Kayaking

People started using kayaks about 9,000 years ago, and while they are still widely used today, people use them for much different reasons now. Previously used for transportation and for hunting, kayaks now have a much more recreational use. I’ve gone on a few kayaking ventures with friends and family. While I was always last, lagging behind the group, I still had fun because it enabled me to see new things. In North Carolina I saw wild horses up close while kayaking in a sound with shallow grasses. Last Friday afternoon our History class decided to go kayaking. When we went as a group I wanted to be in a two person kayak, hoping that two people together would be faster than one. Lihi volunteered to be my kayaking partner! She and I had a pretty good start, sharing a bright orange kayak. Even getting in the kayak was easier than I remembered. However, we had difficulty coordinating our strokes and going in the direction we aimed for.

Reading about the history and the construction of kayaks, it sounds easy to maneuver. Kayaks were built in a hydrodynamic way, custom to each person. They used seal skin, creating a vessel that mimicked a creature built for swift swimming. Lihi and I did not find this to be the case for our kayak. Our brightly colored plastic kayak seemed large, heavy, and difficult to move. Our movements with the paddles were awkward and clumsy, especially when our paddles hit each other. We continually had to yell out “Left, paddle left!” to each other to keep from going too far out from sea.  
Maybe Lihi and I had trouble because we do not routinely rely on the kayak as a means of transportation or a way to gather food. Peter Stark, in his article “From the icy northern waters came the ancient sea kayak” notes that Aleut remains have evidence of huge arm bones, which reveals their dependency on strong arms for paddling kayaks. After about an hour of paddling around, my arms felt like jell-o.    
Stark also writes about the Sigdluk creating kayaks custom fit to each person. Various groups, according to their geographical area and the type of game they hunted, built differently shaped structures. For example some built kayaks with rounded bottoms, others had different types of bows, or different shaped decks. While they changed over time depending on terrain conditions and game, each kayak was built specifically for one individual, was lightweight for easy carrying, and swift for simple maneuvering in the water. My heavy plastic kayak was made for exploration and fun, and was definitely not crafted specifically for my size. Maybe I just needed more practice, but I found it quite difficult to go in any direction I wanted. With more instruction and experience I would definitely be feel more at ease paddling. However, we still had a blast on the trip and I can see why kayaks have been in use for so long. Even though we use them for much different purposes than they were initially intended for, people can still enjoy using them.

In addition to recreational purposes, kayaking is also an Olympic sport. Unlike Olympic kayakers, we were not aiming for speed on our trip. And unlike the Aleuts, searching for food to hunt, we were just trying to have fun. The weather was beautiful that day, with a few clouds shading us from the hot sun. The workers at the dive shop (where we rented the kayaks) dropped us and our kayaks off near Playa Blanca so we wouldn’t have to paddle against the current going back to the dive shop. However, it still seemed like the current pulled us around, testing our arm strength. Learning about the importance of kayaks in history makes me have a great appreciation for them and their creators.

Black Americans in Samaná

When Christopher Columbus first landed on Hispaniola he only met friendly natives- until he arrived in Samaná. There the Ciguayos were hostile and would not trade with him and his sailors, recording this in his ship’s log. This particular area of Hispaniola was now tarnished in Columbus’ mind. He avoided conveying this negative impression back to Spain and the monarchy, saying that the people of Hispaniola were peaceful in an attempt to portray the island as easily conquerable. However, Columbus (and other figures during the colonization) didn’t try to invade this area later.

Consequently, this peninsula was largely left alone during the many power struggles to control the island. Columbus’ initial encounter helped shaped peoples views of the peninsula. In addition, this area is separated differently geographically. Samaná was at one point an island, but later it became connected to Hispaniola by shifts in the earth.  This region “still has relatively poor transportation connections to the outside world...despite being well populated today” writes Dennis Hidalgo in his book Searching for an American Dream. Years later, due to the lack of attention to this area and its geographic remoteness, it was less affected by new peoples and governmental changes than the rest of the country.

I had the chance to see many areas of the country while spending the past five days traveling across the Dominican Republic. One of the more unusual places we visited was Samaná. Leticia Wilmore is a congenial woman in her 80’s who allowed us to visit her home while she shared about her family history and the unique community of Black Americans in Samaná. Leticia’s great grandmother and about 6,000 other free Blacks traveled from the United States (specifically North Carolina and Pennsylvania) to the island of Hispaniola to resettle. In his article “The Samaná Americans”, John Weeks writes about Haitian President Jean-Pierre Boyer’s 1824 attempt to bring more people to the island (which was at that time controlled entirely by Haiti). After the Haitian slave revolt many people left the island because they erradicated slaver. Haiti gained total control and Boyer wanted to replenish the workforce.

Meeting Letecia in her home

Why would so many free Blacks move from the United States to the Caribbean (besides the weather and beautiful beaches)? They left to escape racism. While many of the people who immigrated eventually left Haiti, there remained a strong Black American community in Samaná. In other parts of the country the free Blacks either left, dispersed, or intermarried with other people. This was not the case in Samaná. Consequently, the low population density on the peninsula allowed the U.S. Black emigrants to become significant cultural group in the region.

This  group still practices Anglo-Dominican Methodism at a church that dates back to the 1830’s. Many still speak English, including Leticia. On my visit to this church I met a man named Abraham Kelly who also spoke to us in English. He is about 83 years old. The church service was in Spanish (but they were preformed in English up until Trujio forced them to switch to Spanish in the 1940’s). The fact that this church and its community has stayed cohesive while surrounded by predominantly Catholic and Spanish speaking people is incredible, keeping their religion and language alive.

Observing a service at the church

Abraham Kelly at the church

Did these people succeed in evading racism?  Comparatively speaking, yes. Blacks in the other parts of the Dominican Republic are looked at as having a lower social status than lighter skinned and more Spanish looking people. This is even more prominent closer to Haiti because of Dominicans dislike of Haitians (who are very dark skinned people). But all the way across the island, in Samaná, almost all of the people who live there are very dark skinned and skin color isn’t an issue. Poverty has reached all areas of the Dominican Republic, but in Samaná racism is not a problem like in the rest of the country. In this way, the free Black Americans achieved the success and longevity they were searching for.

Meeting Letecia 

Tainos Then and Now

Historically poor treatment of the Indians of Hispaniola and the negative attitudes towards them has translated into the present day suppression of their culture. Negative views of the Indians may have been caused in part by their believed extinction. A recent reexamination of the sources discussing the extinction shows inaccuracies. There are several reasons for these misconceptions. There was no established classification system set up for categorizing people when taking a census. Many people were lumped into an ‘other’ category. People of mixed races did not fit clearly into any one category. In addition, the Spaniards taking the census didn’t have the ability to count everyone. It was widely recorded that many Indians fled into the mountains. Did the Spanish believe that they had died, or did they just want to believe that? They had motivation to promote the extinction of the Indians. The Spanish viewed the Indians as inferior workers to the Africans. If the Spanish government knew (or at least were led to believe) the Indians had died out, the residents of Hispaniola would be granted permission to have more enslaved Africans sent to the island. More slaves meant higher crop production and yield, which meant more profit, and in turn more power. Thus, the enslavement had huge impacts on the culture of the Africans and Indians in Hispaniola.

The Indian culture is still present today, but many people do not celebrate it or even acknowledge it in their daily lives, which demonstrates the impact of historical misconceptions. Jorge Estevez is an example of a person working to eradicate this idea. Esteves, in his article “Ocama-Daca Taino (Hear Me, I am Taino)” he exclaims, “The denial of our culture and heritage has been ingrained in all Dominicans with just about every book or magazine article we read on the subject” and goes on to say that “institutions have perpetuated the myth that our indigenous ancestors perished...” (59). How can anyone deny this man of his heritage? If he is Taino, his ancestors could not have become extinct. Esteves even went as far as taking a Bio-Geographical nuclear test, showing he has “a significantly high quantity of indigenous genetic markers” (61). He remembers learning about his ancestors way of life, traditions, and stories. He should not have to fight to claim Taino heritage. Because of the longstanding negative opinion of the Tainos and because of their believed extinction, the culture has been suppressed. These mistakes could possibly be helped by verifying historical information and by contextualizing the sources. Evaluate what you read. Current interpretations of history can greatly alter the future.

Discovery

“In fourteen hundred ninety two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”

I’ve learned a lot about Christopher Columbus throughout school, but today we learned more about why and how Columbus and his contemporaries discovered and conquered the Americas. Most importantly, I wondered consequences of this connection. Spain and Portugal dominated Atlantic Ocean navigation during the 1400’s . The countries were rivals, competing for dominance over trade in the Atlantic. After the Spanish succeeded in expelling the moors out of the country and state affairs were going well, Queen Isabella agreed to finance Columbus’ journey to find a route to Asia. The kings and queens of Europe wanted to discover new land, riches, and trade routes. However, Columbus and his crew encountered much more than they expected.

What Columbus actually discovered was a new continent, instead of his anticipated new route to Asia. This opened up something that no one could have imagined. They encountered new peoples, cultures, animals, plants, and new ways of life. Columbus didn’t just bring new things back to the old world. The new world was also completely changed. Columbus and the other newcomers almost killed off the indigenous population through their attempts to conquer and from bringing in new diseases. The environment was also affected, from cutting down trees and bringing in new species. Once the connection between the Old and New World was established, everything evolved irreversibly.

The contact would have been made eventually, but at this particular time of discovery the Europeans had a ‘conquer’ type of attitude. They wanted to obtain riches (especially gold and silver), control more land and resources, gain slaves, and spread Christianity. From the European perspective, the newly discovered land was theirs for the taking. They did not stop to consider the ways in which they affected the people already inhabiting that land. This will happen later on again and again, causing destruction. Why do newcomers believe they can just ‘take over’ what others have already built? Columbus actually reported to Queen Isabella that the people he encountered in the Caribbean didn’t seem to have a religion. Supremacist attitudes- ‘these people are pagans and don’t know how to live’- is just harmful. Many Europeans that came to the Americas didn’t stop to think about how they affected the people they encountered. Learning how other people live can enrich your own life. It even saved many colonists lives later on. The first thanksgiving is an excellent example. Gaining knowledge from others is beneficial for both sides, rather than trying to take over and dominate.