You may ask yourself where on Earth is French Guiana? It's a good start to say it's actually on Earth... When a country needs an introduction, I like it twice. This French overseas department evolved from a former slave populated colony dedicated to sugarcane and rice to a strategic exclave of the francophonic world. In the northern coast of South Americ, the tiny territory borders Brazil and Suriname. From this last country Laura and I took the ferry (above) that landed us in Saint Laurent du Maroni...
As in neighbouring Suriname and Guyana, here too Hindus make up a large percentage of population, and their temples everywhere. However, you don`t see the holy roaming cows observed in Guyana munching on the roadside.
Another minority is the Hmong people, original from Laos, Thialand and Southern China. The ones living in French Guiana (more exactly in the tiny agricultural village of Kakao) came after the communist Pathet Lao took over Laotian government in 1975. As usual we stumble upon cultures in a funny way. On arrival to the village we were invited to a wedding, which was absolutely an unplanned event. Before starting my nomadic life, I worked in the UK for a year in a hotel with wedding venue and learned that English people are very meticolous before getting married. Here in Guiana things were more prompt and unformal.
Upon entrance we were distinguished with paper flowers and warm words. There was even a girld that knew som Spanish. Not that the bride and groom parents were completely happy about two unexpected and hungry visitors, but everyone else was, so we felt absolutely comfortable. We had got used to the strange food and martial silence. In this part of France, costumes are everything but French....
Some signs make you believe you are in France. And they almost cast the spell until....
...next signs appears. Haitian inmigration means many African rooted practices suchs as voodoo are whell heeled in French Guiana. The European Union facade is set in evidence by this sort of details... whch wakes you up to the fact that you are far away from Brusels and need to watch out for caymans in creeks and rivers...
Houdet family, from Saint Laurent du Maroni, were our hosts. We run into them in the supermarket. They had seen the car in the parking place, and they came to almost running and loosing their breath:
- Excuse me! Are you the travellers?
It was pretty obvious that was us. But wait. What car I am talking about? I hadn't told you a secret...
While still on Suriname we hitch a lift in the Subaru of an American couple driving overland from Colorado to Peru. Thay had taken a wee detour from their line and were exploring the guyanas. They were fleeing Babylon and aiming to reach Iquitos, where they were supposed to be trained by a chamn in the ayahusca and other Amazonic sacred medicines. They had a genuine spirit of sharing this knowledge with the rest of the planet afterwards, travelling and teaching what they were to learn. They acknowledge that a pending lesson for them was leaving the Coke and Snack culture in general, food addiction as they called it. Their names were BeijaFlor (self given name as he felt reborn with this trip) and
Colonial houses in Saint Laurent du Maroni.
Rolling on a rainy day from Saint Laurent to Cayenne.
Overview of Cayenne, the capital of French Guiana.
Place du Palmistes.... something like the "palm tree park"... and no need to ask why it gets such name.
Cayenne market is a good sample of the mix of races of the Guiana. Black people descendant from slaves having lunch at a vietnamite foodstall.
Laotian "feh", my favourite soup in Asia, now available in South America, well, if you reach French Guiana....
One for the records: I got a lift with the French "Gendarmerie".... I wonder if they would stop in mainland France.
Laura's dream was to see a big sea turtle. In the beaches of Cayenne, Laura and I spotted this leatherback turtle laying her eggs. Leatherback turtles lay their eggs between March and July. Typicaly, turtles arrive at high tide and go back to the sea in the morning, but this one had a late wake up....
Another luxury ride, from Kakao to Cayenne. Hitch-hiking in French Guiana is so easy, that don't even bother to find out bus schedules. Public transport is actually expensive or non existant, as it's a rich country and most people have cars.
River people, on the Surinamese border. Boats serve for transportation, smuggling and run away plataform for gangs robbering in French Guiana and hiding away in Suriname. They also bring Surinamese women that have their children at French hospitals so they can later claim money from the state, even if they don`t leave in Guiana.
Hmong Sunday market at Kakao. Hmong people are about the only ones in French Guiana that practice agriculture. Almost everything in teh department comes from France. Which means that oranges are shipped from Brazil to France and back to French Guiana, becasue metropole France holds the monopoly of trade. It's a perverse system marked to keep the department dependent on the mainland. Since they don't produce anything, they have to trade with France. It's funny thoug, that a country that hardly accomplishes a level of food sovereignity launches rockets into space....
The fruits...
And the rockets. Laura attempted hitch-hiking to other galaxies at Kourou Sapce Centre. IN the back, Ariane rocket.
We had a great time in French Guiana, so we don`t see the time go get back!!
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