By María Angélica Troncoso |
Arraial d’Ajuda (Brazil) (EFE) Indians are a thing of the past.
This native community is one of the few in the country that openly shares its way of life and its customs with non-indigenous visitors, an activity with which it seeks to tell its version of the facts, but also to survive.
“We want white people to know our culture and transmit our true history to others,” Antonia Rosalves da Silva, vice-chief of Aldeia Velha, a reserve located in Arraial d’Ajuda, one of the most touristy regions of the country, told EFE. Brazil, on the southern coast of the state of Bahia.
“Today, in our country, indigenous people are spoken of as if they did not exist, as if they were something that is only in the school books and that is not true,” he added.
opening ties
Warriors and with a nomadic tradition, the Pataxós were one of the first ethnic groups encountered by the Portuguese in the 16th century, when they arrived on the shores of what is now southern Bahia, thirsty for gold and precious metals.
Although many ethnic groups reject direct contact with the whites, since 2000 the Pataxós have kept the link open with tourists who want to learn about their customs.
Today tourism is their main livelihood base, but it was not easy to reach that decision.
The idea, which was born by three Pataxó indigenous people at the end of the 1990s, when the food they grew barely managed to stave off hunger, was not well received by the oldest members of the ethnic group.
“They were very afraid that by showing themselves to other people they would be massacred again as happened in 1951,” María Luisa da Silva Cruz, director of Pataxó Turismo, the first agency to organize visits to indigenous communities in the region, explained to EFE.
That massacre opened the way for them to be dispossessed of their lands by landowners who wanted them for extensive agriculture, a chapter that culminated a history of harassment started by the Portuguese conquerors, who first used the pataxós in their wars and then they sought to “civilize” them.
Now, after overcoming resistance to contact with ‘non-Indians’, they have opened up to tourism.
According to Da Silva, some 2,000 people a year seek with the agency to live some kind of experience with the pataxós. Most are Brazilian, although some foreigners are also seen in the summer, especially Argentines.
Subsistence base of the ethnic group
The pataxós obtain a percentage of the cost that the agencies charge for the visits and they also collect the money directly when a tourist goes to the reservation by their own means.
In addition to tourism, the nearly 30,000 Pataxós, who currently live in this region in 49 villages distributed in six reserves, the indigenous have other activities that help with their subsistence.
In Aldeia Velha, the 480 families that live in this reserve of more than 2,000 hectares share the duties of the community.
While some dedicate themselves to handicrafts, others grow cassava, pineapple and coconut and still others fish. Those who have the best “seasoning” are in charge of the kitchen.
There are also those responsible for teaching, who teach in the community school -and in patxôhã, their own language- the knowledge of the ‘non-Indian’, without neglecting the history of their people, their customs, beliefs and traditions, work for which they receive salary from the municipality.
All kinds of experiences
The costs to learn something about the life of the Pataxós with the agencies oscillate between about 14 dollars, for a three-hour visit, and about 537 dollars if a five-day experience is carried out through different villages and spending one or two nights in some of them.
The idea is that the visitor is immersed with the natives in the midst of nature in which they live and share one or more of their traditions.
In the walks that take place along the trails of their reserves, the Pataxós explain the uses of the plants in their daily lives, their medicinal benefits and how some were used as traps for animals when they used to hunt, before their discovery.
Visitors can also share purification rituals and traditional festivals such as Awê Heruê, in which, through songs and dances, the pataxós drive away evil to keep nature and their culture alive.