{"id":12208,"date":"2018-05-14t12:14:40","date_gmt":"2018-05-14t12:14:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dpetrov.2create.studio\/planet\/wordpress\/diwigdi-valiente-climate-warrior\/"},"modified":"2023-03-07t19:39:38","modified_gmt":"2023-03-07t19:39:38","slug":"diwigdi-valiente-climate-warrior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/diwigdi-valiente-climate-warrior\/","title":{"rendered":"diwigdi valiente: climate warrior"},"content":{"rendered":"

by laura zornosa<\/strong><\/p>\n

on the edge of a sun-drenched caribbean island, a young man in a floral speedo strikes a yoga pose. he stands apart from the throng of beachgoers, gazing off pensively toward the horizon. after his meditation on the warm, white beach, he joins newfound friends for a drink \u2013 and finds a long-lost cousin \u2013 all within the hour.<\/p>\n

diwigdi valiente, 28, crosses between cultures as an environmental advocate and entrepreneur. very few links bind the san blas islands of guna yala \u2013 the autonomous province of the indigenous guna people in panama \u2013 and kalu yala, the self-described \u201csustainable town\u201d underway in the tres brazos valley. but valiente is one of them.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"
the entryway to kalu yala, a study abroad program that allows students to learn and live in a \u201csustainable town,\u201d greets visitors with lush vegetation. kalu yala recently added a hostel to its settlement in the pacora jungle, focused on sustainability. (grace wade\/medill)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

in spring 2018, valiente and business partner allan lim opened their second bodhi hostel, their venture in ecotourism, on the lush grounds of kalu yala. the duo studied hospitality at the same c\u00e9sar ritz college campuses in switzerland, missed each other by a year and several thousand miles, then connected through a friend back in panama.<\/p>\n

there, they found that valiente\u2019s free spirit blended perfectly with lim\u2019s strategic thinking \u2013 right brain met left brain to mold the bodhi business model. though bodhi keeps \u201cenlightenment through travel\u201d and sustainable living at its core, it is, after all, a business.<\/p>\n

\u201cif you cannot make a business that can make money, and with that money then you can make good for the people and for the environment, and with that good for the environment and the people you can make more money,\u201d valiente said. \u201cif you are not able to achieve that, then you are not sustainable.\u201d<\/p>\n

ringed by palm trees on the san blas islands, he slapped a wood table in the community dining hall of the caba\u00f1as niabub<\/em> for emphasis. his grandparents live on these islands, his father was raised there, and he spent much of his childhood surrounded by the guna \u201cenvironment of socialism\u201d of sharing.<\/p>\n

since he was young, the guna community immersed him in communal sharing, the lifestyle he believes we must have \u201cin order for this planet to survive.\u201d switzerland, however, crystallized environmental sustainability for him \u2013 a term unknown to most of the guna community. but living in equilibrium with nature pervades the lifestyle of the people.<\/p>\n

sustainability as a force of balance with nature is stitched into the fabric of guna life with the seamlessness of traditional molas<\/em>. this indigenous people has subsisted off the panamanian and colombian land since before the spanish invasion; hunting, fishing, farming. the modern interpretation of \u201csustainability,\u201d however, remains distant.<\/p>\n

as global sea levels creep higher, the comarca<\/em> faces one of the growing litany of threats to indigenous island people who will be forced to move because of climate change. a human forced change in climate patterns is neither widely discussed, accepted, nor understood on the islands where people are far removed from the lifestyles causing global warming and sea level rise. resistance to a seemingly inevitable move to the mainland is one among many pressing problems.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"
small pelican island is one of about 365 san blas islands, located east of the panama canal and off the north coast of the isthmus of panama. this island in particular is referred to as the \u201csinking island\u201d \u2013 its shore eroding visibly as water levels rise. (alex schwartz\/medill)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cwe are facing many issues, and i think it\u2019s going to take a group of people,\u201d valiente said. \u201cpeople of my age: people in their 30s, above 25 that already (are) working through the same\u201d love of culture but see a change, he said. \u201ci realize that maybe now that my dad and his generation (built) that bridge, it\u2019s time for my culture to bring back and try to get back as much as we can from our communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

valiente is a cultural liaison of sorts, in constant flux between \u201cthe city\u201d (panama city) where he spent much of his childhood, the islands where his grandparents live, and bodhi hostel locations at kalu yala and el valle de ant\u00f3n<\/em>. he embodies the bridge that spans from the traditional nose ring of his grandmother to the guna youth to the entrepreneurial outside world.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"
bodhi base camp sits on the outskirts of the kalu yala community, and features accommodation in the form of a nylon tent containing an inflatable mattress. bright orange hammocks replace walls and form a ring around a central yoga\/meditation space. (laura zornosa\/medill)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

that bridge bears the weight of an entire community \u2013 with an incredible support beam: his father, aresio valiente l\u00f3pez, a university of panama law professor and lawyer of the general guna congress. there is a glowing filament of pride between the two.<\/p>\n

valiente teared up introducing his father\u2019s work as a professor at the university of panama where he is an expert in agricultural law, environmental law and human rights; a writer, poet, dancer, bohemian. \u201cthe students have to overcome the teachers,\u201d l\u00f3pez responded. a parent is a child\u2019s first teacher, he said. one can only hope their children will achieve more than them \u2013 like, he says, his son did.<\/p>\n

\u201che\u2019s happy that at least i\u2019m doing something good, something good for the house of all of us,\u201d valiente said in translation. \u201cbecause it doesn\u2019t matter what language we talk, or what religion we have. we have all the same house, which is in our language napguana, which means mother earth.\u201d<\/p>\n

in the guna religion, the great mother (nan dummad<\/em>) exists alongside the great father (bab dummad<\/em>). close to the land, the sea and the environment in general, the people believe in nature. they place their faith in the world around them as well as a higher power, but this can prevent a belief in the hard science behind climate change.<\/p>\n

the elders and those in charge of the sovereign guna congress, valiente says, are \u201csuper wise, super wise \u2013 but when you put them next to me, we have seen two different worlds\u2026 we can have a different perspective and a different view, but at the same time, these people were trained 30 years, learning about our traditions.”<\/p>\n

while he fights to preserve traditional culture, valiente has also embraced a modern way of life. coming out of the closet opened doorways toward self-expression, liberation, and the art he creates today, his business partner said.<\/p>\n

\u201ci think a lot of people that are homosexual in our society, they\u2019ve been living in that space for so long,\u201d lim said, \u201cthat when you break out, it not only lets you express yourself, but it gives you the power \u2014 powers you to do anything. diwigdi has that.\u201d<\/p>\n

valiente does<\/em> have that. the self-described \u201cidea hatcher\u201d has that x-factor that allows him to flow from a professional post as a transfer pricing analyst in panama\u2019s ministry of economy and finances to founding burwigan, an art project teaching guna kids about climate change. he is a change maker, and his tool of choice is tourism.<\/p>\n

\u201cwhen you travel to another place, you not only travel for yourself, you travel to blow your mind,\u201d he said. \u201ctourism is a way to enlighten your life and to see how other people live and to learn from that and to teach what you have.\u201d<\/p>\n

the world is an ever-changing transfer of knowledge in his eyes, constantly connecting people with places with new things to learn. today, he is a \u201cclimate warrior,\u201d but not until switzerland did he gain social and environmental consciousness. not until he left home did he realize the need to protect his \u201cgem in the middle of the caribbean.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cwhen you move people from one place to another, you\u2019re not only moving people: you\u2019re moving experiences, you\u2019re moving culture,\u201d he said. \u201ctourism has a greater impact than we thought and than we realized, because it\u2019s not only us moving, it\u2019s everything that we go with, moving with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

amid the tattoo art swirling on his tanned skin \u2013 a papaya (his connection with femininity), a rue flower (his grandmother bathed him with it as a child), a heart containing the catalan flag (for his partner) \u2013 the bodhi hostel logo (the bodhi tree) makes an appearance on his left forearm. valiente pours himself into everything he does: bodhi was chosen by hostelworld.com as the best hostel in panama within a year of its opening.<\/p>\n

he has etched the bodhi tree onto himself as a symbol of enlightenment and a constant reminder of his job, both at the hostel and in the world at large. he lives and works to create environmental change, and to spread the message from traveler to traveler until the world hears about guna yala\u2019s fight for existence.<\/p>\n

the yoga pose he struck on the beach was the warrior pose. valiente may cross cultures and defy definition, but one thing we know to be true: he is a climate change warrior.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

medill’s laura zornosa reports from panama: sustainability means preserving the culture of san blas\u2019 sinking islands for this environmental advocate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9417,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4907,4916,4900],"tags":[144,3715,235,4001,3786,2092,3468],"storyfest_categories":[],"class_list":["post-12208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-economics","category-climate","category-green-living","tag-climate-change","tag-ecotourism","tag-environment","tag-guna-yala","tag-kalu-yala","tag-panama","tag-tourism"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\ndiwigdi valiente: climate warrior - planet forward<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/diwigdi-valiente-climate-warrior\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_us\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"diwigdi valiente: climate warrior - 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