Talamanca

At uni I take the course "Geography of Cultures". It's a very interesting course because we talk a lot about different groups of indígenas (indigenous/Ureinwohner) in Costa Rica. Sadly there are not many left and the tribes that still live here have lost a lot of their culture.

This weekend we made an excursion to a little village in the mountains of Talamanca to live with some of the "Bribrí" families there.

Just to get to the village already was an adventure! First we had to store our bags on the roof of the bus of the uni... of course everything in plastic bags because it's still rainy season.

About 4 hours later we reached the "Reserva Indígena de Talamanca". From here on we continued our journey on boats.



The majority of the bribrí families live from the agriculture of bananas, cocoa and plantain (=Kochbanane).

Another hour later we took the next bus on the other side of the river. Of course the bus broke... but we had we had enough strong men in the group ;-)

Finally we reached the village and the family where we stayed welcomed us very warmly. They live very rustically in wooden houses with open walls and without running water or electricity. Their life is still very connected to the nature and animals that surround them.

(Just joking... we had a toilet inside a little house)

This is a "casa cosmica", something like the spiritual center for the community.

Cocoa plant
(by the way, chocolate is here more expensive than in Germany! They produce the cocoa here, but the chocolate is fabricated in Europa and then re-imported to Costa Rica.)

Starfruit

In groups of three we investigated different topics and interviewed the bribrí which was very interesting. But the climate here is soooo humid that the highlight everyday was a swim in the river.