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Last hike and this time we are even more wild. Of course we joke but surely this is a little different excursion: they chose a motor with buggy to discover something more hidden than the Dominican republic.
We find a wonderful vantage point that allows us to clearly see the Isla Catalina and its beautiful palm trees.
Of course a motor vehicle does not go unnoticed so we explain to some policemen what it is. Lucky that with us there is a guide that helps us understand. The Dominican guide is very nice and all the way, as soon as he can, he takes some photos.
We cross with the buggy of the magnificent red quarries are the quarries of Cumayasa
The scenery is surreal, hidden by Caribbean vegetation.
With the buggy we stop at the entrance of a wonderful cave, cumayasa cave from here we continue on foot. At the entrance of the quarry we find two small perched bats, we do not yet know in reality that inside the bats are the real masters of the cave.
This cave was entirely excavated by the waters of the sea, which literally shaped the stone making it almost sculpture.
Inside, we notice that there are cardboard on the ground and a few bottles, so our guide explains that that cave is the place of spiritual retreat of some evangelicals who spend about 40 nights there, praying and reading sacred texts, illuminated only by natural light that penetrates from a natural skylight.
Why is cueva considered a “sacred” place? If you look closely inside you can observe a suggestive spectacle that only the human eye, guided by psychological involvement, can grasp; in the largest act of the cave, some stalactites seem to reproduce the nativity. The excavated stone reproduces the details of faces and dresses and no reflex is able to faithfully grasp so many peculiarities.
We resume buggies and the rush through the dust continues. The next stop is at a school, in the middle of some slums. here too we find a shop of candies, rum and other products. we buy candies and biscuits to give to children who, after hearing the buggies, are waiting for us.
When we enter the teacher is sitting at the chair and 4-5 pupils face the blackboard, this thing tastes so much like punishment alas. In fact it is true, distracted by the engines, some children were no longer in the skin and had looked out the windows, no longer caring about the master.
The class cannot be called exactly conventional, in a classroom there are children of all ages in uniform and not. They line up to have cookies, someone queues two or three times to try to recover a few more packets of cookies.
Yet over time I have thought about it: is it right to photograph these children? They can’t wait to get some pictures taken with the iPhone and then see each other again but in our rich society, can we ever afford to photograph children we don’t know? Would we give them candy? Would we ever enter their schools?
A little because of us and a little bit because of poverty and culture, we do it, regardless of the principles that we so much demand in our home as privacy, we feel in a museum and photograph everything and everyone as if everything, including people, were attractive put there for fun.
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