Blog post # 4 Getting to know your island: Curacao
I chose to adopt the beautiful island of Curacao, as stated in "VCL"," Curacao began to industrialize in the 20th century with the discovery of oil reserves in Venezuela. The Royal Shell Oil Company chose Curacao to be its base of operations, and built refineries on the island in the 1910’s." they did extract wealth from Curacao through brutal means, which meant that when the Spanish people first went to the island they hosted about 15 Arawak Villages and it was home to roughly 2,000 inhabitants which now a days wouldn't be a lot of people but it was back then. Something that I found interesting while reading ''VCL" is that the most fascinating artifacts on Curacao is called the Mikve Israel- Emanuel Synagogue it is actually the oldest operating synagogue in the western hemisphere. That alone would make me wanna go this is one of the pictures from what it looks like on the outside it is completely breathtaking.
Another great thing to know about that island is that they gave rise to many well known authors such as Frank Martinus Arion his most notable work was being Dubbelspel meaning " Double Play" in English it was in fact published in 1973 that went on to receive the Van Der Hoogt price in the Netherlands, it was adapted into the film Double Play in 2017. Some of the political stuff going around is in the late 2010 the Dutch kingdom granted that this small southern Caribbean island more autonomy than they ever have before, the Dutch wiped clean over 80 percent of Curacao's debt and they did hand over most of the governments functions to local leaders for the first time since the Spaniards arrived in 1499. They also quickly enslaved the indigenous people and the island controlled it's destiny. Characteristics about this beautiful island is that it is the most colorful capital in the Caribbean hence the line or color that is greeting you when you are approaching the waterfront that takes you to Willemstad imagine soaking up the sun on a boat ride and coming up on this beautiful colored buildings that's so iconic it would make me never wanna leave. They mention that most of the islanders speak four languages which amazes me they speak Papiamentu, Dutch, Spanish, and English. I would love to learn more than one language that's pretty neat. Another great thing to point out is that kindness is a way of life you can tell when someone is a local there when they say that to you and I certainly would love to talk to some of them about their beautiful island. Lastly Curacao has no one official religion even though it is home to the oldest Jewish settlement in the west, which is intriguing to me.
Works Cited:
1. Curaço: small island, big problems - CSMonitor.com
3. factcity.com/facts-about-curacao/
Comments
Post a Comment