Dios Es Crante

Sadly, there was a death on the island this week. It is not the first time, but it was the first time we were invited to participated in the ceremony. From where we were standing, they tore down the side of the wall of the stick hut and just let everyone walk in. Outside were waiting benches so that others could rotate in. Everyone gathers round the person who has passed and then started to mourn and wail. When I say that, I mean they actual go on wailing throughout the day. It is custom to hear a traditional saila prayer chant and the following day they bury them in the monte (mountain). After those two days pass, they follow up with a big party celebrating their death and the life they lived. In San Blas when they have a party here it just means that there is a lot of food. With the wall of this hut still tore down they use the inside to make some arroz a liquada for the entire community. It is common to do this for the next year and every additional month of death until they reach the two year mark depending on the person.

It was a nice surprise lunch in which we did not have to pay for. However sometimes here they just rinse out the flavor of the food with water which I forget about every once in a while. Most of the time I drink this cup of water and then I notice that everyone else just spits it out on the floor and then I catch on and just follow along. But this time I drank a little bit and a little bit and that is when I realized that they were all just backwashing into the same glass. I basically drank a full glass of backwash water. Yuuup! But other than that, it was a good meal. I have officially decided that I may have to adopt this tradition. At my funeral, it will all be catered by Wendy’s and backwashed Frosties.

I have loved how my companion has been trying to teach our adopted grandpa how to solve a Rubix cube. Every time he is able to match up a few more squares or sides he just gets so excited.

Oh, and because the Kuna alphabet has like 14 or 16 letters, they tend to spell things just a little off which I always find amusing. One that I heard this week is and please don't ever forget this guys "Dios es Crante" (or Dios es Grande) which means God is Good!

Elder Dudley and I