a classroom in the nearby school, and some Kuna officials said that there we would meet with members of a special commission that would deal with the issue. And so we waited and we waited again, until Max van Rijswijk got tired of it. “First they invite me here to speak and then they treat me like shit and then they expect me to wait for some stupid commission? We’re leaving”, he said.

Kuna chieftain Gilberto Arias screaming at van Rijswijk. Later he tried to steal a suitcase with computer equipment.

So we walked to the dock to get a launch to bring us to the airstrip on the mainland. Enough boats were available, but nobody to steer them. So we walked back to the village to find a captain. Nobody knew any captains available. The smiles of that morning had turned into blank faces. Finally we found an old man who would bring us ashore, so we walked back to the dock and boarded the launch. Then the old captain disappeared, and we didn’t see him again. We asked where he went, and the reply was “to get gas”. I looked at the tank. We had plenty of gas. Donnie Estrada and his colleague went to find out what the hell was going on, while Jaime Figueroa, Max van Rijswijk and me stayed in the boat. A crowd assembled on the dock, staring at us. Then some guy wearing sunglasses jumped in the boat, took Estrada’s suitcase with his laptop computer and projector and walked away. Another man yelled at us that we had to return to the village to talk with the commission. “No”, said Max, “I’ve waisted enough time on this and we’re leaving”. That was easier said then done because, in fact, the situation was such that they wouldn’t let us go.

“You need to come to the commission or you will have more problems”, one Kuna official shouted. Well, we weren’t obviously going anywhere so we decided to go see what was up.

“Did you ask for someone to get your suitcase?”, I asked Donnie. He didn’t know what I was talking about. “Some guy took your suitcase from the boat”, I told him. He went to look for it and found it standing next to Gilberto Arias, the upper Kuna sailadummad, in the giant assembly hut. He had ordered it to be taken as collateral so that we wouldn’t leave. If there was still any doubt, it now became clear that we were in fact being held on the island, against our will, and on orders of the Kuna leadership.

Back in the classroom, the “commission” convened. The chairman was old and senile, but the secretary of this commission was a smart guy. Judging from how he talked and the way he handled things I thought he had received political training from the Cubans – Cuba at one point sent advisors to Kuna Yala to help further the “Kuna Revolution” – or maybe their FARC friends. I wanted to take some pictures, but he said I wasn’t allowed to.

To call this a “commission” would be a perversion of the truth, because what it really was was a makeshift tribunal. The secretary started reading the accusations from a long list, claiming that van Rijswijk et al had done damage to the Kuna’s plants and trees and they were now seeking damages. This was obviously and certifiably total crap. The Kunas were, by all standards, invading land that was not theirs, cutting forest and planting yucca instead. Even if the legitimate owners of the land had acted against that, how could the Kunas reasonably complain and even ask for indemnification? What was left of my respect for the indigenous tribe now melted like snow in the sun. This had been a trap from the beginning, I realized; invite the most peaceful land owners over under the pretension that they are allowed to address the congress, then hold them hostage and shake them down. We were sitting in that classroom, and outside a crowd of savages was looking in through the doors and windows while making gestures of throats being cut and arrows being shot at us. I imagined myself being tied to a totem pole or in a big cooking pot. Not a pretty picture. Then some guy came in and started to take photos. I took out my camera again and started taking pictures as well.

The secretary of the Kuna shakedown commission trying to prevent being photographed. Note the spectators outside looking in.

“Don’t take pictures!”, the secretary of the tribunal yelled at me.

“If he can take pictures, I can”, I replied, and clicked.

“He is on his own territory”, the secretary said.

I had about had it with these Kuna clowns and I didn’t care what they’d do. During the meeting at the Ministry of Government and Justice they were taking pictures and filming all the time, far outside their territory, and now I wouldn’t be allowed to do the same? Fuck’em! Where were our pilots? Couldn’t they just fly over really low, dump some fuel and burn this madhouse down to liberate us?
Meanwhile, I suggested to Max to propose a joint inspection of these supposed “damages” so that at least we could leave now. He made them the offer, told them they could pick the date and bring whomever they wanted to inspect what damage supposedly had been done to Kuna property. After some talking back and forth, the Kuna racketeers could do little else than accept that proposal.

They had also finally understood that taking our party hostage, which included an official of the new Martinelli government after all, would not be without repercussions and so we were finally allowed to leave the island. Jaime Figueroa had waited at the dock with two Kuna policemen while we were being tried by the Kuna tribunal, and was happy to leave when we got out. He told me he’d write a memo to President Martinelli about this whole situation as soon as we’d get back to civilization. All of a sudden there were boat captains everywhere, and minutes later we were up in the air, getting out of the San Blas Kuna hell as fast as we could.

EPILOGUE

At the time of writing, the joint inspection of the “damages”, somehow done to Kuna property outside Kuna property, has taken place. Both the Kuna delegation and the people of the turtle foundation arrived under the protection of several fronterizas, the special police forces in charge of guarding the border with Colombia. Nothing concrete was agreed upon in regard to these supposed “damages”, but at least both parties verified, confirmed by the policemen present, that the “Dutch millionaires” weren’t the ones bringing heavy arms into the area, something the Kunas had been accusing them of. Other than that, nothing has really changed. There are no plans that I know of by the government to solve the situation, but President Martinelli has proposed a highway through Kuna Yala that would connect Panama with Colombia.

The day after these events, Kuna Yala was hit by another earthquake, but they didn’t get the message.

=======================

Related links:

Panama Turtle Protection Group
Fundacion Desarrollo del Caribe
Congreso General Kuna

Rachel Divine

Arriving at the Yoga Divina studio (“take off your shoes, please”), I find Rachel Divine on top of many things. Workmen are being instructed on how and how not to proceed with laying floors and electrical systems. Casandra, the housekeeper, brings cold water and drinks. Two phones ring incessantly and a MacBook pumps out Buddha Bar tunes. I’ve come to find out about Rachel Divine and yoga, but within five minutes we’re discussing the pros and cons of heat exchange pumps which is something she knows about too. Then the heat pumps are interrupted because she needs to read me poetry. And, oh wait! Listen to this music! And so on.

Conversations with Rachel Divine are, I have since learned, seldom linear. They meander around, going back and forth, sometimes touching again on the original theme. To the interviewer who is not prepared for it this is at first exhausting, but once you just let go – remember that term – it’s actually fun. She cuts her own sentences short because she just remembers something that absolutely must be told first and which you’ll find out much later had something to do, vaguely, with what you were originally discussing. Then there’s loud laughter and a sometimes wacky way of doing things. I wouldn’t know anyone who, being invited to come over for a glass of champagne at my office, brings her own strawberries, for example.

So who is Rachel Divine? First: It’s her real name. Some readers don’t believe it, but I checked. She was born in Puerto Rico and grew up in Los Angeles (“Like I’m a valley girl, duh…”), from a Puerto Rican mother and a Czechoslovakian father. Her parents divorced early. Her mother describes her young daughter as a “tornado”. She herself describes her childhood as relatively happy, but these days she doesn’t see her family much and has no contact at all with her father. From LA, she moved to New York and married. Traveled all over the world. Divorced seven years later and moved to Houston, to Barcelona (Spain), then back to New York, then to Costa Rica where she lived in Nosara on the Pacific coast.

“I taught yoga and had a small tourist shop. One day I realized that if you needed a set of spare keys you had to drive for hours to have copies made, so I bought the machine and offered key duplicates as well, which was good business”.

Rachel Divine

Plans to start a yoga retreat stranded when some of her business partners pursued other projects. Divine had already bought the land for the boutique resort. Things took a turn for the worse when a crooked lawyer and some accomplices set out to steal that property from her; a legal fight that continues up to this day. Disillusioned, Rachel moved first to Escazu, also in Costa Rica, and finally decided for Panama.

“There are a ton of foreigners moving to Panama so I believe that there is a lot of opportunity for yoga therapy”, she explained. But she isn’t just thinking about baby boomer expats who can afford the John Hopkins in Punta Pacifica. “I’d love to do some different things as well, like teach yoga in the women’s prison”, she tells me. Then there are plans for a yoga center in Panama City to give classes and train future yoga teachers. Meanwhile Rachel works by appointment as a yoga therapist, specializing in the healing side of yoga which includes stretching, preventative therapy and wellness. It’s a form of yoga that she has been certified and specialized in for more than 7 years.

“You wanna see my balls?” she asks in one of these conversational twists she owns the patent on. The balls turn out to be a sort of skippy balls. You can sit on them or lie on them and do all kind of weird things with them and that is called “yoga” and it’s good for you.

Test Drive

So I decided to take this yoga thing for a test. An old ski accident and too much time at the keyboard had left me with a frozen shoulder and numb fingers and yoga, or so I had read on the internets, would be able to cure those ills once and for all.

It was not my first attempt to fight physical discomfort with the ancient Eastern practice. Many years ago, in Holland, I went to have dinner with a friend who announced that a lady friend of his would join our table as well. After about 20 minutes a well known porn starlet entered the restaurant wearing a track suit and, answering my surprised look, she said that she had arrived straight from yoga class. Yoga, she explained, made her relax after the trials of another day of hard work and she went to class twice a week. I nodded understandingly. Working in the audiovisual industry can be a drag on the body.

“I often have back pain after a day of shooting, do you think yoga would help?” I asked her.

“Yes, of course. If you want I can take you to a class”, she replied.

That point scored, we ordered wine and appetizers and my friend, a bit worried about where this was going, retook control of the conversation and steered it towards safer subjects that wouldn’t invoke uncontrolled visits to stretch sessions. But later on I asked again, “Would you know of any exercises I could already do in anticipation of yoga classes?”

“Yes, you should try this and this” – and she started an explanation of weird movements I should make to make the back pain disappear.

“Can’t you just show me?” I asked. And there I was, lying on the floor of the restaurant with the acclaimed adult movie star on top of me pushing and pulling my arms and legs and what not. My friend watched it in disbelief and despair. The owner of the establishment brought another bottle of wine, quietly shaking his head.

So you see, I am an expert at yoga.

At least, that’s what I thought. Because none of this frivolousness characterizes the yoga classes given by Rachel Divine, I quickly found out. First my clothes were wrong: “Wear something loose next time instead of jeans”, she ordered me. So I bought myself some pajama style pants at Machetazo and prayed nobody would ever see me wear them.

Then there are the classes themselves. No wine drenched late night exercises on restaurant floors here, but hard work, and Rachel accepts no yammering about little pains and other such misery. “Are you dying? Does it feel as if someone is stabbing you with a knife? No? Then I don’t care”, is the consistent reply when I yell “Ouch!” trying to lift up my arm further than I’ve done in decades. All sorts of tools are brought out by Divine to work with, from foam blocks to cushions to belts which I then have to use to tie up my own legs or something like that.

I’m telling you this, dear reader, because many of us believe that yoga is just something fluffy, an esthetically pleasing form of feel-good gymnastics practiced in clouds of incense, at the end of which the participants hurry home on their flying carpets to have lotus flower salads with tofu. Nothing could be further from the truth, however. Divine’s yoga classes are a lot of fun yet no-nonsense. She’ll push and pull you until the right muscle stretches or the right joint says “plop”. The other thing one has to appreciate is that you learn that a lot of physical problems are actually resolved by training to exercise proper control over the body part in question.

An example. I couldn’t move my left arm back very far or it would hurt in my shoulder. So one day Rachel takes my arm, starts chatting with me, meanwhile moving it up and down and back and forth. Then suddenly, “You said you couldn’t move your arm backwards?” I look, my arm is almost a 90 degrees up and I didn’t even feel her do it. “You see? It’s all between the ears”, Divine says triumphantly and lets my arm go. It’s one of the most important lessons I learn during my test drive of Yoga Divina; that by taking exact control of relaxing muscles or indeed using them, pain and physical blockades disappear.

Often it is a matter – I told you to remember that term – of just letting go. One morning Divine made me do some stretching exercise and I was terrified and absolutely convinced it was gonna hurt. A lot. Tears sprung in my eyes, but when I relaxed my shoulder all I heard was “click” and then there was no pain, just free and unobstructed movement. It helped enormously when I, not satisfied with dealing with just old injuries, got myself in a fresh scooter accident and turned to Rachel for help: In little over a week most of the chest pain – which, I was sure, announced imminent and painful death – had in fact disappeared.

Another prejudice against yoga is that it’s for wimps. Also not true. I’ve seen Rachel treat everything from housewives to former marines to two young ladies who had brought their grandfather along for the ride. A great time was had by all.

Months after we first met, I invited Rachel to join me for a trip to the Caribbean Costa Ariba. I had to do some reporting there and she hadn’t seen much of the country yet. In Palenque, a tiny village near Nombre de Dios, we lunched in a small restaurant at the beach. Then I set off to interview the mayor. Walking down the street, I looked over my shoulder and thought, “Oh no…” I saw Rachel approaching the spectacularly overweight owner of the establishment and worried she’d make him do handstands or something. Or maybe we’d get chased out of the village by residents who are not prepared for this kind of modern big city nonsense. Upon return, my fears proved to be unfounded however as it turned out that the restaurant owner has diabetes and was very happy to receive some good advice from the “gringa”. The yoga therapist herself, meanwhile, was peacefully asleep – on top of a table. And I understood at that moment that Panama needs her.

=.=.=

Yoga Divina has its website at yogadivina.com. Rachel Divine can be contacted by sending an email to yogadivina@gmail.com or call at 6554-4744.

More in the Narco News Bulletin

Albany-based Patricia Lynch Associates Inc., the state’s second-largest lobbying firm, has started a new company in Panama.

The company, called Lynch Sosa & Associates, marks the first time founder Patricia Lynch has taken her lobbying and media relations business outside the United States.

Lynch Sosa, located in Panama City, will be considered a “sister company” to Lynch’s original business, which she started in Albany eight years ago. Revenue will be shared between Lynch’s company and its partners, the Sosa family of Panama.

Juan Sosa, the former Panamanian ambassador to the U.S., and his son will both be involved in the new company.

Continue reading at The Business Review

Panama Star – The organization is part of the Evaluation Committee that will have to decide which company will supply the 420 buses initially required to replace the so called “diablos rojos”.

The Chamber of Commerce said that it expects that the commission will carry out its function with impartiality and honesty.

The commission came under fire after it made several attempts to be installed and the Chinese company Higer was disqualified for not providing the insurance guarantee certificate required by law.

The president of the Chamber of Commerce, José Ramón Varela said that the organization will support the Transmovil project as it is regardless of which candidate is elected in the next presidential elections.