Atlantis Online
March 28, 2024, 08:38:37 pm
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
News: Hunt for Lost City of Atlantis
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3227295.stm
 
  Home Help Arcade Gallery Links Staff List Calendar Login Register  

Taino Indians Still Thrive in Cuba

Pages: [1] 2 3 4 5   Go Down
  Print  
Author Topic: Taino Indians Still Thrive in Cuba  (Read 24247 times)
0 Members and 154 Guests are viewing this topic.
Bianca
Superhero Member
******
Posts: 41646



« on: February 26, 2008, 07:26:58 pm »









All the agriculturalists confirmed, with great certainty, the practice of planting root crops
by the waning moon (luna menquante). The assertion is that both yucca and boniato (a
native sweet potato) will "rot early" (se pica temprano) if not planted by the waning moon.

In cutting wood, too, local guajiros argue that it will rot faster if cut in the full or ascending
moons. One old man near the banks of the Rio Toa spoke of fishing by the moon for a fish
called the teti, which is scarce at other times.

At Los Arados, I also visited an elementary school; the principal asked the Indian children
to gather, and about 25 students quickly surrounded us. Some were more reticent than
others, but all affirmed their Indian background. Many of their names corresponded to the
family names identified with Indian-ness.

My questions concentrated on a person's basis or rationale for claiming an Indian identity.
All pointed to family history: "We are an Indian family. It has been always that way." "We
do Indian things, like my mother, she drinks from a jicara, nothing else, she won't use a
glass or a cup." "We know the wilderness [manigua]."

Going toward the Punta Maisi lighthouse, I asked Hartmann about the reluctance of some
Cuban academics to accept the Indian identity in this area of Cuba. He responded, "Well,
even Rivero, he refuses to say the people here are Indians - he defines them as

                                               'descendants'

of Indians. It is common to say that there are no Indians left in Cuba."

"But I am here," Pedro Hernandez said from the back seat. "Indians or descendants, it's the
same thing. They, the old Tainos, were here. Now, we, my generation, we are here. We
don't live exactly like they did, but we are still here."
Report Spam   Logged

Your mind understands what you have been taught; your heart what is true.


Pages: [1] 2 3 4 5   Go Up
  Print  
 
Jump to:  

Powered by EzPortal
Bookmark this site! | Upgrade This Forum
SMF For Free - Create your own Forum
Powered by SMF | SMF © 2016, Simple Machines
Privacy Policy