‘Bupkun’: Outsiders Among the Wounaan

Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand
W. B. Yeats, “The Stolen Child”


Although we are still well within the boundaries of the province of Panama, it feels as if we are in Darien, one of the few remaining tropical jungles on the planet. The moment we enter the mouth of the Rio Hondo—earlier this year, in April, during a school field trip—massive walls of mangroves reach out from the river beds, as if in greeting. The scenery is stunning—every possible shade of green has taken hold of the world. The landscape our eyes devour is worthy of being on the cover of National Geographic.

Our trip has two purposes: one, to deliver school supplies for the children of the village of Rio Hondo and, two, for seventeen students and three teachers from Balboa Academy to learn more about the Wounaan. Our members represent Ecuador, the British Virgin Islands, Jamaica, the United States and Panama (including a few descendants of Zonians).

On the afternoon of our first day in Rio Hondo we are welcomed into the nicest home of this impoverished village: a two-story hexagonal wood building, the only two-story edifice in the area. A community leader, Narcilo, lives there with his family. He escorts us upstairs. In the exact center of the room hangs a long canoe, carved out of a tree trunk. When asked why a wood boat dangles from his ceiling, Narcilo replies: “That’s not a canoe. It’s a Cuchuil.” (A word that sounds similar to ‘cook-wheel’.)

While the students are engaged in the ritual of Kipar—the culture of body painting, which Narcilo's wife performs on the students—the elder explains the legend of the Cuihuil to me.

“For many centuries the Wounaan competed against the Bupkún—the outsiders. In the end, as everyone knows, the Bupkún won. But to reward our loyalty, God gave the Wounaan a great gift: the Cuchuil. This gift has given us considerable control over the fate of the world.

“This room, although it is in my house, is a ceremonial center. Young men can come anytime between 8 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon to play the Cuchuil, which we bang like a drum. Playing it pleases God and this helps bring peace to the world. When conflicts between humans reach a critical level, we play the Cuchuil more frequently. It has a beautiful deep wood tone that’s pleasant and soothing.”

Narcilo pauses for a moment, looks at me, shrugs, and then says: “I’d play it for you now, but if the Cuchuil is played after 2 in the afternoon it pleases the devil, not God.”

* * * *

The following morning—on our first full day there—after breakfast, the top item on our agenda is a long hike through the rainforest. As we travel through the Wounaan trails that allow the residents of Rio Hondo to harvest the palms used for weaving baskets and to get to the small plantations of corn and plantains they’ve carved out of the jungle, it’s easy to imagine how difficult it must have been for Vasco Núñez de Balboa and the Spaniards accompanying him to cross the isthmus through terrain far more entangled than this to become the first Europeans to set eyes on the Pacific.

A dozen or so Wounaan children follow our group. Along the way the boys imitate the sounds of howler-monkeys and birds, and these imitations are uncannily authentic. But the indigenous youths are separate from us, although they had played games the previous evening for several hours with our students. A social barrier still exists—a five-century buffer of mistrust that has evolved into a cultural shyness that keeps these children wary of outsiders and preferring to communicate in the primal language of jungle inhabitants.

Even so, when we arrive at a swimming hole the thin walls of our segregation begin to crumble. Sweaty and hot from the hike, we, the city dwellers, jump into the brown stagnant water—a river will overcome it at high tide—to cool off. Since the shower of our rustic quarters seldom has water, the women in our group take advantage of the opportunity to shampoo their hair. The Wounaan children observe them in silence, seated on the rocks alongside the dry riverbank. But the temptation to join us proves too strong to resist and before long they jump in the water, playing, shampooing their hair, laughing and splashing around with the rest of us.

For the time being the gap between our cultures, languages, and origins ceases to exist. Water, that which cleanses, nourishes, and sustains life, has united us, making all of us embrace our common humanity. And although in a couple of days the students and teachers will return to the entirely different ways of city life, for the moment water equalizes us, and for the remainder of our time in Rio Hondo we will be at ease with our new identity as Bupkúns, outsiders among the Wounaan.