[login]

• // characteristics
• // inspiration trips
• // Spring-Summer 2008 Collection
• // Autumn-Winter 2008 Collection

• HOME >
  • The Collection >
    • inspiration trips

Macabuca

When I saw it, I never thought that the plate of shrimp the waiter was placing at our table under the attentive gaze of my co-workers would change the events of the coming days.

As soon as we tasted the shrimp, we all agreed they were delicious. Hearing us, the owner came out from behind the bar, removing his apron. That intimate strip-tease of his never announced anything brief. Waving his hands, he said “You just arrived in Puerto Rico!” He was going to tell us the secret of his delicious shrimps.

- “They are that good because they live among the roots of the mangrove trees. Those mangrove swamps are something really impressive. Salt water forests! From them we also extract “tannin”, a substance used by the Indians in ancient times as a sedative, to soothe burns… but particularly to tan leather, dye fabrics, paint the…”

We did not let him continue. We were all thinking the same thing and we all began speaking at the same time about the new summer line… although I was the only one lucky enough to travel to “the island of enchantment”.

I was supposed to meet up with Isabel in Jayuya. Isabel is a marine biologist who works at a major laboratory in the capital and she was to accompany me during my adventure in the southern coasts. The place and date to begin our journey were chosen randomly; it so happened that at the time the finest craftspeople of the island were gathered in Jayuya, it was the first day of the National Indigenous Festival, a festival that honours the memory of their ancestors, the “Good Indians”, the Tainos. This celebration takes visitors to Boriken, the peaceful island which was Puerto Rico before America was discovered and the conquistadors brought barbarism and stole everything including its name… a time when any village that protested was burned and plundered and its men turned into slaves, forced to build a road that crossed their land from east to west. Like a wound. The Route of Cain.

The people were enjoying all the dances, games and exhibitions but particularly “El Reinado”; a competition where the boy and girl with the purest indigenous features among all the young people are elected as “King and Queen”. The chosen couple represents the indigenous cultural heritage for a year, making the population aware of the physical and anthropological legacy they treasure. Surrounded by cheering and applause, the winning couple advanced among the crowd. The beauty queen, very distant from the beauty standards imposed by North American magazines, was not your typical “miss”. She did not cry. She did not thank her family for helping her get there. She did not pose. She smiled, assured and confident. She smiled with her whole face and her whole body, she smiled with the expression of someone who knows, who understands. She was so beautiful, holding the “king’s” hand, walking barefoot along the flower-strewn path that led to a small throne made with canes and palm fronds… it was a revelation to realise what pride can do to the spirit, if given the opportunity.

After several hours spent collecting samples of craftwork and listening to descriptions of how the natives still tan their virgin leather, dinnertime arrived. While we waited to be served an appetising roast suckling pig with Creole marinade, Isabel —out of the blue— embarked upon her own personal campaign of denunciation:

- “We are going to hold a “guaitiao”. Do you know what that is? The Tainos used this name for a friendly ceremony between the Indians and the Spaniards, during which they exchanged favours… If you confess what you have really come to seek in Puerto Rico, I will show you the most beautiful mangrove swamp in the island.”

Isabel mistrusts any foreign company that wants to intrude in “her” mangrove swamps, no matter how good their intentions may be. She told me that 70% of mangrove swamps in the Caribbean have disappeared, being turned into shrimp farms, timber operations and tourist resorts… and that she was not going to cooperate, no matter how much we offered to pay her. I assured her that the area would not suffer any damage from my visit and that my interests were quite different but she is a headstrong and distrustful woman who not only has character but is also right. Before retiring for the night, in a last effort at fraternization, I asked her if she would like to suggest a name for a new line inspired in the mangrove swamps of Puerto Rico…

- “There is an old Taino term…: Ma-ca-bu-ca.”

- “It sounds great!… What does it mean?”

- “What do I care.”

Only after hearing what she had to say did I understand her sarcasm:

- “From a lack of understanding of the importance of mangrove swamps before the 1970’s we have moved on to conscious, malicious ignorance. Protection laws are infringed by the powerful, even with the complicity of certain authorities… The mangrove swamps of the coasts are comparable to the kidneys of the human body: they rid the soil of salts and toxic waste, making life possible; and their value is not only to be found in the goods it offers (natural medicines, drugs, honey, fruit, spices…) but in the fact that the life of local communities has always evolved around them. They are part of their identity… But they smell bad, of course. They stink! Although the rotting waters are the source of one of the ecosystems with the greatest biodiversity on Earth, they are seen as unhealthy areas, as a place were mosquitoes thrive… The mangrove swamps hold incalculable riches, but it is obvious that those who should be losing sleep over this couldn’t care less.”