We were headed in the direction of Portobelo, a town up the coast, closer to Isla Grande and farther from Nombe de Dios. There was a canal there, known as the Grand Canal; it had been carved out of a mangrove swamps, just wide enough so that boats could make it through. As we headed in the direction of the Grand Canal, we passed by sailboats with names from the U.S.; they all had a little motor boat on the back of them; the motorboats had small Evenrudes, no Mercurys or Johnsons. 

The weather also changed. From bright sunlight it turned to dark overcast and there was a cold rain falling as we were arriving to the Grand Canal. To enter the Canal you go through a small lagoon and as you push deeper into the lagoon you see in the distance the entrance of the Canal: as we arrived the boat right behind us hit the gas and passed by quickly in order to enter the Canal before us. When you enter the Canal the first thing that hits you are the size of the roots in the mangrove, but even better is the smell of sulfur in the air. Salty sulfur runs up your nose: smell and memory, pushed together.

We passed through, my back hurt from the hard wooden benches on the boat. We passed the boats we had seen on the way to the Grand Canal. Next stop was Isla Grande and we took showers and picked up our stuff and headed off the island and back to Panama City.

Portobelo:

As you leave Isla Grande and head towards Panama City you pass through the town of Portobelo. The town was an intricate part of colonial Panama; there were other important towns less known to people, such as: Nombre de Dios, Acla, Careta, and Santa Maria Antiqua. These are towns that were very important in the history of Panama. But of all those colonial towns on the Caribbean, none has lasted or is more important than Portobelo. On October 21st the black Christ celebration occurs here. The celebration that absolves all crooks of their thieving for the year. The festival goes back to the colonial period in Panama. The story as told to me goes like this, and they’re other versions: There are other black Christs in the world: France and the Philippines have their black Christs. Obviously, at a very early period after Christianity took root, people realized that Christ was probably Arab and looked nothing like what you normally see today. The black Christ of Protobelo was being transported through, or had been made in, Portobelo: maybe the ship had come from the Philippines or Africa or who knows from where. Protobelo was important as a center of piracy. If Australia is the land of the convict, then Panama is the land of the pirate. Anyway, Portobelo had been a center of piracy since Drake died in the harbor of Portobelo – the island in front of the town is named after him. The black Christ came to or from Portobelo and was put on a ship: the ship crashed out at sea and the black Christ washed up on shore. It was taken to sea and thrown in the ocean; it again appeared, and this time the town took it in and decided that it must want to stay in Portobelo. And the 21st of October was declared the day of the black Christ. And this holiday for the pirates meant two-weeks in which they were absolved from prosecution and were allowed free passage in Portobelo. In short, pirates could come, be forgiven for their sins and enjoy themselves without having to run. A Panamá Special. Today people walk from all over to celebrate the black Christ, they walk days to be forgiven for their sins. Their feet swell up and they scream and cry and people go wild from exhaustion. When they reach the black Christ, they ask for forgiveness.

Max Weber seems to me to have been the first person in Western thought to recognize what he called the rationalization of religion – meaning religion formed especially to the organization of the modern world in which it needed to reach. God out of the meadow and out of the trees and out of the car engine and out of the radio as in Panama, and rationalized into a church, a church separated from the secular world, and from the church religion could be rationalized out of the world. Good or bad news depending on you beliefs. Why do I mention this: well the black Christ festival is like a return to the expressiveness of a bygone time when people needed to show the emotions they had about their sins and their religion - and they needed to show their emotions publicly. Of course this sentiment still exists today, but today, you show your emotions on the living room floor in front of the television, or in an air conditioned church, not by walking 50 miles in the blazing sun to a black Christ, in a forgotten colonial town. At the black Christ festival people tell their sins and repent. I could have walked down the street in Portobelo on October 21st with $100 notes sticking out from my pant's pockets and no one would have touched them, and on another day these people would rob me blind with a gun and maybe end my life. 

Information:

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