‘We leave the piece of our life behind’: indigenous group drowning islands

“If the island sinks, I will drown with it,” says Delphino Davis, his smile does not disappear for a second.

Silence is, except for its broom across the floor of the small museum, he documentes the life of his community in Panama, Guna.

“Earlier, you could hear the children shouting … music, neighboring arguments everywhere,” he says, “but now all the sounds have gone”.

His community is the first place in Panama due to climate change, living on the small low-fledged island of Guardi Sugdab.

The government has said that they face the “imminent risk” from the rising level of the sea, which scientists say that the island is likely to provide a uninhabited place by 2050.

In June last year, most of the inhabitants left this tight sheep of wood and tin houses for rows of clean -prefabricated houses on the mainland.

This transfer has been praised as a model for other groups worldwide, whose houses are in danger, but still, it has divided the community.

“My father, my brother, my sisters and my friends have gone,” says Delphino. “Sometimes the children whose families kept crying were wondering where their friends have gone, they say.

The house is Peddlock after home. About 1,000 people survived, while about 100 stopped – some because there was not enough space in the new settlement. Others, such as delphinos, are not completely convinced that climate change is a danger, or simply did not want to leave.

He says that he wants to stay close to the sea, where he can catch fish. “People who lose their tradition lose their souls. The essence of our culture is on the islands,” they say.

The Guna lives on Sugdab since the 19th century, and even on other islands in the archipelago, away from the northern coast of Panama. They ran away from the mainland to escape the Spanish winner and later, epidemic and conflict with other indigenous groups.

They are known for their clothes, called “Molas”, decorated with colored designs.

The folds currently live in more than 40 other islands. Steve Patton, a scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, says it is “almost a certainty”, which will sink the islands before the end of the century if not most, if not all, if not all, if not all, if not all.

Since climate change causes the Earth to heat up, sea level is increasing due to melting of glaciers and ice sheets and sea water expands.

Scientists have warned that hundreds of crores of people living in coastal areas around the world may be at risk by the end of the century.

On the guardi Sugdab, the waves wrapped the houses during the rainy season, wrapping under the swing, where the families sleep.

Says Mr. Patton, “It is not very possible that the island will be living by 2050” depending on the current and estimated rates of sea level. “

However, the first discussion about rehabilitation began, more than a decade ago, due to population growth, not climate change.

The island is just 400 meters long and 150 meters wide. Some residents see the crowd as a more pressure problem. But others, such as Magdelena Martinez, are afraid of the Rising Sea:

“Every year, we saw that the tides were more,” she says. “We could not cook on our stove and it was always filled … so we said ‘We have to get out of here.”

Magdelena was one of those who climbed motor boats and wooden canoe in the last June, bound to new houses.

“I just brought my clothes and some kitchen utensils,” she says. “You think you are leaving pieces of your life on the island.”

The new community, Isberrya, is – weather allowed – just 15 minutes by boat, then five minutes drive, guardi sugdb. But it looks like another world.

Lines of similar white and yellow houses on Termacddddddddd on on the roads.

Magdelena’s eyes become lightened as she shows the “Little House”, where she lives with her 14 -year -old granddaughter Bianka and her dog.

Each house has a small area of ​​land behind it – a luxury is not available on the island. “I want to apply yukka, tomato, bananas, mangoes and pineapples,” she excite.

She says, “You are very sad to leave a place for so long. You remember your friends, where you lived, she says on the streets, being so close to the sea,” she says.

Isabarala was built with the Panaman government with $ 15M (£ 12M) and had an additional amount from the Inter-American Development Bank.

In its new meeting house, which is a roof with branches and leaves in the traditional style, Tito Lopez, Sayla of the community – or the leader.

“My identity and my culture is not going to change, it has just turned into homes,” they say.

He is lying in a swing, and states that by the time the swing holds his place in the gun culture, “Guna people’s heart will be alive”.

When a fold dies, they lie for a day in their swing for family and friends. This is then buried next to them.

In state -of -the -art new school, students aged 12 and 13 are doing fold music and dancing. Boys play PAN pipe in a bright shirt, while the girls wore molas shake maracus.

The tight school on the island is now closed, and students whose families stayed there, travel to new buildings with their computer, sports areas and libraries each day.

Magdelena says the conditions in thisbara are better than the island, where she says that she had only four hours of electricity a day and had to bring drinking water from a boat from a river on the mainland.

In Isabarala, the power supply is stable, but the water – pump from nearby wells – is switching for a few hours a day only. The system is broken several times at a time.

In addition, there is no healthcare yet. Another resident, Yanisella Vallarino, says that one evening his younger daughter was unwell and had to arrange for transport on the island back till late night to see the doctor.

The Panamanian officials told the BBC that the construction of a hospital in Isbarla had stopped at the lack of funding a decade ago. But he said that they expect to revive the plan this year, and were assessing how to make space for the remaining residents to move from the island.

Yanisella is happy that she is now able to attend the evening classes in the new school, but she still returns to the island often.

“I don’t get used to it yet. And I miss my home,” she says.

Erica Bover, a researcher at climate displacement at Human Rights Watch, says, the way the residents of Gardi Sugdab have faced their position, communities around the world will be “motivated”.

She says, “We need to understand from these early matters what success looks.”

As it comes in the afternoon, school activities give way to football, basketball and volleyball shouts and scuffle.

“I like this place for the island because we have more space to play,” says eight -year -old Jers’s, before diving for a football.

Magdelena sits with her granddaughter, teaching her to Molas.

“It’s hard for her, but I know she is going to learn. Can’t lose our unique ways,” Magdelena says.

Asked what she misses about the island, she replies: “I wish we all were here.”